"Philip Jose Farmer - Jesus on Mars" - читать интересную книгу автора (Farmer Phillip Jose)

But they still didn't know if Hfathon was saying 'fork', 'a fork', 'the fork', or
'this is a fork'. Bronski asked Sha'ul to explain in Greek. He expected some
difficulty because, as far as he knew, Koine Greek had no word for fork. That
instrument had not been invented in the first century AD.
Ya'aqob protested that Bronski should be addressing his question to him,
not to Sha'ul. He, Ya'aqob, was the chief human interrogator and was therefore
the proper one to carry on this lesson.
Bronski smiled and said in English, 'Captain, whatever else the Martians
are, they're jealous of their authority. They've got the same old Homo sapiens
pecking order.'
'You can take the Terrestrial from Earth, but you can't take Earth away
from the Terrestrial,' Orme said.
Ya'aqob asked Bronski what he had said. Bronski replied that he was
merely translating for Orme. Ya'aqob said that he didn't think so. They were
smiling, but there was nothing funny in anything they had said.
Bronski shrugged.
Hfathon spoke somewhat angrily in Greek. If these interruptions kept on,
the lessons would be far behind schedule. From now on, if Bronski wanted to
know the Greek equivalent, he could ask him about it. He was as fluent in that
language as anybody else in the group.
Ya'aqob said, 'In that case, the rest of us might as well return to the
university. However, this is a committee, not a military unit. Though you are the
chairman, anybody has a right to speak up if it so pleases him.'
'Or her,' Zhkeesh, the female, said.
Ya'aqob smirked.
Bronski translated the exchange to Orme.
'They're academics, no doubt about that.'
'Well, what is it, a "fork", or what?тАЩ Orme said impatiently.
'Shneshdit just means "fork". It's a loan word in Greek, but it's pronounced
slightly differently.'
'Don't tell me how it's pronounced in Greek,' Orme said. 'I just want to
learn Krsh. For the time being, anyway.'
The lesson proceeded rather rapidly after that, though Bronski twice tried
to ask when he and Orme would be released from their quarters. Hfathon said
they would learn that in due time.
Both of the Marsnauts had excellent memories. In three hours they had
mastered the names of twenty artefacts and also learned the names of parts of
the human and Krsh bodies.
They had also picked up some short phrases. Of the four forks on the
table, the fork nearest to them was shnesh-am-dit. A fork a little more distant was
shnesh-aim-dit. A third fork even further away was shnesh-tu-dit. Two forks close
to them was shnesh-am-gr-dit. And so on.
Orme had difficulty pronouncing '-gr-' without an intrusive vowel between
the g and the r, especially since the r was pronounced with the tip of the tongue
near the palate. He failed utterly to master two consonants produced deep in the
throat that sounded like ripping sailcloth to him.
Bronski said, 'They have near-equivalents in Arabic. You'll get them
eventually.'
'If I don't die of a sore throat first. Anyway, I can't tell the difference
between them.'