"Eric Frank Russell - Late Night Final" - читать интересную книгу автора (Russell Eric Frank)

hum of bees, and the gentle rustle of leaves on trees. Four engine-room wranglers of
ship num-ber seventeen had found this sanctuary and sprawled flat on their backs in
the shade of a big-leafed and blossom-orna-mented growth. With eyes closed, their
hands plucked idly at surrounding grasses while they maintained a lazy, desul-tory
conversation through which they failed to hear the ring of Cruin's approaching bells.
Standing before them, his complexion florid, he roared: "Get up!"
Shooting to their feet, they stood stiffly shoulder to shoulder, faces expressionless,
eyes level, hands at their sides.
"Your names?" He wrote them in his notebook while obe-diently they repeated them
in precise, unemotional voices. "I'll deal with you later," he promised. "March!"
Together, they saluted, marched off with a rhythmic pounding of boots,
one-two-three-hup! His angry stare followed them until they reached the shadow of
their ship. Not until then did he turn and proceed. Mounting the hill, one cautious
hand continually on the cold butt of his gun, reached the crest, gazed down into the
valley he'd just left. In neat, exact positioning, the two star-formations of the ships of
Huld were silent and ominous.
His hard, authoritative eyes turned to the other side of the hill. There, the landscape
was pastoral. A wooded slope ran down to a little river which meandered into the
hazy distance, and on its farther side was a broad patchwork of culti-vated fields in
which three houses were visible.
Seating himself on a large rock, Cruin loosened his gun in its holster, took a wary
look around, extracted a small wad of reports from his pocket and glanced over
them for the twentieth time. A faint smell of herbs and resin came to his nostrils as he
read.
"I circled this landing place at low altitude and recorded it photographically, taking
care to include all the machines standing thereon. Two other machines which were in
the air went on their way without attempting to interfere. It then occurred to me that
the signals they were making from the ground might he an invitation to land, and I
decided to utilize opportunism as recommended in the manual of pro-cedure.
Therefore I landed. They conducted my scout vessel to a dispersal point off the
runway and made me welcome."
Something fluted liquidly in a nearby tree. Cruin looked up, his hand automatically
seeking his holster. It was only a bird. Skipping parts of the report, he frowned over
the con-cluding words.
.. lack of common speech made it difficult for me to refuse, and after the sixth drink
during my tour of the town I was suddenly afflicted with a strange paralysis in the
legs and collapsed into the arms of my companions. Believing that they had
poisoned me by guile, I prepared for death .. . tickled my throat while making jocular
remarks . . . I was a little sick." Cruin rubbed his chin in puzzlement. "Not until they
were satisfied about my recovery did they take me back to my vessel. They waved
their hands at me as I took off. I apologize to my captain for overdue return and
plead that it was because of factors beyond my control."
The fluter came down to Cruin's feet, piped at him plain-tively. It cocked its head
sidewise as it examined him with bright, beady eyes.
Shifting the sheet he'd been reading, he scanned the next one. It was neatly
typewritten, and signed jointly by Parth, Fane, Kalma and Hefni.
"Do not appear fully to appreciate what has occurred .. . seem to view the arrival of
a Huldian fleet as just another incident. They have a remarkable self-assurance which
is incomprehensible inasmuch as we can find nothing to justify such an attitude.
Mastery of them should be so easy that if our homing vessel does not leave too