Pegasus in Space

Foremost on my list of thank-yous for this novel is Dr. Steven Beard of the UK Astronomy Technological Center, Royal Observatory in Edinburgh. I asked for help and he gave me such a large measure of valuable information that I had more than enough for this part of the
Pegasus
universe. Not only is he a marvelous punster but also a dedicated researcher, leading me to many previously unexplored paths of stargazing and suggesting useful Web sites where my basic reference texts were out of date. He patiently went over drafts and consequently the relevant characters are well informed. I would like to thank Elizabeth Kerner, author of
Song in the Silence
, for introducing me to Dr. Beard.

Dr. Brian Kane of the Lowell Observatory Web site also responded to my specific queries, for which I am indeed grateful.

Mark Finkelstein, D.O., F.A.O.C.R., of the Du Pont Hospital for Children, dropped by Dragonhold for tea one afternoon with his friend, Michael Zeik, offered his assistance, and found me taking him up on his kind offer.

Dr. Donald L. Henninger of J.S.C. NASA was somewhat surprised by my phone call asking him to confirm some specific information on CELSS—Controlled Environment Life Support Systems. He gave me what I needed to know and for that I am indebted to him. I hadn’t realized so much had changed from what we s-f writers used to use in hydroponic gardens on spaceships and stations.

Books on Bangladesh, its geography, culture, and language, published in Australia, were accessed from
Amazon.com
and
Amazon.co.uk
. The names will be different from those current in many American-printed atlases, especially as the major rivers change their beds and names to
whatever the local people choose. I am deeply indebted for the help of Dr. S. Farid Ahmed from Dhaka, currently Registrar in the Borders Hospital, for his assistance; he has prevented me from making several glaring misrepresentations.

My son, Todd McCaffrey, came forward magnificently with suggestions and solutions for the Limo (Lunar Insertion Moon Orbit) scenes and Jenna Scott McCaffrey read with her copy editor’s eyes on the text. So have my daughter, Georgeanne Kennedy, and Richard Woods, Lea Day, and Mary Jean Holmes.

I am happy to acknowledge the continued assistance and support of Shelly Shapiro, my editor at Del Rey, Diane Pearson, my editor at Transworld-Corgi, and Martha Trachtenberg, the copy editor who joggled my short-term memory about names and relationships.

One other point: since the genesis of the Pegasus books (and indeed the Rowan/Tower and Hive series) is the short story I wrote back in 1959, I have been constrained to keep to the people and places mentioned so long ago. Forty years later, we understand science and ourselves more clearly and in greater detail. I have kept to the original premises and places in “The Lady in the Tower” while moving along with such advances as possible and extrapolating as seemed logical.

A
s Peter Reidinger was teleporting in gestalt with the huge Jerhattan Power Station to bring the kinetics down from Padrugoi Space Station to Dhaka, an exhausted group of men and women were trying to reach the shelter of the nearest
shomiti
. With the bundles they had snatched from their homes before escaping the breached levees, they staggered to higher ground along the muddy banks of the Jamuna River. They had to scramble to bridge the gaps in the levee mounds that, in places, were sliding into the Jamuna’s torrent. Despite Herculean efforts by the government and the local administrators in the Rajshahi Division, the levees had not supplied the longed-for protection to those living along its banks.

Anger at the “authorities” consumed Zahid Idris Miah and sustained him as he slogged at the head of the group from his
bari
, flashing the long-life light ahead of him. In the gloom of this monsoon, the tool at least kept them from slithering into places where the Jamuna had chewed ravines into the levee bank in its rush to the sea. He devoutly mumbled prayers to Iswah that this tool was truly a “long-life” torch. He half expected it to fade out now, when it was most needed, like so many other items that came to his small
bari
south of Sirjganj as Rajshahi Division tried to—what was the
ingraji
word?—“upgrade” him and the other jute farmers.

They
should have kept a close watch on the levees in this storm.
They
should have worked more diligently to reinforce the collecting lakes along the Jamuna River.
They
had promised to do so, to keep more of Bangladesh from sliding beneath the Bay. He vaguely knew that a great new engineering process that had kept some city in Italia from drowning had been adapted to keep the Bay of Bengal from inundating the coastal regions near the mouth of the Padma. Much land had been lost along the seacoast
in spite of the efforts of many, very gifted engineers. The once inland city of Khulna was now protected by the great Dike, which had been erected three decades ago. Barisal City was also ringed south and east by the Ocean Dikes, invented by yet other westerners who had been determined to keep their land from drowning. Those islands that had once dotted the Bay of Bengal: Bhola, Hatiya, and Sondwip—where the Meghna River flowed into the Bay—had been inundated and the people saved only by the massive efforts of the World Relief Organization.

He had heard that the islands of Kutubdia and Maheskhali, near Cox’s Bazar were also gone, and the tip of Chittagong. As Zahid had never been farther from his
bari
than Sirājganj, these places might as well have been in Great India or Meriki. What had happened to those who had helped before? Had they, like so many others, deserted the Bangla in their hours of need? He wiped the sudden spurt of wind-driven rain from his face. Were they tired of rescuing poor Bangladeshi? He wasn’t surprised; who cared, but Iswah, what happened to the poor? The wind smacked at his lean, work-honed frame again and he slid on the mud, the light briefly aimed to his right.

Was that debris now bobbing along on the swift flowing current the plants he had struggled so to keep watered during the dry season? There was always too much of everything—Iswah be praised, he added quickly—when it wasn’t needed. The Jamuna had irrigated his fields but
this
was overdoing it.

“Where be those who aid? Curses be on their names and every generation of them!” Zahid roared above the wind, waving about both hands, making the torchlight stab about the darkness.

Behind him, Jamila wailed, berating her husband. “Do not wave our light about so! How am I seeing where to put my feet? If it falls from your hand, how will we be seeing where dry land is?” She had hiked up her sari, its sodden, muddy hem banging against her thin calves. He had already reprimanded her several times for her immodesty.

“Hush, woman. Rafiq and Rahim have torches. Watch your sari that you do not tempt Ayud Bondha.” To emphasize his displeasure in her demeanor, he lengthened his stride, sweeping the ray of light in front of him to see where he was going. This disgruntled him more, for it might appear to her that he was heeding her complaint.

“How far to go now, Zahid?” Salma, Ayud Bondha’s young wife, cried
in ragged gasps. She had to shout above the wind noise. She was many months pregnant with her firstborn, and clumsy. Ayud was half carrying her, both of them slipping about in the thick mud.

Zahid didn’t like Salma. As a young girl, she had been chosen from her village to go to the school to learn to read and write and do sums. Because of that, she did not efface herself, as a proper woman should, speaking out often in the
shomiti
with unseemly disregard of custom. Ayud Bondha always indulged her, smiling and doing nothing to discipline her, as a husband should.

“We will be seeing
shomiti
lights soon,” Zahid said and sent his beam ahead of them, squinting to see any glimmer from their destination.
Shomiti
were still built on heavy concrete pillars, thanks be to Iswah, so their shelter remained above the flooded lands. There would be light cylinders—also of the long-life variety—hung on the corners of the covered veranda to show refugees their way through the day’s darkness, wind, and rain.