promised, they began cropping up all over the base before long. Kedrick was the second man to turn up with one; then three or four of the other .officers, including the WAVEs; then the enlisted personnel—apparently on the principle that they were comparatively expendable. My own WAVE appeared at the keyboard of the computer one morning with a feminine-styled model perched on the back of her head. It was smaller than mine—apparently a later issue—which, considering that mine was no more than three or four days old, indicated a pretty high priority in project development. Evidently the burns were causing more trouble than the newspapers reported.
And by then, of course, the reason for the helmets was an open secret. Semyon's feelings were hurt. "I have not enough brain, then?" he asked bitingly. "The Orientals cannot vector in the little brain of Semyon Timiyazev, the son of a disciple of Pavlov? Hah!" He was moody about it for days, until we got a shipment of helmets of a new size and shape. Then he was utterly crushed: The new helmets were for our dogs!
I tried to explain to him that it was a matter of ESP sensitivity, not intellect; that our work with the dogs might have made them susceptible. But you cannot tell a Russian anything once he gets an idea fixed in his brain; and for some little time after that Semyon was of no use to Project Mako; all he could do was stare at the dogs and sigh.
But the work proceeded.
I pushed myself pretty hard, because along about the time I got my first command I got a letter from the Red Cross. "Lieutenant, Miller," they said, "we regret to inform you in answer to your request of 28 June that we are unable to establish contact with Elsie NMI Miller, Signalman 2/C, last known to be interned at AORD S-14, Zanzibar, due to current security restrictions in force. Application has been made for permission for a Red Cross representative to visit her for the purpose of ascertaining her welfare, in line with your request. However, we must inform you that there is a backlog in excess of fourteen hundred such applications. None have been granted."
So I pushed myself hard, and the animals and Semyon harder still.
The hull of the Weems began to smell a little bit like an old goat barn. "Trained, these animals," Semyon complained bitterly. "They are not even house-broken."
But that had little to do with their military occupational specialty. The chimpanzees were named Clara and Kay, both females, both young and friendly; they caught on to what we wanted of them quickly enough. It was a spectacular sight to see Semyon, vocabulary sheets in his hand, chattering and posturing at the apes, but it got results. I found out very quickly that there wasn't any such thing as a conversation with an ape. You could stand there and tell it the chimpanzee symbols for, "Loud noise. Hurry. Grab-that-thing. Pull," and it would merely look at you, head cocked far over on one side, brown ape eyes staring vacantly. And then it would scratch and scamper away. But then the crash-dive bell would sound, and Clara or Kay would leap up from her flea hunt and jerk open the manual, main-tank valve as skillfully as any twenty-year submariner. I don't mean to say that they never talked back—often they would object and complain and tell us that they wanted a banana or a shiny ball or a handful of meal worms. But there was little consecutivity in their responses.
The dogs were another matter entirely. Their main problem was garrulousness; you would explain to them, say, a complicated course-correction maneuver, and they would bark, growl and semaphore the whole thing back to you. And they wouldn't repeat it just once; they would tell you the whole procedure two or three times, and then come up and put their forepaws on your legs and mention a couple of the high spots, and tell you about the fire control drill they had done the day before, with emphasis on how High-Shiny-Lever was not the same as Little-Thick-Lever,
And by then, of course, the reason for the helmets was an open secret. Semyon's feelings were hurt. "I have not enough brain, then?" he asked bitingly. "The Orientals cannot vector in the little brain of Semyon Timiyazev, the son of a disciple of Pavlov? Hah!" He was moody about it for days, until we got a shipment of helmets of a new size and shape. Then he was utterly crushed: The new helmets were for our dogs!
I tried to explain to him that it was a matter of ESP sensitivity, not intellect; that our work with the dogs might have made them susceptible. But you cannot tell a Russian anything once he gets an idea fixed in his brain; and for some little time after that Semyon was of no use to Project Mako; all he could do was stare at the dogs and sigh.
But the work proceeded.
I pushed myself pretty hard, because along about the time I got my first command I got a letter from the Red Cross. "Lieutenant, Miller," they said, "we regret to inform you in answer to your request of 28 June that we are unable to establish contact with Elsie NMI Miller, Signalman 2/C, last known to be interned at AORD S-14, Zanzibar, due to current security restrictions in force. Application has been made for permission for a Red Cross representative to visit her for the purpose of ascertaining her welfare, in line with your request. However, we must inform you that there is a backlog in excess of fourteen hundred such applications. None have been granted."
So I pushed myself hard, and the animals and Semyon harder still.
The hull of the Weems began to smell a little bit like an old goat barn. "Trained, these animals," Semyon complained bitterly. "They are not even house-broken."
But that had little to do with their military occupational specialty. The chimpanzees were named Clara and Kay, both females, both young and friendly; they caught on to what we wanted of them quickly enough. It was a spectacular sight to see Semyon, vocabulary sheets in his hand, chattering and posturing at the apes, but it got results. I found out very quickly that there wasn't any such thing as a conversation with an ape. You could stand there and tell it the chimpanzee symbols for, "Loud noise. Hurry. Grab-that-thing. Pull," and it would merely look at you, head cocked far over on one side, brown ape eyes staring vacantly. And then it would scratch and scamper away. But then the crash-dive bell would sound, and Clara or Kay would leap up from her flea hunt and jerk open the manual, main-tank valve as skillfully as any twenty-year submariner. I don't mean to say that they never talked back—often they would object and complain and tell us that they wanted a banana or a shiny ball or a handful of meal worms. But there was little consecutivity in their responses.
The dogs were another matter entirely. Their main problem was garrulousness; you would explain to them, say, a complicated course-correction maneuver, and they would bark, growl and semaphore the whole thing back to you. And they wouldn't repeat it just once; they would tell you the whole procedure two or three times, and then come up and put their forepaws on your legs and mention a couple of the high spots, and tell you about the fire control drill they had done the day before, with emphasis on how High-Shiny-Lever was not the same as Little-Thick-Lever,
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