"Bradbury, Ray - Mars Is Heaven" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bradbury Ray)

“This couldn’t be Heaven,” said the captain, ironically. “Though, I must admit, it looks peaceful and cool, and pretty much like Green Bluff, where I was born, in 1915.”
lie looked at the chemist. “The air’s all right, is it?”
“Yes, sir.”
‘Well, then, tell you what we’ll do. Lustig, you and Ilinkston and I will fetch ourselves out to look this town
over. The other 14 men will stay aboard ship. If’ anything untoward happens, lift ‘the Ship ‘and get the hell out, do you bear what I say, Craner?”
“Yes, sir. The hell out we’ll go, sir. Leaving you?”,
“A loss of three men’s better than a whole ship. If
something bad happens get back to Earth and warn the next Rocket, that’s Lingle’s Rocket, I think, which will be completed and ready to take off some time around next Christmas, what he has to meet up with. If there’s something hostile about Mars we certainly want the next expedition to be well armed.”
“So are we, sir. We’ve got a regular arsenal with us.”
“Tell the ‘men to stand by the guns, then, as. Lustig and Hinkston and I go out,”
“Right, sir.”
“Come along, Lustig, Hinkston.”
The three men walked together, down through the levels of the ship.

It was a beautiful spring day. A robin sat on a blossoming apple tree and sang continuously. Showers of petal snow sifted down when the wind touched the apple tree, and the blossom smell drifted upon the air. Somewhere in the town, somebody was playing the piano and the music came and went, came and went, softly, drowsily. The song was Beautiful Dreamer. Somewhere else, a phonograph, scratchy and faded, was hissing out a record of Roamin’ In The Gloamin,’ sung by Harry Lapder.
The three men stood outside the ship. The port closed
behind them. At every window, a face pressed, looking out. The large metal guns pointed this way and that, ready.
Now the phonograph record being played was: -

“Oh give me a June night
The moonlight and you—”

Lustig began to tremble. Samuel Hinkston did likewise.
Hinkston’s voice was so feeble and uneven that the captain had to ask him to repeat what he had said. “I said, sir, that I think I have solved this, all of this, sir!”
“And what is the solution, Hinkston?”
The soft wind blew. The sky was serene and quiet and somewhere a stream of water ran through the cool caverns and tree-shadings of a ravine. Somewhere a horse and wagon trotted and rolled by, bumping.
“Sir, it must be, it has to be, this is the only solution!
Rocket travel began to Mars in the years before the first’
World War, sir!” S
The captain stared at his archaeologist. “No!”
“But, yes, sir! You must admit, look at all of this! How else explain it, the houses, the lawns, the iron deer, the flowers, the pianos, the music!”
“Hinkston, Hinkston, oh,” and the captain put his hand to his face, shaking his head, his hand shaking no~v, his lips blue.
“Sir, listen to me.” Hinkston took his elbow persuasively and looked up into the captain’s face, pleading. “Say that there -were some people in the year 1905, perhaps, who hated wars and wanted to get away from Earth and they got together, some scientists, in secret, and built a rocket and came out here to Mars.”
“No, no, Hinkston.”
“Why not? The world was a different place in 1905, they could have kept -it a secret much more easily.”
“But the work, Hinkston, the work of building a corn.’ plex thing like a rocket, oh, no, no.” The captain looked at his shoes, looked -at his hands, looked at the houses, and then at Hinkston.
“And they caine up here, and haturally the houses they built were similar to Earth houses because they
brought the cultural -~architecture with them, and here it is!”
“And they’ve lived here all these years?” said the captain.
“In peace and quiet, sir, yes. Maybe they made a few trips, to bring enough people here for one small town, and then stopped, for fear of being discovered. That’s why the town seems so old-fashioned. I don’t see a thing, myself, that is older than the year 1927, do you?”
“No, frankly, I don’t, Hinkston.”
“These are our people, sir. This is an American city; it’s definitely not European!”
“That—that’s right, too, Hinkston.”
“Or maybe, just maybe, sir, rocket travel is older than we think. Perhaps it started in some part of the world hundreds of years ago, was discovered and kept secret by a small number of men, and they came to Mars, with only occasional visits to Earth over the centuries.”
“You make it sound almost reasonable.”
“it is, sir. It has to be. We have the proof here before us, all we have ‘to do now, is find some people and verify it!”
“You’re right- there, of course. We can’t just stand here and talk. Did’ you bring your gun?”
“Yes, but we won’t need it.”
“We’ll see about it. Come along, we’ll ring that doorbell and see if anyone is home.”
Their boots were deadened of all sound in the thick green grass. it smelled from a fresh mowing. In spite of himself, Captain John Black felt a great peace come over him. It had been thirty years since he had been in a small’ town, and the buzzing of spring bees on the air lulled and quieted him, and the fresh look of things was a balm to the soul.