"Murray Leinster - First Contact (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Leinster Murray)

them a fraction of an inch. We’ daren’t! They’ve locators. Maybe they’ve tracers better than any
we have. Maybe they could trace us all the way home without our knowing it! We can’t risk a
nonhuman race knowing where Earth is unless we’re sure of them! And how can we be sure? They could
come to trade, of course—or they could swoop down on overdrive with a battle fleet,that could wipe
us out before we knew what happened. We wouldn’t know which to expect, or when!”
Tommy’s face was startled.
“It’s all been thrashed out over and over, in theory,” said the skipper. “Nobody’s ever
been able to find a sound answer, even on paper. But you know, in all their theorizing, no one
considered the crazy, rank impossibility of a deep-space contact, with neither side knowing the
other’s home world! But we’ve got to find an answer in fact! What are we going to do about them?
Maybe these creatures will be aesthetic marvels, nice and friendly and polite—and, underneath,
with the sneaking brutal ferocity of a mugger. Or maybe they’ll be crude and gruff as a farmer—and
just as decent underneath. Maybe they’re something in between. But am I going to risk the possible
future of the human race on a guess that it’s safe to trust them? God knows it would be worthwhile
to make friends with a new civilization! It would be bound to stimulate our own, and maybe we’d
gain enormously. But I can’t take chances. The one thing I won’t risk is having them know how to
find Earth! Either I know they can’t follow me, or 1 don’t go home! And they’ll probably feel the
same way!”
He pressed the sleeve-communicator button again.
“Navigation officers, attention! Every star map on this ship is to be prepared for instant
destruction. This includes photographs and diagrams from which our course or starting point could
be deduced. I want all astronomical data gathered and arranged to be destroyed in a split second,
on order. Make it fast and report when ready!”
He released the button. He looked suddenly old. The first contact of humanity with an
alien race was a situation which had been foreseen in many fashions, but never one quite so
hopeless of solution as this. A solitary Earth-ship and a solitary alien, meeting in a nebula
which must be remote from the home planet of each. They might wish peace, but the line of conduct
which best prepared a treacherous attack was just the seeming of friendliness. Failure to be
suspicious might doom the human race—and a peaceful exchange of the fruits of civilization would
be the greatest benefit imaginable. Any mistake would be irreparable, but a failure to be on guard
would be fatal.
The captain’s room was very, very quiet. The bowquartering visiplate was filled with the
image of a very small section of the nebula. A very small section indeed. It was all diffused,
featureless, luminous mist. But suddenly Tommy Dort pointed.
“There, sir!"
There was a small shape in the mist. It was far away. It was a black shape, not polished
to mirror-reflection like the hull of the Lianvabon. It was bulbous—roughly pear-shaped. There was
much thin luminosity between, and no details could be observed, but it was surely no natural
object. Then Tommy looked at the distance indicator and said quietly:
“It’s headed for us at very high acceleration, sir. The odds are that they’re thinking the
same thing, sir, that neither of us will dare let the other go home. Do you think they’ll try a
contact with us, or let loose with their weapons as soon as they’re in range?”
The Lianvabon was no longer in a crevasse of emptiness in the nebula’s thin substance. She
swam in luminescence. There were no stars save the two fierce glows in the nebula’s heart. There
was nothing but an allenveloping light, curiously like one’s imagining of underwater in the


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