محاسبه آینده

CHAPTER ONE

Computing the future

Rachel put down her pen, and closed her eyes. She felt tired, very tired. She looked up at the clock: four thirty. Good, there was enough time to get to the newspaper office before five o’clock, and she wanted the advertisement to go into Friday’s newspaper. Then . . . well, she didn’t know what was going to happen next.

It was a wonderful idea, and it was a new idea. She picked up the finished advertisement and walked through the office door into the computer room.

The computer room was always busy. Fourteen people worked there. Rachel smiled and said ‘Hello’ to everyone as she walked across the room. Long pieces of blue paper were coming out of the computers. The operators were checking them carefully, then putting them into envelopes

Rachel’s company used computers to do horoscopes for people. You sent the date, time and place of your birthday to the company, Computer Astrology Ltd, and the computers could do a horoscope for you.

Rachel’s boss, Mervyn Astra, started the company three years before. Mervyn Astra wasn’t his real name, of course, but it sounded good. It sounded good in the newspaper and magazine advertisements.

His real name was Brian Smith, but only a few people knew that. Rachel was his assistant. She didn’t like Mervyn very much.

He was a short fat man with glasses and very long hair. Mervyn drove an orange Rolls-Royce everywhere. There were gold stars all over it. ‘It’s good advertising,’ Mervyn always said. Anyway, when Rachel had the new idea, Mervyn said, ‘All right, you can try it.’

On Friday morning Rachel got up early. She was waiting for the newspaper. It arrived at eight o’clock. Rachel hurried to the table, and opened it. She was looking for her advertisement. There it was! On page seven!

Rachel smiled. She didn’t really believe in palmistry. She thought it was nonsense. But she thought astrology was nonsense, too.

And the advertisement wasn’t a lie. Not really. Mervyn was a wonderful computer programmer, and the computer program really did have all the information that they could find about palmistry.

It could ‘read’ the photographs with a special video camera, and it could compare them to thousands and thousands of pictures in the program. The program was very expensive. Mervyn worked on it for a long time.

Rachel was a little worried. She wanted the idea to be successful. Mervyn could get angry very quickly, and he hated losing money.

She read the advertisement again, and laughed. ‘Rachel Grant, Palmistry Consultant.’ That was funny. It was Mervyn’s idea, of course.

DO YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT THE FUTURE?

Palmistry is the science of telling the future from people’s hands. It’s a very old science. You can learn about your life, and about important things that will happen to you.

You can learn about your thoughts, future romances, andyour future wealth! We use modern technology to give you a forecast of the future. Our computer has a special program, with information from all the best fortune tellers in the world.

Are you interested? Just send a photograph of your left hand, with a cheque for $10/00 made out to Computer Astrology Ltd to: Rachel Grant,

Palmistry Consultant,

Computer Astrology Ltd,

P.O Box 75, LAZENHURST, LE6 4IQ.

(Don’t forget to write your name on the back of the photograph.)

COMPUTER ASTROLOGY LTD™

Director: Mervyn Astra