"Carr, Terry (ed) - anthology - Science Fiction for People Who Hate Science Fiction - 07 - Davidso" - читать интересную книгу автора (Carr Terry)

all without confusion. How to match sound and sight. That
things had names. What people were, who made the voices
and the music. What meaning was.
Aboat himself, he learned nothing directly. For a while,
he had tried to speak to them, but it was apparent that
nothing of him reached Earth. He had learned Earth, yes.
And knew what this place was, where he was. An asteroid.
How had he come to be there? This was in space. There
were spaceshipshe saw the scenes on television. Meteors
were dangerous to spaceships. He knew meteors. Some-
times spaceships crashed. He scanned all his little world,
but there was no spaceship, crashed or otherwise.
You'ue got to help me1 don't know who I ami But that
was more easy, oh, so much more sothat one was a man,
and there were many men. The sponsors (in this case, Muls,
the creamy-smooth deodorant) were men, too. Everybody
was very kind to this man. He had amnesia. What was odor?
This the observer could not understand. But to have no
memory, this he understood very well. This he shared with
men.
Gradually he had come to share many things with men.
They spoke different languages, but the one which came
with the first pictures was English, English from America.
Later on, there was English from England, there was
French, Russian, Spanish, Japanesebut American was first
and best. So much more interesting than the Red Army and
the hydroelectric dams, these stories of real life. Of love
and sadness and of happiness.
Kid, there ain't no problem in all this world you can't lick
if you really try. Very well, the observer would try. You
never know what you can do till you try. His first attempt
at taking shape wasn't good. It didn't look much like a man.
So he tried again and again. Each time he grew better at
it. It was true, what the people said. It was all true, every
word and picture of it. There ain't no problem
And so when it came time for his favorite Wednesday
evening program, the distant observer was ready. Summon-
ing all his effort, husbanding all his energy, he passed along
the wave length as a man walks down a street. There was
a slight jar, a click. He realized that he could never undo
what had just been done. There was a new body now, a
new metabolism. The past is dead, David. We have to live
for the future.
"And what is your namemy, you got up here but quick!"
burbled Keith Kane, the M.C. of Cash or Credit. "I've never
known a volunteer from our happy studio audience to man-
age it quite so suddenly. This is just the warmup, sir, so
you needn't be nervous. Not that you need the reassurance
cool as a cucumber, isn't he, folks? Say, did you folks ever
hear the story about the little Sunday School boy who said