"(ss) Kindness UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Del Rey Lester)

Back on Earth, Bryant Kenning nodded slowly to the small group as he put the communicator back, and his eyes were a bit sad in spite of the smile that lighted bis face. "The Director's scout is back, and he did choose "The Dane's'. Poor kid. I'd begun to think we waited too long, and that he never would make it. Another six monthsЧand he'd have died like a flower out of the sun! Yet I was sure it would work when Miss Larsen showed me that story; with its mythical planetoid-paradises. A rather clever story, if you like pseudohis-tory. I hope the one I prepared was its equal."

"For historical inaccuracy, fully its equal." But the amusement in old Professor Kirk's voice did not reach his lips. "Well, he ^wallowed our lies and ran off with the ship we built him. I hope he's happy, for a while at least."

Miss Larsen folded her things together and prepared to leave. "Poor kid! He was sweet, in a pathetic sort of way. I wish that girl we were working on had turned out better; maybe this wouldn't have been necessary then. See me home, Jack?"

The two older men watched Larsen and Thorpe leave, and silence and tobacco smoke filled the room. Finally Kenning shrugged and turned to face the professor.

"By now he's found the note. I wonder if it was a good idea, after all? When I first came across it in that old story, I was thinking of Jack's preliminary report on Number 67, but now I don't know; she's an unknown quantity, at best. Anyhow, I meant it for kindness."

"Kindness! Kindness to repay with a few million credits and a few thousands of hours of workЧplus a lie here and thereЧfor all that we owe the boy's race!" The professor's voice was tired, as he dumped the contents of his pipe into a snuffer, and strode over slowly toward the great window that looked out on the night sky. "I wonder sometimes, Bryant, what kindness Neanderthaler found when the last one came to die. Or whether the race that will follow us when the

darkness falls on us will have something better than such

kindness."

The novelist shook his head doubtfully, and there was silence again as they looked out across the world and toward the stars.