"Appleton, Victor - Tom Swift Jr 12 - In the Race to the Moon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Appleton Victor)

"Good to have you back with us, Doctor," Tom said with a smile as they
shook hands.
A SOLAR EXPERIMENT 23
The tall, keen-eyed scientist beamed at them through his thick-lensed
spectacles. "Delighted to see you both!"
The boys drove him by jeep to the communications building where Mr. Swift
and Professor Glennon were waiting. As the conference began, Dr. Faber said,
"If we're to help, we'll need to know more about the symptoms of the disease."
Evan Glennon nodded between puffs on his huge briar pipe. "Quite right. We
can hardly make a diagnosis until we have the facts."
"I suggest we call our space friends now and ask them for further details,"
Mr. Swift replied. "Then you two can ask questions."
"Excellent," Dr. Faber agreed.
Immediately Tom beamed out a request for more information. Several
minutes went by before the bell signaled a reply. But to everyone's surprise, no
message was punched out on the tape!
"Hey, what's wrong?" said Bud.
Frowning, Tom pointed to a red light which had lit up above the keyboard.
"That means the machine couldn't translate the message."
"Ask them to rephrase it, using the symbols we know," Mr. Swift suggested.
Tom did so. Finally an answer came through:
WE CANNOT DESCRIBE DISEASE WITHOUT USING NEW SYMBOLS.
The group exchanged baffled looks. "I'm afraid it's hopeless without
something more to go on." Dr. Faber said. "We might tell
24 THE RACE TO THE MOON
them about our new synthetic drugs and antibiotics. However, the chance is
slim that these would conquer a totally unknown disease."
Mr. Swift drummed his fingers on the conference table. "And trying to
translate those unknown symbols might take days," he said, frowning.
"What do you suppose caused the outbreak, Dad?" put in Tom.
Mr. Swift shook his head. "That's what puzzles me. Our space friends are
highly advanced in science, so one would expect them to have all disease-
causing germs or viruses under control- unless it's something new on their
planet."
"Exactly what I was thinking," Tom said. "The infection may have been
picked up from another planet-perhaps from earth itself."
Evan Glennon puffed thoughtfully on his pipe. "Look you! Could your space
friends send an infected animal by rocket ship for us to study? Or at least some
tissue samples or germ cultures?"
"Evan, that may be the solution!" Tom looked at his father. "What do you
think, Dad?"
"It's worth a try," Mr. Swift agreed.
Tom spelled out the request on the electronic brain. A few moments later the
machine punched out the return message on tape:
CANNOT GIVE DEFINITE ANSWER NOW. WILL REPLY LATER.
"Whew!" Bud sighed. "This is worse than
waiting to learn 'whodunnit' in a mystery story!"
Rather than stand by to wait for the message,
A SOLAR EXPERIMENT 25
Mr. Swift called a radioman to watch the machine. Then he took the two