That afternoon Pat Danielson was one of a handful of people to receive the following memo:

Due to a reordering of priorities, active investigation connected with operation code name QUAKER will terminate effective immediately. Please act promptly to deliver to central inactive files all material relevant to Project QUAKER which is in your possession.

It was initialled by Isaacs.

Danielson reread the two sentences with confusion and disappointment. She still had no inkling of what caused the strange signal, but she was captivated by it and had spent long hours wrestling with it. Only yesterday she had spoken briefly with Isaacs about it. They had expressed their mutual frustration that no solution had been devised, but his interest showed no sign of flagging, and he had expressed satisfaction with her work. Stunned by the surprise terse note, she was now assailed with doubt. Was her enthusiasm for the project misplaced? The signal a trivial curiosity? Even worse, was it through an inadequacy on her part that progress towards understanding had come to a halt?

Without pausing to analyse the propriety of her actions, she logged off the computer, slammed her notebook shut and strode off towards Isaacs's office, the memo crumpled in her hand.

Kathleen looked up in mild surprise when Danielson appeared in her office and announced stiffly, 'I'd like to see Mr Isaacs.'

'He's in the middle of a conference call. Do you want to wait until he finishes to see if he has the time? It may be fifteen or twenty minutes.'

Danielson was taken aback by the roadblock.

'Oh, well, yes. Yes. I would like to wait,' she finished in a strong voice. She looked around and sat briskly in one of the office chairs.

Kathleen recognized the wrinkled memo. After a moment, she nodded at it and spoke in a friendly tone.

'Is that the problem?'

Danielson looked at the slip of paper. She sat back in her chair and brandished the memo at Kathleen. 'It was such a surprise. I'm a bit upset.'

'Not my place to stick my nose in,' Kathleen said, 'but I can give you a little insight. That's nothing against you.'

'I'd like to think so, but I've done the most work on it, spent every spare minute since I got back from Boston, and to have it cancelled.. I was afraid...'

Kathleen leaned on her forearms. 'Do you know about the tiff between Mr Isaacs and McMasters?'

'There's some scuttlebutt. I haven't paid much attention to it,' Danielson smiled in self-deprecation. 'I don't operate in that league.'

'Who does?' Kathleen smiled in return. 'But sometimes some of us get caught up in the battles.' She turned serious. 'For some reason McMasters has it in for Isaacs. Bob, Mr Isaacs, is always having to tiptoe around him. It's too bad. Mr Isaacs can be pretty ferocious when he's worked up, but he really is very sweet.'

'I've enjoyed working with him,' Danielson admitted. 'He takes everything very seriously, but he's reasonable.'

'Well, he won't toady to McMasters, and McMasters took a dislike to him early on. I don't know the details, but McMasters is behind the cancellation of that particular project. As I say, it's nothing personal against you, I'm sure.'

'I'd like to believe that.'

'Do you still want to see Mr Isaacs?'

'Yes,' Danielson said thoughtfully, 'I think I still would.'

'Well, you're welcome to make yourself at home, but I've got to finish this briefing paper.'

'Oh, please go ahead.'

Kathleen turned back to her keyboard. Danielson watched her fingers rap the keys and then began to think about Project QUAKER. The project fascinated and haunted her. She also wanted very much to please Isaacs with her performance. How frustrating to do your best, she thought, try to gain some appreciation and be thwarted by something beyond your control, in this case interference by McMasters, some high muckety-muc I haven't even met.

She recognized the cord of tension, strong and familiar, the ambition to go her own way played against the need to satisfy another authority figure, no stranger at all. She slipped into a reverie, her thoughts drifting to her childhood, dim memories of the tragic, premature death of her mother in an auto collision with a drunk. Her father, a chief petty officer in the Navy, giving up the sea he loved to take a desk job, trying to be both father and mother, while she tried to be wife and daughter.

She had worked hard to do well in school, at first to protect him from further disappointment, but then more to satisfy her own drives. She had been only dimly aware of the degree to which he lived his life through her, of her irrational guilt that his situation was somehow her fault, of her own repressed resentment that she had to be strong for him, that she could never, for even a brief moment, set all her burdens on his broad shoulders. In hindsight, she saw how the seeds had been slowly planted for the bitter row that still tainted their relationship years later, despite their love for one another.

She was finishing high school and planning to join the Navy as he wished, but she aimed for, insisted on, sea duty. He wanted her to follow his path, but was too tradition-bound to countenance women on shipboard, particularly his own kin. Years of repressed feelings erupted. He called her headstrong and ungrateful for his years of sacrifice. 'It's not my fault that your wife died,' she shouted in return, and suffered immediate remorse.

In the aftermath of their fight, she had spurned the Navy and gone to UCLA to study engineering. Now she found the work for the Agency stimulating and enjoyed the notion that she played an important, if small, role in the strategic balance of power in the world. Still, during those low points like the present, she could sense her father looking over her shoulder.

Her head snapped up as Isaacs's voice came over the intercom.

'Yes, sir,' replied Kathleen, glancing at Danielson. 'Do you have time to see Dr Danielson? She's waiting here.'

Isaacs appeared quickly in the doorway.

'Pat, please come in.' He held the door for her and gestured her to a chair. 'I'm sorry that was so impersonal,' he pointed his chin at the note still wadded in her hand. 'I was too busy to get around, and it did have to be in writing anyway.'

'I didn't mind that,' she lied a little, 'but I was shocked.'

'It was sudden, a decision from upstairs.' Isaacs looked at the young woman, wondering how much of the real problem he should reveal to her.

Danielson searched for words that would not seem too bald an appeal for approval.

'I couldn't help wondering, if I had made more progress, if I had isolated the source of the signal, would that have kept the project alive?'

Isaacs spoke thoughtfully.

'Perhaps. Unfortunately, we can't answer that, since we didn't find the source.' He noted the look of discomfort that passed over her face and hastened to add reassurance. 'Please don't feel responsible for this. You did some very good work to get as far as you did. You can't blame yourself for getting bogged down. It turned out to be a problem with no simple resolution, and you had lots of other things to do the last two or three weeks.'

He disliked the tone of those words. By weaselling around the real issue, he made it sound as if she might shoulder some blame for not working quite hard enough or being quite bright enough. He sighed mentally. If this young woman had a future in the Agency, she might as well learn the ropes.

'Pat, let me level with you. Unless you had showed that this was a new Russian weapon aimed at the Oval Office, the project would have been killed. The decision really had nothing to do with the project itself. It was strictly politics.'