Footfall

Clara had remembered, and wondered where he was. He fought abnormally dense rush-hour traffic straight to the Tate-Evans place, one house among many in the San Fernando Valley. Clara met him at the curb, laughing, insisting that she’d followed him right in, in her own car. He grabbed her and kissed her to shut her up. They held each other breathlessly for a moment, then by mutual consent let go and walked up on the porch.

Clara rang the bell and they waited. In those few seconds Clara stopped laughing, even stopped smiling. “Do you think they’ll be angry?”

“Yeah. My fault, and I guess I don’t care that much. Relax.”

“They did tell us. Or Jack did.”

The door opened. George Tate-Evans ushered them inside. He wasn’t angry, but he wasn’t happy either. “Clara, Isadore, come on in. What kept you?”

“My boss,” Isadore lied. “What’s happening?”

George ran his hand over bare scalp to long, thin blond hair. He wasn’t yet forty, but he’d been half bald when Isadore first met him. “Sign of virility,” he’d said. Now he answered, “Jack and Harriet taped some newscasts. We’re playing them now. Clara, the girls are in the kitchen cooking something.”

Girls, kitchen, cooking something. What? This was serious, then; or else George was sure this was serious. Could it be? That serious?

Survivalism. Specialization. Wartime rules. Isadore made his way into a darkened living room. He knew where the steps and the furniture were; he’d been there often enough. The light of the five-foot screen showed him an empty spot on the couch.

There were only men in the room. The house belonged to George and Vicki Tate-Evans, but Vicki wasn’t present.

And Clara had gone to the kitchen. Clara! Ye gods, she thought it was real…

George waved him to a seat, then went to the Betamax recorder. “Here it is again,” he said.

The set lit up to show the presidential seal, then the Oval Office. The camera panned in on President David Coffey. The President looked calm and relaxed. Almost too much so, Isadore thought. But he does look very presidential…

“My fellow Americans,” Coffey said. “Last night, scientists at the University of Hawaii made an amazing discovery. Their findings have since been confirmed by astronomers at Kitt Peak and other observatories. According to the best scientific information I have been able to obtain, a very large spacecraft is approaching Earth from the general direction of the planet Saturn.”

The President looked up at the camera, ignoring his notes for a moment. He had a way of doing that, of looking into the camera so that everyone watching felt he was speaking directly to them. Coffey’s ability to do that had played no small part in his election. “I have been told that it is not possible that the ship came from Saturn, and that it must have come from somewhere much farther away. Wherever it came from, it is rapidly approaching the Earth, and will arrive here within a few weeks, probably at the end of June.”

He paused to look at the yellow sheets of paper that lay on his desk, then back at the camera again. “So far we have received no communication from this ship. We therefore have no reason whatever to believe the ship poses any threat to us. However, the Soviet Union became aware of this ship at the same time we did. Predictably, their reaction was to mobilize their armed forces. Our observation satellites show that they have begun a partial strategic alert.

“We cannot permit the Soviets to mobilize without some answer. I have therefore ordered a partial mobilization of the United States’ strategic forces. I wish to emphasize that this is a defensive mobilization only. The United States has never wanted war. We particularly do not desire war at a time when an alien spacecraft is approaching this planet.

“No American President could ignore the Soviet mobilization. I have not done so. However, I have spoken with the Soviet Chairman, and we have reached an agreement on limiting our strategic mobilization. We are also consulting on a joint response to the alien ship.

“My fellow Americans, our scientists tell us that this could be the greatest event in the history of mankind. You now know all that we know: a large object, perhaps a mile in length, is approaching the Earth along a path that convinces our best scientific minds that it is under power and intelligently guided. So far there has been no communication with it.

“We have no reason to believe this is a threat, and we have many reasons to believe this is an opportunity. With the help of God Almighty we will meet this opportunity as Americans have always met opportunities.

“Good night.”

The Oval Office faded, and news analysts came on. George switched off the set. “We can skip the analysis. Those birds don’t know any more than we do. But you see why I called an alert.”

They had called themselves the Enclave before there was anything more than four men meeting at George and Vicki’s house.