Ann-Marie MacDonald - Way the Crow Flies

“I’d take six orbits over a hundred any day if it meant I could spend a week or two in Florida,” says Steve. “The waitresses alone are bound to be easier on the eyes.”

“Not to mention the food!” says Vic.

Froelich waits until they have stopped laughing. “By landing on the moon”—he speaks with the precision, the slight annoyance, of an expert—“the successful party demonstrates the ability to achieve instant liftoff which is necessary for the moon which is a moving target. When one is adding to this the superior Soviet guidance and control, there is the prospect also of ICBMs that launch to orbit where they cannot be shot down, then re-enter earth’s atmosphere to strike a target—” As Jack listens he speculates; Froelich with his PhD could be teaching at a university, patches on his elbows. Maybe he’s an eccentric, getting away from it all out here in the boondocks. Yet he clearly loves his subject. Why would he want to get away from it? “Sputnik made the West very afraid,” Froelich is saying. “But what is Sputnik?”

“Fellow Traveller, I think is the translation,” says Jack.

Froelich ignores the comment and continues. “A small transmitter on the head of a rocket. And also the last resting place of a dog who did not ask to be a cosmonaut.” The others chuckle, but Froelich does not smile. “Sputnik was not an intercontinental ballistic missile, it had to hit no target, just it had to … go up.” And he points. “They did not have the ICBM, we have this — America has this — before Russia, but ordinary people in the West become afraid and this fear becomes useful to….” He pauses, knits his brow, in search of the words. The other men wait respectfully for him to pick up the thread. Froelich is the picture of the absent-minded professor.

Hal Woodley supplies the missing phrase: “The powers that be.”

“ Ja , thank you,” says Froelich. “By landing on the moon, the successful party demonstrates also the ability to rendezvous between two spacecrafts in orbit, and this is vital to making a military installation.”

There is a moment of silence. He seems to have finished.

Jack says, “You’re right, Henry, putting a man on the moon’ll give us a nice warm fuzzy feeling, but the bottom line is security. The Yanks ought to pour their dollars into the air force space program.”

“It’s all politics,” says Hal. “Look what happened with the Arrow.”

A moment of silence for the Avro Arrow, the most advanced jet fighter in the world. Created by Canadians, test-flown by Canadian pilots, scrapped by Canadian politicians.

“And what did we buy instead?” says Steve with disgust. “Bomarcs.”

“American hand-me-downs,” snorts Vic.

“I don’t know why McNamara is stalling,” says Jack. “USAF’s got all kinds of good stuff in the works like their, uh — they’re working on those Midas satellites that tell you every time the enemy launches a missile, they’ve got a manned space glider in the works, what do they call it—?”

“The Dyno-Soar,” says Vic.

“Yeah, Time had a whole spread. NASA’s got Apollo but there’s plenty of work to go around. Kennedy ought to throw USAF a bone.”

Vic says, “Uncle Sam don’t want to look like the Soviets, rattling the sabre in space.”

Henry says, “You think space is not military now?”

“NASA is a civilian agency,” argues Jack. “In fact, half the movers and shakers down in Houston are your countrymen, Henry.”

“That’s right,” says Hal. “Look at von Braun and that other fellow—”

“Arthur Rudolph,” says Jack. “Guy’s a managerial genius.”

Froelich shrugs. “They worked for Nazis.”

“Really?” says Steve.

Jack winces. “Technically yes, but they were civilians. Scientists and dreamers.”

Vic lifts his glass to Henry. “You got to hand it to the Germans, eh, when it comes to technology.”

But Henry is still hunched, arms crossed, glass in hand. “Scientists and dreamers also caused the first atomic bomb to detonate at Los Alamos. They hold — held it together with masking tape. Very idealistic. It would stop Hitler. It kills instead millions of civilians.”

There’s a pause. Then Jack says, “It ended the war, though, didn’t it?”

Hal says, “Although I wonder if you could’ve found a single general who’d’ve made that particular call.”

Another pause. Vic sighs. “The Yanks always get stuck with the dirty work.”

Jack nods. “Yup.” Then smiles. “You know, Peter Sellers had the right idea. We ought to declare war on the Americans. They’ll come in and hammer us, then give us a whole bunch of aid and we’ll be better off than ever.” Henry shrugs again, sips. Jack continues. “We’re just lucky the nuclear types didn’t get together with the rocket types over in Germany during the war — they’d’ve had nuclear missiles.”

Vic says, “I wonder why they didn’t.”

Henry replies, “Because it is Jewish science.”

The others look at him, but Henry does not continue.

“What’s that?” asks Jack.

“Atomic science.”

Hal asks, “What do you mean, ‘Jewish’?”

“Einstein is a Jew,” says Henry.

Jack flinches at the word — it sounds abrupt, rude: Jew . It sounds … anti-Semitic. Jack knows that isn’t fair — just because Froelich is German doesn’t make him an anti-Semite.

“Hitler rejects Jewish science”—Henry sounds more Teutonic than ever to Jack, clipped tones, confident to the point of arrogance—“also Hitler does not have the imagination to marry the rocket with the atomic warhead.”

“Boy,” says Steve. “So in a strange way … Hitler’s anti-Semitism may have saved us from the big one.”

Jack gives a low whistle. Henry says nothing.

Elaine calls, “What are you boys talking about?”

Jack smiles over at her. “Aw, fun ’n’ games, Elaine, fun ’n’ games.”

“They’re talking politics,” says Mimi, carrying a TV table over with four plates of pineapple upside-down cake, “solving the world’s problems.” She sets the table down and winks at her husband.

Vic protests, “That’s the third dessert tonight!”

“I don’t know where you found the time, Mimi,” calls Betty.

Jack notices Karen sitting a little apart, both babies asleep in her lap. Yet she doesn’t look maternal so much as … what? He tries to put his finger on it. She looks as though she’s on safari … like that woman who rescues animals … monkeys … lion cubs? What’s the name of that book?

“Well stop being so boring,” Elaine calls to the men from her chaise, “and come talk to us.”

“Let them get it out of their system, love,” says Betty, pouring tea, although Elaine is still working on a cocktail.

Froelich takes a bite of cake. “Thank you Mrs. McCarthy— entschuldigen Sie mich, bitte —Mimi. Delicious cake.” He inclines his head in a formal old-world bow, and resumes energetically: “My point being, why go to the moon when we can so very well annihilate ourselves from here?”

The other men look at him. “I’m talking about avoiding annihilation,” says Jack.

“Then why don’t we get rid of the weapons?”

“Are you a ban-the-bomb type, Henry?”

“Sure, why not?”

“So am I,” says Vic. “I’d like the Soviets to ban it first, though.”

“The military are the biggest peaceniks of all,” says Jack. “Unlike a lot of politicians, military types know what war is like.”

Henry Froelich says, “And some civilians too. They know.”

Hal looks Henry in the eye. “That’s for sure, Henry. Lest we forget, eh?” He raises his glass.

“To friendship,” Jack says.