Cities in Flight

“Do we have the facilities?” (Just how much?)

“Only the beginnings.” (About four billion dollars, Bliss.)

“Conservatively?” (Why so much?)

“Yes. Field strength again.”

(That was shorthand for the only problem that mattered, in the long run, if you wanted to work with gravity. Whether you thought of it, like Newton, as a force, or like Faraday as a field, or like Einstein as a condition in space, gravity was incredibly weak. It was so weak that, although theoretically it was a property of every bit of matter in the universe no matter how small, it could not be worked with in the laboratory. Two magnetized needles will rush toward each other over a distance as great as an inch; so will two balls of pith as small as peas if they bear opposite electrical charges. Two ceramet magnets no bigger than doughnuts can be so strongly charged that it is impossible to push them together by hand when their like poles are opposed, and impossible for a strong man to hold them apart when their unlike poles approach each other. Two spheres of metal of any size, if they bear opposite electrical charges, will mate in a fat spark across the insulating air, if there is no other way that they can neutralize each other.

(But gravity—theoretically one in kind with electricity and magnetism—cannot be charged on to any object. It produces no sparks. There is no such thing as an insulation against it—a di-gravitic. It remains beyond detection as a force, between bodies as small as peas or doughnuts. Two objects as huge as skyscrapers and as massive as lead will take centuries to crawl into the same bed over a foot of distance, if nothing but their mutual gravitational attraction is drawing them together; even love is faster than that. Even a ball of rock eight thousand miles in diameter—the Earth—has a gravitational field too weak to prevent one single man from pole-vaulting away from it to more than four times his own height, driven by no opposing force but that of his spasming muscles.)

“Well, give me a report when you can. If necessary, we can expand.” (Is it worth it?)

“I’ll give you the report this week.” (Yes!)

And that was how the Bridge had been born, though nobody had known it then, not even Wagoner. The senators who had investigated the Bridge still didn’t know it. MaoHinery’s staff at the FBI evidently had been unable to penetrate the jargon on their recording of that conversation far enough to connect the conversation with the Bridge; otherwise MacHinery would have given the transcript to the investigators. MacHinery did not exactly love Wagoner; he had been unable thus far to find any handle by which he might grasp and use the Alaskan senator.

All well and good.

And yet the investigators had come perilously close, just once. They had subpoenaed Guiseppi Corsi for the preliminary questioning.

Committee Counsel: Now then, Dr. Corsi, according to our records, your last interview with Senator Wagoner was in the winter of 2013. Did you discuss the Jupiter Project with him at that time?

Corsi: How could I have? It didn’t exist then.

Counsel: But was it mentioned to you in any way? Did Senator Wagoner say anything about plans to start such a project? Corsi: No.

Counsel: You didn’t yourself suggest it to Senator Wagoner?

Corsi: Certainly not. It was a total surprise to me, when it was announced afterwards.

Counsel: But I suppose you know what it is.

Corsi: I know only what the general public has been told. We’re building a Bridge on Jupiter. It’s very costly and ambitious. What it’s for is a secret. That’s all.

Counsel: You’re sure you don’t know what it’s for?

Corsi: For research.

Counsel: Yes, but research for what? Surely you have some clues. Corsi: I don’t have any clues, and Senator Wagoner didn’t give me any. The only facts I have are those I read in the press. Naturally I have some conjectures. But all I know is what is indicated, or hinted at, in the official announcements. Those seem to convey the impression that the Bridge is for weapons research.

Counsel: But you think that maybe it isn’t?

Corsi: I—I’m not in a position to discuss government projects about which I know nothing.

Counsel: You could give us your opinion.

Corsi: If you want my opinion as an expert, I’ll have my office go into the subject and let you know later what such an opinion would cost.

Senator Billings: Dr. Corsi, do we understand that you refuse to answer the question? It seems to me that in view of your past record you might be better advised—

Corsi: I haven’t refused an answer, Senator. I make part of my living by consultation. If the government wishes to use me in that capacity, it’s my right to ask to be paid. You have no right to deprive me of my livelihood, or any part of it.

Senator Croft: The government made up its mind about employing you some time back, Dr. Corsi. And rightly, in my opinion.