Brunner, John - The Pronounced Effect
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2024-11-24
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THE PRONOUNCED EFFECT
THE PRONOUNCED EFFECT
John Brunner
Never in all her nineteen years had Lies Andrassy wished so devoutly her father could be with her. She
had been tense and edgy throughout the 200-mile bus ride which had brought her here; now, in the huge
hall of the hotel where banners welcomed the annual convention of the Linguistics Society, she was
positively trembling. She had only seldom been among such a large group of people before—there must
have been at least a thousand, milling around or waiting patiently in line—and the sheer pressure of their
presence was upsetting.
Worst of all was the fact that she didn’t know a single soul, and nobody knew her.
However, she was determined to put a bold face on it. She had checked into her room easily enough, and
then come down to collect her conference documents. Tables had been set up with signs above them:
PRE-REGISTERED A – K; PRE-REGISTERED L – Z; OFFICIALS AND PARTICIPANTS; NON-
REGISTERED… She had duly joined the line at the first table, but it was moving dreadfully slowly, and
she had far more time than she wanted to look about her and envy those who had friends to talk to.
One man in particular, of early middle age, with a big red beard and a booming laugh, was holding forth
to half a dozen seeming admirers just far enough away for her not to catch what was being said, but
everybody in the group was obviously vastly entertained by his witty conversation. Well, maybe by the
time the weekend was over she too might be chatting happily with new acquaintances. But Monday
seemed like an awfully long way away from Friday, and in her heart of hearts she could not be
optimistic. She was acutely aware how confident, how poised, most of the women were who strode
briskly across the hallway, and how out of keeping her own “safe” tailored suit was compared with the
up-to-the-minute styles most of them wore. People who wanted to be polite to her called her “cuddly,”
or at worst “plump,” but in fact she was fat; and, worse yet, she had had to wear glasses since she was
six. It looked, in short, as though nature had marked her out for the same kind of dull academic career
her father had endured.
Not, of course, that he had ever admitted to finding it dull; indeed, he more often talked of it as though it
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THE PRONOUNCED EFFECT
were some kind of grand contest, in which there were skirmishes and duels and outright battles.
But how on earth could anyone get excited about whether or not a certain word in a dead language was
pronounced this way rather than that way?
On the bus she had read and re-read the paper of her father’s which she was scheduled to present
tomorrow in his place, until she had practically memorised it.
She muttered a phrase from it which was supposed to be some kind of grand curse, calling up a veritable
devil, as she went on staring at the man with the red beard.
“Oh, excuse me!” a light voice said at her side. “Did I bump into you?”
She returned to the here and now with a start, and realised that the line she was in had moved without
her noticing, so there was now six feet between her and the person ahead. Hastily she closed the gap, at
the same time glancing—glancing up—at the man who had addressed her. He was very tall and quite
indecently handsome: a shock of fair hair, neatly brushed, incongruously dark eyes above well-modelled
cheekbones, a light summer jacket, open shirt, silk choker…
He had been among the early arrivals; he already carried his file of conference documents, and pinned to
his lapel was a badge identifying him as J.R. DeVILLE, Ph.D., MISKATONIC U.
Not a college Lies had ever heard of—but then, she hadn’t heard of half the places represented this
weekend. There would be almost two thousand teachers and students of linguistics and etymology
assembled by tonight. And how bare her own name-badge would seem among all these doctors and
professors, without a single qualification!
But that was irrelevant. What mattered was that he still thought her under-the-breath exclamation had
been due to his bumping into her, and he had apologised needlessly. She summoned a smile.
“That’s all right, Doctor! You didn’t do anything.”
“I’m glad,” he said, and flashed sparkling white teeth as he made to turn away.
Before she could stop herself, she had caught his sleeve.
“Excuse me!” she heard herself saying. “But do you know who that man is over there, with the red
beard?”
“Hmm?” Dr. DeVille checked and looked around. “Oh, that’s Professor Simon Tadcaster. One of the—
ah—more conspicuous delegates, as you might say… Is something wrong?”
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THE PRONOUNCED EFFECT
For on hearing the name Lies had turned pale and started to sway, furious because she could not control
the impulse.
“I’m—I’m all right,” she forced out.
“You don’t look all right,” he contradicted, taking her arm. “Let me help you to a chair.”
“No, no—really!” She straightened and released herself from his grip. “I don’t want to lose my place in
line, do I? And I really am all right, I promise. It’s just…”
She felt obliged to explain. “I simply didn’t realise that was Professor Tadcaster. He’s—he’s my father’s
greatest enemy.”
It sounded ridiculous, put like that. But what else could one call a person who set out systematically to
mock and ridicule the life’s work of a professional colleague?
Dr. DeVille raised his eyebrows. “Really? Your father being—?”
“Well… Well, Professor Julius Andrassy. I don’t suppose you ever heard of him.”
“Heard of Andrassy?” DeVille countered with a trace of sarcasm. “Of course I have! He’s giving a paper
tomorrow on the way the pronunciation of Latin and Hebrew was affected by local dialects in Central
Europe, and I certainly don’t intend to miss it! It sounds fascinating!”
“Oh, you do know about him! I thought…” Lies licked her lips. “But he’s not giving the paper. He’s too
ill to come, so I’ve got to do it instead, and I don’t more than half-understand it… And it’s all that
Professor Tadcaster’s fault, I’m sure!”
“Well, I must admit,” DeVille said after a slight hesitation, “he has been a bit scathing in the
professional journals about your father’s theories, and I suppose most of the people who turn up will be
there in the hope of watching a grand set-to between them… But never mind that for the moment. You
said you’re actually going to present the paper?”
“Yes, I promised I would.”
“Then you’re in the wrong line,” DeVille said briskly, and taking her arm urged her over to the table for
officials and participants, where there was for the moment no line at all; the girl on duty was leaning
back in her chair and covering a yawn.
“But—!” Lies began.
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分类：外语学习
价格：5.9玖币
属性：22 页
大小：56.03KB
格式：PDF
时间：2024-11-24
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