Colossus (11 page)

Chapter 9

THE PRESIDENT liked to dine alone. To some extent this habit was a reaction against the endless round of functions he had to attend, but to an even greater extent it was due to the fact that he could not stand the sight of his wife. Their necessary public appearances as a devoted couple were a great burden on the First Citizen—and on the First Lady. It had been a smart match. The states that had been Canada were sensitive about federation—though there had been no option—and a Manitoban-born First Lady was a sop to the dying embers of national pride. But it was a marriage of convenience. So the President, when possible, ate alone and slept alone—or to be more accurate, had a bedroom well away from his wife’s palatial suite. Clad simply in shirt and trousers, the President was attacking a baked Virginia ham garnished with pineapple when Prytzkammer knocked and peered round the door of the dining room, aware that his appearance would not add to the President’s pleasure.

“Sorry, sir, but there is a hotline call coming up for you. I said you would be on five minutes from now.” He checked his watch to be quite certain. Past experience had shown that neither the President nor the Soviet Chairman liked to wait on the line for the other. Both suspected—with good reason—that the other was capable of keeping his fellow head of state waiting, quite deliberately. The personal aides on both sides had evolved a system whereby both came to the line at the same moment, and an affront to national pride—or, even more important, to personal ego—was avoided. It was a private nightmare of Prytzkammer’s that one of these days his opposite number would cheat, and hold his man back for a couple of minutes.

“Any slant on the subject?”

“You know these boys, sir. But I’ve the idea the Chairman has Colossus on his mind.”

The President grunted. “We’ll soon find out. I’ll take it here.”

Prytzkammer inclined his head slightly, and with the air of a conjurer, produced a red telephone and plugged it in. There had been a suggestion that a televiewer should be incorporated in the circuit, but for once both heads of state had been in complete agreement, and vetoed the idea. The President summed it up in one short sentence—”Horse trading is best done in the dark.”

Prytzkammer looked at his watch. “Two minutes to go, sir. I’ll be on the line in the office- -the recorder’s lined up.” He looked expectantly at the President.

“OK, P, I won’t be late.”

“Thank you, Mr. President.” Prytzkammer withdrew, leaving the President alone with his ham, Scotch and telephone.

Exactly on time Prytzkammer heard the voice of his opposite number in Moscow.

“OK, Moscow, the President is on—” Prytzkammer paused, letting the final seconds tick away—”now.”

“President speaking.” There was a hard metallic quality in his voice that had nothing to do with the telephone.

“First Chairman here. Good evening, Mr. President. I do not propose using the translator and as you do not speak our tongue, I will speak in yours.” An instantaneous two-way translator had long been part of the hot line; it gave extremely good results, but meant that both parties were listening to a machine which could not reproduce the emotional content of the conversation. This could be a considerable drawback, and it was evident, on this occasion, that the Chairman wanted to be clearly understood, even if it did take longer and involve a microscopic loss of face. In actual fact, his English was unusually good, but this he would never admit.

“Very well, Mr. Chairman, go ahead.”

“Mr. President, I wish to protest most strongly about this attempt on your part to subvert our Guardian of the Soviet People.” Prytzkammer, listening in, reflected that the President had no corner in the market for metallic voices.

“What!” The translator would have flattened the exclamation almost to vanishing point. As it was, the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet was satisfied that the President was genuinely surprised.

“This so-called Colossus broadcast of yours is clearly directed at Guardian. I am informed that your machine is attempting to feed in false mathematical theories with the object of disrupting Guardian. I must warn you that my experts consider this a potentially dangerous action on your part, and if it continues, it will be at your own peril. Our machine has as much, um, sophistry—intelligence—perhaps even more—as your machine.” The Chairman paused. “I hope you understand me, Mr. President?”

“I understand your words, Mr. Chairman, but I assure you that I have not authorized any attempt to subvert Guardian. Colossus suggested—” The President could have bitten his tongue off. The Russian was quick to pounce, so quick that he, too, slipped.

“Yours also!”

The President was no less fast to spot the gap in the Chairman’s defenses and to take advantage of it.

“Are you going to permit Guardian to transmit?”

The Chairman knew full well it was no good denying; he was also well aware both sides would have the whole conversation taped, and the use that might be made of the Moscow recording made him think fast. To retract would be an admission of error—and error, as always, was very unpopular with the Praesidium. Better to make it appear deliberate.

“In view of the unwarranted interference of Colossus, I consider we have no option, and are fully justified in doing so.

The President took time out from mentally blasting Forbin and CIA to note that the Chairman still had not given a straight answer.

“You will, of course, act as you see fit, Mr. Chairman. I can only repeat we have no desire to upset or derange Guardian. It is obviously in the interests of us both that the machines are not upset, and it was for that reason I raised the question of the instructions fed to our respective machines’ parameters, as we call them. Have you a decision on that point yet?”

“I cannot answer that question, Mr. President. The matter is being considered.” The momentary gap in his defenses was sealed off; the Soviet chief was back stonewalling.

“I suggest to you that an early decision is very desirable for both our countries.”

“I will inform you as soon as a decision is reached, Mr. President.”

“Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I hope it will be soon; delay could be dangerous. Good night.”

“Good night, Mr. President.”

The President replaced the handset carefully. His first action thereafter was to pour a large Scotch. His second, a loud shout for his PPA.

“Sir?”

“Get that bastard Forbin!”

Chapter 10

When Forbin entered the watch room he found Fisher and Jackson immersed in a long roll of paper torn off the teletype. Fisher was shaking his head and muttering, “It can’t be, it can’t be!”

It was evident that Johnson was a good deal less incredulous.

“But it must be, Doctor—what else?” He stabbed a finger in the middle of a sea of calculations and formulae. “Look at that, you can’t buck that.”

Both had ignored the arrival of the Director and Cleo.

“Well, Jack—what goes?” said Forbin with a trace of impatience. Fisher looked up, blinking as he mentally adjusted himself to his surroundings.

“What? Yes, Charles.” Fisher returned to the roll, hurriedly scanned it. “Yes, here it is— read from there, Charles, what do you make of that?”

Forbin read swiftly through the mass of formulae and equations, the frown of concentration deepening as he progressed. He stopped once or twice, and reread a portion more slowly before going on. Once he stopped and shut his eyes to assist assimilation. Finally he handed the roll back to Fisher, the frown remaining on his face.

“As far as I can see, it’s the theory of gravitation as amended by Hoyle back in the sixties. I’m a bit rusty on all that, but some of it looks rather odd.”

“Odd! Fisher gave a high-pitched cackle, a sound that made Forbin look searchingly at his chief assistant; there was more than a trace of hysteria in Fisher’s voice.

“Take it easy, Jack!” said Forbin sharply, but Fisher hardly heard him.

“Odd!” he repeated. “The men who have advanced the theory of gravitation can practically be named on one hand! Aristotle, Galileo, Newton, Einstein, Hoyle—and now Colossus! This is new, Charles! Colossus has gone on where Hoyle left off over thirty years ago!” Fisher banged his fist on the desk, snatched up the roll of paper and waved it at Forbin. “New! Do you hear? Do you realize what it means?”

“Fisher!” shouted Forbin suddenly. “Sit down, and shut up!” He grasped his colleague’s arms, propelled him backwards to a chair and thrust him down into it. Fisher did not try to resist, but leaned back, gasping soundlessly.

“Now, listen to me, Jack.” Forbin spoke softly, but with great intensity. “Get hold of yourself. So now we have a new theory of gravitation—”

“You miss the point, Charles,” said Fisher wearily. “This is no theory. It is stated as a cold fact—’

“Right, then it’s a fact—what’s so upsetting about that? We advance our knowledge.” Forbin’s voice took on a more reasonable tone. “While it’s arguable that mankind might have done better to stay in the cave, we haven’t, and you can’t argue that we should put the clock back. From the moment man started fooling around with fire, this was inevitable. We have no option but to go on, and cracking up won’t help. This is more knowledge for us—”

Once more Fisher interrupted. “Don’t you see, Charles, we get this like a crumb from the rich man’s table! What else is there in that brain? Hardly running twenty-four hours!” Fisher’s voice was climbing again. “What else?”

Forbin was about to speak when Armsorg called out, “Urgent, Professor—the President is on the line personally and wants you now!”

Forbin grunted and looked at Cleo. “Try and get him calmed down if you can,” he said softly, nodding slightly at Fisher. He crossed to the phone.

The President wasted no time. “What in hell’s name are you doing with Colossus?” This was his metallic rasping voice at its best.

“Doing? I’m doing nothing, sir.” Forbin was acutely aware that that must sound very much like a schoolboy’s answer. It did nothing to improve his frayed temper. “We hooked up the transmitter as arranged, and Colossus has been sending basic knowledge—chiefly arithmetic, geometry, mathematics, getting progressively harder—”

“I don’t give a damn about that crap!” snarled the President, “What else?”

“Nothing,” Forbin felt his own temper slipping from his control, “and you can check that with CIA!”

It was evident to the President that the angry Forbin was speaking the truth. When he replied, his tone was more moderate, but not much. “OK, Forbin. But if that’s so, how come I have just had a blast from the Chairman of the USSR, accusing me—us—of attempting to seduce Guardian with phony math?”

Forbin’s answer was damped down by puzzlement. “Seduce Guardian? It’s true Colossus is breaking new ground in math, but it can hardly seduce—” He thought for a moment. “How does the Chairman get to thinking that?”

“Well, I bounced it out to him that Guardian had asked for transmitter facilities, and he knows all about Colossus shooting his mouth off.”

A frisson of fear swept momentarily over Forbin. Guardian wanted to talk too! He did not answer, deep in thought. “You there, Forbin?” The President did not like being kept waiting, and his anger started cooking up again.

“Yes, I heard. I was just thinking about Guardian wanting to transmit.”

“To hell with that! Those two can play footsie all they want, but this is no time to rile the Soviets—”

“It may be very important to study the behavior of the two machines.” As he said it, Forbin knew that once more his phraseology was letting him down.

“Look, Forbin.” The President made little attempt to control his anger. “I employ guys like you to handle all that; you can play high school as much as you like, but I want no half-baked attempts on Guardian—you got that?”

“I get you one hundred per cent!” shouted Forbin, his temper snapping, “but you’re talking to the wrong guy—tell Colossus!” He slammed the phone down and stood trembling with rage, dimly aware of the surprised and scared reaction of his colleagues in the watch room. Before any of them could speak the phone sounded again. He snatched the instrument up.

“Yes?” he barked. If it was the President expecting to find Forbin in a quivering heap, he might as well find out right away …

“Duty Officer, CIA. Flash—Guardian is up on 9153 kilocycles, sending call sign GUARDIAN. To Professor Forbin from Head of CIA: Do we plug this transmission to Colossus?”

“Forbin here. Yes, plug it through,” he said recklessly. “If the President doesn’t care, why should I?’

“Beg pardon, sir?”

“Nothing. Go ahead, plug Guardian to Colossus and make a line available to us here.”

In Forbin’s defense, he was still sweeping along on a tide of anger when he gave the fateful order. If the call to the President had been ten minutes earlier or later, it might have made all the difference. It might have.

“Colossus going through now. Your line will be on in thirty seconds.”

“Right. Please tell Mr. Grauber I would like to talk with him as soon as convenient.” “Yes, sir.” The CIA man believed in brevity. “Your line now on Point Number Four.” “Four, OK.” Forbin rang off. “Armsorg, get the spare teletype lined up on Point Four.”

Armsorg wheeled the machine across and plugged it in, and immediately the teletype began its muted chatter.

GUARDIAN GUARDIAN GUARDIAN

Armsorg watched for a minute. “Talks English and with exactly the same timing as Colossus, five seconds pause between calls—and the key—action is in step. God, I hope we don’t have to sit through all them multiplication tables again.”

After five minutes the call sign stopped. Fisher, who had been staring sightlessly at his roll of paper, stirred. “Johnson, you following Colossus?”

“Sure, Doctor, but so much is being churned out it’s a tough proposition even roughly watching the stuff. Just now I don’t know what the hell is coming out. It may be astrophysics, but—aw, hell”—he threw up his hands in despair—”It’s like a five-year university course condensed into half an hour. I can follow, but not at this speed.”

The Guardian teletype chattered into action once more; Armsorg’s wish was granted, no multiplication tables, straight into advanced equations. Forbin watched without comment. Johnson took one look and appealed to him, “Sir, this is too goddam much. If this bum is anything like Colossus we’re going to be snowed up by morning. We’ll need all the mathematicians in the country to keep up!”