"Tom Godwin - The Cold Equations" - читать интересную книгу автора (Godwin Tom)

said.
"ButтАФ"
She looked at Prentiss in uncertainty. He went to the thick-chested man, knowing there would be
violence and welcoming it as something to help drive away the vision of Irene's pale, cold face under the
red sky.
"She asked you to get her some water," he said. "Get it."
The man looked up at him, studying him with deliberate insolence, then he got to his feet, his heavy
shoulders hunched challengingly.
"I'll have to set you straight, old timer," he said. "No one has appointed you the head cheese around
here. Now, there's the container you want filled and over there"тАФhe made a small motion with one
handтАФ"is the creek. Do you know what to do?"
"Yes," he said. "I know what to do."
He brought the butt of the rifle smashing up. It struck the man under the chin and there was a sharp
cracking sound as his jawbone snapped. For a fraction of a second there was an expression of stupefied
amazement on his face then his eyes glazed and he slumped to the ground with his broken jaw setting
askew.
"All right," he said to Mary. "Now you go ahead and name somebody else."
***
He found that the prowlers had killed seventy during the night. One hundred more had died from the
Hell Fever that often followed exposure and killed within an hour.
He went the half mile to the group that had arrived on the second cruiser as soon as he had eaten a
delayed breakfast. He saw, before he had quite reached the other group, that the Constellation's
Lieutenant Commander, Vincent Lake, was in charge of it.
Lake, a tall, hard-jawed man with pale blue eyes under pale brows, walked forth to meet him as
soon as he recognized him.
"Glad to see you're still alive," Lake greeted him. "I thought that second Gern blast got you along with
the others."
"I was visiting midship and wasn't home when it happened," he said.
He looked at Lake's group of Rejects, in their misery and uncertainty so much like his own, and
asked, "How was it last night?"
"BadтАФdamned bad," Lake said. "Prowlers and Hell Fever, and no wood for fires. Two hundred
died last night."
"I came down to see if anyone was in charge here and to tell them that we'll have to move into the
woods at onceтАФtoday. We'll have plenty of wood for the fires there, some protection from the wind,
and by combining our defenses we can stand off the prowlers better."
Lake agreed. When the brief discussion of plans was finished he asked, "How much do you know
about Ragnarok?"
"Not much," Prentiss answered. "We didn't stay to study it very long. There are no heavy metals
here, or resources of any value. We gave Ragnarok a quick survey and when the sixth man died we
marked it on the chart as uninhabitable and went on our way.
"As you probably know, that bright blue star is Ragnarok's other sun. Its position in the advance of
the yellow sun shows the season to be early spring. When summer comes Ragnarok will swing between
the two suns and the heat will be something no human has ever endured. Nor the cold, when winter
comes.
"I know of no edible plants, although there might be some. There are a few species of rodent-like
animalsтАФthey're scavengersтАФand a herbivore we called the woods goat. The prowlers are the dominant
form of life on Ragnarok and I suspect their intelligence is a good deal higher than we would like it to be.
There will be a constant battle for survival with them.
"There's another animal, not as intelligent as the prowlers but just as dangerousтАФthe unicorn. The
unicorns are big and fast and they travel in herds. I haven't seen any here so farтАФI hope we don't. At the