Read Online Watson, Ian - Novel 11 by Chekhov's Journey (v1.1) - Free Book Online

meteors and meteorites
and bolides and the craters on the Moon. From it he gathered that th ~*e ought to be a huge crater hidden somewhere out in the
taiga, with a fortune in iron and nickel and platinum buried underneath. A
fortune, that is, for any passing reindeer or Tungusi tribesman enterprising
enough to build a mine and smelting works and a railway line . . .
                 Anton
was beginning to itch all over as the heat from the tea tried to sweat its way
out through his blocked pores. Putting aside the letter from Borovsk till
later, he hurried out to pay a call on the public bath house. On the way he
fell in with Jaroslav Mirek, heading for the same destination, though the Czech
was hardly one tenth as filthy as Anton.
     
                 To
Anton’s embarrassment the water turned first to brown then to inky black, as
the two men soaped and scrubbed and ducked. To take their attention off the
dirt, Anton went into Kundasova’s notions of meteoric wealth in lavish detail.
                 “Hmm,”
said Mirek. He was a short, hairy, muscular man with keen blue eyes. “If that’s
so, it’s just what this part of the world needs. Yet what incredible
difficulties ... It might be fifty years before we could even contemplate
utilisation.”
                 ‘Utilisation’
was one of Mirek’s favourite words. He habitually saw the trees of the taiga as
nothing more than so many railway sleepers planted upright in the ground,
waiting to be pushed over and trimmed.
                 “Maybe
it needs a change in the system of government, too,” he added quietly. “But
that’s no business of mine.”
                 They
repaired to the steam room together, where they thrashed each other with birch
besoms; after which Anton felt ravenous.
     
                 He
dined alone back at the hotel, in the restaurant, on boiled eggs with cream
followed by flabby boiled chicken and cabbage. Afterwards he went up to his
room and poured himself a generous glass of spirits; then he opened the letter
from Borovsk . . .
     
                 Most Truly Honoured Sir,
     
                 Permit
me to introduce myself. My name is Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky, and
currently I am employed as a teacher of arithmetic and geometry at the
elementary school here in Borovsk . . .
                 ‘What’s
this, then? An application for a job?’ Quickly Anton
skimmed through the long letter, various passages catching his eye.
     
                 ... my sincere hope is that next year may see the
publication of my paper on How to Protect
Fragile & Delicate Objects from Jolts & Shocks —with special
reference to gravitational acceleration due to interplanetary travel . . .
     
                 ...
my own humble, and as yet unpublished essay in the art of fiction—of a species
which might perhaps best be described as ‘Science Fantasy’—entitled On the Moon . . .
     
                 ‘Science
Fantasy, eh? What’s that?’ wondered Anton. ‘A new school of
literature? A sort of Odoyevsky and Jules Verne thing? Aha, now I see, this fellow wants me to recommend him to a publisher!’
                 But
surely no one in their right mind would despatch a letter thousands of versts
for that reason alone? Not unless they were crackers . . .
     
                 .
. . ballistic shockwave . . .
     
                 Anton
skipped through to the end.
     
                 .
. . therefore my conclusion, most respected Anton Pavlovich, based upon the
newspaper reports from Siberia which you quote in your article, together with
the other hearsay evidence you cite, is that an interplanetary space
vehicle—perhaps from the planet Mars—exploded high above the forests of the
taiga whilst attempting to enter the Earth’s atmosphere subsequent to its
journey through the void. This disaster would