"Murray Leinster - Time Tunnel" - читать интересную книгу автора (Leinster Murray)

lined the Rue Flamel. There was nobody on the sidewalks.
For minutes there had been no traffic going past the
small cafe. It was just cold enough so that Harrison was the
only customer at any of the outdoor tables.
Around him there were houses which had stood in their
places for centuries and thereby acquired a self-satisfied air.
From high overhead there came a rumbling, distant thunder.
A jet had made the sound, but there was no use in trying to
sight it. It had left its noise-trail far behind. It was now un-
doubtedly hidden by roofs or chimney-pots.
Then, at last, someone did come down the street. It was
an extremely improbable occurrence, not that somebody
should walk down the street, but who it happened to be. The
odds against anything that actually happens are always enor-
mous, when one considers the number of other things that
could have happened instead. But certainly the odds were
incalculably great that Pope Ybarra, who had been at Brevard
University with Harrison and had shared one course in statisti-
cal analysis with him, would not be walking down the Rue
Flamel at this particular moment, when Harrison had come
upon the preposterous and doubted his own sanity.
But there he was. He came briskly toward the cafe. Har-
rison hadn't seen him for four years. The last time had been in
Uxbridge, Pennsylvania, when Pepe was being hauled out
of the Roland River by an also-dripping policeman who was
going to arrest him within minutes, but was forced to accept
Pepe's warmly grateful handshake beforehand. Now he was
walking down the Rue Flamel on an autumn afternoon. It
was not a probable occurrence, but it was the kind of thing
that happens.
He greeted Harrison with a glad outcry.
"For the love of heaven! What are you doing here?
Where've you been? What gives? How long have you been in
Paris? Do you know any interesting girls?"
Harrison shook hands and Pepe dropped into a chair op-
posite him. He regarded Harrison with approving eyes.
"I've been here for two months," said Harrison wrily. "I
don't know any girls, and I think I'm going to try to forget
what I came for."
Pepe rapped on the table. He ordered a drink over his
shoulder. To Harrison he said warmly, "Now we have fun!
Where are you living? What are you doing? Why don't you
knotJeany girls?"
"I've been busy," said Harrison. He explained. "I've an
elderly aunt. She offered to stake me to a Ph.D. And she said
that since I lived here when I was a small boyuntil I was
twelve1 ought to try to get back my French. And I had a
crazy sort of idea that fitted into the proposal. It was some-
thing Professor Carroll said once in a lecture. Remember
him? So I came over to get back my French and dig up