“How?”

Mark smiled. “I won’t call you up and say, `Hey, Randy, the Russians are about to attack us.’ Phones aren’t secure, and I don’t think my C-in-C, or the Air Staff, would approve. But if you hear `Alas, Babylon,’ you’ll know that’s it.”

Randy had forgotten none of this talk. A week or so later, thinking about Mark’s words, Randy had decided to go into politics. He would start in the state legislature, and in a few years be ready to run for Congress. He’d be the kind of leader Mark wanted.

It hadn’t worked out that way. He couldn’t even beat Porky Logan, a gross man whose vote could be bought for fifty bucks, who bragged that he had not got beyond the seventh grade but that he could get more new roads and state money for Timucuan County than any half-baked radical, undoubtedly backed by the burrheads and the N.A.A.C.P., who didn’t even know that the

Supreme Court was controlled by Moscow. So Randy’s fiasco had been inspired by that night, and now the night bore something worse.

He wondered what Mark was doing in Puerto Rico, and why his warning had come from there. It should have come from Washington or London or Omaha or Colorado Springs rather than San Juan. It was true that SAC had a big base, Ramey, in Puerto Rico, but– It was no use guessing. He’d know at noon. Of one thing he was certain, if Mark expected it to come, it would probably come. His brother was no alarmist. Randy sometimes allowed emotions to distort logic, Mark never did. Mark was capable of calculating odds, in war or poker, to the final decimal, which was why he was a Deputy Chief of Intelligence at SAC, and soon would have his star.

Randy knew there were a thousand things he should be doing, but he couldn’t think of any of them. He became aware of a rhumba rhythm in the living room, and presently Missouri skated into view, feet bundled with waxing cloths, shoulders moving and hips bouncing with elephantine elegance, intent on her polishing. He yelled, “Missouri!”