Timescape (31 page)

True, Gordon conceded, Cooper was weak on the overall theory. But experimental students were traditionally more concerned with their detailed lab work–"stroking their apparatus," Gordon called it, to provoke some much-needed mirth–than with the fine points of theory. Gates bought this; Carroway frowned.

Lakin shrugged, conceding it as a tied point. He paused while Carroway, and then Gates in turn, expressed some misgivings over Cooper's occasionally sloppy work on basic physics problems–the two electrons in a box, for example. Gordon agreed. He pointed out, though, that the Physics Department could only require students to take the relevant courses and then hope that the knowledge sank in. Cooper had already passed the department's Qualifying Examination–three days of written problems, followed by a two-hour oral examination. The fact that Cooper's grasp of some points was still slippery was, of course, regrettable.

But what could this candidacy committee do? Gordon promised to press Cooper on these subjects, to–in effect–browbeat the student into making up the deficiency. The committee accepted this rather standard reply with nods.

So far Gordon had skated on relatively firm ice. Now Lakin tapped his pen reflectively on the table, tick, and slowly, almost languidly, reviewed Cooper's data. The true test of an experimenter, he said, was his data. The crux of Cooper's thesis was the spontaneous resonance effect. And this was precisely what was in question. "The thesis is an argument, let us remember, not a stack of pages," Lakin said with dreamy ease.

Gordon countered as best he could. The spontaneous resonance phenomenon was important, yes, but Cooper was not primarily concerned with it. His topic was much more conventional. The committee should look at the spontaneous resonances as a kind of overlay, occasionally obscuring the more conventional data Cooper was trying to get.

Lakin countered in earnest. He brought up the
Physical Review Letters
paper, which carried the names of Lakin, Bernstein, and Cooper. The final thesis would have to mention it. "And this, of course"–a sad, weary glance toward Gordon "means that we must bring up the entire issue of the ...

interpretation ... which has been placed upon these ... interruptions ... of the resonance curves."

"I disagree," Gordon snapped.

"The committee must consider all the facts," Lakin said mildly. "The fact is that Cooper is going for a standard problem here."

"It has not been so advertised."

"Look, Isaac, what I do has no connection with this thesis and this committee."

"I really rather believe," Gates broke in, "we should focus on the possibilities of the experiment itself."

"Quite so," Carroway muttered, rising from his half-sleep.

"Cooper will probably not deal with the, ah, message theory at all,"

Gordon said.

"But he must," Lakin said with quiet energy.

"Why?" Gordon said.

"How can we be sure his electronics gear is functioning right?" Gates put in.

"Exactly," Lakin said.

"Look, there's nothing that special about his equipment."

"Who can say?" Lakin said. "It contains a few modifications above and beyond the usual resonance rig. These, if I understand them correctly–" a slight note of sarcasm here, Gordon saw –were designed to increase sensitivity. "But is that all they do? Is there not some unforeseen effect?

Something which makes this experiment, this apparatus, pick up new effects in the solid in question–indium antimonide? How can we say?"

"Good point," Gates murmured.

"What sort of effect are you thinking of, Isaac?" Carroway said, genuinely perplexed.

"I do not know," Lakin conceded. "But this is the issue. Precisely the issue."

"I disagree," Gordon said.

"No, I think Isaac is dead right," Carroway murmured.

"There's some justice to it," Gates said, reflecting.

"How can we be sure this is a good thesis topic until we know the equipment will do what Cooper says it will? I mean, there's Isaac here, who has doubts. You, Gordon–you think it's okay. But I feel we ought to have more info before we go ahead."

"That's not the purpose of this exam," Gordon said flatly.

"I believe it to be a legitimate issue." Carroway said.

Gates added, "So do I."

Lakin nodded. Gordon saw that they were all uncomfortable, not wanting to broach the issue buried under the detail of Cooper's apparatus and the niceties of theory. Still, Gates and Carroway and Lakin thought the message hypothesis was bullshit, pure and simple. They weren't going to let the issue slide by. Cooper couldn't explain all his data, not the interesting parts, anyway. As long as that riddle hung in the air, this committee wasn't going to pass on a thesis. Also, it was not simply a question of conflicting theories. Cooper was weak in some important areas. He needed more study, more time peering at textbooks. He had never been a particularly brilliant classroom student, and here it showed up in spades. That, plus the muddy issue of the messages, was enough.

"I move that we fail Mr. Cooper on this first try at the candidacy examination," Lakin said mildly. "He needs more preparation. Also, this matter of the spontaneous resonances–" a glance at Gordon"should be resolved."

"Right." Gates said.

"Um," Carroway said drowsily, already picking up his scattered papers.

"But look–"

"Gordon," Lakin murmured with a kind of tired friendliness, "that is a majority of the committee. Could we have the forms?"

Gordon stiffly handed over the University form for the examination, on which faculty could sign and write out either "yes" or "no" to the question of whether Cooper had passed. The form came back across the table with three nos. Gordon stared at it, still off balance, still not sure the whole thing was over. It was the first time he had shepherded a student through this examination and now the student had failed–a rather uncommon event. The candidacy was supposed to be a putz of an exam, for Chrissakes. Gordon thought suddenly of the conventional theory of scientific revolutions, where paradigms overtook each other, old replacing new. In a way the message theory and the spontaneous resonance theory were paradigms, erected to explain one bunch of mysterious data. Two paradigms, arguing over a scrap of experimental bread. It almost made him laugh.

The scraping of chairs and shuffle of papers roused him. He muttered something to each of the men as they left, still dazed with the outcome.

Lakin even gave him a handshake and a lightly delivered,

"We do have to straighten this out, you know," before leaving. As Gordon watched Lakin's retreating back he saw that to the other man this was a regrettable incident involving a junior faculty member who had gone off on a tangent. Lakin had abandoned the softer ways of persuasion.

He could no longer come to Gordon and gently urge him to give up his notions. That kind of conversation would lead nowhere had led nowhere.

Their personalities didn't match, and maybe that was in the end the most important thing in research. Crick and Watson hadn't got on with Rosalind Franklin, and that prevented their collaboration on the DNA helix riddle. Together they might have cracked the problem earlier.

Science abounded with fierce conflicts, many of which blocked progress.

There were great missed opportu-nities-if Oppenheimer had broken through Einstein's hardening isolation, perhaps the two of them could have gone beyond Oppenheimer's 1939 work of neutron stars to consider the whole general relativistic problem of collapsed matter. But they hadn't, in part because Einstein stopped listening to others, cut himself off with his own drowsy dreams in a complete unified field theory ...

Gordon realized he was sitting alone in the bleak room. Downstairs, Cooper was waiting for the result. There were joys to teaching, but Gordon suddenly wondered whether they were worth the bad moments. You spent three quarters of your time on the bottom quarter of the students; the really good ones gave you no trouble. Now he had to go down and tell Cooper.

He shuffled his papers together and left. Sunlight streamed in yellow blades through the corridor windows. The days were getting longer.

Classes were over. For a moment Gordon forgot Cooper and Lakin and the messages and let a single thought wash over him: the blessed long summer was beginning.

AUGUST, 1998

By the time Marjorie heard a car crunch on the gravel of their driveway, she had everything ready. There was ice in the freezer, carefully hoarded through the power-off hours. She was looking forward to company after a dull week. John's description of Peterson had quite prepared her to dislike him; Council members were remote, forbidding figures. Having one in her own home carried the threat of committing some enormous social gaffe and the compensating thrill of contact with someone more important than a Cambridge don.

John had given her two hours' notice, the classic unthinking husband's trick. Luckily the house was reasonably tidy, and anyway men never noticed things like that. The problem was dinner. She felt that she would have to invite him to stay, out of politeness, though with any luck he would refuse. She had a roast in the battery-assisted freezer. She had been saving it for a special occasion, but there was no time to defrost it. She knew it was important to put on a good show for Peterson; John was not inviting him home out of friendship. A souffle, perhaps. She had searched through her kitchen cupboards and found a tin of shrimp. Yes, that would do it. A shrimp souffle and a salad and French bread. Followed by strawberries from the garden, and cream. Bloody elegant, considering. It would exhaust a good fraction of her weekly grocery budget, but economy be damned on such short notice. She had fetched up a bottle of their expensive California Chablis and put it in the tiny freezer, the only way to chill it in time. Might as well make the occasion festive, she thought. For days she had hardly seen John, as he worked late every night at the lab. She had got into the habit of fixing a quick and easy dinner for the kids and herself, keeping a pot of soup to heat up for John whenever he came home.

Outside, car doors clapped. Marjorie stood up as the two men came into the living room. John looked his usual teddy bear self, she thought affectionately. Seeing him in daylight for the first time that week, she also noticed how tired he was. Peterson was goodlooking in a smooth sort of way, Marjorie decided, but his mouth was too thin, making him look hard.

"This is my wife, Marjorie," John was saying as she held out her hand to Peterson. Their eyes met as they shook hands. A sudden prickly feeling ran through her. Then he looked away again and they moved into the room.

"I hope this isn't inconveniencing you too much," Peterson said. "Your husband assured me it was all right, and we still have some business to discuss."

"No, not at all. I'm glad to have some company for a change. It can be pretty dull being the wife of a physicist when he's working on an experiment."

"I imagine it can." He gave her a brief dissecting glance and strolled over to the window. "You have a charming place here."

"What can I get you to drink, Peterson?" John asked.

"I'll take a whisky and soda, please. Yes, this is charming. I'm very fond of the country. Your roses look especially good." He gestured towards the garden and followed this up with precise comments on soil conditions.

"You live in London, I suppose, Mr. Peterson?"

"Yes, I do. Thank you." He accepted a drink from John.

"Have you got a weekend cottage in the country too?" Marjorie asked.

She thought she saw something flicker for a second in his eyes before he answered. "No, unfortunately. I wish I did. But I probably wouldn't have time to use it. My work requires a lot of travel."

She nodded sympathetically and turned to her husband. "I'm one ahead of you on the drinks, but I'd like another one, please, John," she said, holding out her glass.

"Sherry, is it?" From the deliberately light way he spoke Marjorie saw at once the effort he was making to get on with Peterson. She had felt the tension between the two men from the first instant. John crossed to the sideboard and said in a strained, jolly voice, "It's Ian's job to see we aren't forced to sop up too much of this stuff in order to face the world."

This remark made no visible impression whatever on Peterson, who murmured, "Unfortunate, that previous sots hadn't the excuse of a World Council to blame their reality-avoiding on."

"Reality-avoidance?" Marjorie broke in. "Isn't that the new therapy theory?"

"A disease masquerading as a cure, I'll wager." John chuckled.

Peterson confined himself to a "Hmmmm," and turned towards Marjorie. Before he could change the subject, as he obviously intended, she said, in part to keep him off balance, "What's the reality behind these odd clouds we're seeing? I heard a bit on the news about a Frenchman saying they were a new type, something–"

"Can't say," Peterson said abruptly. "Can't really say. I get awfully behind, you know."

Marjorie thought, quite an artful dodger, yes. "Brazil, then. What can the World Council tell us about that?"

"The bloom is spreading and we are doing what we can." Peterson seemed to warm to this subject, perhaps because it was already public.

"Is it out of your hands, then?" she asked.

"Largely. The Council identifies problems and directs research, integrating them with political considerations. We pounce on technology-related sore spots as soon as they become visible. Most of our function is integrating the satellite ecoprofiles. We sift through the data for telltale changes. Once. a supernational riddle appears, it's really up to the technical types–"

"–to solve it," John finished, returning with the sherry. "It's that putting-out-fires psychology that makes untangling a riddle so sodding hard, though, y'see. With no continuity in the research—"

"Oh, John, we've heard that speech before," Marjorie said with a gay lilt in her voice she did not feel. "Surely Mr. Peterson knows your views by now."

"Right, I'll pack it in," John agreed mildly, as if remembering where he was. "Wanted to focus on the equipment thing, anyway. I'm trying to convince Ian here to get on the phone and get me help from the Brookhaven people. It takes clout, as the Americans say, and–"