them through . . . after you've arranged a longer stretch of time."
Admiral Boone's worried voice came then. "You, Mr. President, and Mrs. Conner, and the children ought, I think, to fly at once for the Maryland post. I mean--if this thing warmed up--"
The President said, "Fooie! I'm going down stairs for some breakfast. I'm hungry!" And he hung up, grinning at the faint sounds of dismay he'd overheard.
His grin faded the moment he set down the phone. It had been the best he could do. Was it good enough? It had always worked before.
Threat, counterthreat, compromise, and--usually--some slight retreat of the free world that, as time passed, showed itself to be greater than it had first appeared. . . .
CHAPTER 4
Ben woke in the predawn hours surprised that he had already slept deeply. He had not expected that. Undressing alone in his guest chambers, he'd anticipated a night of nervous insomnia. One small question had altered his insight and even battered his basic concept of himself. . . .
Why didn't you ever ask me to marry you?
Faith had meant that . . . almost. Faith had meant, anyhow, that her engagement to Kit Barlow was not the whelming joy an engagement ought to be. She had meant she found him--Ben Bernman--attractive . . . at least, interesting.
With that he had realized how his feelings for her had grown, unknown by him, like the crystals that create a complex beauty inside a geode. Feelings that had begun with his first, startled grunt as he'd brushed snowflakes from the face of an unconscious woman and seen in the steady beam of a flashlight that she was beautiful. Feelings that had become clear and sharp and urgent . . . but stifled . . . in the weeks he'd seen her during her convalescence in the hospital on Long Island. Feelings that had exploded into his awareness only when she'd asked that strange question . . . asked it lightly yet with an undertone of urgency, or of--perhaps--irony; even bitterness.
Then he had known, of a sudden, and known in the next flash of thought that it was too late to know, to count, to matter. Known--or at least presumed-that Faith's words rose from her version of represented reaction. Not love necessarily of him, but an expression of the small and uneven affection she held for Barlow. So he thought.
Still, being honest--scientific as well--and a kind of brave gambler where his person and destiny were concerned, Ben wished he had asked her . . . wished he'd had the insight earlier, because it might have led him to ask . . . wished he'd taken the chance even though the outcome would have been . . . what? The yet-more-brutal thing of Faith's disillusionment in being engaged, or promised, or whatever, to a Jew, with all that signified? A love affair, maybe, broken off eventually? The mere idea stirred him to a degree he'd never experienced.
Or would she just have laughed at him, supposing he had known he loved her and said so? Worse, would she have tried to play up to such a statement and then gently let him down . . . because she would have felt she owed him the (accidental) debt of her life?
With his mind in a furnace of retrospection, of premises cast down as quickly as they were devised, Ben had anticipated a restless night. Yet he'd slept from about eleven until now. And now, his watch said in chimed code, was close to daybreak. He lay still, wondering what alarm had roused him, and then why he felt his awakening had been caused by alarm.
The hot dark outdoors was silent.
Not even a rooster crowed anywhere yet.
Was someone in danger? Had there been some devilish calamity at Brookhaven?
Had some stealthy hand tried his door? Why did he feel, for an instant, a cold surge of fear that, as he examined it, became baseless?
Ben didn't believe in telepathy. Didn't believe in the possibility that he, or anyone, might catch a winging wash of dread like this, that grew in intensity minute by minute on waves of unknown lengths from random epicenters. No
Admiral Boone's worried voice came then. "You, Mr. President, and Mrs. Conner, and the children ought, I think, to fly at once for the Maryland post. I mean--if this thing warmed up--"
The President said, "Fooie! I'm going down stairs for some breakfast. I'm hungry!" And he hung up, grinning at the faint sounds of dismay he'd overheard.
His grin faded the moment he set down the phone. It had been the best he could do. Was it good enough? It had always worked before.
Threat, counterthreat, compromise, and--usually--some slight retreat of the free world that, as time passed, showed itself to be greater than it had first appeared. . . .
CHAPTER 4
Ben woke in the predawn hours surprised that he had already slept deeply. He had not expected that. Undressing alone in his guest chambers, he'd anticipated a night of nervous insomnia. One small question had altered his insight and even battered his basic concept of himself. . . .
Why didn't you ever ask me to marry you?
Faith had meant that . . . almost. Faith had meant, anyhow, that her engagement to Kit Barlow was not the whelming joy an engagement ought to be. She had meant she found him--Ben Bernman--attractive . . . at least, interesting.
With that he had realized how his feelings for her had grown, unknown by him, like the crystals that create a complex beauty inside a geode. Feelings that had begun with his first, startled grunt as he'd brushed snowflakes from the face of an unconscious woman and seen in the steady beam of a flashlight that she was beautiful. Feelings that had become clear and sharp and urgent . . . but stifled . . . in the weeks he'd seen her during her convalescence in the hospital on Long Island. Feelings that had exploded into his awareness only when she'd asked that strange question . . . asked it lightly yet with an undertone of urgency, or of--perhaps--irony; even bitterness.
Then he had known, of a sudden, and known in the next flash of thought that it was too late to know, to count, to matter. Known--or at least presumed-that Faith's words rose from her version of represented reaction. Not love necessarily of him, but an expression of the small and uneven affection she held for Barlow. So he thought.
Still, being honest--scientific as well--and a kind of brave gambler where his person and destiny were concerned, Ben wished he had asked her . . . wished he'd had the insight earlier, because it might have led him to ask . . . wished he'd taken the chance even though the outcome would have been . . . what? The yet-more-brutal thing of Faith's disillusionment in being engaged, or promised, or whatever, to a Jew, with all that signified? A love affair, maybe, broken off eventually? The mere idea stirred him to a degree he'd never experienced.
Or would she just have laughed at him, supposing he had known he loved her and said so? Worse, would she have tried to play up to such a statement and then gently let him down . . . because she would have felt she owed him the (accidental) debt of her life?
With his mind in a furnace of retrospection, of premises cast down as quickly as they were devised, Ben had anticipated a restless night. Yet he'd slept from about eleven until now. And now, his watch said in chimed code, was close to daybreak. He lay still, wondering what alarm had roused him, and then why he felt his awakening had been caused by alarm.
The hot dark outdoors was silent.
Not even a rooster crowed anywhere yet.
Was someone in danger? Had there been some devilish calamity at Brookhaven?
Had some stealthy hand tried his door? Why did he feel, for an instant, a cold surge of fear that, as he examined it, became baseless?
Ben didn't believe in telepathy. Didn't believe in the possibility that he, or anyone, might catch a winging wash of dread like this, that grew in intensity minute by minute on waves of unknown lengths from random epicenters. No
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