JACQUE
Laughs.
I suppose. Here comes our man.
The wine steward serves the bottle with appropriate ceremony. They toast and drink.
CAROL Good. Are you used to this kind of living?
JACQUE
Was once. Not since I was a boy.
CAROL
Your parents were rich?
JACQUE
Fairly well off. Dad was a senior physicist at Institut Fermi in New York.
CAROL
He’s dead now.
JACQUE
Hesitates.
In a manner of speaking. Let’s talk about something else.
CAROL
Sure, I’m sorry.
JACQUE
It’s funny.
CAROL Hmm?
JACQUE
Well . . . that we should have gone through so much together-discover a new world together- and be such strangers.
CAROL
Together separately. I can’t get used to seeing you as a solid human, inside a body. You’re supposed to be just a voice in my ear.
JACQUE
I don’t have any trouble getting used to your body.
CAROL
You’re so gallant.
JACQUE dips a forefinger in the wine and skims along the top of the glass. It’s fine crystal and makes a pure singing note, which unfortunately doesn’t go well with the octet. A man at the next table gives JACQUE a sharp look, and he stops.
CAROL
You don’t care for the music?
JACQUE
Music! It’s just a gimmick to sell lutes and flutes.
CAROL
It’s pretty…
JACQUE
Next year it’ll be electric guitars.
CAROL
Could be.
JACQUE
If it were real Elizabethan music, madrigals and such, that would be all right-austere, controlled; but this modem-
CAROL
Calm down, Jacque. It’s nothing to get all worked up over.
JACQUES finishes his wine and pours another glass. CAROL declines.
CAROL
What time is it?
JACQUE
Five after nine…
CAROL
If we left now, we could walk to the chamber.
JACQUE
That’s…
Regards his drink.
probably a good idea.
Signals waiter.
It’s a nice night.
JACQUE settles the check and they leave, CAROL’S hand lightly on his arm.
19 – Fugue
A polyphonic composition based upon one, two, or more themes, which are enunciated by several voices or parts in turn, subjected to a contrapuntal treatment, and gradually built up into a complex form having somewhat distinct divisions or stages of development and a marked climax at the end.
The Groombridge bridge was housed in a room-sized hyperbaric chamber adjacent to the ready room. It was overbuilt for the purpose, the air pressure on Groom-bridge being nine-tenths of an atmosphere, but as Jacque pointed out, it had one real advantage for their particular experiment: no windows.
They were a little early, and were sharing a cup of coffee when Van der Walls and his group came out.
“Any results, Dr. Van?” Carol asked.
“Difficult to say.” He shook his head. “Most of the animals were lethargic.” He opened the cage he was carrying and took out a small collie, still trailing wires from its head and chest. It was limp as a rag; didn’t want to stand. Van der Walls stroked it gently and talked to it.
“They couldn’t wear masks, of course. Carbon dioxide got to most of them. We’ll know more after we look at the biometrics results. There, boy.” The dog was standing sleepily.
His two assistants brought out the rest of the cages. “That’s it, Van,” one of them said. Van der Walls tucked the dog under his arm and with a straight face wished them good luck.
Jacque and Carol put new plastic inserts in two of the breathers and slipped on the masks. They didn’t strap the tanks on their backs, but carried them through the airlock into the chamber.
The drop in pressure made their ears pop.
“Not exactly the honeymoon suite,” Jacque said. Bright white enamel walls and black tile floor, an aquarium full of muddy water on a table in the middle. A folding cot borrowed from the infirmary. Video cameras.
“Omnia vincit Amor,” Carol said.
“We’ll see.” They led each other to the cot. In passing, Jacque threw his jacket over one of the cameras.
“They said the cameras wouldn’t be on,” Carol said. Jacque was taking his shirt off, a tricky business, since it was a turtleneck. He had to worry it over the mask, then thread it down over the airhose and tank. “That’s what they said.” He threw the shirt over the other camera.