"Ryan's been lying to me."

"Bullshit, Bob." Durling kept his voice level and reasonable. He called it his country-doctor voice. "He's too much of a pro for that."

"Roger, I know you mean well, but I don't have time for psychoanalysis. We have what may be a nuclear strike about to be launched on us. The good news, I suppose, is that you'll survive. I wish you luck, Roger. Wait - there's a Hot Line message coming in."

PRESIDENT FOWLER:

THIS IS ANDREY IL'YCH NARMONOV COMMUNICATING TO YOU. THE SOVIET UNION HAS TAKEN NO AGGRESSIVE ACTS AGAINST THE UNITED STATES. NONE AT ALL. WE HAVE NO INTEREST IN HARMING YOUR COUNTRY. WE WISH TO BE LEFT ALONE, AND TO LIVE IN PEACE. I HAVE AUTHORIZED NO ACTION WHATEVER AGAINST ANY AMERICAN FORCES OR CITIZENS, YET YOU THREATEN US. IF YOU ATTACK US, WE MUST THEN ATTACK YOU ALSO, AND MILLIONS WILL DIE. WILL IT ALL BE AN ACCIDENT? THE CHOICE IS YOURS. I CANNOT STOP YOU FROM ACTING IRRATIONALLY. I HOPE THAT YOU WILL REGAIN CONTROL OF YOURSELF. TOO MANY LIVES ARE AT RISK FOR EITHER OF US TO ACT IRRATIONALLY.

"At least we're still getting these," Goodley noted.

"Yeah, it just makes things so much better. It's going to set him off," Ryan announced. "This one's really going to do it. You can't tell an irrational person that he's losing it "

"Ryan, this is Durling." Ryan fairly leaped at the button.

"Yes, Mr Vice President."

"He didn't - he didn't listen, and then this new one came in, and he reacted rather badly to it."

"Sir, can you open a channel to SAC?"

"No, I'm afraid not. They're on a conference call with NORAD and Camp David. Part of the problem, Jack, the President knows he's vulnerable there and he's afraid - well "

"Yeah, everyone's afraid, aren't we?"

There was silence for a moment, and Ryan wondered if Durling felt guilty for being in a place of relative safety.

At Rocky Flats, the residue samples were loaded into a gamma-ray spectrometer. It had taken longer than expected, due to a minor equipment problem. The operators stood behind a shield and used lead-lined rubber gloves and yard-long tongs to move the samples out of the lead bucket, then waited for the technician to activate the machine.

"Okay - this is a hot one, all right."

The machine had two displays, one on a cathode-ray tube, with a back-up paper print-out. It measured the energy of the photo-electrons generated by the gamma radiation within the instrument. The precise energy state of these electrons identified both the element and the isotope of the source. These showed as lines or spikes on the graphic display. The relative intensity of the various energy lines - shown as the height of the spike - determined the proportions. A more precise measurement would require insertion of the sample in a small reactor for re-activation, but this system was good enough for the moment.

The technician flipped to the Beta Channel. "Whoa, look at that tritium line! What did you say the yield on this thing was?"