John Blaine - Rick Brant 16 by The Egyptian Cat Mystery

Author:The Egyptian Cat Mystery [Mystery, The Egyptian Cat]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-06-05T11:45:44+00:00

CHAPTER X

The Great Pyramid

Parnell Winston faced the group of Egyptian scientists in the crowded radio-telescope control room. Rick and Scotty waited impatiently for the scientist to begin. They knew something important was coming up, from remarks dropped by Winston earlier, but they didn’t know what.

“Gentlemen,” Winston began, “Iand my young associates came at Dr. Kerama’s request because of the assumption that internal or local difficulties had caused the strange peaks in your Sanborn tracings of the first tryouts of the new system. The assumption was a natural and logical one. However, we have demonstrated that it isn’t true. The system is working so perfectly that I must congratulate you. It is seldom that anything so complex functions as well in the early stages.”

Winston paused thoughtfully. “Of course Dr. Kerama realized that it would be highly unusual to have internal circuit troublecause such signals. But what we have left, after eliminating the possibilities of both internal and local interference, is something even more unusual. In fact, it is fantastic.”

Rick moved forward a little. He didn’t want to miss any of this, because he knew Winston, and he had never before seen the scientist so excited.

“What we have is a source of neutral hydrogen out in space, over five thousand light years away from earth. This source is moving at such incredible velocity that it is very close to the speed of light.”

There was a stunned silence in the room. Rick considered the implications of Winston’s statement. The scientist had spent hours with Kerama and Farid going over the Sanborn tracings, checking the location of the source as shown by the big telescope’s position. The change in the source’s position, from the time of first discovery to yesterday’s checking of the system, had given enough data to calculate its velocity with reasonable accuracy.

The big unknown was the precise distance of the source.Readings from a single position could not give distance with high accuracy, so the scientists weren’t sure of their figures-yet.

Winston asked, “Dr. Kerama, do you want to explain what we have decided?”

The Egyptian scientist nodded. “Thank you, Dr. Winston. And thank you on behalf of all of us for determining that our mystery does not come from the receiver system itself, or from nearby.”

Kerama faced the group. “Last night I sent cables, giving detailed information on times, locations, and our computations to the radio-telescope stations atManchester,England , and Green Bank and Goldstone in theUnited States . I also, at Dr. Winston’s suggestion, sent similar information to the Mount Palomar Observatory.

“If the other radio telescopes are able to participate, it will serve to confirm or disprove our own information. If confirmed, we will then have a precise fix on the source that has caused us so much concern. We will also have the benefit of continuous consultation with our American and English colleagues. At the same time, the two-hundred-inch telescope at Palomar will attempt to see this strange object and to photograph it.”

Rick knew of the huge American radio telescope at Green Bank,West Virginia , and the smaller one atGoldstoneLake , inCalifornia .

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