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“The increased radiation count?”

“That’s not all.” He hesitated again. He did not like saying it. To communicate a fact seemed always to lend it fuller existence.

“Well?”

“It’s connected with that seismic disturbance a few days ago. It’s carried by the upper winds from that direction. All things considered, it looks like fallout from a low altitude burst in the megaton range.”

“Heu!” Zerchi sighed and covered his eyes with a hand. ‘Luciferum ruisse mihi dicis?”

“Yes, Domne, I’m afraid it was a weapon.”

“Not possibly an industrial accident?”

“No.”

“But if there were a war on, we’d know. An illicit test? but not that either. If they wanted to test one, they could test it on the far side of the moon, or better, Mars, and not be caught.”

Joshua nodded.

“So what does that leave?” the abbot went on. “A display? A threat? A warning shot fired over the bow?”

“That’s all I could think of…

“So that explains the defense alert. Still, there’s nothing in the news except rumors and refusals to comment. And with dead silence from Asia.”

“But the shot must have been reported from some of the observation satellites. Unless-I don’t like to suggest this, but-unless somebody has discovered a way to shoot a space-to-earth missile past the satellites, without detection until it’s on the target.”

“Is that possible?”

“There’s been some talk about it, Father Abbot.”

“The government knows. The government must know. Several of them know. And yet we hear nothing. We are being protected from hysteria. Isn’t that what they call it? Maniacs! The world’s been in a habitual state of crisis for fifty years. Fifty?” What am I saying? It’s been in a habitual state of crisis since the beginning-but for half a century now, almost unbearable. And why, for the love of God? What is the fundamental irritant, the essence of the tension? Political philosophies? Economics? Population pressure? Disparity of culture and creed? Ask a dozen experts, get a dozen answers. Now Lucifer again. Is the species congenitally insane, Brother? If we’re born mad, where’s the hope of Heaven? Through Faith alone? Or isn’t there any? God forgive me, I don’t mean that. Listen, Joshua-”

“m’Lord?”

“As soon as you close up shop, come back over here…That radiogram-I had to send Brother Pat into town to get it translated and sent by regular wire. I want you around when the answer comes. Do you know what it’s about?”

Brother Joshua shook his head.

“Quo peregrinatur grex.”

The monk slowly lost color. “To go into effect, Domne?”

“I’m just trying to learn the status of the plan. Don’t mention it to anybody. Of course, you’ll be affected. See me here when you’re through.”

“Certainly.”

“Chris’tecum.”

“Cum spiri’tuo.”

The circuit opened, the screen faded. The room was warm, but Joshua shivered. He gazed out the window into a premature twilight murky with dust. He could see no farther than the storm fence next to the highway where a passing procession of truck headlights made traveling halos in the dust haze. After a while he became aware of someone standing near the gate where the driveway opened on to the turnpike approach. The figure was dimly visible in silhouette whenever the headlights’ aurorae flashed by in review. Joshua shivered again.

The silhouette was unmistakably that of Mrs. Grales. no one else would have been recognizable in such poor visibility, but the shape of the hooded bundle on her left shoulder; and the way her head tilted toward the right, made her outline uniquely that of Old Ma’am Grales. The monk pulled curtains across the window and turned on the light. He was not repelled by the old woman’s deformity; the world had grown blasé about such genetic mishaps and pranks of the genes. His own left hand still bore a tiny scar where a sixth finger had been removed during his infancy. But the heritage of the Diluvium Ignis was something he preferred to forget for the moment, and Mrs. Grales was one of its more conspicuous heirs.

He fingered a globe