Element 79 Read Online Free PDF Page B

distinguished had fallen into his lap.
    Professor Pym and his wife lived economically in a small house in a not very attractive suburb of the town—economically, in part so they could give help to a married daughter with a young family, in part for them to afford the cottage they had bought in Hartsop Village, Patterdale, in the Lake District. Time passes, with results more tragic to the old than the young. The daughter had gone with her husband to Australia because there were better opportunities in the vibrant young Commonwealth. When Pym’s wife died in her seventieth year he was left, still with many friends and acquaintances, but without anyone of close attachment. In many ways, life had become a memory.
    It was natural for Pym to give up his suburban home, to retire to Patterdale, to the hills he loved, his last love really. Now approaching the middle seventies, he was still to be seen out walking on a fine afternoon. Given time, he could still manage the broad grassy tracks leading up from the valley to the higher slopes. His weather-beaten face, white hair, and shy, diffident smile were well known to the locals. Although he wasn’t one of them, they made him feel welcome in the village.
    Lately, Pym hadn’t been any too well. It could be just the hot spell, of course, quite exceptionally hot it was. Yet a bit of heat shouldn’t bother him this much, or cause him active pain. He should see a doctor—but then why? Either he was seriously ill or he wasn’t. If it was bad they’d only rush him into hospital, to a little cubicle of a room. The doctors might drag out his life for a month or two, but what were a few extra months worth, spent looking at walls and a ceiling, compared to a last walk along the valley? Besides, there was a piece of work he ought to finish.
    Pym did in fact finish his work. It put quite a drain on his failing strength, but he finished it. Then he sat himself out in the garden, relaxing. A stranger came down the hill path from the direction of “The Knott.” In a few minutes he was at the cottage. Then he paused for a moment, nodded, and opened the garden gate. Pym saw a man of about thirty, handsome in a slightly repellent way, coming up the garden path. “Do you think you could make me a pot of tea?”
    Pym rose slowly from his wicker chair. “Of course, if you wouldn’t mind having it inside. You see, it’s a bit awkward to carry the things out here.”
    Pym showed the stranger into the tiny sitting room and then went to put on the kettle. When he came back with the tea he found the fellow reading his latest paper. It seemed a bit impudent, but Pym didn’t like to be too impolite. “Are you a scientist, might I ask?”
    “You could call me that, Professor Pym.”
    “So you know my name?”
    “You are well known around here.”
    “Not really.”
    “Oh, yes. There aren’t many scientists in these parts, real scientists. Let me ask you a question, Professor Pym. Do you consider yourself a real scientist?”
    Pym flopped into a chair. “That hardly seems very civil.” The stranger threw back his head and laughed. His teeth were evenly spaced, very white, and apparently without blemishes. Pym liked him less and less, particularly as he went on, “You are a Fellow of the Institute of Physics. I know that. It doesn’t answer my question. Take this paper here, for instance. It is no better, no worse, than the fifty-three other papers you have written. In it you make six assumptions each reasonably plausible in itself. But have you ever paused to reflect that a chain of six assumptions gives only a poor chance of the whole argument being right? In fact, your paper is wrong. It is utterly worthless.”
    Pym went very white, his legs trembled badly. “You can’t know that! Even if you’ve worked on the subject yourself, it’s impossible to be sure.”
    For answer, the stranger took three sheets of paper from his rucksack. He flicked them down in front of the old man. “Read