The Big Eye

by Max Ehrlich

  "It gets you, doesn't it?" said David softly.

  "Oh yes, yes," she whispered. "David, what -- what does a Thing like that do?"

  "More than any man ever dreamed would be possible." He spoke almost reverently. "The Big Eye right out there has reached up into billions of light years of cold space, Carol. It's pulled down stars and nebulae and supemovae we never knew existed before, and dropped them right into our laps. It's discovered new and remote worlds -- millions and millions of them -- some of them vast enough to make our own look like a microscopic speck of dust floating around in a stadium." He was staring up into the dome, talking half to himself now. "It's brought enough light down through what we call the tube and onto that big mirror to make real studies of the galactic systems, the binary stars and their separation, and the secret of the expanding universe itself."

  "I'm not sure of what you're saying," she interrupted. "But just hearing it makes my head swim."

  He nodded. "Unless you're an astronomer, Carol, I suppose this is so much Greek. But putting it in layman's language, that big 'scope out there is already giving us the story of how stars are born, how big they are, how hot they get, and how long they have to live. And that isn't all. From that kind of data we're already getting a hint of how long we have to live right here on earth."

  She stared at him. "How?"

  "Well, it's this way, Carol. The sun itself is a star -- and pretty small potatoes, a poor relative, as far as stars go. In terms of stellar distance, the earth is practically glued to it. When we find out how old the sun actually is, we'll he able to predict how much longer it's going to shine, giving us light and heat." He smiled. "See? We're kicking around in this particular universe on borrowed time. We've hitched our earthy wagon to a star, but someday that star's going to lie down and slowly die on us!"

  She shuddered. "What a horrible thought!"

  "Don't worry." He laughed. "We're still good for a few billion years yet." Suddenly he sobered. "Or -- we were. Now -- I don't know. It looks as though man, with his little atom bomb, is going to beat the sun to the punch and get rid of himself first." He took her arm. "Come on, Carol. I'll take you up to the top."

  "You mean -- way up there?" She looked apprehensively up into the shadowy dome.

  "Sure. Up to the observer's cage, inside the top of the 'scope." He led her back down the stairs and into the corridor. "We never take the public into the observation room itself. You see, Carol, crowds generate heat from their bodies, and just a couple of degrees' rise in the observation-room temperature would be enough to throw several of the delicate instruments right out of whack. And of course we rarely give anybody a ride to the top. You ought to feel very flattered."

  "Thank you," she said weakly. "But right now I'm beginning to feel scared."

  He went to a locker, pulled out two heavy fleece-lined suits, fur hats with ear muffs attached, heavy mittens, and scarves. "We'd better put these on," he said. "If we're going for a ride to heaven, we'd better be dressed for it. Gets pretty cold up there in the dome. From the way it felt when we got out of the car in the yard, it's well below zero."

  They wriggled into the heavy clothing, and then David led her to a small automatic elevator. In a few moments they stopped at the main floor, and as the elevator door opened, a cold blast of air hit them. David stepped out, went to a control board, and pushed a button. A motor droned somewhere, and the hemispheric roof opened into two halves. Only an almost imperceptible hum and a faint lightening of the shadows indicated that the roof was opening at all. Carol, craning her neck and looking straight upward, finally made out a faint segment of blue-black sky and two or three faint stars almost hanging onto the end of the 'scope as it thrust up vaguely into the slice of night between the parted dome.

  David came away from the control room, smiling. "Of course this is just a demonstration. We're not going to take any observations or anything like that. I just wanted you to know what it was like when the dome was down."

  He led her back into the elevator, and they stopped on a narrow balcony. From here they climbed a short, circular iron stairway to what David called the "jump-off" bridge. They were already at a dizzy height, and he could feel Carol holding his hand with almost frantic pressure. A blast of icy-cold air blew down upon them through the open dome.

  "All right, darling?" he asked.

  "I think so," she said in a small voice. "But as far as I'm concerned this is the end of the world."

  He held her close. "In a way it is. From here on we take a scenic railway to the stars."

  He pressed a push button on the bridge. Carol gasped as a flying conveyor car raced down a curved track from an invisible perch far up under the dome and stopped at the bridge. David grinned at her discomfiture and motioned her to step onto the narrow car.

  She looked at him and shook her head, a little pale. "Don't be afraid," he said gently. "Just hang onto me." He held her by the arm, and gingerly she stepped across the abyss beneath and onto the car.

  David closed the small swinging gate on the conveyor car and locked it. "Hang onto the rail with both hands," he said.

  Then he pushed a button, and somewhere below motors began to sing a muted song. The cage glided away, then soared outward and upward in a dizzy, fantastic ascent toward the top of the telescope. Now they were two fur-covered pygmies whirling up into the vault of the dome, riding a steel carpet toward the stars. Finally the car slowed and came to a stop next to a catwalk. The observation floor yawned far below, and they were almost fifteen stories from the ground level itself.

  For a moment Carol clung to David, trembling as he held her. He was immediately penitent. "Maybe I shouldn't have brought you up here."

  "No, no," she said faintly. "I -- just for a moment I felt -- well, a little sick. I'll be all right."

  "Sure?" He was really concerned now.

  She nodded. He held onto her and pointed down into the top of the telescope. She saw a cisternlike cubbyhole, a cylindrical steel well, with a curved bottom and an instrument desk coming up through the floor. There was a strange-looking little chair at the desk which rolled around on rails within the well, and an instrument panel opposite the desk, set with dials.

  "This is the observer's cage," said David. "The Old Man sits in that chair and through the voice-power phone signals to me down at the control board for star settings. When I start the Big Eye moving, he rides along down there inside of it, watching those luminous dials until they indicate the exact observation position. Then he pushes his photographic plateholder into position, pulls out the slide -- and that's the 'take.' "

  He said nothing more for the moment. They stood there, clinging to the catwalk. Carol felt David's arm slip around her waist, and she leaned against him. A strange, almost wild feeling of exaltation filled her, and she looked up through the dome into the indigo sky. The stars seemed to be floating by across it, moving through it like tiny lighted ships at sea.

  They had escaped from their own planet now, and they were standing in space. They had stepped off the earth and ridden up into the mysterious bosom of the heavens and thrust their heads among the stars, into the vault of the universe itself. Up there the illuminated stars moved along their ordained paths through infinity, through everlasting tranquillity. The earth was not a few feet below, but a million light years below, a remote and troubled and diseased speck of dirt swimming around in the void, crawling with microscopic and cannibalistic organisms.

  "It's wonderful," Carol whispered, "wonderful. I've never felt so exhilarated, so free" She stole a look at David's face, saw his reverent, faraway look.

  It's like being close to God up here, she thought, so close that you could almost see His face.

  The phone suddenly buzzed down in the cisternlike cage. Like a noisy burglar, it broke the silence and the spell. Up here at the top of the telescope, they had for a moment soared into the heavens, but now they knew that it, too, was earthbound.

  David turned to Carol. "Somebody below wants us
," he said. "Do you think you can hang onto the catwalk here for a moment?"

  She nodded. He walked to the top of the telescope and clambered down a series of pipe rails into the cage. The phone buzzed again, and he hunched over it like a furry dwarf, fumbling with the receiver in his heavy mittens.

  He spoke briefly, put the receiver back on the hook, and then looked up at Carol from the cistern below.

  "That was Francis. We'd better go right back down. The Old Man wants to see me now."

  As they descended to the ground-floor corridor they heard the news coming over Francis's radio, muflSed in the Old Man's study.

  They were back on earth again.

  Outside of Dr. Dawson's study they saw small knots of men gathered, talking in low voices. David was struck by the fact that their faces were taut and grim, that they seemed strangely quiet, without animation.

  He picked them out one by one -- Ellender of the Harvard Observatory, the shaggy man with the ill-fitting suit; Manning of Mount Wilson, a giant of a man, bald as a billiard ball; Van Vreeden of Holland; Perez of Brazil, rotund and swarthy; Vara-nov, the Russian from Leningrad, a white-bearded man with ice-blue eyes; Dr. Smythe of the Royal Astronomical Society, a wizened hunchback.

  There were others, too, whom Francis hadn't mentioned. Duval, who watched the heavens from the Swiss Alps, Wallace of Aberdeen, Alvarez of Chile. Many of them were refugees from Soviet-dominated Europe and Asia.

  What was the matter with them? thought David, bewildered. Where was all the excitement of the new discovery, if there had been something new. Why were they speaking in hushed tones? Why were their faces so grave, so pale and rigid, like puppet masks?

  David walked up to Dr. Ellender and extended his hand. Ellender had been his mentor at Harvard and had been largely instrumental in getting the Old Man to invite David to Palomar. But Ellender seemed hardly to recognize him; his gray eyes seemed to look through and beyond David.

  "Hello, David," he said absently. That was all. Ellender turned and followed the other men down the corridor. His hand, in the brief moment it had touched David's, was damp and limp and cold. And his forehead, too, was wet with perspiration.

  As they drifted ofi, Francis came out of the reception room and met David and Carol near Dr. Dawson's door. Then he added almost apologetically:

  "Dr. Dawson just rang for me. Dr. Hughes. He asked me to bring in both of you."

  David looked puzzled for a moment and then knocked on the door. A gentle voice spoke from within, almost inaudibly.

  "Come in."

  A man was seated at a desk piled with a jumble of books, slide rules, photographs, pencils, and yellow scratch pads covered with computations. Carol looked at him curiously as he rose to greet them. So this is Dr. Dawson, she thought. This is the Old Man of the Mountain, the Wizard of Palomar, one of the great men of all time, whose back yard was the universe itself.

  Carol lived in a world of celebrities, of Big Names, and she was used to them. She was one herself, in a modest way. Yet in the presence of this man she suddenly felt an almost embarrassing humility. There was nothing blatant about his appearance, nothing particularly bizarre or striking. Yet in a roomful of men you would pick him out among all the others for some baflSing reason. You would know instinctively that here was a great man, a man who attracted others by a personal magnetism of sheer intelligence glowing from within and radiating outward.

  "Dr. Dawson," said David. "This is my fiancee, Carol Kenny."

  The Old Man offered her a thin, blue-veined hand. "Welcome to Palomar, Miss Kenny."

  He spoke mechanically, almost without interest, as though he were hardly aware she was there. He seemed preoccupied, a million miles away. He was courteous enough, but there was no warmth in his voice, no welcoming smile.

  The Old Man's just going through the motions, that's all, thought David.

  It was unbelievable, he thought, unbelievable. He'd never seen the Old Man act like this before. Ordinarily Dr. Dawson was an unfailing gentleman in his relations with others. He put them at their ease, and they took to him immediately. No matter whom he met, in whatever station of life, he gave others the impression of humility, made them feel that it was his privilege to meet them, listened intently to what they had to say, as though every word they spoke were a word of wisdom. David knew that this appreciation of others was genuine. The Old Man was no poseur. Yet now he was almost rude.

  It was plain that something had shaken him deeply, that he was laboring under some kind of tremendous tension. There was no other answer. After all, he wasn't meeting a perfect stranger in Carol. He had always been keenly interested in her, had asked David a hundred questions about her, had looked forward to meeting her. Now . . .

  "You must be tired after your trip, Miss Kenny. Francis here will take you to your quarters if you wish."

  His voice was gentle, but it was an obvious dismissal. David, shocked, glanced at Carol to see how she was taking it. He wondered : What is she thinking of the Old Man now -- especially after the way I built him up?

  But Carol was sensitive and a good actress. She could see that the Old Man wanted to be alone with David. She only smiled gratefully and said: "I am a little tired, Dr. Dawson. Thank you for being so thoughtful." David saw her to the door with Francis and squeezed her hand. "See you in the morning, darling," he said. Then he closed the door and turned to face the Old Man.

  "Sit down, my boy," said Dr. Dawson gently.

  David sank into one of the deep leather chairs. His curiosity was like a mouse in his belly, gnawing away at his innards. What was the Old Man waiting to tell him?

  Slowly, almost deliberately. Dr. Dawson reached into his desk, took out one of the small cigars he favored. He lit it, and as he did David saw that his hand trembled.

  "My boy, I don't have to tell you that something tremendous has happened. You know that I would not have countermanded General Hawthorne's order and exposed you to grave charges without a very good reason."

  David nodded. The Old Man puffed on his cigar for a moment and looked steadily at his protege. Then he said suddenly:

  "David -- do you believe in God?"

  David's mouth dropped half open at the question. It stunned him by its very suddenness, by its irrelevance to anything he had even remotely expected. But the Old Man was dead serious, his eyes demanded an answer, and David managed to falter:

  "Of course, sir, of course -- I believe in God."

  The Old Man paused. He seemed to look deep into David, weighing the sincerity of his answer. Then he said quietly:

  "I know what you must be thinking, my boy, and I don't blame you. But I have not gone suddenly mad, and I am not yet senile. We have known each other for some time, David, and for some reason we have never touched upon this subject, this subject of faith, or religion, if you like. Now, in view of what has happened, I had to ask you, I had to know."

  In view of what has happened, the Old Man had just said. Well, thought David, what has happened? And what did God have to do with it?

  Dr. Dawson seemed to anticipate what David was thinking. He went on:

  "Here at Palomar, David, you and I, as astronomers, have seen the great procession of stars and planets move in their immutable courses. We have named and classified them, measured them in precise terms -- positions, orbits, velocities, temperatures, luminosities, compositions, and absolute magnitudes. If, in doing this kind of work, we have thought of our relationship to God at all, we have marveled at the orderly manner in which He has arranged the expanding universe."

  Dr. Dawson put his cigar on a tray and leaned back in his chair, his eyes half closed. Then he continued:

  "There are men of science who, since they cannot measure God, weigh him, or produce Him in chemical synthesis, are not concerned with his existence. Yet even they must have reflected that once, at the beginning of time, there was an original nebula that filled the void of the universe with equal density everywhere. They must have asked themselves, 'Where did it come fr
om ? How did it get there? Who put it there?' i a Creator did not create it, who did? n the agnostics and atheists among us do not admit the role of a Creator here, they must at least admit that it is an undefinable mystery.

  "At any rate, David, whatever the innermost conviction of each man, it is only the fool who does not at least admit the mystery of creation -- who thinks that everything just 'happened' somehow."

  Dr. Dawson paused, looked steadily at David. "Forgive me, my boy, for all this preamble. But it is very pertinent to what I have to say." He measured his words. "In the past few months, David, I have seen a miracle. I have witnessed the hand of God suddenly appear in the universe."

  "The hand of God?" echoed David stupidly.

  The Old Man nodded. He reached forward on his desk, picked up a batch of enlarged photographs.

  "Look at these."

  David stared at the top photograph. So this was the project Dr. Dawson had been working on so feverishly through the Big Eye. This was why, at the Old Man's urgent request, Ellender, Perez, Varanov, and the others had come running to Palomar from all over the world. They were concerned with the sky, after all, and not with earth-bound matters.