Fire Watch Part 12

The questioning in the auditorium went on for almost another hour after the movie, during which time Laynie went through two more packs of gum and a roll of Lifesavers the old couple behind gave her. Meg decided they were saints sent down from heaven to help young mother's through the eclipse. If heaven wasn't too far to come, Meg thought idly while the man with the microphone held forth on the construction of a pinhole viewer from a s...o...b..x, how far was too far to come?

Everyone who had been in the auditorium was in the cafe and then some. The special was something called an "eclipse burger," which turned out to be a hamburger with a fried egg and cheese on top. Laynie took the top bun off and refused to eat anything else. Rich and Paulos talked about the weather while Meg sc.r.a.ped egg and cheese off Laynie's hamburger. They hadn't noticed the haze yet.

"Do you realize how far some of these people have come?" Rich said. "That guy that was sitting next to us was from New York. He drove drove out." out."

"Yeah, if it's cloudy tomorrow, there are going to be some mighty unhappy people," Paulos said.

"Ick," Laynie said, pointing to the yellow mess beside her hamburger. Meg sc.r.a.ped the offending goo onto her own plate.

"It seems to me," she said, "that if you had come far enough you would have some way of ensuring that the weather was clear." She put the top bun on the hamburger and handed it to Laynie. Rich and Paulos were looking at her as if she had lost her mind.

"You mean cloudseeding?" Rich said finally.

"I just-exactly how far do you think people actually come to something like this?"

They looked at each other. "I don't know," Paulos said. "There are supposed to be some astronomers here from Italy."

"Are there four of them?" Meg said without thinking, and then stopped. They were looking at her again. "But they don't have to come, do they? I mean, I thought scientists could see everything they wanted to with the satellite equipment. The corona and all that, I mean," she finished weakly.

"Catch up," Laynie said. Meg handed her the catsup bottle. She wouldn't be able to get the lid off and it would keep her occupied.

Rich was still frowning. In a minute he would ask, "What's the matter?" and she would say, "There are four scientists here who aren't from Italy," and then he would really think she was crazy But he was frowning about something else.

"You know," he said thoughtfully, "somebody else was saying that same thing this afternoon, that with all the above-the-atmosphere equipment we've got now, there's really no reason for all the elaborate setup every eclipse."

"Then why do they come all the way from Italy?" Meg persisted. She was not sure what she wanted him to say; perhaps that the distances were dwindling, that n.o.body came very far anymore just to see an eclipse.

Rich hesitated. "They just-I don't know."

"They come to see the show," Paulos said suddenly.

"Ick," Laynie said.

"They come for the same reason the pilgrims went to Canterbury, Teddy Roosevelt went to Yellowstone, the astronauts went to the moon. To see the show."

"Well, but surely it's more than just that. Scientific curiosity and-" Rich said.

Paulos shook his head. "Protective coloration," he said.

Meg sucked in her breath.

"But there's still a lot of information that can't be gotten any other way," Rich said. "Look at-"

"Ick," Laynie said again. Meg could not see Laynie's plate under the catsup. She had apparently gotten the lid off quite easily.

After supper they went back to the motel. The men stood outside with the redheaded boys and debated the weather. The faint haze had become a light film nearly obscuring Jupiter, although the moons could still be seen faintly through Paulos's telescope. Meg gave Laynie her bath and put her to bed. She washed out the catsup-stained T-shirt and the mud-soaked socks and hung them over the shower curtain rod in the bathroom. Then she got ready for bed herself and flicked on the TV.

It was a Helena station. Helena was worried about early morning fog. They were recommending Lewistown and Gra.s.srange. Apparently Helena hadn't noticed the haze either. There was a guest meteorologist from Denver. He explained how the Russians had used cloudseeding during the last-eclipse to obtain a perfect view through dense cloud cover. He said modem technology had not developed to the sophistication necessary for weather control in the northwest due to complicated arctic flow patterns, but plans were already being made for the eclipse in Hawaii so that hopefully they would be able not only to predict but to guarantee good weather to the people who had traveled so far to see this wonder of nature. Meg turned off the TV and went to bed.

She woke up at five-thirty frozen stiff. The door of the motel room was standing open. She pulled on her coat, pulled the covers up over Laynie, and went outside. It was just starting to get light. Rich and Paulos stood with their hands in their pockets, looking miserable. The redheaded boys had the back of their orange hatchback open and were slinging sleeping bags and equipment into it. The sky was completely overcast.

"Where are they going?" Meg asked Rich.

"Helena." He sounded grim, which meant he was frantic with worry.

"But Helena's supposed to have fog."

"Fog might burn off. This ..." He waved a hand at the sky. It was getting lighter by the minute. The clouds looked totally impenetrable. A major front. "What do you think, Paulos?"

"I think if we don't make up our minds within the next few minutes it'll be too late to make any difference. We've only got about two hours until it starts."

The redheaded boys came out with a last load. Two backpacks and the camera tripod. They threw them in the back of the car and slammed down the hatch. One of them had drawn "Eclipse Special" with his finger in the mud on the back window. Next to it he had drawn a sun. A circle with uneven lines radiating from it.

"I say Helena," Rich said.

"Great," Paulos said, and turned back to the motel.

"No," Meg said.

They all looked at her, even the redheaded boys. They will never forgive me if it's cloudy and they miss the eclipse, she thought. It's the last one in North America in this century; and they will never forgive me. But Helena has fog and we have ...

"No," she said again. They were waiting for her to explain, and to explain would be disastrous. "There's no need to go anywhere," she said clearly "We'll be able to see the eclipse from here."

"How do you know that?" Rich asked.

"I know it." Her tone sounded convincing even to herself. The redheaded boys looked almost persuaded.

"How do you know it?" Paulos asked. "Women's intuition?" do you know it?" Paulos asked. "Women's intuition?"

She almost said, "There's no such thing and you know it," but the boys looked as if they might believe that. They were only eighteen. Emergency situations demand emergency measures. "Yes," she said, "women's intuition. It's going to clear off in time to see the eclipse."

"All right," Rich said, "we stay." The boys looked at each other, nodded their heads, and started hauling their stuff back out of the car. Rich took Meg's arm and led her back toward the motel room. "Meet you for breakfast in fifteen minutes, Paulos," he said.

"Yeah," Paulos said, laughing. "That's one benefit of staying here. We get to eat."

Rich shut the door behind them. "Women's intuition," he said. "You know something, don't you?"

Meg looked at him steadily "You've seen something?"

Yes. Dust marks on a car. Two missiles in a town the size of a pinhole viewer. Four scientists who look so much like scientists they could have been copied out of a National Geographic film who aren't even worried about this storm. A child's drawing of the sun. Laynie. Yes, I've seen lots of things. But I'm the only one. Who's going to notice four scientists in a town full of scientists? Who's going to notice that they're speaking some strange foreign language? Everybody's speaking science, and nothing's stranger than that. Who's going to notice anything? You're all looking at the sky. She kept silent.

"How on earth can you believe that mess out there is going to clear off by eight-thirty?"

"Clips?" Laynie said from her bed.

"Clips," Meg said firmly. "Let's get your clothes on so we can go eat breakfast."

They set up in front of the high school. Meg did not see the four anywhere. It was not even possible to see the sun's disc through the gray blanket of clouds, though it was possible to get an image through the telescopes.

"We have contact," one of the redheaded boys said at 8:21, and there was some scattered applause.

"Sun?" Laynie said.

"Behind the clouds," Rich said.

Everyone was going through the motions of setting up telescopes, cameras, binoculars for projecting an image on the snow. n.o.body looked at the sky. The elderly couple let Laynie look through a pinhold viewer made out of an oatmeal box, even though there was nothing to see. Meg walked Laynie around the outside of the high school and told her all about not looking at the sun unless she had her special gla.s.ses on that Daddy had made for her.

At 9:04 she found her scientists where they had been before, on the tennis courts around the other side of the building. They were setting up their equipment, most of which was short, fat, and the same faded khaki as the missile in the park. They were all talking animatedly at each other and nodding at the sky.

At 9:05 the clouds around the sun began to be pushed away in a ragged circle and the sun's disc began to shine very thinly through. Meg made Laynie put her special gla.s.ses on. At 9:17 the sun came out and everybody cheered. Meg walked Laynie back around to the front of the school where Rich had the telescope set up. Rich looked frantic, which meant he was hopeful. He and Paulos were wearing eye patches made of kleenex and masking tape. It began to get dark in the west, a purple-blue darkness like a summer rainstorm. Meg looked through the telescope at the last sliver of the sun, still shining too bright to look at in the now completely blue eastern half of the sky.

At 9:24 Paulos said, "She's a-coming." Meg picked Laynie up and started edging away from the men in the direction of the tennis courts. It began to get very dark. Laynie clung to Meg's neck and squeezed her eyes shut under the mylar gla.s.ses. Shadows rippled suddenly over Meg like a shudder. She looked up.

And was caught by the eclipse. There was a flash, like the captured light from a diamond, and then it was there, suspended in the sky The sky was not totally dark. Reflection from the snow. The science teacher had explained it yesterday in the auditorium. He had not explained how beautiful it would be. The sky was a dawn blue with pink shining from the retreating clouds like a coming sunrise. In the center of the fragile blue the sun flared out on all sides from behind the moon.

Meg pried Laynie's arms loose from around her neck and took her gla.s.ses off her. "This is it, Laynie honey," she whispered. "Look at the clips."

Laynie turned around shyly, as if she were being introduced to someone. "Oh," she said in a tiny voice, and stuck her finger in her mouth. Her other hand she kept tight around Meg's neck.

"Twenty-nine, twenty-eight ..." One of the redheaded boys was counting backwards. It could not possibly have been two minutes already. A fine line of light appeared at one side of the bluish circle. "Thar she goes!" somebody said. Meg shoved Laynie's gla.s.ses back on her and looked down at the snow. The sun flared back into blindingness and there was a tremendous roar of applause.

The redheaded boys pounded Meg on the back. "Boy, was that ever neat!" they kept saying. "Boy, are we ever glad we listened to you."

Rich grinned at her. "You've set women's lib back a hundred years," he said, and squeezed her hand.

"Quite a show," Paulos said, rocking back contentedly on his heels, "quite a show."

"Oh," Meg said, and took off through the forest of tripods with Laynie still in her arms. They were already gone, the four of them carrying their equipment down the hill. There was probably time to catch them before they made it to the park. I didn't want to catch them, Meg thought. I just wanted to see what they thought of it, if it was worth it, coming all this way She could see them gesturing. Their gestures had taken on grandiose proportions. Meg decided it must have been.

"Laynie had to go to the bathroom," Meg explained when they got back. The air had turned chilly. Meg put Laynie's hood up.

"Ten-degree drop of temperature during the eclipse," Paulos said. "It looks like it's turning bad again, too." He got into the car. The even layer of clouds was pushing steadily back over the sun.

Meg settled Laynie in the back seat and then helped Rich get the camera tripod maneuvered into the trunk. "You're not going to tell me, are you?" Rich said.

Meg looked at him. "Tell you what?"

He slammed the trunk shut. Meg got into the back seat with Laynie. Rich started the car.

"I sure would like to know what you did back there," Paulos said. "That was some weather predicting!"

"Um," Meg said. She was straining to see the park as they pa.s.sed the side street she and Laynie had walked up.

"Rocket," Laynie said. "Rocket. Tana. Clips."

"What, honey?" Rich asked.

Emergency situations demand emergency measures. Meg popped a Lifesaver into Laynie's mouth.

There's been a lot of research on twins lately, especially twins who were raised separately. They meet for the first time at age thirty and find that they both smoke Marlboros, drive Rabbits, are married to girls named Jennifer, and are computer technicians. You see them on TV. Donahue asks them a question and they both start to answer at the same time, in the same words. They stop, both of them lean backward, put their hands on their knees, reach for a Marlboro. The audience laughs.

Doesn't this strike terror into any hearts besides mine? What if Donahue asked them, "Do you believe in free will?" What would they answer? "Yes, of course"? At the same time? And then would they lean backward, put their hands on their knees, and reach for a Marlboro?

The Sidon in the Mirror

We are near the spiraldown. I cannot see the mooring lights, and there are no landmarks on Paylay; but I remember how the lights of Jewell's abbey looked from here, a thin disjointed string of Christmas tree lights, red and green and gold. Closer in you can see the red line under the buildings, and you think you are seeing the heat of Paylay, but it is only the reflection of the lights off the ground and the metalpaper undersides of Jewell's and the gaming house.

"You kin't see the heat," Jewell said on our way in from the down, "but you'll feel it. Your shoes all right?"

My shoes were fine, but they were clumsy to walk in. I would have fallen over in them at home, but here the heavier gravity almost clamped them to the ground. They had six-inch plastic soles cut into a latticework as fragile-looking as the mooring tower, but they were st.u.r.dier than they looked, and they were not letting any heat get through. I wasn't feeling anything at all, and halfway to Jewell's I knelt and felt the sooty ground. It felt warm, but not as hot as I had thought it would be, walking on a star.

"Leave your hand there a minute," Jewell said, and I did, and then jerked my soot-covered hand up and put it in my mouth.

"Gits hot fast, din't it?" she said. "A tapper kidd fall down out here or kimm out with no shoes on and die inside of an hour of heatstroke. That's why I thought I bitter come out and wilcome you to Paylay. That's what they call this tapped-out star. You're sipposed to be able to pick up minny laying on the ground. You kin't. You have to drill a tap and build a comprissor around it and hope to Gid you don't blow yoursilf up while you're doing it."

What she did not say, in the high squeaky voice we both had from the helium in the air, was that she had waited over two hours for me by the down's plastic mooring tower and that the bottoms of her feet were frying in the towering shoes. The plastic is not a very good insulator. Open metal ribs would work far better to dissipate the heat that wells up through the thin crust of Paylay; but they can't allow any more metal here than is absolutely necessary, not with the hydrogen and oxygen ready to explode at the slightest spark.

The downpilot should have taken any potential fire-starters and metal I had away from me before he let me off the spiraldown, but Jewell had interrupted him before he could ask me what I had. "Doubletap it, will you?" she said. "I want to git back before the nixt shift. You were an hour late."

"Sorry, Jewell," the pilot said. "We hit thirty percent almost a kilometer up and had to go into a Fermat." He looked down again at the piece of paper in his hand. "The following items are contraband. Unlawful possession can result in expulsion from Paylay. Do you have any sonic fires, electromags, matches-"

Jewell took a step forward and put her foot down like she was afraid the ground would give way.

"Iv course he din't. He's a pian.o.board player."

The pilot laughed and said, "Okay, Jewell, take him," and she grabbed up my tote and walked me back to St. Pierre. She asked about my uncle, she told me about the abbey and the girls and how she'd given them all house names of jewels because of her name. She told me how Taber, who ran the gaming house next door to her abbey had christened the little string of buildings we could see in the distance St. Pierre after the patron saint of tappers, and all the time the bottoms of her feet fried like cooking meat and she never said a word.

I couldn't see her very well. She was wearing a chemiloom lantern strapped to her forehead and she had brought one for me, but they didn't give off much light and her face was in shadow. My uncle had told me she had a big scar, from a fight with a sidon, that ran down the side of her face and under her chin.

"It nearly cut the jugular," my uncle had said. "It would have if they hadn't gotten it off of her. It cut up quite a few of the tappers, too."

"What was she doing with a sidon anyway?" I said. I had never seen one, but I had heard about them, beautiful blood-red animals with thick, soft fur and sot-razor claws, animals that could seem tame for as long as a year and then explode without warning into violence. "You can't tame them."

"Jewell thought she could," my uncle said. "One of the tappers brought it back with him from Solfatara in a cage. Somebody let it out, and it got away. Jewell went after it. Its feet were burned and it was suffering from heatstroke. Jewell sat down on the ground and held it on her lap till someone came to help. She insisted on bringing it back to the abbey, making it into a pet. She wouldn't believe she couldn't tame it."

"But a sidon can't help what it is," I said. "It's like us. It doesn't even know it's doing it."

My uncle did not say anything, and after a minute I said, "She thinks she can tame us, too. That's why she's willing to take me, isn't it? I knew there had to be a reason she'd take me when we're not allowed on Solfatara. She thinks she can keep me from copying."

My uncle still did not answer, and I took that for a.s.sent. He had not answered any of my questions. He had suddenly said I was going, though n.o.body had gone off-planet since the ban, and when I asked him questions, he answered with statements that did not answer them at all.