He slowed the car down, pointing his finger at murky lights, turning into the sleepy suburb of Nassau Bay and cruising along its empty streets. There were lights on in the houses, silhouettes framed by windows, the lights beaming out and falling on neat lawns, the shrubbery bent by the wind. Stanford cruised for some time, studying the left side of the road, straining to see through the clouds of dust and muttering under his breath.
‘That’s it,’ he said eventually, pulling over to the right, stopping the car on a gravel drive that fronted a chalet-styled charcoal-brown house. He killed the engine and switched the lights off, opened the door and slipped out; Epstein followed him and joined him on the porch as he was pressing the doorbell. They heard the sounds of revelry inside, a lot of laughing and shouting. Stanford pressed the bell again, looking angry and impatient. The man who opened the door was flushed with alcohol, his bloodshot eyes blinking and settling on Stanford, opening wide with surprise. Her had a half finished drink in his right hand.
‘Oh, Christ!’ he said softly.
‘We had an appointment,’ Stanford said.
The man seemed reluctant to open the door farther, his shoulder leaning against it.
‘Get out of here,’ he said.
‘Let us in,’ Stanford said.
‘I can’t talk to you, Stanford. Go away. I’ve got people in here.’
‘Your buddies from the MSC?’
‘That’s right,’ Armstrong said. ‘It’s a private party, Stanford. I can’t talk now. Just get the hell out of here.’ He started to shut the door, but Stanford stopped it with his foot.
‘We’ve come a long way,’ he said. ‘We came just to see you. You said you had something to tell us – now you’re slamming the door. What the hell’s going on?’
‘Nothing,’ Armstrong said.
‘Then let us in,’ Stanford repeated.
‘I can’t,’ Armstrong said. ‘It’s a private party. For Christ’s sake, get out of here.’
‘I love parties,’ Stanford said.
‘You can’t come in, Stanford.’
‘Why not? What the hell are you worried about? I’ve been in there before.’
‘You know damned well why not.’
‘You brought us out here,’ Stanford said.
‘I said I’d meet you at the MSC.’
‘You weren’t there,’ Stanford said.
A burst of laughter from inside, more shouting, someone singing. Armstrong glanced nervously over his shoulder, then looked back at Stanford.
‘Godammit,’ he said.
‘What’s going on, Armstrong. How come you suddenly throw a private party instead of meeting us as planned?’
‘It just happened,’ Armstrong said.
‘That’s bullshit,’ Stanford said. ‘You threw that party because you didn’t want us to come here and find you alone. You don’t want to talk. You’re frightened of something. You were going to tell me something and now you’re scared shitless. I want to know why.’
‘I’ll give you a call,’ Armstrong said.
‘I don’t want a goddamned call. I’m not leaving here until I know what’s happening, so you’d better start talking.’
‘Give me a break, for Christ’s sake!’
‘Why?’ Stanford said.
‘I’ve got the CIA on my back.’
‘We’re coming in,’ Stanford said.
He started to push his way in, but Armstrong resisted him, glancing nervously back into the house and wiping his lips with a jittery hand. Then he looked back at Stanford. ‘Okay, okay!’ he whispered, stepping outside and closing the door behind him. He was a small man, potbellied, his hair thinning and turning gray; he glanced back over his shoulder, at the closed door behind him, then he turned reluctantly into the howling wind and spoke directly to Stanford.
‘This is the last time,’ he said. ‘I won’t talk anymore. Don’t ask me why – I won’t tell you – but this is the last time.’
‘You mentioned the CIA.’
‘No, I didn’t,’ Armstrong said. ‘Remember that: I didn’t say a word. I didn’t mention the CIA.’
‘Okay,’ Stanford said, ‘I never heard it.’
‘Good,’ Armstrong said. ‘Now listen carefully to the rest of this and don’t ever forget it. You don’t call me anymore. You understand that, Stanford? What I say to you tonight is the end. I’ll only talk on those terms.’
‘Christ, Armstrong, we’re old friends!’
‘Shut up. There’s something else… This conversation never happened. The last time we talked was on the phone, a couple of hours ago. We haven’t spoken since then. We never had this meeting.’
They stood facing one another, the dust sweeping across between them, the wind shaking the wooden railings of the porch. Epstein said nothing, feeling embarrassed and guilty, ashamed of his complicity in this bullying, avoiding Armstrong’s frightened eyes.
‘It’s a deal,’ Stanford said.
‘Okay,’ Armstrong said. He licked his lips and nodded, glancing nervously left and right, ascertaining that there was no one else on the porch, seeing only the swirling dust. He was still holding his drink, a half empty glass of bourbon, and he finished it off and wiped his lips and looked directly at Stanford.
‘There’s a flap on,’ he said. ‘It’s a very big flap. In fact, it’s the biggest flap we’ve ever had and that place is bananas. It all started about three hours ago. We received some calls from our pilots. They reported seeing unidentifieds over the Gulf of Mexico, traveling in a northerly direction at incredible speeds. These objects were silvery lights. The pilots refused to comment further. The sightings occurred an hour before sunset and continued till darkness. Meanwhile, we were getting radar lock-ons. These lock-ons located the unidentifieds not over the Gulf of Mexico, but over a local farmer’s ranch. According to the radar, something enormous had come from the direction of the Gulf of Mexico, circled around at forty thousand feet over the Manned Spacecraft Center, and then descended as three separate blips over the ranch. These objects went off the scopes when they entered the radar’s ground clutter.’
Armstrong glanced about him, left and right along the porch, his gaze wandering to the far side of the street as if searching for someone. There was no one in the street. The storm was keeping them all inside. Armstrong spat dust from his mouth and rubbed his eyes and then squinted at Stanford.
‘We were going to scramble some jets,’ he said, ‘but just as we gave the order this dust storm blew up out of nowhere. That effectively grounded the jets – the winds over the airstrip were incredible – but we still kept getting lots of unidentifieds. These reports were coming in by telephone from other radar stations located at White Sands, Los Alamos and the whole Gulf of Mexico area – and then, according to our own radar readings, the unidentifieds were suddenly right above us. Naturally, because of the dust storm, we still couldn’t scramble the jets, so we just had to sit there and tear our hair out. Then, about half an hour before I called you, the three objects above the ranch reappeared on the radarscopes, merged until they became one, and this single, much bigger object started flying toward the Manned Spacecraft Center, doing no more than thirty miles an hour.’
‘Thirty miles an hour?’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘That’s impossible.’
‘You bet.’
‘And it wasn’t just a weather balloon, being blown horizontally by the storm?’
‘No, Stanford, it wasn’t.’
The sounds of the party continued inside, growing louder each minute. Armstrong listened at the door, nodded his head in satisfaction, then glanced again along the porch, his bloodshot eyes shifting nervously.
‘We all went outside,’ he said. ‘We observed this thing flying over us. It was flying above the storm, but it was pitch black out there, so all we could see were its lights. The lights were multicolored and formed a perfect circle. They were hazy in the darkness. There were no visible features to measure them against, b
ut that circle of lights looked enormous… The object must have been a few hundred feet up, but it still looked enormous… It just glided right over us, hardly moving at all, then it went off in an easterly direction and its lights abruptly blinked out. When we went back inside, there were unidentifieds all over the radarscopes.’
Taking a deep breath, Armstrong gazed up at the sky to see nothing but a curtain of dust. He shook his head disbelievingly from side to side and started talking again.
‘Shortly after that sighting we received a call from the local sheriff, telling us to get out to the ranch. Bearing in mind what we had seen, we complied immediately and soon received a phone call from our boys. No need to recount the message – you’ve already been out there – but when our boys found out what was happening, the MSC intelligence promptly ordered us all off the base. Naturally, we were furious. We wanted to know what was going on. What we were told was that we hadn’t seen or heard anything, that loose talk could lead to trouble for us, and that we were to go to our homes and remain there until further notice. That’s why we’re all here. That’s why I can’t talk to you again. What happened out there is unprecedented – and we’re all pretty scared.’
‘The CIA?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘Right. You didn’t say it. Just tell me about that field of gutted cattle. Where does that fit in?’
‘I don’t know,’ Armstrong said. ‘Swear to God, I don’t know. All I know is that it’s happened before – all over the country.’
‘One of your men said it was a bunch of local crazies, but I can’t really buy that.’
‘One final thing, Stanford, and that’s it… I won’t talk anymore.’
‘Okay, one last thing.’
‘It wasn’t a bunch of local crazies. That wasn’t amateurish butchery. Whatever the reason for the butchery, it was done with a frightening efficiency. Those animals were killed with an unknown nerve gas, they were sliced up with tools that must have been razorsharp; and their tongues and their eyes, their genitals and their udders, were removed with a surgical precision and then spirited away. Don’t ask me why. It doesn’t make any sense to me. But those animals were slaughtered by a bunch of nutters – they were professionally butchered.’
‘The decontamination unit?’
‘The area’s radioactive. That’s why coyotes and buzzards won’t touch the carcasses. It’s always the same.’
‘The old rancher and his daughter?’
‘That’s as far as I go, Stanford. That’s it. I’m not saying another damned word. Don’t ever call me again.’
Armstrong opened the door, started into the house, hesitated, and then turned back to face them, his gaze fixed on Stanford.
‘We’re old friends,’ he said, ‘so I’ll give you some advice. Don’t go back to that ranch. I warn you, don’t be tempted. Whatever you do, don’t go back there. It’s not worth the trouble.’
He stepped into the house and slammed the door shut. Stanford stood there, his gaze fixed on the closed door, then he turned to Epstein, shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, stepped down to the dark gravel driveway and walked back to his car. Epstein followed him automatically, feeling dazed and exhausted, fighting against the howling wind and dust, wondering how this would end. Once in the car, he stared at Stanford, now pale and too tense. Stanford angrily started the car, drove out into the road, and turned back the way they had come, looking determined.
‘I’m going back there,’ he said.
‘To the MSC?’ Epstein asked.
‘No,’ Stanford said. ‘To the ranch.’
‘Oh, my God,’ Epstein murmured.
He put his head back on the seat, closed his eyes and welcomed the darkness, silently cursing the wind and the dust and the night’s teeming mysteries. He kept his eyes closed, refusing to look outside the car, letting the anger take hold of him and shake him back to wakefulness. He then thought of the butchered cattle, of the old rancher and his daughter, of the lights in the sky and the guards at the MSC, of Armstrong’s reluctance to talk and Stanford’s subsequent fury. Something odd was definitely happening. It was causing widespread panic and confusion. He and Stanford had been lied to, locked out and warned off; the events of the night were being suppressed and that meant they were real.
Epstein coughed and muttered an oath, opened his eyes to look at Stanford, saw his profile silhouetted in the window, the storm raging beyond him. Stanford’s normal good humor had finally deserted him. He had never looked so cold. The wind and dust were pummeling the car, but he just kept on driving.
Eventually, they turned off the road, went along the familiar track, passed the flatlands that stretched into the darkness on both sides, and stopped near the crest of the hill that led down to the ranch. Stanford killed his headlights and they both stared straight ahead. A ghostly light formed a huge fan in the sky beyond the crest of the hill.
‘What the hell…?’ Stanford said.
After glancing quizzically at Epstein, he opened his door and slipped out, letting the wind sweep the dust through the car. Epstein coughed to clear his throat, covering his eyes with his hands, then he followed Stanford out of the car, into the storm’s awful fury.
The storm seemed to be worse than ever, much louder, more violent, the dust lashing their faces with remarkable strength. They had to force themselves forward, shielding their eyes with their hands, stooped over as if pushing against a wall, being pummeled from side to side. Epstein felt suffocated, dazed, slightly frightened; he saw Stanford on the hill, his clothes flapping about him, silhouetted in the large fan of light that split the darkness ahead. Epstein struggled up to him, reached out to grab his shoulder, and they stood there, neither saying a word, looking down on the ranch.
The area surrounding the ranch was floodlit, filled with trucks and armed troopers, some of the soldiers wearing protective masks and goggles, staring up at the sky. Other soldiers were hard at work, crouched low and gesticulating, hammering posts into the ground and running barbed wire along them, erecting a fence that ran right around the ranch in an enormous rectangle. The lights in the ranch were on. The wind howled and hurled sand over all and made the whole scene unreal.
‘Jesus Christ!’ Stanford said. ‘Do you see that? They’re being fenced in!’
‘Damn them,’ Epstein responded, surprised by the extent of his own rage. ‘They won’t get away with this.’
‘They’re carrying weapons and scanning the sky,’ Stanford said. ‘They must be looking for something.’
Epstein suddenly exploded, his throttled anger breaking loose; he smacked the palm of one hand with his fist and turned back to the car. The wind lashed him, tugged at him, tried to throw him to the ground, as he cursed and shouted against the storm.
‘Damn them!’ he shouted. ‘They won’t get away with this! We’ve been given the runaround too often, but the buck stops right here. I want to know about this, Stanford! I want to know about
all of it! I want the Air Force checked out. I want the facts on the CIA. I want to know what’s been happening all these years and why they’re keeping it secret. The Air Force say they’re not involved. The CIA say the same. They’re both lying and now we have the proof, so let’s find out the truth. You understand, Stanford? It’s time to stop playing around! I want to know what’s been going on, I want the facts, not their fiction, and I want to take those facts and break them down and tear this whole thing apart!’
He stopped shouting and stared at Stanford. His friend was gazing up at the sky. Epstein suddenly realized that it was quiet, that the fierce wind was dying. Startled, he looked around him: the billowing sand was settling down, spiraling gently, drifting languidly on all sides in the stark, abrupt silence. Epstein couldn’t believe it. He looked up at the sky. He saw the dust clouds thinning out, the moon and stars reappearing, the soft moonlight illuminating the flatlands and the parched, shivering trees.
Epstein stared down at the ranch. The dust no longer obscured
the porch. The girl was standing there and sucking her thumb, gazing up at the sky. Everyone was gazing up. The soldiers had switched off the floodlights. They were standing around the house, clearly visible in the moonlight, neither moving nor making a sound, just staring up at the night sky.
‘There they go,’ Stanford said.
Epstein followed Stanford’s gaze. He saw the three lights in the sky. They were very high up, very small, very bright, one of them the size of a dime, the other two even smaller. Epstein observed them, mesmerized. He felt Stanford’s presence beside him. The lights formed a perfect triangle, climbing vertically, moving slowly, each composed of a luminous outer layer that surrounded a darker core. Epstein felt his heart pounding. He couldn’t tear his eyes away. The two smaller lights changed, glowing brighter, accelerating, then they raced with a silent, serene grace toward the large light above them. The three lights merged together, became one, a brilliant star, then the star flared up and shot off to the south and disappeared almost instantly.
Stanford looked down at the ranch. He saw the girl on the porch. She was bathed in the moonlight, her dress fluttering against her legs, her feet bare, her thumb still in her mouth, her eyes fixed on the sky. Then she turned in his direction. She appeared to be staring directly at him. Stanford shivered and looked at Epstein, shivered again and shook his head, then they both returned silently to the car and headed back toward Galveston.
‘I’ll find out,’ Stanford said.
Chapter Ten
Richard sat up straight in the hard wooden chair and stared nervously at the window beyond the desk. The desk was long and solid, its surface badly scarred, supporting a telephone and a couple of empty trays, all covered in dust. The window was equally dusty, one of its panes badly cracked, now vibrating from the traffic that inched along Tottenham Court Road, London. Richard sat there for five minutes. It seemed longer than that. He was still studying the window, watching the rain splash on the glass, when the door behind him suddenly opened and then slammed shut.
GENESIS (Projekt Saucer) Page 16