Operation: Outer Space. Murray Leinster

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СКАЧАТЬ in exactly four hundred and seventy-three years. They were good men for a television producer to have on call. Now, instructed, they went out to be briefed by somebody who undoubtedly knew more than both of them put together, but whom they would regard with tolerant suspicion.

      Bell, left behind, said cagily:

      "This script I've got to do, now—Will that laboratory be the set? Where is it? In the dome?"

      "It's not in the dome," Cochrane told him. "West and Jamison took a moon-jeep to get to it. I don't know what the set will be. I don't know anything, yet. I'm waiting to be told about the job, myself."

      "If I've got to cook up a story-line," observed Bell, "I have to know the set. Who'll act? You know how amateurs can ham up any script! How about a part for Babs? Nice kid!"

      Cochrane found himself annoyed, without knowing why.

      "We just have to wait until we know what our job is," he said curtly, and turned to go.

      Bell said:

      "One more thing. If you're planning to use a news cameraman up here—don't! I used to be a cameraman before I got crazy and started to write. Let me do the camera-work. I've got a better idea of using a camera to tell a story now, than—"

      "Hold it," said Cochrane. "We're not up here to film-tape a show. Our job is psychiatry—craziness."

      To a self-respecting producer, a psychiatric production would seem craziness. A script-writer might have trouble writing out a psychiatrist's prescription, or he might not. But producing it would be out of all rationality! No camera, the patient would be the star, and most lines would be ad libbed. Cochrane viewed such a production with extreme distaste. But of course, if a man wanted only to be famous, it might be handled as a straight public-relations job. In any case, though, it would amount to flattery in three dimensions and Cochrane would rather have no part in it. But he had to arrange the whole thing.

      He went back to the table and rejoined Babs. She confided that she'd been talking to Johnny Simms' wife. She was nice! But homesick. Cochrane sat down and thought morbid thoughts. Then he realized that he was irritated because Babs didn't notice. He finished his drink and ordered another.

      Half an hour later, Holden found them. He had in tow a sad-looking youngish man with a remarkably narrow forehead and an expression of deep anxiety. Cochrane winced. A neurotic type if there ever was one!

      "Jed," said Holden heartily, "here's Mr. Dabney. Mr. Dabney, Jed Cochrane is here as a specialist in public-relations set-ups. He'll take charge of this affair. Your father-in-law sent him up here to see that you are done justice to!"

      Dabney seemed to think earnestly before he spoke.

      "It is not for myself," he explained in an anxious tone. "It is my work! That is important! After all, this is a fundamental scientific discovery! But nobody pays any attention! It is extremely important! Extremely! Science itself is held back by the lack of attention paid to my discovery!"

      "Which," Holden assured him, "is about to be changed. It's a matter of public relations. Jed's a specialist. He'll take over."

      The sad-faced young man held up his hand for attention. He thought. Visibly. Then he said worriedly:

      "I would take you over to my laboratory, but I promised my wife I would call her in half an hour from now. Johnny Simms' wife just reminded me. My wife is back on Earth. So you will have to go to the laboratory without me and have Mr. Jones show you the proof of my work. A very intelligent man, Jones—in a subordinate way, of course. Yes. I will get you a jeep and you can go there at once, and when you come back you can tell me what you plan. But you understand that it is not for myself that I want credit! It is my discovery! It is terribly important! It is vital! It must not be overlooked!"

      Holden escorted him away, while Cochrane carefully controlled his features. After a few moments Holden came back, his face sagging.

      "This your drink, Jed?" he asked dispiritedly. "I need it!" He picked up the glass and emptied it. "The history of that case would be interesting, if one could really get to the bottom of it! Come along!" His tone was dreariness itself. "I've got a jeep waiting for us."

      Babs stood up, her eyes shining.

      "May I come, Mr. Cochrane?"

      Cochrane waved her along. Holden tried to stalk gloomily, but nobody can stalk in one-sixth gravity. He reeled, and then depressedly accommodated himself to conditions on the moon.

      There was an airlock with a smaller edition of the moon-jeep that had brought them from the ship to the city. It was a brightly-polished metal body, raised some ten feet off the ground on outrageously large wheels. It was very similar to the straddle-trucks used in lumberyards on Earth. It would straddle boulders in its path. It could go anywhere in spite of dust and detritus, and its metal body was air-tight and held air for breathing, even out on the moon's surface.

      They climbed in. There was the sound of pumping, which grew fainter. The outer lock-door opened. The moon-jeep rolled outside.

      Babs stared with passionate rapture out of a shielded port. There were impossibly jagged stones, preposterously steep cliffs. There had been no weather to remove the sharp edge of anything in a hundred million years. The awkward-seeming vehicle trundled over the lava sea toward the rampart of mighty mountains towering over Lunar City. It reached a steep ascent. It climbed. And the way was remarkably rough and the vehicle springless, but it was nevertheless a cushioned ride. A bump cannot be harsh in light gravity. The vehicle rode as if on wings.

      "All right," said Cochrane. "Tell me the worst. What's the trouble with him? Is he the result of six generations of keeping the money in the family? Or is he a freak?"

      Holden groaned a little.

      "He's practically a stock model of a rich young man without brains enough for a job in the family firm, and too much money for anything else. Fortunately for his family, he didn't react like Johnny Simms—though they're good friends. A hundred years ago, Dabney'd have gone in for the arts. But it's hard to fool yourself that way now. Fifty years ago he'd have gone in for left-wing sociology. But we really are doing the best that can be done with too many people and not enough world. So he went in for science. It's non-competitive. Incapacity doesn't show up. But he has stumbled on something. It sounds really important. It must have been an accident! The only trouble is that it doesn't mean a thing! Yet because he's accomplished more than he ever expected to, he's frustrated because it's not appreciated! What a joke!"

      Cochrane said cynically:

      "You paint a dark picture, Bill. Are you trying to make this thing into a challenge?"

      "You can't make a man famous for discovering something that doesn't matter," said Holden hopelessly. "And this is that!"

      "Nothing's impossible to public relations if you spend enough money," Cochrane assured him. "What's this useless triumph of his?"

      The jeep bounced over a small cliff and fell gently for half a second and rolled on. Babs beamed.

      "He's found," said Holden discouragedly, "a way to send messages faster than light. It's a detour around Einstein's stuff—not denying it, but evading it. Right now it takes not quite two seconds for a message to go from the moon to Earth. That's at the speed of light. Dabney has proof—we'll see it—that he can cut that down some ninety-five СКАЧАТЬ