"James P. Hogan - Giants 3 - Giant's Star" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hogan James P)

be getting space-happy with all these lunar ifights." Pacey sighed. "I'll be thinking about you
while I'm holding the fort up here. I only wish I was coming too."


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"You'll get your chance soon enough," Heller said. Everything looked bright again. She
lifted her face suddenly from the papers in her hand. "I'll tell you what-tonight we'll both have
a special dinner to celebrate...a kind of farewell party until whenever. Champagne, a good wine,
and the best poultry the cook here's got in his refrigerator. How does that sound?"
"Sounds great," Pacey replied, then frowned and rubbed his chin dubiously.
"Although...would it really be a good idea? I mean, with this unidentified signal coming in only
an hour ago, people might wonder what the hell we're celebrating. Sverenssen might think it's us,
not the Soviets, who are being underhanded."
"Well we are, aren't we?"
"Yeah, I guess so-but for a good reason. That's different."
"So let them. If the Soviets think the heat's on us, they might get a false sense of
security and not move too fast." A look of grim satisfaction came into Heller's eyes as she
thought of something else. "And let Sverenssen think anything he damn well likes," she said.
Chapter seven


Clad in a standard-issue UNSA arctic jacket, quilted over-trousers, and snowboots, Hunt
stood in the center of a small group of muffled figures stamping their feet and breathing frosty
clouds of condensation into the air on the concrete apron of McClusky Air Force Base, situated in
the foothills of the Baird Mountains one hundred miles inside the Arctic Circle. The ground fog of
the previous day had thinned somewhat to become a layer of overcast through which the washy blob
of the sun was just able to impart a drab mix of off-white and grays to the texture of the
surrounding landscape. Most of the signs of life among the huddle of semiderelict buildings behind
them were concentrated around the former mess hail, which had been hastily patched up and
windproofed to provide makeshift accommodation and a command post for the operation. A gaggle of
UNSA aircraft and other vehicles parked among a litter of supplies and equipment along the near
edge of the apron, and a team of handpicked UNSA personnel positioned in the background with
cameras and microphone booms set up ready to record the impending event, completed the scene. The
command post had landline links into the area radar net, and a homing beacon had been set up for
the Ganymean ship. A strangely tense silence predominated, broken only by the intermittent cries
of kittiwakes wheeling and diving above the frozen marshes beyond the perimeter fence, and the
humming of a motor generator supplying power from one of the parked trailers.
McClusky was about as far from population centers and major air-traffic lanes as it was
possible to get without going outside the U.S., but like every other point on the Earth's surface
it was still subject to satellite scrutiny. In an attempt to mask the landing, UNSA had given
notice that tests of a new type of reentry vehicle would be conducted in the area during that
week, and had requested airlines and other organizations to reroute ifights accordingly until
further notice. To accustom the region's radar controllers to an abnormal pattern of activity,
UNSA had also been
staging irregular ifights over Alaska for several days and altering their announced flight
plans at short notice. Beyond that there was little they could do. How anything like the arrival
of a starship could be kept secret from terrestrial observers, never mind an advanced alien
surveillance system, was something nobody was quite sure of. Whoever was sending the messages