The two previous years of drought in California and the light winter snowfall in the Sierra Nevada were compounding the problem because hydroelectric reserves were significantly less than usual. Nim, whose role as vice president, planning, placed him at the center of activity, became engaged in a hectic succession of conferences, their purpose to review emergency plans and decide priorities. Meanwhile, some national and state priorities had already been decreed. The President ordered immediate gasoline rationing, and a standby coupon scheme already "on the shelf" was to be activated within days.

Additionally, all sales of gasoline were forbidden from Friday nights to Monday mornings.

Also emanating from Washington was an edict halting all major sporting events and other attractions which produced large crowds, and closing national parks. The objective was to reduce unnecessary travel, especially by automobile. Theaters and movie houses, it was stated, might have to be closed later.

All public utilities using oil were ordered to begin around-the-clock "brownouts" by reducing their voltages five percent.

Public utilities which produced electricity by burning coal-principally in the central United States-were instructed to transmit as much power as they could spare to the East and West Coasts, which would be hardest hit by the oil embargo, and where massive umemployment was expected because of power-short plants and businesses. The scheme was labeled "Coal by Wire." However, its effect would be limited, in part because the central U.S. needed most of its electricity for local use, and also because long distance transmission lines were few in number.

Schools in many areas were being ordered to close now, and reopen in the summer when their heating and lighting needs would be far less.

Curbs on air travel were being worked out and would shortly be announced.

More drastic steps, the public was warned-including three- or even four-day weekends-were likely if the oil situation failed to improve.

Accompanying all official measures were pleas for voluntary conservation of energy in all its forms.

At Golden State Power & Light, every discussion was overshadowed by the knowledge that the utility's own stored oil was sufficient for only thirty days of normal operation.

Since some new oil, from tankers now en route, would still be coming in, it was decided that "rolling blackouts" would be delayed until the second week of May. Then, initially, the electricity cutoffs would be for three hours each day, after which more draconian measures might be needed.

But even the earliest power cuts, it was realized, would be disruptive, and damaging to the state's economy. Nim knew bow grim the situation was; so did others directly intervened. But the general public, Nim believed, had still not grasped, or perhaps didn't want to, the full significance of what was happening.

As well as Nim's planning duties, and because of his reinstatement as company spokesman, he was in demand to explain the current scene and outlook.

He found the two responsibilities a strain and told Teresa Van Buren, "Okay, I'll handle the important occasions for you, but you'll have to use your own people for the small stuff." She said she would. Next day the PR director appeared in Nim's office. "There's a midday TV program called Lunch Break."

"You may not believe this, Tess," he said, "but I never watch it."

"Yeah, yeah; very funny. Well, don't be too quick to dismiss daytime television. There are a million housewives out there who do watch, and tomorrow the program wants the electricity crisis explained."

"By me, I suppose."

"Naturally," Van Buren said. "Who does it better?"

Nim grinned. "Okay, but do something for me. All TV stations specialize in time wasting. They ask you to be there early, then keep you waiting forever to go on. You know how busy I am so, for once, try to arrange a fast-in, fast-out."

"I'll come with you myself," Van Buren said. "And I'll work it out. I promise."

As it turned out, the promise was not fulfilled.

Lunch Break was a one-hour show which went on the air at noon. The PR director and Nim arrived at the TV studios at 11:50- In the foyer a young woman program assistant met them; like so many who worked in television, she dressed and looked as if she graduated from high school the week before. She carried the standard badge of office-a clipboard-and wore her glasses in her hair.

"Oh, yes, Mr. Goldman. You'll be on last, at ten to one."

"Hey, hold it!" Van Buren protested. "I was assured Mr. Goldman would be at the top of the show. He's one of our senior executives and his time is valuable, especially now."

"I know." the program assistant smiled sweetly. "But the producer changed his mind. Mr. Goldman's subject is rather heavy. It might depress our audience."

"They should be depressed," Nim said.

"If they are, and then switch off, our program will be over anyway," the young woman said firmly. "Perhaps you'd like to come on the set while you're waiting. Then you can watch the rest of the show."

Van Buren looked at Nim, putting up her hands in a gesture of helplessness.

Resigned, knowing how much urgent work he could have accomplished in the wasted hour, he told her, "Okay."

The program assistant, who had played the same scene many times, said, "Come with me, please."

The studio set, colorful and brightly lighted, was intended to look like a living room. Its centerpiece was a bright orange sofa occupied by two regular interviewers-Jerry and jean-young, vivacious, turned-on, Beautiful People. Three TV cameras prowled in front in a semicircle. Guests would join the interviewers under the bright lights, one by one.

The show's first ten minutes was devoted to a dancing bear from a visiting circus, the second to a seventy-year-old grandmother who had traveled from Chicago on roller skates. "I wore out five pairs," she boasted, "and would have been here sooner, except the police wouldn't let me use interstate highways."

Immediately preceding Nim was Lunch Break's own "House Doctor."

"He's on every day and has a tremendous following," the program assistant confided in a whisper. "People tune in especially, which is why, when you follow him, they'll be listening to you."

The doctor, in his fifties, graying and distinguished, was a solid performer who knew every trick in television's manual, including how to smile disarmingly, when to act the fatherly physician, and at what point to use a simplistic diagram of a stomach. "My subject today," be informed his unseen audience, "is constipation."

Nim watched and listened, fascinated.

" . . Many people worry needlessly. What not to do is take laxatives. Millions of dollars' worth are sold each year-a waste; many are damaging to your health . . . Most constipation is 'imagined.' A daily bowel movement can be a needless fetish . . . Let your natural cycle have its way. For some, five to seven days without is normal. Be patient, wait . . . A real problem: Some folks don't heed the call of nature immediately. They're busy, they postpone. That's bad. The bowel gets discouraged, tired of trying . . . Eat high roughage food, drink lots of water to stay moist . .."

Van Buren leaned across. "Oh God, Nim! I'm sorry."

He assured her softly, "Don't be. Wouldn't have missed it. I only hope I'm not an anticlimax."

The doctor was faded out, a commercial in. The program assistant took Nini's arm. "You're on, Mr. Goldman." She escorted him to the center of the set, where he was seated. While the commercial continued, Nim and the interviewers shook hands. Jerry, frowning,- cautioned him "Were running late, and don't have much time, so keep your answers short." He accepted a sheet of notes from a stagehand, then, as if a switch had been snapped, his smile went on and he turned toward a camera.

"Our last guest today knows a great deal about electricity and oil. He is....."

After the introduction, Jean asked Nim brightly, "Are we really going to have electricity cuts, or is it just another scare, something which in the end won't happen?"

"It's no scare, and it will happen." (You want short answers, Nim thought; so, okay.) Jerry was consulting the sheet be had been given. "About that alleged oil shortage . . ."

Nim cut in quickly. "It is not alleged."

The interviewer's smile widened. "We'll let you get away with that one." He went back to his notes. "Anyway, haven't we had a glut of oil recently in California-oil coming in from Alaska, from the pipeline?"

"There have been some temporary local surpluses," Nim agreed. "But now, with the rest of the country desperately in need of oil, any extra will disappear fast."

"It seems selfish," Jean said, "but can't we keep that Alaska oil in California?"

"No." Nim shook his head. "The federal government controls it, and already has an allocation program. Every state, every city in the country, is pressuring Washington, demanding a share. There won't be much for anyone when the available domestic oil is spread around."

"I understand," Jerry said, referring to his notes once more, "that Golden State Power has a thirty-day supply of oil. That doesn't sound too bad."

"The figure is true in one sense," Nim acknowledged, "but misleading in another. For one thing, it's impossible to use oil down to the bottom of every tank. For another, the oil isn't always where it's needed most; one generating plant may be without oil, another have enough in storage for several days, and the facilities to move big quantities of oil around are limited. For both reasons, twenty-five days is more realistic."

"Well," Jerry said, "let's hope everything is back to normal before those days run out."

Nim told him, "There's not the slightest chance of that. Even if agreement is reached with the OPEC oil nations, it will take . . ."

"Excuse me," Jean said, "but we're short of time and I have another question, Mr. Goldman. Couldn't your company have foreseen what has happened about oil and made other plans?"

The effrontery, the injustice, the incredible naivety of the question astounded Nim. Then anger rose. Subduing it, he answered, "Golden State Power & Light has been attempting to do precisely that for at least ten years. But everything our company proposed-nuclear plants, geothermal, pumped storage, coal burning-bas been opposed, delayed or thwarted by. . ."

"I'm truly sorry," Jerry interrupted, "but we just ran out of time. Thank you, Mr. Goldman, for being with us." He addressed a zooming lens. "Among the interesting guests on Lunch Break tomorrow will be an Indian swami and . . ."

On their way out of the TV station building, Teresa Van Buren said dispiritedly to Nim, "Even now, no one believes us, do they?"

"They'll believe soon enough," Nim said. "When they all keep flipping switches and nothing happens."

While preparations for widespread blackouts went ahead, and a sense of crisis peryaded GSP & L, incongruities persisted.

One was the Energy Commission hearings on Tunipah which continued, unchanged, at their original maddening pace.

"A stranger from Mars, using commonsense," Oscar O'Brien observed during lunch with Nim and Eric Humphrey, "would assume, in view of our present power emergency, that licensing procedures for projects like Tunipah, Fincastle, and Devil's Gate would move faster. Well, Mr. Commonsense Mars would be dead wrong."

The general counsel moodily ate some of his lunch, then continued, "When you're in there at those hearings, listening to testimony and the same old rehashed arguments about procedure, you'd think no one knows or cares what's going on in the real world outside. Oh, by the way, we have a new group fighting us on Tunipah. They call themselves CANED, which, if I remember it right, means Crusaders Against Needless Energy Development.

And compared with CANED's accusations about Golden State Power & Light, Davey Birdsong was a friend and ally."

"Opposition is a hydra-headed monster," Eric Humphrey mused, then added, "The Governor's support of Tunipah seems to have made little, if any, difference."

"That's because bureaucracy is stronger than governors, presidents, or any of us," O'Brien said. "Fighting bureaucracy nowadays is like wrestling a sea of mud while you're in it up to your armpits. I'll make a prediction: When the blackouts hit the Energy Commission building, the hearings on Tunipah will continue by candlelight-with nothing else changed."

As to the Fincastle geothermal, and Devil's Gate pumped storage plant proposals, the general counsel reported that dates to begin public hearings had still had not been set by the responsible state agencies.

Oscar O'Brien's general disenchantment, as well as Nim's, extended to the bogus Consumer Survey distributed in the city's North Castle district. It was almost three weeks since the carefully planned questionnaire had gone out and it now appeared as if the attempt to entrap the terrorist leader, Georgos Archambault, had been abortive, a waste of time and money.

Within a few days after the bulk mailing, hundreds of replies poured in, and continued to do so through the following weeks. A large basement room at GSP & L headquarters was set aside to deal with the influx and a staff of eight clerks installed there. Six were borrowed from various departments, the other two recruited from the District Attorney's office.

Between them, they painstakingly examined every completed questionnaire.

The D.A.'s office also sent photographic blowups of handwriting samples from Georgos Archambault's journal, and the clerks worked with these in view. To guard against error, each questionnaire was examined separately by three people. The result was definite: Nothing had come in which matched the handwriting samples. Now, the special staff was down to two, the remainder having returned to their regular duties. A few replies were still trickling in and being routinely examined. But it seemed unlikely, at this stage, that Georgos Archambault would be heard from. To Nim, in any case, the project had become a lot less important than the critical oil supply problem which occupied his working days and nights.

It was during a late evening work session about oil-a meeting in Nim's office with the company's Director of Fuel Supply, the Chief of Load Forecasting and two other department beads-that be received a telephone call having nothing to do with the subject under discussion, but which disturbed him greatly.

Victoria Davis, Nim's secretary, was also working late and buzzed from outside while the meeting was in progress.

Annoyed at the interruption, Nim picked up the telephone and answered curtly, "Yes?"

"Miss Karen Sloan is calling on line one," Vicki informed him. "I wouldn't have disturbed you, but she insisted it was important."

"Tell her . . ." Nim was about to say he would return the call later, or in the morning, then changed his mind. "Okay, I'll take it."

With an "Excuse me" to the others, he depressed a lighted button on the telephone. "Hello, Karen."

"Nimrod," Karen said without preliminaries, her voice sounding strained, "my father is in serious trouble. I'm calling to see if you can help."

"What kind of trouble?" Nim remembered that the night be and Karen went to the symphony she had said much the same thing, but without being specific.

"I made my mother tell me. Daddy wouldn't." Karen stopped; he sensed she was making an effort to regain composure, then she went on, "You know that my father has a small plumbing business."

"Yes." Nim recalled that Luther Sloan had talked about his business the day they all met in Karen's apartment. It was the day on which both parents later confided in Nim their burden of guilt about their quadriplegic daughter.

"Well," Karen said, "Daddy has been questioned several times by people from your company, Nimrod, and now by police detectives."

"Questioned about what?"

Again Karen hesitated before answering. "According to Mother, Daddy has been doing quite a lot of subcontracting for a company called Quayle Electrical and Gas. The work was on gas lines, something to do with lines going to meters."

Nim told her, "Tell me that company's name again."

"It's Quayle.' Does that mean something to you?"

"Yes, it means something," Nim said slowly as he thought: It looked, almost certainly, as if Luther Sloan was into theft of gas. Though Karen didn't know it, her phrase "lines going to meters" was a giveaway. That and the reference to Quayle Electrical and Gas Contracting, the big-scale power thieves already exposed and still being investigated by Harry London. What was it Harry reported only recently? "There's a bunch of new cases, as well as others developing from the Quayle inquiry." It sounded to Nim as if Luther Sloan might be among the "others."

The sudden news, the realization of what it implied, depressed him.

Assuming his guess to be correct, why had Karen's father done it? Probably for the usual reason, Nim thought: Money. Then it occurred to him that he could probably guess, too, what the money had been used for.

"Karen," he said, "if this is what I think, it is serious for your father and I'm not sure there's anything I'll be able to do." He was conscious of his subordinates in the room, waiting while he talked, trying to appear as if they were not listening.

"In any event, there's nothing I can do tonight," Nim said into the telephone. "But in the morning I'll find out what I can, then call you."

Realizing he might have sounded unusually formal, he went on to explain about the meeting in his office.

Karen was contrite. "Oh, I'm sorry, Nimrod! I shouldn't have bothered you."

"No," be assured her. "You can bother me anytime. And I'll do what I can tomorrow,"

As the discussion on oil supplies resumed, Nim attempted to concentrate on what was being said, but several times his thoughts wandered. He asked himself silently: Was life, which had thrown so many foul balls at Karen, in the process of delivering still one more?

13.

Again and again, sometimes while sleeping, sometimes while awake, a memory haunted Georgos Winslow Archambault.