“Daily,” Santa whispered. “I’m supposed to be with Oppy right now, briefing our teams. We have some excellent men—Jungians, alienists, some strict Freudians. General Groves has written some press releases, and we’re going over them for psychological impact. Of course, if the bomb is a dud there won’t be any release. If the bomb makes a big bang, then we’ll report that an ammunition dump exploded without loss of life. If we blow up the desert and everyone in it, then we’ll have to come up with a different story. The main thing is to avoid panic, and to send our teams, most of which will be stationed well away from the blast, to those cities that will be most affected by any runaway fallout. I feel I can confide in you.”

“Yes?”

“In that instance, a press release would choose an alternative, assimilable emergency. ‘Epidemic,’ ‘tainted water,’ ‘chemical warfare.’ I think we ought to say ‘chemical warfare’ right at the start because people are never going to believe in an epidemic. The Freudians want ‘tainted water,’ naturally.”

Gold walked out of the La Fonda in shoes instead of boots, wearing a fedora in place of his late Stetson, smoking a cigar and holding a folded newspaper under one arm. He crossed the street to the smaller building on the opposite corner, the ticket office of the Santa Fe Railroad.

“You’re wondering why,” Santa said, “if all this is going on inside, I’m out here?”

“Yes?” Joe mumbled, distracted.

“They’re picking volunteers for the team for Trinity. Do you think I’m cowardly?”

“What do you think?”

Santa laughed in a whisper. “I knew you’d say that.”

Gold emerged from the ticket office, stood at the corner and looked at his wristwatch, then at the public clock, a giant pocket watch on a column outside a jewelry store on the south side of the plaza. He started back across the street to the La Fonda, changed his mind and continued to the south side, past the curio shop, the jeweler’s and into Woolworth’s, where he sat at the counter.

“But it’s good to have someone to talk to,” Santa said.

“Excuse me.” When Joe saw a waitress bring Gold a coffee, he left the obelisk for the ticket office. The clerk was a grandmotherly Spanish woman who told Joe he had just missed the friend he described but she could sell him a ticket on the same train going to Kansas City and New York on the seventeenth. Joe said he didn’t know if he could go then, but not to tell his friend in case the man returned to the office because Joe wanted it to be a surprise.