The Two Worlds Read Free Page A

himself.

    It wouldn't have needed a Sherlock Holmes to read the story of the night before from the scene that confronted him in the living room. The half-filled coffee cup, empty cigarette pack, and the remains of a pepperoni pizza surrounded by scientific papers and notes strewn untidily in front of the desk terminal told of an evening that had begun with the best and purest of intentions to explore another approach to the Pluto problem. Lyn's shoulder bag on the table by the door, her coat draped across one end of the couch, the empty Chablis bottle, and the white cardboard box containing traces of a beef-curry dinner-to-go all added up to an interruption in the form of an unexpected but not exactly unwelcome arrival. The crumpled cushions and the two pairs of shoes lying where they had fallen between the couch and the coffee table said the rest. Oh well, Hunt told himself, it wouldn't make much difference to the rest of the world if the solution to how Pluto had wound up where it was had to wait an extra twenty-four hours.

    He walked over to the desk and interrogated the terminal for any mail that might have come in overnight. There was a draft of a paper being put together by Mike Barrow's team at Lawrence Livermore Labs, suggesting that an aspect of Ganymean physics that they had been studying implied the possibility of achieving fusion at low temperatures. Hunt scanned it briefly and rerouted it to his office for closer reading there. A couple of bills and statements of account . . . file away and present again at the end of the month. Videorecording from Uncle William in Nigeria; Hunt entered a command for a replay and stood back to watch. Beyond the closed door the shower noises stopped, then Lyn sauntered back into the bedroom.

    William and the family had enjoyed having Vic over on vacation recently and had especially liked hearing his personal account of his experiences at Jupiter and later back on Earth with the Ganymeans . . . Cousin Jenny had gotten an admin job at the nuclear steelmaking complex that was just going into operation outside Lagos. . . . News from the family in London was that all were well, except for Vic's older brother, George, who had been charged with threatening behavior after an argument about politics at his local pub. . . . The postgraduate students at Lagos University had been enthralled by Hunt's lecture about the Shapieron and were sending on a list of questions that they hoped he'd find time to reply to.

    Just as the recording was finishing, Lyn came out of the bedroom wearing her chocolate blouse and ivory crepe skirt from the night before, then disappeared again into the kitchen. "Who's that?" she called, to the accompaniment of cupboard doors being opened and closed and plates being set down on a working surface.

    "Uncle Billy."

    "The one in Africa that you visited a few weeks ago?"

    "Uh huh."

    "So how are they doing?"

    "He looks fine. Jenny's got herself fixed up at the new nuplex I told you about, and brother George is in trouble again."

    "Uh-oh. What now?"

    "Doing his pub lawyer act by the sound of it. Somebody didn't agree that the government ought to guarantee paychecks to anybody on strike."

    "What is he—some kind of nut?"

    "Runs in the family."

    "You said it, not me."

    Hunt grinned. "So never say you weren't warned."

    "I'll remember that. . . . Food's ready."

    Hunt flipped off the terminal and walked into the kitchen. Lyn, perched on a stool at the breakfast bar that divided the room in two, had already started eating. Hunt sat down opposite her, drank some coffee, then picked up his fork. "Why the rush?" he asked. "It's still early. We're not pushed for time."

    "I'm not coming straight in. I ought to go home first and change."

    "You look okay to me—fact, not a bad piece of womanry at all."

    "Flattery will get you anywhere you like. No . . . Gregg's got some special visitors coming down from Washington today. I don't want to look `groped'