[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
course. Einstein, Lorentz-Fitzgerald, the whole roster-they're all against it. It's called-get
this!-polynomiation."
He waited for a laugh, hopelessly. Then he said, "Although I must say he appears to have
something, since the tests-"
Marchand said gently and with enormous restraint: "Dan, will you please spit it out? Let's
see what you said so far. There's this fellow named Eisele, and he has something, and it's crazy,
but it works."
"Well-yes."
Marchand slowly leaned back and closed his eyes. "So that means that we were all wrong.
Especially me. And all our work-"
"Look, Norman! Don't ever think like that. Your work has made all the difference. If it
weren't for you, people like Eisele never would have had the chance. Don't you know he was working
under one of our grants?"
"No. I didn't know that." Marchand's eyes went out to the Tycho
Brahe for a moment. "But it doesn't help much. I wonder if fifty-odd thousand men and women who
have given most of their lives to the deep freeze because of-my work-will feel the way you do. But
thanks. You've told me what I want to know."
When Czerny entered the chart room an hour later, Marchand said at once, "Am i in good
enough shape to stand a smith?"
The doctor put down his bag and took a chair before he answered. "We don't have anyone
available, Norman. There hasn't been a volunteer for years."
"No. I don't mean smithed into a human body. I don't want any would-be suicide volunteer
donors-you said yourself the smithed bodies sometimes suicided, anyway. I'll settle for a chimp.
Why should I be any better than that young fellow-what's his name?"
"You mean Duane Ferguson."
"Sure. Why should I be any better than he is?"
"Oh, cut it out, Norman. You're too old. Your phospholipids-"
"I'm not too old to die, am I? And that's the worst that could happen."
"It wouldn't be stable! Not at your age; you just don't understand the chemistry. I
couldn't promise you more than a few weeks."
Marchand said joyously, "Really! I didn't expect that much. That's more than you can
promise me now."
The doctor argued, but Marchand had held up his end of many a hard-fought battle in ninety-
six years, and besides, he had an advantage over Czerny. The doctor knew even better than Marchand
himself that getting into a passion would kill him. At the moment when Czerny gauged the risk of a
smith translation less than the risk of going on arguing about it, he frowned, shook his head
grudgingly, and left.
Slowly Marchand wheeled after him.
He did not have to hurry to what might be the last act of his life. There was plenty of
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time. In the Institute they kept a supply of breeding chimpanzees, but it would take several hours
to prepare one.
One mind had to be sacrificed in the smith imposition. The man would ultimately be able to
return to his own body, his risk less than one chance in 50 of failure. But the chimp would never
be the same. Marchand submitted to the beginnings of the irradiation, the delicate titration of
his body fluids, the endless strapping and patching and clamping. He had seen it done, and there
were no surprises in the procedure. . . . He had not known, however, that it would hurt so much.
III
Trying not to walk on his knuckles (but it was~ hard; the ape body was meant to crouch,
the arms were too long to hang comfortably along his sides), Marchand waddled out into the pad
area and bent his rigid chimp's spine back in order to look up at the hated thing. Dan Fleury came
toward him. "Norm?" he asked tentatively. Marchand attempted to nod; it was not a success, but
Fleury understood. "Norman," he said, "this is Sigmund Eisele. He invented the FTL drive."
Marchand raised one long arm and extended a hand that resisted being opened: it was used
to being clawed into a fist. "Congradulazhuns," he said, as clearly as he could. Virtuously he did
not squeeze the hand of the young dark-eyed man who was being introduced to him. He had been
warned that chimpanzee strength maimed human beings. He was not likely to forget, but it was
tempting to allow himself to consider it for a moment.
He dropped the hand and winced as pain flooded through him.
Czerny had warned him to expect it. "Unstable, dangerous, won't last," had rumbled through
his conversation, "and don't forget, Norman, the sensory equipment is set high for you; you're not
used to so much input: it will hurt."
But Marchand had assured the doctor he would not mind that, and indeed he didn't. He
looked at the ship again. "Zo thads id," he grumbled, and again bent the backbone, the whole
barrel chest of the brute he occupied, to stare at the ship on the pad. It was perhaps a hundred
feet tall. "Nod mudge," he said scornfully. "De Zirian, dad was our firzd, zdood nine hoonderd
feed dali and garried a dousand beople to Alpha Zendauri."
"And it brought a hundred and fifty back alive," said Eisele. He didn't emphasize the
words in any way, but he said it quite clearly. "I want to tell you I've always admired you, Dr.
Marchand. I hope you won't mind my company. I understand you want to go along with me out to the
Tycho Brahe."
"Why zhould I mind?" He did, of course. With the best will in the world, this young fellow
had thrown seventy years of dedication, plus a handsome fortune-eight million dollars of his own,
countless hundreds of millions that Marchand had begged from millionaires, from government
handouts, from the pennies of schoolchildren-tossed them all into the chamber pot and flushed them
into history. They would say: "A nonce figure of the early twenty-first century, Norman
Marchand, or Marquand, attempted stellar colonization with primitive rocket-propelled craft. He
was, of course, unsuccessful, and the toll of life and wealth in his ill-conceived venture
enormous. However, after Eisele's faster-than-light became practicable . . ." They would say that
he was a failure. And he was.
When Tycho Brahe blasted off to the stars, massed bands of five hundred pieces played it
to its countdown, and television audiences all over the world watched it through their orbiting
satellites. A President, a Governor, and half the Senate were on hand.
When Eisele's little ship took off to catch it and tell its people their efforts had been
all in vain, it was like the departure of the 7:17 ferry for Jersey City. To that extent, thought
Marchand, had Eisele degraded the majesty of starifight. Yet he would not have missed it for [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl freetocraft.keep.pl
course. Einstein, Lorentz-Fitzgerald, the whole roster-they're all against it. It's called-get
this!-polynomiation."
He waited for a laugh, hopelessly. Then he said, "Although I must say he appears to have
something, since the tests-"
Marchand said gently and with enormous restraint: "Dan, will you please spit it out? Let's
see what you said so far. There's this fellow named Eisele, and he has something, and it's crazy,
but it works."
"Well-yes."
Marchand slowly leaned back and closed his eyes. "So that means that we were all wrong.
Especially me. And all our work-"
"Look, Norman! Don't ever think like that. Your work has made all the difference. If it
weren't for you, people like Eisele never would have had the chance. Don't you know he was working
under one of our grants?"
"No. I didn't know that." Marchand's eyes went out to the Tycho
Brahe for a moment. "But it doesn't help much. I wonder if fifty-odd thousand men and women who
have given most of their lives to the deep freeze because of-my work-will feel the way you do. But
thanks. You've told me what I want to know."
When Czerny entered the chart room an hour later, Marchand said at once, "Am i in good
enough shape to stand a smith?"
The doctor put down his bag and took a chair before he answered. "We don't have anyone
available, Norman. There hasn't been a volunteer for years."
"No. I don't mean smithed into a human body. I don't want any would-be suicide volunteer
donors-you said yourself the smithed bodies sometimes suicided, anyway. I'll settle for a chimp.
Why should I be any better than that young fellow-what's his name?"
"You mean Duane Ferguson."
"Sure. Why should I be any better than he is?"
"Oh, cut it out, Norman. You're too old. Your phospholipids-"
"I'm not too old to die, am I? And that's the worst that could happen."
"It wouldn't be stable! Not at your age; you just don't understand the chemistry. I
couldn't promise you more than a few weeks."
Marchand said joyously, "Really! I didn't expect that much. That's more than you can
promise me now."
The doctor argued, but Marchand had held up his end of many a hard-fought battle in ninety-
six years, and besides, he had an advantage over Czerny. The doctor knew even better than Marchand
himself that getting into a passion would kill him. At the moment when Czerny gauged the risk of a
smith translation less than the risk of going on arguing about it, he frowned, shook his head
grudgingly, and left.
Slowly Marchand wheeled after him.
He did not have to hurry to what might be the last act of his life. There was plenty of
file:///F|/rah/Frederik%20Pohl/Frederik%20Pohl%20-%20Best%20of%20Frederik%20Pohl.txt (43 of 152) [1/23/03 12:26:27 PM]
file:///F|/rah/Frederik%20Pohl/Frederik%20Pohl%20-%20Best%20of%20Frederik%20Pohl.txt
time. In the Institute they kept a supply of breeding chimpanzees, but it would take several hours
to prepare one.
One mind had to be sacrificed in the smith imposition. The man would ultimately be able to
return to his own body, his risk less than one chance in 50 of failure. But the chimp would never
be the same. Marchand submitted to the beginnings of the irradiation, the delicate titration of
his body fluids, the endless strapping and patching and clamping. He had seen it done, and there
were no surprises in the procedure. . . . He had not known, however, that it would hurt so much.
III
Trying not to walk on his knuckles (but it was~ hard; the ape body was meant to crouch,
the arms were too long to hang comfortably along his sides), Marchand waddled out into the pad
area and bent his rigid chimp's spine back in order to look up at the hated thing. Dan Fleury came
toward him. "Norm?" he asked tentatively. Marchand attempted to nod; it was not a success, but
Fleury understood. "Norman," he said, "this is Sigmund Eisele. He invented the FTL drive."
Marchand raised one long arm and extended a hand that resisted being opened: it was used
to being clawed into a fist. "Congradulazhuns," he said, as clearly as he could. Virtuously he did
not squeeze the hand of the young dark-eyed man who was being introduced to him. He had been
warned that chimpanzee strength maimed human beings. He was not likely to forget, but it was
tempting to allow himself to consider it for a moment.
He dropped the hand and winced as pain flooded through him.
Czerny had warned him to expect it. "Unstable, dangerous, won't last," had rumbled through
his conversation, "and don't forget, Norman, the sensory equipment is set high for you; you're not
used to so much input: it will hurt."
But Marchand had assured the doctor he would not mind that, and indeed he didn't. He
looked at the ship again. "Zo thads id," he grumbled, and again bent the backbone, the whole
barrel chest of the brute he occupied, to stare at the ship on the pad. It was perhaps a hundred
feet tall. "Nod mudge," he said scornfully. "De Zirian, dad was our firzd, zdood nine hoonderd
feed dali and garried a dousand beople to Alpha Zendauri."
"And it brought a hundred and fifty back alive," said Eisele. He didn't emphasize the
words in any way, but he said it quite clearly. "I want to tell you I've always admired you, Dr.
Marchand. I hope you won't mind my company. I understand you want to go along with me out to the
Tycho Brahe."
"Why zhould I mind?" He did, of course. With the best will in the world, this young fellow
had thrown seventy years of dedication, plus a handsome fortune-eight million dollars of his own,
countless hundreds of millions that Marchand had begged from millionaires, from government
handouts, from the pennies of schoolchildren-tossed them all into the chamber pot and flushed them
into history. They would say: "A nonce figure of the early twenty-first century, Norman
Marchand, or Marquand, attempted stellar colonization with primitive rocket-propelled craft. He
was, of course, unsuccessful, and the toll of life and wealth in his ill-conceived venture
enormous. However, after Eisele's faster-than-light became practicable . . ." They would say that
he was a failure. And he was.
When Tycho Brahe blasted off to the stars, massed bands of five hundred pieces played it
to its countdown, and television audiences all over the world watched it through their orbiting
satellites. A President, a Governor, and half the Senate were on hand.
When Eisele's little ship took off to catch it and tell its people their efforts had been
all in vain, it was like the departure of the 7:17 ferry for Jersey City. To that extent, thought
Marchand, had Eisele degraded the majesty of starifight. Yet he would not have missed it for [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]