Stepping a little closer and scanning the screens, Aaron could see that a good eighty or ninety of the PIPER 100 were wearing their wristwatches, as per their agreement with Ogle Data Research. There were a few stragglers. Almost all of them were women. One of the problems that had come up with the PIPER program was that the bulky watches looked clumsy on a woman's wrist, and most women didn't want to wear them all the time. Hopefully, they were carrying them around in their purses, and would take them out and put them on as soon as the program started.
If they didn't, they'd forfeit the rest of their money, and their wristwatches would be given to someone a little more reliable. For this, the first test of PIPER, a 90 percent compliance rate would be pretty decent.
"So, what's the mood of America?" Aaron said. He couldn't resist asking. He stepped as far forward as he could and stood right next to Ogle's chair, so that the panorama of screens completely filled his peripheral vision. The effect was like hanging in outer space, in the center of a dynamic young galaxy: against a backdrop of velvety black, bursts of colored light flared unpredictably in every direction, in hues of red, green, blue, and mixtures thereof.
"Hard to say, since we don't know what any of these people are reacting to," Ogle said. "I been keeping an eye on this poor guy right here." He pointed to a screen that had been consistently red ever since Aaron had come into the room. "I think this guy must be right in the middle of a bar fight or something."
Aaron leaned closer to the red screen and squinted to read the label at the bottom. It read, TRADE SCHOOL METAL HEAD/KENT NISSAN, MT. HOLLY, N.J.
"His blood pressure is through the roof," Aaron said. "Maybe you're right."
He couldn't help checking out his five participants. Floyd Wayne Vishniak seemed to be in a quiescent state, probably sacked out on his couch watching television. Chase Merriam was in an excellent mood; probably getting lubricated at a cocktail party in the Hamptons.
"Hey, this looks great!" another voice exclaimed. "Jesus! Look at this thing! It's virtual reality, man!"
It was a tall man in early middle age, with a neatly trimmed beard and a ponytail: the controlled hippie look. He was wearing shorts and sandals and a Hawaiian shirt, and was just tossing a weather-beaten leather satchel on to one of the counters.
"Evening, Zeldo," Ogle said.
Zeldo's gaze was fastened upon the Eye of Cy. "This thing is killer," he said. "Does it work?"
"The input side works," Ogle said, "as you can see for yourself. Now that you're here, we can run some tests on the output side."
"What's the output side?" Aaron said.
"Okay, I'm up for it," Zeldo said. He ran over to the nearest Calyx workstation and started to sign in. "I just came over from Argus's dressing room. He's waiting."
"Who's Argus?" Aaron said.
A faint beeping noise sounded from the direction of Cy Ogle. His big chair, in the middle of the Eye of Cy, had a telephone built into it, and he was punching in a number.
"Good evening, this is Cy Ogle," he said. "Is there any possibility that I could speak to the Governor? Thank you so very much." Ogle was actually capable of delivering this kind of dialogue as though he meant it.
"I have acquired Argus," Zeldo said. The screen of his Calyx system had come alive with a multiple-window display showing the status of some incredibly complicated system.
"Evening, Governor. You mind if I put you on the speaker-phone?"
One of the windows on Zeldo's screen was a rapidly fluctuating bar graph. It had been dead for a little while, but now it put on a burst of colorful activity.
"Okay," Ogle said, and punched a button on his phone.
"I hate these speakerphones," said a deep voice. When he spoke, the bar graph on Zeldo's screen came alive.
"They make me feel like I'm in a box," the voice continued. Aaron had finally recognized it: it was the voice of Governor William A. Cozzano.
"We want to test our communications link," Ogle said.
"That's what Zeldo told me," Cozzano said. "Go ahead and do something."
The armrests of Ogle's chair were huge, like the captain's chair on the bridge of the Enterprise. The right one was covered with small keys, like on a computer keyboard. Each key was labeled in small letters.
The left armrest contained a row of several joysticks or sliders that could individually be moved back and forth, left to right, between two extremes. Aaron stepped forward, leaned over Ogle's shoulder, and read the labels on the joysticks:
LIBERAL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 CONSERVATIVE
LIBERTARIAN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 AUTHORITARIAN
POPULIST 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 ELITIST
GENERAL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 SPECIFIC
SECULAR 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 RELIGIOUS
MATERIAL 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 ETHEREAL
KIND/GENTLE 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 BELLIGERENT
Right now, all of the joysticks were set close to the middle except for GENERAL/SPECIFIC which had been set to 1 (GENERAL) and stuck in place with a piece of duct tape.
Ogle punched a button on his armrest.
"Bullet whizzing past my head," Cozzano said.
"Correct," Ogle said. "That means that you're under attack and you'd better take cover and defend yourself."
"Got it," Cozzano said. "Do another one."
Ogle punched another button.
"Apple pie," Cozzano said. "Which means American values."
Ogle punched another button.
"Ice cubes. Which means I should cool it."
Ogle punched another one.
"A B-52. A strong national defense."
They went on in this vein for several minutes. Ogle had a few dozen buttons on his armrest.
"Argus is Cozzano," Aaron said.
"Right," Zeldo said. "Argus was the mythological figure who had a hundred eyes. With Ogle's help, and with the PIPER 100 feeding him their emotions, Cozzano becomes the new Argus."
At first, Floyd Wayne Vishniak didn't know what it was: a burst of tinny music with sort of a patriotic brass-band sound to it. It sure wasn't coming from his TV set, which was tuned to a fishing program. Finally a flash of red-white-and-blue color caught his eye. It was coming from his wrist. From the big fancy wristwatch that he was being paid to wear. It was showing a logo, a computerized American flag image.
Finally they were doing something. He'd been wearing the damn thing for two weeks and hadn't seen anything on it except for occasional test patterns. He turned off the TV - the fish didn't seem to be biting anyway - cracked open a beer, and sat down to watch.
Chase Merriam was out on the lawn of his brother-in-law's house in East Hampton, Long Island, savoring a mint julep and enjoying the cool night air, when his watch came to life. It didn't much bother him, since this was a dull party anyway. The sound of the music attracted the attention of several other partygoers, and by the time the program got underway, he was in the center of half a dozen people, standing on tiptoe, staring at his wrist in fascination.
"This is ridiculous," he said. "Why don't we all just watch it on C-SPAN."
Dr. Hunter P. Lawrence, pundit extraordinaire, moderator of the Washington Hot Seat, and nemesis of Eleanor Richmond, was a veteran of the Kennedy glory days. He had come down from Harvard to serve as an Undersecretary of State for Cultural Affairs, "liasing" with Ed Murrow's USIA. After putting in his three years, he had returned to Harvard to take a joint appointment in the Political Science Department and as an administrator at the Kennedy School. He had a Savile Row tattered professional elegance with a hint of dandruff around the shoulders of his dark gray pinstriped suit. His graying hair, cut long in the back to compensate for its gradual retreat in front, defied the best efforts of spray and gel to get it to lie down, and the backlights of the set turned them into silvery scratches against the dark blue background. As the house filled up and the media consultants fussed over their candidates and the technicians ran around barking into their headsets, he sat in his chair, legs crossed, flipping listlessly through some papers.