"Stanley G. Weinbaum - Flight on Titan" - читать интересную книгу автора (Weinbaum Stanley G)

 She laughed. "There are things I'd rather have, Tim."
A pounding sounded above the windy bellowing. They knew what it meant; Tim rose and peered
through the reenforccd window into the brilliant night, and, after a moment of blinking, made out the
four-foot-long body of a native sprawled before his door, his coned claws hooked into the ice. On Titan,
of course, no creature stood erect against those perpetual howling blasts, no creature, that is, save man, a
recent arrival from a gentler world.
Tim opened the door, slipping it wider notch by notch on its retaining chain, since muscular power
would have been inadequate to hold it. The wind bellowed gleefully in, sweeping the hanging utensils on
the walls into a clanging chorus, spinning a loose garment into a mad dance, chilling the air to bitterness.
The native slithered through like a walrus, his streamlined body seallike and glistening with its
two-inch protective layer of blubbery flesh. As Tim cranked the door shut, the creature raised the filmy
underlids from its eyes, and they showed large, luminous, and doglike.
This was a Titanian native, not much more intelligent than a St. Bernard dog, perhaps, but peacable
and inoffensive, beautifully adapted to its forbidding environment, and the highest form of life yet known
on Titan.
He reached into the pouch opening on his rubbery back. "Uh!" he said, displaying a white ovoid. As
the comparatively warm air of the room struck it, the flame-orchid began to glow in exquisite colors.
Diane took it; against her palms the tints changed more quickly, deepened gloriously. It was a small
one, no larger than a robin's egg, but perfect except where it had been attached to some frigid rock.
"Oh!" she exclaimed. "What a beauty, Tim!"
He grinned. "That's no way to bargain."
He pulled out the black case that contained their trade goods, opening it to display the little mirrors,
knives, beads, matches, and nondescript trinkets.
The coal-black eyes of the native glittered avidly; he glanced from one article to the next in an agony
of longing indecision. He touched them with his clawed, three-fingered hands; he cooed huskily. His eyes
wandered over the room.
"Huss!" he said abruptly, pointing. Diane burst into a sudden laugh. He was indicating an old and
battered eight-day clock, quite useless to the pair since it lacked the adjustment to permit them to keep
other than Earth time. The ticking must have attracted him.
"Oh, no!" She chuckled. "It's no good to you. Here!" She indicated a box of trinkets.
"Ugha! Huss!" The native was insistent.
"Here, then!"
She passed him the clock; he held it close to his skin-shielded ears and listened. He cooed.
Impulsively, Diane picked a pocketknife from the box. "Here,тАЭ she said, "I won't cheat you. Take
this, too."
The native gurgled. He pried open the glittering blade with his hooked claws, closed it and slipped it
carefully into his back pouch, stuffing the clock after it. The pouch stood out like a miniature hump as he
turned and scuttled toward the door.
"Uh!" he said.
Tim led him out, watching through the window as he slipped across the slope, his blunt nose pointed
into the wind as he moved sideways.
Tim faced Diane. "Extravagance!" He grinned.
"Oh, a fifty-cent knife for this!" She fondled the gem.
"Fifty cents back home," he reminded her. "Just remember what we paid for freight, and you'll see
what I mean. Why, look at Nivia; they mine gold there, pure, virgin gold right out of the rocks, and by the
time the cost of shipping it back to Earth is deducted, and the insurance, it barely paysтАФjust barely."
"Cold?"
"Yes. That's simple to understand. You know how little freight a rocket can carry when it has to be
fueled and provisioned for a flight from the Earth to Titan, or vice versa. A mere jaunt of seven hundred
and eighty million miles and plenty of chance for trouble on the way. I think the insurance on gold is thirty