"At the controls," Lanier said without hesitation. "I wanted to save the plane so badly I couldn't even think about punching out. I thought it—the plane—was absolutely beautiful, and I wanted to save it. I also wanted to keep it from killing other people. So we both landed in a lake."

"I'm not nearly so brave," Hoffman said. "I think the Earth is beautiful, and I want to save it. I've been working my buns off to do so. Now all I get is shit. Your airplane didn't thumb its nose at you. It didn't call you on the carpet for your best work, did it?"

Lanier shook his head.

"That's what's happening here. So now I'm saying to myself, 'The hell with 'em.' I want to be up on the Stone when it happens."

"If everything goes to hell on Earth, we're not going to get down from the Stone for years. Not even the lunar settlement will be able to help us."

"Earth will survive?"

"Barely," Lanier said. "A year of sub-zero temperatures throughout the northern hemisphere, plagues and starvation, revolutions. If the libraries reflect our reality, maybe three or four billion people will die overall."

"But it isn't the end of the world."

"No. It may not even happen."

"Do you believe that?"

Lanier kept his silence for a long moment. Hoffman waited, hardly blinking. "No. Not now. Perhaps if the Stone had never arrived."

Hoffman put down her drink and ran her fingers around the rim of the glass. "Well. I'm going to try to get up there. Don't ask how. If I make it, I'll see you on the Stone. If I don't. . . You've been good to work with. I'd enjoy working with you more." She reached out and drew him to her, kissing him on the forehead. "Thank you."

A half hour later, after they had drained three drinks apiece, she escorted him to the door. She took a folded piece of paper and pressed it into his hand.

"Now take this and use it however you will. You can give it to Gerhardt if you want, or you can destroy it. It's probably not that important now."

"What is it?" he asked.

"The name of the Russian operative on the Stone."

Lanier's hand tightened on the paper, but he did not unfold it.

"The President is moving quicker than I thought he would," Hoffman said. "Sometime tomorrow, you're going to be ordered to close the libraries. He wants to convince the Soviets we're on the up-and-up."

"That's insane," Lanier said.

"Not very. It's politics. He's got big problems. Did I just say that? Yes. I even understand the President now. I must be drunk. Anyway, does it matter?"

"It sure as hell could."