He appeared to have finished. Lentz spoke up. "Suppose, Captain, suppose we check your mathematics and find no flaw — what then?"
Harrington flung out his hands. "That's what I came here to find out!"
Although Lentz had asked the question, Harrington directed the appeal to King. The Superintendent looked up; his eyes met the astronomer's, wavered and dropped again. "There's nothing to be done," he said dully, "nothing at all."
Harrington stared at him in open amazement. "But good God, man!" he burst out. "Don't you see it? That bomb has got to be disassembled — at once!"
"Take it easy, Captain." Lentz's calm voice was a spray of cold water. "And don't be too harsh on poor King — this worries him even more than it does you. What he means is this: We're not faced with a problem in physics, but with a political and economic situation. Let's put it this way: King can no more dump the bomb than a peasant with a vineyard on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius can abandon his holdings and pauperize his family simply because there will be an eruption some day.
"King doesn't own that bomb out there; he's only the custodian. If he dumps it against the wishes of the legal owners, they'll simply oust him and put in someone more amenable. No, we have to convince the owners."
"The President could do it," suggested Harrington. "I could get to the President—"
"No doubt you could, through the Navy Department. And you might even convince him. But could he help much?"
"Why, of course he could. He's the President!"
"Wait a minute. You're Director of the Naval Observatory; suppose you took a sledge hammer and tried to smash the big telescope — how far would you get?"