As far as he could make out, most of it was simply given to him, though by whom and for what was harder to pin down. No doubt some came from wealthy and elderly benefactors, humoured in their final years and at least glad to have a ready source of emergency toilet paper. But who on Earth were ‘The Institute for Meteorological Advancement’ and the ‘The International Council of Illuminanti’? One month, when Dave took a stand in the interests of scientific integrity and devoted the entire issue to real testable theories, the mystery funding dried up. Dave was no financial whiz-kid but he knew not to rock a boat that didn’t even have a keel. Not wanting to incur the wrath of his normally dormant publishers, next month the lunatic fringe returned with a vengeance. And so did the money.
So, truly scientific investigation of the UFO phenomena was currently at a low ebb, lower even than Dave’s love life – and as tides went that particular ocean surge was so far down the beach you could smell the rotting seaweed and had to step over the occasional surfer dying of toxic shock. But with Kate steadfastly declining his amorous advances, constantly maintaining that she wanted them to remain ‘just best friends’, for better or worse, ScUFODIN Monthly remained the real partner in Dave’s life.
An overly cheerful mechanical voice, asking him to fasten his seatbelt, brought Dave back to the present with a bump. He was meant to be putting all that behind him on this trip of a lifetime, but as Kate was so fond of saying, ‘You don’t just bring your work home with you, you sleep with it. If you were female, you’d have its babies.’
When he came down to it he had to admit she was right about the motives for his journey. Sure enough, he was claiming it as holiday, the first he’d had in three years as editor. But in his rare moments of self-honesty Dave knew there was only one reason he was visiting Nevada, and it wasn’t because he liked one-arm bandits or dancing girls with ostrich feathers sprouting from their pants. Well, OK leave in the last bit, but really this was a pilgrimage he’d wanted to make all his life. A holy journey you had to do once in a lifetime. Even though his personal desert Mecca was enshrined in triple-thickness security fences, antipersonnel minefields and luminous day-glo signs reading PROPERTY OF UNITED STATES AIR FORCE, TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT WITH BIG GUNS he’d be there to worship at the first opportunity.
Ten minutes later, with a cheerful smile and an optimistic swagger, he stepped off the plane at Las Vegas International Airport and gazed up at the star-filled desert sky. Kate or no Kate, while he was here, he knew he was going to have one hell of a time.
February 1969, somewhere deep beneath North America
The politician stepped onto the circular pedestal and self-consciously smoothed back his sweat-laced hair. One trouser leg was rolled up to the knee, revealing a pallid vein-riddled lower leg. Around him the intense darkness pressed in from all sides. When the beam of white light flooded in from above he squinted through heavy-browed eyes, his weighty jowls quivering as he searched for figures in the blackness beyond. Shortly, the sort of computerized voice that was much in fashion before computers had very much to say gave its verdict.
‘Subject confirmed as Richard Millhouse Nixon. Thirty-seventh President of the United States, and Chairman of the Committee of 300.’ From a rather tinny loudspeaker somewhere far above drifted the first few bars of ‘Hail to the Chief’. It was hard to escape the feeling it had done this many times before.
The new President tentatively stepped down and shielded his eyes from the glare. Nothing moved, apart from a small vein at the side of his temple. Then, accompanied only by a faint whiff of sweat, which Nixon quickly realized was his own, a dark figure stepped from the shadows. The newcomer’s voice was like gallows-yard gravel ground under an executioner’s heel, yet as smooth and cultured as an upper-cut from an Oxford Don.
‘Can’t be too careful these days, Mr Chairman. Traitors where you least expect.’ There was no doubt which of his guest’s titles afforded the most respect.
The Commander-in-Chief offered a half-hearted salute, then thought better of it and turned it into a cheerless wave. ‘Well no, I guess not. Reds … and worse shades, everywhere. You must be …’
‘They call me Becker. Some call me worse things, but when the enemies of justice hate your guts you know you’re doing something right. You can roll down that trouser leg too – we don’t pander to mysticism down here.’
His guest looked to be in two minds. ‘I thought you Committee boys were sticklers for tradition?’
Becker’s eyes held the faintest trace of annoyance. ‘We don’t stand on ceremony, as long as it doesn’t stand on us. I suspect you’ve been misled by some of your senior partners. Would you walk this way, please.’
They stepped onto a conveyor belt which whisked them off down a seemingly endless corridor of smooth walls and no doors. The leader of the Free World took the chance to study his companion. He was a big man, wearing an impeccably tailored black suit cut in the ‘organization man’ style of the early fifties. In his big grizzled hand he held a dark and sinister package. At his wrist was some sort of complex flashing electrical device. Though his craggy features were cast in shadow, somehow his eyes seemed darker still.
Small talk was neither of their specialities, though nervously the President felt an urge to try. ‘Quite a facility you have here. Good to know the public’s tax dollars aren’t all wasted, even the ones we don’t account for.’
The Dark Man looked back coldly at his nominal superior. Then, after a heart-stopping instant, his broad face creased into a mirthless smile which got no nearer his eyes than Lee Harvey Oswald’s bullets had to JFK. ‘We know you’re one of us, sir. Those who took you this far will ensure you stay in power. The Committee will back you to the hilt, and beyond – as long as you fulfil your role.’
At this assurance the President grinned his dumbest vote-catching grin. As was his custom, Becker didn’t. Further conversation was now clearly inappropriate.
Dark and silent minutes passed, until at last the walkway glided to a halt before a huge and featureless wall.
‘The time has come for you to learn what all who hold your high office must know – I speak not of the Presidency but your other, more fundamental brief. Beyond this wall is our organization’s most closely guarded secret, hidden even from the likes of yourself – one of our most promising associate members. It’s my opinion that if this information ever leaks out the bedrock on which the Committee’s power rests will crumble. Unfortunately, not all your colleagues share my views. I have reason to worry about their motives. Prepare yourself.’
The President looked on agog, an expression he was practised at, as Becker fiddled with the device strapped to his wrist. Slowly and steadily a section of the vast wall slid away before them.
What gradually appeared was the interior of a hall the size of an aircraft hangar. The first thing to strike Nixon as odd was the small grassy hill rising from the floor not twenty yards from where he stood. Larger than the infamous Texan ‘grassy knoll’, it was nevertheless similar enough to touch off a spark of guilty panic in the President’s underemployed heart.
That was the first odd thing. Then everything else struck him at once. In the middle distance grew anaemic-looking trees. Overhead, great banks of spotlights produced a sun-like glare. Far away, a snatch of bird-song that warbled for a moment then died off then repeated – tinny and false, clearly recorded. But these details were mere bit-players in the rich pageant of unreason