‘We got the message across,' McRae informed Anton Karp.

‘Well done,' Karp said. ‘This Bertold Goltz, this Sons of Job man, makes me nervous; I think the speech here now this morning will dispel a little of that, my legitimate fear.'

He glanced timidly at McRae for confirmation, as did the others in the control room, the simulacrum engineers from the Karp Werke.

‘This is only the start,' McRae said presently.

‘True,' Karp agreed, nodding. ‘But a good start.' Walking up to the Kalbfleisch simulacrum he touched it gingerly on the shoulder, as if expecting it, prodded, to resume its activity. It did not.

McRae laughed.

‘I wish,' Anton Karp said, ‘that it had mentioned Adolf Hitler; you know, comparing the Sons of Job to the Nazis more directly, comparing Goltz to Hitler.'

‘But,' McRae said, ‘that would not have helped. True as it may be. You're not authentically a political person, Karp; what gives you the idea that ‘the truth' is the best story to stick to? If we want to stop Bertold Goltz we don't want to identify him as another Hitler simply because in their secret hearts fifty-one per cent of the local population would like to see another Hitler.' He smiled at Karp, who looked worried, who looked, in fact, tremulous and apprehensive.

‘What I want to know,' Karp said, ‘is this: is Kalbfleisch going to be able to handle the Sons of Job? You have von Lessinger equipment; tell me.'

‘No,' McRae said. ‘He won't be able to.'

Karp gaped at him.

‘But,' McRae said, ‘Kalbfleisch is going to go. Soon. Within the next month.' He did not say what Karp at once wanted him to say, what Anton and Felix Karp and the entire Karp Werke instinctively inquired into as a first reflex, an immediate query of primary magnitude.

Will we build the next simulacrum? Karp would have asked, had he dared, but he was afraid to speak. Karp was, as McRae knew, a coward. His integrity had long ago been emasculated in order that he be capable of functioning properly within the German business community; spiritual -- moral emasculation was a present day prerequisite for participation in the Ge class, in the ruling circles.

I could tell him, McRae thought. Ease his pain. But why? He did not like Karp, who had built and now maintained the simulacrum, kept it functioning as it had to function -- without even a trace of hesitation. Any failure would have betrayed to the Bes the secret, the Geheimnis, which distinguished the elite, the establishment of the United States of Europe and America; their possession of the one or more secrets made them into Geheimnistrager, bearers of the secret, rather than Befehltrager, mere carry-outer of instructions.

But all this to McRae was Germanic mysticism; he preferred to think of it in simple practical terms. Karp u.

Sohnen Werke was capable of building simulacra, had as an example built Kalbfleisch and done a good job of it, as well as a good job of maintaining this der Alte during his reign. However, another firm would construct the next der Alte equally well, and by eradicating the economic ties with Karp, the government cut the vast cartel out of participation in the economic privileges which it now enjoyed ... to the government's loss.

The next firm which built a simulacrum for the government of the USEA would be a small firm, one which the authorities could control.

The name which came to McRae's mind was Frauenzimmer Associates, an extremely small, marginal firm barely surviving in the field of sun-con: simulacra construction for planetary colonization.

He did not tell Anton Karp this, but he intended to open business discussions with Maurice Frauenzimmer, the head of the firm, any day now. And it would surprise Frauenzimmer, too; he did not know either.

Karp said thoughtfully, eyeing McRae, ‘What do you think Nicole will say?'

Smiling, McRae said, ‘I think she'll be glad. She never really liked old Rudi.'

‘I thought she did.' Karp looked chagrined.

‘The First Lady,' McRae said acidly, ‘has never liked a der Alte yet. Why should she? After all ... she's twenty-three and Kalbfleisch was, according to our informational poop-sheets, seventy-eight.'

Karp bleated, ‘But what does she have to do with him? Nothing. Just appear at a reception very seldom, just every now and then!'

‘I think that Nicole in general detests the old, the outworn, the useless,' McRae said, not sparing Anton Karp; he saw the middle-aged businessman wince. ‘That is a good shorthand description of your chief product,' he added.

‘But the specifications -- ‘

‘You could have made it a trifle more -- ‘ McRae searched for the word, ‘fascinating.'

‘Enough,' Karp said, flushing, knowing now that McRae was merely tormenting him, that all this was simply to drive home the point that as large and powerful as it was, Karp u. Sohnen Werke was a servant, only an employee, of the government; it did not really influence it, and even McRae, who was simply an Assistant Secretary of State, could take a stand of this sort with impunity.

‘If you ran things once more,' McRae drawled reflectively, ‘how would you alter matters? Go back to hiring concentration camp victims, as Krupp did during the twentieth century? Perhaps you could obtain and use von Lessinger equipment for that ... letting them die even faster, as your employees, than they died at Belsen-Belsen -- ‘

Karp turned and strode off. He was trembling.

Grinning, McRae lit a cigar. An American, not a German-Dutch, variety.

EME's top recording technician watched in amazement as Nat Flieger carried the Ampek F-a2 to the ‘copter. ‘You're going to catch him on that?'

Jim Planck groaned. ‘My god, the F-a2 was obsolete last year!'

‘If you can't operate it -- ‘ Nat said.

‘I can,' Planck muttered. ‘I've run wormies before; I just feel that -- ‘ He gestured in dismay. ‘I suppose you're using an old-tune carbon type mike along with it.'

‘Hardly,' Nat said. Good-naturedly, he spalled Planck on the back; he had known him for years and was used to him.

‘Don't worry. We'll get along fine.'

‘Listen,' Planck said in a low voice, glancing around. ‘It is really a fact that Leo's daughter is coming with us on this trip?'

‘It's really a fact.'

‘That Molly Dondoldo always meant complications -- you know what I refer to? Naw, you don't. Nat, I don't have any idea what your relationship to Molly is these days, but -- ‘

‘You worry about recording Richard Kongrosian,' Nat said shortly.

‘Sure, sure.' Planck shrugged. ‘It's your life and job and your project, Nat; I'm just a wage-slave, doing what you tell me.' He ran a nervous, shaky hand through his thinning, slightly shiny black hair. ‘Are we ready to go?'

Molly had already got into the ‘copter; she sat reading a book, ignoring the two of them. She wore a brightly coloured cotton blouse and shorts and Nat thought to himself how inappropriate her dress would be for the rain-drenched forests into which they were going. Such a radically different climate; he wondered if Molly had ever been north before. The Oregon-Northern California region had lost much of its population during the fracas of 1980; it had been heavily hit by Red Chinese guided missiles, and of course the clouds of fallout had blanketed it in the subsequent decade. They had in fact not entirely dissipated yet.

But the level had been pronounced by NASA technicians as lying within the safe tolerance.

Lush growth, tangled variants created by the fallout ... the forestation had an almost tropical quality now, Nat knew. And the rain virtually never ceased; it had been frequent and heavy before 1990 and now it was torrential.

‘Ready,' he said to Jim Planck.