"Dickson, Gordon - Dragon And The George Txt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

Gordon Dickson - The Dragon And The George

Chapter 1

At 10:30 a.m., sharp, James Eckert pulled up in front of Stoddard Hall on the Riveroak College campus, where Grottwold Weinar Hansen had his lab. Angie Farrell was not, however, ready and waiting at the curb. Of course.

It was a warm, bright September morning.

Jim sat in the car and tried to keep his temper un- der control. It would not be Angie's fault. That idiot of a Grottwold undoubtedly had dreamed up some- thing to keep her working overtime in spite of-or perhaps because of-the fact he knew she and Jim were supposed to go home-hunting this morning. It was hard not to lose his temper with someone like Grottwold, who was not only one of the world's non- prizes but who had been very patently trying to take Angie away from Jim and get her for himself.

One of the two big doors on the front of the Stoddard Hall opened and a figure came out. But it was not Angie. It was a stocky young man with bushy reddish hair and mustache, carrying an overstaffed briefcase. Seeing Jim in the car, he came down the steps over to the car and leaned on the edge of the opened win- dow on the curb side of the front seat.

"Waiting for Angie?" he asked.

"That's right, Danny," said Jim. "She was supposed to be out here to meet me, but evidently Grottwold's still hanging on to her."

"That's his style." Danny Cerdak was a teaching assistant in the Physics Department. He was the only other Class AA volleyball player on campus. "You're going out to see Cheryl's trailer?"

"If Angie ever gets loose in time," said Jim. "Oh, she'll probably be along any second now. Say, do the two of you want to drop over to my place after we play tomorrow night? Nothing special, just pizza and beer and a few other people from the team with their wives and so forth."

"Sounds fine," said Jim, glumly, "if I'm not stuck with some extra work for Shorles. Thanks, in any case, though; and we'll certainly be there if we can make it."

"Right." Danny straightened up. "See you tomor- row for the game, then."

He went off. Jim returned to his own thoughts. At the same time, he told himself, maturity dictated that he should not lose his emotional control over something like this-even though they only had two hours to get to the trailer court and return and have lunch before getting Angie back to her part-time job as Grottwold's lab assistant. He must remember that frustration was a part of life. He had to learn to live with the whole business of selfish department heads, inadequate salaries and an economy that was pinching Riveroak College here, like all other educational institutions, to the point where it seemed that about all you could do with a doctorate in medieval history was use the diploma to shine your shoes, before going to apply for a job as a grain shoveler-

Jim hauled himself up in his thoughts at this point, having noticed that, far from calming him down, this rehearsing of things to be endured had his fists white- knuckled and beginning to bend the ancient steering wheel of the Gorp. Nothing about the Gorp was strong enough to ignore that kind of treatment. For a ten- year-old Fiat, it was still a faithful little car, but no honest person could call it in good shape. On the other hand, Jim himself-like many Class AA volleyball players-was in shape with a vengeance. He stood a shade under six feet, but even professional weight- guessers usually underestimated by twenty or more his two hundred and ten pounds, which he carried mostly in bone and hard muscle. Unfortunately, that sort of physical engine, matched with an instinct for taking direct action when challenged-which was use- ful on the volleyball courts with the caliber of oppo- nents Jim had been facing in tournament play for some years now, but not perhaps the best thing so- cially-gave Jim reason to consider that he had cause for concern about himself.

Thank heaven for Angie. The beautiful thing about her was that she could get results from people without becoming at all annoyed with them, in situations when Jim would have sworn that the other persons were deliberately looking for a fight. How she managed it, Jim had never been able to figure out. As far as he could see, all she did was to explain matters in a level, friendly voice. Whereupon, for some reason, the other people immediately stopped doing whatever they had been doing that was antagonistic and became friendly and helpful. Angie was really rather special; partic- ularly for someone hardly bigger than a minute. Look at the way she handled Grottwold...

Jim woke to the fact that time had been sliding away as he had been sitting here thinking. He looked at his watch and scowled. Nearly a quarter to eleven. This was too much. If Grottwold didn't have the sense to let her go, Angie herself ought to have broken away by this time.

He pushed open the car door on his side, and was just getting out, when one of the two big front doors swung open again and Angie came running down the steps to the car, pulling on her light beige topcoat as she ran. Her brown eyes were bright and her cheeks pink with her hurry.

"Oh, there you are," said Jim, getting back in.

"I'm sorry." Angie got into the Gorp on her side and slammed the door behind her. "Grottwold's all excited. He thinks he's right on the verge of proving astral projection is possible-"

"Whichjection?"

Jim keyed the Gorp to life and pulled away from the curb.

"Astral projection. Setting the spirit free to wander outside the body. What with the results he's been get- ting using advanced input on biofeedback circuitry to duplicate certain forms of sleep states-"

"You aren't letting him experiment on you, are you? I thought we got that settled."

"Don't get all worked up, now," Angie said. "I'm not letting him experiment on me, I'm helping him with his experiments. Don't worry, he's not going to hypnotize me, or anything like that."

"He tried it once."