"Arthur C Clarke - Pruess, Paul - Venus Prime Vol1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Clarke Arthur C)

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remote successors of Star Queen will ply the spaceways
between the worlds.
Paul Preuss, who knows about all these things, has
cleverly updated my old tale and introduced some elements
of which I never dreamed (though I’m amazed to
see that The Seven Pillars of Wisdom was in the original;
when I read the new text, I thought that was Paul’s invention).
Although I deplore the fact that crime stories
have such a universal attraction, I suppose that somebody
will still be trying to make a dishonest buck selling life
insurance the day before the Universe collapses into the
final Black Hole.
It is also an interesting challenge combining the two
genres of crime and science fiction, especially as some
experts have claimed that it’s impossible. (My sole contribution
here is ‘‘Trouble with Time’’; and though I hate to
say so, Isaac What’s-His-Name managed it superbly in his
Caves of Steel series.)
Now it’s Paul’s turn. I think he’s done a pretty good
job.
—Arthur C. Clarke
Columbo, Sri Lanka
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PART ONE
THE FOX
AND THE HEDGEHOG
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I
‘‘Does the word Sparta mean anything to you?’’
A young woman sat on a spoke-backed chair of varnished
pine. Her face was turned to the tall window; her
unmarked features were pale in the diffuse light that
flooded the white room, reflected from the wintry landscape
outside.
Her interrogator fussed with his trim salt-and-pepper
beard and peered at her over the top of his spectacles as
he waited for an answer. He sat behind a battered oak desk
a hundred and fifty years old, a kindly fellow with all the
time in the world.
‘‘Of course.’’ In her oval face her brows were wide ink
strokes above eyes of liquid brown; beneath her upturned
nose her mouth was full, her lips innocent in their delicate,
natural pinkness. The unwashed brown hair that lay in
lank strands against her cheeks, her shapeless dressing
gown, these could not disguise her beauty.
‘‘What does it mean to you?’’
V E N U S P R I M E
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‘‘What?’’