Читать книгу Atmospheric Disturbances - Rivka Galchen - Страница 10

After I agreed to the plan, Rema suggested that I find the name of an actual scientist at the Academy, just in case Harvey looked up my superior’s name or was already familiar with the members. I, she said, would have to emphasize that I was, like Harvey, a secret, and therefore unlisted, agent.

“Right,” I said. “So no need to involve someone’s real name, if we’re talking about secret agents.”

“The real is good for deception,” she insisted.

And so.

Following Rema’s advice I obtained a list of the fellows of the Royal Academy. I chose the name Tzvi Gal-Chen capriciously, or so I thought. It just seemed like an anomalous and gentle sort of name, somehow authoritative and innocent at once. I almost chose the name Kelvin Droegemeier. That name also had charm and a kind of diffident beauty. But in the end I settled on Tzvi, because I remembered that degrees Kelvin was a temperature scale, which made Kelvin Droegemeier’s name, even though it was a real name, seem fancifully invented.