‘Please, Mary… That’s not fair.’
She shook her head and turned away, went to the windows and came back, started walking to and fro in agitation, her hands slapping her thighs.
‘He was a scientist,’ she said. ‘He wasn’t cut out to be a detective. He studied physics at Berkeley, designed nuclear reactors, worked for NASA and the American Nuclear Society, had an entry in Who’s Who. My husband was a fine man – an intelligent and decent man – then you involved him in your UFOs, in your speculations and intrigues, and he fell for it and became obsessed with it and paid the full price. Do you know what it was like watching him? Seeing him crack and fall apart? Can you possibly understand what it’s like to see your husband go down that way?’
‘He was frightened,’ Epstein said.
‘Damned right, he was frightened. You and your damned institute, your associates, you frightened him to death.’
‘It wasn’t us,’ Epstein protested.
‘It was you,’ Mary said. She stopped pacing and just stood there, looking accusingly at him, her brown eyes bright with tears.
‘Damn you,’ she said.
Epstein had to look away, his gaze roaming around the dark room, taking in the familiar paintings, the furniture and ornaments, all the items he had seen through the years that he had visited this place. Those days were gone now. They had gone with Irving’s death. It couldn’t ever be the same again – not for him, not for Mary. Epstein shivered with grief and rage that matched the woman’s. He wanted to reach out and console her, but he didn’t dare touch her.
‘I saw it coming,’ Mary said. ‘It had been coming a long time. He wasn’t able to fighting his old friends and it tore him apart. I saw it back in 1968, during the House Science and Astronautics Committee Symposium, when he stood up and stated that he had come over to your side and now believed in the existence of the UFOs. He should never have done that.’
Epstein didn’t respond. There was nothing he could say. He simply had to let her talk it out, no matter how much it hurt him. Knowing this, he just sat there, watching her carefully with his tired eyes, as she paced to and fro across the room, from darkness to moonlight.
‘It was after that,’ she said. ‘That was when it began. He believed in it all, gave lectures and interviews, and then, when he started losing his credibility, he simply had to believe it. Why not indeed? It was all he had left. First, he was a senior physicist at the University of Arizona, next thing he was a member of your institute, another crank chasing UFOs… You think I’m being cruel? Well, so be it. As far as I’m concerned, he fell in with a bunch of scientific quacks and was ridiculed for it.’
‘You don’t believe that,’ Epstein said.
‘Yes, damn you, I believe it. Irving was a physicist, a man of some authority, but then, when he championed your cause, he lost everything… Everything!’ She almost chocked on the last word, actually had to catch her breath, then she blinked repeatedly, looking dazed, and slumped into her chair. ‘Jesus Christ, I feel ill,’ she said.
Epstein flinched when she wept again, felt himself recoil with shame, averting his gaze when she reached for her handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes. He thought briefly of Irving, of his passion for the truth, of how that passion had led him inexorably into the UFO controversy. Epstein hadn’t seduced him. Irving had joined of his own accord. And then, as had happened to so many, something happened to Irving… Epstein thought about it briefly, tried to cast it from his mind, and looked up, feeling pained and confused, to see Mary’s dark eyes.
‘It was you,’ Mary said. ‘I don’t want you to forget that. If it hadn’t been for you and your institute, he would still be alive.’
She burst into tears again, bent over in the chair, moonlight falling on the back of her head as she shook it from side to side. Her sobbing was loud and wracked, filled with pain and despair, and she pressed both hands to her face as if to blot out the truth. Epstein sat there, saying nothing, too stricken to offer sympathy, deeply wounded by what she had said, wondering how he could live with it. Then she sobbed even louder, her body shaking in a fever, so he stood up and went to her chair, bent down to her, embraced her.
‘Oh, God!’ she sobbed brokenly. ‘It’s a lie! It’s all a lie! It’s tearing me apart and I can’t take it and I have to strike out. It wasn’t you, Frederick – I know it wasn’t you – God, it’s all such a mess!’ She pressed her face to his thigh, her tears flowing, head shaking, holding on to him as if he might vanish and leave her with nothing. Then she looked up at him, her face pale and distraught, and he saw the brown, luminous eyes, stunned with incomprehension. ‘What was it?’ she sobbed. ‘How did it happen? Was it me? Was it me?’
He lowered himself to his knees beside her, held her face in his hands, gently shook her head from side to side, murmuring words he would not recall. Eventually, she calmed a little, wiped her eyes dry, sighed, sinking slowly back into her chair, staring up at the ceiling.
‘No,’ Epstein said. ‘It wasn’t you. It had nothing to do with you.’
‘It was suicide,’ she whispered.
‘It wasn’t suicide,’ Epstein said. ‘Irving wasn’t the type to commit suicide. We both know that’s a fact.’
‘Then what…?’ She shook her head from side to side. ‘I just don’t understand… Why on earth…? Who would want to…?’ She shook her head again, bit her lower lip. ‘I don’t understand!’
Epstein sighed and stood up, disappeared into the darkness, returned with two glasses of bourbon and handed one to her. She took it gratefully and drank it down, gasped for breath, put her head back, stared up at him as if not quite awake, moonlight touching her pale face. Epstein sipped at his own drink, looking thoughtful, undecided, then he sat in his chair and stared at her, speaking quietly, convincingly.
‘Listen to me,’ he said. ‘I didn’t encourage Irving to join the institute. He wrote to me and suggested we work together. In fact, Irving had been privately interested in the UFOs from about 1955, and the 1965 wave had merely strengthened his growing conviction that the phenomenon had definite scientific importance. Irving never officially joined the institute; his only connection was that he would trade information with us and help us by proxy with his specialized knowledge. It is true that he visited us in Washington DC a few times, and that by the time he had gone through our files he had become convinced of the reality of the phenomenon. But I repeat: Irving did all of this on his own – not because we encouraged him.’
Mary studied him carefully, her eyes illuminated in moonlight, the rest of her face in deep shadow, darkness swimming around her. She seemed calmer now, more thoughtful, alert, and she studied Epstein’s face as if whether deciding to talk or keep silent. The tension between them was palpable, filled with doubt and recrimination, but eventually she sighed and leaned forward and gave him her glass.
‘I need another,’ she said.
Epstein nodded and stood up, disappeared into the darkness, returning with two glasses of bourbon and handing her one of them. She didn’t say anything, simply turned the glass around, watched the moonlight flash on and off it like tumbling diamonds. Epstein sat down again, crossed his legs, sipped his drink, determined not to push her too hard, to let her take her own time. Finally she drank some bourbon, licked her moist upper lip, then sank wearily back into her chair, lost in shadow once more.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘What do you want to know?’
‘I want to know what frightened Irving,’ Epstein said. ‘Or what you think might have frightened him.’
Mary shook her head and sighed. ‘God,’ she said, ‘I don’t know. At least, I’m not very sure. It just seems too ridiculous.’
‘Ridiculous?’
‘Yes, ridiculous. He never really told me what frightened him. I can only make guesses.’
She leaned slightly forward, elbows resting on her knees, the moonlight falling over her head and glinting off the small bourbon glass.
‘You’ve heard of Dr James E.
McDonald?’
‘Of course,’ Epstein said.
‘Then you’ll know that McDonald was once at the University of Arizona, senior physicist in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences and a leading proponent of the extraterrestrial hypothesis.’
‘Yes,’ Epstein said. ‘It’s common knowledge.’
‘Okay. Now Irving certainly didn’t agree with all of McDonald’s theories, but he did respect McDonald enormously for his courage in putting forward his unpopular opinions. Indeed, if anyone may be said to have influenced Irving, McDonald would have to be that man.’
‘So?’
Mary shrugged. ‘Back in 1967, when the Condon Committee was being set up, McDonald was on a visit to the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, when he accidentally saw the classified version of the 2953 Robertson Panel report. McDonald was shocked to discover that the CIA had had a large hand in the report, and that the classified version of the report, apart from deliberately ignoring some of the most positive UFO sightings, had secretly recommended what amounted to a national brain-washing program and a complete coverup of official UFO investigations. So, in early 1967, after seeing the classified version of this report, McDonald linked the Air Force’s notorious secrecy policies to the CIA and, on the same day that the Air Force announced the establishment of the Condon Committee, made this controversial information public. Naturally, Irving – who had widespread connections with the scientific community and the media – helped him in this. And from that day on, both he and McDonald became loudly vocal critics of the Air Force and the CIA.’
‘Are you trying to tell me that Irving was frightened of the CIA?’
Mary shrugged again, sighed heavily, gazed around her, the bourbon glass resting on one knee, her free hand lightly stroking it.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I think he was certainly worried about it. I think that by this time he was beginning to understand that you couldn’t wade too deep in those waters. You know, McDonald was in the forefront of all this, and Irving was well aware of what was happening to McDonald. McDonald attacked the Air Force and the CIA relentlessly, and by 1969 the word was out that those organizations wanted to silence him. Whether this was true or not, it was certainly pretty obvious that McDonald was not having an easy time. The major defenders of the Air Force’s attitudes toward UFOs were Harvard astronomer and author Donald Menzel, and Philip Klass, avionics editor of Aviation Week. Menzel had repeatedly explained most of the sightings – including the famous Washington DC sightings – as reflections, mirages, ice crystals floating in clouds, or the results of refraction and temperature inversion. On the other hand, Klass, a man fervently opposed to the extraterrestrial hypothesis and particularly opposed to McDonald, continually tried to ridicule McDonald and put forward his own theory that all UFO sightings were due to coronal discharges in the atmosphere. Anyway, McDonald tore these theories to shreds and made himself a couple more enemies. According to McDonald, Klass tried to ruin him by telling the Office of Naval Research that he, McDonald, had used Navy funds on a trip to Australia to study UFOs, This caused a hell of a scandal and led to the Navy sending an auditor to look at McDonald’s contract and expenditure. The Navy found nothing to pin on McDonald, but it still caused McDonald embarrassment and gave him a lot of problems with the university administration. Then, as McDonald continued to expose Air Force and CIA shenanigans, things grew progressively worse for him. More and more professional ridicule was heaped on him, until, in 1971, the House Committee on Appropriations called him to testify about the SST supersonic transport plane. During his testimony, he was constantly mocked as the man who saw little green men flying around in the sky. McDonald’s work on the SST was his last project. In June 1971, at the age of fifty-one, he drove himself into the desert and shot himself in the head – exactly like Irving.’
Mary suddenly shivered and shook her head from side to side, a clenched fist going to her mouth as if to stifle a sob. She took a deep breath and sank back, her face disappearing in darkness, then the glass of bourbon glinted in the moonlight as she had a stiff drink. There was silence for a long time. A clock ticked on the wall. Epstein hadn’t heard the ticking before and it made him feel strange.
‘Do you think there’s a connection?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Mary said. ‘It just seems too ridiculous. But I do know that Irving thought about it… and it certainly frightened him.’
‘Why?’
‘Oh… various things.’ The glass came down from her lips to rest on a knee, her fingers curving lightly around it, her wedding ring glinting. ‘You know, some strange things have happened to a lot of people involved with UFOs – accidents, suicides, the loss of formerly strong careers – and Irving started taking an interest in such cases. This was shortly after Dr McDonald’s suicide – and also after Irving had started his heavy drinking.’
‘The drinking was really bad?’
‘Yes, very bad. I’d never known him to drink before, but then he started to drown in it.’ She shivered again, shook her head in a dreamy manner, raised the glass to her lips and had a sip, sighing deeply, forlornly. ‘Irving was particularly fascinated by the career of Captain Edward Ruppelt, who headed the Air Force’s UFO investigations from 1951 to 1953. According to Irving, Ruppelt was the best man the Air Force ever used during their twenty years of UFO investigations; however, during his three years as head of Project Blue Book, Ruppelt became increasingly convinced that the UFOs were real and of extraterrestrial origin, and that the Air Force was antagonistic to such a hypothesis. According to Irving, this was why, when the Robertson Panel submitted its formal conclusions to the CIA, the Pentagon and the higher echelons of the Air Force, the CIA refused to give a copy to Ruppelt and his staff. And from that point on, Ruppelt, who was critical of the whole Robertson Panel, found the ground being cut from under his feet. Apparently Ruppelt had been determined to mount a full-scale UFO investigation but faced a lot of opposition from the Pentagon, until, by mid-1953, the Blue Book staff had been stripped down to a total of only three people: Ruppelt and two assistants. Consequently, Ruppelt left Blue Book permanently in August of that year, went to work as a research engineer for the Northrop Aircraft Company, and also wrote his famous book on UFOs.’
‘The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects.’
‘Right. Now what bothered Irving about this case was the fact that Ruppelt’s book was a forthright attack on the Air Force’s handling of the UFO phenomenon and a plea for a more honest and intensive investigation of it. Obviously, Ruppelt was a believer… Yet in 1959, three years after he had first published his book, Ruppelt revised it, totally reversed his previous stand, and stated in the new edition that UFOs as a unique phenomenon did not exist. One year later he died of an unexpected heart attack.’
Mary finished off her bourbon, placed the glass on the floor, and leaned forward until her face was back in the moonlight, her brown eyes large and misty.
‘Irving was bothered by the case,’ she said. ‘He couldn’t understand Ruppelt’s reversal. He investigated the case thoroughly, interviewed a lot of people, but couldn’t really come up with anything conclusive. There was the possibility that Ruppelt had just become fed up with it, with the constant controversy that surrounded the subject, with the media and the crackpots who hounded him night and day. A possibility. A thin one. Certainly Irving could never accept this as an answer, and he never stopped pondering the riddle. Possibly because of this, he became involved with a similar case: that of Dr Morris Jessup, the noted astronomer and selenographer.’
‘I thought he was a crackpot,’ Epstein said.
‘Well, he may or may not have been. In his defense, it’s worth noting that he was a teacher of astronomy and mathematics at the University of Michigan and a researcher whose work led to the discovery of thousands of binary stars. In short, Jessup was an astronomer of considerable repute – until he became obsessed with the UFOs. Apparently, once that started, his ideas became a lit
tle crazier, more speculative and bizarre, some derivative, but others strikingly original. As Irving frequently said, this wasn’t all that unusual: a lot of people who developed an interest in UFOs tended to turn pretty strange. Anyway… Irving was interested in Jessup because Jessup had been conducting investigations into possible Naval experiments with field forces that could temporarily dematerialize matter or somehow make it invisible. While this sounded pretty crazy to me – a sort of Flash Gordon fantasy – it interested Irving in the sense that he often felt that the UFOs might work on just such a principle. So… Dr Jessup had been investigating what had been known in books, magazines and various scientific journals as the Philadelphia Experiment.’
‘I know about it,’ Epstein interjected. ‘Allegedly, during 1943, the United States Navy conducted a series of tests at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, at Norfolk-Newport News, Virginia, and at sea to the north of the Bermuda Triangle. Reportedly the experiment was at least partially successful, the ship used being the USS Eldridge, and its disappearance allegedly being seen from the decks of the Liberty ship SS Andrew and a cargo ship, SS Malay. Reportedly, after disappearing, the Eldridge reappeared at its berth in Norfolk, then mysteriously turned up at its original dock in the Philadelphia Navy Yard. And according to other unsubstantiated reports, some of the crew died, many had to be hospitalized, and more than a few had gone mad.’
Mary nodded agreement. ‘As I said, Irving was interested in this because he through that the seemingly incredible materialization and dematerialization of UFOs might somehow be based on unusual, controlled magnetic conditions in which the attraction between molecules could be altered temporarily to cause the transmutation or transference of matter.’
‘A sort of space-time machine.’
‘Exactly. Matter simply dematerializes and materializes elsewhere
– hey presto! Space and time don’t exist.’
GENESIS (Projekt Saucer) Page 8