Solaris Read Online Free PDF Page B

sections of the ocean were named after the scientists who had explored them. I was examining Thexall's swell, which surrounded the equatorial archipelagos, when I had a sudden sensation of being watched.
    I was still leaning over the map, but I no longer saw it; my limbs were in the grip of a sort of paralysis. The crates and a small locker still barricaded the door, which was in front of me. It's only a robot, I told myself—yet I had not discovered any in the room and none could have entered without my knowledge. My back and my neck seemed to be on fire; the sensation of this relentless, fixed stare was becoming unbearable. With my head shrinking between my hunched shoulders, I leant harder and harder against the table, until it began slowly to slide away. The movement released me; I spun round.
    The room was empty. There was nothing in front of me except the wide convex window and, beyond it, the night. But the same sensation persisted. The night stared me in the face, amorphous, blind, infinite, without frontiers. Not a single star relieved the darkness behind the glass. I pulled the thick curtains. I had been in the Station less than an hour, yet already I was showing signs of morbidity. Was it the effect of Gibarian's death? In so far as I knew him, I had imagined that nothing could shake his nerve: now, I was no longer so sure.
    I stood in the middle of the room, beside the table. My breathing became more regular, I felt the sweat chill on my forehead. What was it I had been thinking about a moment ago? Ah, yes, robots! It was surprising that I had not come across one anywhere on the Station. What could have become of them all? The only one with which I had been in contact—at a distance—belonged to the vehicle reception services. But what about the others?
    I looked at my watch. It was time to rejoin Snow.
    I left the room. The dome was feebly lit by luminous filaments running the length of the ceiling. I went up to Gibarian's door and stood there, motionless. There was total silence. I gripped the handle. I had in fact no intention of going in, but the handle went down and the door opened, disclosing a chink of darkness. The lights went on. In one quick movement, I entered and silently closed the door behind me. Then I turned round.
    My shoulders brushed against the door panels. The room was larger than mine. A curtain decorated with little pink and blue flowers (not regulation Station equipment, but no doubt brought from Earth with his personal belongings) covered three-quarters of the panoramic window. Around the walls were bookshelves and cupboards, painted pale green with silvery highlights. Both shelves and cupboards had been emptied of their contents, which were piled into heaps, amongst the furniture. At my feet, blocking the way, were two overturned trolleys buried beneath a heap of periodicals spilling out of bulging brief cases which had burst open. Books with their pages splayed out fanwise were stained with colored liquids which had spilt from broken retorts and bottles with corroded stoppers, receptacles made of such thick glass that a single fall, even from a considerable height, could not have shattered them in such a way. Beneath the window lay an overturned desk, an anglepoise lamp crumpled underneath it; two legs of an upturned stool were stuck in the half-open drawers. A flood of papers of every conceivable size swamped the floor. My interest quickened as I recognized Gibarian's hand-writing. As I stooped to gather together the loose sheets, I noticed that my hand was casting a double shadow.
    I straightened up. The pink curtain glowed brightly, traversed by a streak of incandescent, steely-blue light which was gradually widening. I pulled the curtain aside. An unbearable glare extended along the horizon, chasing before it an army of spectral shadows, which rose up from among the waves and dispersed in the direction of the Station. It was the dawn. After an hour of darkness the planet's second