"Robert Reed - Treasure Buried" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reed Robert)

and Wallace looked up at Meiter, coming out of his daydream and asking, тАЬWhat are
you talking about?тАЭ

тАЬThe hand! ItтАЩs here!тАЭ

The yeti hand, sure. Wallace remembered hearing the minors, antiaircraft
missiles exchanged for a dismembered chunk of fossil tissue. Meiter took him to the
freezer, letting him peer in through the frost. тАЬSee? Mangled but whole. And old.
Maybe thirty thousand years old, we think. Some kind of anaerobic circumstances
preserved it. Peat moss. A deep cave. Something. Whatever it was, thereтАЩs virtually
no decay. WeтАЩre already running the first maps. Fossils donтАЩt give whole cells, but
the handтАЩs never read the textbooks. WeтАЩve got nice fat whole ones. No need to
jigsaw things together, it looks that good!тАЭ

тАЬIt looks human,тАЭ Wallace mentioned. тАЬDoesnтАЩt it?тАЭ

That disturbed Meiter. тАЬOh, I donтАЩt agree.тАЭ Then he asked, тАЬHow would you
know, anyway? It could be an apish hand just as well тАФтАЭ
 тАЬMaybe so.тАЭ

тАЬAnd the good part, the best part, is that itтАЩs female. The skullcapтАЩs male, and
here weтАЩve got a lady. TheyтАЩre separated by three hundred centuries, which assures
genetic diversity. MekalтАЩs saying that the big kids upstairs are thinking about making
a splash, playing up our charity in bringing yetis back. TheyтАЩre even talking about
buying up part of Nepal, making a preserve, planting new forests and using human
volunteers to carry the little critters part-term. Neat, huh? You bet it is!тАЭ

Wallace looked at the ugly bunch of bone and brutalized meat, knowing it was
human. Chromosome numbers were the same between humans and half-humans; he
didnтАЩt fault Meiter. But what was, was. What any person believed never changed
what was real and true. That was the first lesson that he carried into work every day
тАФ the towering impotence of his hard-held opinions тАФ which helped him think and
rethink, always seeing the old as new.

Later Meiter came with the sorry news. тАЬA human hand,тАЭ he said bravely, тАЬbut
itтАЩs not all lost. ItтАЩs got some primitive genetics, which means the academics will be
curious. Human evolution and all that stuff.тАЭ

Wallace had a thought.

He asked, тАЬAre you going to keep mapping? Because IтАЩm not sure anyoneтАЩs
ever done a total map of such an old, high-quality fossil.тАЭ

тАЬAnd tie up the machinery? Take lab-tech time?тАЭ

He couldnтАЩt have given any reason; Wallace had only a feeling, distinct but
imprecise, that something useful might come out of it.

тАЬListen,тАЭ he said. тАЬwhy donтАЩt you keep people at it? If you need, IтАЩll get
MekalтАЩs signature. Okay?тАЭ