They'd try some of that stuff out with the big
betatron at Smolensk, and a microsecond after they'd throw the switch,
Smolensk would look worse than Hiroshima did."
"Well, why would our esteemed colleague commit suicide, just at this
time?" Karen Hilquist asked.
"Maybe plutonium poisoning." Farida suggested. "He was doing something
in the radiation-lab and got some Pu in him, and of course, shooting's
not as painful as that. So--"
"Oh, my dear!" Suzanne protested. "That but stinks! The great Adam
Lowiewski, descending from his pinnacle of pure mathematics, to perform
a vulgar experiment? With actual _things_?" The Frenchwoman gave an
exaggerated shudder. "Horrors!"
"Besides, if our people began getting radioactive, somebody would be
sure to claim we were endangering the safely of the whole establishment,
and the national-security clause would be invoked, and some nosy person
would put a geiger on the dear departed," Sir Neville added.
"Nervous collapse." Karen said. "According to the laity, all scientists
are crazy.
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