"Anderson, Poul - 1964 Nicholas Van Rijn 02 - Trader to the Stars 1.1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Anderson Poul)

planets. So that proves nothings." He turned toward Ya-
mamura, rather like a rotating globe himself. "But see
here, even if the crew did pump out all the air before we
boarded, why not check their reserve tanks? If we find air
stored away just like these diddlers here are breath-
ing..."
"I thought of that," said Yamamura. "In fact, it was
almost the first thing I told the men to look for. They've
located nothing. I don't think they'll have any success,
either. Because what they did find was an adjustable
catalytic manifold. At least, it looks as if it should be,
though we'd need days to find out for certain. Anyhow,
my guess is that it renews exhausted air and acts as a
chemosynthesizer to replace losses from a charge of
simple inorganic compounds. The crew probably bled all
the ship's air into space before we boarded. When we go
away, if we do, they'll open the door of their particu-
lar cage a crack, so its air can trickle out. The environmen-
tal adjuster will automatically force the chemosynthe-
sizer to replace this. Eventually the ship'll be full of
enough of their kind of air for them to venture forth and
adjust things more precisely." He shrugged. "That's
assuming they even need to. Perhaps Earth-type conditions
suit them perfectly well."
"Uh, yes," said Torrance. "Suppose we look around
some more, and line up the possibly intelligent species."
Van Rijn trundled along with him. "What sort intelli-
gence they got, these bespattered aliens?" he grumbled.
"Why try this stupid masquerade in the first places?"
"It's not too stupid to have worked so far," said Torrance
dryly. "We're being carried along on a ship we don't
know how to stop. They must hope we'll either give up and
depart, or else that we'll remain baffled until the ship enters
their home region. At which time, quite probably a naval
vessel-or whatever they've got-will detect us, close in,
and board us to check up on what's happened."
He paused before a compartment. "I wonder."
The quadruped within was the size of an elephant, though
with a more slender build indicating a lower gravity than
Earth's. Its skin was green and faintly scaled, a ruff of
hair along the back. The eyes with which it looked out
were alert and enigmatic. It had an elephant-like trunk,
terminating in a ring of pseudodactyls which must be as
strong and sensitive as human fingers.
"How much could a one-armed race accomplish?"
mused Torrance. "About as much as we, I imagine, if not
quite as easily. And sheer strength would compensate.
That trunk could bend an iron bar."
Van Rijn grunted and went past a cubicle of feathered
ungulates. He stopped before the next one. "Now here