Our Children's Children (16 page)

They went back beyond the circle of light, pulled three chairs together and sat down.

“Now suppose you tell me,” Wilson said, “what this is all about.”

“We had thought,” said Gale, “that the proceeds from these stones, wisely marketed, could compensate in part some of the actual costs that helping us entails. Not one government, not one people, but all the governments and all the peoples of the Earth. Putting the proceeds into a fund, perhaps, and once all the stones are sold, allocating the monies in proportion to the actual costs involved.”

“In that case.…”

“I anticipate your question. Why were the stones not divided and offered each government involved? There are two reasons this was not done. The more people who are involved, the greater the possibility that the news would leak out. Our only chance was to keep the number who knew of it at a minimum. Among us there are not more than six who know. Here, you are the only one so far. There is, as well, the matter of trust. On the basis of history, we knew there were few governments we could trust—actually, only two, you and the British. On the basis of our study, we decided on the United States. There had been some feeling the United Nations should be the organization entrusted with the gems. But, quite frankly, we had little confidence in the UN. I was supposed to hand the stones to the President. I decided against this when I realized how many problems he had weighing on his mind, how he was forced to depend upon the judgment of so many people.”

“I know only one thing,” said Wilson. “You can't keep on carrying this case around with you. You have to be placed under security until it has been put into some safe place. Fort Knox, probably, if the government is willing to accept it.”

“You mean, Mr. Wilson, that I'll have to be placed under guard. I'm not sure I like that.”

“Christ, I don't know,” said Wilson. “I don't even know where to begin.”

He reached for the phone and dialed. “Jane, you still on duty? Do you know—has the President retired?'.'

“An hour ago,” said Jane.

“Good,” said Wilson. “He should have long before then.”

“Is it important, Steve? He left orders if there was anything important that he should be called.”

“No, this can wait. Do you think you can get hold of Jerry Black?”

“I'll try. I think he's still around.”

The room was silent except for the teletypes. Gale and Alice sat unstirring in their chairs. Light still shone beneath the press lounge doors, but there was no sound of typing.

“We're sorry to upset you so,” Alice said to Wilson. “But we were at out wits' ends. We didn't know what to do.”

“It's all right,” said Wilson.

“You don't know how much this means to us,” she said. “The rest of the people may not know till later, but we'll know. That we did not come as beggars. That we paid our way. That's important to us.”

Footsteps came down the corridor and turned in at the door.

“What's going on, Steve?” asked Jerry Black.

“We need a couple of men,” said Wilson.

“I'm one of them,” said Black. “I can find another.”

“It'll be a favor,” said Wilson. “I have no jurisdiction. I'm acting on my own. It'll be until tomorrow morning, as soon as I can see the President.”

“It's OK,” said. Black, “if it's for the President.”

“I think,” said Wilson, “that it might be for him.”

“All right,” said Black. “What is it?”

“Mr. Gale has an attaché case. I won't tell you what is in it. You wouldn't want to know. But it's important. And I want him to keep it—him and no one else. Until we know what to do with it.”

“That can be managed. You think it needs two of us?”

“I'd feel better if there were two of you.”

“No trouble,” said Black. “Let me use your phone.”

32

Dawn was graying in the eastern sky when Enoch Raven sat down to his typewriter. Outside the window lay the green Virginia hills, and in the trees and shrubs a few awakening birds began their twittering and chirping.

He flexed his fingers over the keyboard and then began to type, writing steadily, without pause for thought. He had made it a rule, these many years, to have it all thought out before he sat down to write, to have run the subject matter through his mind, refining it and sharpening it so that the readers of his column need never search for meaning. The meaning must be there for all to see, the logic well developed.

He wrote:

The world today faces what may be its greatest crisis and the strangeness of this lies in the fact that the crisis comes not by the ordinary channels we have come to associate with crisis. Although, when one thinks it through, it becomes apparent that it does parallel a crisis situation we long have recognized—overpopulation and the economic problems which could spring from it. As short a time ago as last Sunday morning, however, no one in his right mind could remotely have imagined that the over-population which had been feared and preached against so long, could have come upon us overnight.

Now that it has, we are faced with a situation that must be solved, not over a long period of careful planning, but in a matter, perhaps, of weeks. The brutal fact of the matter is that we can feed the hordes of people who have come to us for help over only a very limited span of time. They, themselves, are frank in admitting that they were aware of the problems their coming would create and in consequence of this have brought us the knowledge and the tools we will need in solving them. All that remains is that we use these tools forthwith. For this to be done requires the willing cooperation of every one of us. This phrase is not used lightly, nor in its hortatory political sense, but in a very personal way. Every one of us, each of us, all of us.

What is needed from the most of us is forbearance, a willingness to bear certain sacrifices, to tolerate certain inconveniences. It may mean that there will be less food, and not so good, for us to eat. We may have to wait for delivery of that new car. We may not be able to buy a new lawn mower when the old one that is now on its last legs finally breaks down. The economic energy and direction that under normal circumstances would be channeled into the production and distribution of items and services we need must be cancelled not only into sending our far descendants back deeper into time, but into providing them with the equipment, tools and supplies they will need to build a viable culture. It may be that Detroit may be called upon to turn out plows and other implements rather than cars. It may be that, voluntarily, or by government decree, we may have to ration ourselves. Wise as the actions taken by President Henderson may have been in calling for a bank and transactions holiday and a price and wage freeze, a case can be made that he should have taken one further step by issuing a strong warning against hoarding. While we can ill afford to deal in a bureaucratic manner with the press of events that have been forced upon us, it would seem that some move toward a strict rationing of food and other items vital to the continuing economy should be taken at once. It is quite understandable, for political reasons, why Mr. Henderson might have been reluctant to do this. But it is upon such unpopular actions, or the failure to take these actions, that we will stand or fall.

It would seem scarcely necessary to point out that such actions as the President has taken should be taken by other nations as well. It is reliably understood that Britain, Russia, France, Germany, Japan, China, and possibly other nations may have already taken corresponding actions before these words see the light of print. But the action must be worldwide rather than the actions of just a few of the more powerful nations. The problem that we face is a worldwide problem and for it to be solved temporary economic strictures must be imposed not only upon the larger economic units, but upon the entire world.

The appearance of the people from the future undoubtedly will call forth from the various intellectual factions a wide variety of opinions, many of which undoubtedly will be ill-founded. This is well illustrated by the public agony which is being exhibited by the Rev. Jake Billings, one of the more colorful of our evangelists, over the revelation that the people of five hundred years from now have forsaken religion as a rather footless factor in the lives of mankind. Distressing as this may be to the professional religionists, it is scarcely a consideration which has any bearing upon the matter now immediately at hand. Not only on this point, but on many other points, profound questions will be raised, but now is not the time to expend any noticeable amount of energy in trying to answer or resolve them. They will do no more than to further divide a population which, under the best of circumstances, is bound to be divided by the basic task which has been brought upon us.

We have not as yet had the time, nor indeed the facts, to enable us at this moment to form a true evaluation of the situation. While we have been made aware of some of the basic facts, there may be other facts that are as yet unknown, or perhaps some which, in the press of other considerations, have not become apparent. It may well be that some of the emphasis may be at fault—not as a result of someone trying to obscure the importance of any fact, but simply because there has not been the opportunity to assess the various factors and give each the weight of importance which rightly belongs to it.

There is no time, of course, for deliberate consideration of the crisis; in essence, the world must act with more expediency than may be entirely wise. The very fact that expediency is necessary calls for a public forbearance that is usually not desirable when great issues are at stake. A storm of criticism and a violent putting forward of opinions at variance with official opinion and action will accomplish nothing other than an impedance to a solution which must come quickly if it is to come at all. The men in Washington, at Whitehall and in the Kremlin may be wrong on many points, but their various publics must realize that they are acting not out of the perversity of stupidity, but in honest good faith, doing what they consider proper to be done.

Insofar as the republics of the world are concerned, this is not the way things should be done. Democracy demands, and rightly, that all men should have a voice in their government and in governmental decisions and actions, that all viewpoints be given full consideration, that there be no arbitrary decisions counter to the public will. But today we cannot afford the luxury of such an idealistic concept. The situation may not be handled as many of us would wish that it would be handled, some toes undoubtedly will be trod upon, certain ideas of justice and propriety may be outraged. But to accept all of this, if not in silence, at least without raising too great an outcry, is a part of that forbearance that is called for.

This is not one country that is threatened, not one political party nor one political fortune, not one people nor one region, but the entire world. This commentator has no way of knowing what will happen. I cannot even guess. I am aware that there may be much that I will not like, much that I will consider might have been done differently or better. In the past there has been no hesitancy on my part to place personal opinion upon record and at a later date, after this is over, I suppose I might not be above the pointing out of glaring errors as I may have perceived them. But from this day forward I shall, as a personal contribution to the forbearance which appears to me so necessary, exercise stern censorship upon, if not my thoughts, at least upon my typewriter. I am hereby enrolling myself as charter member in the Keep Your Mouth Shut, Enoch Club. The membership is wide open and I invite all of you to join.

33

He had somehow climbed a tree and got out on a limb and had been hanging onto it, for no reason that seemed quite logical, when a sudden violent wind had come up and now he was hanging grimly to the branch which was whipping in the wind. He knew that at any moment his grasp might be torn loose and he'd be thrown to the ground. But when he looked down, he saw, with horror, that there wasn't any ground.

From somewhere far off a voice was speaking to him, but he was so intent on maintaining his grip upon the branch that he was unable to distinguish the words. The shaking became even more violent. “Steve,” the voice was saying. “Steve, wake up.” His eyes came open a slit and he realized that he was in no tree. A distorted face swam crazily just above him. No one had such a face.

“Wake up, Steve,” said a voice that was Henry Hunt's. “The President is asking for you.” Wilson lifted a fist and scrubbed his eyes. The face, no longer distorted, was the face of Henry Hunt.

The face receded into the distance as the
Times
man straightened up. Wilson swung his feet off the couch, sat up. Sunlight was streaming through the windows of the press lounge.

“What time is it?” he asked.

“Almost eight.”

Wilson squinted up at Hunt. “You get any sleep?” he asked.

“I went home for a couple of hours. I couldn't sleep. Things kept spinning in my head. So I came back.” He picked a jacket off the floor. “This yours?” he asked.

Wilson nodded groggily. “I got to get washed up,” he said. “I got to comb my hair.”

He rose to. his feet, took the jacket from Hunt and tucked it underneath his arm. “What's going on?” he asked.

“What you might expect,” said Hunt. “The wires are clogged with screams of anguish over the business holiday. How come you didn't tip us off, Steve?”

“I didn't know. He never said a word about it.”

“Well, that's all right,” said Hunt. “We should have guessed it. Can you imagine what would have happened if the exchanges were open?”

“Any word about the monster?”

“Rumor. Nothing solid. One rumor says another got through in Africa. Somewhere in the Congo. Christ, they'll never find it there.”