For twenty years, Harold Smith had fielded innumerable crises as head of CURE, the supersecret government agency that officially did not even exist, drawing vast sums from a secret operating budget, sanctioning covert operations that involved mayhem, murder, and extortion, utterly unaccountable to anyone, yet in all that time he had personally accounted for every penny to the highest authority Harold Smith personally knew-his own conscience.
The president who had invested Harold Smith with his enormous power and responsibility had never lived to see how Smith had exceeded the trust placed in him. But if he had, he would have experienced absolutely no misgivings.
And so, on a Tuesday evening in April, Harold Smith sat in a comfortable overstuffed chair in the privacy of his home enjoying a night alone, with his wife away at his sister-in-law's, and saw the greatest crisis in his career of public service begin as a KNNN update.
"This just in to Kable Newsworthy News Network News," the cool-voiced anchor had said. "As they were preparing their evening news programs, the three major broadcast networks experienced a unusual simultaneous service interruption. The disruption appears to be nationwide. More on this story as it becomes available."
Smith took his remote from his coat pocket and pointed it at the cable box. The channels marched before his eyes. It took him only one cycle before he realized two incontrovertible facts.
First, that all satellite reception and cable-only stations were broadcasting unimpeded.
Second, all other stations were blacked out, UHF and VHF.
He listened to the sonorous voice advising viewers that the trouble was not in their sets and, not being a watcher of episodic television, failed to recognize it as an old program theme opening.
That was not important. For Harold Smith recognized something more important that he was witnessing the tip of an iceberg more terrible than any that had threatened the democracy he had sworn to safeguard.
Smith turned on a tabletop radio, and the sonorous voice broadcasting on all TV stations issued from the radio speaker in perfect time with the TV. There was no tape delay.
Turning off the radio and lowering the TV volume, he picked up a well-worn briefcase that was never far away. Smith placed it in his lap, defused the explosive charges in the locking latches, and exposed a portable computer and telephone handset.
This was his link with the secret computers at Folcroft, the nerve center though which he monitored the affairs-public, secret and subversive-of a computerlinked nation. He lifted the handset, dialed a number from memory, and was relieved to find his enforcement arm reachable.
Only after he had put Remo Williams on standby did Harold Smith call the President of the United States, the only person outside CURE to know about the organization.
Smith had not spoken to the new president, who had taken office months before, trusting to the outgoing chief executive to have broken the news of the existence of CURE. He imagined the revelation of the secret organization that kept American democracy stabilized for nearly thirty years had come as a distinct shock to the new man. Normally, Smith left it to each successive president to make contact with him.
But this was a crisis. He just hoped he could convince the latest occupant in the White House of its gravity.
The President's raspy Southern voice was curious.
"Smith?"
"Of course," said Smith. The phone was tied by computer link into the dedicated line that had rung a red dialless telephone in the Lincoln Bedroom of the White House. No president since CURE's inception ever failed to answer it. Harold Smith did not make casual calls. "Mr. President, I am calling to warn of a grave danger to this country."
The President's tone lifted an octave. "What is it?"
"Are you aware of the nationwide television blackout?"
"Yes. But the White House is wired up for cable. We weren't affected."
"Sir, a powerful force has showed itself. For what reason, I do not know, but it has the capability to knock broadcast television off the air nationwide."
"They're saying it's sunspots," said the President.
"Who are saying this?"
"The networks."
"Sunspots would not do what this power has accomplished," Smith returned. "Somehow, by some science I cannot fathom, this power has managed to intercept all TV video signals, at the same time broadcasting an audio signal of its choosing."
"Could this be the Cubans up to their old tricks?"
"Doubtful. This appears to be a quantum leap beyond Havana's technical capability. Let me explain the situation as I see it. For years we have feared Cuban interference with our broadcast reception. We know that they possess a transmitter that could be boosted to over 100,000 watts-powerful enough to overwhelm U.S. TV transmissions nationwide. In short, they would override ordinary signals across all frequency bands with an overriding multifrequency signal of their own."
"I follow, Smith."
"This is not the phenomenon we are witnessing here."
"No?"
"No, Mr. President. This power is somehow preventing the outgoing signals from every local broadcast station from getting onto the air. At the same time, it is able to put out an audio signal of its own."
"Science isn't exactly my field, Smith."
"My limited grasp of television theory tells me that this is an amazing and very threatening breakthrough. The power behind this has tonight tested his equipment. Now that he know it works, he will show his hand."
"How?"
"He will jam every TV station in his broadcast radius. Soon. Within the week at the very latest. And if there are demands, he will broadcast them."
"That's a heck of a lot of deduction from a seven-minute blackout."
"Mr. President, I have placed my people on alert. I suggest you do the same. Particularly, be prepared to triangulate the audio signal so that we may trace this interference to its source or sources."
"You think there is more than one source?"
"While it is possible to drown out all TV signals through one centrally positioned broadcast tower, we can't discount an array of jamming stations. Each of them must be tracked down and terminated."
"I'll start the machinery, Smith. Please stay in touch."
"Of course, Mr. President," said Harold Smith, hanging up.
It has gone as well as could be expected, Smith reflected. The succession had gone as it always did, noisy but bloodless. Still Smith was going to miss the old President. He was probably the last one of Harold Smith's generation.
Sadly he closed his briefcase, shucked off his slippers, and drew on his well-polished wing tip shoes. He had not so much as loosened his tie upon coming home, but he tightened the knot as he stood up.
Smith was a tall graying man of retirement age, the flesh tight on his prominent bones. His face was pinched, a pair of rimless glasses perching precariously on his patrician nose. A congenital heart defect gave his skin an unhealthy grayish pallor that matched the hue of his three-piece suit. His eyes, faded from years of dull bureaucratic work, were a similar gray. Even his fingernails looked gray. His Dartmouth tie was hunter green.
For the work that lay before him, Smith would need the speed and power of his Folcroft mainframes. He picked up his worn briefcase.
Smith went out into the night, a cold feeling in the pit of his stomach. He had tried to impress upon the President the seriousness of the event, but he doubted the President had fully grasped the potential for harm tonight's seven-minute blackout foreshadowed. The man had not turned down the music that had been playing in the background during their conversation. It had sounded like Elvis Presley.
As he drove his battered station wagon to Folcroft Sanitarium, Harold Smith hoped the President would not have to deal with it.
For just the tip of the iceberg filled Smith with dread.