"Philip Jose Farmer - The Book of Philip Jose Farmer" - читать интересную книгу автора (Farmer Phillip Jose)

strip of soil at the tube would be useless. It would be as unfirm as the rest of the
garden. It was at that point that the tanks must have fallen in.
Another thought came to him: that the tanks must have disturbed the orderly
arrangement of the little umbrellas close to the tube. Yet there was no sign of such a
happening. Therefore, somebody must have rescued the plants and set them up again.
That meant that somebody might come along in time to rescue him.
Or to kill him, he thought.
In either event, his problem would be solved.
Meanwhile, he knew it was no use to make a jump from the pack to the strip at
the tube. The only thing to do was to stay on top of the pack and hope it didn't sink
too deeply.
However, the pack did sink. The jelly rose swiftly to his knees, then his rate of
descent began slowing. He prayed, not for a miracle but only that the buoyancy of the
pack plus the tank on his chest would keep him from going completely under.
Before he had finished praying, he had stopped sinking. The sticky stuff had
risen no higher than his breast and had left his arms free.
He gasped with relief but did not feel overwhelmed with joy. In less than four
hours the air in his tank would be exhausted. Unless he could get another tank from
the pack, he was done for.
 He pushed down hard on the pack and threw his arms up in the air and back in
the hope his legs would rise again and he could spread-eagle. If he could do that, then
the pack, relieved of his weight, might rise to the surface. And he could get another
tank from it.
But his legs, impeded by the stickiness, did not rise far enough, and his body,
shooting off in reaction to the kick, moved a little distance from the pack. It was just
far enough so that when the legs inevitably sank again, they found no platform on
which to be supported. Now he had to depend entirely on the lift of his air tank.
It did not give him enough to hold him at his former level; this time he sank
until his arms and shoulders were nearly under, and only his helmet stuck out. He was
helpless. Several years from now the second expedition, if any, would perhaps see the
sun glinting off his helmet and would find his body stuck like a fly in glue.
If that does happen, he thought, I will at least have been of some use; my
death will warn them of this trap. But I doubt if they'll find me. I think that Somebody
or Something will have removed me and hidden me.
Then, feeling an inrush of despair, he closed his eyes and murmured some of
the words he had read that last night in the base, though he knew them so well it did
not matter whether he had read them recently or not.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me..

Repeating that didn't lift the burden of hopelessness. He felt absolutely alone,
deserted by everybody, even by his Creator. Such was the desolation of Mars.
But when he opened his eyes, he knew he was not alone. He saw a Martian.
A hole had appeared in the wall of the tube to his left. It was a round section
about four feet across, and it had sunk in as if it were a plug being pulled inward, as
indeed it was.
A moment later a head popped out of the hole. The size of a Georgia
watermelon, it was shaped like a football and was as pink as a baby's bottom. Its two
eyes were as large as coffee cups and each was equipped with two vertical lids. It