Dark as Day Read Online Free Page A

that decision when the time comes. Just make sure I have a copy of the cage specs.” Beston turned to a woman just a couple of seats along from Milly. “Zetter. Any progress?”
    The woman had a thin vulpine face with a sharp nose. She must have slipped in late, and very quietly, because Milly had surveyed everyone in the room when she first arrived.
    Zetter—first name? last name?—did not stand up. She leaned forward, so that Milly was presented with only a quarter profile, and shook her head in a slow, reptilian manner. “Not as of four hours ago. I received a report from—”
    “No names. You know the rules.”
    “I wasn’t about to.” The woman sniffed. “I received a report from our source at L-5 four hours ago. Odin is tightening security on all fronts.”
    “Of course. The Bastard is as worried about leaks as we are. Any peepholes?”
    “Too soon to say. Maybe one weak point—human, not equipment.”
    “Better. You can’t buy a machine. How much?”
    “I don’t know yet. Pricey. You get what you pay for.”
    “Or less. Get onto it again. Tell our source we don’t want general information. If it’s not decrypt methods—” Jack Beston stopped in mid-sentence. His green eyes, apparently staring at nothing, had suddenly focused their glare on Milly. “You in the back. What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
    It was a direct question, the kind that supervisor Hannah Krauss had told her to answer. But it wasn’t one that Milly understood. She sat frozen.
    “Who are you?” Beston barked. “What’s your name?”
    “Milton Wu.”
    “Milton?” Beston moved to peer at her body. “What sort of a fucking name is that? You’re no man.”
    “No.” Milly, as always since the age of thirteen, was conscious of her too-large breasts. “Milton is my real name, a family name. But everyone calls me Milly.”
    “She’s new. Only been here six days.” Hannah Krauss was trying to divert Jack Beston’s anger. It didn’t work.
    “I don’t give a flying fuck if she’s been here just six minutes. And I’m not talking to you, Krauss.” He pointed straight at Milly’s crotch. “What’s that?”
    He meant the scribe plate sitting on her lap. He had to mean the scribe plate. They had already established that she was a woman. Milly felt herself blushing. “I thought I ought to make notes. I have a lot to learn.”
    “You can say that again. Tell me this, Milly Wu. Are we safe inside a cage, so no E/M signals get out?”
    “No. I mean, I don’t think so.”
    “I’ll tell you. We are not. You’ve been writing on that thing?”
    “Yes, sir. Just notes. Squiggles. In condensed Post notation.”
    “Which are converted to words for storage. Converted electromagnetically .” Jack Beston turned to the woman on Milly’s right. “Zetter? Are you on?”
    “Yes.” She opened her jacket, peered at something inside, and the thin nose twitched. “So is she. I’m picking up and recording. Not interpreting, but that’s an easy piece of processing. Unless we’re shielded, the reception range for that strength of signal will be at least five kilometers.”
    “Which might as well be infinity. Look around you, Milly Wu. Do you see anybody else making electronic notes?”
    Milly looked. Neutral stares, except for Hannah’s rueful rubber-lipped quirk. Sorry. I ought to have warned you.
    “No, sir.”
    “And you won’t. This is a maximum security installation. We don’t let anybody know how we’re doing. We are going to be the first to pick up and decipher an alien signal, and nothing is going to stop us. Understand?”
    “Yes, sir.” Milly, greatly daring, added, “I want to be part of the team that gets there first. That’s why I came here.”
    “Damn right. Can you do hand-writing, on paper?”
    “Yes, sir, I can.” Thank heaven for Uncle Edgar, and his insistence on an old-fashioned education.
    “Then that’s what you do, if you want notes. Hand that thing over.”
    He took the