The Best of L. Sprague de Camp
- Автор: Де Камп Лайон Спрэг
- Год: 1978
- Язык: английский
- Год: Del Rey / Ballantine
- ISBN: 0-345-25474-0
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Best of L. Sprague de Camp». Краткое содержание книги:
When the lights came on, there was a yell and a command in an unknown language. The slate smashed down on Dan Pringle's head. While he stood blinking, glasses dangling from one ear and the frame of the slate around his neck, other articles went sailing at him. He stumbled over his overturned chair and bolted for the door. The articles followed.
When Pringle reached the street, pebbles began picking themselves up and throwing themselves after the mill owner. It took about three tries to get his range. Then a pebble no bigger than the end of one's thumb, travelling with air-rifle speed, hit the back of his thigh with a flat spat. Pringle yelled, staggered, and kept running. Another glanced off his scalp, drawing blood and making him see stars.
The inhabitants of Gahato were entertained by the unprecedented sight of their leading businessman panting down the main street and turning purple with effort. Every now and then there would be the sound of a pebble striking. Pringle would make a bucking jump and come down running harder than ever.
His eye caught a glimpse of Virgil Hathaway letting himself into his shop, and a faint memory of silly talk about the Indian's supernatural powers stirred his mind. He banked and galloped up the porch steps of Soaring Turtle's establishment just as Hathaway closed the screen door behind him. Pringle went through the door without bothering to reopen it.
"Jeepers Cripus!" exclaimed Hathaway mildly. "What be the matter, Dan?"
"L-l-isten, Virgil! Are you a medicine man?"
"Aw, don't pay no attention to superstitious talk like that—"
"But I gotta have help! They're after me!" And he told all.
"Well!" said Hathaway doubtfully. "I'll see what I can do. But they're Iroquois spooks, and don't think much of us Algonquins. Got some tobacco? All right, pull down the shades."
Hathaway took Pringle's tobacco pouch and opened his shattered screen door. He threw a pinch of tobacco into the dark and chanted in bad Seneca:
All eight Gahunga imps materialized on the lawn. Hathaway sternly ordered them to come inside. When they were in, he questioned them:
"What have you little twerps been up to now?"
Gaga squirmed. "We was only trying to do Miss Scott a favor," he said. "She wants to put on a good spook show. So we help. She don't like this old punkin Pringle. All right, we throw a scare into him. We wasn't going to hurt him none."
"You know you was let come up here for your vacations only if you didn't use your stone-throwing powers," Hathaway said. "And you know what Eitsinoha does to little imps who don't behave."
"Eitsinoha?" cried Gaga. "You wouldn't tell her!"
"Dunno, yet. You deserve it."
"Please, mister, don't say nothing! We won't throw even a sand-grain! I swear by Iuskeha! Let us go, and we'll head right back to Cattaraugus!"
Hathaway turned to the quivering Pringle. "Changed your mind about raising my rent, Dan?"
"I'll lower it! Five Dollars!"
"Ten?"
"Seven and a half!"
"Okay. Gaga, you and your boys can disappear. But stick around. And don't do anything, understand, unless I tell you to." The Gahunga vanished.
Pringle recovered some of his usual self-assurance and said:
"Thanks, Virgil! Don't know what I'd have done without you."
"That's all right, Dan. You better not say anything about this, though. Remember, being a medicine man is a kind of joke among us Indians, like being the High Exalted Potentate of one of those there lodges."
"I understand. So they were doing her a favor, huh? It would be bad enough to have my son marry a phony medium, but I can see where a real one would be worse. No sale, and you can tell her I said so. And Harvey'll do what I say, because he has to in order to eat."
"But—" said Hathaway. He wanted to defend Barbara Scott; to tell Pringle that even if she was a crooked medium in a mild way, she was still better than that no-count son of his.
"What?" said Pringle.
"Nahthing." Hathaway reconsidered; everything was working out fine. Barbara would get over her crush on that big loafer, finish her college, and be able to drop the medium racket. Why stir things up? "Goodnight, Dan."
He hadn't done badly, thought Hathaway as he locked up, considering that he had only been in the medicineman business a couple of days. He must take a trip out to Tonawanda in the fall and look up Charlie Catfish. Maybe the thing had commercial possibilities.
THE INSPECTOR'S TEETH
A.D. 2054-2088
WORLD MANAGER CHAGAS sat waiting for the Osirian ambassador, mentally practicing the brisk handshake and the glassy smile. Across the conference table the First Assistant to the Manager, chainsmoked, while the Minister of External Affairs, Evans, filed his nails. Although the faint rasp annoyed Chagas, he gave no sign, imperturbability being one of the qualities for which he was paid. The indirect lighting threw soft highlights from the silver skullcaps covering the shaven crania of the three.
Chagas said: "I shall be glad when I can let my hair grow again like a civilized man."
"My dear Chagas," said Wu, "with the hair you have, I don't see what difference it makes."
Evans put away his nail file and said: "Gentlemen, when I was a kid a century ago, I wondered what it would be like to be on the inside of a great historical moment. Now I'm in on one, I find it queer I'm the same old Jefferson Evans, and not Napoleon or Caesar." He looked at his nails. "Wish we knew more Osirian psychology ..."
Wu said: "Don't start that Neo-Paretan nonsense again about Osirians being guided by sentiments, so we need only know which one to play on, like pressing a button. Osirians are rational people; would have to be to invent space travel independently of us. Therefore will be guided by their economic interests alone."
"Neo-Marxist tapioca!" snapped Evans. "Sure, they're rational, but also sentimental and capricious like us. There's no contradiction—"
"But there is!" said Wu excitedly. "Environment makes the man, and not the contrary."
"Do not start that, I beg," said Chagas. "This is too important to get your systems full of adrenalin over theory. Thank God I am a plain man who tries to do his duty and does not worry about sociological theories. If he takes our terms, the Althing will ratify the treaty and we shall have an Interplanetary Council to keep peace. If he insists on the terms we privately think he is entitled to, the Althing will not ratify. Then we shall have separate sovereignties, and it will be the history of our poor Earth all over again."
"You borrow trouble, chief," said Wu. "There are no serious disputes between our system and the Procyonic. Even if there were, there is no economic advantage to a war at such distance, even though Osirians have capitalistic economy like Evans's country."
"Who said wars are always fought for economic advantage?" said Evans. "Ever hear of the Crusades? Or the war that was fought over one pig?"
Wu said: "You mean the war some sentimental historian without grasp of social and economic factors thought was fought for pig—"
"Stop it!" said Chagas.