"Will McCarthy - Bloom" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCarty Sarah)

be within six meters of a mini-lad or other major heat source to function. Note the gene sequences,
please. This may duplicate some of the information you've already got, but I wanted to impress upon you
the potential significance of this finding."

"Finding?" I paused, blinked. "Doctor, I'm afraid we're speaking different languages. Why, exactly, am I
here?"

Lottick seemed surprised at that, looking up, his brow furrowing. "You didn't get the information packet,"
he said. Not a question.

"I don't think so, no. I got a message with a meeting date and time, that's all."

He was out of his chair, grumbling. "My apologies, Mr. Strasheim. In their current task loading my staff
may haveтАж overlooked it. There was no intention of wasting your time."

"You people have a lot on your minds," I said, diplomatically. In fact, my trip here had been rather a
welcome break from the factory, and if I had to linger a little longer than expected, well, that was more
job time I could justify missing.

"I have a few things to attend to," Lottick said, ignoring my attempt at mollification. He gestured at the
sliding glass door behind his desk. "If you'd like to wait out on the balcony, I'll come join you in a few
minutes. Right now there's an ear that needs twisting before it goes off shift. Several ears, actually."

"Oh," I said, rising, "sure. By all means." I wanted to get involved in that about as much as I wanted to go
back to work at the factory, which was not very much. But Lottick's balcony would afford fresher air, a
view of the city, a rare moment of quiet. "Take as long as you need; it's really no trouble."

Cursing softly, he brushed past me, went out the door. Behind his desk, the sliding glass door did indeed
appear to have a balcony behind it. I moved to it, touched the handle. It slid open, powered but silent,
looking heavy. Glass? It was zirconium, of courseтАФmuch stronger and heavier and, in these ladderdown
days, just as free for the taking. But in language, as in life, the old habits linger.

Lottick's office was on the top floor of the tallest building in Ansharton, ten stories high and right up
against the side of the cavern, so that essentially every part of the city was visible, a pool of tiny,
picturesque houses and factories spilling out across the broad cavern floor. A magnificent view, but it
probably owed as much to logic as to politics. Even here there were blooms, probably a few small ones
every week, and Research certainly needed to keep an eye out. Vaclav Lottick was no prince, no
president, no corporate bureaucrat from times gone by, but simply a harried worker like everyone else,
the contents of his head and the work of his hands outvaluing all the golden streets of Ganymede.

He even had a small telescope mounted on the railing, pointing down at the city. I peered through it, saw
only a street corner, not particularly busy. Whisper-quiet, the zirconium door slid closed behind me.

There were no chairs out here, no furniture of any sort; the balcony was really only large enough for
standing, large enough for maybe four or five people at the very most. I put my elbows on the railing,
leaned out. I'd long ago lost my fear of heights; we cling to architectural styles meant for ten times the
gravity we actually experience, deep in the mantles of the Jovian moons. In fact, there was no height from
which I could fall that was likely to injure me, except possibly the cavern roof itself.

But neither was I going to jumpтАФfor some reason, we don't do that, either. So I simply waited, looking