"Mack Reynolds - Pacifist" - читать интересную книгу автора (Reynolds Mack)

MACK REYNOLDS




PACIFIST

IT WAS ANOTHER TIME, another space, another continuum.


Warren Casey called, “Boy! You’re Fredric McGivern, aren’t you?”


The lad stopped and frowned in puzzlement. “Well, yes, sir.” He was a youngster of about nine. A bit plump,
particularly about the face.


Warren Casey said, “Come along, son. I’ve been sent to pick you up.”


The boy saw a man in his mid-thirties, a certain dynamic quality behind the facial weariness. He wore a
uniform with which young McGivern was not familiar, but which looked reassuring.


“Me, sir?” the boy said. “You’ve been sent to pick me up?”


“That’s right, son. Get into the car and I’ll tell you all about it.”


“But my father said . . .”


“Your father sent me, son. Senator McGivern. Now, come along or he’ll be angry.”


“Are you sure?” Still frowning, Fredric McGivern climbed into the helio-car. In seconds it had bounded into
the second level and then the first, to speed off to the southwest.


It was more than an hour before the kidnapping was discovered.
Warren Casey swooped in, dropped two levels precipitately and brought the helio-car down in so dainty a
landing that there was no perceptible touch of air cushion to garage top.


He fingered a switch with his left hand, even as be brought his right out of his jacket holding a badly
bummed-out pipe. While the garage’s elevator sunk into the recess below, he was loading the aged briar from
an equally ancient pouch.