The Daleth Effect

24

For Martha Hansen, events had a dreamlike quality that made them bearable. It had started when Ove had called that night, 4:17 in the morning, her clearest recollection of his call had been the position of the glowing hands in the dark while his voice buzzed in her ear.

4:17. The numbers must mean something important cause they kept coming to the front of her mind. Was that the time her world had ended? No, she was still very much alive. But Nils was away on one of his flights. He had always returned from his flights before this…

That was the point where her thoughts would always slide around and come to something else. 4:17. The people who had called, talked to her, the Prime Minister himself. The Royal Family… 4:17. She had tried to be nice to everyone. Surely she had. She had at least learned to be polite in finishing school, if she had not learned anything else.

But she should have noticed more about the trip to the Moon. But even then the numbness had prevailed. They had flown in one of the new Moon ships, space-buses they were being called. Very much like flying in a jet, only with more room all around. A long cabin, rows of seats, sandwiches and drinks. Even a hostess. A tall ash-blond girl who had seemed to stay quite close for most of the trip, had even talked to her a bit. With the kind of lilting Swedish accent the men loved. But sad now, like all of them. When had she seen a smile last?

The funeral ceremony had seemed empty. There was the monument all right, in the airless soil just beyond the windows. Draped in flags, a bugle had wailed a plaintive call that pulled at the heartstrings. But no one was buried there. No one would ever be buried there. An explosion, they had told her. Died instantly, painless. And so far away. Days later Ove Rasmussen had told her the real story behind the explosion. It sounded like madness. People did not really do this kind of thing to each other. But they did. And Nils was the kind of man who could do what he had done. It wasn’t suicide, she could not imagine Nils committing suicide. But a victory for what he knew was right. If he had to die at the same time she knew he would consider this second, and not give it much consideration at all. In dying he had taught her things about the man, living, that she had never realized.

“Just a drop of sherry?” Ulla asked, bending over her with a glass in her hand. They were in a lounge, the ceremony was over. They would be returning to Copenhagen soon.

“Yes, please. Thank you.”

Martha sipped the drink and tried to pay attention to the others. She knew she had not been doing this of late, and also knew that they had been making allowances for it. She did not like that. It was too much like being pitied. She sipped again, and looked around. There was a high-ranking Army officer at the table with them, and someone—she forgot his name—from the Ministry of Space.

“It won’t happen again,” Ove said angrily. “We treated the other countries as if they were civilized, not monsters of what?—national greed, that is the only term for it. Smuggled weapons, hired thugs, subversion, piracy in space. Almost unbelievable. They won’t have a second chance. And we are not going to kill ourselves any more. We’ll kill them if they ask for it.”

“Hear, hear,” the Army officer said. “The new Daleth ships will be built with a complete internal division. Well advertise the fact. Crew on one side, passengers on the other, without as much as a bulkhead in between. We’ll have a troop of soldiers aboard if needs be. Armed with guns, gas…”

“Let’s not get carried away, old boy.”

“Yes, of course. But you know what I mean. It can’t ever happen again.”

“They won’t stop trying,” the man from the Ministry said gloomily. “So they’ll probably get the drive from us some day, if they don’t stumble onto it themselves first.”

“Fine,” Ove said. “But we’ll put that day off as long as possible. What else can we do?”

Silence was the only answer to this. What else could they do?

“Excuse me,” Martha said, and the men rose as she left. She knew where to find the commanding officer oi he base, and he was most accommodating.

“Of course, Mrs. Hansen,” he told her. “There is no cause at all to refuse a request like this. We’ll of course take care of sending Captain Hansen’s effects back to you. But if there is any thing you wish to take now…”

“No, it’s not that so much. I just want to see where he lived when he was here. I hardly saw him at all this last year.”

“Quite understandable. If you will permit me, I’ll take you there myself.”

It was a small room, not luxurious, in one of the first sections that had been built. She was left alone there. The walls, under their coats of paint, still showed the grain of the wooden mold the cement had been poured into. The bed was metal framed and hard, the wardrobe and built-in drawers functional. The only note of luxury was a window that faced out upon the lunar plain. It was a porthole, really, one of the first jury-rigs. Two standard ship’s portholes that had been welded together to make a double-thick window. She looked out at the airless reaches and the hills, sharp and clear beyond, and could imagine him standing here like this. His extra uniforms were hung neatly in the closet and she missed him, how she missed him! She still had tears left, not many, and she dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. It had been a mistake coming here, he was dead and gone and would never return to her. It was time to leave. As she turned to go she noticed the framed picture of her on the little desk. Small, in color, in a bathing suit, laughing during some happier time. For some reason she did not want to look at it. It was here because he had loved her, she knew that. She should always have known that. Despite everything.

Martha started to put the picture into her purse, but she did not really want it. She opened the top drawer of the dresser and poked it down under his pajamas. Her hand brushed something hard, and she pulled out a paperbound booklet. Elementær Vedligeholdelse og Drift of Daleth Maskinkomponenter af Model IV it was labeled, and as she mentally translated the compound, technical Danish terms, she flipped through the book. Diagrams, drawings, and equations flicked past as the meaning of the title registered in her brain.

Basic Maintenance and Operation of Daleth Drive Units Mark IV.

He must have been studying it; he always had to know all the details of the planes he flew. The new ships would be no different. He had stuffed it in here, forgotten it.

Men had died to obtain what she held in her hand. Other men had died to stop them.

She began to put it back into the drawer, then hesitated, looking at it again.

Baxter was dead, she had been told about that, dead aboard the ship. There was a new man at the embassy who had been trying to contact her, she had his name written down somewhere.

She could give this booklet to them and they would leave her alone. Everything would be settled once and for all and there would be no trouble.

Martha dropped the booklet into her purse and snapped it shut. It made no bulge at all. She slid the bureau drawer shut, looked around the room once more, then left.

When she rejoined the others some of them were already getting ready to leave. She glanced about the reception hall, seeking a familiar face. She found him, standing against the far wall, looking out of the large window.

“Herr Skou,” she said, and he turned about sharply.

“Ahh, Mrs. Hansen. I saw you, but I have not had a chance to talk to you. Everything, everything…”

He had a haunted look on his face, and she wondered if he, somehow, blamed himself for what had happened.

“Here,” she said, opening her purse and handing him the booklet. “I found this with my husband’s things. I didn’t think that you wanted it lying around.”

“Good God, no!” he said when he saw the title. “Thank you, most kind, helpful. People never think. Doesn’t help my work, I tell you. Numbered copy, we thought it was on board the Holger Danske. I never realized.” He drew himself up and made a short, formal bow.

“Thank you, Frau Hansen. I don’t think you realize how helpful you have been.”

She smiled. “But I do know, Herr Skou. My husband and many others died to preserve what is in that book. Could I do less? And it is the other way around. Until now, I don’t think I realized how helpful you, everyone, has been to me.”

And then it was time to return to Earth.