'Great,' Barbie said. He supposed he was being sarcastic, but he was too amazed and perplexed to be sure.
'None of this is conclusive, but it's persuasive. Of course the exploring has just started, but right now it does look as if the thing is down as well as up. And if it goes up five miles...'
'How do you know that? Radar?'
'Negative, this thing doesn't show on radar. There's no way of telling it's there until you hit it, or until you're so close you can't stop The human toll when the thing went up was remarkably low, but you've got one hell of a bird-kill around the edges. Inside and outside.'
'I know. I've seen them.'Julia was done with her pictures now. She was standing next to him, listening to Barbie's end of the conversation. 'So how do you know how high it is? Lasers?'
'No, they also shoot right through. We've been using missiles with dummy warheads.We've been flying F-15A sorties out of Bangor sine; four this afternoon. Surprised you didn't hear them.'
'I might have heard something,' Barbie said. 'But my mind was occupied with other things.' Like the airplane. And the pulp-truck. The dead people out on Route 1.17. Part of the remarkably low human toll.
'They kept bouncing off... and then, at: forty-seven thousand plus, just zippity-zoom, up, up and away. Between you and me, I'm surprised we didn't lose any of those fighter-jocks.'
'Have you actually overflown it yet?'
'Less than two hours ago. Mission successful.'
'Who did it, Colonel?'
'We don't know.'
'Was it us? Is this an experiment that went wrong? Or. God help us, some kind of test? You owe me the truth. You owe this town the truth. These people are goddam terrified.'
'Understood. But it wasn't us.'
'Would you know if it was?'
Cox hesitated. When he next spoke, his voice was lower. 'We have good sources in my department. When they fart in ttie NSA, we hear it. The same is true about Group Nine at Langley and a couple of other little deals you never heard of.'
It was possible that Cox was telling the truth. And it wa?possible he wasn't. He was a creature of his calling, after all; if he had been drawing sentry duty out here in the chilly autumn dark with the rest of the pogeybait Marines, Cox too would have been standing with his back turned. He wouldn't have liked it, but orders were orders.
'Any chance it's some sort of natural phenomenon?' Barbie asked.
'One that conforms exactly to the man-made borders of a whole town? Every nook and f**king cranny? What do you think?'
'I had to ask. Is it permeable? Do you know?'
'Water goes through,' Cox said. 'A little, anyway'
'How is that possible?'Although he'd seen for himself ttie weird way - water behaved: both he and Gendron had seen it.
"We don't know, how could we?' Cox sounded exasperated. 'We've been working on this less than twelve hours. People here are slapping themselves on the back just for figuring out how high it goes. We may figure it out, but for now we just don't know.'
'Air?'
'Air goes through to a greater degree. We've set up a monitoring station where your town borders on... mmm...' Faintly, Barbie heard paper rustle. 'Harlow. They've done what they call "puff tests." I guess that must measure outgoing air pressure against what bounces back. Anyway, air goes through, and a lot more freely than water does, but the scientists say still not completely. This is going to severely f**k up your weather, pal, but nobody can say how much or how bad. Hell, maybe it'll turn Chester's Mill into Palm Springs.' He laughed, rather feebly.
'Particulates?' Barbie thought he knew the answer to that one.
'Nope,' Cox said. 'Particulate matter doesn't go through. At least we don't think so. And you want to be aware that works both ways. If particulate matter doesn't get in, it won't get out. That means auto emissions - '
'Nobody's got that far to drive. Chester's Mill is maybe four miles across at its widest. Along a diagonal - ' He looked at Julia.
'Seven, tops,' she said.
Cox said, 'We don't think oil-heat pollutants are going to be a big deal, either. I'm sure everybody in town has a nice expensive oil furnace - in Saudi Arabia they have bumper stickers on their cars these days saying I Heat New England - but modern oil furnaces need electricity to provide a constant spark. Your oil reserves are probably good, considering the home-heating season hasn't started yet, but we don't think it's going to be very useful to you. In the long run, that may be a good thing, from the pollution standpoint.'
'You think so? Come on up here when it's thirty below zero and the wind's blowing at - ' He stopped for a moment. ' Will the wind blow?'
'We don't know,' Cox said. 'Ask me tomorrow and I may at least have a theory'
'We can burn wood,' Julia said. 'Tell him that.'
'Ms Shumway says we can burn wood.'
'Ifeople have to be careful about that, Captain Barbara - Barbie. Sure, you've got plenty of wood up there and you don't need electricity to ignite it and keep it going, but wood produces ash. Hell, it produces carcinogens.'
'Heating season here starts...' Barbie looked at Julia.
'November fifteenth,' she said. 'Or thereabouts.'
'Ms Shumway says mid-November. So tell me you're going to have this worked out by then.'
'All I can say is that we intend to try like hell. Which brings me :o the point of this conversation. The smart boys - the ones we've been able to convene so far - all agree that we're dealing with a forcefield - '
'Just like on Star Trick' Barbie said. 'Beam me up, Snotty.'
'Beg your pardon?'
'Doesn't matter. Go on, sir.'
'They all agree that a force field doesn't just happen. Something either close to the field of effect or in the center of it has to generate it. Our guys think the center is most likely. "Like the handle of an umbrella," one of them said.'