Free The Crystal World by J. G. Ballard

huge rocks began to reach the market. The share prices on the Paris Bourse climbed to fantastic heights. That's how it all started. A man was sent to investigate and ended up in the river."
    "There were vested interests?"
    "There still are. We aren't the only people trying to keep this quiet. The mines here have never been particularly profitable-" Radek seemed about to reveal something, and then changed his mind, perhaps aware of Sanders's withdrawn manner. "Well, I think I can tell you, in confidence of course, that this is not the only affected area in the world. At this moment at least two other sites exist-one in the Florida Everglades, and the other in the Pripet Marshes of the Soviet Union. Naturally, both are under intensive investigation."
    "Then the effect is understood?" Dr. Sanders asked.
    Radek shook his head. "Not at all. The Soviet team is under the leadership of Lysenko. As you can imagine, he is wasting the Russians' time. He believes that non-inherited mutations are responsible, and that because there is an apparent increase in tissue weight, crop yields can also be increased." Radek laughed wearily. "I'd like to see some of those tough Russians trying to chew a piece of this crystallized glass."
    "What is Tatlin's theory?"
    "In general he agrees with the American experts. I spoke to him at the site this morning." Radek opened a drawer and tossed something from it across the desk to Sanders. It lay there like crystallized leather, giving off a soft light. "That's a piece of bark I show to visitors."
    Dr. Sanders pushed it back across the desk. "Thank you, but I saw the satellite last night."
    Radek nodded to himself. He scooped the bark back into the drawer with his ruler and closed it, obviously glad to have this exhibit out of sight. He brushed his fingers together. "The satellite? Yes, an impressive sight. Venus now has two lamps. Not only two either. Apparently at the Mount Hubble Observatory in the States they have seen distant galaxies efflorescing!"
    Radek paused, collecting his energies with an effort. "Tatlin believes that this Hubble Effect, as they call it, is closer to a cancer than anything else-and about as curable-an actual proliferation of the sub-atomic identity of all matter. It's as if a sequence of displaced but identical images of the same object were being produced by refraction through a prism, but with the element of time replacing the role of light."
     
    There was a knock on the door. The sergeant put his head through. "The inspection party is ready to leave, sir."
    "Good." Radek stood up and took his cap from the peg. "We'll have a look, Doctor. I think you'll be impressed."
    Five minutes later the party of visitors, some dozen in number, set off in one of the amphibian craft. Father Balthus was not among them, and Sanders assumed that he had left for his mission by road. However, when he asked Radek why they were not approaching Mont Royal by the highway the captain told him that the road was closed. In response to Sanders's request, the captain arranged to make contact by field telephone with the clinic where Suzanne and Max Clair were working. The owner of the mine near by, a Swedish-American by the name of Thorensen, would tell them of Sanders's arrival, and with luck Max would be at the wharf to meet him when they landed.
    Radek had heard nothing of Anderson 's whereabouts. "However," he explained to Louise before they embarked, "we ourselves have had great difficulty in taking photographs-the crystals look like wet snow, in Paris they're still sceptical-so he may be hanging about somewhere, waiting for a convincing picture."
    As he took his seat near the driver in the bow of the amphibian, Dr. Sanders waved to Louise Peret, who was watching from the wharf on the other side of the pontoon-barrage. He had promised to return with Max for her after they had visited the affected area, but even so Louise had made a half-hearted attempt to stop him going at all.
    "Edward, wait till I