"Edmond Hamilton - Calling Captain Future" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hamilton Edmond)

"Doctor Zarro calling the Solar System peoples," he A buzzer sounded from atop the televisor set.
rasped in a deep, harsh voice. "People of the nine "General Government Call!" exclaimed Sparks, his
worlds, I bring you warning of a dreadful peril тАУ a peril youthful face stiffening. He reached and touched a stud.
which your bungling, stupid scientists have not yet An official of the System Government appeared in
even discovered. the televisor. He spoke with decisive firmness.
"A huge dark star is rushing upon our Solar System "This is to inform the System peoples that the so-
from the boundless abyss of outer space! This colossal called Doctor Zarro who broadcast a warning tonight is
dead sun is coming from the direction of the constella- merely a cheap faker trying to scare the System," said
tion Sagittarius тАУ its exact position is Right Ascension, the official. "His assertions are not true. Astronomers
seventeen hours, forty-one minutes, Declination, minus have quickly checked the position in space he gave, and
twenty-seven degrees, forty-eight minutes. It is coming found nothing. The dark star does not exist!"
straight toward us and will reach our System in several "What did I tell you?" scoffed the first mate as the
weeks, at its present speed. This on-coming monster System official switched off. "Just a crazy fake, that's
will wreck our System тАУ unless it is turned aside." all."
"Maybe," muttered the operator. "But that man did-

D OCTOR ZARRO'S rasping voice deepened into a n't look like a faker. He looked queer, powerful тАУ super-
reverberating thunder. human!"
"I can tum aside that oncoming dark star, if I am giv- "Rats тАУ he's just a crank alarmist," repeated the
en power to do so in time!" he shouted. "I alone! I am stocky mate. "The Planet Police will soon hunt him
master of forces unknown to your ignorant scientists, down."
for I am not really a native of this System at all. Who I

B
am or what I am does not matter in this emergency. UT the Planet Police did not hunt Doctor Zarro
"I am going to form a legion of men who believe in down. Two weeks later the Mercurian newscaster
me and will help me avert this peril тАУ a Legion of was announcing:
Doom! But to prepare the forces that can turn aside the "тАУ and so the Planet Police have been completely
onrushing menace, I must have complete authority over unable to find the mysterious Doctor Zarro who made

1
 Edmond Hamilton тАУ CALLING CAPTAIN FUTURE

that broadcast, for his wave was of a strange new type shop. A Government announcer was on.
whose source could not be located or analyzed. "People of the System, our scientists have now lo-
"Karthak, Saturn: A disastrous atomic explosion in cated a dark body of some kind in Sagittarius," admit-
this colony today took toll ofтАУ" ted the official; "But there is no danger from it! As far
The crowd of chromium-miners and engineers in as the scientists have ascertained, it has almost no mass.
this little drinking-shop in one of the Twilight Cities of So there's nothing to fear."
Mercury paid no further attention to the news bulletins. "See?" exclaimed the bald Earthman miner tri-
One of them, a big, bald Earthman miner, had started umphantly. "I told you it was all nonsense."
arguing with a little Mercurian engineer. But the others looked worried. One of them, the
"I tell you, I heard that broadcast," the Mercurian in- younger Mercurian, voiced what all were thinking.
sisted, "and that Doctor Zarro wasn't any Earthman! He "The scientists said at first there was no dark star at
looked тАУ" all! Now they admit that Doctor Zarro was right, that
"Look тАУ there he is now!" yelled one of the crowd, there is a dark star. They claim it lacks sufficient mass
pointing at the televisor. to harm us, even though it's big. Suppose the scientists
They stared stupefiedly. The newscaster had been are wrong again? Suppose Doctor Zarro's warning is
crowded off the ether, and the tall, gaunt, burning-eyed right?"
image of Doctor Zarro had appeared in the screen. They looked at each other in wild surmise.