"The Jupiter Theft" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moffitt Donald)

The tech bit her lip again. УI'd better get Dr. Ruiz,Ф she said.

УHe won't like it. He was up all night.Ф

But the duty tech already had spoken into her lapel communicator and asked the desk to wake up Farside's director.

By the time Dr. Ruiz arrived, green-smocked technicians and off-duty personnel were milling around the area. Word had spread quickly that something was going on, and curious faces peered into the glass-walled monitor booth.

Ruiz pushed through the crowd and closed the door of the booth behind him. He was a tall, gaunt man, slightly stooped, with hollow cheeks and a leathery complexion. His knobby legs showed the effects of childhood malnourishment. His eyes were bleary with lack of sleep, and he was still tucking his singlet into his baggy shorts.

УI'm sorry, Dr. Ruiz, butЧФ

He waved her apology aside. УWhat's this about the computer asking to divert the Sagan reflector?Ф

УIt's true, Doctor. It's already diverted the Polyphemus array. Now it apparently wants to try for a counterpart image at the visible wavelengths. But with optical-viewing time booked three months in advance, I thought I'd betterЧФ

УYes, yes. You did the right thing to call me.Ф The director's eyes already were roving restlessly over the winking lights and flickering data screens of the big board. УWhat have you got so far?Ф

The tech turned on her lightpad. Her handwriting and underlinings, in scratches of blue lightning on the pad's polycrystalline surface, crowded the computer-generated script she had dialed in from the board.

УWell, for one thing it doesn't pulse. It just gives off a steady X-ray emission consistent with a point source.Ф

УHmmm. How about the possibility of sinusoidal variation with a period of several hours, like Cyg X-3?Ф

She shook her head firmly. УThe computer's been tracking it long enough to have detected a curve. It's a radio source, too. We have a fix on it with Polyphemus.Ф

Ruiz raised a shaggy eyebrow. УYou diverted Polyphemus?

She stood her ground. УYes, Doctor. I'm authorized toЧФ

УDon't worry about it.Ф He laughed. УI'll deal with Dr. Shevchenko. You're doing fine so far. Go on.Ф

The junior resident butted in, trying to get himself noticed. УExcuse me, Dr. Ruiz, but the X-ray source is only a couple of seconds of arc from Cyg X-1. It confused the telescope at first. Doesn't that suggest that it's been occulted by X-1 until now?Ф

УAnd what do you say"ЧRuiz squinted at the duty tech's ident diskЧ"Mizz Maybury?Ф

The tech blushed. УIt's only twenty-eight days since the last sighting. Cyg X-1 is over ten thousand light-years away. The new source couldn't have been hiding behind it. For the apparent separation to increase that much, it would have to be moving laterally at several hundred times the speed of light.Ф

УAnd what does that suggest?Ф

Maybury gave the junior resident an apologetic glance. УThat it's the other way around. The new source may have been masked by Cyg X-l, but it's closer to the solar system.Ф

УMy thought exactly.Ф

Ruiz walked over to the observation window, an imposing and dignified figure despite his baggy shorts, his knobby joints, the legs twisted by rickets that were his legacy from his childhood in New Manhattan. He looked out at the starry sky and located the Swan. He stared at it a long time, as if he were making up his mind about something.

With a casualness that made the other two gasp, Ruiz turned back to the board and punched in an authorization for the immediate use of the 500-inch Sagan mirror in the Tsiolkovsky crater. Diverting the giant telescope from high-priority projects wasn't something you did lightly, even if you were the director of Farside Station.

Instantly, a stunning image sprang into life on the photoplastic viewplate. It was truer and richer than the images that had been possible on the obsolete photographic emulsions of the twentieth century. There was no graininess with enlargement. They were seeing, in real time, exactly what the big eye was seeing halfway across the Moon.