Ships in the Night by Jack McDevitt

Author:Jack McDevitt [McDevitt, Jack]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, General, Fiction, Life on other planets, Space ships, Space flight
ISBN: 9780975720806
Google: 9RCSAAAACAAJ
Publisher: nao informado
Published: 2005-01-01T22:00:00+00:00

#

In a way that he was hard-pressed to define, the sheer unearthliness of the encounter seemed to be dwindling. The prickle along the backbone, the deep fears, the sense of wonder, faded. Despite its ethereal structure, the Traveler possessed a harder reality than, say, Mrs. Mike Kramer, who came in with her husband and, while he selected a hammer, gabbled on about the church choir's next project. Or Bill Pepperdine, the high school football coach, who was worried about the low level of ferocity in his offensive line this year.

Floyd Rickett came in around three, and jabbed his way through several customers taking advantage of Arnold's annual autumn paint sale.

"I was out in the wind screen today," he said, pointedly, talking across Mrs. Mellon, who was trying to make up her mind over the color chart.

Floyd's eyes connected with his. They were blue, but like marble rather than seawater. "And--?" asked Arnold, hopefully.

"This one," said Mrs. Mellon, pointing to sunset bronze. Arnold nodded. "Just be a couple of minutes." He picked up the primaries, poured in a measure of red, and set it in the mixer. He activated the device, and returned to Floyd, who was waiting over near the flashlight display. Floyd Looked puzzled, and maybe a little scared. He sold two gallons of white primer to Lev Anderson, helped Eddie Miranda choose a color for his porch, went back and got Mrs. Mellon's sunset bronze.

"What is it?" he asked anxiously, when his customers had thinned out. "Did you hear anything?"

"A voice," said Floyd.

"Out in the wind screen?"

"Yes." Cut to the bottom line. "Arnold, I was walking out there, thinking about what you'd said. And I heard it. Plain as day. Whispering in the treetops." The blue eyes peered at him from either side of the long, sharp nose. "I'll never forget it, Arnold."

"What did it say?"

"It was hard to tell at first. I could make out my name, but there was something else, too." Miranda hadn't left the store yet, and he was showing signs of interest in the conversation. But Arnold didn't care. "Were you able to understand the rest of it?"

"I can tell you what it sounded like."

"What what sounded like?" asked Miranda.

"It sounded like... " Floyd dropped his voice, and delivered his next words in a conspiratorial tone: "... The Pack will be back."

Arnold's spirits sagged. "Excuse me, Floyd." He turned away.

"'The Pack will be back.'" Floyd roared with laughter. "Sure enough, that's what it said."

"What what said?" demanded Miranda.

"Arnold's voice. Arnold says there's an invisible thing out in the wind screen that predicts football scores." Floyd's grin was as wide as the Red River.

Miranda laughed, and no one took any of it seriously. Still, when it was over, Arnold was left staring out across Bannister Avenue. His cheeks were enflamed. Arnold always thought of himself as an even-tempered man, and it was a fair assessment. On that day, however, he wondered whether half-seriously whether he might find a good hit man somewhere this side of Fargo.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.