"William Tenn - The Flat-Eyed Monster" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tenn William)

an oversized dandelion, to a mass of equipment overhead, "but I'm not. I don't like this business one little
bit."
"Me friendly and intelligent entiтАФ" Manship began. He sneezed again. "Damn this wet air," he
muttered morosely.
"What was that?" Glomg demanded.
"Nothing very important, Councilor," Srin assured him. "The creature did it be-fore. It is evidently a
low-order biological reaction that takes place periodically, pos-sibly a primitive method of imbibing
glrnk. Not by any stretch of the imagination a means of communication, however."
"I wasn't thinking of communication," Glomg observed testily. "I thought it might be a prelude to
aggressive action."
The professor skimmed back to the table, carrying a skein of luminescent wires. "Hardly. What
could a creature of this sort be aggressive with? I'm afraid you're let-ting your mistrust of the unknown
run away with you, Councilor Glomg."
Manship had crossed his arms across his chest and subsided into a helpless si-lence. There was
evidently no way to make himself understood outside of telepathy. And how do you start transmitting
telepathically for the first time? What do you use?
If only his doctoral thesis had been in biology or physiology, he thought wistfully, instead of The Use
of the Second Aorist in the First Three Books of the Iliad. Oh, well. He was a long way from home.
Might as well try.
He closed his eyes, having first ascertained that Professor Lirld did not intend to approach his
person with the new piece of equipment. He wrinkled his forehead and leaned forward with an effort of
extreme concentration.
Testing, he thought as hard as he could, testing, testing. One, two, three, fourтАФtest-ing, testing. Can
you hear me?
"I just don't like it," Glomg announced again. "I don't like what we're doing here. Call it a
presentiment, call it what you will, but I feel we are tampering with the infiniteтАФand we shouldn't."
I'm testing, Manship ideated frantically. Mary had a little lamb. Testing, testing. I'm the alien creature
and I'm trying to communicate with you. Come in, please.
"Now, Councilor," Lirld protested irritably. "Let's have none of that. This is a scientific experiment."
"That's all very well. But I believe there are mysteries that flefnobe was never meant to examine.
Monsters as awful-looking as thisтАФno slime on the skin, only two eyes and both of them flat, unable or
unwilling to pmbff, an almost complete absence of tentaclesтАФa creature of this sort should have been left
undisturbed on its own hell-ish planet. There are limits to science, my learned friendтАФor there should be.
One should not seek to know the unknowable!"
 Cant you hear me? Manship begged. Alien entity to Srin, Lirld and Glomg: This is an attempt at a
telepathic connection. Come in, please, someone. Anyone. He considered for a moment, then added:
Roger. Over.
"I don't recognize such limitations, Councilor. My curiosity is as vast as the uni-verse."
"That may be," Glomg rejoined portentously. "But there are more things in Tiz and Tetzbah,
Professor Lirld, than are dreamed of in your philosophy."
"My philosophyтАФ" Lirld began, and broke off to announceтАФ"Here's your son. Why don't you ask
him? Without the benefit of half a dozen scientific investigations that people like you have wanted to call
off time after time, none of his heroic achieve-ments in interplanetary discovery would be possible."
Thoroughly defeated, but still curious, Manship opened his eyes in time to see an extremely narrow
black suitcase swarm up to the tabletop in a spaghetti-cluster of tentacles.
"What isтАФthat?" the newcomer inquired, curling a bunch of supercilious eye-stalks over Manship's
head. "It looks like a yurd with a bad case of hipplestatch." He considered for a moment, then added,
"Galloping hipplestatch."
"It's a creature from astronomical unit 649-301-3 that I've just succeeded in teleporting to our
planet," Lirld told him proudly. "Mind you, Rabd, without a trans-mitting outfit on the other end! I admit I