"Aldiss, Brian - There is a Tide" - читать интересную книгу автора (Aldiss Brian W)

or smell or breathe it. Always an airtight dome er a space
suit between you and actuality. But in ten years' time, you'll
be able to run your bare fingers through the sand, feel the
breezes on your cheek... Well, you know what I mean, er
sort of feel her undressed."
He was thinking1 saw it in his eyes"Rog's going to go
all poetic on me." He said: "And you approve of that-
the change-over of atmospheres?"
"Yes."
"Yet you don't approve of what we're doing here, which
is just the same sort of thing?"
He had a point. "You're upsetting a delicate balance here,"
I said gingerly. "A thousand ecological factors are swept by
the board just so that you can grind these waters through your
turbines. And the same thing's happened at Owen Falls
over on Lake Victoria... But on Venus there's no such
balance. It's just a clean page waiting for man to write what
he will on it. Under that CO blanket, there's been no spark
of life: the mountains are bare of moss, the valleys lie in-
nocent of grass; in the geological strata, no fossils sleep;
no arncebae move in the sea. But what you're doing here. . ."
"People!" he exclaimed. "I've got people to consider. Babies
need to be born, mouths must be fed. A man must live.
Your sort of feelings are all very wellthey make good
poemsbut I consider the people. I love the people. For
them I work. . ."
He waved his hands, overcome by his own grandiose visions.
If the passion for Progress was his strength, the fallacy in-
herent in the idea was his secret weakness. I began to grow
warm.
"You get good conditions for these people, they procreate
forthwith. Next generation, another benefactor will have to
step forward and get good conditions for the children. That's
Progress, eh?" I asked maliciously.
"I see you so rarely, Rog; don't let's quarrel," he said
meekly. "I just do what I can. I'm only an engineer."
That was how he always won an altercation. Before meek-
ness I have no defence. But hostility ran like a sewer below
the level of our conversation.
The sun had finished another day. With the sudden dark-
ness came chill. Jubal pressed a button, and glass slid round
the veranda, enclosing us. Like Venus, I thought; but here
you could still smell that spicy, bosomy scent which is the
breath of dear Africa herself. On Venus, the smells are
imported.
We poured some more wine and talked of family matters.
In a short while his wife, Sloe, joined us. I began to feel
at home. The feeling was only partly psychological; my glands
were now beginning to readjust fully to normal conditions
after their long days in space travel.