Charles Sheffield - Aftermath

“So you also remember the Vice President of the time.”

“Indeed I do. It was Spiro Agnew. As I recall, we had some considerable contempt for the man and never referred to him by his name. We used an anagram.”

“An anagram of Spiro Agnew?” It was Saul’s turn to be surprised.

“I’m afraid so.” Munce shrugged. “The follies of irreverent youth. However, I suspect that I digress.”

“Not so far as I’m concerned, you don’t. My God, Lucas, I hope that someday soon you write your memoirs. What did you call him?”

“Mr. President, I invoke the Fifth Amendment. I leave the working out of the anagram to your own ingenuity, and admit only that the result is vulgar and involves adding a body part. But I do not see the relevance of either Richard Nixon or Spiro Agnew to today’s situation.”

“Richard Nixon was protected from impeachment, so long as Spiro Agnew was Vice President and would assume the presidency in Nixon’s place. Half of Washington knew that Agnew was a crook, and a boneheaded one at that. They had to get rid of Agnew before they could really go after Nixon.”

“Which they did.” Munce nodded. “I played some small role in that myself. Agnew resigned rather than face legal action for the bribes that he had taken.”

“And after that Congress could go after Nixon. Now you see the similarity.”

“I do. Sarah Mander and her cronies may dislike you, but they positively hate the policies and priorities of Brewster Callaghan. As long as he is Vice President, you are safe.”

“Which is why I think I need to add to his security detail. Keep stringing your grand-niece along, would you?”

“I will indeed. Sometimes one feels it necessary to apologize for blood relations.” Munce rose to his feet and inclined his head in a formal bow. Even in that position he looked down at Saul. “Thank you for your time, Mr. President.”

“Thank you for vital information.” Saul glanced back at his desk. Already the intercom was buzzing. “Excuse me.”

He touched the switch as Lucas Munce made a leisurely exit. “Yes?”

“General Mackay is here, sir.”

“Auden, she just left.”

“Yes, sir. But she is back. She says she has the information that you requested.”

On relative military strength? That was impossible in the few minutes she had been gone.

“Have her come in.” And, as she entered, “Yes, General? Sit down.”

“Thank you, sir. You didn’t specify a level of urgency for your question about global sea-level changes. But I went and asked Dr. Vronsky, and he gave me a worst-case answer immediately.”

“He had studied it already?”

“No. He worked it out while I watched.”

“And I thought I’d asked a hard question. What’s the answer?”

“The rise could be substantial, as much as twenty-five feet. On the other hand, it probably won’t be anything like that much.”

“That’s so vague, it’s useless.”

“I know. Vronsky promised a better number in a few hours, after he’s had a chance to talk to the specialists. He says this is not his field.”

“Then how was he able to come up with an answer at all?”

“From first principles.” She held out a sheet of paper, with half a dozen lines of scribbled numbers. “Here’s Dr. Vronsky’s arithmetic. Assume that Supernova Alpha shines as brightly in Earth’s skies as the sun, for a period of two months. The amount of heat per unit area pumped into the Earth by the sun is a well-known number, it’s called the solar constant. The Earth presents one whole face to the supernova. Assume that all the extra heat goes into melting the Antarctic ice cap — a worst case, because melting of floating ice won’t affect sea level. The total volume of ice melted comes out to about two point seven million cubic kilometers. Spreading that over the world’s oceans, Dr. Vronsky calculates a possible rise in sea level of about twenty-five feet. Sir?”

She had heard Saul’s muttered curse.

“It’s all right, General. I was hoping for a much smaller number. Twenty-five feet sounds pretty damn bad.”

“I’m afraid it is, sir. Dr. Vronsky says that a twenty-five-foot rise would have a huge effect on all the flora and fauna of the world’s coastal zones. The shorelines would also become unrecognizable, and we’d lose the use of many major ports. On the other hand, he emphasizes that he made gross worst-case assumptions. There are more clouds now, so there will be more reflected energy. Much of the heat hitting the Earth, from both the sun and Supernova Alpha, will go right back into space. His best guess is that the actual sea-level rise will be no more than a foot or two.”

“I like that a whole lot better.”

“Yes, sir. We can live with it.”

“We’ll have to — even if it turns out to be twenty-five feet. Thank you, General.”

“I’ll get back to you when he has a tighter estimate.” She stood up, and paused. Saul did not look like a man encouraging her to leave.

“I’m afraid I have still another question for you.” He waved a hand. “Sit down, General, if you would. This is an awkward one.”

“Sir?”

“Has anyone in the past couple of weeks approached you and suggested that in the future you might do better with a job other than the one you have?”

“Ah.” The ramrod spine bowed a little, and she leaned against the back of the chair. “So you know. I wasn’t going to bother you, because it sounded like nonsense. But I did have that strange conversation at Admiral Watanabe’s memorial service, ten days ago.”

“Strange, how?”

“General Beneker came up to me. We did Turnabout control work together, back in ’07, and we were both friends of Watanabe. We chatted for a few minutes, then Beneker said, ’Times of crisis are times of opportunity for military people. I think it will be the same this time. There will be some real plums to be had when it’s over.’

“I agreed with him, because he’s right. There will be a lot of positions to fill. Then he said, ’But not if you stay where you are now, Grace. You’d have to move. If you have any interest, I can introduce you to the right people.’

“I just nodded. I mean, I’m Secretary of Defense. It’s a tough job, but no one could possibly offer me anything I want more.”

“I’m glad to hear that. Were any other names mentioned?”

“No. About fifteen minutes after he talked to me he was nose-to-nose with Congressman Otamo. But that could have been coincidence.”

“Or maybe not. Let me know, would you, if there’s any follow-up? Or if you hear of something similar with anyone else.”

“You think there’s a problem here, sir?”

“I don’t know. But I do know I can’t ignore it.”

After she left Saul wondered if he should have told her about Lucas Munce. Probably not. It wasn’t a problem you could solve by sharing, he’d have to sort it out himself. He stared at a presidential portrait on the wall. Harry Truman hadn’t said it quite right. “The buck stops here.” He ought to have said, “ All the bucks stop here.”

How long would the sea-level rise take to happen? Maybe by the time it did, Saul would no longer be President.

As he picked up the telcom unit to begin working the list of urgent calls ( most urgent calls — everyone claimed urgency) Saul’s eye went once more to the framed portrait of Benjamin Disraeli.

That man had seen his own share of disasters. His career had been long and hard and often discouraging. He was sixty-three years old when he became Prime Minister of England, and his first term had been for only a few months. But he offered perhaps the most comforting thought that anyone in his or Saul’s position could be given: “Politics abides, but what politicians can accomplish is always necessarily ephemeral.”