Germany to escape a program. She came to this country, and told us about
it.
We were searching, there in the laboratory in Maryland, for a way to use
U235 in a controlled explosion. We had a vision of a one-ton bomb that
would be a whole air raid in itself, a single explosion that would flatten
out an entire industrial center. Dr. Ridpath, of Continental Tech, claimed
that he could build such a bomb, but that he could not guarantee that it
would not explode as soon as it was loaded and as for the force of the
explosion—well, he did not believe his own figures; they ran out to too
many ciphers.
The problem was, strangely enough, to find an explosive which would be weak
enough to blow up only one country at a time, and stable enough to blow up
only on request. If we could devise a really practical rocket fuel at the
same time, one capable of driving a war rocket at a thousand miles an hour,
or more, then we would be in a position to make most anybody say “uncle” to
Uncle Sam.
We fiddled around with it all the rest of 1943 and well into 1944. The war
in Europe and the troubles in Asia dragged on. After Italy folded up,
England was able to release enough ships from her Mediterranean fleet to
ease the blockade of the British Isles. With the help of the planes we
could now send her regularly and with the additional over-age destroyers we
let her have, England hung on somehow, digging in and taking more and more
of her essential defense industries underground. Russia shifted her weight
from side to side as usual, apparently with the policy of preventing either
side from getting a sufficient advantage to bring the war to a successful
conclusion. People were beginning to speak of “permanent
war.”
I was killing time in the administrative office, trying to improve my
typing—a lot of Mannings reports had to be typed by me personally—when the
orderly on duty stepped in and announced Dr. Karst. I flipped the
inter-office communicator. “Dr. Karst is here, chief. Can you see her?”
“Yes,” he answered, through his end.
I told the orderly to show her in.
Estelle Karst was quite a remarkable old girl and, I suppose, the first
woman ever to hold a commission in the corps of engineers. She was an M. D.
as well as an Sc.D. and reminded me of the teacher I had had in fourth
grade. I guess that was why I always stood up instinctively when she came
in the room—I was afraid she might look at me and sniff. It couldn’t have
been her rank; we didn’t bother much with rank.
She was dressed in white coveralls and a shop apron and had simply thrown a
hooded cape over herself to come through the snow. I said, “Good morning,
maam,” and led her into Mannings office.
The Colonel greeted her with the urbanity that had made him such a success
with women’s clubs, seated her, and offered her a cigarette.
“I’m glad to see you, Major,” he said. “I’ve been intending to drop around
to your shop.”
I knew what he was getting at Dr. Karst’s work had been primarily
physiomedical; he wanted her to change the direction of her research to
something more productive in a military sense.
“Don’t call me ‘major,’ ” she said tartly.
“Sorry, Doctor—”
“I came on business, and must get right back. And I presume you are a busy
man, too. Colonel Manning, I need some help.”
“That’s what we are here for.”
“Good. I’ve run into some snags in my research. I think that one of the men
in Dr. Ridpath’s department could help me, but Dr. Ridpath doesn’t seem
disposed to be cooperative.”
“So? Well, I hardly like to go over the head of a departmental chief, but
tell me about it; perhaps we can arrange it. Whom do you want?”
“I need Dr. Obre.”
“The spectroscopist—hm-m-m. I can understand Dr. Ridpath’s reluctance, Dr.
Karst, and I’m disposed to agree with him. After all, the high-explosives
research is really our main show around here.”