Frederik Pohl Heechee 1 Gateway

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under it were spread out sheets of fine netting to catch the dropping fruit. I walked past it, and
down the path there were a woman and a child.
A child! I hadn't known there were any children on Gateway. She was a little bit of a
thing, maybe a year and a half, playing with a ball so big, and so lazy in the light gravity, that
it was like a balloon.
"Hello, Rob."
That was the other surprise; the woman who greeted me was Gelle-Klara Moynlin. I said
without thinking, "I didn't know you had a little girl."
"I don't. This is Kathy Francis, and her mother lets me borrow her sometimes. Kathy, this
is Rob Broadhead."
"Hello, Rob," the little thing called, studying me from three meters away. "Are you a
friend of Klara's?"
"I hope so. She's my teacher. Do you want to play catch?"
Kathy finished her study of me and said precisely, each word separate from the one before
it and as clearly formed as an adult's, "I don't know how to play catch, but I will get six
mulberries for you. That's all you can have."
"Thank you." I slumped down next to Klara, who was hugging her knees and watching the
child. "She's cute."
"Well, I guess so. It's hard to judge, when there aren't very many other children around."
"She's not a prospector, is she?"
I wasn't exactly joking, but Klara laughed warmly. "Her parents are permanent-party. Well,
most of the time. Right now her mother's off prospecting; they do that sometimes, a lot of them.
You can spend just so much time trying to figure out what the Heechee were up to before you want
to try your own solutions to the puzzles."
"Sounds dangerous."
She shushed me. Kathy came back, with three of my mulberries in each open hand, so as not
to crush them. She had a funny way of walking, which didn't seem to use much of the thigh and calf
muscles; she sort of pushed herself up on the ball of each foot in turn, and let herself float to
the next step. After I figured that out I tried it for myself, and it turned out to be a pretty
efficient way of walking in near-zero gravity, but my reflexes kept lousing it up. I suppose you
have to be born on Gateway to come by it naturally.
Klara in the park was a lot more relaxed and feminine than Klara the teacher. The eyebrows
that had looked masculine and angry became outdoorsy and friendly. She still smelled very nice.
It was pretty pleasant, chatting with her, while Kathy stepped daintily around us, playing
with her ball. We compared places we'd been, and didn't find any in common. The one thing we did
find in common was that I was born almost the same day as her two-year-younger brother.
"Did you like your brother?" I asked, a gambit played for the hell of it.
"Well, sure. He was the baby. But he was an Aries, born under Mercury and the Moon. Made
him fickle and moody, of course. I think he would have had a complicated life."
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This Park Is MONITORED By Closed-Circuit PV
You are welcome to enjoy it. Do not pick flowers or fruit. Do not damage any plant. While
visiting, you may eat any fruits which have fallen, to the following limits:
Grapes, cherries
8 per person
Other small fruits or berries
6 per person
Oranges, limes, pears
1 per person
Gravel may not be removed from walks. Deposit all trash of any kind in receptacles.
MAINTENANCE DIVISION THE GATEWAY CORPORATION
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I was less interested in asking her about what happened to him than in asking if she
really believed in that garbage, but that didn't seem tactful, and anyway she went on talking.
"I'm a Sagittarius, myself. And you -- oh, of course. You must be the same as Davie."
"I guess so," I said, being polite. "I, uh, don't go much for astrology."
"Not astrology, genethlialogy. One's superstition, the other's science."
She laughed. "I can see you're a scoffer. Doesn't matter. If you believe, all right; if
you don't -- well, you don't have to believe in the law of gravity to get mashed when you fall off
a two-hundred story building."
Kathy, who had sat down beside us, inquired politely, "Are you having an argument?"
"Not really, honey." Klara stroked her head.
"That's good, Klara, because I have to go to the bathroom now and I don't think I can,
here."
"It's time to go anyway. Nice to see you, Rob. Watch out for melancholy, hear?" And they
went away hand in hand, Klara trying to copy the little girl's odd walk. Looking very nice. . .
for a flake.
That night I took Sheri to Dane Metchnikov's going-away party. Klara was there, looking
even nicer in a bare-midriff pants suit. "I didn't know you knew Dane Metchnikov," I said.
"Which one is he? I mean, Terry's the one who invited me. Coming inside?" [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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