Short Fiction Poul Anderson (reading a book .TXT) đ
- Author: Poul Anderson
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âNo,â said OâMallory dully. âWe canât figure out where the hydrogenâs disappearing to, and anyway it shouldnât make that much difference. The energy output down thereâs about what itâs supposed to be, you know.â
Gilchrist stood trying to think. His brain felt gelid.
But damn it, damn it, damn it, there must be a rational answer. He couldnât believe they had blundered into an ugly unknown facet of the cosmos. Natural law was the same, here or in the farthest galaxyâ âit had to be.
Item, he thought wearily. The pile was operating as usual, except that somehow hydrogen was being lost abnormally fast and therefore the pump had to bring in more from Tritonâs air. Butâ â
âItem. That couldnât be due to a leak in the heating pipes, because they were still at their ordinary pressure.
âItem. The gas in the pipes included some radioactive isotope. Neverthelessâ â
âItem. It could not be hydrogen-3, because the pile was working normally and its neutron leakage just wasnât enough to produce that much. Therefore, some other element was involved.
Carbon? There was a little methane vapor in Tritonâs atmosphere. But not enough. Anyway, carbon-13 was a stable isotope, and the pile-room conditions wouldnât produce carbon-14. Unlessâ â
Wait a minute! Something flickered on the edge of awareness.
Danton had buttonholed OâMallory. âWe were talking about using the battery banks,â he said.
The engineer shrugged. âAnd what happens after theyâre used up? No, weâre keeping them as a last resort.â His grin was hideous. âWe could get six or seven comfortable days out of them.â
âThen letâs have them! If you thumb-fingered idiots havenât fixed the system by then, you deserve to die.â
âAnd youâll die right along with us, laddybuck.â OâMallory bristled. âDonât think the black gangâs loafing. Weâre taking the cold and the radiation as much as you areâ ââ
âRadiation?â
Faces turned around. Gilchrist saw eyes gleam white. The word rose in a roar, and a woman screamed.
âShut up!â bawled OâMallory frantically. âShut up!â
Danton shouted and swung at him. The engineer shook his head and hit back. As Danton lurched, a man rabbit-punched OâMallory from behind.
Gilchrist yanked Catherine away. The mob spilled over, a sudden storm. He heard a table splinter.
Someone leaped at him. He had been an educated man, a most scientific and urbane man, but he had just been told that hard radiation was pouring through his body and he ran about and howled. Gilchrist had a glimpse of an unshaven face drawn into a long thin box with terror, then he hit. The man came on, ignoring blows, his own fists windmilling. Gilchrist lowered his head and tried clumsily to take the fury on his arms. Catherine, he thought dizzily, Catherine was at least behind him.
The man yelled. He sat down hard and gripped his stomach, retching. AlemĂĄn laughed shortly. âA good kick is advisable in such unsporting circumstances, mi amigo.â
âCome on,â gasped Catherine. âWeâve got to get help.â
They fled down a tunnel of blackness. The riot noise faded behind, and there was only the hollow slapping of their feet.
Lights burned ahead, Veseyâs office. A pair of engineer guards tried to halt them. Gilchrist choked out an explanation.
Vesey emerged and swore luridly, out of hurt and bewilderment at his own people. âAnd we havenât a tear gas bomb or a needler in the place!â He brooded a moment, then whirled on Jahangir, who had come out behind him. âGet a tank of compressed ammonia gas from the chem section and give âem a few squirts if theyâre still kicking up when you arrive. That ought to quiet them without doing any permanent damage.â
The chief nodded and bounded off with his subordinates. In this gravity, one man could carry a good-sized tank.
Vesey beat a fist into his palm. There was agony on his face.
Catherine laid a hand on his arm. âYouâve no choice,â she said gently. âAmmonia is rough stuff, but it would be worse if children started getting trampled.â
Gilchrist, leaning against the wall, straightened. It was as if a bolt had snapped home within him. His shout hurt their eardrums.
âAmmonia!â
âYes,â said Vesey dully. âWhat about it?â Breath smoked from his mouth, and his skin was rough with gooseflesh.
âIâ âIâ âIâ âItâs yourâ ââ ⊠y-y-your answer!â
They had set up a heater in his laboratory so he could work, but the test was quickly made. Gilchrist turned from his apparatus and nodded, grinning with victory. âThat settles the matter. This sample from the pile room proves it. The air down there is about half ammonia.â
Vesey looked red-eyed at him. There hadnât been much harm done in the riot, but there had been a bad few minutes. âHowâs it work?â he asked. âIâm no chemist.â
AlemĂĄn opened his mouth, then bowed grandly. âYou tell him, Thomas. It is your moment.â
Gilchrist took out a cigarette. He would have liked to make a cavalier performance of it, with Catherine watching, but his chilled fingers were clumsy and he dropped the little cylinder. She laughed and picked it up for him.
âSimple,â he said. With technicalities to discuss, he could speak well enough, even when his eyes kept straying to the girl. âWhat we have down there is a Haber process chamber. Itâs a method for manufacturing ammonia out of nitrogen and hydrogenâ âobsolete now, but still of interest to physical chemists like myself.
âI havenât tested this sample for nitrogen yet, but thereâs got to be some, because ammonia is NH3. Obviously, thereâs a vein of solid nitrogen down under the Hill. As the heat from the pile room penetrated downward, this slowly warmed up. Some of it turned gaseous, generating terrific pressure; and finally that pressure forced the gas up into the pile room.
âNow, when you have a nitrogen-hydrogen mixture at 500 degrees and 600 atmospheres, in the presence of a suitable catalyst, you get about a 45 percent yield of ammoniaâ ââ
âYou looked that up,â said Catherine accusingly.
He chuckled. âMy dear girl,â he said, âthere are two ways to know a thing: you can know it,
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