The Greatest SF Classics of Stanley G. Weinbaum. Stanley G. Weinbaum
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Название: The Greatest SF Classics of Stanley G. Weinbaum
Автор: Stanley G. Weinbaum
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Языкознание
isbn: 9788027247912
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Jan Orm smiled dryly. "And if she thinks otherwise?"
"Then I must convince her."
Jan shook his head in mild wonderment. "Perhaps you can," he said, with the barest hint of reluctance. "There's something dynamic about you. In some ways you're like the Immortals of Urbs."
When they reached the village Connor left Jan Orm and trudged in a deep reverie up Evanie's hill, musing on the curious revelations he had heard, analyzing his own feelings. Did he really love the bronze–haired Evanie? The query had never presented itself until Jan had put it to him, so bluntly, yet now he was certain he did. Admitting that, then—had he the right to ask her to marry a survival of the past, a revivified mummy, a sort of living fossil?
What damage might that millennium of sleep have done him? Might he not awake some morning to find the weight of his years suddenly upon him? Might he not disintegrate like a veritable mummy when its wrappings were removed? Still he had never felt stronger or healthier in his life. And was he such a freak, after all, in this world of Immortals, satyrs, and half–human swimmers?
He paused at the door of the cottage, peering within. The miraculous cook– stove hissed quietly, and Evanie was humming to herself as she stood before a mirror, brushing the shining metal of her hair. She glimpsed him instantly and whirled. He strode forward and caught her hands.
"Evanie—" he began, and paused as she jerked violently to release herself.
"Please go out!" she said.
He held her wrists firmly. "Evanie, you've got to listen to me. I love you!
"I know those aren't the right words," he stumbled on. "It's just—the best I can do."
"I don't—permit this," she murmured.
"I know you don't, but—Evanie I mean it!"
He tried to draw her closer but she stood stiffly while he slipped his arms about her. By sheer strength he tilted her head back and kissed her.
For a moment he felt her relax against him, then she had thrust him away.
"Please!" she gasped. "You can't! You don't—understand!"
"I do," he said gently.
"Then you see how impossible it is for me to—marry!"
"Any wildness in any children of ours," he said with a smile, "might as easily come of the Connor blood."
For a long moment Evanie lay passive in his arms, and then, when she struggled away, he was startled to see tears.
"Tom," she whispered, "if I say I love you will you promise me something?"
"You know I will!"
"Then, promise you'll not mention love again, nor try to kiss me, nor even touch me—for a month. After that, I'll—I'll do as you wish. Do you promise?"
"Of course, but why, Evanie? Why?"
"Because within a month," she murmured tensely, "there'll be war!"
In Time of Peace
Connor held strictly to his word with Evanie. But the change in their relationship was apparent to both of them. Evanie no longer met his gaze with frank steadiness. Her eyes would drop when they met his, and she would lose the thread of her sentences in confusion.
Yet when he turned unexpectedly, he always found her watching him with a mixture of abstractedness and speculation. And once or twice he awakened in the morning to find her gazing at him from the doorway with a tender, wistful smile.
One afternoon Jan Orm hailed him from the foot of Evanie's hill.
"I've something to show you," he called, and Connor rose from his comfortable sprawl in the shade and joined him, walking toward the factory across the village.
"I've been thinking, Jan," Connor remarked. "Frankly, I can't yet understand why you consider the Master such a despicable tyrant. I've yet to hear of any really tyrannous act of his."
"He isn't a tyrant," Jan said gloomily. "I wish he were. Then our revolution would be simple. Almost everybody would be on our side. It's evidence of his ability that he avoids any misgovernment, and keeps the greater part of the people satisfied. He's just, kind, and benevolent—on the surface!"
"What makes you think he's different underneath?"
"He retains the one secret we'd all like to possess—the secret of immortality. Isn't that evidence enough that he's supremely selfish? He and his two or three million Immortals—sole rulers of the Earth!"
"Two or three million!"
"Yes. What's the difference how many? They're still ruling half a billion people—a small percentage ruling the many. If he's so benevolent, why doesn't he grant others the privilege of immortality?"
' "That's a fair question," said Connor slowly, pondering, "Anyway, I'm on your side, Jan. You're my people now; I owe you all my allegiance." They entered the factory, "And now—what was it you brought me here to see?"
Jan's face brightened.
"Ah!" he exclaimed. "Have a look at this."
He brought forth an object from a desk drawer in his office, passing it pridefully to Connor. It was a blunt, thick–handled, blue steel revolver.
"Atom–powered," Jan glowed. "Here's the magazine." He shook a dozen little leaden balls, each the size of his little fingernail, into his palm.
"No need of a cartridge, of course," commented Connor. "Water in the handle?…I thought so. But here's one mistake. You don't want your projectiles round; you lose range and accuracy. Make 'em cylindrical and blunt–pointed." He squinted through the weapon's barrel. "And—there's no rifling."
He explained the purpose of rifling the barrel to give the bullet a rotary motion.
"I should have known enough to consult you first," Jan Orm said wryly. "Want to try it out anyway? I haven't been able to hit much with it so far."
They moved through the whirring factory. At the rear the door opened upon a slope away from the village. The ground slanted gently toward the river. Glancing about for a suitable target, Connor seized an empty can from a bench within the door and flung it as far as he could down the slope. He raised the revolver, and suddenly perceived another imperfection that had escaped his notice.
"There are no sights on it!" he ejaculated.
"Sights?" Jan was puzzled.
"To aim by." He explained the principle. "Well, let's try it as is."
He squinted down the smooth barrel, squeezed the trigger. There was a sharp report, his arm snapped back to a terrific recoil, and the can leaped spinning СКАЧАТЬ