Hidden Variables Read Online Free PDF

they want me to prove myself one more time. I don't know how."
    Garry Scanlon looked across at Len, slumped in the rocker. The dark hair was grey, as grey as the face beneath it.
    Have I aged that much? Garry thought. God knows, I've had the reasons. The baby, then Jennie.
    "I can help, Len. Just tell me what you need. I didn't get much from the move to Headquarters, but at least I can pull a few strings if I have to."
    "Not these strings, Garry. Who do you know over at the Department of Justice?"
    "Couple of neighbors are there. You want me to keep you out of jail?"
    Len smiled wanly. "It may come to that—I haven't told you what I've been doing, but I've gone a long way past old Uncle Seth. A long way. Right now, I want to arrange a meeting with somebody, as high up as you can get me."
    "You're part of the group that's bidding on Lungfish, that ought to get their attention. What else do you need from me? "
    "Nothing. The less you know, the better. Believe me, when the time comes for a trip out, you'll know the minute that I do."
    "How long?"
    A weary shrug. "Three years? As my ex-boss says, don't hold your breath waiting. Maybe you'll beat me to it, doing it the regular way."
    "Uh-uh." Garry stood up. He was developing signs of a paunch and the rounded shoulders of a desk worker. "You should see the budget for next year. It's a disaster—we spend more in welfare in one week than we do on space in two years. Got a job for me out there, Len?"
    Len Martello had closed his eyes. He was silent for so long that Garry wondered if he were in pain.
    "Not right now, Garry."
    And not this year. It's bad enough that I have to do what I'm doing.
    "Maybe when we get the operation going," he said at last.
    "You'll need specialists in chemical plants if you're really going into space pharmaceuticals."
    "There's a few bridges to be crossed before we're there. Big ones. Got a Congressional Directory? I need to dig out Senator Macintosh's address."
    'Most men and women, at their deepest levels, are a complex combination of bravery and cowardice. It is the rare individual who has the pure essence, the complete courage or the true cowardice. Of all the professions, politics draws an unusually high percentage of both pure types. The difficult task is to determine with which one is dealing, since there are strong resemblances in their superficial behavior.
    'It is much the same when we look at corruption. Politics presents a strange mixture of high and low ideals, the naturally corrupt and the incorruptible. The 101st Congress is no exception . . .'
    Len read on, marking certain passages for future use. At nine p.m., the preset alarm sounded. The sixteen inch refractor set into the roof of his penthouse apartment was ready, computer-controlled on its target. Lungfish was rising. Slightly above synchronous orbit, its twenty-seven hour period took it slowly across the star field; it had less apparent motion than any other body in the sky except for the synchronous satellites.
    The consortium was ready to prove their statement: Lungfish still had working communications with ground-based stations, and enough fuel in the mickey-mouse external thrusters to achieve attitude stabilization.
    Len watched closely, but he could see no change. Lungfish was still only a point of light. He would have to wait for attitude telemetry to come down and prove that the station was still live and controllable, even though it was no more than the hollow husk of a working space station.
    On impulse, he keyed in lunar coordinates. The microcomputer that controlled the telescope tracking took a fraction of a second to compute the relative positions, then swung the system quickly to its new target. The Taurus-Littrow Range was at the center of the field of view. For the thousandth time, Len peered at the image, seeking in his own inner vision the tiny speck of the Lunar Rover from Apollo 17. The last trip out . . .
    A sudden razor's edge of pain from his stomach made him