Alice: The Girl From Earth - Булычев Кир. Страница 59

Then he broke into laughter, and the flower petals whirled in the air.

“Do not think that I am so naive, Alice.” He said, when the fit of laughter had ended and he had control over his breath again. “I know when someone is frightened of me, and when someone is delighted. Therefore I always nock on the door and ask if I frighten them. If they answer “No,” then I enter and tell them that I am the famous archaeologist Gromozeka from the planet Chumaroz. Satisfied, now?”

“Satisfied.” Alice answered. She was sitting, her feet crossed, on a tangle of Gromozeka’s tentacles. “Continue. This means, first of all, they are delighted Gromozeka has come to visit them. But doesn’t this imply a ‘secondarily?’“

“Secondarily,” Gromozeka said, because they had just finished experiments with a new machine at the Time Institute. You will recall that all the earlier machines were only capable of operating on the Institute’s premises, but the new time machine can be transported to other localities. They power it with atomic batteries. They were just about ready to transport the machine to Miracle Lake…”

“Where?” I was surprised.

“Gromozeka said, to ‘Lake Chudskoe.’ Right?” Alice said. “Gromozeka has the right not to know all the details of Earth history.”

“And I was about to say,” Gromozeka said, “Chudskoe Lake. And anyone who heard otherwise has deficient ears… They wanted to look at how Alexander the Great defeated the Tattletale Knights.”

“That’s right,” Alice said, “They would want to watch Alexander Nevsky defeat the Teutonic Knights.”

“Oh, them.” Gromozeka sighted. “I always get those two confused! But when I discovered at they had a machine ready for travel already, I told them: ‘What’s just one lake, when I can put an entire planet at your disposal? And you will always be able to go back to the lake if you want and confirm what every school child knows, that Alexander Nevsky defeated the Teutonic Order in the famous Battle on the Ice on April Fifth, 1242 AD, and saved Russia from conquest, but as to what happened on the planet Coleida, not even I, the great and glorious archaeologist Gromozeka, know, although I do suspect they were wiped out by Space Plague.’“

“And they agreed?” Alice asked.

“Not right away.” Gromozeka admitted. At first they said that the time machine was still not fully tested under such extreme conditions, such as space, and it might not work properly, or else an accident might happen. Then, when I said that conditions on Coleida were not at all more difficult than at the Chudsky lake, they said that the atomic batteries and other apparatus were so heavy that it would need ten space ships to convey everything to Coleida. But by then I already knew that they had all but agreed. And anyway, they themselves were tempted to test their time machine on another planet. And I told them how we could start up the main power station on Coleida, and even more we of the expedition have a very powerful mass conversion reactor, and even gravity engines. And if they wanted to send a whole group of investigators along with their machine, we could feed and house them all and even provide them with excursions to the main tourist traps. So of course they agreed. Pretty smart of me, if I don’t say so myself, eh?”

“You’re a genius, Gromozeka.” I said.

“And now I shall have to get some sleep, for tomorrow we begin loading. Even without the atomic batteries we shall require at least three ships for the loading of the machine. And I still have to find the ships.”

And Gromozeka promptly leaned his large, soft, rather balloon-like head against the wall and fell asleep..

4

All the following day Gromozeka rushed around Moscow, flew to Prague, called back and forth to the Moon constantly, acquired ships, negotiated about freight and cargo space and only in the evening arrived back at our house. On this occasion he came without flowers, not but alone.

Gromozeka brought with him two temporalists, as the researchers at the Institute of Time were known. One temporalist was young, lanky, and very lean, and perhaps because of that appeared rather morose. He had thick, kinky black hair in an Afro, and Gromozeka, astonished that such thing creatures could even exist, spent all his time poking and prodding at the poor fellow with the claw at the end of one tentacle. The second temporalist was a short, thickset, middle aged man with small, penetrating grey eyes. From time to time he hiccoughed; he was dressed in the latest fashion.

“Petrov.” He introduced himself. “M-micael Petrov. I’m project director. But it will be Richard here who will actually operate the machine.”

“Of course, of course.” I said. The name of this famous physicist, who had discovered temporal changes in superstring plasma, and who had then went on to head the Time Institute, was one very familiar to me. “I am delighted you could come here.”

“Is there some holiday or celebration.” Petrov asked. “A birth day, p-perhaps? I’m sorry; if we had known I’d have brought something..”

“No, no celebration.” I said. “Our friend Gromozeka brought some flowers yesterday. And as Gromozeka never does anything at less than ten thousand percent he just cleared out an entire flower nursery.”

“Do sit down.” Gromozeka said. “Have some Ex-Lax and we can talk.”

He reached inside the deep pouch which grows on the belly of all Chumaroseans and pulled out a bottle of Ex-Lax, several kinds of crackers, cheeses and dips, as well as some bottles of wine for the rest of us.

“So,” he said, spreading out on the rug and surrounding all of us with his tentacles, as though we were afraid we might all run screaming in every direction, “We now have ships, the agreement of the Academy of Sciences for your expedition into space, and we will soon be testing your machine. Are you happy?”

“Thank you.” Petrov said politely. “Your invitation was…most kind.”

“Ah,” Gromozeka said mortified, turning to me, “in reality he is anything but happy. And do you know why? Because he wanted to spend time on Chud lake.”

“Chudskoe.” Alice corrected Gromozeka.

Gromozeka ignored her.

“He wanted to go to Chudskoe lake because he knew what was awaiting him there in the past. As many times as he might venture there and then, nothing will change the fact that Alexander….. Nevsky defeated the Tattletonic Knights. But on Coleida we do not know, with certainty, how everything came about. And what if the planet died not from Space Plague but from something else?”

“If you are trying to imply cowardice on our parts,” Richard grew angry, “try somewhere else. You have no idea what sort of risks are associated with working out-time. Our people have tried to save Giordano Bruno from the fire, they have infiltrated the Crusades and Fascist camps, sharing the danger and misfortune, and sometimes fates, of the peoples of other times…”

“Don’t get angry, Richard.” Petrov said. “Can’t you see that Gromozeka is trying to tease you? And you took the bait.”

“But I am teasing no one!” Gromozeka grew agitated. “I am a very direct and naive archaeologist.”

What Gromozeka said was anything but the truth. In reality he was not devoid of spite himself, and he was afraid the temporalists would somehow get out of going to the archaeological dig and that all his dreams would turn to dust.

“Don’t be afraid, Gromozeka.” Petrov said suddenly. “If the Time Institute promised you the exp-perimental model of the time machine would be tested at your expedition, it will be.” He was a very perceptive person.

“Now that is superb!” Gromozeka answered. “Of course I don’t doubt it. Otherwise I would never have introduced you to my best friends, Professor Seleznev and his famous daughter Alice, about whom you know far too little, although you will soon have the opportunity to become more fully acquainted with her.”