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contact, eh? And find out how they're getting along?"
Fran nodded. He moved so that the heat of their fire would not fall on him, to tell that he camped
out-of-doors. He found a place to lie down in comfort, so that there would be no distracting sensation.
He closed his eyes. Soames saw him press the end of his tiny communicator and release it quickly. After
an instant's pause he pressed it again. He held the communicator on for several seconds, half a minute.
He released it and sat up.
"You try," he said in a puzzled fashion. "You try!"
Soames closed his eyes. He pressed the little pin-head button at the end of the instrument which was
hardly larger than a match-stick. He felt the sensations of another body. That other body opened its eyes.
Soames saw who it was, Gail's face was reflected in a mirror. She was pale. Her expression was drawn
and harried. But she smiled at her reflection, because she knew Soames would see what she saw.
He spoke, so she'd hear his voice as he did.
"Gail!"
He felt a hand which was her hand spill something on a levelled surface before her. It smoothed the
spilled stuff. It was face-powder, spread on a dressing-table top. A finger wrote. She looked down at
what was written there.
"Help Fran," he read. "You Must!"
He felt her hand swiftly smoothing the message away. Rage swept over him. Instantly he knew what had
happened. Fran's escape from Calumet Lake had proved that he knew that his communications were
intercepted and directionally analyzed. Therefore the other children were no longer a means by which he
might be trapped. So their communicators had been taken away from them for the second time, and now
they were watched with an unceasing closeness. Every glance, every word, every gesture was noted.
"This has to be quick," said Soames coldly, for her to hear. "I would help him, but he'd want to get in
touch with his people."
Gail opened her eyes again. Her image in the mirror nodded.
"And if he did," said Soames as coldly as before, "they'd come here and conquer us. And I'd rather that
we killed each other off than that the most kindly-disposed of conquerors enslaved us."
He felt her hand again smoothing the spilled face-powder. She wrote in it. He knew what she had written
before she dropped her eyes to it. He couldn't believe it. She'd written three words, no, two words and a
numeral. Soames felt an almost physical shock. He was incredulous. If this was true ...
Then he felt a hand closed firmly on Gail's shoulder. Captain Moggs spoke, authoritative and stern and
reproachful:
"Gail! How could you! You have one of those horrible telepathic things too! This is a very grave
matter, Gail!"
Then the contact was broken. Captain Moggs had snatched away Gail's communicator.
Raging, Soames took Fran and left that spot which was undoubtedly pin-pointed by now. As they sped
away he tried to consider the meaning of the two words and the numeral which was completely
unbelievable at first thought.
Shortly after sunrise he bought a two-day-old newspaper. It was the latest he could find for sale. He
rode a certain distance and stopped where the highway made an especially dramatic turn and there was a
turn-out for tourists to park in while they admired the view. He stopped there and deliberately read the
news affecting war and peace and the children and therefore Gail. At the end he folded the newspaper
painstakingly and with careful self-control tore it to bits. Then he said angrily:
"Fran, a question it never occurred to me to ask you before."
He posed the question. Fran could have answered it with two English words and a numeral, and the
same words and numeral that Gail had used. But he didn't have the words. Especially, he did not have
the number. Fran's way of writing numbers was as complex as the system used in ancient Rome, and
Soames had no key. It took a long time to grasp the quantity Fran had in mind. Then Soames had to
make sure he had it right.
Then, abruptly, he knew that it was true. He knew why it was true. It increased his anger over the
situation and the treatment of Gail and the children. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] - zanotowane.pl
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