"Aldiss, Brian - Saliva Tree, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Aldiss Brian W)

"That he waswhen it happened! He went out with his
shotgun, and Bert Neckland with him. But there was nothing to
see but bubbles in the pond and steam over it, and this morning
he wouldn't discuss it, and said that work must go on whatever
happen."
They stood beside the pond, a dark and extensive slab of
water with rushes on the farther bank and open country
beyond. As they looked at its ruffled surface, they stood with the
windmill black and bulky on their left hand. It was to this that
Nancy now pointed.
Mud had been splashed across the boards high up the sides
of the mill; some was to be seen even on the top of the nearest
white sail. Gregory surveyed it all with interest. Nancy,
however, was still pursuing her own line of thought.
"Don't you reckon Father works too hard, Gregory? When
he's not outside doing jobs, he's in reading his pamphlets and
his electricity manuals. He never rests but when he sleeps."
"Um. Whatever went into the pond went in with a great
smack! There's no sign of anything there now, is there? Not
that you can see an inch below the surface."
"You being a friend of his. Mum thought perhaps as you'd
say something to him. He don't go to bed till ever so
latesometimes it's near midnight, and then he's up again at
three and a half o'clock. Would you speak to him? You know
Mother dassent."
"Nancy, we ought to see whatever it was that went in the
pond. It can't have dissolved. How deep is the water? Is it very
deep?"
"Oh, you aren't listening, Gregory Rolles! Bother the old
meteor!"
"This is a matter of science, Nancy. Don't you see"
"Oh, rotten old science, is it? Then I don't want to hear. I'm
cold, standing out here. You can have a good look if you like but
I'm going in before I gets froze. It was only an old stone out of
the sky, because I heard Father and Bert Neckland agree to it."
"Fat lot Bert Neckland knows about such things!" he called
to her departing back.
He looked down at the dark water. Whatever it was that had
arrived last night, it was here, only a few feet from him. He
longed to discover what remained of it. Vivid pictures entered
his mind: his name in headlines in "The Morning Post," the
Royal Society making him an honorary member, his father
embracing him and pressing him to return home.
Thoughtfully, he walked over to the barn. Hens ran clucking
out of his way as he entered and stood looking up, waiting for
his eyes to adjust to the dim light. There, as he remembered it,
was a little rowing boat. Perhaps in his courting days old Mr.
Grendoii had taken his prospective wife out for excursions on
the Oast in it. Surely it had not been used in years. He dragged
the boat from the barn and launched it in the shallows of the