"Jeff Hecht - The Crystal Highway" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hecht Jeff)

through the best coatings we can find. We can only stay a few hours each
trip."
"Why do people live there?" he asked, hoping to hear of the beauty that
had inspired Vaxila.
"To mine crystal," she replied. "Old Man Lambrecht found it seventy
years ago, and set up the base. Fifty years ago crystal jewelry became a fad
for rich people who wanted to glitter with a new color. Grandfather Lambrecht
had two hundred people down there once, and sold a lot of jewel-crystal. Now
only six people are left, and they hardly sell anything."
Axel quoted Vaxila's poems, and the sisters found something else they
needed to do. He went to the tiny room set aside for the odd passenger, and
wrote in the diary he had promised Hannah he would keep.
****
When they reached the surface, two thick plastic tubes reached out from
the station through the murky air. A short one clamped against the ship's
cargo hold, and heavy robots began wheeling out boxes. A longer, thinner tube
bent up to the passenger airlock, making a path for Axel. He walked carefully
through the tube to another airlock, which let him into a tiny room in a small
tower. The walls and floor were gray; the only light came from a fixture
overhead.
 A pair of sliding doors faced Axel, marked with fine print in the 23
Standard Languages. He carried his luggage the five paces across the room and
read: "Welcome to Lambrecht Station. This automatic elevator is programmed to
deliver you to the Primary Room, at ground level, and to alert base personnel
to your arrival." He pushed the button.
****
"So you're the tourist," began the large man who greeted the elevator.
He wore a thick, bushy gray beard and was so tall that Axel had to look up to
him. "I'm Klaus Lambrecht, stationmaster."
"You got my message, didn't you?" Axel asked nervously. "I'm Professor
Cormier, and I sent word ahead that I was coming. I never got any response,
but the time came, so I had to..."
"I got the message, but I didn't know what to say," the stationmaster
shrugged. "I'm sorry." He took one of Axel's bags, and led Axel to his office.
He motioned Axel to sit in a well-worn armchair. "What brings you across the
light-years to this desolate place?"
"I'm a scholar," Axel said.
"You're not a geologist, are you? The last one was really
disappointed."
"No, I study poetry."
"Really?" Lambrecht asked. "I didn't know anybody still did that."
Trying to hide his hurt, Axel tried to explain the beauty of Vaxila's
poems. He didn't think he succeeded very well.
"Beauty," mused Lambrecht. "A lot of people called the crystal
beautiful, 50 years ago when crystal jewels were high fashion. But my
grandfather told me back then that there were too many other pretty rocks in
the galaxy for the fad to last. He was right, you know," he sighed.
"I saw a crystal on old Earth. It is beautiful," Axel said, remembering
how carefully Hannah had held the cube she had taken from an air-tight box on
her black metal optical table.