When they pressed me to, I talked of Venus. As I spoke, back rushed that humblingbut intoxicatingsense of awe to think I had actually lived to stand in full possession of my many faculties on that startling planet. The same feeling had often possessed me on Mars. And (as justifiably) on Earth.
The vision chimed, and an amber light biinked drowsily off and on in Jubal’s tank. Even then, no premonition of ca-tastrophe; since then, I can never see that amber heartbeat without anxiety.
Jubal answered it, and a man’s face swam up in the tank to greet him. They talked; I could catch no words, but the sudden tension was apparent. Sloe went over and put her arm round Jubal’s shoulder.
“Something up,” J-Casta commented.
“Yes,” I said.
“That’s Chief M-Shawn on the visionfrom Owenstown, over on Lake Victoria.”
Then Jubal flashed off and came slowly back to where we were sitting.
“That was M-Shawn,” he said. “The level of Lake Victoria has just dropped three inches.” He lit a cheroot with clumsy fingers, his eyes staring in mystification far beyond the flame.
“Dam okay, boss?” J-Casta asked.
“Perfectly. They’re going to phone us if they find anything …”
“Has this happened before?” I asked, not quite able to understand their worried looks.
“Of course not,” my half-brother said scornfully. “Surely you must see the implications of it? Something highly un-precedented has occurred.”
“But surely a mere three inches of water…”
At that he laughed briefly. Even J-Casta permitted himself a snort.
“Lake Victoria is an inland sea,” Jubal said grimly. “It’s as big as Tasmania. Three inches all over that area means many thousands of tons of water. Casta, I think we’ll get down to Mokulgu; it won’t do any harm to alert the first aid services, just in case they’re needed. Got your tracer?”
“Yes, boss. I’m coming.”
Jubal patted Sloe’s arm, nodded to me and left without relaxing his worried look. He and J-Casta shortly appeared outside. They bundled into a float, soared .dangerously close to a giant walnut tree and vanished into the night.
Nervously, Sloe put down her cheroot and did not resume it. She fingered a dial and the windows opaqued.
“There’s an ominous waiting quality out there I don’t like,” she said, to explain our sudden privacy.
“Should I be feeling alarmed?” I asked.
She flashed me a smile. “Quite honestly, yes. You don’t live in our world, Rog, or you would guess at once what was happening at Lake Victoria. They’ve just finished raising the level again; for a long time they’ve been on about more pressure, and the recent heavy rains gave them their chance to build it up. It seems to have been the last straw.”
“And what does this three-inch drop mean? Is there a breach in the dam somewhere?”
“No. They’d have found that. I’m afraid it means the bed of the lake has collapsed somewhere. The water’s pouring into subterranean reservoirs.”
The extreme seriousness of the matter was now obvious even to me. Lake Victoria is the source of the White Nile; if it ceased to feed the river, millions of people in Uganda and the Sudan would die of drought. And not only people: birds, beasts, fish, insects, plants.
We both grew restless. We took a turn outside in the cool night air, and then decided we too would go down to the town.
All the way there a picture filled my head; the image of that great dark lake emptying like a wash-basin. Did it drain in sinister silence, or did it gargle as it went? Men of action forget to tell you vital details like that.
That night was an anticlimax, apart from the sight of the full moon sailing over Mount Kangosi. We joined Jubal and his henchman and hung about uneasily until midnight.
As if an unknown god had been propitiated by the sacrifice of an hour’s sleep, we then felt easier and retired to bed.
The news was bad the next morning. By the time I was dressed Jubal was already back in town; Sloe and I breakfasted alone together. She told me they had been in-formed that Victoria had now dropped thirteen and a half inches; the rate of fall seemed to be increasing.