"I wonder why? This bird's supposed to orbit satellites now…"
"Heavy ones, they say, communications birds…"
"Yeah, but look at that part…"
The foundation for the warhead "bus" had to be strong across its entire area. The corresponding foundation for a communications satellite was essentially a thin steel annulus, a flat, sturdy donut that invariably looked too light for its job. This one was more like an unusually heavy wagon wheel.
Scott unlocked a file drawer and removed a recent photo of an SS-19 taken by an American officer on the verification team in Russia. He handed it over to Mrs. Fleming without comment.
"Look here. That's the standard structure, just what the Russians designed in, maybe with better steel, better finish. They changed almost everything else, didn't they?" Fleming asked. "Why not this?"
"Looked that way to me. Keeping that must have cost them—what? A hundred pounds, maybe more?"
"That doesn't make sense, Chris. This is the first place you want to save weight. Every kilo you save here is worth four or five on the first stage."
Both stood and walked to the screen. "Wait a minute…"
"Yeah, this fits the bus. They didn't change it. No mating collar for a satellite. They didn't change it at all." Scott shook his head.
"You suppose they just kept the bus design for their trans-stage?"
"Even if they did, they don't need all this mass at the top end, do they?"
"It's almost like they wanted it to stay the way it was."
"Yeah. I wonder why."
14—Reflections
"Thirty seconds," the assistant director said as the final commercial rolled for the Sunday-morning audience. The entire show had centered on Russia and Europe, which suited Ryan just fine.
"The one question I can't ask." Bob Holtzman chuckled before the tape started rolling again. "What's it like to be the National Security Advisor in a country with no threat to its national security?"
"Relaxing," Ryan answered with a wary look at the three cameras. None had their telltale red lights burning.
"So why the long hours?" Kris Hunter asked in a voice less sharp than her look.
"If I don't show up for work," Jack lied, "people might notice how unimportant I am." Bad news. They still don't know about India, but they know something's up. Damn. He wanted to keep it quiet. It was one of those things that public pressure would hurt, not help.
"Four! Three! Two! One!" The assistant director jerked his finger at the moderator, a television journalist named Edward Johnson.
"Dr. Ryan, what does the Administration make of changes in the Japanese cabinet?"
"Well, of course, that's a result of the current difficulties in trade, which is not really in my purview. Basically what we see there is an internal political situation which the Japanese people can quite easily handle without our advice," Jack announced in his earnest-statesman's voice, the one that had taken a few elocution lessons to perfect. Mainly he'd had to learn to speak more slowly.
Kris Hunter leaned forward. "But the leading candidate to take the prime ministership is a long-standing enemy of the United States—"
"That's a little strong," Ryan interrupted with a good-natured smile.
"His speeches, his writings, his books are not exactly friendly."
"I suppose," Ryan said with a dismissive wave and a crooked smile.
"The difference between discourse among friendly nations and unfriendly ones, oddly enough, is that the former can often be more acrimonious than the latter." Not bad, Jack…
"You are not concerned?"
"No," Ryan said with a gentle shake of the head. Short answers on a show like this tended to intimidate reporters, he thought.
"Thank you for coming in this morning, Dr. Ryan."
"A pleasure as always."
Ryan continued to smile until the camera lights blinked off. Then he counted slowly to ten. Then he waited until the other reporters removed their microphones. Then he removed his microphone and stood up and moved away from the working part of the set. And then it was safe to speak. Bob Holtzman followed Jack into the makeup room. The cosmeticians were off drinking coffee, and Ryan took a fistful of HandiWipes and passed the container to Holtzman. Over the mirror was a large slab of wood engraved on which was, IN HERE EVERYTHING IS OFF THE RECORD.
"You know the real reason behind equal rights for women?" Holtzman asked. "It wasn't equal pay, or bras, or any of that crap."
"Right," Jack agreed. "It was forcing them to wear makeup. We deserved everything we got. God, I hate this shit!" he added, wiping the pancake off his forehead. "Makes me feel like a cheap whore."
"That isn't too unusual for a political figure, is it?" Kristyn Hunter asked, taking wipes to do the same.
Jack laughed. "No, but it's kind of impolite for you to say so, ma'am."
Am I a political figure now? Ryan asked himself. I suppose I am. How the hell did that happen?
"Why the fancy footwork on my last question, Jack?" Holtzman asked.
"Bob, if you know it was fancy footwork, then you know why." Ryan motioned to the sign over the mirror, then decided to tap it to make sure everyone caught the message.
"I know that when the last government fell, it was us who developed the information on the bribery scandal," Holtzman said.
Jack gave him a look but nothing else. Even no comment would have been a substantive comment under these circumstances.
"That killed Goto's first chance to become Prime Minister. He was next in line, remember?"
"Well, now he's got another. His patience is rewarded," Ryan observed.
"If he can get a coalition together."
"Don't give me that," Hunter leaned toward the mirror to finish cleaning her nose off. "You've read the stuff he's been telling their papers, same as I have, he will get a cabinet formed, and you know what arguments he's been using."
"Talk is cheap, especially for somebody in that business," Jack said. He still hadn't quite made the leap of imagination to include himself "in that business." "Probably just a blip, one more politician with a few too many drinks under his belt who had a bad day at the office or the track."
"Or the geisha house," Kris Hunter suggested. She finished removing the makeup, then sat on the edge of the counter and lit a cigarette. Kristyn Hunter was an old-fashioned reporter. Though still on the sunny side of fifty, she was a graduate of Columbia's School of Journalism and had just been appointed chief foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. Her voice was as dry as dust. "Two years ago that bastard put a move on me. His language would shock a Marine, and his suggestions were…shall we say, eccentric. I presume you have information on his personal habits, Dr. Ryan?"
"Kris, never, ever, not even once will I discuss what personal stuff, if any, we have on foreign officials." Jack paused. "Wait. He doesn't speak English, does he?" Ryan closed his eyes, trying to remember what his briefing documents had said on that point.
"You didn't know? He can when it pleases him, but he doesn't when it doesn't. That day, it didn't. And his translator that day was a female, about twenty-seven. She didn't even blush." Hunter chuckled darkly. "I sure as hell did. What does that tell you, Dr. Ryan?"
Ryan had few doubts about the information that had come out of Operation SANDALWOOD. Despite that, it was very nice to hear this from a completely independent source. "I guess he likes blondes," Jack said lightly.
"So they say. They also say that he has a new one now."
"This is getting serious," Holtzman noted. "Lots of people like to fool around, Kris."
"Goto loves to show people how tough he is. Some of the rumors about Goto are downright ugly." Kris Hunter paused. "I believe them, too."