"Whats It Like Out There by Edmond Hamilton" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hamilton Edmond)

I said, yes, I guessed it would.
I was sweating blood, waiting for him to start asking
about Walter, and I didn't know yet just what I could tell
him. I could get myself in Dutch plenty if I opened my big
mouth too wide, for that one thing that had happened to
Expedition Two was supposed to be strictly secret, and
we'd all been briefed on why we had to keep our mouths
shut.
But he let it go for the time being, and just talked other
stuff. I gathered that his wife wasn't too well, and that Wal-
ter had been their only child. I also gathered that he was
a very big shot in business, and dough-heavy.
I didn't like him, Walter I'd liked plenty, but his old
man seemed a pretty pompous person, with his heavy busi-
ness talk.
He wanted to know how soon I thought Martian ura-
nium would come through in quantity, and I said I didn't
think it'd be very soon.
"Expedition One only located the deposits," I said, "and
Two just did mapping and setting up a preliminary base. Of
course, the thing keeps ex~nding, and I hear Four will have
a hundred rockets. But Mars is a tough setup."
Mr. Millis said decisively that I was wrong, that the world
was power-hungry, that it would be pushed a lot faster than
I expected.
He suddenly quit talking business and looked at me and
asked, "Who was Walter's best friend out there?"
He asked it sort of apologetically. He was a stuffed shirt;
but all my dislike of him went away then.
"Breck Jergen," I told him. "Breck was our sergeant. He
sort of held our squad together, and he and Walter cottoned
to each other from the first."
Mr. Millis nodded, but didn't say anything more about it.
He pointed out the window at the distant lake and said we
were almost to his home.
It wasn't a home, it was a big mansion. We went in and
he introduced me to Mrs. Millis. She was a limp, pale-
looking woman, who said she was glad to meet one of
Walter's friends. Somehow I got the feeling that even
though he was a stuffed shirt, he felt it about Walter a lot
more than she did.
He took me up to a bedroom and said that Brock's parents
would arrive before dinner, and that I could get a little rest
before then.
I sat looking around the room. It was the plushiest one
I'd ever been in, and, seeing this house and the way these
people lived, I began to understand why Walter had blown
his top more than the rest of us.
He'd been a good guy, Walter, but high-tempered, and I
could see now he'd been a little spoiled. The discipline at