The Last Starship From Earth Read Online Free PDF Page B

whispered in the winds of late November. He was a ghost drifting among ghosts, for he was no longer Haldane IV of the twentieth century. Helix had introduced him, and Moran had wedded him, to the immortal dead. Only his body trudged this desolate heath; his soul danced a minuet in an eighteenth-century drawing room.
    He found his car and drove back to the apartment.
    His father had not arrived. Remembering the disappointment he had caused the old man, Haldane went to the bureau and removed the chess pieces, setting them up for a game.
    Greystone wasn’t one to talk forever. His father should be in early enough for a game. Haldane, in a spirit of repentance, knew in advance that his father would win tonight.
    Haldane III entered, bringing the chill on his overcoat and rubbing his hands together. His eyes lighted when he saw the chess board. “Ready for a beating?”
    “Ready to give you one.”
    “Good. How was your lecture?”
    “So-so,” Haldane said. “How was yours?”
    “Excellent. I’ve got the Fairweather Effect down pat. How about mixing me a drink while I make room for it.”
    Haldane went to the bar and poured two drinks.
    His father, divested of his coat, returned and pulled up a chair to the chess table. “So, your lecture was only fair. Mine was good, very good.”
    Well into the game, Haldane sat silent and moody until his father remarked, “I can’t understand why you young people all want to jump your categories.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “There was an art student at the lecture tonight. A girl. They introduced me as an honored guest before the lecture, and she came over and introduced herself. We sat and talked for quite a while, and she listened to me. More than I can say for my son.”
    “Uh-huh. What’d she look like?… Check.”
    “What difference does it make? A female’s a female.”
    “I was just wondering if my old man still had an eye for a frail.”
    “As you have often had the kindness to point out, son, I’m not too observant. But, as I remember, this girl had chestnut hair, hazel eyes, a rather broad face, and a determined chin. Her nose tilted slightly. Her breasts were high and wide apart. She walked with a slight sway to her hips that would have doubled her income if she had been a prostitute.”
    He looked over at his son with a half-grin. “Do you want me to tell you about the mole under her left breast and the appendix scar about four inches below her navel?”
    Haldane looked at him seriously, “Father, I’ve never before truly gauged the extent of your satyriasis.”
    “She had beauty, a strange beauty. It seemed to be a quality of the mind as much as the body, and as I talked to her I had the impression I was talking to a much older woman. She was writing a paper on the poetry of Fairweather, and I told her about you.”
    “She must have made an impression if you were willing to clank out the family skeleton.”
    “She did. I invited her to dinner tomorrow night. She doesn’t have far to come. She’s a student at Golden Gate. I told her I would try to get you to join us if you weren’t away at some poetry lecture.”
    “I’ll try to make it,” Haldane said.

Chapter Three
    She glittered as coldly as the Northern Lights, and the eyes which laughed for his father turned on him with immaculate propriety. “If your machine should work, citizen, all you would need do would be to reverse the input, and you would have an electronic poet. Such a device would destroy my category.
    “Logically, the next step would be machines to create machines, and there would be no social need for human beings. Don’t you agree, sir?”
    “Absolutely, Helix. I told him it was a foolish idea.”
    Haldane had never found his father more quick to agree, had never seen him more charming or animated. The light from the old man’s eyes practically illuminated the table. Outflanked, Haldane withdrew into dessert and silence as his father launched a monologue.
    “You’ve touched on an