Goodbye California - Alistair [133]
‘I think congratulations are in order, Professor Aachen,’ Morro said. ‘Your little contraption seems to have worked quite well.’
Aachen gave him a look which was meant to be a glare, but wasn’t. A broken spirit can take a long time to heal.
For about the next thirty seconds the commentator stopped commentating. It was no instance of a gross dereliction of duty: he was probably so awe-struck that he could find no words to describe his emotions. It was not often that a commentator had the opportunity to witness the terrifying spectacle unfolding before his eyes: more precisely, no commentator had ever had the opportunity before. By and by he bestirred himself. ‘Could we have full zoom, please?’
All but the base of the centre of the fan disappeared. A tiny ripple could be seen advancing lazily across the ocean. The commentator said: ‘That, I suppose, must be the tidal wave.’ He sounded disappointed; clearly he regarded it as an altogether insignificant product of the titanic explosion he’d just seen. ‘Doesn’t look much like a tidal wave to me.’
‘Ignorant youth,’ Morro said sadly. ‘That wave is probably travelling something about four hundred miles an hour at the moment. It will slow down very quickly as it reaches shallower water, but its height will increase in inverse proportion to its deceleration. I think the poor boy is in for a shock.’
About two-and-a-half minutes after the detonation a thunderous roar, which seemed as if it might shake the TV to pieces, filled the room. It lasted about two seconds before it was suddenly reduced to a tolerable level. A new voice cut in.
‘Sorry about that, folks. We couldn’t reach the volume control in time. Whew! We never expected a deafening racket like that. In fact, to be quite honest with you, we didn’t expect any sound at all from an explosion so deep under water.’
‘Fool.’ Liberal as ever, Morro had supplied refreshment for the entertainment, and he now took a delicate sip of his Glenfiddich. Burnett took a large gulp of his.
‘My word, that was a bang.’ The original commentator was back on the air. He was silent for some time while the camera, still on full zoom, remained fixed on the incoming tidal wave. ‘I don’t think I like this too much. That wave might not be so big but I’ve never seen anything moving so fast. I wonder –’
The viewers were not to find out what he was wondering about. He gave an articulate cry, there was an accompanying crashing sound and suddenly the tidal wave on the screen was replaced by an empty expanse of blue sky.
‘He’s been hit by the blast shock wave. I should have warned them about that, I suppose.’ If Morro was covered with remorse he was hiding it well. ‘Couldn’t have been all that bad, or the camera wouldn’t still be functioning.’
As usual Morro was right. Within seconds the commentator was on the air again but was clearly so dazed that he had forgotten the fact.
‘Jesus Christ! My bloody head!’ There was a pause, punctuated by a fair amount of wheezing and groaning. ‘Sorry about that, viewers. Mitigating circumstances. Now I know what it’s like to be hit by an express train. If I may be spared a feeble joke, I know the occupation I’d like to have tomorrow. A glazier. That blast must have broken a million windows in the city. Let’s see if this camera is still functioning.’
It was functioning. As the camera was lifted back to the upright the blue sky was gradually replaced by the ocean. The operator had obviously advanced the zoom, for the fan was once again in the picture. It had grown no larger and appeared to be in the first beginnings of disintegration because it had become ragged and was gradually losing its shape. A faint greyish cloud, perhaps two miles high, could be seen faintly drifting away.
‘I think it’s falling back into the ocean. Can you see that cloud drifting away to the left – to the south? That can’t be water, surely. I wonder if it’s a radio-active cloud.’
‘It’s radio-active, all right,’ Morro said. ‘But that greyness is not