"George Zebrowski - The Star Web" - читать интересную книгу автора (Zebrowski George)

and discoveryтАж

He walked up to the tractor cab, threw back the hood of his parka and climbed inside where Malachi
Moede was listening to the radio wail of whatever was embedded in the ice.

"Why aren't you helping outside, Mai?"

The black Kenyan smiled at him, showing teeth like milk in an inkwell. "Magnus doesn't trust anyone with
his gear except Lena, claims she's more careful, the old chauvinist bounder."

The radio sound silenced them for a moment. It reminded Juan of a perfectly formed carrier signal, an
alarm repeating endlessly, devoid of all except prearranged information.

"Why did they send you?" Malachi asked. "And why me? Why duplicate abilities? What does Summet
know that he hasn't told us?"

"Somebody got Titus all worked up about the importance of this thingтАФprobably a militaryтАФenough for
him to send out two hounds. Makes him feel better. But you and I are different, we know a lot of other
things too."

Through the forward windshield they could see Magnus Rassmussen and Lena Dravic pulling the small
radar sled across the ice. The sled gained speed but they stopped it at a previously set thousand yard red
flag marker.

"There are only a few explanations about this," Juan said, "and I can throw most of them away."

Malachi sighed. "Back at Oxford during my childhood there was a feeling that the universe had all been
collected, by Queen Victoria actually, and we were not to show surprise at anything startlingтАФas if we
could look it up for ourselves in the place where they store extraordinary things. I wonder what the
increase in knowledge has done to them. Ignorance is probably good manners now." He paused. "Tell
me what you think is going on here."

Juan shrugged. "You guess first."

"After youтАФyou're ready with at least one or two thoughts, maybe they'll suggest something to me."

"Okay, one it's something natural we've never encountered before. Two, it's something belonging to a
UN member. Three, it's extraterrestrial. Four, it's from the past."

"That's it?"

"All I've got, Mai."

Rassmussen and Lena Dravic looked like lumpy bears coming back across the ice. Juan stared at them
as he listened to Malachi's answer.

"Your first idea reminds me of the flap thirty years ago about signals from intelligent life out in the galaxy,
and that turned out to be a rotating neutron starтАФa pulsarтАФemitting signals like a lighthouse. Completely
natural but it seemed very intentional at the timeтАФbut that was the only time. I don't think this belongs to
a UN member, or anybody elseтАФ"