To Ride Pegasus (6 page)

Probability figured the cost of the collision and fire at several millions and a thirty-six hour tie-up of Seaway
traffic, plus delayed cargoes which would complicate schedules and routines for ninety-two companies, involving work-loss of some eighteen thousand people.

“Okay, Ben, get out the usual warning format. See if Iricoil will listen to us.”

“And if Iricoil doesn’t want to believe?”

“We get after this Frascati. In fact, he’d be easier to bully than Iricoil but we’ve got to warn them, too.”

Iricoil was suspicious and uncooperative and, in phrases just short of insult, refused to consider diverting the tanker. It’s supplies were urgently required in Toronto by late evening. Frascati was not at his home nor in his business office. Urgent messages were left for the man to contact the Center before taking out his pleasure craft. Henry was dialing the Seaway Authority Control when George cut the connection.

“I’ve got an idea, Hank,” George said. “I’ve watched this routine so often and seen you insulted, ignored, and calumniated. No one trusts the altruist anymore, whether he’s Talented or not. You’ve warned Iricoil, tried to do them a favor. They aren’t buying. Well, like the puppy who leaves too many messages, let’s rub their nose in it.”

“You mean, let the accident occur?”

“More or less. Considering what’s involved in terms of credit and work-loss, and considering that I have shares in four of the companies to be affected by the snarl-up, will you play it my way, this once?”

Henry began to relax. “What have you in mind, George?”

“You did leave timed messages at Iricoil and for Frascati, didn’t you?”

Ben Avedon tapped the computer panel. “All time-sealed, George.”

“Fine. Now, issue a fax warning to Seaway Authority. Then give me a few comlines to work from and Molly to help me. Irenee was telling me about their new oil-pollutant at Dupont. This would be good PR for him. Always like to oblige friends. Which reminds me, you get on to
Jim Lawson … our revered Governor owes you a favor or two for that bullet Steve stopped And ask him for a few more VTOLs and a couple of frogmen.”

“Why?”

“
You
don’t know?”

Henry grinned. “Would you believe an educated guess?”

Henner chuckled. “My, my, how the mighty have fallen … Guessing!”

“Run the show your way, George.”

“Yes, let a pro show you how, Henry Darrow. You’re too damned soft You talk too much. Action speaks louder than a hundred of your Talented words.”

At exactly 16:32 hours of a bright spring afternoon, an Iricoil tanker proceeding down the St. Lawrence Seaway fouled its propellor on a tangle of steel cables, origin unknown. The tanker drifted athwart the current as a United Line freighter entered the narrow channel from the opposite direction. A second tanker, also United Line, making speed enough to reach Toronto port by dark, cruised into the danger zone, although it was apparent that the Iricoil boat was in distress. Both United Line ships continued, evidently hoping to pass the injured vessel, one on the port, the other on the starboard. Likely they would have succeeded but the Aitch Bee, also impatient to reach port, came bucketing down the searoute. It swung rather dose to the distressed vessel. As Frascati ever after maintained, he wanted to see if he could be of any assistance in getting a message ashore: a ridiculous alibi since the tanker was well equipped by radio and ship-shore telephone. Frascati’s propellor became fouled on the same villain cable. The freighter began to pass the disabled pair and her wash slammed the small craft into the Iricoil tanker. The United Line tanker was broadside of the Iricoil when her bow swung out Tanker #2 swung to starboard to avoid a collision and her stern banged into
Iricoil, splitting a seam in the aft oil hold just as the small craft was ground between the two bigger hulls. Its galley fires caught old grease and spread in the cabin as the yacht’s gasoline tank was breached. Oil pouring from the Iricoil vessel would shortly ignite from that flame.

At this point the hovering rescue copters intervened as newsmedia cameras recorded the event from every angle. Foam quickly doused the yacht fire, the oil-pollution material gobbled up the spilt petroleum and kinetics held back additional oil loss by pressure until the teleports could get the conveniently handy plates into position. Other kinetics and the frogmen worked loose the steel cable and it was hoisted out of the way. “Captain” Frascati and the two crew members (his sons) of the damaged yacht were lifted up and another team of kinetics kept the little ship floating until the belatedly arriving coast guard cutter could tow it into port.

The Seaway was not blocked since all four vessels were cleared out of the narrow channel before others made the passage. There was no loss of life and no long-term pollution of the water. The Parapsychic teams were volubly and embarassingly thanked for preventing a major disaster, and by cocktail time everyone was pleased by the denouement, especially Patsy Tucker and Terry Cle.

The congratulatory euphoria lasted twelve hours, at which point the Seaway Authority began to realize that matters had come to near-disaster in an unprecedented way.

“What was the meaning of sending us only a fax to announce a major disaster?” the Seaway Commissioner demanded in such stentorian tones that George Henner need not have listened in on the second comunit in Henry’s office.

“You were informed by fax as usual,” Henry replied in a mild tone of voice.

“By fax! When countless millions of credits were at stake? And blockage of the most important waterway in North America? And do you realize that we have only just
balanced the sealife ecology in that strip of waterway That oil …”

“You were informed …”

“Well, I’m informing you that you’re in for a suit or criminal negligence …”

“Negligence of what, Commissioner? You were informed nine hours and thirty-eight minutes prior to the accident by this ex-officio group, which is not a government sponsored or accredited agency. We act for and in the public interest. But we are understaffed and overworked. You could have queried this office for more particulars, although all we had were included in that fax. Your Authority could have held back any one of the four vessels involved, thus preventing the …”

“Are
you
accusing the Seaway Authority of negligence?”

Henry held the receiver away from his ear, shook his head, and replied in his mildest manner, “Forewarned is forearmed, sir.” He caught George Henner giving the high sign of approval.

“You’ll hear from us, Darrow. You people can’t get away with irresponsible behavior like this.”

The connection was rudely and noisily broken.

“Did you figure a lawsuit in your calculations, George?” asked Henry.

Henner rubbed his hands together in glee. “
If
they sue, we’d win.”

Henry couldn’t exactly share in Henner’s gleerul anticipation. The precog knew of the multitude of lawsuits which would be served on Talents in the next decades and the sheer cost of inspired defense made him shudder. The money would be available but it was credit that could be used to better advantage in training and identifying Talent, not defending against misunderstanding and greed. By late afternoon, Henry’s premonitions of immediate disaster were borne out by additional suits of negligence which arrived from United Line, Iricoil Tankers and A. Frascati.

“Let me handle this,” George Henner told Henry and his hastily convened executive staff. “I don’t need any crystal ball or anerodic graph needle to tell me how to manage this sort of crap.”

Before he had Henry’s voiced approval, he was on the wires to the major media networks, chatting familiarly with presidents and commissioners. By the time the films of the Parapsychic Center’s assistance had been widely aired, with a few choice comments on how the Center operated to forestall major disasters, the threatened legal action against the Talents was withdrawn. Suits were entered against the Seaway for criminal negligence. Then the Center, on George Henner’s advice (“Make ’em pay for it, when they don’t listen to you.”), sent bills for the rescue operations to Frascati, United Line and Iricoil Tankers.

“And from now on, Henry,” George said, “don’t ever follow up your faxed warnings with personal phone calls. Don’t be the supplicant, damn it. Be the prelate!”

Henry watched with inner amusement as George Henner paced up and down the floor, his eyes flashing, even his stride firm and aggressive so that Henry could see traces of the strengths which had amassed George Henner his considerable fortune and which had overwhelmed less determined adversaries in the business world.

“There’s no point in you bruising your larynx with persuasion. You’ve proved your worth over and over again and this Seaway bollix ought to make a validated Parapsychic warning worth the paper it’s printed on, even at the dreadful price of paper these days.”

“A sound argument, George, and I appreciate your help …”

George stopped midstride, glaring at Henry through narrowed lids.

“Yes, I am helping you, aren’t I? Shouldn’t do that, should I?”

“My friendly enemy,” replied Henry with a laugh.

“Ha! Tell me that when my executors snatch the rug of Beechwoods from under your telepathetic feet …”

“And we need you, George,” Henry raised his voice to overwhelm Hennef’s snide remarks. “If I can convince a skeptic like you, I’m well away to swaying John Q. Public to my side. He’s more variable than you, and he will be the hardest to win over.”

John Q. Public, however, quixotically decided the Seaway Authority had been foolish to ignore the Parapsychic warning. Criticism was heaped on the Seaway from every quarter. Later the Authority was somewhat exonerated of primary guilt since the Court felt that good judgment on the part of any one of the other three skippers would have prevented the accident and no costs were awarded the claimants. The official records cited and credited the Parapsychic Center with averting a major calamity, and loss of life and property. All Transport Authorities were severely enjoined to heed any warnings from the Center which involved public transport.

For the next few weeks all precogs of traffic problems, possible fire, storm or spring floods throughout the world were instantly acted upon. The Center was besieged with anxious calls about whether Mr. S could undertake that long distance flight, or Mrs. J could safely make her annual pilgrimage from Florida to Wisconsin, and if there had been any precog about the transfer of cyanide cylinders to the authorized Atlantic Trench dump. Thousands of hopeful people applied for the simple tests which would indicate if they possessed some useful Talent.

“It’s an ill wind that blows no good,” Henry remarked to Molly after another hectic day answering urgent calls and dealing with anxious queries.

“I suppose so,” she said, sinking wearily into the armchair of their private suite in the main house. “But I wish we had more Gooseggs or a surer way of spotting the live ones.”

“Any today?” Henry fixed Molly a stiff drink.

“Yes,” and she brightened as if she’d temporarily forgotten the event “One very strong receiving telepath out of forty-five aspirants.” She accepted the drink, turning the glass in her hand as if the amber liquid held some other answer. “Henry, they come in so hopeful … and some of them leave so angry and disappointed. As if
we
ought to be able to find what doesn’t exist …”

“Not your fault, love. Everyone wants to be, in some way, unique, and can’t realize that being unique is a responsibility as well as a privilege. You can’t cure that. How strong’s the telepath?”

Molly brightened. “I think he’s very strong, but he’s been blocking thoughts, the way they all do. Out of fear. He may need a lot of training.”

“No, not too much,” Henry said easily, pulling his chair close to Molly and clasping her free hand. “Young fellow, isn’t he? Welsh extraction, Welsh name. Right?”

“I just sent the report in …” Molly began, startled, and stopped mid-sentence, arrested by Henry’s knowing look. “Not another one, Henry?”

“They do seem to appear right on schedule,” Henry grinned at her but there was a shadow in his eyes. “Right on schedule. One day I’ll be wrong.”

“Don’t Henry.” She clasped his hand tightly, reassuringly, knowing the strain of his unfortunate infallibility, knowing that some of the events he foresaw he’d rather not have seen. “And, he is, as you predicted, Welsh,” she went on in a light voice, “by name, Daffyd op Owen. Very likeable chap. He’s important?”

Henry nodded. “He won’t need more than some basic pointers and a few quiet weeks here to wash the ‘noise’ out of his mind and learn to project as well as receive.”

“Well, that’s one on the plus side of the ledger.” She rotated her shoulders to ease the day’s strains but Henry’s disclosure about young op Owen made her feel much better about her labors.

“When is he moving in?”

“Don’t you know?” she asked in a bantering fashion.

“What I know I wish I didn’t. What I’d give anything to know, I have to wait and see.”

She smiled at him lovingly. “You mean, if we retain Beechwoods?” When he nodded, she chided him gently. “How often have you been wrong in the merest detail?”

“It’s not how often I’m right Molly luv, it’s will I be wrong
this
time, this once? This important, crucial, critical once? Such a terrible gift, luv. Terrible when your knowledge means the loss of a friend …”

“Henry, your recognition, the very challenge of the Center,” and her arm gesture encompassed all of Beechwoods, “have kept George Henner alive … and kicking.” She peered into Henry’s face, reassuring him by touch, word and look. “He’s determined to do you out of Beechwoods, if only by a minute. That determination alone has strengthened his hold on life. I’ve seen his medical reports, Henry. I know.” She leaned back in her chair. “You’ve done him quite a favor and he knows it. I shouldn’t be surprised if he hasn’t left the Center Beechwoods anyway.”

“He hasn’t. He showed me the will.”

Molly opened her mouth to say something then thought better of it.

“All right,” Henry went on, catching her look of mischief, “so he could write a second one in secret … No, we’ve a wager on and …”