Janos reached the inescapable conclusion that Dr. des Jardins had either lost faith in his ability or somehow suspected that he might have himself administered the drugs to General Borzov without consulting her. Either way he should find out what she was thinking. A strange idea, born from his own feelings of guilt, next crossed his mind. Could it be, he mused, that Nicole somehow knows about the Schmidt and Hagenest project and suspects all four of us?
For the first time, Janos himself wondered if perhaps Valeriy Borzov’s pain had not been natural. He recalled the chaotic meeting the four of them had had two hours after David Brown had learned that he would be left onboard the Newton during the first sortie. “You must talk to him, Otto!” a frustrated Dr. Brown had said to Admiral Heilmann. “You must convince him to change his mind.”
Otto Heilmann had then admitted it was unlikely General Borzov would change the personnel assignments based on his request. “In that case!” Dr. Brown had replied angrily, “we can say good-bye to all the incentive awards in our contract.”
Throughout the meeting Francesca Sabatini had remained quiet and seemingly unworried. As he was leaving, Janos had overheard Dr. Brown berating her. “And why are you so calm?” he had said. “You stand to lose as much as anyone else. Or do you have a plan I don’t know about?”
Janos had glimpsed Francesca’s smile for only a fraction of a second. But he had remarked to himself at the time that she had seemed oddly confident. Now, as Cosmonaut Tabori awaited dawn on Rama, that smile returned to haunt him. With Francesca’s knowledge of drugs it would have been well within her capability to give General Borzov something that would induce appendicitis symptoms. But would she have done something so… so blatantly dishonest, just to enhance the value of their postmission media project?
Again Rama was instantaneously flooded with light. As always, it was a feast for the eyes. Janos turned around slowly, looking in all directions and studying both bowls of the immense structure. With the light now brightly shining, he resolved to talk to Franceses at the first opportunity.
It was Irina Turgenyev, strangely enough, who asked the question. The cosmonauts were almost finished with their breakfast. Dr. Brown and Admiral Heilmann, in fact, had already left the table to conduct another of their interminable conference calls with ISA management. “Where’s Dr. Takagi-shi?” she said innocently. “He’s the last member of the crew that I would expect to be late for anything.”
“He must have slept through his alarm,” Janos Tabori answered, pushing his folding chair away from the table. “Ill go check on him.”
When Janos returned a minute later he was perplexed. “He wasn’t there,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders. “I guess he went out for a walk.”
Nicole des Jardins had an immediate sinking feeling in her stomach. She rose abruptly without finishing her breakfast. “We should go look for him,” she said, her concern undisguised, “or he won’t be ready when we leave.”
The other cosmonauts all noticed Nicole’s agitation. “What’s going on here?” Richard Wakefield said good-naturedly. “One of our scientists takes a little morning walk on his own and the company doctor goes into panic?” He switched on his radio. “Hello, Dr. Takagishi, wherever you are. This is Wakefield. Will you please let us know that you’re all right so that we can finish our breakfast.”
There was a long silence. Every member of the crew knew that it was an absolutely mandatory requirement to carry a communicator at all times. You could choose to turn off the transmission capability, but you had to listen under any and all circumstances.
“Takagishi-san,” Nicole said next with an urgent edge in her voice. “Are you all right? Please respond.” During the extended silence, Nicole’s sinking feeling in her stomach turned into a large knot. Something terrible had happened to her friend.
“I’ve explained that to you twice, Dr. Maxwell,” David Brown said in exasperation. “It makes no sense to evacuate part of the crew. The most efficient way to search for Dr. Takagishi is to use the entire staff. Once we find him we will clear out of Rama with great haste. And to answer your last question, no, this is not a ploy on the part of the crew to avoid compliance with the evacuation order.”
He turned to Admiral Heilmann and handed him the microphone. “Dammit, Otto,” he muttered, “you talk to that bureaucratic nincompoop. He thinks he can command this mission better than we can, even though he’s a hundred million kilometers away.”
“Dr. Maxwell, this is Admiral Heilmann. I am in complete agreement with Dr. Brown. Anyway, we really can’t afford to argue with such long delay times. We are going to proceed with our plan. Cosmonaut Tabori will stay here with me at Beta and pack all the heavy equipment, including the biot. I will coordinate the search. Brown, Sabatini, and des Jardins will cross the ice to New York, the most likely destination if the professor went under his own power. Wakefield, Turgenyev, and Yamanaka will look for him in the helicopters.”
He paused for a moment. “There’s no need for you to respond to this transmission in a hurry. The search will already have begun before your next message will arrive.”
Back in her hut, Nicole very carefully packed her medical supplies. She criticized herself for not foreseeing that Takagishi might try one last time to visit New York. You made another mistake, Nicole said to herself. The least you can do is make certain you “re prepared when you find him.
She knew the personal packing procedure by heart. Nevertheless, she skimped on her own supplies of food and water to ensure that she had whatever an injured or sick Takagishi might need. Nicole had mixed emotions about her two companions on the quest to find the Japanese scientist, but it never occurred to her that the grouping might have been purposely planned. Everyone knew Takagishi’s fascination with New York. Given the circumstances, it was not surprising that Brown and Sabatini were accompanying her to the primary search area.
Just before Nicole left the hut, she saw Richard Wakefield at her door. “May I come in?” he asked.
“Certainly,” she replied.
He walked in with an uncharacteristic uncertainty, as if he were confused or embarrassed. “What is it?” Nicole asked after an awkward silence.
He smiled. “Well,” he said sheepishly, “it seemed like a good idea a few minutes ago. Now it strikes me as a little stupid — maybe even childish.” Nicole noticed he was holding something in his right hand. “I brought you something,” he continued. “A good luck charm, I guess. I thought you might take it with you to New York.”
Cosmonaut Wakefield opened his hand. Nicole recognized the figurine of Prince Hal. “You can say what you will about valor and discretion and all that, but sometimes a little luck is more important.”
Nicole was surprisingly touched. She took the little figurine from Wake-field and studied its intricate detail with admiration. “Does the prince have any special qualities I need to know about?” she asked with a smile.
“Oh yes.” Richard brightened. “He loves to spend witty evenings in pubs with fat knights and other unsavory characters. Or battle renegade dukes and earls. Or court beautiful French princesses.”
Nicole blushed slightly. “If I’m lonely and want the prince to amuse me, what do I do?” she asked.
Richard came over beside Nicole and showed her a tiny keyboard just above Prince Hal’s buttocks. “He’ll respond to many commands!” Richard said, handing her a very small baton the size of a pin. “This will fit perfectly into any of the key slots. Try t for talk or a for action if you want him to show you his stuff.”
Nicole put the little prince and the baton in the pocket of her flight suit. “Thank you, Richard,” she said. “This is very sweet.”
Wakefield was flustered. “Well, you know, it’s no big deal. It’s just that we’ve had a spate of bad luck and I thought, I mean, maybe—”
“Thanks again, Richard,” Nicole interrupted, “I appreciate your concern.” They walked out of her hut together.
34
STRANGE COMPANIONS
Dr. David Brown was the kind of abstract scientist who neither liked nor trusted machines. Most of his published papers were written about theoretical subjects because he abhorred the formality and detail of empirical science. Empiricists had to contend with instrumentation and, even worse, engineers. Dr. Brown considered all engineers to be nothing more than glorified carpenters and plumbers. He tolerated their existence only because some of them were necessary if his theories were ever to be proved by actual data.
When Nicole innocently asked Dr. Brown some simple questions about the workings of the icemobile, Francesca could not restrain a cackle. “He has absolutely no idea,” the Italian journalist responded, “and he couldn’t care less. Would you believe that the man doesn’t even know how to drive an electric cart? I’ve seen him stare at a simple food processing robot for over thirty minutes, trying without success to figure out how to use it. He would starve to death if nobody helped him.”
“Come on, Francesca,” Nicole replied as the two women climbed into the front seat of the icemobile, “he can’t be that bad. After ail, he has to use all the crew computers and communication devices, as well as the image processing system onboard the Newton. So you must be exaggerating.”
The tenor of the conversation was light and harmless. Dr. David Brown slumped in the backseat and heaved a sigh. “Surely you two exceptional women have something more important to discuss. If not, perhaps you could explain to me why a lunatic Japanese scientist takes off from our camp in the middle of the night.”
“According to Maxwell’s assistant, that obsequious cipher named Mills, many people on Earth think our good Japanese doctor was kidnapped by the Ramans.”
“Come on, Francesca. Be serious. Why would Dr. Takagishi decide to strike out on his own?”
“I have an idea,” Nicole said slowly, “that he was impatient with the scheduled exploration process. You know how fervently he believes in the importance of New York. After the Wilson incident… well, he was fairly certain that an evacuation would be ordered. By the time we come back inside, if we come back, the Cylindrical Sea may have melted and it will be more difficult to reach New York.”
Nicole’s natural honesty was urging her to tell Brown and Sabatini about Takagishi’s heart problems. But her intuitive sense told her not to trust her two companions. “He just doesn’t seem like the type to go off half-cocked,” Dr, Brown was saying. “I wonder if he heard or saw something.”
“Maybe he had a headache or couldn’t sleep for some other reason,” Francesca offered. “Reggie Wilson used to prowl around at night when his head was bothering him.”
David Brown leaned forward, “By the way,” he said to Nicole, “Francesca tells me that you think Wilson’s instability might have been exacerbated by the headache pills he was using. You certainly seem to know your drugs. I was extremely impressed by how quickly you identified the particular sleeping pill I had taken.”
“Speaking of drugs,” Francesca added after a short pause. “Janos Tabori mentioned something about a discussion he had with you concerning Borzov’s death. I may not have understood him correctly, but I thought he said that you believe a drug reaction may have been involved.”
They were driving steadily across the ice. The conversation had been even in tone, apparently casual. There was no obvious reason to be suspicious.
Nevertheless, Nicole said to herself as she framed a response to Francesca’s remarks, those last two comments seemed too smooth. Almost practiced. She turned to look at David Brown. She suspected that Francesca could dissemble without effort, but Nicole was certain she would be able to tell from Dr. Brown’s facial expression whether or not their questions were rehearsed. He squirmed slightly under her unblinking gaze.
“Cosmonaut Tabori and I were having a conversation about General Borzov and we started speculating about what might have caused his pain!” Nicole said blandly. “After all, his appendix was perfectly healthy, so something else must have been responsible for his acute discomfort. In the course of our conversation, I mentioned to Janos that an adverse drug reaction should be considered as one possible cause. It was not a very strong statement.”
Dr. Brown seemed relieved and immediately changed the subject. However, Nicole’s statement had not satisfied Francesca. Unless I am mistaken, our lady journalist has more questions, Nicole mused. But she isn’t going to ask them right now. She watched Francesca and could tell that the Italian woman was not paying attention to Dr. Brown’s monologue in the backseat. While he was discussing the reaction on Earth to Wilson’s death, Francesca was deep in thought-There was a momentary quiet after Brown finished his commentary. Nicole glanced around her at the miles of ice, the imposing cliffs on the sides of the Cylindrical Sea, and the skyscrapers of New York in front of her. Rama was a glorious world. She had a momentary pang of guilt about her distrust of Francesca and Dr. Brown. It’s a shame that we humans are never able to pull in the same direction, Nicole said to herself. Not even when confronted by infinity.
“I can’t imagine how you have managed it,” Francesca said, suddenly breaking the silence. She had turned to address Nicole. “Even after all this time, not even the tabloid videos have a legitimate lead. And it doesn’t take a genius to figure out when it must have occurred.”
Dr. Brown was completely lost. “What in the world are you talking about?” he asked.
“Our famous life science officer,” Francesca replied. “Don’t you find it fascinating that after all this time, the identity of her daughter’s father is still unknown to the public?”
“Signora Sabatini,” Nicole said immediately, switching to Italian, “as I told you once before, this subject is none of your business. I will not tolerate this kind of intrusion into my private affairs—”
“I just wanted to remind you, Nicole!” Francesca interrupted quickly, also in Italian, “that you have secrets you might not want exposed.”
David Brown stared blankly at the two women. He had not understood a word in the last exchange and was confused by the obvious tension. “So, David,” Francesca said in a patronizing tone, “you were telling us about the mood on Earth. Do you think we’re going to be ordered home? Or are we merely going to abort this particular sortie?”
“The COG Executive Council has been called into special session for later this week,” he answered after a puzzled hesitation. “Dr. Maxwell’s current guess is that we will be told to abandon the project.”
“That would be a typical overreaction from a group of government officials whose primary objective has always been to minimize the downside risk. For the first time in history, adequately prepared human beings are exploring the interior of a vehicle built by another intelligence. Yet on Earth, the politicians continue to act as if nothing unusual has happened. They are incapable of vision. It’s amazing.”
Nicole des Jardins did not listen to the rest of Francesca’s conversation with Dr. Brown. Her mind was still focused on their earlier exchange. She must think I have proof about the drugs in Borzov, Nicole said to herself. There’s no other possible explanation for the threat
When they reached the edge of the ice, Francesca spent ten minutes setting up the robot camera and sound equipment for a sequence showing the three of them preparing to search the alien city for their missing colleague. Nicole’s complaints to Dr. Brown about the waste of time went unheeded. She did, however, make the fact that she was annoyed obvious by refusing to participate in the video sequence. While Francesca was completing her preparations, Nicole climbed the nearby stairway and studied the amazing city of skyscrapers. Behind and below her, Nicole could hear Francesca invoking the drama of the moment for the millions of viewers back on Earth.
“Here I stand on the outskirts of the mysterious island city of New York. It was near this very spot that Dr. Takagishi, Cosmonaut Wakefield, and I heard some strange sounds earlier this week. We have reason to suspect that New York may have been the professor�
�s destination when he took off from Beta campsite last night to do some solitary and unauthorized exploration…
“What has happened to the professor? Why does he not respond when called on the commpak? Yesterday we witnessed a terrible tragedy when journalist Reggie Wilson, risking his own life to save this reporter, was trapped inside the rover and was unable to escape the powerful claws of the crab biots. Has a similar fate befallen our Rama expert? Did the extraterrestrials who built this amazing vehicle eons ago perhaps create a sophisticated trap designed to subdue and ultimately destroy any unsuspecting visitors? We don’t know for certain. But we…”
From her vantage point on top of the wall, Nicole tried to ignore Francesca and imagine in what direction Dr. Takagishi might have gone. She consulted the maps stored in her pocket computer. He would have gone toward the exact geometrical center of the city, she concluded. He was certain there was meaning in the geometry.
35
INTO THE PIT
They had walked the bewildering maze of streets for only twenty minutes, but they would have already been hopelessly lost without their personal navigators. They had no thorough plan for the search. They simply wandered up and down streets in a quasi-random pattern. Every three or four minutes there would be another transmission from Admiral Heilmann to Dr. Brown and the search party would have to look for a location where the signal strength was satisfactory.
“At this rate,” Nicole remarked as once again they faintly heard Otto Heilmann’s voice on the communicator, “our search is going to take forever Dr. Brown, why don’t you just stay in one spot? Then Francesca and I—”
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