"Gordon R. Dickson - The Monkey Wrench" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

THE MONKEY WRENCH



by



Gordon R. Dickson




Cary Harmon was not an ungifted young man. He had the intelligence to carve himself a position as a
Lowland society lawyer, which on Venus is not easy to do. And he had the discernment to consolidate
that position by marrying into the family of one of the leading drug-exporters. But, nevertheless, from the
scientific view-point, he was a layman; and laymen, in their ignorance, should never be allowed to play
with delicate technical equipment; for the result will be trouble, as surely as it is the first time a baby gets
its hands on a match.

His wife was a high-spirited woman; and would have been hard to handle at times if it had not been for
the fact that she was foolish enough to love him. Since he did not love her at all, it was consequently both
simple and practical to terminate all quarrels by dropping out of sight for several days until her obvious
fear of losing him for good brought her to a proper humility. He took good care, each time he
disappeared, to pick some new and secure hiding place where past experience or her several years’
knowledge of his habits would be no help in locating him. Actually, he enjoyed thinking up new and
undiscoverable bolt-holes, and made a hobby out of discovering them.

Consequently, he was in high spirits the grey winter afternoon he descended unannounced on the
weather station of Burke McIntyre, high in the Lonesome Mountains, a jagged chain of the deserted
shorelands of Venus’ Northern Sea. He had beaten a blizzard to the dome with minutes to spare; and
now, with his small two-place flier safely stowed away, and a meal of his host’s best supplies under his
belt, he sat revelling in the comfort of his position and listening to the hundred and fifty mile per hour,
sub-zero winds lashing impotently at the arching roof overhead.

“Ten minutes more,” he said to Burke, “and I’d have had a tough time making it!”

“Tough!” snorted Burke. He was a big, heavy-featured, blond man with a kindly contempt for all of
humanity aside from he favoured class of meteorologists. “You Lowlanders are too used to that present
day Garden of Eden you have down below. Ten minutes more and you’d have been spread over one of
the peaks around here to wait for the spring searching party to gather your bones.”

Cary laughed in disbelief.

“Try it, if you don’t believe me,” said Burke. “No skin off my nose if you don’t have the sense to listen
to reason. Take your bug up right now if you want.”
 “Not me,” Cary’s teeth flashed. “I know when I’m comfortable. And that’s no way to treat your guest,
tossing him out into the storm when he’s just arrived.”

“Some guest,” rumbled Burke. “I shake hands with you after the graduation exercises, don’t hear a