Free Wheels by Arthur Hailey

soon in their own garages .”
    The Silver Fox smiled at his public relations colleague, who had shifted uneasily and was fidgeting with his pipe. "Relax, Jake. I'm not taking off at the press. Just trying to fix a perspective .”
    Jake Earlharn said dryly, "I'm glad you told me. For a minute I was wondering .”
    "Aren't you losing sight of some f acts, Mr. Braithwaite .”
    AP persisted. "There are reputable people who still believe in steam power. Some big outfits other than auto companies are working on it. The California government is putting money on the line to get a fleet of steam cars on the road. And there are legislative proposals out there to ban internal combustion engines five years from now .”
    The Product Development vice-president shook his h ead decisively, his silver mane bobbing. "In my book, the only reputable guy who believed in a steam car was Bill Lear. Then he gave up publicly, calling the idea 'utterly ridiculous .”
    ' "But lie's since changed his mind," AP said. "Sure, sure. And carries around a hatbox, saying his new steam engine is inside. Well, we know what's inside; it's the engine's innermost core, which is like taking a spark plug and saying 'there's an engine from our present cars.' What's seldom mentioned, by Mr. Lear and others, is that to be added are combusters, boiler, condenser, recuperation fans . . . a long list of heavy, expensive, bulky hardware, with dubious efficiency .”
    Jake Earlharn prompted, "The California government's steam cars . . .”
    The Silver Fox nodded. "Okay, California. Sure the state's spending lots of money; what government doesn't? If you and half a million others were willing to pay a thousand dollars more for your cars, maybe-just maybe-we could build a steam engine, with all its problems and dis advantages. But most of our customers-and our competitors' customers, which we have to think about too--don't have that kind of moss to sling around .”
    "You're still ducking electric cars," The Wall Street Journal pointed out. Braithwaite nodded to Adam. "You take that one .”
    "There are electric cars right now," Adam told the reporters. "You've seen golf carts, and it's conceivable that a two-passenger vehicle can be developed soon for shopping or similar use within a small local area. At the moment, though, it would be expensive and not much more than a curiosity. We've also built, ourselves, experimental trucks and cars which are electric powered. The trouble is, as soon as we give them any useful range we have to fill most of the inside space with heavy batteries, which doesn't make a lot of sense .”
    "The small, lightweight battery-zinc-air or fuel cells," AP questioned. "When is it coming .”
    "You forg ot sodium sulphur," Adam said. th at's another that's been talked up. Unfortunately, there's little more than talk so far .”
    Elroy Braithwaite put in, "Eventually we believe there will be a breakthrough in batteries, with a lot of energy stored in small packages. What's more, there's a big potential use for electric vehicles in downtown traffic. But based on everything we know, we can't see it happening until the 1980s .”
    "And if you're thinking about air pollution in conjunction with electric cars," Adam added, "there's one factor which a lot of people overlook. Whatever kind of batteries you had, they'd need recharging. So with hundreds of thousands of cars plugged into power sources, there'd be a requirement for many more generating stations, each spewing out its own air pollution. Since electric power plants are usually built in the suburbs, what could happen is that you'd end up taking the smog from the cities and transferring it out there .”
    "Isn't all that still a pretty weak alibi .”
    The cool Newsweek brunette uncrossed her legs, then twitched her skirt downward, to no effect, as she undoubtedly knew; it continued to ride high on shapely thighs. One by one, the men dropped their e y es to where the thi g hs and skirt joined. She