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

though I don't know why they wouldn't, they could easily have been receiving
radio waves all these years. It's only logical that they should. So wouldn't they
know a lot more about us than they've been pretending to know?'
'It does seem likely,тАЩ Bronski said. 'But maybe they have a reason for not
listening in.'
'Would Earth people under similar circumstances deliberately keep
themselves in ignorance?'
'I don't know. After all, half of the Martians are descendants of Earth
people.'
Orme was silent for a while as he walked back and forth, swinging his
arms. He liked and needed hard exercise. Being imprisoned made him feel like a
caged tiger. Pushups and kneebends were not adequate. He required exercise
that was also fun: tennis, basketball, swimming. The ascetic Bronski, however,
seemed quite able to sit or lie down for days without being bored as long as he
had something to study.
'The way I get it,' Orme said suddenly, 'is that they're so interested in what
happened after 50 AD, if they're not lying, that is, because they know what
happened up to that time. Which means that they left Earth then and haven't
been back. Or maybe they have been back to observe from a ship, but they don't
know the meaning or the details of what they saw. They can get those only from
us. So, to fool us into not knowing they do have a general knowledge of events,
they get us to tell them the broad story. Then they can lead us into telling the
details.'
'It's obvious that the humans are descended from people who were picked
up by the Krsh in the first century AD,' Bronski said. 'Beyond that, all is
speculation on our part. But if it makes you feel better to guess, go ahead.'
Orme said nothing. After a few minutes Bronski turned on the holographic
TV. The show seemed to be a newscast. Orme was interested in it because
there were scenes from other places than the cavern in which they were
prisoners. He saw two outdoor events, one a festival of some sort and the other a
stock-judging contest. Some glimpses of the hollows revealed that the entrances
were not only different but that the lighting was provided by many small globes
hanging from the ceiling. Another scene was in a large tunnel evidently
connecting two of the hollows, A man had been killed by a horse. Though he
couldn't understand the newscaster's speech, he had no trouble seeing what had
happened.
'One picture is worth ten thousand words,' he muttered.
'What?' Bronski said.
Orme started to repeat himself, but he stopped almost at once.
'Hey, that's us!'
There they were being questioned by the six.
The images were snapped off abruptly; the announcer, a somewhat red-
faced, fleshy, old Krsh, said something.
Then another picture flashed on.
 Both men leaped out of their chairs. There were Madeleine Danton and
Nadir Shirazi getting out of the same kind of vehicle which had carried them from
the outside tunnel to their prison. They had their helmets on, and their faces were
not visible. But it had to be them.
Orme groaned, and said, 'So now they've got them! But how?'