H. G. WELLS: The Greatest Sci-Fi Collection - 15 Books in One Edition. Герберт Уэллс

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СКАЧАТЬ leaf-denuded branches shone the flames of his burning house.

      I entered the copse, dashing from one tree to another and clinging to them, and for a space I sought him in vain. Then amidst a heap of smashed branches and fencing that had banked itself against a portion of his garden wall I perceived something stir. I made a run for this, but before I reached it a brown object separated itself, rose on two muddy legs, and protruded two drooping, bleeding hands. Some tattered ends of garment fluttered out from its middle portion and streamed before the wind.

      For a moment I did not recognise this earthy lump, and then I saw that it was Cavor, caked in the mud in which he had rolled. He leant forward against the wind, rubbing the dirt from his eyes and mouth.

      He extended a muddy lump of hand, and staggered a pace towards me. His face worked with emotion, little lumps of mud kept falling from it. He looked as damaged and pitiful as any living creature I have ever seen, and his remark therefore amazed me exceedingly.

      “Gratulate me,” he gasped; “gratulate me!”

      “Congratulate you!” said I. “Good heavens! What for?”

      “I’ve done it.”

      “You have. What on earth caused that explosion?”

      A gust of wind blew his words away. I understood him to say that it wasn’t an explosion at all. The wind hurled me into collision with him, and we stood clinging to one another.

      “Try and get back — to my bungalow,” I bawled in his ear. He did not hear me, and shouted something about “three martyrs — science,” and also something about “not much good.” At the time he laboured under the impression that his three attendants had perished in the whirlwind. Happily this was incorrect. Directly he had left for my bungalow they had gone off to the publichouse in Lympne to discuss the question of the furnaces over some trivial refreshment.

      I repeated my suggestion of getting back to my bungalow, and this time he understood. We clung arm-in-arm and started, and managed at last to reach the shelter of as much roof as was left to me. For a space we sat in armchairs and panted. All the windows were broken, and the lighter articles of furniture were in great disorder, but no irrevocable damage was done. Happily the kitchen door had stood the pressure upon it, so that all my crockery and cooking materials had survived. The oil stove was still burning, and I put on the water to boil again for tea. And that prepared, I could turn on Cavor for his explanation.

      “Quite correct,” he insisted; “quite correct. I’ve done it, and it’s all right.”

      “But,” I protested. “All right! Why, there can’t be a rick standing, or a fence or a thatched roof undamaged for twenty miles round….”

      “It’s all right — really. I didn’t, of course, foresee this little upset. My mind was preoccupied with another problem, and I’m apt to disregard these practical side issues. But it’s all right — ”

      “My dear sir,” I cried, “don’t you see you’ve done thousands of pounds’ worth of damage?”

      “There, I throw myself on your discretion. I’m not a practical man, of course, but don’t you think they will regard it as a cyclone?”

      “But the explosion — ”

      “It was not an explosion. It’s perfectly simple. Only, as I say, I’m apt to overlook these little things. Its that zuzzoo business on a larger scale. Inadvertently I made this substance of mine, this Cavorite, in a thin, wide sheet….”

      He paused. “You are quite clear that the stuff is opaque to gravitation, that it cuts off things from gravitating towards each other?”

      “Yes,” said I. “Yes.”

      “Well, so soon as it reached a temperature of 60 degrees Fahrenheit, and the process of its manufacture was complete, the air above it, the portions of roof and ceiling and floor above it ceased to have weight. I suppose you know — everybody knows nowadays — that, as a usual thing, the air has weight, that it presses on everything at the surface of the earth, presses in all directions, with a pressure of fourteen and a half pounds to the square inch?”

      “I know that,” said I. “Go on.”

      “I know that too,” he remarked. “Only this shows you how useless knowledge is unless you apply it. You see, over our Cavorite this ceased to be the case, the air there ceased to exert any pressure, and the air round it and not over the Cavorite was exerting a pressure of fourteen pounds and a half to the square in upon this suddenly weightless air. Ah! you begin to see! The air all about the Cavorite crushed in upon the air above it with irresistible force. The air above the Cavorite was forced upward violently, the air that rushed in to replace it immediately lost weight, ceased to exert any pressure, followed suit, blew the ceiling through and the roof off….

      “You perceive,” he said, “it formed a sort of atmospheric fountain, a kind of chimney in the atmosphere. And if the Cavorite itself hadn’t been loose and so got sucked up the chimney, does it occur to you what would have happened?”

      I thought. “I suppose,” I said, “the air would be rushing up and up over that infernal piece of stuff now.”

      “Precisely,” he said. “A huge fountain — ”

      “Spouting into space! Good heavens! Why, it would have squirted all the atmosphere of the earth away! It would have robbed the world of air! It would have been the death of all mankind! That little lump of stuff!”

      “Not exactly into space,” said Cavor, “but as bad — practically. It would have whipped the air off the world as one peels a banana, and flung it thousands of miles. It would have dropped back again, of course — but on an asphyxiated world! From our point of view very little better than if it never came back!”

      I stared. As yet I was too amazed to realise how all my expectations had been upset. “What do you mean to do now?” I asked.

      “In the first place if I may borrow a garden trowel I will remove some of this earth with which I am encased, and then if I may avail myself of your domestic conveniences I will have a bath. This done, we will converse more at leisure. It will be wise, I think” — he laid a muddy hand on my arm — “if nothing were said of this affair beyond ourselves. I know I have caused great damage — probably even dwelling-houses may be ruined here and there upon the countryside. But on the other hand, I cannot possibly pay for the damage I have done, and if the real cause of this is published, it will lead only to heartburning and the obstruction of my work. One cannot foresee everything, you know, and I cannot consent for one moment to add the burthen of practical considerations to my theorising. Later on, when you have come in with your practical mind, and Cavorite is floated — floated is the word, isn’t it? — and it has realised all you anticipate for it, we may set matters right with these persons. But not now — not now. If no other explanation is offered, people, in the present unsatisfactory state of meteorological science, will ascribe all this to a cyclone; there might be a public subscription, and as my house has collapsed and been burnt, I should in that case receive a considerable share in the compensation, which would be extremely helpful to the prosecution of our researches. But if it is known that I caused this, there will be no public subscription, and everybody will be put out. Practically I should never get a chance of working in peace again. My three assistants may or may not have perished. That is a detail. If they have, it is no great loss; they were more zealous than able, and this premature event must be largely due to their joint neglect of the furnace. If they СКАЧАТЬ