The imminence of collapse made the very sky terrifying, to know that this apparent order could crumble, and planets fly from suns, and suns themselves spin blindly nowhere. Every word before the Committee was vital. The whole wheeling order of existence turned upon it. He felt the wood beneath his finger tips, smooth and cool and solid. * * * * * The second day of the open hearing, Norma flew down from Vermont to reason with Bud. Bud was gracious. Years in politics had taught him to mask his real feelings; taught him so well that he was no longer at all sure what his real feelings were. The outbursts of anger and suppressed sadism he unleashed on those closest to him always the morning after confused him and left him feeling that the person of the previous day had been someone distinct and separate from his genuine self. "It's good to see you," he said. A warm, brotherly and artificial love flattered his sense of rectitude. He considered her the baby of the family. He remembered her as a gawky, frightened girl giving a last long glance at the security of the living room before venturing into the night of her first date. "I've been meaning to get up your way." His hands signaled the extent of his confinement to Washington. "There's so much to do, you can't imagine. I have to take work home with me. I'm sometimes up half the night with it.... I've been hearing about you. Very fine, Norma, very fine." Norma was tense and uncomfortable and, Bud thought, a little over-awed to be sitting across the desk from her own brother in the rebuilt Senate Office Building. She blinked nervously. "Frank will be in this afternoon." "Yes. Yes?" A trace of petulance haunted Bud's voice. "Terribly busy just now, but...." Hollow enthusiasm conquered. "That's just fine. I can always find time to see Frank." "He thinks it's important that he see you," Norma said. "Has something happened?" Bud always sought ways to escape from the anticipated responsibility of sharing a family crisis. "We want to talk to you." "I don't quite understand, Norma. What are you talking about?" "These hearings, Bud." Instantly the Senator felt the crush of the whole family arrayed against him, and he wanted to snarl at her in shame and anger and shout, "Leave me alone! Leave me alone! Leave me alone, for Chrissake!" "They've got space flight. We can't even begin to guess what else they've got. What does Senator Stilson do? And you're there on his side, right with him!" Bud puffed his cheeks and his skin grew hot and prickly. _It's none of your damned business_, he thought viciously. "They have space flight," she repeated doggedly. "Think what that would mean to us." "I haven't time to discuss it right now, Sis. We'll have to talk this out later." He stood up, anger pounding in his temples. She stood with him. "Tonight. You and I and Frank."