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science departments. But he’d been outraged by a tall, dark-haired, brimstone-eyed preacher who’d informed the board what their duties were, and left no doubt he was speaking for a higher power. The preacher had brought his congregation, one of whom was waving a sign with the number 649 on it, supposedly the number of obscenities in Catcher . Unable to contain himself, Charlie had taken on the preacher.
    In hindsight, he hadn’t thought he’d done well. The preacher was louder and more practiced than he, but the small group of school supporters liked what they saw. They asked him to run in the fall election, and as Charlie saw it, next thing he knew he was vice president.
    He looked at his watch. “Give me a minute to change,” he said. “And then we better get started.”
    “Yeah. Listen, on second thought, wear the jacket. Okay? It’ll help you bond with these people. But the uniform’s too much.”
    Rick’s value lay in what Charlie liked to think of as an ability to see around corners. If there was a booby trap ahead, he could be counted on to find it before it exploded.
    Wearing only the jacket would be a halfway measure. A sign of weakness. When Charlie came out of the bedroom, he’d pulled on his own custom-made gray suit.
    Rick frowned. “I don’t know why you keep me on,” he said.
    Skyport, NASA/Smithsonian Orbital Laboratory. 12:13 P.M.
    The Orbital Lab at the Earth satellite Skyport served as a worldwide clearinghouse for astronomical data. New variable pulsar analyses, fresh information on large-structure configurations, the latest findings on extra-solar terrestrial worlds supporting oxygen atmospheres—all were funneled into the Orbital Lab, collated, cross-indexed, relayed to interested consumers, and made available on the Web for the general public.
    Tory Clark was watching the progress of the eclipse across North America on the overhead monitor while she looked through incoming reports. Although there was an enormous amount of activity connected with the event, nonrelated routine inputs did not slow down appreciably. She had, for example, a quasar update from Kitt Peak, a new report on R 136a in the Large Magellanic, and corrections to the velocity measurements for the runaway star 53 Arietis. She also had something else.
    “Windy?” She held up a hand to get the attention of her supervisor, Winfield Cross. “You want to take a look at this?”
    Cross was in his fifties, medium size, medium build, medium everything. People tended to have a hard time remembering who he was, or what his name was. He was African-American, had grown up in south Los Angeles, gone to Princeton on a scholarship, and now seemed worried only by the possibility that his age would catch up to him before he achieved his one ambition. The automated observatory at Farside, the hidden side of the Moon, was going to be expanded and provided with a human staff. Windy hoped to get the director’s job.
    He held up one hand to signal that he understood, finished writing on a clipboard, and turned to his own screen. She heard him inhale. “What is it? You check it yet?”
    They were looking at Tomiko’s splinter of light.
    “Don’t know.”
    “Sun-grazer, you think?”
    “I guess. Can’t imagine what else.”
    There was nothing new, of course, about sun-grazing comets. They approached from the far side of the Sun and returned the same way. Consequently, they were virtually impossible to see from Earth, unless they happened to show up during a total eclipse, as this one had.
    Windy’s fingertips drummed on the computer table. “Who’ve we got?”
    Tory was ready for the question. “Feinberg’s at Beaver Meadow for the show.” She was referring to the eclipse.
    “ Feinberg . Well, no point monkeying with the small fry. Okay, try to get him and ask him to take a look.”
    Moonbase, Ranger Auditorium. 12:17 P.M.
    The place was named for the only ship lost during the second wave of lunar exploration. The second