"Robert F. Young - The Worlds of Robert F. Young" - читать интересную книгу автора (Young Robert F)

little red notebook. You could tell just by looking at him that he was a businessman, and you didn't have
to look twice to see that he was a successful one. He was wearing a neat charcoal-gray suit and a pair of
modem horn-rimmed glasses. His hair was quite dark, but his temples were sprinkled becomingly with
gray. When he noticed Henry and Janice staring at him, he smiled at them warmly and gave a little laugh.
It was an odd kind of a laugh "Ha ha ha ha," it went, then dropped abruptly way down the scale: "HO
HO HO HO! .. ."
"Incidentally," Mr. Krull was saying, "if a million dollars does come your way, you have to accept it,
you knowтАФeven though you won't get a chance to spend it. Not only that, if you get an opportunity to
win a million dollars, you've got to take advantage of it. It's all stipulated in the contract."
Janice repressed a nervous giggle. "Now who in the world would give us a million dollars!"
Mr. Krull smiled, then frowned. "Sometimes I just can't understand people at all," he said. "Why, if
I'd approached our prospective customers directly, in my capacity as Mr. Baal's representative, and had
offered each of them a brand. new TV consoleтАФor even a million dollarsтАФfor his or her soul, I'd have
been laughed right off the face of the earth! If you want to be a success today, no matter what business
you're in, you've got to provide an added inducement. Oh, good night, sir."
The tall man was leaving. At Mr. Krull's words, he paused in the doorway and turned. The final rays
of the afternoon sun gave his face a reddish cast. He bowed slightly. "Good night, Krull," he said. "Good
night, Janice and Henry." He appended to his words another measure of his unusual laughter.
"WhoтАФwho was that?" Henry asked.
"That was Mr. Baal. He's preparing a list of contestants for his new TV program."
"His TV program!"
Mr. Krull's smile was the quintessence of innocence. "Why, yes. It hasn't been announced yet, but it
will be soon. . . . It's a giveaway showтАФand quite a unique one, too. Mr. Baal has everything arranged
so that none of the contestants can possibly lose."
Janice was tugging at Henry's arm. Her face was pale. "Come on, darling. Let's go home."
But Henry hung back "WhatтАФwhat's the name of the show?" he asked.
"Make a Million," Mr. Krull said.


HOPSOIL
(TRANSLATOR'S NOTE: The following story came into my possession through certain
hitherto inaccessible channels, the nature of which I am not at liberty to divulge. It is, to the best
of my knowledge, the first Martian science-fiction story ever to reach Earth, and, while it makes
its own point, there are a number of other points that can be inferred from its pages: (1) Martians
are pretty much like us; (2) their civilization is pretty much like our own; (3) all the while Earth
science-fiction writers have been using Mars to mirror the foibles of our society, Martian
science-fiction writers have been using Earth to mirror the foibles of Martian society; (4) the
mirror business has been overdone on Mars as well as on Earth, and certain Martian
science-fiction writers have started parodying other Martian science-fiction writers; and (5) the
story itself falls into this latter category.)

The ship came down out of the abysmal immensities and settled like a dark and wingless bird on the
blue sands of Earth.
Captain Frimpf opened the door. He stepped out into the sparkling sunshine and filled his lungs with
the clean sweet air. All around him the blue sands stretched away to the hazy horizon. In the distance the
broken buildings of a long- dead city iridesced like upthrust shards of colored glass. High above him fat
little clouds played tag on the big blue playground of the sky.
His eyes misted. Earth, he thought. Earth at last!
The three enlisted men, who made up the rest of the historic crew, came out of the ship and stood
beside him. They, too, stared at the land with misted eyes.