Free The Chain of Chance by Stanislaw Lem

northward. We landed at Orly shortly after seven. Annabella’s father was there to meet her. Before landing we exchanged addresses, and to this day I still have fond memories of her. I wish I could say the same about her father. He was profusely grateful, even paying me a farewell compliment inspired no doubt by his having watched the television coverage of the “massacre on the steps.” He said I had esprit de l’escalier.

Paris
 (Orly-Garges-Orly) 

    I spent the night at Orly, at the Hotel Air France, since by now my contact had already left the Centre National de Recherche Scientifique and I didn’t particularly feel like bothering him at home. Before going to sleep I had to get up and close the windows, because my nose was starting to act up again. It was then I realized I’d gone the whole day without sneezing once.
    As it turned out I could have taken Fenner up on his offer, but then I’d been in such a hurry to reach Paris.
    The next morning, the first thing after breakfast, I called the CNRS only to find out that my contact was on vacation, moving into a new house, but that he could still be reached. I then placed a call to his house in Garges, but it turned out he was just having his new phone connected. Announced or unannounced, I decided to pay him a visit. At the Gare du Nord the suburban trains were not in service, due to a strike. Seeing the mile-long line-up in front of the cabstand, I inquired about the nearest car rental agency—it turned out to be another Hertz—and settled for a Peugeot compact.
    Trying to get around Paris, especially when you’re unsure of your destination, is sheer hell. Not far from the Opéra—it wasn’t on my itinerary; I wound up there quite by accident—a delivery van rammed into my bumper; the damage was so minor I kept on going, my mind now conjuring up visions of Canadian lakes and glacial waters as a distraction from the downpour of blazing-hot sun, unseasonable for this time of year. By mistake I wound up in a place called Sarcelles, one of those ugly, nondescript little settlements; then later I got stuck in front of a railway crossing, sweated, and pined after an air conditioner. Dr. Philippe Barth, my contact, was a well-known French computer scientist who also served as a scientific consultant for the Sûreté. The team he headed was in the process of programming a computer capable of solving multifactorial problems in which the number of case-related facts exceeded the storage capacity of the human memory.
    The exterior of the house had just been freshly stuccoed. Surrounding the house was an old-fashioned garden: one wing shaded by stately elms, a gravel driveway, a flower bed in the center—marigolds, if I’m not mistaken (botany is the only subject astronauts are spared). Parked in front of a shed serving temporarily as a garage was a 2 CV, mud-spattered from the windows down, and right beside it a cream-colored Peugeot 604, its doors wide open, floormats spread out on the lawn, and dripping all over with soapsuds. Some kids were washing the car, but with such bustle and teamwork I had trouble counting them at first. They were all Barth’s kids. The oldest two, a boy and a girl, greeted me in collective English: as soon as one began to falter, the other would fill in the missing word. How did they know they were supposed to speak English? A telegram had come from Randy announcing the arrival of an American astronaut. How could they tell I was the astronaut? No one else was in the habit of wearing suspenders. Good old Randy. While I was talking with the older kids, the younger one—I couldn’t tell whether it was a boy or a girl—kept circling around me, hands folded behind its back, as if hunting for the spot that presented me in the most interesting light. I was told their father was very busy, and just as I was debating whether to go inside the house or to join the car-washing party, Dr. Barth leaned out of the ground-floor window. He looked