You’re carrying a screaming load of guilt, Colonel, whether you’re aware of it or not.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Why don’t you just beat it?”
“No. And you know well enough. You fell all over yourself to tell me about the family you killed in your flying accident.” I gave him ten seconds of silence, and then shot the question at him as hard as I could. “What was their name?”
“How do I know? Sweeney or something. Anything. I don’t remember.”
“Sure you do. Do you think that killing your own family is going to bring the Sweeneys back to life?”
Gascoigne’s mouth twisted, but he seemed to be entirely unaware of the grimace. ‘That’s all hogwash,” he said. “I never did hold with that psychological claptrap. It’s you that’s handing out the baloney, not me.”
“Then why are you being so vituperative about it? Hogwash, claptrap, baloneyyou are working awfully hard to knock it down, for a man who doesn’t believe in it.”
“Go away,” he said suUenly. “I’ve got my orders. I’m obeying them.”
Stalemate. But there was no such thing as stalemate up here. Defeat was the word.
The tape traveled. I did not know what to do. The last bomb problem CIG had tackled had been one we had set up ourselves; we had arranged for a dud to be dropped in New York harbor, to test our own facilities for speed in determining the nature of the missile. The situation on board SV-I was completely different
Whoa. Was it? Maybe I’d hit something there.
“Colonel Gascoigne,” I said slowly, “you might as well know now that it isn’t going to work. Not even if you do get that bomb off.”