and  cut blood vessels.
It could wound deeply, even kill. True, we were  in the same situation,  but
our skills differed. The blades  of our swords  struck in the same way,  our
shirts both freely opened up our bodies to  the opponent. But my tight short
sports  shirt  couldn't  match his  white  silken  shirt, like the one  Paul
Scofield played Hamlet in.
     We  crossed  swords.  I  recalled yet  another one of  my  instructor's
warning:  do not  attack too  soon, not until your opponent has  just for an
instant lost his feeling of distance. Wait until he  opens up. But Bonnville
did not open up.  His sword  buzzed around  my  chest like a wasp, ready  to
sting. But I retreated and parried blow after blow. What luck that he fought
with his left hand, I anticipated all his movements.
     Bonnville was obviously reading my thoughts.
     "With my left all I can do is stitch boots," he  said. "Would  you like
to see my right?"
     He took his arm out of the sling and tossed the sword over to his other
hand. Its blade flashed, knocked mine aside and hit me in the chest.
     "That's  the way  it's  done,"  he boasted, but  did not  have  time to
continue.
     Somebody, unseen, reminded him:
     "Use your left, Bonnville, your left! Take away the right!"
     Bonnville  obediently  switched  hands. The  red  spot on  my chest was
spreading.
     "Bandage it," said Bonnville.
     I was stripped of my  shirt and my shoulder was bandaged. It was not  a
deep  wound but  a  lot of blood was flowing. I flexed and extended my right
arm: there was no pain. I could still play for time.
     "Where did you study?" asked Bonnville. "In Italy?"
     "Why? What makes you  think  so?" "Your  defence  is very much like the
Italian way. But that will not help you."
     I  laughed and almost  let him  pass, for he was waiting for me  on the
right.  I  hardly  had  time  to back down,  his sword  only  slid along  my
shoulder. I parried it upwards and, in my turn, dealt
     a blow.
     "Well done," he said.
     "There's blood on your hand."
     "Nothing to worry about."
     His sword again whirled  about me. I parried, retreated, and my fingers
gripping the handle felt like ice.  I repeated  to myself, "Don't  fall, the
main thing is not to fall, don't fall!"
     "Don't drag it  out, Bonnville,"  said the  invisible voice, "there are
not going to be any retakes."
     "There  won't be anything,"  Bonnville replied, retreating  a  bit  and
giving me a breathing spell. "I can't get him with my left."
     "Then  he'll  get you. I'll change  the  plot. But you are a  superman,
Bonnville. That's the way I have devised you. Act! Courage, man!"
     Bonnville again stepped towards me.
     "So there was a conversation," I said with a snigger.
     "What conversation?"
     This was again a robot that forgot everything with the exception of his
ultra-task. Suddenly I felt a wall at my back. There was no room for further
retreat. "The end," I thought to myself helplessly.
     His sword again caught mine, flashed back  and then ran into my neck. I
did not feel  any  pain,  but something gurgled in my  throat. My knees gave
way, I fell on my sword, but it slipped  from my hands. The last I heard was
an exclamation as if from another world:
     "That's it."



         * PART FOUR. CONTACT ESTABLISHED!




        Chapter XXIV. AWAKENING



     What followed  I saw as fragments,  a disconnected sequence of nebulous
white patterns. The white spot  of the ceiling  above me,  white curtains at
the  windows that did not darken  the  room, and white sheets at my chin. In
this whiteness I  suddenly recognized some sort of nickel-plated cylindrical
surfaces, long tubes that coiled like snakes, and some faces bent over me.
     "He's conscious," I heard.
     "I see. Anesthesia."
     "Everything's ready, Professor."
     All this conversation was in French, fast French  that penetrated to my
consciousness  or  skimmed  across  a  chaos  of obscure  coded terms.  Then
everything  was blanked  out-light, thoughts, everything-then  again a fresh
awakening in white.  Again unfamiliar faces bent over me,  polished surfaces
of scissors or a spoon, a wrist-watch  or a needle. At times the nickel gave
way to the  transparent  yellow  of rubber gloves or  the rosy sterility  of
hands with close-cut nails. All of this lasted only a short time, then again
dropped  into  darkness where there  was no  space, no time, only  the black
vacuum of sleep.
     Then the  pictures gradually straightened out as if someone at controls
were  bringing them  into focus.  The peaked strict face of the professor in
white cap faded into a still more drawn face of the nurse in white headgear.
I  was  fed  broth and juices, my  throat was swathed and I was told not  to
talk.
     Somehow, however, I got out the words:
     "Where am I?"
     Rough hands of the nurse clamped down on my lips.
     "Silence. You  are  in  the clinic  of Professor Peletier. Take care of
your throat. Do not talk."
     Once, a very familiar  face bent down towards me with tinted glasses in
gold frames on.
     "You?" I exclaimed and did not  recognize  my own voice, neither hoarse
nor the scream of a bird.
     "Tss.. .." And she too covered my mouth, but so carefully, so  lightly.
"Everything's  all right, my love. You  are getting well but  you  must  not
speak yet.  Be silent  and wait. I will  return soon, very  soon.  Now go to
sleep."
     I slept, and woke up again, and I felt my throat become freer,  I could
taste the broth they gave me; then again the jab of a needle, again the dark
emptiness until finally I woke up for  good. I could speak, yell, sing-and I
knew it, there wasn't even any bandage.
     "What is  your name?" I asked my usually stern-faced guest in the white
cap.
     "Sister Therese."
     "Are you a nun?"
     "We are all nuns in this clinic."
     She  did not  stop me from  yelling  "hurrah", and I asked her  without
hidden guile, "So the Professor is catholic, isn't he?"
     "The Professor will burn in hell," she replied without a smile, "but he
knows that we are the most skilled nurses. That is our vow."
     "I'll probably burn in hell too," I thought and so changed the subject.
     "How long have I been in the clinic?"
     "This is the second week after the operation."
     "So he's an atheist?" I sniggered.
     She sighed, "These are all the affairs of God."
     "And the rose clouds too?"
     "In the Encyclical  of His  Holiness they are proclaimed to be made  by
human hands. The  creation of  our brethren  of  the Universe created in the
image of God."
     I  saw that His Holiness had given way to the lesser evil, casting  his
lot with the anthropocentric hypothesis. That was the only  way out for  the
Christian world. But for  science? What hypothesis did the  Congress uphold?
And why is it that I still don't know anything about this matter?
     "Is  this  a hospital or a jail?" I raged. "And  why am I being starved
with sleep?"
     "Not starved but treated. This is sleep therapy."
     "Aren't there any newspapers around here? Why can't I have something to
read?"
     "Complete cut-off from the outside world is also part of the treatment.
When the course of treatment is over, you'll have all the papers you want."
     "And when will that be?"
     "As soon as you are well."
     "And when.. .."
     "Ask the Professor."
     In a way, this was funny, but I wasn't getting anywhere so I decided an
attack from the flank.
     "Well, I certainly am much better, don't you think so?"
     "Yes, definitely."
     "Then, why am I not allowed visitors? Or have I been forgotten?'
     You have to be a nun to stand up to a patient like that. Sister Therese
withstood it all,  except once. Something like a smile even  ran  across her
imperturbable lips.
     "Today is visitor's day. It begins in. .." and she looked at her watch,
whose reflections I had  seen so many times during  my  awakenings, "in  ten
minutes."
     I  got through those ten minutes as  submissive as a lamb.  I was  even
allowed to  sit  up in bed  and  talk without looking at the clock, my vocal
chords had healed completely. But Irene said:
     "I'll do the talking, you ask questions."
     But  I didn't want  to ask anything, I just wanted to  repeat "dearest,
dearest, dearest" .... It was funny how it all happened: no explanations, no
sighing, no hints, no play. The whole preparatory work was carried out by my
opponent Bonnville-Mongeusseau. I wonder whether Irene knew about that. Yes,
it turned  out, she did. She got  it all from Zernov. She herself during all
this time  was in  a  kind  of trance,  a dream yet not  a dream, a complete
blot-out  of all memory. She  woke up, it  was  morning, drowsiness. She was
drowsy, didn't want to get up.
     "And you  meanwhile were  bleeding  to  death in Zernov's  room  at the
hotel. Luckily he got here in time, you were still breathing."
     "Where did he come from?"
     "From  below,  from the  hall.  He  himself  had  been  knocked  almost
unconscious,  his whole body was beaten up. Miracles! Almost as  if  you had
come back from the crusades."
     "Must  have been  somewhat later.  The sixteenth  century,  I  believe.
Swords without sheaths, and slender blades fast as lightning!"
     "Why? Did you fight? You're some musketeer! You have to know how!"
     "We  were taught a  bit  in the  institute, movie  people  have to know
everything. That's when it came in handy."
     "Very helpful on the operating table."
     "But I was ambushed. Behind was a wall, a ditch on one side. And he was
good!"
     "Who was this?"
     "Mongeusseau. Try standing up to an Olympic champion. Remember the  guy
with the eye patch at the table d'hote?"
     Irene was not surprised.
     "He's here in the hotel right now  too. And he's together with Carresi.
Incidentally,  I  took him for a  movie actor,  for  some  reason. With  the
exception of us, these two are the only guests that  did not leave the hotel
after  that night.  Boy, that was some panic! And the doorman even committed
suicide, he hanged himself."
     "Which one?" I exclaimed.
     "That one, the baldheaded one."
     "Etienne?" I asked to make sure. "Why?"
     "Nobody knows. He didn't even leave a note. But I think Zernov has some
suspicions."
     "Marvellous," I exclaimed, "A dog's death for a dog."
     "You have suspicions too?"
     "I don't suppose anything, I know!"
     "What?"
     "It'd take a long time to tell. Not now."
     "Why are you hiding things from me?"
     "Certain  things  need not  be revealed  now. You'll  learn about  them
later. Don't  be offended, it's for the best. Now  tell me what  happened to
Lange. Where is he?"
     "He's left. It seems he's left Paris for good. He got into some kind of
a  fix  too."  She  laughed.  "Martin  for  some  reason put  him  through a
meat-grinder,  you wouldn't recognize him now. At least not during the first
few days. There was talk it'd develop into a diplomatic scandal, but nothing
happened. The  West Germans were quiet as mice. Martin's an American and the
right hand  of  Thompson. Local Ribbentropites find that too hard  a nut  to
crack. Then  Lange himself all of a  sudden relinquished all claims. He said
you couldn't deal with a madman. Newsmen attacked Martin for  an explanation
and he served up  whiskey  and reported that Lange wanted to get the Russian
girl  away from him. He meant  me. A  lot  of fun and laughter  but  there's
something  mysterious  behind  it all. Martin  has  now  left  together with
Thompson. Don't look so surprised. That's  a  long story  to tell too.  I've
collected all the paper clippings, you  can  read  them. There's also a note
for you from Martin, but not a word about the fight. But I think that Zernov
knows something on  that  score. Yes, tomorrow he's  speaking at the plenary
session. All the reporters are waiting like  sharks, and he keeps putting it
off. All because  of you, incidentally. He  wants  to have a talk  with  you
first. Right now. Surprised again? Really, I mean it, right now."
     Zernov appeared as  fast as they do in movies. He wasn't  alone. He was
accompanied  by Carresi and Mongeusseau. He couldn't have produced a greater
effect.  I opened  my mouth  as  I  recognized Mongeusseau and did  not even
respond to their greetings.
     "He recognizes you," said Zernov to his companions in English. "And you
wouldn't believe it."
     Then I went  off the handle; luckily it was easier to go off the handle
in any other language except Russian.
     "I have not gone mad nor have I lost any of my memory. It would be hard
to forget the sword that cut my throat."
     "And you remember the sword?" asked Carresi, for some reason overjoyed.
     "It's the last thing I'll forget."
     "And your own?" Carresi even rose to his feet, he was so excited. "From
Milan, a steel snake at the guard coiled round the handle, remember?"
     "Let  him  remember," I said maliciously,  nodding in the  direction of
Mongeusseau.
     The latter did not seem offended, nor was he embarrassed in the least.
     "I've  had   it  since   1960.  The  prize  of  Toulouse,"  he  replied
phlegmatically.
     "That's where I remember it from. Both the blade and the snake," put in
Carresi again.
     But Mongeusseau was not listening.
     "How  long did you last?" he asked, looking at me with interest for the
first time. "One minute, two minutes?"
     "More," I said. "You were fighting with your left hand."
     "Makes no difference. My left is much weaker, hasn't the lightness that
is  needed. But in  training...."  For some reason,  he  did  not finish the
sentence  and  changed his  tone  of  voice: "I  know  your  swordsmen, I've
encountered them in contests,  but I don't remember you.  You  weren't taken
off the team, were you?"
     "I gave up fencing," I said; I didn't want to let him know too much. "I
gave it up a long time ago."
     "Too bad," he said slowly and looked at Carresi.
     I never found out  what he was sorry about: about my losing interest in
swordplay or that his fight with  me took him more than two precious minutes
of the champion's time. Carresi noticed my perplexed look and laughed:
     "Gaston wasn't present at the fight."
     "What do  you  mean, wasn't there?" I asked  in astonishment.  "Who was
then?"
     I  cautiously  ran my fingers over the slanting healed  slit across  my
throat.
     "Blame me," said Carresi in confusion. "I thought the whole thing up at
home lying on my couch. Gaston, who was synthesized and given an identically
synthesized  sword,  is the  fruit  of my imagination. How  it was  done,  I
certainly  do not understand. But the real honest to  God Gas-ton never even
touched you. So don't be angry."
     "Honestly, I  don't  even  remember  you  at  the table  dhoti,"  added
Mongeusseau.
     "False life," Zernov  reminded me of our talk on the stairs. "I allowed
for  modelling  of  suppositions  or  imagined situations," he explained  to
Carresi.
     "And  I didn't  allow for anything," Carresi objected  impatiently.  "I
didn't  want to have anything to do with that world-wide scandal. At first I
simply refused to  believe  it, like  those flying saucers,  then I saw your
film and was petrified:  that was it! For a whole week I could not  think of
one single thing except that. Then I got used to the idea, like you get used
to something unusual and quite  far-fetched but repeated a sufficient number
of  times. Professional interests took me away from  common sense and a good
heart: even on the eve of the Congress I  could  think of  nothing except my
new picture. I wanted to revive an historical film, not Hollywood  syrup and
not a museum  piece,  but something re-evaluated  by  the  eyes and minds of
people of  today. I chose the age, the heroes and, as you people put it, the
socio-historical  background.  Then at  the restaurant  I found a 'star' and
convinced him. There  was only one thing he didn't  like: fighting  with his
left  hand. But,  you see,  that was my lookout, strange as  it  may seem. I
remember  him  at fencing  contests. The sword in his right hand-it would be
too  professional,  he wouldn't be able to enter  the image. Now in the left
hand, he was a God!  There  were threats and mistakes and anger with himself
and a miracle of naturalness. I convinced him. We parted. Then I lay down in
my hotel room, thinking. A red light bothered me. The hell with it, I closed
my  eyes. And I imagined the whole  scene, the road high above the  sea, the
rocks,  the  vineyards, the  white wall  of  the Count's park. And then this
craziness: the hirelings of Gaston-he's Bonnville in the play-stop some bums
on the road.  Well, not bums,  tourists, if you like, outsiders, in a  word.
The age is changed and the  plot too. I want to  throw them out but I can't,
they're just stuck there. So then I  switch round and include them too. This
produces a new plot,  very original: say, the bums are wandering actors. Now
Gaston,  quite naturally, at home is thinking about the film, not  about the
plot but about  himself, his dilemma of fighting either with his left or his
right. Mentally,  I get into an argument  with him: I get  excited,  try  to
convince him, then demand subordination. Period!"
     "I saw  that,"  I recalled. "A pile of crimson foam near the road,  and
then you stepped out like a devil from a box."
     Carresi  closed his  eyes,  obviously trying to visualize  what  he had
heard and was again pleased.
     "Now  that's an idea! A marvellous angle for  the  plot. Let's  restore
everything that happened and exactly the way  it occurred. In  short, do you
want to play together with Gaston?"
     "Thanks a lot," I said hoarsely, "I don't want to die a second time."
     Mongeusseau smiled politely but with a certain amount of guile.
     "In your place, I would refuse too. But drop in to see me on Rivoli for
a friendly  visit. We'll cross  swords. Don't be  afraid,  they're  only for
training. Everything according  to regulations, outfit and masks. I  want to
try you out a bit, and find out how you stood up so long. I'll work with  my
left on purpose."
     "Thanks," I repeated, but knew that I would never again see him.




        Chapter XXV. ASSIGNMENT: GREENLAND



     When the producer and the  swordsman had left, a  strange uncomfortable
silence  set  in. I contained  myself  with  difficulty exasperated by  this
unneeded visit. Zernov laughed, waiting to find out what I would say. Irene,
noticing at once the import of the pause, remained silent as well.
     "Angry?" asked Zernov.
     "Positively,"  I  said.  "You  think  it's  fun  being  polite to  that
murderer?"
     "Mongeusseau  is  not  to blame,  even indirectly,"  Zernov  continued.
"That's what I have just figured out."
     "Presumption of innocence," I taunted.
     He did not respond.
     "It's my  fault,  I got you two together on purpose, don't be angry.  I
wanted to correlate the model with the source. For  my paper I had to have a
perfect  check  on  what  was modelled,  whose  psyche.  And  what  is  more
important-the memory or imagination. Now I know. They have dipped into both.
The other  one simply  wanted  to go to sleep, probably going over Carresi's
proposition lazily: not too  much  work, it  would  seem, and the pay not so
bad. But  Carresi created, he was the  one who  contrived the conflicts, the
dramatic  situations, in  a word,  the illusion of real  life.  It  was  the
illusion that they modelled. And rather exactly, incidentally. Remember  the
landscape?  Vineyards  on  the  background  of the sea.  More exact  than  a
photograph."
     I involuntarily touched my throat.
     "And this? Another illusion?"
     "That's  an accident. While  experimenting  they probably  did not even
realize that it was dangerous."
     "I don't  get it,"  Irene  interrupted,  continuing her  own  thoughts,
"there  must be something else  to  all this, and not life.  Biologically it
can't  be  life, even  if  it  reproduces life.  Life  can't be made  out of
nothing."
     "Why out of nothing? They probably have some sort of building material,
a kind of primary matter of life."
     "The red fog?"
     "Perhaps. So  far  nobody  has  found any explanation, nobody has  even
advanced  a  hypothesis,"  Zernov  sighed. "Don't expect hypotheses tomorrow
from  me  either. I'm  simply  going to express  a  supposition  of what  is
modelled and why. As to how it is done-that's beyond me.. .."
     I laughed.
     "Somebody will get to an explanation. Live and see."
     "Where?"
     "Where do you think? At the Congress naturally."
     "You won't see anyone."
     Zernov smoothed his straight light  hair.  He  always did  that  before
saying something unpleasant.
     "It won't  work,"  I  said maliciously.  "You won't  hold me here.  I'm
well."
     "I know. The day  after  tomorrow  you will be discharged.  And  in the
evening you can pack your suitcases."
     He said it so firmly and decisively that I jumped up out of bed.
     "A recall?"
     "No."
     "So it's to Mirny again?"
     "And not to Mirny either."
     "Then where to?"
     Zernov was silent, smiling, he gave a quick sidelong glance at Irene.
     "Suppose I don't agree?" I said.
     "You'll agree. You'll be all too eager.  In  fact,  you'll grab at  the
chance."
     "Come on, Boris Arkadievich. Where to?"
     "Greenland."
     My  face obviously spelled  such  disappointment that Irene  burst  out
laughing.
     "He doesn't jump, Irene".
     "No, he doesn't."
     I lay back on purpose.
     "There's no dope to make me jump. But why to Greenland?"
     "There'll be dope enough," said Zernov and winked at Irene.
     Irene, imitating the TV news announcer, began:
     "Copenhagen. Our special  correspondent reports that pilot observers of
the  United  States  polar station  at Soenre Stremfiorde  (Greenland)  have
detected  a curious  artificial or  natural phenomenon  to  the north of the
seventy-second parallel  of latitude,  in the  area of Simpson's expedition.
..."
     I rose up on my pillows.
     "..  .over  an  extensive  ice-covered  plateau,   blue  kilometre-long
protuberances have  been  observed. Something in the nature of  a diminished
Aurora Borealis, only  along an enormous  ellipse in  a close  band of  blue
fire. The tongues of  flame  merge roughly at  an altitude of  one kilometre
forming  the  surface of an  immense octahedron. That's it,  isn't it, Boris
Arkadievich?"
     I fell back on the bed.
     "Now are you ready to jump, Anokhin?"
     "I seem to be ready."
     "Now listen. Reports of this 'aurora' have appeared in  all the papers.
The octahedron  shines for hundreds of kilometres.  It cannot be  approached
either on  foot  or on tractor:  our  familiar  invisible wall  repulses all
oncomers. Aircraft have been unable to come down from above, they are turned
aside. The suspicion is that  this  is  a powerful field of  force that  the
space beings have set up. Now do you jump?"
     "Definitely.  Boris  Arkadievich,  that   means  they  are  already  in
Greenland."
     "Have been for some time. But deep in  the interior of the plateau they
seem to have something new. Fire, yet instruments nearby do not register the
slightest increase in temperature. Neither is there any  rise in atmospheric
pressure or  in ionization. Radio communications are  not interrupted even a
few metres  away from  the  protuberances.  Geiger counters are suspiciously
silent. Strange camouflage, rather like a kid's  kaleidoscope.  The flashing
of broken glass and that's all. The photos we have don't seem to make sense.
A  clear sky on a sunny day  reflected  in enormous crystalline facets of  a
crystal. But the  'horsemen' go  through like birds into a cloud.  But  real
birds  bounce  back  like  tennis balls. Attempts  were  made  with pigeons,
complete failure."
     I was  bitterly jealous of  my colleagues for getting in to  shoot that
scene!
     Zernov was not so elated, he thought there might be great danger in the
whole  affair. He said: "You  know what the activities around this thing are
now called?  'Operation T' after  our friend Thompson. He himself says  that
this is  a  personal search for contact. He says that  before he took  over,
everything  had  been  tried,  and  in  vain:  light signals,  radio  waves,
mathematical  codes,  and all manner of figures traced in  the  sky  by  jet
planes.  The horsemen refuse to respond. But he says he'll  make contact. So
far  nobody knows  with  what  media,  and  he  isn't  communicative either.
However,  the core  of the expedition has  already been  formed and has been
sent to Upernivik. That's  where the  Greenland expedition  of  Koch-Wegener
started out from in 1913. They are supported by  a cargo-passenger aircraft,
a  helicopter  borrowed  from  the  Tutie base,  two  tracked  vehicles  and
aerosleighs. Not so badly equipped, as you can see."
     I still couldn't make out what sort of contact Thompson could expect to
make with the aid of helicopter and aerosleigh. Zernov smiled enigmatically.
     "The  news boys  don't  either.  But  Thompson is no  fool.  He  didn't
corroborate a single statement attributed to him by the press concerning the
aims of  the expedition or the means with  which  they hope  to attain them.
Queried by journalists, not a single firm  supplying him with equipment  and
gear has  responded. He has been asked whether he is taking along tanks with
gas of an  unknown composition.  Other questions: What  are  the instruments
recently loaded onto a vessel at Copenhagen  to be used for? Does  he intend
to  explode, drill  or break  into the force field of the extra-earth-lings?
His reply  is that the equipment  of his expedition  was checked by  customs
officials and that nothing  was found  to violate the  rules for bringing it
into  Greenland. He knows nothing, he insists, about any special instruments
that were said to have been loaded at Copenhagen. The aims of the expedition
are scientific-research and he's going to count his chicks when they hatch."
     "Where does he get the money?"
     "Don't know? There's no big money here, even the 'mad men' of  politics
aren't ready to place big sums at his disposal. He's not fighting communists
or  Negroes. Of  course, somebody is  financing the  thing, without a doubt.
Some newspaper syndicate  they say.  Like Stanley's  expedition to Africa. A
sensational piece is playing, why not risk it."
     I wanted to know whether his expedition was connected with some kind of
decision or recommendation of the Congress.
     "He's  broken with  the  Congress," Zernov explained.  "Even  before it
started he announced in the press that he does not consider himself bound by
its future  resolutions.  By the  way,  you don't even  know  what  happened
there."
     That  was so, I didn't know what had happened at the Congress. I didn't
even know that it had taken  place at the very time that I was being removed
from the operating table to my post-operative ward.
     After the Security Council of the United Nations refused to discuss the
phenomenon of the rose clouds prior to a  resolution of the Paris  Congress,
correctly taking the view that the first word should come from  science, the
atmosphere around the Congress became extremely heated.
     It opened up like a world football championship. Trumpets, flags of the
nations, greetings from all scientific associations of the world.  True, the
wiser ones  kept  quiet while the less  cautious participants  came out with
statements  that the mystery of  the rose  clouds would be clarified in  the
near future.  Of  course,  there  was no  discovery  of any kind,  with  the
possible   exception  of  Academician  Osovets'  report.  He  advanced   and
substantiated the thesis  that  the visitors  were peace-loving  beings from
space, and this set the  course for  other scientists. Pieces of wisdom were
bandied about.  Zernov  told  roe  some  of  them  with  hardly  containable
disappointment. Opinions collided and hypotheses  rose and fell. Some of the
conferees even took the 'clouds' to be varieties of flying saucers.
     "Yuri, if you only knew how many dopes there are in science, people who
have long  since  lost  the  right to  be called scientists!"  said  Zernov.
"Naturally,  there   were   some  well-thought-out  speeches,  and  original
hypotheses, some  bold conjectures.  But Thompson left after the very  first
meetings. 'A thousand shy oldsters won't cook  up anything worth while,'  he
said to waiting newspaper men."
     Out of the  entire Congress, he invited  to this expedition only Zernov
together with the crew of the 'Kharkovchanka' and Irene. "We began together,
we'll continue together," said Zernov.
     "I didn't begin," interrupted Irene.
     "But you continued."
     "Where?"
     "On that same night in the hotel Homond."
     "I don't get it."
     "Ask Anokhin. He'll tell you a thing or two."
     "About what?" Irene was concerned.
     "That you are  not you  but your model created by the  'clouds' on that
ill-fated night."
     "Quit joking, Boris Arkadievich."
     "I'm not joking. Simply Anokhin and Martin saw you in St. Disier."
     "Not her," I put in, "you've forgotten."
     "I haven't forgotten, but I figured it would be better not to tell."
     A nervous extended pause set in. Irene took off her  glasses, collapsed
the bows automatically and again opened them-the first sign of nerves.
     "Now I understand," she said accusingly to Zernov, "that you and Martin
were hiding something from me. What was it?"
     Zernov evaded the question this time as well.
     "Let Anokhin tell you. We believe that he is the  only one  who has the
right to tell you."
     I  replied to Zernov  with  a  glance the  force of  a sword stroke  by
Bonnville. Irene turned to him, then to me in a state of complete confusion.
     "Is that true, Yuri?"
     "Yes, it is," I sighed and said nothing.
     To  tell her what had happened in the officer's casino in  St. Disier I
had to be alone with her, not here.
     "Something unpleasant?"
     Zernov  smiled. The pause  continued. I was really pleased  to hear the
familiar creak of the door.
     "The most unpleasant thing is to begin right now," I said and nodded in
the  direction of  the  opening door,  through which my angel in white  with
hypodermic needle  in hand was coming. "This is part  of  the treatment that
even friends are not supposed to view."
     And  the curative  therapy of  Professor Peletier again pushed  me down
into the abyss of sleep.




        Chapter XXVI. THE CONGRESS



     I woke up the next morning, promptly recalled everything and got mad as
hell: I still  had another day in  the  hospital. The appearance of my white
angel with a wheeled table containing my breakfast did not console me in the
least.
     "Turn on the radio."
     "We have no radio here."
     "Then get me a transistor set."
     "Out of the question."
     "Why?"
     "Everything is prohibited that can interfere with the normal well-being
of a convalescent patient."
     "I'm already well."
     "You will know about that only tomorrow morning."
     The white angel was fast turning into a demon.
     "But I've  got to  know what is taking place at the Congress. Zernov is
speaking. Don't you understand? Zernov!"
     "I do not know Monsieur Zernov."
     She handed me a folder in red morocco.
     "What's this?"
     "Newspaper  clippings   that  Mademoiselle  Irene  left  for  you.  The
Professor allowed them."
     That was bread for a person starving from lack of information. I opened
the folder, forgetting about breakfast and listened. Yes, I listened.
     It was the voice of the world coming through to  me, through nickel and
glass, through the  white brick of the  hospital walls,  through the murk of
bottomless sleep and the beatitude of getting well. It was the voice of  the
Congress with the opening speech of Academician  Osovets that set the  right
course for a  reasonable  and consistent stand  of  humanity relative to the
visitors from space.
     "What is already clear?"  said  the Academician.  "That we are  dealing
with an extraterrestrial civilization, one  from  another planet.  That  its
technical and scientific level  far surpasses our own. That neither they nor
we have been able to establish contact with one another. And  also  that its
attitude towards us is friendly and peaceful. During these three months  the
visitors  have collected  and  transported out into space the ice of all the
continents and we  have not been  able to  intervene. What does  this action
spell for humanity?  Nothing  but  good.  Climatologlsts will establish  the
precise consequences of what has been done, but  even now  we can speak of a
considerable  amelioration in the climate of the polar and adjacent moderate
latitudes, about the mastering of vast  earlier  inaccessible areas and of a
free settling of the population of the world.  What is  more, the extraction
of  the terrestrial  ice was  accomplished without  geological catastrophes,
Hoods  or  other  natural calamities. Not  a  single  expedition or ship  or
scientific research station operating in these areas of glaciation suffered.
More, the  guests presented humanity, as a by-product, with newly discovered
riches that were soon located. In the foothills of the Yablonevy Range, they
discovered vast  deposits of copper ore,  in Yakutia fresh diamond deposits.
In the Antarctic they discovered oil and in their own way drilled and put up
rigs of a very peculiar design quite unfamiliar to any of us." He  concluded
in a  burst of  applause with the following words.  "I can say to  you  that
right now in Moscow an agreement is being signed among  interested countries
on the establishment of an industrial and trade stock company, with the code
name SJEAP, which stands for Society for the Joint Exploitation of Antarctic
Petroleum."
     Academician  Osovets also summarized  the  events  connected  with  the
spacelings'  modelling of  phenomena  in terrestrial life in which they were
interested. The list was so long that the  speaker did  not read it. It  was
simply issued as a printed supplement to the report. I will cite  only  what
was commented on by the journalists at Paris.
     In  addition to Sand City/the "horsemen" modelled a  resort town in the
Italian Alps,  the  French  beaches in  the morning, when they resemble  the
mating grounds of seals, the square of St.  Mark  in Venice and a portion of
the London underground railway. Passenger transport  systems attracted their
attention in many countries.  They dived into trains,  ocean and air liners,
police helicopters and even balloons participating in some  kind of sporting
contest at Brussels.
     In France they penetrated to some  kind of racing event at the Parisian
cycle racetrack, in San Francisco, it was a boxing match of heavyweights for
champion of the Pacific Coast,  in Lisbon, at a football game for the Cup of
European Champions  (the  players  later complained that the red fog  around
them was so thick that they  could not see the opponent's goal). The fog was
the same  during  the  games  of the  first  round at  the interzonal  chess
tournament in Zurich, and for two hours at the Government Cabinet meeting in
the South  African Republic, and for forty minutes the animals in the London
Zoo dined. The newspaper gibed that both events occurred on the same day and
that  in both  cases  the  fog did  not disperse either  the  beasts  or the
racists.
     The  Academician's list included  a  detailed  enumeration  of all  the
factories  and  plants  modelled  by   the  cosmic  visitors  completely  or
partially:  sometimes  a department,  or a  conveyor line,  or simply  a few
machines and tools characteristic  of a given type of  production and chosen
with unerring precision. Parisian journalists commenting this choice came to
some curious conclusions. Some said that the "clouds" were interested mostly
in outmoded  types  of machines that had not changed fundamentally over  the
past  century,  and  therefore least  comprehensible  to them,  such as  the
filigree working of precious stones or the designations of kitchen utensils.
Then  a  diamond-cutting  shop  in Amsterdam was  modelled and  a  primitive
manufactory of toys in Nuremberg.
     Other observers, commenting on the list of  Osovets, noted the interest
displayed in  services for  the  consumer. Wrote  the  correspondent  of the
"Paris-Midi":  "Have  you  noticed the  quantity  of  modelled  barbershops,
restaurants, fashion  houses and television studios? Note the attention paid
to the choice of shops, stores, market places, fairs and even  show windows.
And note the  variation  of modes of modelling. At times a "cloud" will dive
onto a site  and leave immediately before there is time for a natural  panic
to develop.  At  other times  the  cloud  envelopes  the  objective  slowly,
imperceptibly penetrating to every nook and cranny, and people do not notice
anything until the  density  of the gaseous cloud turns into visibility. And
even  then  there is  something  that  prevents  them  from  altering  their
customary  behaviour,  something  that represses  the mind  and will  power.
Nobody experienced fear: barbers cut hair,  clients leaf through illustrated
journals, movie cameramen  make takes  or conduct  TV  shows, the goalkeeper
snatches a difficult ball, and a  waiter  politely hands you the bill in the
restaurant.  Everything round about has become  red like  the light of a red
lamp, but you  continue  your activities,  only  later  realizing  what  has
occurred after the ''horsemen'  have passed beyond the horizon carrying with
them your live imagination. Most of the time you don't even have a chance to
see it: the cosmic visitors demonstrated it to humans only during the  first
experiments in  fixation  of  terrestrial life.  afterwards  everything  was
confined to films of red gas of varying consistency and tonality."
     "Nobody  has suffered  during all of this, and nobody has even  had any
material losses  of any kind,"  thus the  Academician summarized.  "With the
exception of a stool  that vanished together  with a double at a meeting  of
polar men at Mirny, and the automobile of pilot Martin who rashly left it in
the modelled  city,  no one can name a  single thing destroyed or damaged by
our  cosmic  friends. There was  talk of  a cycle  that was left by a  Czech
cyclist and disappeared near Prague during a race, but it was later found in
a parking lot during a rest period. Then there was an alpenstock  taken away
from a Swiss  guide,  Fred  Schomer, by his double who suddenly appeared  in
front of him  on  an Alpine pathway. But  Fred Schomer wrote  to the editors
saying  that nothing of the kind  had  taken place, that  firstly, he was so
frightened he threw it  away,  and  secondly, the same stick was returned to
him by the rose cloud that dived to the front door  of his house. All of the
other  cases  reported  in  the  press turned  out  to be  simply  the  idle
imaginings of self-styled 'victims' or of the newspaper men  themselves. The
rose clouds returned  to space without having done any harm to humanity  and
without taking anything with them except terrestrial ice and the conjectured
recordings  of terrestrial life  coded  in some fashion  in  red  fog. This,
incidentally,  is a  hypothesis that  has  not been proven  in  any  way  by
anybody."
     Academician Osovets' speech  met  the approval of far and away the bulk
of the delegates. I did not read Thompson's speech, it had found no support,
and actually the debate turned into an exchange  of queries and replies, not
in  the  least  polemical and  not even  very bold or  confident. There were
apprehensions for example that the peaceful nature of the newcomers was only
a manoeuvre and that they would return with quite different intentions.
     "What kind?" the Academician would like to know.
     "Aggressive."
     "With the technological  facilities at their disposal what  purpose  is
there in camouflage?"
     "But suppose it's reconnaissence?"
     "The very first encounters have demonstrated to them  the difference in
our technical potentials."
     "But have we shown them our potential?" Thompson asked.
     "They've modelled it already."
     "But we didn't even attempt to direct it against their attack."
     "How can you call that an attack?"
     "However, can you risk asserting that it will not follow?"
     "In support of my assertions  I  cited numerous  proven facts, while in
support of your contentions I hear only hypotheses."
     After that  ignominious discussion-that is,  for the  opponents of  the
Soviet Academician-the "doubters", as they were dubbed, fought  back in  the
commissions,  especially in  the Commission for  Contact and Conjecture that
soon  became  famous  for  its  tempestuous  sessions.  Here,  all manner of
hypotheses  were   advanced   and  straightway  venomously  countered.   One
discussion merged into  another,  very often gradually straying  farther and
farther from the original  topic. This continued until the electric  gong of
the chairman sounded. The  journalists did not even  work up  their notes or
inject any hyperbolas, all that was needed was to cite verbatim.
     I took at random one of the clippings and read:
     "PROFESSOR O'MELLY (Northern Ireland):
     I  suggest  an  amendment to  the  formulation  of  Professor  MacEdou:
ammonium and fluorine.
     PROFESSOR  MACEDOU (USA). I agree.  That was  mentioned  at  the  press
conference.
     PROFESSOR  TAINE  (Great  Britain). As  I  remember  it,  at the  press
conference it was suggested  that the rose clouds were  visitors from a cool
planet.  For  fluorine beings,  a temperature of minus  one  hundred degrees
would be only a pleasant frost. I do not want to  put  it  strongly but  any
first-year college student would be able to  correct the colleague  who made
that statement. The problem of fluorine proteins....
     VOICE FROM THE BACK OF THE AUDITORIUM. There's no such problem.
     TAINE. No, there  isn't, but there easily could be. The commission here
is one of conjectures and not scientific facts,
     VOICE FROM PRESS CENTRE. Boy, this is boring.
     TAINE.  Why don't you  go  to  a  variety show if  you  don't  like it?
Organo-fluorine compounds are activated only at  very high temperatures.  Or
has  my colleague forgotten  the difference between plus and minus? Fluorine
life is life based  on  a background  of sulphur  and  not water.  On  'hot'
planets, professor, and not cold planets.
     MACEDOU  (jumping  to his  feet).  Who's that  talking  about  water or
sulphur? Professor Dillinger, who  is absent, had in view hydrogen flouride.
I  am not  surprised that  he was  misunderstood by newspaper reporters, but
what surprises me is the incomprehension of  an outstanding scientist. It is
precisely  hydrogen  fluoride  or fluorine  oxide  that  can be the  'viable
solvent' at temperatures of not plus but minus one hundred and more degrees.
The rose clouds might also be visitors from a cold planet, gentlemen.
     VOICE FROM BACK OF AUDITORIUM (speaker hides behind the man in front of
him). At what  temperature, Professor, do they cut kilometre-thick layers of
ice?
     TAINE. Another point in favour of the hot planet.
     PROFESSOR GWINELLI (Italy). More  likely in favour of the hypothesis of
gas-plasma life.
     TAINE.  It is  difficult  to  believe  that  even  in  extraterrestrial
conditions gas could serve as a medium for biochemical reactions.
     GWINELLI [heatedly). What  about  the famous  experiments of Miller who
succeeded  in synthesizing elementary organic compounds in a gaseous medium?
And the  investigations of the Soviet  Academician Oparin? Carbon, nitrogen,
oxygen and hydrogen are to be found in any corner of the universe. And these
elements, in their turn, form compounds that carry us up the ladder of life,
including the jump from the nonliving to the living. Then why should  we not
conjecture that it is precisely in a  gaseous medium that a  life originated
that has risen to the heights of a supercivilization?
     CHAIRMAN. Can  you formulate  your  idea  within  the framework  of the
hypothesis?
     GWINELLI. Of course.
     CHAIRMAN. Let us hear Professor Gwinelli at our next session....
     VOICE  FROM BACK OF AUDITORIUM (interrupting)... and  Dr.  Schnellinger
who   is   now  in   Vienna.  He  has  a  well   worked  out  hypothesis  of
intercommunications of the cosmic beings, something in the nature of  direct
frequency modulation,  irradiation of ultrashortwave  impulses  and even the
possibility of telepathic transmission via gravitational waves... .
     LAUGHTER NEARBY. Nonsense!
     VOICE FROM BACK OF AUDITORIUM
     (persistently.)  Excuse  me for  any  inaccuracy in  the  formulations,
specialists will understand.
     Professor Janvier in black silk cap rises. He is the  oldest  professor
of the  famous French Poly-technical School. He holds on  to his hearing aid
and speaks into the microphone.
     JANVIER.   Esteemed   ladies   and   gentlemen.   I   would  leave  Dr.
Schnellinger's report until  we  have heard the  hypotheses about those with
whom we are dealing:  with living beings or highly organized biocybernetical
systems. In the former  instance, direct telepathic communications might  be
possible.
     "I am not  in  possession of them, but there are apprehensions that all
these hypotheses are simply ingenious fabrications," concluded  the Parisian
observer.  "The  number  of  hypotheses presented  at the  sessions  of  the
commission has already topped the hundred mark...."
     I  took another clipping from  another verbatim report, but chosen with
the  same  humorous intentions and  commented on in  the same  style. In the
third  one, the  author recalled  Gulliver and condescendingly pitied people
who could not be like Lilliputians  that do not concoct hypotheses. However,
after Zernov spoke, there was not a trace of any ironic condescension.  When
I opened up  the evening papers Irene brought me, their solidarity this time
was quite different.
     "Riddle solved!", "Russians Penetrate Mystery of Rose Clouds," "Anokhin
and  Zernov Establish  Contact  with  Visitors", "Soviets Again Surprise the
World". Such were the headlines on the story about the  conversion of modern
Paris  into  the  provincial  town  of  St.  Disier  of  the  time of  Nazis
occupation,  about the marvellous  materialization  of the movie  plots of a
famous producer and about my  clash with the  first swordsman of France. The
latter  was what  captivated  Paris  completely.  An  ordinary cameraman and
amateur fencer  crossed swords  with Mongeusseau himself. And  stayed alive,
that's what's important. That evening  Mongeusseau was interviewed  a number
of times and got his salary doubled for participation in the film. Newspaper
reporters squeezed Mongeusseau and Carresi dry  and then attacked Peletier's
clinic;  only the strict monastery regime there  relieved me  of yet another
press   conference.  Zernov  was  lucky.  Taking  advantage  of  the  ritual
accompanying  the opening and  closing of Congress sessions, he slipped away
and grabbed  the  first  available  taxi to get  out of  town  and  visit  a
communist Mayor, an acquaintance of his.
     I did not find anything new in his  report, which was  given  in detail
and with commentary. Everything had emerged clear-cut  from  our discussions
about what we had experienced. Yet the comment of even the most conservative
portion of the press was extremely flattering to us all.
     On the first page of the "Paris  Jour",  next to photographs of myself,
Zernov  and Martin, I read: "Two Russians and one  American lived  through a
fantastically  thrilling night  in  a Paris hotel, a night that recalled  to
life  all  the  nightmares  of  a  Gothic  novel.  By far not  every  person
instantaneously jerked out  of  the present world and plunged into the world
of materialized dreams and apparitions  extracted from the depths of someone
else's  memory would behave with such fearlessness,  orientation  in his new
surroundings and  reasonable  sequence of actions. This can  be said of  all
three participants of this fantastic Odyssey. But Zernov must be singled out
as the one who did the most. Boris Zernov was the first of the scientists of
the  world to  give the  only  possible  answer to the query that  has  been
exciting  thousands  of  millions of  people  on  this planet Earth: why the
visitors  ignore  our attempts at contact  and  they  themselves do not seek
communication  with  us. Zernov's  answer  is  that there is  a  far greater
difference between  our  physical  and  psychical life  and  theirs (perhaps
immeasurably greater)  than, say, between  the  organization, the biological
organization, and  the psychic make-up of a man and a bee. What would happen
if we attempted to contact bees-they with their media and we with ours? Then
is  contact possible between two still  more diversified forms of  life?  We
have not  found  it, they have. They need  not  have shown us the models  of
their  world, yet they did. Why? In  order to  get to  know our physical and
psychic reactions,  the nature and the depth of our thought  processes,  our
capacity for understanding and  evaluating their actions.  They chose worthy
Argonauts, but only Zernov proved to be Odysseus: he comprehended  the  gods
and out-tricked them."
     I  read  that  article with  such relish  that  Irene couldn't  contain
herself any longer and said:
     "I wanted to punish you for hiding  things. Well, okay, I'll show it to
you."
     And she showed me an opened cable from Umanak, Greenland.
     "PARIS.  Congress.  Zernov.  Heard your  report  by radio,  staggering.
Perhaps here in Greenland you  will  make a new discovery. Expecting you and
Anokhin next flight. Thompson."
     That was my happiest day in Paris.




        Chapter XXVII. IMAGINATION OR PREDICTION



     And most likely not only mine. Particularly when I told Irene.
     At first  she  did not believe me. She grinned like a girl on her first
date.
     "You're just joking."
     I said nothing, then asked her:
     "Your mother was in the Resistance movement. Where?"
     "Our Foreign Office asked the French, and they don't know for sure. Her
whole group perished. And it's not known where or how."
     "In St. Disier," I said. "Not so far from Paris. She was an interpreter
in the officer's casino. That's where she was captured."
     "How do you know?"
     "She told me so herself."
     Irene slowly took off her glasses and folded the bows.
     "You don't joke about things like that."
     "I'm perfectly earnest. Martin and I saw her that night in St.  Disier.
We were taken  for English pilots; their plane  had  been  shot  down in the
night on the outskirts of the town."
     Irene's lips were trembling.  She  couldn't even  ask the question  she
wanted to.
     Then I related the whole story from beginning to end, about Etienne and
Lange,  about  the  burst  of gunfire Martin fired  on the staircase  of the
casino, the explosion that we heard in the dark town.
     She was silent. I  got  angry, realizing all the  helplessness of words
that were powerless to reproduce life, even a model of life.
     "What did she look like?" Irene asked of a sudden.
     "Who?"
     "You know."
     "She continually changed  depending on  the  person that  recalled her.
Etienne, or  Lange. She  was young,  about  your age. They both admired her,
though one betrayed her and the other killed her."
     She said very softly:
     "Now I understand Martin."
     "That's much too little as punishment."
     "I understand." She thought for a moment and then asked, "Am I like her
in any way?"
     "A real  copy. Remember the  surprise on  the  face of  Etienne in  the
hotel? And the concentrated attention of Lange? Ask Zernov, he'll tell you."
     "And what happened afterwards?"
     "Then I walked up the stairs of the Hotel Homond."
     "And everything vanished?"
     "Yes, as far as I was concerned."
     "And as far as she was concerned?"
     I spread my arms in a helpless gesture. How could I answer?
     "I  do  not get it," she said.  "There's the present and the  past. And
life and what else?"
     "A model."
     "A living one?"
     "Don't know.  It  might be  recorded in some way  or another. On  their
film." I laughed.
     "Don't laugh.  This is terrifying.  Living life. Where? In what kind of
space? In what kind of time? And do they carry it away with them? Why?"
     "Listen," I said, "I haven't enough imagination to keep up with you."
     But there was  a person who  had all  the necessary imagination. We met
him the following day.
     In the morning I  was discharged from the clinic  and said  a masculine
farewell to the as-always stern  Peletier  ("You saved my life, Professor, I
am  in  your debt"),  embraced  the  senior  nurse-my white  angel with  the
devilish needle ("It makes me sad to have to say goodbye, Mademoiselle") and
in response came the highly non-nunish, almost Maupassant, "Naughty boy" and
I went out onto the Voltaire Embankment where I was to meet Irene. The first
thing she told me  was that  Tolya  Dyachuk and Vano had left Copenhagen and
were flying  to Greenland  direct, and that my visa  and Zernov's were being
processed in the Danish  Embassy.  I could still be  present  at the plenary
session of the Congress.
     The heat  outdoors  was awful, the asphalt melted under one's feet, but
in the corridors and halls of the Sorbonne where the Congress was being held
since all the students  were away on vacation, it was cool and as quiet as a
church after services. And just as empty. There were no late comers or eager
smokers or avid  gossipers or  argumentative thinkers. All the smoking rooms
and refreshment places were empty. Every one was gathered in the  auditorium
where  there wasn't room for even  one more person- never so  packed. People
were sitting everywhere, even on  the  floor  in the aisles, on the steps of
the uprising amphitheatre. That's the only place we could find.
     At the lectern  was  an  American.  I  gathered  that from  the way  he
swallowed separate letters and put too much stress on "o" and "a" just  like
my  English  teacher  at  the institute.  She  had studied  at Princeton  or
Harvard.  I  knew  his name, like  all  the  reading world; but this  was no
statesman, not even  a  scientist, which would have been in full accord with
the composition of the assembly and the list of its speakers. This one was a
writer  and not even a very  fashionable one-simply a science-fiction writer
that had made a name  for himself. Actually, he did not take any great pains
to substantiate scientifically his  amazing  concoctions,  and even here, in
front  of  a galaxy of prominent scientists, had the nerve to state  that he
personally was  not  interested in scientific  information about  the cosmic
visitors  that  the  Congress was  putting together  bit  by  bit with great
difficulty  (those  were the words he  used), but  the fact of  an encounter
between two utterly different worlds with what are actually two incompatible
civilizations.
     It was this statement and  the  hum of  the auditorium that followed it
signifying either agreement or disagreement  (hard to say) which we heard as
we found our seats on the steps in the aisle.
     "Don't be  offended  by the word 'bit', gentlemen," he continued with a
slight grin, "you will collect  tons of information of the  highest value in
the commissions of glaciologists and climatologists, in special expeditions,
at scientific-research stations, in institutes and scientific papers, all of
which will  be concerned with  problems  of  new formation  of ice, climatic
changes  and  the meteorological consequences of the phenomenon of the  rose
clouds.  Yet the mystery of  them still remains a mystery. So far we do  not
know a thing about the nature of the force field that has paralysed  all our
attempts at an approach to them, or about  the character of the life that we
have encountered, or about its location in the universe.
     "The conclusions of Boris Zernov  about an experiment  of the newcomers
to establish contact with earth-dwellers are interesting,  but that is their
experiment and not ours. Now I can offer a counter-proposal, if the occasion
arises. To consider the world that they create as  a direct channel to their
consciousness,  to  their  thinking  process. To speak  with  them  via  the
'doubles' and  'spirits' which  they  create.  And  use every one  of  their
models, every ultimate substance (structure) that they materialize, use them
as a microphone for direct or indirect communication with the cosmic people.
Something  in  the nature of  a telephone conversation  without mathematics,
chemistry or other codes. And in simple human speech, English or Russian, it
makes no difference, they will  understand. You may say that that is science
fiction, and I say it is too. But the Congress has already risen-note that I
say 'risen' and not 'come down'-to the level  of genuine scientific fiction;
actually, I do  not insist on the  word  'science',  it is the  fiction, the
fantastic portion that I stress, when the imagination foreshadows the future
(noise in the  hall). Scientists are polite people! Say it louder: sacrilege
in  the temple of science! {Cries  of 'sacrilege, of course'). Just a bit of
fairness,  gentlemen. Now tell me,  was it really scientists  that predicted
television,  the  videophone,  lasers,  Petrucci's  experiments  and  cosmic
nights? Those were all the inventions of science fiction to begin with.
     "I  did not  miss a single session of the conjecture commission  and at
times I was truly amazed at what I heard, for it  was fantasy  of the purest
water. Explosions of imagination. The hypothesis of a  hologram, wasn't that
imagination? The visual perception, by the spacemen,  of any object by means
of reflected  light waves? This  kind of photorecording  is  perceived  as a
three-dimensional representation and  has all the optical peculiarities of a
natural  landscape. Yesterday's report about painted icebergs in the Bay  of
Melville  at  the shores  of Greenland  corroborates  this  hypothesis.  The
icebergs were  painted  red  by  a  Danish  expedition  vessel,  the  'Queen
Christina'  in full  view of  the 'horsemen' galloping across the  sky. They
were moving at an  altitude  of  several kilometres,  yet from shipboard the
unaided eye  could not detect the slightest trace of colour at a distance of
a hundred metres, yet the 'horsemen' went into a dive, first washed away the
paint, and then extracted from the water the chunk of pure blue ice. In this
way,  the  conjecture   that  the  spacelings  have  super-vision  became  a
scientific fact.
     "Not  all imagination represents prediction or foreshadowing of events,
and not every hypothesis is reasonable. For instance,  I wish to reject  the
hypothesis  of the Catholic  Church that  the newcomers  are supposedly  not
living beings  endowed with reason, but artificial creations of our brethren
'in  the  image and  being  of God'. Actually,  that is the  same  religious
formula concerning God,  the Earth and Man,  in which the concept 'Earth' is
extended to encompass the whole Universe. Philosophically  speaking, this is
simply playing up to naive  anthropocentrism,  which can readily be  refuted
even on the basis of those 'bits' of knowledge that we have already gathered
concerning the  rose clouds. If  their creators were  humanoids,  then  when
sending their  cybernetic constructs  into cosmic scouting expeditions, they
would undoubtedly be trained for the possibility of an encounter with beings
of outward similarity  if  not humanlike intelligence. Properly  programmed,
these  biorobots would readily find  a common language  with earthlings, and
human life would not appear to them to be such a deep mystery. No, no matter
what the theologians and  anthropocentrists claim, we have come face to face
with a  different form  of life, an  unfamiliar  form that we  have  yet  to
comprehend. Most likely,  this  is  a mutual necessity,  but  that  does not
alleviate our situation in any way. Try to answer, for example, the question
of how our visitors from other worlds live,  of whether they are immortal or
simply long-living; then for how long and how far away  from us? How do they
reproduce, how is their life organized biologically, socially,  and  in what
medium-liquid  or gaseous-do  they  develop; perhaps  they  do not need  any
medium  and live as blobs  of energy isolated  from the  external  medium by
fields of force. I appeal  to  your  imagination, gentlemen: try  to answer!
{Noise in the hall, applause). That is a  vote of confidence, I take it, and
the science-fiction man can continue, is that right?"
     I notice how the chairman involuntarily looks at his watch and his hand
reaches for the bell button. But a roar of clapping and shouts in a  variety
of languages of  "let him speak" bring  him to a halt  and he does not press
the button.
     "Speaking here, Boris Zernov mentioned the  human being and the  bee as
an  instance  of  two  incompatible  forms of  life.  Let  us  whip  up  our
imagination. Let us switch the example around. We have an encounter of, say,
a  supercivilization  of bees  and a human  civilization lagging  behind  by
millennia. Observers  have already noted a  certain functional difference in
the behaviour of our cosmic visitors: they cut ice, others  transport it out
into space, a third kind  establishes the  atomic scheme of the model, and a
fourth  type creates  the  model. Accordingly, there  are differences in the
structural  forms of the constructors:  one  kind  stretches out like a band
saw,  others blow  up  into  an enormous flower-like something, still others
emerge as a red fog, and still others condense into a cherry-like jelly. The
question now arises: are we not dealing with  a  swarm,  a  highly developed
swarm of beings with their  specific functional  development?  Incidentally,
life in a beehive is organized somewhat differently from the dwelling houses
on Park  Avenue in New City or in Moscow's Cheryomushki district. Both as to
work and rest. But do they need rest? Have they any feeling for beauty? Have
they music,  say?  What do they do for sports? That's  what I  ask.  Try  to
answer  those  questions.  It's like  chess,  like  going  through variants.
Difficult of course. But that is precisely what a grandmaster does.
     "What strikes me as strange is why the grandmasters of science have not
yet asked themselves the most important thing  of all: the  reason for these
spacelings  coming to  visit  us (agitation  in the  hall). Everyone has the
answer, I know,  even two answers. Some-about 90%-are sure that they came to
earth for terrestrial ice,  which might be a unique type as far as  isotopic
composition  goes in adjacent  space. The minority, led by Thompson, believe
that  this  is a  reconnaissance  expedition  with  aggressive  aims for the
future.  Personally, I  believe that the  scouting  took place  earlier,  we
simply missed  it.  This  time,  it  is  a  powerfully  equipped  expedition
(apprehensive  silence in  the auditorium, only  the buzzing of journalists'
tape-recorders is  heard),  but  not  of  conquerors,  gentlemen.  They  are
colleagues  studying  a  form  of life with which  they  are not acquainted.
(Shouts of: "But the  ice?"). Wait a minute, you'll have your ice. That is a
sideline operation. The important thing is we ourselves. The highest form of
protein  life based on  water. Something seems  to be hampering them here on
Earth in their study of this life. Perhaps the environment but maybe fear of
upsetting it. What is there to be done? Start with God, with the creation of
the world. (More noise in the  hall, and shouts of "Shut up, blasphemer"). I
am no  more a blasphemer than the father of cybernetics, Wiener. In his day,
there were those who screamed: 'This is of the devil!' He encroaches  on the
second commandment!  'Thou  shalt not make unto thee any graven image..  ..'
And now you are building robots  and dreaming  of an  electronic brain.  The
idea of constructing a model of our life in  all its richness and complexity
is natural for these beings, for what is cognition if not modelling by means
of  thought?  And  the transition  from  mental  model-building  to material
modelling is  only one step of  progress. There will come a time and we will
be  doing  that. Some even  say  when: next  century. So why  shouldn't some
supercivilization of cosmic beings have attained that  much earlier,  say by
one thousand years?"
     The writer  fell silent, took a gulp of soda water  and stood thinking.
The audience waited. No one coughed, no one got uneasy, no one whispered.  I
was  never present  at a  lecture that was  listened to with  such  reverent
attention.  He was  silent,  and his  glance, as if severed  from everything
about him, seemed to be groping for some distant-distant thing, inaccessible
to all except him.
     Then he started again ever so softly, though no one missed even so much
as the  intonation: "If  it is  possible  to  build a model  of life,  it is
possible to carry it away;  record  it and then set it up somewhere else  in
one's own vicinity and establish a nutrient medium for its development. What
is needed for this purpose? An artificial satellite, an asteroid,  a planet,
a  model  of  the  terrestrial  atmosphere   and  of  solar  radiation.  But
principally water, water and more water, without which protein-based life is
an impossibility. Therein lies the meaning  of  transporting terrestrial ice
in quantities sufficient for supplying a whole planet. It is then that  deep
within our galaxy (or  perhaps  even some other  galaxy) there will emerge a
new world, not  a repetition but a similarity, and one  with the most subtle
kinship,  for all the  models  of these spacepeople are flawless and precise
{Remark:  "A cosmic  zoo with  humanlike at  larger). Quite naturally, there
will be such as the person  who  just  spoke {laughter). But I would correct
him,  not  a zoo  but  a  laboratory. Or,  to be  more  exact,  a scientific
institute  where human life would,  in all its complexity of psychic, social
and  everyday  aspects,  become  the  subject  of  a  profound,  careful and
considerate  study. It would of course be studied. That was the  purpose  of
making experiments, but it would be studied and not meddled with, studied in
development  and in  motion forward and grasped in motion. And if once  this
motion  were  comprehended,  there  might  be  some  way   of  refining  and
accelerating  it. I think I've said  all I need to. That  is  my hypothesis.
Object if you  wish.  Like any hypothesis newly  born of the imagination, it
can of course  be  readily refuted. Yet I am pleased to think that somewhere
in  the  depths of the universe there lives  and moves a piece of  our life,
even though  only  a  modelled,  synthesized piece, but created for a  great
idea-the closer understanding of two civilizations that  are at present very
far removed from one another, the basis for this better understanding having
been laid here on  the  Earth. And  if the space people  return,  they  will
return  with  an  understanding of  us,  they  will be enriched  by  such  a
comprehension, we  will  have given them something, and  they will know what
need be given us on this mutual pathway towards perfection."
     The writer bent forward slightly in a bow and left the lectern. Silence
followed  in his  wake,  a  silence much  more eloquent  than  any storm  of
applause.




        Chapter XXVIII. THE VIOLET SPOT



     We cut out something  like a foxhole at the very edge of the plateau of
ice that  had apparently  been cut by a  gigantic knife. The shiny pale blue
section that reflected just as  blue a sky with not  a cloud  in  sight fell
from the height  of  a five-storey house. Actually, this was not a cut but a
gouge,  a  broad excavation of  about three hundred metres  in diameter that
stretched  beyond the  horizon. Its  ideally  even  and  straight  structure
resembled the bed of an artificial  canal prior to entry of water. The empty
canal cut in a mass of ice came right up to a violet spot.
     In the solid wall of cold blue fire it darkened like an entrance way or
an  exit. Not only a snow tractor, even an  icebreaker of medium proportions
could freely pass through it without touching  the uneven pulsating sides. I
aimed my  camera  and  spent a few  tens  of  metres  of film on it and then
switched out. The spot was like any other, no miracles!
     But the wall of blue  fire  far exceeded all  the wonders of the world.
Picture to yourself the bluish flame  of an alcohol lamp illuminated further
from  behind by the steady rays  of the sun  hanging just above the horizon.
The brilliant fire growing blue in the light, next to it another one, and at
a short distance the snaking outline of a third, then a fourth, and they all
merge into a Hat even  flame in contact with one another  along the faces of
some kind of marvellous flaming  crystal. Now enlarge that a  thousand-fold.
The flames race up a kilometre in height, bend inwards somewhere in the pale
blue sky, the facets blending into a giant crystal that does not reflect but
captures the  full  beauty of this  subdued  sky, morning and sun.  It was a
mistake when someone called it an octahedron.  First of all, it  is flat  at
the bottom like the plateau  on  which it  stands; secondly, it has numerous
facets,  not  alike  and not  symmetric, but  fanciful  crystalline surfaces
beyond which a marvellously beautiful blue gas flows and flames.
     "I  can't  tear  my eyes off it,"  said Irene  when  we  approached the
skating rink of blue flame.  We  came to within  thirty metres, but couldn't
get any closer  because one's body  grows  heavier  and  heavier.  A vertigo
grasps you as if you are standing on a high  precipice. The Niagara falls is
magnificent, but this is beyond all comparison. It's hypnotizing.
     I tried to look at the violet spot. It was fairly common even trivial-a
sort of lilac satin drawn taut over an uneven frame.
     "Could that  be the entrance  way?" Irene mused aloud. "The  door to  a
wonder."
     I recalled yesterday's conversation between Thompson and Zernov.
     "I  told  you it was  the entrance way. Smoke, gas,  all that  sort  of
stuff.  They  passed through it single-file. I saw  it myself. And now we've
passed through."
     "Not you, but a directed shock-wave."
     "What's  the difference? I have  demonstrated to  them  that humans are
capable of thinking and of drawing conclusions."
     "A mosquito finds an opening in a  net and bites. What kind of proof is
that of any ability to think and draw conclusions?"
     "You know, I'm  fed up with this talk  about mosquito civilizations. We
are a  true civilization and not one of bugs and ants. And I think that they
comprehend as much. And that is already contact."
     "Too costly. One person has paid with his life."
     "That  was an  elementary  accident.  Perhaps  the  wiring  was wet  or
something like that. A lot of  things happen. A worker  with high explosives
is no  gardener. I say  that Hanter died due to  his own lack of caution, he
could  have  jumped into the  crevice;  there  was  time  enough.  Then  the
reflected shock-wave would have passed over him."
     "They've reflected it again."
     "The second one. The first  got through, don't forget. But Hanter could
have made a second mistake by not calculating the direction properly."
     "It would  be more correct to say  that they themselves calculated both
the force of the charge and the direction of the wave. And deflected it."
     "Let's try something else."
     "What  for  instance? They are  not sensitive  either to beta  or gamma
rays."
     "How about  a laser or a jet of water? An ordinary hydraulic excavator.
In itself, any change of  means of penetration to the violet spot and beyond
would, in our view, make them sit up  and  think. And that means contact. Or
at least the preliminaries of contact."
     Thompson's  new weapon was brought almost up  to  the very "spot"; they
were separated  by no  more  than  fifteen metres. The force field  was  not
apparent even in this  microregion.  From my photography site  on top of the
plateau, the hydraulic excavator resembled a grey cat readying  itself for a
jump. Its streamlined metallic surfaces shimmered dully on the background of
snow. The  English mechanic was  making a last check on some  kind of clutch
and contacts. Two steps from him was  an indentation cut in the ice the size
of a human being.
     Irene was  not with me. After the death of  the demolition  worker  she
refused to be present at "suicides" organized and paid for by a maniac whose
place is in an insane asylum. The "maniac" himself, together with Zernov and
other advisers, delivered the signals from their headquarters  by telephone.
The  headquarters was located a short distance from me  on the plateau  in a
hut  made  of  thermally insulated blocks.  A corrugated metal tank  rose up
alongside.  Big chunks of  ice were  fed to this  tank and  the  melt  water
entered  a  hydraulic  excavator.  Technically  speaking, the expedition was
conceived and executed flawlessly.
     I too was ready with  my  camera aimed.  Ready! Shoot!  A flash  of the
pencil-thin  jet  pierced   the  gaseous  curtain  of  the   "spot"  without
encountering any resistance,  and then vanished beyond it,  as if severed at
the  base. Half a minute  later, the  ultra-high-speed  jet shifted, slashed
through  the  violet  mirage at  an  angle  and  vanished  again. Even  in a
high-power pair of binoculars I could not detect the slightest change in the
structure surrounding the "spot",  either in  the diverging rings, or in the
turbulent or luminary flows, which might have been produced by the impact of
the hydrojet in an allied medium.
     This did not last more  than two minutes. Then, of a sudden, the "spot"
slowly crawled upwards, like a fly on  a blue curtain. The hydrojet  met the
scintillating  blue, did not pass through it, but split into two parts, like
a jet of water from a fire hydrant crashing into a window. That very instant
the water built up into a  whirling  twister  that was not deflected  to the
side, but curled  downwards to the  ground.  I am  not  positive  about  the
accuracy of my description. Specialists who later viewed the film found some
regularities in the motion of spray, but that's the way I saw it.
     I continued photographing for a while, and then quit, figuring that for
science that would be  enough and for the general public, more  than enough.
But at  that  instant the water  jet was switched off: Thompson, apparently,
had realized  the  experiment  was  pointless. Meanwhile, the "spot" crawled
upwards, ever upwards, until  it  vanished  at aircraft altitude beyond  the
curve of the enormous blue tongues curled inwards.
     That  was the most  impressive thing I observed  in  Greenland-out of a
great  number  of  impressive  items.  First   the   marvellous  airport  at
Copenhagen, the  multilayered  Danish  sandwiches aboard the  plane, and the
colours of  Greenland as we approached from  the air-the perfectly white ice
plateau to the  north, the  black level stretch off to the south, from which
fresh ice  had  been excavated,  the dark  red  promontories of  the coastal
mountain ridges and the blue  of the sea that blended into the dull green of
the fjords. After that came a coastwise voyage on a  schooner  northwards to
Umanak. That's where Wegener's*  (* A  German expedition which  in 1930-1931
explored the thickness of  the ice cover in the central and northern regions
of the continent. Wegener died a tragic death during his last wintering over
season.) famous expedition started out on its last lap.
     Already on the schooner "Akiuta" we found ourselves in an atmosphere of
general  turbulence and unaccountable exhilaration  that gripped  the entire
crew,  from  the  captain to  the  cook.  Since  we  did not  know  a single
Scandinavian  language,  we  wouldn't  have  learned  a  thing if  our  only
companion, Dr. Karl Petersen from the  Danish polar station in Godhaven, did
not turn out to be a very communicative  person with an  excellent knowledge
of English.
     "Have you ever seen  our fjords before?" he asked over a cup of  coffee
in the mess room. "No?  The wind drives the sea ice even in July. There have
been ice fields up to three and  even five  kilometres  across. In Godhaven,
half  the  harbour is covered with ice the year around. Caravans of icebergs
descend  from  the  glaciers  of  Uperniwik and farther north. The whole  of
Baffin Bay has been clogged up with them like a traffic jam on a highway. No
matter where you look, there are always two or three in your field of  view.
That was before. Now, not a single one about in  a whole day of sailing. And
notice  how warm it is. Both  the  water and the air.  Have  you noticed how
upset the crew is? They're talking of going into commercial fishing. Herring
and cod are now  coming from Norwegian waters in huge schools. From the air,
they say,  you can even see them near the eastern fjords. Do you picture  it
on the map?  What is  our eastern  shoreline? Jammed both  winter and summer
because all the Russian Arctic ice gathers there. Where  is  the Arctic  ice
today? On Sirius? The 'horsemen' have fished it all out clean. Incidentally,
why are they called 'horsemen'? Those that have seen  them  say they're more
like balloons or dirigibles. I  haven't  had any luck that way, haven't seen
any at all. Perhaps  they'll put in an appearance during our trip, or  maybe
at Umanak."
     But  we  did not  encounter  any  of  them either during the trip or at
Umanak.  They  appeared here  before  when they began excavating glacial ice
that was descending  into the  waters of the bay. Then they left behind them
an ideal canal bed cut  out of the ice about three  hundred  kilometres long
back into the interior of the continental plateau. As if they knew that they
were  going  to follow their route from Umanak,  where Wegener's  expedition
crawled  along  on sleighs over gravel frozen into the ice.  We had  at  our
disposal a marvellous highway  of  ice,  broader  than any  speedway  in the
world,  and  a  crosscountry  vehicle  on  caterpillar  tread  ordered  from
Dusseldorf.  Our crew was Antarctic, but  the vehicle  was smaller than  the
"Kharkovchan-ka" and neither as speedy or as tough.
     "There'll be trouble enough with  it,  you'll see. One  hour of travel,
two  of  waiting,"  said  Vano,  who  had just  received  a  radiogram  from
Thompson's  headquarters stating that  two other  Sno-Cats of the expedition
that had started out  24 hours ago had not yet arrived at their destination.
This is  driving us  mad.  There's nothing to  buy here.  Syrup in place  of
sugar.  Lucky,  we  brought  flying  boots,  otherwise  you'd  have to  wear
camiki-Eskimo  footwear  of  dogfur-with  grass.  Every  previous  Greenland
expedition had  worn those unpleasant boots. Vano was completely indifferent
to the  surrounding  scenery painted  so remarkably  by Rockwell Kent. Tolya
even looked at Irene  reproachfully for her admiration  of the Gothic in the
Umanak mountains and of the colours  of the Greenland summer, which for some
reason reminded us of Moscow summers in the countryside.
     "Clear  as  daylight,"  Tolya  explained,  "the  line  of cyclones  has
shifted,  no snow. July winds.  Don't whine  Vano, we'll  get there  without
mishap."
     But adventures began  hardly three hours  after we got started. We were
stopped  by a  helicopter  sent  by Thompson. The  Admiral  was  in need  of
advisers  and  wanted  to  speed  up  Zernov's arrival. Martin  piloted  the
helicopter.
     What  he related  was  fantastic  even  for  us  who  were  used to the
mysterious doings of the "horsemen from nowhere".
     On this  helicopter, Martin  made a survey  of the latest trick  of the
cosmic visitors-blue protuberances merging at high altitudes in the  form of
a multi-facet roof. As  always,  the rose clouds appeared suddenly  and from
nowhere, as it seemed. They  passed over Martin without paying any attention
to  him and vanished  in the  violet crater somewhere near  the edge of  the
cover. That is where Martin headed his craft.
     He landed on a violet pad and did  not find any support. The helicopter
kept  on descending,  freely  penetrating the lilac-grey  cloudy medium. For
about two minutes visibility was nil, and then Martin's machine found itself
hovering  over a city, a large modern city but with a  limited  horizon. The
blue  cupola of the sky  covered it, as it  were,  like a  hood.  There  was
something familiar  in the city, as far as Martin  could see. He descended a
bit and then piloted his craft along the central street that cut the city in
two  from  one  end to the other and recognized  it at  once-Broad-way. This
seemed  so preposterous that he  rubbed his eyes. No,  this was Broadway all
right. Forty-second street over there, then the station.  A  bit  closer was
Times Square, to the left the canyon of Wall Street. He  could even make out
the  church, the  famous  millionaire church.  Martin was  able to pick  out
Rockerfeller  Centre  and  the  Huggenheim  Museum and the enormous towering
Empire  State  Building. From  the  observation  platform,  tiny  figures of
tourists  were  waving  handkerchiefs,  down  in  the  streets  below   were
multicoloured  automobiles crawling  along like ants. Martin  turned  in the
direction of the sea, but  something prevented  him from advancing.  Then it
dawned on him that it was  not he  who was piloting his craft-invisible eyes
and hands were doing the job for him. For another three minutes or so he was
taken over  the  river, which  appeared to be cut  by the cupola of the sky.
Inside, the blue radiance gave the appearance of a summer sky illuminated by
a  sun that had just sunk below the horizon. Then  he was over Central Park,
had  almost  reached Harlem, but at that moment  he was being pushed upwards
through a denseless lilac-coloured  cork into the natural atmosphere of  the
earth. That is how he got back into the normal  sky together with his craft,
above  the  city now hidden in a blue flame.  At  once, he  sensed  that the
helicopter was in his control and ready  for action. Martin then went in for
a landing at the site of the camp of the expedition.
     We listened avid for information and  did  not interrupt  with a single
word. Then Zernov, after some thought, asked:
     "Have you reported to  the Admiral?" "No, I  haven't. He's queer enough
as it is." "Are you positive you saw everything  well?  No mistake?  Nothing
confused?"
     "You can't mistake New York. But why  New  York? They  never  even came
close to it. Anyone ever read about a red fog in New York?" "Maybe they  did
it at  night."  I suggested. "Why?" objected  Zernov.  "We already  know  of
models built  up from visual samples,  from  imprints of the memory.  Do you
know the city in detail?" he asked Martin.
     "I was born there."
     "How many times have you walked the streets?"
     "Thousands of times."
     "That's  it.  You walked about,  observed  and got accustomed. Your eye
recorded and your memory stored away  the recordings. They  went through the
recordings, selected the ones they wanted and reproduced them."
     "Does that mean that that is my New York, the way I saw it?"
     "I'm not positive, they might have modelled  the psyche of a number  of
New Yorkers, including yours  too. Kind of a jigsaw puzzle. Large numbers of
little pieces of cardboard are put together to form a picture, a portrait, a
scene. And that's the way they  did it: thousands of visual impressions  are
assembled into something that actually  exists, but as viewed and remembered
by different  people  in different situations.  I think  that  the Manhattan
reconstructed in the blue laboratory  of the cosmic-men  is not  exactly the
true Manhattan. In some way it must differ from the real thing.  In details,
in points of view. The visual memory rarely portrays things exactly  as they
are,  it  creates. And the  collective memory  is  still  more material  for
creativity. Jigsaw puzzle creativity."
     "I'm  not  a  scientist,   sir,"  said  Martin,  "but  that  is  surely
impossible. Science is not capable of explaining it."
     "Science..."  and Zernov sniggered. "Our science here on earth does not
yet  allow for the possibility of a repeated  creation of the  world. But in
the distant,  the  far distant, future it  will  finally  provide for such a
possibility."
     After Martin's  story, everything  appeared to  me routine  and  common
until I saw and filmed the blue protuberances and the violet spot. The fresh
wonder of the cosmic people  was  just as  extraordinary and inexplicable as
all the earlier ones had been. Those were the thoughts that clamoured for my
attention as I returned to the camp.
     As I approached, Irene came running all excited.
     "Yuri, Thompson wants to see you,  hurry up. The Admiral has called all
the members of the expedition. A Council of War."




        Chapter XXIX. THE JIGSAW PUZZLE



     We  were  the last  to arrive and immediately sensed  the atmosphere of
curiosity and apprehension. The urgent, extraordinary nature  of the meeting
as it came  straightway after  the experiment indicated  that  Thompson  was
undecided. He who was so used to making decisions  alone was now overanxious
to  get a collective view. He now wanted the opinion of  as  many people  as
possible.
     The meeting  was conducted in English. Those who didn't understand  sat
closer to their neighbours for a running translation.
     "The  experiment  has  been  a  success,"  Thompson  began  without any
introductory  words.  "They have  already gone over  to  the  defensive. The
violet entrance  way has been shifted to the upper facets  of the cupola. In
this connection  I  will try to use something new.  From above  and from the
air."
     "A bomb?" someone put in.
     "And what if it is?"
     "You  haven't got any nuclear ones," Zernov remarked  coldly.  "And you
haven't any  conventional  high explosives  either. The best you can do is a
plastic bomb to blow  up safes or cars. Whom do you  think you will frighten
with such toys?"
     The Admiral shot a brief glance at him and parried:
     "I am not speaking of bombs."
     "I advise you to tell him, Martin," said Zernov.
     "I  know,"  the Admiral put in.  "Directed hallucinations. Hypnomirage.
We'll try someone else, not Martin."
     "We have only one pilot, sir."
     "I do not  intend to risk  the helicopter. I need parachutists. And not
simple ones, but..." he  screwed up his mouth  looking for  the  right word,
"say, ones that have already had dealings with the spacemen."
     We exchanged glances. Zernov was out because  he was no sportsman. Vano
had hurt  his hand during the last trip. I had parachuted twice in  my life,
but without any pleasure either time.
     "I  would like  to  know whether Anokhin would be able to  perform that
operation," Thompson said.
     I was angry.
     "It isn't a matter of being able to, but one of wanting to, Admiral."
     "You mean that you do not have that desire?"
     "You guessed it, sir."
     "How much do you want, Anokhin? A hundred? Two hundred?"
     "Not  a cent. I do not get  pay for the work I  do  in  the expedition,
Admiral."
     "It's all the same, you obey the rulings made by your superior."
     "According  to  regulations,  Admiral,  I  photograph  what  I consider
necessary and  provide  you with  one copy of the photo.  What  is  more,  a
cameraman does not necessarily need to know how to jump with a parachute."
     Thompson again screwed up his mouth and asked:
     "Maybe someone else will do it?"
     "The only jumping I ever did was in an amusement park in Moscow, from a
tower," Dyachuk said in Russian, looking at me reproachfully, "but I'll risk
it."
     "I will too," Irene added.
     "Don't try  to outdo all the big boys," I cut in. "This is no operation
for girls."
     "Nor for cowards either."
     "What's the talk about?" Admiral Thompson asked after patiently waiting
for our dialogue to end.
     I got in ahead of Irene:
     "About forming a special unit,  Admiral. Two of  us  will jump: Dyachuk
and Anokhin. Anokhin will be in charge. That's all."
     "I see  I was not mistaken,"  the  Admiral smiled. "You are  a man with
character,  just what we need. Okay. Martin will pilot the plane." He looked
round the room. "That will be all, gentlemen."
     Irene rose and at the exit turned round:
     "You are not only a coward but a provoker too."
     "Thanks."
     I did  not want to argue, but what I definitely did not want  to do was
to allow her to get into what might possibly be another St. Disier.
     We were briefed before the flight as follows:
     "The aircraft  will ascend to two thousand metres. It will come in from
the northeast and will descend to the  target  to an altitude of two hundred
metres, right  over the entrance. There is no  danger. The only thing  under
you  will be  a stopper made of air. Everything will be all right as soon as
you get  through  it. Martin  did not  freeze and  he  was  able to  breathe
comfortably, so I think you will too. Good luck."
     The Admiral looked each one of us over and, as if in some doubt, added:
     "If  anyone is afraid, he  can  refuse. I do  not insist."  I looked at
Tolya. And he looked at me.
     "Getting  nervous,"  Tolya  said in Russian.  "He's  already  relieving
himself of the responsibility. How are you?"
     "And you?"
     "Ironclad."
     The Admiral listened  to the  unfamiliar language and did  not  utter a
word.
     "We  exchanged some  impressions," I said dryly. "We're  ready  for the
mission."
     The aircraft  rose from  the  plateau of  ice and  headed east  gaining
altitude. It  skirted  the pulsating protuberances. Then  banked and  took a
sharp turn  back, falling  all the time.  Down below was a boiling  blue sea
that  did  not   heat.  The  violet  entrance  way  was   clearly  visible-a
lilac-coloured patch on blue velvet-and seemed as flat  and  as  hard as the
ground. For a moment it was frightening-jumping from such a low altitude. We
wouldn't be able to collect our bones afterwards, as the phrase goes.
     "Don't be afraid," said Martin. "You won't get bumped. It's rather like
the foam on beer, and coloured too."
     We jumped. First  Tolya and then I followed. Both parachutes opened  up
without mishap, Tolya's  a  rainbow of colours underneath me. I saw  him  go
into  the violet  crater and slip through as  if it were a swamp-first Tolya
and  then  his   colourful  umbrella.  For  another   moment  it  was  again
frightening.  What was beyond the murky gaseous shutter-ice, darkness, death
from  impact  or  lack of air?  I  was still guessing  when  I  plunged into
something dark  and  not  very perceptible, something  without  temperature,
without odour. Only the  lilac  colour  turned  a familiar  red.  Absence of
sensitivity to the medium passed into body sensations as well-I couldn't see
my body  nor feel it, as if I  had dissolved in the gas. The sensation I had
was that  only my mind, not my body, only  my consciousness was  floating in
this incomprehensible  crimson  foam.  There was  nothing at  all  about, no
parachute, no shroud lines, no body, nothing, I wasn't even there.
     Then all of a sudden, as if struck in the eye- the blue sky and a  city
below. At first indistinct and then barely distinguishable in the haze; then
the city came closer and we could see  it more clearly. Why  did Martin call
it New York? I was never there, and had not seen it from an airplane, but  I
did have an idea  of what it should look like. This one was quite different,
no  Statue  of  Liberty,  no  Empire  State  Building,  no  skyscrapers,  no
canyon-like streets. No, this was definitely no Bagdag over  the Subway that
O'Henry had  described, no City  of the Yellow Devil penned by Gorky, and no
Iron  Mirgorod as described by the poet Yesenin. This was  a different city,
and one much more familiar to me, though I still couldn't make it out. But I
had the feeling that I would in just a minute, just a minute!
     And  I  did.  Beneath me  was  an  enormous  letter A,  constructed  in
three-dimensional space. The  lacework  of  the Eiffel  Tower could  be seen
rising into the sky. Away from it to the right and left was the twisting and
turning-greenish  hand of the  Seine River,  a  mix of sparkling silver  and
green lawns in the sun. The  green rectangle of the Tuileries  Park was sure
proof that this was real and  not illusory  green. To many, rivers seen at a
height appear to be blue, but to me they are green. This green Seine twisted
to the right to the Ivry and to the left to the Boulogne. I immediately felt
where  the Louvre could be, and the  turn of the river and  the island Cite.
The Palace of Justice and the Notre Dame cathedral appeared from above  like
two stone cubes in hazy outline, but I recognized them. I even glimpsed  the
Arch of Triumph on the famous square from which a dozen streets radiate.
     "How was it that Martin  had gotten things so wrong?" I asked myself. I
am no expert  on Paris  and had  seen it  from an airplane only  once, but I
concentrated as I observed the city before landing. And the same day  I went
over  what I had seen by telling Irene my impressions as we walked about the
town. We didn't  have time to cover  much  ground  and see so very much, but
what we did I firmly fixed in my memory.  Then an idea  came to me: "Perhaps
Martin was  not mistaken  after  all. He  simply  saw  New  York  and I  was
witnessing Paris. In  both  cases,  it  was  ahypno-mirage, as Thompson  had
termed  it.  But  why  did  these  beings  need  to  impose  all  manner  of
hallucinations?  Based  on  place of birth?  That  is  where  the  strongest
memories are sited, yet I was  not born in Paris, but  in Moscow, and what I
see is the Eiffel Tower and not the Kremlin.  It might  be that the "clouds"
choose what has been recalled from the recent  past; yet Martin, so he says,
hasn't been in New York a  good  ten years. What was  the logic behind these
two different movies they had  us view? And again  doubts plagued me: maybe,
after all,  this is no film, no mirage or hallucination. Could it be that in
this enormous laboratory whole cities are  actually reproduced, cities  that
had  made  great  impressions  on  the  cosmic  beings.  And  how  are  they
reproduced,  materially  or  mentally?  And  for  what  purpose?  Is  it  to
comprehend  the city as  a structural form of our being? As a social unit of
our society? Or simply as a living and  multifaceted, vibrant chunk of human
life?
     "It's all crazy," said Tolya.
     I turned around and saw him hanging next to me, two metres away, on the
taut shroud lines of his parachute. Hanging it was, not falling, or floating
or  being carried  by the  wind; simply fixed  motionless  in  that  strange
unmoving  air. Not  the slightest breeze, not a single cloudlet in the  sky.
Only  pure ultramarine of the heavens and beneath us  a familiar city. There
we were at an altitude of a kilometre  and  a half,  suspended  inexplicably
from rigidly fixed shroud lines, motionless. We were in air, for we breathed
freely, at least as freely as Camp Eleven near the summit of Mt. Elbrus.
     "Martin gave us the wrong impression," Tolya added.
     "No, he didn't," I said. "He was telling the truth."
     "Then he made a mistake."
     "I don't think so."
     "Then what do you see?" Tolya was worried.
     "What do you see?"
     "Why, the Eiffel Tower, naturally. I can surely recognize that."
     So  Tolya was  looking at Paris. The  hypothesis of  hypnohallucination
specifically tailored to the subject under study had to go.
     "Still this is not Paris. It's not the real thing," said Tolya.
     "Nonsense."
     "Where do you find mountains in Paris? The Pyranees are far enough away
and the Alps too. So what are those?"
     Turning  to  the  right  I saw  a  chain of  wooded  slopes  rising  to
snow-capped rocky reddish peaks:
     "Those might be Greenland hills," I suggested.
     "We're inside a cupola. There are no mountains round about. Did you see
any snow-capped peaks? There aren't any left anywhere on the Earth."
     I took another glance at the mountains. Between us and the cupola lay a
blue strip of water. Was it a lake or a sea?
     "What's that game called?" Tolya asked suddenly.
     "What game?"
     "You know, when you piece together pictures and things."
     "Oh, a jigsaw puzzle."
     "How  many  employees  were  there  in  the  hotel,  not  counting  the
visitors?" Tolya began  to muse. "About thirty. Now were they all Parisians?
There must have been a few from Grenoble. Or from some place where there are
mountains and the sea. Everyone has his own Paris and an added piece of  his
hometown. Now if all  that is  put together  it will not  produce  a  model.
Anyway, not a true one."
     He repeated Zernov's  idea, but I was still doubtful.  Then it's a game
of building blocks. Today we build, tomorrow we  disassemble. Today it's New
York  and tomorrow it's Paris. Today Paris with Mont Blanc and tomorrow with
Fujiyama. Why not? Surely what has been created on the earth  by  nature and
man is not the limit of perfection. Could it not be that a fresh creation of
things would improve matters?  Could it be that this laboratory is searching
for  the typical in  terrestrial  life?  Maybe  the  typical is  here  being
verified and tested? It could easily be that what  for us is a mix-up is for
them the goal they are seeking.
     Finally, I was thoroughly confused. The bulging parachute hung above me
like  the  roof  of  a  street cafe. The only thing lacking  were tables and
bottles of lemonade. I  noticed it  was  hot.  There was no sun, but it  was
stiflingly hot.
     "Why don't we fall?" Tolya asked suddenly.
     "Didn't you ever finish school  or  did they  kick you out of the fifth
grade?"
     "No, really, I'm serious."
     "And I am too. You've heard of weightlessness, haven't you?"
     "One floats in a state of zero gravity, here I can't even move. And the
parachute is stiff as a piece of wood. What's holding it?"
     "Not what, but who."
     "Why?"
     "Just being polite. Hospitable hosts  are giving a lesson in manners to
unwanted guests."
     "Then what's Paris here for?"
     "It might be the geography they like."
     "Yes, but if we suppose they are reasonable. .." Tolya exploded.
     "I like your 'if'."
     "Quit the joking, I'm serious. They must have some purpose."
     "That's right. They record our responses and this conversation too, for
instance." .
     "You're impossible," was Tolya's concluding  remark  and  then-we  were
jerked from our position by a gust of  wind and found ourselves flying  over
Paris.
     At first we descended some two hundred  metres. The city  was close and
every  detail  clear-cut.  We  could see  black  smoke with greyish  streaks
billowing out of factory stacks. Big barges on the  Seine and motor boats of
all colours plying the waters. A worm crawling along the Seine turned into a
train  approaching the  Gare de Lyon, and the  roiling blur  on  the streets
turned  into a colourful mosaic of summer  suits and dresses.  Then we  were
thrown upwards and the city began to recede  and melt in the distance. Tolya
went  up  higher  and  vanished  together   with   his  parachute   in   the
lilac-coloured plug. In another two or  three seconds I whirled into it too.
Then  the two of  us, like dolphins, swished  over the  facets  of  the blue
cupola. In the process, neither of our parachutes  changed its shape at all,
as if  unseen and unperceivable  air currents  were carrying us along to the
white sheet of the glacier.
     We landed more slowly than  in an ordinary parachute descent, but Tolya
fell and was dragged along  the  ice.  While I was getting out of  my shroud
lines, Thompson and the others from the camp  were already approaching.  His
jacket was unbuttoned, he  was in boots that he hadn't had  time to lace up,
without a hat-he looked the perfect hockey coach.
     "How was it?" he asked imperiously.
     I never liked that tone.
     "Everything's normal," I said.
     "Martin signalled that you both had emerged from the plug."
     I  shrugged. Why  had  they  kept Martin in the air? How  could he have
helped us if we had emerged from the plug in a difficult situation?
     "What's it like there?" Thompson asked finally.
     "Where?"
     (You'll have to wait, Mister, you're going to have to wait.)
     "You know where, come on, out with it."
     "Yes, I do at that."
     "Well?"
     "It's a jigsaw puzzle."




        Chapter XXX. A BET



     We returned to  Umanak. That  is,  our  Antarctic expedition  plus  the
engineering  and  scientific personnel  of the  expedition  and  two tractor
vehicles-our  quarters-and  a caravan of sleighs with all the equipment. The
helicopter had  already  returned  to  the  Arctic Base  in  Thule, and  our
commander together with the apparatus that could be put on board an airplane
had already taken off for Copenhagen.
     That is where  the last press conference took place at which he refuted
al