【英文读物】The Girls From Earth.docx

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1、【英文读物】The Girls From EarthChapter 1The beasts arent much help, are they?Karl Allen snatched a breath of air and gave another heave on the line tied to the raft of parampa logs bobbing in the middle of the river.No, he grunted, theyre not. They always balk at a time like this, when they can see itll

2、be hard work.Joseph Hill wiped his plump face and coiled some of the ropes slack around his thick waist.Together now, Karl. One! Two!They stood knee-deep in mud on the bank, pulling and straining on the rope, while some few yards distant, in the shade of a grove of trees, their tiny yllumphs nibbled

3、 grass and watched them critically, but made no effort to come closer.If were late for ships landing, Joe, well get crossed off the list.Hill puffed and wheezed and took another hitch on the rope.Thats what Ive been thinking about, he said, worried.They took a deep breath and hauled mightily on the

4、raft rope. The raft bobbed nearer. For a moment the swift waters of the Karazoo threatened to tear it out of their grasp, and then it was beached, most of it solidly, on the muddy bank. One end of it still lay in the gurgling, rushing waters, but that didnt matter. Theyd be back in ten hours or so,

5、long before the heavy raft could be washed free.How much time have we got, Karl?The ground was thick with shadows, and Karl cast a critical eye at them. He estimated that even with the refusal of their yllumphs to help beach the raft, they still had a good two hours before the rocket put down at Lan

6、ding City.Two hours, maybe a little more, he stated hastily when Hill looked more worried. Time enough to get to Landing City and put in for our numbers on the list.He turned back to the raft, untied the leather and horn saddles, and threw them over the backs of their reluctant mounts. He cinched hi

7、s saddle and tied on some robes and furs behind it.Hill watched him curiously. What are you taking the furs for? This isnt the trading rocket.I know. I thought that when we come back tonight, it might be cold and maybe shell appreciate the coverings then.You never would have thought of it yourself,

8、Hill grunted. Grundy must have told you to do it, the old fool. If you ask me, the less you give them, the less theyll come to expect. Once you spoil them, theyll expect you to do all the trapping and the farming and the family-raising yourself.You didnt have to sign up, Karl pointed out. You could

9、have applied for a wife from some different planet.Ones probably just as good as another. Theyll all have to work the farms and raise families.Karl laughed and aimed a friendly blow at Hill. They finished saddling up and headed into the thick forest.It was quiet as Karl guided his mount along the di

10、mly marked trail and he caught himself thinking of the return trip he would be making that night. It would be nice to have somebody new to talk to. And it would be good to have somebody to help with the trapping and tanning, somebody who could tend the small vegetable garden at the rear of his shack

11、 and mend his socks and wash his clothes and cook his meals.And it was time, he thought soberly, that he started to raise a family. He was mid-twenty now, old enough to want a wife and children.You going to raise a litter, Joe?Hill started. Karl realized that he had probably been thinking of the sam

12、e thing.One of these days Ill need help around the sawmill, Hill answered defensively. Need some kids to cut the trees, a couple more to pole them down the river, some to run the mill itself and maybe one to sell the lumber in Landing City. Cant do it all myself.He paused a moment, thinking over som

13、ething that had just occurred to him.Ive been thinking of your plans for a garden, Karl. Maybe I ought to have one for my wife to take care of, too.Karl chuckled. I dont think shell have the time!They left the leafy expanse of the forest and entered the grasslands that sloped toward Landing City. He

14、 could even see Landing City itself on the horizon, a smudge of rusting, corrugated steel shacks, muddy streets, and the small rocket porta scorched thirty acres or so fenced off with barbed wire.Karl looked out of the corner of his eye at Hill and felt a vague wave of uneasiness. Hill was a big, th

15、ick man wearing the soiled clothes and bristly stubble of a man who was used to living alone and who liked it. But once he took a wife, he would probably have to keep himself in clean clothes and shave every few days. It was even possible that the woman might object to Hill letting his yllumph share

16、 the hut.The path was getting crowded, more of the colonists coming onto the main path from the small side trails.Hill broke the silence first. I wonder what theyll be like.Karl looked wise and nodded knowingly. Theyre Earthwomen, Joe. Earth!It was easy to act as though he had some inside informatio

17、n, but Karl had to admit to himself that he actually knew very little about it. He was a Second System colonist and had never even seen an Earthwoman. He had heard tales, though, and even discounting a large percentage of them, some of them must have been true. Old Grundy at the rocket office, who s

18、hould know about these things if anybody did, seemed disturbingly lacking on definite information, though he had hinted broadly enough. Hed whistle softly and wink an eye and repeat the stories that Karl had already heard; but he had nothing definite to offer, no real facts at all.Some of the other

19、colonists whom they hadnt seen for the last few months shouted greetings, and Karl began to feel some of the carnival spirit. There was Jenkins, who had another trapping line fifty miles farther up the Karazoo; Leonard, who had the biggest farm on Midplanet; and then the fellow who specialized in ca

20、tching and breaking in yllumphs, whose name Karl couldnt remember.They say theyre good workers, Hill said.Karl nodded. Pretty, too.They threaded their way through the crowded and muddy streets. Landing City wasnt big, compared to some of the cities on Altair, where he had been raised, but Karl was p

21、roud of it. Some day it would be as big as any city on any planetmaybe even have a population of ten thousand people or more.Joe, Karl said suddenly, whats supposed to make women from Earth better than women from any other world?Hill located a faint itch and frowned. I dont know, Karl. Its hard to s

22、ay. Theyrewell, sophisticated, glamorous.Karl absorbed this in silence. Those particular qualities were, he thought, rather hard to define.The battered shack that served as rocket port office and headquarters for the colonial office on Midplanet loomed up in front of them. There was a crowd gathered

23、 in front of the building and they forced their way through to see what had caused it.We saw this the last time we were here, Hill said.I know, Karl agreed, but I want to take another look. He was anxious to glean all the information that he could.It was a poster of a beautiful woman leaning toward

24、the viewer. The edges of the poster were curling and the colors had faded during the last six months, but the girls smile seemed just as inviting as ever. She held a long-stemmed goblet in one hand and was blowing a kiss to her audience with the other. Her green eyes sparkled, her smile was provocat

25、ive. A quoted sentence read: Im from Earth! There was nothing more except a printed list of the different solar systems to which the colonial office was sending the women.She was real pretty, Karl thought. A little on the thin side, maybe, and the dress she was wearing would hardly be practical on M

26、idplanet, but she had a certain something. Glamour, maybe?A loudspeaker blared.All colonists waiting for the wife draft assemble for your numbers! All colonists.There was a jostling for places and then they were in the rapidly moving line. Grundy, fat and important-looking, was handing out little bl

27、ue slips with numbers on them, pausing every now and then to tell them some entertaining bit of information about the women. He had a great imagination, nothing else.Karl drew the number 53 and hurried to the grassy lot beside the landing field that had been decorated with bunting and huge welcome s

28、igns for the new arrivals. A table was loaded with government pamphlets meant to be helpful to newly married colonists. Karl went over and stuffed a few in his pockets. Other tables had been set out and were loaded with luncheon food, fixed by the few colonial women in the community. Karl caught him

29、self eyeing the women closely, wondering how the girls from Earth would compare with them.He fingered the ticket in his pocket. What would the woman be like who had drawn the companion number 53 aboard the rocket? For when it landed, they would pair up by numbers. The method had its drawbacks, of co

30、urse, but time was much too short to allow even a few days of getting acquainted. Hed have to get back to his trapping lines and he imagined that Hill would have to get back to his sawmill and the others to their farms. What the hell, you never knew what you were getting either way, till it was too

31、late.Sandwich, mister? Pop?Karl flipped the boy a coin, picked up some food and a drink, and wandered over to the landing field with Hill. There were still ten minutes or so to go before the rocket landed, but he caught himself straining his sight at the blue sky, trying to see a telltale flicker of

32、 exhaust flame.The field was crowded and he caught some of the buzzing conversation. never knew one myself, but let me tell you. knew a fellow once who married one, never had a moments rest afterward. no comparison with colonial women. They got culture. Id give a lot to know the girl whos got number

33、 twenty-five.Lets meet back here with the girls who have picked our numbers, Hill said. Maybe we could trade.Karl nodded, though privately he felt that the number system was just as good as depending on first impressions.There was a murmur from the crowd and he found his gaze riveted overhead. High

34、above, in the misty blue sky, was a sudden twinkle of fire.He reached up and wiped his sweaty face with a muddy hand and brushed aside a straggly lock of tangled hair. It wouldnt hurt to try to look his best.The twinkling fire came nearer.Chapter 2A Mr. Macdonald to see you, Mr. Escher.Claude Escher

35、 flipped the intercom switch.Please send him right in.That was entirely superfluous, he thought, because MacDonald would come in whether Escher wanted him to or not.The door opened and shut with a slightly harder bang than usual and Escher mentally braced himself. He had a good hunch what the proble

36、m was going to be and why it was being thrown in their laps.MacDonald made himself comfortable and sat there for a few minutes, just looking grim and not saying anything. Escher knew the psychology by heart. A short preliminary silence is always more effective in browbeating subordinates than an ini

37、tial furious bluster.He lit a cigarette and tried to outwait MacDonald. It wasnt easyMacDonald had great staying powers, which was probably why he was the head of the department.Escher gave in first. Okay, Mac, whats the trouble? What do we have tossed in our laps now?You know the onecolonization pr

38、oblem. You know that when we first started to colonize, quite a large percentage of the male population took to the stars, as the saying goes. The adventuresome, the gamblers, the frontier type all decided they wanted to head for other worlds, to get away from it all. The male of the species is far

39、more adventuresome than the female; the men leftbut the women didnt. At least, not in nearly the same large numbers.Well, you see the problem. The ratio of women to men here on Earth is now something like five to three. If you dont know what that means, ask any man with a daughter. Or any psychiatri

40、st. Husband-hunting isnt just a pleasant pastime on Earth. Its an earnest cutthroat business and Im not just using a literary phrase.He threw a paper on Eschers desk. Youll find most of the statistics about it in that, Claude. Notice the increase in crimes peculiar to women. Shoplifting, badger game

41、s, poisonings, that kind of thing. Its quite a list. Youll also notice the huge increase in petty crimes, a lot of which wouldnt have bothered the courts before. In fact, they wouldnt even have been considered crimes. You know why they are now?Escher shook his head blankly.Most of the girls in the p

42、ast who didnt catch a husband, MacDonald continued, grew up to be the type of old maid whos dedicated to improving the morals and what-not of the rest of the population. Weve got more puritanical societies now than we ever had, and we have more silly little laws on the books as a result. You can be

43、thrown in the pokey for things like violating a womans privacywhatever that meansand shes the one who decides whether what you say or do is a violation or not.Escher looked bored. Not to mention the new prohibition which forbids the use of alcohol in everything from cough medicines to hair tonics. O

44、r the cleaned up moral code that reeksif youll pardon the expressionof purity. Sure, I know what you mean. And you know the solution. All we have to do is get the women to colonize.MacDonald ran his fingers nervously through his hair.But it wont be easy, and thats why its been given to us. Its your

45、baby, Claude. Give it a lot of thought. Nothings impossible, you know.Perpetual motion machines are, Escher said quietly. And pulling yourself up by your boot-straps. But I get the point. Nevertheless, women just dont want to colonize. And who can blame them? Why should they give up living in a luxu

46、ry civilization, with as many modern conveniences as this one, to go homesteading on some wild, unexplored planet where they have to work their fingers to the bone and play footsie with wild animals and savages who would just as soon skin them alive as not?What do you advise I do, then? MacDonald de

47、manded. Go back to the Board and tell them the problem is not solvable, that we cant think of anything?Escher looked hurt. Did I say that? I just said it wouldnt be easy.The Board is giving you a blank check. Do anything you think will pay off. We have to stay within the letter of the law, of course

48、, but not necessarily the spirit.When do they have to have a solution?As soon as possible. At least within the year. By that time the situation will be very serious. The psychologists say that what will happen then wont be good.All right, by then well have the answer.MacDonald stopped at the door. Theres another rea