Read Online From the Ocean from teh Stars by Arthur C. Clarke - Free Book Online
Authors: Arthur C. Clarke
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later."
There was considerable surprise in the mess when Franklin turned up without his instructor and settled quietly down in a corner to read a magazine. Forty minutes later, a great slamming of doors announced Don's arrival. The warden's face was a study in relief and perplexity as he looked around the room and located his missing pupil, who stared back at him with his most innocent expression and said: "What kept you?"
Burley turned to his colleagues and held out his hand.
"Pay up, boys," he ordered.
It had taken him long enough to make up his mind, but he realized that he was beginning to like Franklin.
☆ CHAPTER FIVE
The two men leaning on the rails around the main pool of the aquarium did not, thought Indra as she walked up the road to the lab, look like the usual run of visiting scientists. It was not until she had come closer and was able to get a good look at them that she realized who they were. The big fellow was First Warden Burley, so the other must be the famous mystery man he was taking through a high- pressure course. She had heard his name but couldn't remember it, not being particularly interested in the activities of the training school. As a pure scientist, she tended to look down on the highly practical work of the Bureau of Whales—though had anyone accused her outright of such intellectual snobbery she would have denied it with indignation.
She had almost reached them before she realized that she had already met the smaller man. For his part, Franklin was looking at her with a slightly baffled, "Haven't we seen each other before?" expression.
"Hello," she said, coming to a standstill beside them. "Remember me? I'm the girl who collects sharks."
Franklin smiled and answered: "Of course I remember: it still turns my stomach sometimes. I hope you found plenty of vitamins."
Yet strangely enough, the puzzled expression—so typical of a man straining after memories that will not come—still lingered in his eyes. It made him look lost and more than a little worried, and Indra found her self reacting with a sympathy, which was disconcerting. She had already had several narrow escapes from emotional entanglements on the island, and she reminded herself firmly of her resolution: "Not until after I've got my master's degree . . ."
"So you know each other," said Don plaintively. "You might introduce me." Don, Indra decided, was perfectly safe. He would start to flirt with her at once, like any warden worthy of his calling. She did not mind that in the least; though big leonine blonds were not precisely her type, it was always flattering to feel that one was causing a stir, and she knew that there was no risk of any serious attachment here. With Franklin, however, she felt much less sure of herself.
They chattered pleasantly enough, with a few bantering undertones, while they stood watching the big fish and porpoises circling slowly in the oval pool. The lab's main tank was really an artificial lagoon, filled and emptied twice a day by the tides, with a little assistance from a pumping plant. Wire-mesh barriers divided it into various sections through which mutually incompatible exhibits stared hungrily at each other; a small tiger shark, with the inevitable sucker fish glued to its back, kept patrolling its underwater cage, unable to take its eyes off the succulent pompano parading just outside. In some enclosures, however, surprising partnerships had developed. Brilliantly colored crayfish, look ing like overgrown shrimps that had been sprayed with paint guns, crawled a few inches away from the incessantly gaping jaws of a huge and hideous moray eel. A school of fingerlings, like sardines that had escaped from their tin, cruised past the nose of a quarter-ton grouper that could have swallowed them all at one gulp.
It was a peaceful little world, so different from the battlefield of the reef. But if the lab staff ever failed to make the normal feeding arrangements, this harmony would quickly
There was considerable surprise in the mess when Franklin turned up without his instructor and settled quietly down in a corner to read a magazine. Forty minutes later, a great slamming of doors announced Don's arrival. The warden's face was a study in relief and perplexity as he looked around the room and located his missing pupil, who stared back at him with his most innocent expression and said: "What kept you?"
Burley turned to his colleagues and held out his hand.
"Pay up, boys," he ordered.
It had taken him long enough to make up his mind, but he realized that he was beginning to like Franklin.
☆ CHAPTER FIVE
The two men leaning on the rails around the main pool of the aquarium did not, thought Indra as she walked up the road to the lab, look like the usual run of visiting scientists. It was not until she had come closer and was able to get a good look at them that she realized who they were. The big fellow was First Warden Burley, so the other must be the famous mystery man he was taking through a high- pressure course. She had heard his name but couldn't remember it, not being particularly interested in the activities of the training school. As a pure scientist, she tended to look down on the highly practical work of the Bureau of Whales—though had anyone accused her outright of such intellectual snobbery she would have denied it with indignation.
She had almost reached them before she realized that she had already met the smaller man. For his part, Franklin was looking at her with a slightly baffled, "Haven't we seen each other before?" expression.
"Hello," she said, coming to a standstill beside them. "Remember me? I'm the girl who collects sharks."
Franklin smiled and answered: "Of course I remember: it still turns my stomach sometimes. I hope you found plenty of vitamins."
Yet strangely enough, the puzzled expression—so typical of a man straining after memories that will not come—still lingered in his eyes. It made him look lost and more than a little worried, and Indra found her self reacting with a sympathy, which was disconcerting. She had already had several narrow escapes from emotional entanglements on the island, and she reminded herself firmly of her resolution: "Not until after I've got my master's degree . . ."
"So you know each other," said Don plaintively. "You might introduce me." Don, Indra decided, was perfectly safe. He would start to flirt with her at once, like any warden worthy of his calling. She did not mind that in the least; though big leonine blonds were not precisely her type, it was always flattering to feel that one was causing a stir, and she knew that there was no risk of any serious attachment here. With Franklin, however, she felt much less sure of herself.
They chattered pleasantly enough, with a few bantering undertones, while they stood watching the big fish and porpoises circling slowly in the oval pool. The lab's main tank was really an artificial lagoon, filled and emptied twice a day by the tides, with a little assistance from a pumping plant. Wire-mesh barriers divided it into various sections through which mutually incompatible exhibits stared hungrily at each other; a small tiger shark, with the inevitable sucker fish glued to its back, kept patrolling its underwater cage, unable to take its eyes off the succulent pompano parading just outside. In some enclosures, however, surprising partnerships had developed. Brilliantly colored crayfish, look ing like overgrown shrimps that had been sprayed with paint guns, crawled a few inches away from the incessantly gaping jaws of a huge and hideous moray eel. A school of fingerlings, like sardines that had escaped from their tin, cruised past the nose of a quarter-ton grouper that could have swallowed them all at one gulp.
It was a peaceful little world, so different from the battlefield of the reef. But if the lab staff ever failed to make the normal feeding arrangements, this harmony would quickly
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