"Michael Swanwick - Bones of the Earth" - читать интересную книгу автора (Swanwick Michael)

tugged at the knees as he sat, to protect the cloth. He had a heavy, inexpressive face. "Why is that?"
"Well, to begin with, the Smithsonian gave me my current position while I was still finishing up my
doctorate. That's one hell of an honor, and I'd look pretty damn ungrateful to move on after less than three
years service. I realize you're offering more money--"
"I haven't mentioned salary yet."
"The Smithsonian is acutely aware of what an honor it is to work for them," Leyster said dryly. "One
of our technicians moonlights selling beer at Orioles games. Guess which job pays him more?"
"There are other inducements besides money."
"Which is precisely why you're wasting your time. I was on a dig this summer in Wyoming where we
uncovered a trackway that's just... well, it's the sort of find that comes along once in a lifetime -- if you're
lucky. Whatever you're offering couldn't possibly be worth my walking away from it."
For a long moment, Griffin said nothing. Swiveling in his chair, he stared out the window. Following
his gaze, Leyster saw only the dark sky, the slick orange tiles on the rooftops opposite, the taxis throwing
up gray rooster tails behind themselves on Constitution Avenue, the wet leaves clinging to the glass.
Then, turning back, Griffin asked, "Could I see?"
"Do you really want to?" Leyster was surprised. Griffin didn't seem the sort to be interested in original
research. A bureaucrat, an arranger, an organizer, yes. A politician, possibly. But never a scientist. Griffin
hadn't even arranged for this meeting as a scientist would, with the name of a mutual colleague and his
professional affiliation held high, but through the administrative apparatus of the Museum. Some
apparatchik, he couldn't even remember who, had called and said that somebody had applied pressure to
somebody else up the line, and, figuring it was easier to take the meeting than hear out the explanation,
he'd said he'd do it.
"I wouldn't ask if I didn't."
With a mental shrug, Leyster booted up first his computer and then the trackway program, routing the
image to a high-density monitor hung on the wall. The image was as detailed as modern technology could
make it. He had provided multiple photographs of each track and Ralph Chapman, down the hall, had
come up with a 3-D merge-and-justify routine for them. The program began at the far end of the
trackway.
"What do you see?" he asked.
"Footprints," Griffin said, "in mud."
"So they were, once. Which is what makes them so exciting. When you dig up fossil bones, that's the
record of a dead animal. But here, this -- this was made by living animals. They were alive and breathing
the day they made these, and for one of them it was a very significant day indeed. Let me walk you
through it."
He held one hand on the trackball, so he could scroll through the program as he talked. "One hundred
forty million years ago, an Apatosaurus -- what used to known as Brontosaurus, before the taxon was
reattributed -- is out for a stroll along the shores of a shallow lake. See how steady the apatosaur's prints
are, how placidly it ambles along. It is not yet aware that it's being hunted."


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 Michael Swanwick - Bones of the Earth

Griffin gravely folded his hands as Leyster scrolled down the trackway. They were enormous hands,
even for a man of his bulk, and strangely expressive.
"Now look at these smaller sets of prints here and here, coming out of the forest and following along
to either side of the apatosaur's prints. These belong to a hunting pair of Allosaurus fragilis. Killer
dinosaurs twelve meters long, with enormous sharp claws on their hands and feet, and teeth as large as
daggers but with a serrated edge. They move more swiftly than their prey, but they're not running yet --
they're stalking. Notice how they've already positioned themselves so they can come up on it from either