"A. E. Van Vogt - The Rat & the Snake & Other Stories" - читать интересную книгу автора (Van Vogt A E)

tion. It was Yoal who finally replied.
"Yes. Desolation. Death. Ruin. Have you any ideas as to
what happened?"
The man came back and stood in front of the energy
screen that guarded the Ganae. "May I look over the mu-
seum? I have to estimate what age I am in. We had certain
possibilities of destruction when I was last alive, but which
one was realized depends on the time elapsed."
The councillors looked at Captain Gorsid, who hesitated;
then, "Watch him," he said to the guard with the ray gun. He
faced the man. "We understand your aspirations fully. You
would like to seize control of this situation and ensure your
own safety. Let me reassure you. Make no false moves,
and all will be well."
Whether or not the man believed the lie, he gave no sign.
Nor did he show by a glance or a movement that he had seen
the scarred floor where the ray gun had burned his two
predecessors into nothingness. He walked curiously to the
nearest doorway, studied the other guard who waited there
for him, and then, gingerly, stepped through. The first guard
followed him, then came the mobile energy screen, and finally,
~ trailing one another, the councillors.
Enash was the third to pass through the doorway. The
_room contained skeletons and plastic models of animals. The
room beyond that was what, for want of a better term, Enash
called a culture room. It contained the artifacts from a single
period of civilization. It looked very advanced. He had ex-
amined some of the machines when they first passed through
,it,, and had thought: Atomic energy. He was not alone in his
recognition. From behind him. Captain Gorsid said to the
man:
"You are forbidden to touch anything. A false move will be
the signal for the guards to fire."
The man stood at ease in the centre of the room. In spite
of a curious anxiety, Enash had to admire his calmness. He
must have known what his fate would be, but he stood there
thoughtfully, and said finally, deliberately, "I do not need to
go any farther. Perhaps you will be able to judge better than I
of the time that has elapsed since I was born and these ma-
chines were built. I see over there an instrument which, ac-
cording to the sign above it, counts atoms when they explode.
As soon as the proper number have exploded it shuts off the
power automatically, and for just the right length of time to
prevent a chain explosion. In my time we had a thousand
crude devices for limiting the size of an atomic reaction, but
it required two thousand years to develop those devices from
the early beginnings of atomic energy. Can you make a com-
parison?"
The councillors glanced at Veed. The engineering officer
hesitated. At last, reluctantly, he said, "Nine thousand years