"Henry Kuttner - The Time Axis" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kuttner Henry)

Face. That whole planet is nekronic matter except for the City itself.

"You didn't sense that from your first experience with the Record? No? You will. The people in the
City can't save themselves by direct action on the world around them. They appeal to us. We can
save them. I don't yet know how. But they know or they wouldn't have appealed in just the way they
did."

"Wait a minute," I said. "Let me get this straight. You're asking me to accept a lot, you know.
The only premise I've got to believe in is theтАФthe Record. But what do you want from me,
personally? How do I come into it? Why me?"

De Kalb shifted in his chair, sighed heavily, opened his fingers and peered at the orange he held
as if he had never seen it before. He grimaced.

"Sir, you're right. I accept the rebuke. Let me give you facts. Item, the Record. It is, in
effect, a book. But not a book made by human minds. And it must, as you know, be experienced, not
read. Each time you open the box you will get the same flash of complete vision, and each time you
will forget a little less as your mind is conditioned. But there will always be facets of that
tremendous story which

will elude us, I think. Our minds can never wholly grasp what lies inside that box....

"It was found in Crete. It had lain there perhaps three thousand years, perhaps five thousandтАФI
think, myself, a million. It came into my hands half by accident. I could not open it. Off and on
I tried. That is my habit. I used X-rays to look through the substance of the box. Of course I saw

nothing.

"I detected radioactivity, and I tested it with certain of the radio-elements. I exposed it to
supersonics. IтАФwell, I tried many things. Something worked. Something clicked the safety, so that
one day it opened. You seeтАФ" He looked at me gravely. "You see, it was time."

"Time?"

"That box was made with a purpose, obviously. It was sent to us, with a message. I say to us but



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the aim was less direct. It was sent through time, Mr. CortlandтАФthrough time itselfтАФand the
address said simply, To be opened only by a skilled technological civilization.' "

"All right," I said. "Suppose it came through time. Suppose it's an appeal for help. I didn't get
that, but I'm willing to believe I might if I opened the box often enough. But why do you assume
this is a living issue, here and now? You imply the fate of the City depends on us. If that box is
as old as you say, isn't it more likely the City of the Face existed somewhere in the prehistoric
past?