Chain Reaction Read online

  ‘The tin-opener,’ said the Director gently, ‘is in your handkerchief pocket.’ Mr Rupert suppressed a titter. Manson decided not to notice it; but with the dexterity of much experience rapidly opened both cans and tipped the beans on to the plates. ‘Now, first the innocent beans … then the bad ones. You see?’

  In fact, the needle rose rather higher than it had before.

  Seff frowned. ‘That’s funny,’ he remarked. ‘I should have thought that the radiation would be higher from the can itself than from the food.’

  Gatt said: ‘I think it makes sense, doesn’t it? If the contamination is in the inner coating of the metal, the gamma rays have to come through the tin to the outside, so they would be weaker. Let’s try sticking the detector inside the tin. That should bump it up a bit.’

  Obediently Alec did so, and the meter gave about the same reading as it had for the contaminated food.

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Gatt. ‘Hallo, what’s happened to your toy, Alec?’ A red light was glowing on the front panel.

  ‘Blast! That means a fault has developed — probably a valve gone. Anyway, at least it lasted for the demonstration!’ There was general laughter.

  And something that was still worrying Seff was put completely out of his mind. Which was a pity, because it was really very obvious.

  *

  When the engineers came up to collect the equipment, Manson instructed them to replace the faulty valve, and to leave everything, including the tins, in the small lab. ‘You can test it with one of these tins,’ he added. ‘The one on my right is gamma-active.’

  The apparatus was then removed, and the meeting resumed.

  But it was Dick now who was frowning to himself …

  *

  Ed Springle looked across his sunlit office at the fat, amiable Mrs Harper, his secretary. ‘It’s like sitting on a volcano,’ he said.

  ‘You’ll get used to it — after the first three.’

  ‘You mean, you expect me to go through this all over again — twice over?’

  Mrs Harper burrowed in the filing cabinet, her ample rear view almost completely masking the thing from his vision. ‘Don’t you worry,’ she said. ‘You leave it to Mrs Springle — you’ve done your bit. She’s got a nurse with her; what more do you want? Here, let’s go through the Lifetime Dose Sheet for Marsdowne — that’ll give you something to do.’

  She placed the chart on his desk. It was a ‘breakdown’ which showed the amount of irradiation each member of the staff had received. The entries were made once every thirteen weeks, during which period the maximum dose permitted per person was 3 roentgens. Usually the figure was well below this.

  Ed scanned the chart for any figures that were entered in red. ‘Luther,’ he said aloud, ‘4.5 roentgens in the last period. How’d he get that?’

  Mrs Harper studied a report she held in her hand. ‘It seems the idiot got nosy about Project 3. They caught him snooping about the control-room.’

  ‘He’s been transferred, has he, for the next period?’

  ‘Yes. He’s doing paper-work in the office block.’

  ‘That’ll teach him! Oh well, he can go back at the end of the period. Long as we keep his average down.’ Ed lit a cigarette. ‘I must say,’ he observed, ‘they take a hell of a lot more care than we used to mining for uranium back in Africa! I shudder to think what my total score was in those dark days!’

  She smiled. ‘Oh well, you don’t look any the worse for it, Mr Springle! And even after you stopped that packet up at Project 3, you hardly seemed to turn a hair.’

  ‘My dear Mrs Harper! I was sick as a dog for two days.’ He pulled a face. ‘Anyway, old Seff reckoned I’d had enough for a while.’

  Mrs Harper became serious. ‘You And it pretty dull down here, don’t you?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. At least, I see more of June; and that makes up for all the other things.’

  ‘Now, you! Stop thinking about her or you’ll be worrying again. And you’ve forgotten to initial the chart, That’s better!’

  The telephone rang — or, rather, tried to, He had the receiver in his hand in less time than it takes to split the atom. ‘Yes?’

  Then he looked up at Mrs Harper rather sheepishly. ‘It’s Seff,’ he said.

  She threw up her hands in despair.

  *

  ‘You look,’ said Kate, ‘like a man in a dream.’

  Dick was so absorbed he didn’t reply. Kate thought: I’m not getting through. Eventually Dick said: ‘You know about the travel arrangements for tonight? Manson is leaving by train for Birmingham in a few minutes — he can be contacted tonight at the canning wholesalers. Here’s the number.’ He tore a sheet from his pad. ‘You’d better have the car ready in about ten minutes. He’ll be returning first thing tomorrow.’

  ‘Uhuh. What about Seff?’

  ‘That’s all laid on. He’s flying up to Marsdowne immediately after the press conference. The Min. of Supply are laying on a plane, but you’d better get on to Selgate right away and ask him to meet him at Glennaverley airstrip. Air Traffic Control at London Airport will give you all the gen, but I think the flight number is M.X. One — a Dove, I think. He’ll need a car, of course, to get him to the airport. Incidentally, Mrs Seff is going too, so it might save time if the transport called for her first. I should phone her up, and check that she’s ready in good time.’

  ‘You’re terrifyingly efficient all of a sudden,’ said Kate.

  ‘I’m after promotion,’ he said automatically, a little irritated by her inept timing yet not wanting to snub her. He added: ‘If anyone wants me I’ll be in the No. 2 lab.’

  As he left, briskly parting the glass doors, Kate stared after him. She was wondering what she had done wrong and when she’d done it.

  *

  Half an hour later Dick returned to Kate’s office. He strode up to her looking, she thought, even more impersonal. ‘Don’t let Manson go without telling me,’ he said.

  ‘He’s already gone.’

  ‘Damn!’

  ‘Is it important? You might catch him at the station. We could call the station announcer.’

  Simmel stood there thinking for a moment. ‘No; he can’t be that stupid,’ he said. ‘I must be wrong.’ He looked at his watch. ‘I’d better go upstairs and get ready for the press. See the staff get there on time, won’t you?’ He started for the door. ‘The man I’m afraid of is Bob Soliss. He asked some highly embarrassing questions about Windscale, and he’s not all that popular with the A.E.A.’

  *

  Bob Soliss did, in fact, live up to his reputation, and it was he who sent the most penetrating missiles in the general direction of Project 3. Most of them were aimed pretty accurately.

  Soliss was a small, hunched-up man in his fifties. He was softly spoken, and was conspicuously unlike the popular idea of a newspaper man. He wrote for a very influential Lancashire newspaper which daily garnished many a London breakfast table.

  When Hargreaves had finished his short, prepared address Soliss fired the first salvo. ‘I notice,’ he said, in that easy, relaxed way of his, ‘that there has been no reference in your statement to the ill-fated Project 3. Do you feel, sir, that there can be no possible connection between that and the crisis which you have just outlined?’

  Hargreaves answered without hesitation. This was not his first press conference. ‘Naturally we have not ruled it out as a possibility. But, as you know, a very thorough investigation was carried out at the time.’

  ‘But would it be true to say that no conclusive reason was found or given for the damage that then occurred to the pile?’

  Hargreaves looked across at Gatt, who answered the question. ‘Unfortunately that is perfectly right. It was necessary to seal off the entire reactor since it became highly radioactive after the fire. It won’t be possible to diagnose the trouble with any certainty for several years. But the fact that we didn’t discover the cause doesn’t alter the fact that we were very careful to ensure th
at the effects were very carefully watched.’

  Peter Mobray, still in his everlasting, ill-fitting raincoat, put the next question. ‘If you don’t suspect that Project 3 was the fly in the ointment, why all the bother? Why call a conference of most of those connected with it — and why send its designer up to Marsdowne tonight, in a specially chartered aircraft, to make a special report?’ This last question caused a slight stir.

  Seff answered this, and couldn’t help grinning as he did so. ‘You seem to have found out a great deal in a short time!’ he said. ‘It’s quite true that I am going up there tonight. And the reason is surely pretty obvious, isn’t it? We certainly don’t think that Marsdowne has any connection with the disaster, but since Project 3 is the only thing for which we as an organisation are responsible that is capable — or was capable — of producing radioactive isotopes (apart from our main reactor) we naturally must make absolutely certain that nothing was overlooked at the time in the course of the stringent steps we took to protect the public.’

  Soliss unhurriedly rolled up a document he had been consulting. He said: ‘Most of us here are familiar with the main features of the Windscale accident. For instance, the escaping of iodine-131 through the chimney. Is it not possible that some similar but undetected occurrence also happened in this case?’

  Gatt said: ‘In the first place, don’t forget that the Marsdowne incident happened nearly two years ago — that is, six months before the food product in question was canned. Marsdowne, as you know, is in the Scottish Highlands, Spigett’s factory is in Watford — so they are some four hundred miles apart. The beans are imported. It is a little hard, both in the time and distance scale, to see the connection. In the second place, since I personally supervised the investigation, I can put your mind at rest about the chimneys. Without going into technical details, I should point out that Project 3 was a closed-circuit pile and nothing except surplus heat could go up the chimney. In any case, exhaustive tests were made for miles around, and no trace of radioactivity was detected over and above the normal background count. It is true that a small quantity of radioactive steam escaped, but this didn’t go on for long because Seff, who was on the spot, ordered the water to be drained from the heat-transference system.’

  ‘Where did the water go?’

  ‘Into underground tanks.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  Gatt grinned. ‘Of course I’m sure.’

  There was only a barely perceptible smile on Soliss’s lips. ‘How do you know the tanks don’t leak?’

  ‘Because there is some very fool-proof equipment that would tell us so immediately if it did.’

  ‘Would you stake your last dollar on the “fool-proof” equipment?’

  ‘Lloyd’s did.’

  ‘I only asked.’

  ‘That’s the answer.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Alford of the Mirror asked: ‘What restraints are you asking us to put on what we report?’

  Hargreaves said: ‘None. Except the common-sense ones. We don’t want you to make a meal of it. We all have a responsibility in this matter, which I’m sure you all feel. We must not alarm the public. If you consider, from what you have heard here, that we are taking every possible precaution to safeguard your readers, and to find the cause of the crisis and deal with it energetically, we would naturally like you to say so. If you don’t, then I would be extremely grateful if you would tell us now, so that at least we know what we are in for! If there is anything we have overlooked, we would, believe me, be only too happy to have the omission put right.’

  Soliss said: ‘I myself have no criticisms of that sort, but I would like to address one question personally to Mr Seff.’

  For the first time Seff appeared to be tense. ‘Yes?’

  The whole room had gone quiet, and everyone seemed to sense that Soliss had now bracketed his aim and was about to fire his heavy artillery …

  ‘I must ask you not to regard my question as an impertinence,’ he said carefully. ‘We are dealing with vital issues, and since the freedom of the press is — commendably — to be observed, I intend to exert it to the full.’

  Seff said: ‘I am sure, Mr Soliss, that any question you ask on behalf of your paper would never be regarded as an impertinence.’

  ‘Thank you. Then would you please tell us how many drinks you had that evening prior to the moment when Project 3 ran out of control?’

  ‘To the best of my knowledge and belief, three large whiskies. And now do you mind if I ask you one?’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘Before coming to this conference and asking the extremely astute and carefully considered questions that you have just been asking, you must presumably have had lunch somewhere. May I ask you what you laced it with?’

  ‘A fairly immoderate quantity of good Scotch.’

  ‘Thank you very much.’

  *

  The Seffs did not speak to each other until the plane had levelled off on a northerly heading. Below them London impersonated Cinerama and curved away in all directions, changing its angle slightly every now and then as the pilot corrected small variations in the aircraft’s attitude. The big, red-lit ‘T’ which marked the threshold of the runway had now been reduced to six-point type, and the network of runways looked hopelessly small — surely not large enough to land a paper dart. And all the lights of the city seemed to pulsate like stars. A thousand feet below the little Dove a huge airliner, its navigation light flashing rhythmically, was nosing its way in, losing height and dropping away from them now, as its captain sought to render the airfield larger by getting closer to it; until finally the runway would open out before him, an illuminated study in perspective, and offer a sure pathway for the fat tyres of his ship. What more satisfying, thought Seff, than the moment when the runway would come up under the belly of the big plane, just at the right angle, to scoop it up at precisely the right instant, with a squeal of tyres and a momentary smell of hot rubber and brakes? A superlative exercise in mechanical perfection.

  Angela was nervous. Not because she was in an aircraft — although she never did like flying — but because she was well aware that Jack knew why she had insisted on coming with him. One of the many scenes that had taken place since she had told him what Gatt had said at the Springles’ party had been about just that. He was sitting in silence, peering down at the receding lights of London.

  Seff said: ‘It seems strange and horrible that all those people down there, beneath so many nice, secure roofs, are suddenly threatened by an innocent-looking object on the kitchen shelf.’ He wasn’t looking at her, just went on looking out of the window.

  Angela said: ‘How do you think this mess is going to affect the canning industry generally? Will it stop people buying tinned foods — I mean, even the good brands?’

  ‘It won’t make any difference at all,’ he said shortly, still not looking at her. ‘Any more than an isolated air crash stops people flying.’ He hadn’t meant to frighten her by this remark; but now that he had he didn’t do anything to lessen its effect.

  Angela showed no reaction. ‘But doesn’t it mean,’ she persisted, ‘that if it could happen to one company, it could happen to another?’

  He turned round at last, and seemed at least slightly interested in the point. ‘Have you met Spigett?’ he said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, if you had you would begin to wonder whether anything he handled would be entirely above reproach. Basically, in my opinion he is just a bumped-up spiv — out to make money as quickly and as ruthlessly as possible. A real wide-boy. Oh, he’s got a certain jovial way with him; and I think he fooled the Old Man, up to a point. Perhaps Gatt as well — I don’t know. But he didn’t fool me.’

  ‘I don’t see what his personal failings have got to do with it. How can his business ethics have affected the contamination of the cans? I can see that an unscrupulous man might not be too fussy about the general hygiene at his factory; but there’s a difference bet
ween that and suddenly finding that a lot of tin cans are radioactive.’

  ‘Yes. But we don’t really know where he gets all his cans from, do we?’

  ‘Well, surely that must have come out at the enquiry, hasn’t it?’

  Seff said: ‘It hasn’t yet.’ He had forgotten to undo his safety-strap, and he began to do so now. It was a bit of a struggle, so he punctuated his comments with little grunts. ‘Yes. He told us who supplied the tins. But the figures are rather interesting, if you look at them carefully … blast the thing!’

  ‘Here, let me do it.’ She undid the strap with the greatest of ease, then smiled at him comically. He smiled back. That was better.

  ‘Spigett says he keeps a stock of empty tins at the factory. He said that, before I realised why he said it.’ He looked at her meaningfully. ‘He also said it before we got the figures from the can manufacturers.’

  She was on to it like a knife. ‘You mean, he’d got more cans than they supplied!’

  ‘Exactly. So the rest of the cans must have come from somewhere else! And I’ll lay you three to one he’s working one hell of a fiddle somewhere. And he wants to keep it quiet!’

  An income-tax wangle?’

  ‘Or worse. I’d say the best reason for getting tins over and above those supplied by your proper contractor would be the price. He got those tins cheap. What’s more, he got them from someone he had no right to deal with — otherwise, why keep it dark?’

  ‘Then Spigett is a crook.’ She looked at him sideways quizzically. ‘That right?’

  God,she looked adorable when she did that! ‘Well, hardly a crook,’ he said. ‘Let’s say he’s pretty fly. In other words, he does things that a reputable company doesn’t do.’ He took her hand in his. ‘So next time you go shopping for your 57 Varieties, or your Ten O’clock Tested, or your Batchelors Wonderful Peas, I don’t think you need to take a geiger counter!’ She laughed, and for the first time for weeks they felt relaxed together.

  *

  The impact of the conditional tense upon human, life is bewildering.