"Jack Vance - Tschai 1 - City of the Chasch" - читать интересную книгу автора (Vance Jack)

"A scout isn't trained," Deale told him. "He exists: half acrobat, half mad scientist, half cat
burglar, half-"

"That's several halves too many."

"Just barely adequate. A scout is a man who likes a change."

The scouts aboard the Explorator IV were Adam Reith and Paul Waunder. Both were men of resource
and stamina; each was master of many skills; there the resemblance ended. Reith was an inch or two
over average height, dark-haired, with a broad forehead, prominent cheekbones, rather gaunt cheeks
where showed an occasional twitch of muscle. Waunder was compact, balding, blond, with features
too ordinary for description. Waunder was older by a year or two; Reith however, held senior rank,
and was in nominal command of the scout-boat: a miniature spaceship thirty feet long, carried in a
clamp under the Explorator's stern.



file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20...chai%201%20-%20City%20of%20the%20Chasch.txt (1 of 85) [12/29/2004 12:51:38 AM]
 file:///C|/2590%20Sci-Fi%20and%20Fantasy%20E-books/Jack%20Vance%20-%20Tschai%201%20-%20City%20of%20the%20Chasch.txt

In something over two minutes they were aboard the scoutboat. Waunder went to the controls; Reith
sealed the hatch, pushed the detach-button. The scout-boat eased away from the great black hull.
Reith took his seat, and as he did so a flicker of movement registered at the corner of his
vision. He glimpsed a gray projectile darting up from the direction of the planet, then his eyes
were battered by a tremendous purple-white dazzle.

There was rending and wrenching, violent acceleration as Waunder clutched convulsively upon the
throttle, and the scout-boat went careening down toward the planet.

Where the Explorator IV had ridden space now drifted a curious object: the nose and stern of a
spaceship, joined by a few shreds of metal, with a great void between, through which burnt the old
yellow sun Carina 4269. Along with crew and technicians, Commander Marin, Chief Officer Deale,
Second Officer Walgrave had become fleeting atoms of carbon, oxygen and hydrogen, their
personalities, brisk mannerisms, and jocularity now only memories.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER ONE

THE SCOUT-BOAT, STRUCK rather than propelled by the shockwave, tumbled bow over stern down toward
the gray and brown planet, with Adam Reith and Paul Waunder bumping from bulkhead to bulkhead in
the control cabin.

Reith, only half-conscious, managed to seize a stanchion. Pulling himself to the panel, he struck
down the stabilization switch. Instead of a smooth hum there was hissing and thumping;
nevertheless the wild windmilling motion gradually was damped.

Reith and Waunder dragged themselves to their seats, made themselves fast. Reith asked, "Did you