When Cooper looked at the congressman, she realized he desperately wanted her to give him a reason to have said no. “Who was the donor?” she asked.
Calhoun smiled and walked over to examine another canvas, which was obscured behind Pearl’s. “You know I can’t tell you that,” he said. Calhoun pulled the portrait away from the wall, and suddenly, his smile faded. He studied the gaunt, angular face, framed in a fur-fringed hood. The lucent eyes were gone, and in their place were two black caves.
Calhoun tore his gaze away from the portrait to look at Cooper. “I know this man,” he said.
With an ear-shattering scratch, the All-Call system suddenly came to life, and Tucker’s sleepy voice spewed out a host of acronyms and directives.
“That’s for you. They’ll turn this place inside out looking for you,” Cooper said.
“Of course they will,” he said as he walked to the door. “Their lapdog took a walk.”
Cooper picked up the antique compass from her desk. She was ready to let it go; though it had failed her in so many ways, something told her it wouldn’t fail Calhoun. “Wait, I have something to give you.” She handed him the compass.
The wrinkles in the corners of his eyes deepened as he examined it. “You use this for inspiration?”
Cooper shook her head. “No. It was given to me. Sort of like your pin. Take it,” she said. When he hesitated, she added: “Please.”
Calhoun accepted it, gazing at it like it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, his face radiant with happiness. For a moment, Cooper felt like she was looking at her father. There’s a whole generation of those kinds of fathers, Birdie had told Cooper back at McMurdo.
Tucker’s voice came over the loudspeaker again, talking about sectors and annexes.
“You better go,” Cooper said.
Calhoun looked at Cooper, his eyes wet. “This means a lot to me, young lady. I take everything said in this room to heart.”
Later, as she prepared for bed, Cooper got on her chair and gazed out the window at the endless expanse of snow surrounding the station. She reached for her ruler from the bedside table, and set it on the bottom of the window frame. The sun had sunk a half inch since last week. It looked like a burning ship, disappearing into the seam between earth and sky.
*
The next morning, on the same stage where Coq au Balls had performed on Halloween, Congressmen Sam Bayless and Jack Calhoun sat between the undersecretary for Democracy and Global Affairs and the NSF liaison for the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies. The Beakers considered Alexandra Scaletta’s absence “conspicuous,” but Tucker assured them that she was back in Washington trying to negotiate with the more reasonable members of the House budget committee.
Bayless was a lean, whippet-faced man, with the kind of facial structure one typically only found in Manga. His hair, heavily gelled, gleamed under the fluorescents. Even seated, he exuded arrogance. But it was Calhoun whom Cooper studied. She’d expected him to look tired, perhaps even exhausted, after last night, but instead he looked wide-awake. He was even smiling.
As Bayless moved to the podium, Cooper remembered Sal telling her that these DV speeches were usually obsequious paeans to the brutality of polar life, full of admiration for the “unique” individuals who sacrificed all that was familiar to do important work under heinous conditions, and promises to safeguard the funding that made such work possible. All had gone as expected so far, except for that last point. And there had been no grand confrontation, aside from Sal’s conversation with Calhoun in the Smoke Bar. The station population, which had been itching for a fight, had—save for cynical veterans who knew better—depended on the scientists to lead the charge. No matter how passionate the dishwashers and welders were about keeping politics out of science, they were still just support staff, not climate researchers or theoretical physicists on government grants. The former could be dismissed as the partisan harridans and Libertarians they usually were while the latter were recipients of taxpayer funds that were currently under threat. The sense of unrest in the crowd was palpable.
“I’m told that you folks are not used to the kind of media attention you’ve been getting over the last few weeks,” Bayless began. “I apologize for that, especially if Representative Calhoun and I have been the cause of any disruption to the important work being done down here. We are as surprised as any of you by the way the media has shown such robust interest in what’s happening here. Dissent is the healthiest state of affairs in any democracy, of course. And while the South Pole is technically a continent without country, I do consider it a democracy.” Cooper felt Sal stir next to her. “I think that democracy is under attack. That in a bastion of scientific thought, the covenant of free thought has been broken.”
“There is no such thing as a scientific covenant,” Sal burst out. “You’re using religious language to describe science.”
Two NSF admins approached Sal’s row from either end. But the congressman put his hand up. “No, it’s okay.” He gripped the sides of the podium and leaned over it. “Without god, science doesn’t exist.” Half of the room laughed. “Oh, did I make a joke? I guess it must be funny to people who believe time, space, and matter came into existence unassisted. That planets and stars formed from space dust, not the hand of an intelligent force. That matter created life by itself and early life-forms learned to reproduce like Sea-Monkeys.” At this, the room fell silent. “Look, guys—gals—we’re on the same side. I believe in science. I also believe all findings of science will eventually be found to agree with Scripture.”
“Amen,” Calhoun said, dipping his head.