"As soon as it began to play a really good game of chess, Washington
put the whole thing under wraps for security reasons. Which is why you
won't hear any more about it from me."
I'm no Eniac, but I can occasionally put two and two together myself.
If the boss's remarks mean anything, they mean that an electronic brain
capable of playing games has been developed, and that it's led to
something important militarily. Of course! I could kick myself for not
having guessed it before.
Brains-and-games--that's what MS is all about, obviously. It had to
happen: out of the mathematical analysis of chess came a robot chess
player, and out of the chess player came some kind of mechanical brain
that's useful in military strategy. _That's_ what Len Ellsom's in the
middle of.
"Really brilliant mind," the boss said after we'd sawed for a while.
"Keen. But he's a little erratic--quirky, queer sense of humor. Isn't
that your impression?"
"Definitely," I said. "I'd be the last one in the world to say a word
against Len, but he was always a little peculiar. Very gay one moment
and very sour the next, and inclined to poke fun at things other people
take seriously. He used to write poetry."
"I'm very glad to know that," the boss said. "Confirms my own feeling
about him."
So the boss has some doubts about Len.
* * * * *
_October 27, 1959_
Unpleasant evening with Len. It all started after dinner when he showed
up in my room, wagged his finger at me and said, "Ollie, you've been
avoiding me. That hurts. Thought we were pals, thick and thin and till
debt and death do us part."
I saw immediately that he was drunk--he always gets his words mixed
up when he's drunk--and I tried to placate him by explaining that it
wasn't anything like that; I'd been busy.
"If we're pals," he said, "come on and have a beer with me."
There was no shaking him off, so I followed him down to his car and we
drove to this sleazy little bar in the Negro part of town. As soon as
we sat down in a booth, Len borrowed all the nickels I had, put them
in the jukebox and pressed the levers for a lot of old Louie Armstrong
records.
"Sorry, kid," he said. "I know how you hate this real jazzy stuff, but
can't have a reunion without music, and there isn't a polka or cowboy
ballad or hillbilly stomp in the box. They lack the folksy touch on
this side of the tracks." Len has always been very snobbish about my
interest in folk music.