"Secret Place, The by Richard McKenna" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nebula Award Stories 2)

frustrated desperation, Dr. Lewis decided to make the project
a model textbook exercise in mapping the number and thick-
ness of the basalt beds over the search area all the way down
to the prevolcanic Miocene surface. That would at least be a
useful addition to Columbia Plateau lithology. It would also
be proof positive that no uranium ore existed there, so it was
not really cheating.
That Oregon countryside was a dreary place. The search
area was flat, featureless country with black lava outcropping
everywhere through scanty gray soil in which sagebrush grew
hardly knee high. It was hot and dry in summer and dismal
with thin snow in winter. Winds howled across it at all
seasons. Barker was about a hundred wooden houses on dusty
streets, and some hay farms along a canal. All the young
people were away at war or war jobs, and the old people
seemed to resent us. There were twenty of us, apart from the
contract drill crews who lived in their own trailer camps, and
we were gown against town, in a way We slept and ate at
Colthorpe House, a block down the street from our head-
quarters. We had our own "gown" table there, and we might
as veil have been men from Mars.
I enjoyed it, just the same. Dr. Lewis treated us like
stvdents, with lectures and quizzes an~ fr-i"ned reading. He
was a fine teacher and a brilliant scientist, and we loved him.
He gave us all a turn at each phase of the work. I started on
surface mapping and then worked with the drill crews, who
were taking cores through the basalt and into the granite
thousands of feet beneath. Then I worked on taking gravimet-
ric and seismic readings. We had fine team spirit and we all
knew we were getting priceless training in field geophysics. I
decided privately that after the war I would take my doctorate
in geophysics. Under Dr. Lewis, of course.
In early summer of 1944 th'e field phase ended. The
contract drillers left. We packed tons of well logs and many
boxes of gravimetric data sheets and seismic tapes for a move
to Dr. Lewis's Midwestern university. There we would get
more months of valuable training while we worked our data
into a set of structure contour maps. We were all excited and
talked a lot about being with girls again and going to parties.
Then the army said part of the staff had to continue the field
search. For technical compliance, Dr. Lewis decided to leave
one man, and he chose me.
It hit me hard. It was like being flunked out unfairly. I
thought he was heartlessly brusque about it.
"Take a jeep run through the area with a Geiger once a
day," he said. "Then sit in the office and answer the phone."
"What if the army calls when I'm away?" I asked sullenly.
"Hire a secretary," he said. "You've an allowance for that."
So off they went and left me, with the title of field chief
and only myself to boss. I felt betrayed to the hostile town. I