Arthur Clarke - Richter 10

Gabler had cocked his head like a dog and was, apparently, thinking, or, Crane mused, trying to. “I’ll just bet you Mr. Li understands,” Crane added, the Chinese man smiling in return.

“We have reached a decision, Dr. Crane,” he said.

Crane took a deep breath to calm himself, to not let the facade down. “Yes,” he said.

“I would ask everyone to leave the room.”

Crane nodded and looked at Newcombe, the man’s expression revealing both irritability—he’d get over it—and excitement.

Within thirty seconds, Li and Crane were alone across the table.

“You are an interesting man, Dr. Crane.”

“As are you, sir.”

“You know, of course, that we could never give you carte blanche with the government checkbook.”

“But, I—”

Li raised his hand for silence. “I’ve played with you this far. Now it’s my turn. If, and I emphasize the word if, we’re able to work together, you will need someone to oversee the project. I’m not adverse to someone we’re both comfortable with, say, Sumi Chan, for instance.”

“Sumi?”

“We’re not difficult men to deal with.” His drink sat before him. “We like Americans. You’re all so clever with your hands. You people make the most amazing gadgets. Quite extraordinary.”

“You said if we work together?”

“Well, yes. Certainly.” The man picked up the glass and drank, then poured the rest of Mui’s drink in his and finished that also. “Everyone is very excited about your idea, but you are asking private industry and the government to turn a great deal of responsibility over to you, all on the strength of one demonstration.”

“What are you getting at?”

“Simple, Dr. Crane.” Li smiled, his eyes cunning. “You may have everything you asked for. But we must know, for sure, that you are what you say you are.”

“And how do I do that?”

“Once again—simple. Predict another major quake, something big, high profile. Do it before the election. This is May. It gives you six months. If, indeed, thirty major quakes occur a year, that should be plenty of time.”

“Is that all?”

“No,” Li replied. “Give us something close to home. Something the voters will really understand. And then, Dr. Crane, the world is yours.”

“Of course we’re under surveillance,” Brother Ishmael told Crane.

Newcombe sat between them, listening intently. They were in the yacht’s twenty-foot dining room, paneled and brass-trimmed. Ishmael had stayed on after everyone, including his own bodyguards, had left. Newcombe wondered why.

“Everyone’s under some sort of surveillance all the time. It’s the nature and the chief employment of your white man’s world. People watch, and other people watch them. Machines watch machines. Why?”

“We’re insufferably curious, I suppose,” Crane replied amiably. “Plus, what gets invented gets perfected, then used. It’s human nature. And not everybody gets watched. Those who can afford it hire people who can … outwit the technology.”

Ishmael smiled and pointed a long finger. “Then that person watches you. And don’t forget the person who watches him.”

“You don’t have survie units in the War Zone?” Newcombe asked Ishmael, who treated Newcombe with warmth and respect.

“Yes, we do,” he said. “We use them on the whites, just as the whites attempt to use them on us. Like Dr. Crane, we spend a lot of time outwitting the technology. My people tell me that this conversation is being recorded right now by a device called Listening Post #528, whose low space orbit carried it within our range until…”—he looked at his watch—“two forty-five P.M.”

Lanie sat directly across from Newcombe, her eyes bright. “If we’re being listened to, why are you talking?”

“It’s part of our political agenda. We’re prepared to present to the white population the reasons why we cannot share the same society. You, and the world, are listening to my reasoning. If I have anything private to say, I will say it privately.”

“You are using me shamelessly,” Crane said. He slugged heavily on a glass full of straight bourbon. “Look, Brother Ishmael. I have a great deal of respect for you. I don’t even mind being used by you and your cause right now, but dammit, man, give something in return, a little support. I just want what’s best for everyone.”

“No,” Ishmael said. “You don’t want to help people; you want to slay the beast. I can see it in your eyes when you talk about earthquakes. You hate the earthquakes. God wrought their majesty, but you have the gall to hate His creation. I feel sorry for you and your windmills, and I pray to Allah you never get the power to vent your hatred.”

“You’re a hard kind of fellow,” Crane said. “Sure, I hate the beast. I hate it the way the Cretans hated the Minotaur. Is it wrong to hate a monster? Wasn’t it Malcolm X who said, ‘When our people are being bitten by dogs, they are within their rights to kill those dogs’? I hate it because of the lives and dreams it destroys and I will find a way to blunt its sword with or without your help. There, I’m talking to the world, too.” He snorted. “Do you really think you’ll have your Islamic State?”

Ishmael nodded slowly. “We will have an Islamic nation,” he replied. “In a fractured world, we are the dominant force.”

“It didn’t work that way in the Middle East,” Lanie said.

“The Jewish entity chose to destroy itself rather than face the reality of Islam,” Ishmael said. “The Masada Cloud is the reminder of Allah’s power over the Infidel. There are no more Jews in Palestine.”

“There’s nobody in Palestine,” Crane snapped. “And there won’t be. How can you presume to know who should live and who should die?” He stood. “I want everyone to live.”

“Jungles don’t work that way,” Ishmael returned, “and neither do earthquakes. You can’t bring your parents back, doctor.”

“Please, don’t try to analyze me.” Crane picked up his drink, finished it with a scowl. “I’m going up to observation. Is it safe for you to be on board, Brother Ishmael?”

“I don’t know, is it?”

“I’m not powerful enough to protect you. Anyone want to join me?”

“Sure,” Lanie said, picking up her coffee and adding another spoonful of dorph to it.

As Newcombe started to rise, Ishmael put a hand out. “Stay with me. Brother Daniel. I want to speak with you.”

Newcombe nodded. “Watch the sun up there,” he said to Lanie. “I’ll join you shortly.”

Newcombe watched Lanie and Crane walk to the dining room hatchway where they donned coats, gloves, goggles, and hats, Crane pulling a tube of sunblock from his pocket to smear on their exposed faces. He opened the hatch, bright sunlight pouring in. Lanie waved at him and left.

Newcombe and Lanie spent a good deal of time with each other, and he was cautiously letting himself dream again of home and family, something—anything—besides Crane’s relentless pursuit of his monsters. He’d even talked Lanie into moving in with him when they got back to the Foundation.

“Why are you with the white woman, Brother?”

“I love her.”

“She is your oppressor. Not just a white woman, but a Jewess.”

Newcombe’s jaw muscles tightened. “She’s a Cosmie.”

“Judaism is a race, not a religion.”

“I do not accept the philosophies of the Nation of Islam. I’m an Africk in America and I’m doing very well, thank you. I’m not oppressed; I’m the master of my own fate. Well educated, intelligent, I have risen to the top of my field—and I have chosen the woman I wish to spend my life with.”