Roadside Picnic

"That's it, the black sprays. That's a good name. Well, you know their properties. If you shine a ray of light into one of those beads, the transmission of the light is delayed and the delay depends on the bead's weight, size, and several other parameters. And the unit of light coming out is always smaller than the one entering. What is this? Why? There is a wild theory that the black sprays are gigantic expanses of space with properties different from those of our space and that they became curled up under the influence of our space.” Valentine sighed deeply. “In short, the objects in this group have absolutely no applications to human life today. Even though from a purely scientific point of view they are of fundamental importance. They are answers that have fallen from heaven to questions that we still can't pose. Perhaps Sir Isaac wouldn't have figured out lasers, but he would at least have understood that such a thing is possible, and that would have influenced his scientific outlook greatly. I won't go into detail, but the existence of such objects as the magnetic traps, the K-23, and the white ring has invalidated most of our recently developed theories and has brought forth completely new ideas. And there is still a third group."

"Yes,” Noonan said. “The witches' jelly and other goodies."

"No, no. Those fall either into the first or second category. I'm talking about objects that we know nothing about or have only hearsay information. The things that the stalkers stole from under our noses and sold to God knows who, or have hidden. The things that they don't talk about. The things that have become legends or semi-legends. The wish machine, Dick the Tramp, and the jolly ghosts."

"Wait a minute! What are those things? I can figure out the wish machine, but … "

Valentine laughed.

"You see, we have our own shop talk, too. Dick the Tramp—that's the hypothetical wind-up teddy bear wreaking havoc in the old plant. And the jolly ghost is a type of dangerous turbulence that occurs in some parts of the Zone."

"First I've heard of it."

"You understand, Richard, that we've been digging around in the Zone for twenty years but we don't even know a thousandth of what it contains. And if you want to talk of the Zone's effect on man … By the way, it looks as though we'll have to add another category, the fourth group. Not of objects, but of effects. This group has been shamefully neglected, even though as far as I'm concerned, there are more than enough facts for research. And you know, sometimes my skin crawls, Richard, when I think about those facts."

"Zombies,” Noonan said.

"What? Oh, no, that's merely puzzling. How can I put it—at least, that's imaginable. I mean when suddenly for no reason at all things start happening, nonphysical, nonbiological phenomena."

"Oh, you mean the emigrants."

"Exactly. Statistics is a very precise science, you know, even though it deals with random occurrences. And besides, it's an eloquent and beautiful science."

Valentine seemed to be tipsy. His voice was louder, his cheeks were red, and his eyebrows had crept up high over his dark glasses, wrinkling his forehead into a washboard.

"I really like nondrinkers,” Noonan said.

"Don't get off the subject!” Valentine said. “Listen, what can I tell you? It's very strange.” He raised his glass, drank half in one gulp, and went on. “We don't know what happened to the poor Harmonites at the very moment of the Visitation. But now one of them decides to emigrate. Your most typical man in the street. A barber. The son of a barber and the grandson of a barber. He moves, say, to Detroit. He opens up a barbershop and all hell breaks loose. Over ninety percent of his clients die during a year: they die in car crashes, fall out of windows, are cut down by gangsters or muggers, drown in shallow waters, and so on and so forth. A number of natural disasters hit Detroit and its suburbs. Typhoons and tornadoes, not seen since eighteen-oh-something, suddenly appear in the area. And all that kind of stuff. And such cataclysmic events take place in any city, any area where an emigrant from a Zone area settles. The number of catastrophes is directly proportional to the number of emigrants who have moved to the city. And note that this reaction is caused only by emigrants who actually lived through the Visitation. Those born after the Visitation have no effect on the disaster and accident statistics. You've lived here for ten years, but you moved in after the Visitation and it would be safe to relocate you even in the Vatican. How can this be explained? What should we reject? The statistics? Or common sense?” Valentine grabbed the glass and finished his drink in a gulp.

Richard Noonan scratched his head.

"Hmmm, yes. Of course, I'd heard all that before, but I, uh, assumed that it was all, to put it mildly, exaggerated. Really, from the point of view of our highly developed science … "