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THE MAGAZINE OF Fantasi/ and Science Fiction fintOSE FOR ECCLESIASTES Mt by Roger Z^lozny THE EfiS OF PHORKOt by Sirf Lawrence Jones TH E MA GAZINE 0 E Science Fiction N 0 V E Admm R- St 'FOR • > . A Rose For Ecclesiastes {novelet) ROGER ZEEAZNY 5 Mama PHILIP WINSOR 36 Science: Welcome Stranger! ISAAC ASIMOV 39 Wings of Song LLOYD BIGGLE, JR, 50 Winged Victory S, DORMAN 64 Books AVRAM DAVIDSON 68 Eight O’clock in the Morning RAY NELSON 74 The Eyes of Phorkos {short novel) L, E. JONES 79 Ferdinand Feghoot: IfKVI GRENDEL BRIARTON 126 In this issue . Coming next month 4 Letters 127 F&SF Marketplace 129 Cover by Hannes Bok {illustrating "A Rose For Ecclesiastes”) 1 Joseph W. Ferman, publisher Avram Davidson, executive editor Isaac Asimov, science editor Edward L. Ferman, managing editor Ted White, assistant editor The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Vohtme 25, No, 5, Whole No. 150, Nov. 1963. Pithlished monthly by Mercury Press, Inc., at 40^ a copy. Annual subscription ^4.50; $5.00 in Canada and the Pan American Union; $5.50 in all other countries. Publi- cation office, 10 Ferry Street, Concord, N. H. Editorial and general mail should be sent to 347 East 53rd St., Neva York 22, N. Y. Second Class postage paid at Concord, N. H. Printed in U. S. A. © 1963 by Mercury Press, Inc. All rights, including translations into other languages, reserved. Submissions iniist be accoinpunied by stamped, self-addressed envelopes; the Publisher assumes no rcsponsibjlity for return of unsolicited manuscripts. In this issue . Music is something the world can never have too much of, and it does not very often supply a theme for SF stories. It supplies a poignant one for a story by LLOYD HIGGLE, JR. At the other end of the spectrum is a real weirdo about men . er . well ... by S. DORMAN. A good solid chunk of short novel about men, marble, and The Isles of Greece by SIR LAWRENCE JONES is balanced by a vivid htde terror tale of RAY NELSON’s. PHILIP WTNSOR gives us a glimpse of wisdom ordained out of the mouths of babes, and the cover story is one of love, mystery, a strange planet and a dying race, by ROGER ZELAZNY (of whom we shall hear much more). The cover is, of course, by one of the great Science-Fantasy artists of all times, the rare and incomparable HANNES BOK. Coming next month . ... is part one of a two part novel, THE TREE OF TIME, by DAMON KNIGHT. Need we say that it’s good? Certainly not. Also scheduled is one by Your Servant To Command. The former deals with the future, the latter, with the past. In both there is, we frank- ly declare, a certain (of cotextual necessity) touch of modest deca- dence; but there will be plenty of wholesome goodies for young and old alike, as well. Hasta la vista . 4 Roger Zelazny, whose first story for FirSF makes its im- pressive appearance below, says that he has read SF and Fan- tasy for as far back as he can remember, and has wanted to write it for almost as long, “but did not have much opportunity to do so until early last year when Columbia got around to giving me the M.A. for ‘Two Traditions and Cyril Tourneur: An Examination of Morality and Humor In <« The Revenger’s Tragedy >» Former 6pee instructor, ex-Nike crewman, Mr. Zelazny is now an OASDI claims examiner with the Social Se- curity Administration, is 25 years old, claims that he is dread- fully lazy and likes beer . All the elements of Classical Old-Fashioned Science Fiction are here in this story of a Mars “where the sun is a tarnished penny . the wind is a whip [and] two moons play at hotrod games”—but the authors wide-ranging mind and perceptive pen bring us new lamps for old. A ROSE FOR ECCLESIASTES by Roger Zelazny L away, and send him to his cabin. — Since there’s only one damned .’’ I WAS BUSY TRANSLATING ONE conceited rhymer . of my Madrigals Macahre into “Let not ambition mock thy use- Martian on the morning I was ful toil.’’ I cut him off. found acceptable. The intercom So, the Martians had finally had buzzed briefly, and I dropped made up their minds! I knocked my pencil and flipped on the tog- an inch and a half of ash from a gle in a single motion. smouldering butt, and took my first "Mister G,” piped Morton’s drag since I had lit it. The entire youthful contralto, “the old man month’s anticipation tried hard to says I should ‘get hold of that crowd itself into the moment, but damned conceited rhymer’ right could not quite make it. I was 5 ” : 6 FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION t'rightened to walk those forty feet sometime and surprise everybody? and hear Emory say the words I I’m willing to admit you’re smart, already knew he would say; and maybe even a genius, but— oh. that feeling elbowed the other one Hell!” He made a heaving gesture into the background. with both hands and walked back So I finished the stanza I was to his chair. translating before I got up. “Betty has finally talked them It took only a moment to reach into letting you go in.” His voice Emory’s door. I knocked twice and was normal again. “They’ll receive opened it, just as he growled, you this afternoon. Draw one of "Come in.” the jeepsters after lunch, and get "You wanted to see me?” I sat down there.” down quickly to save him the trou- “Okay,” I said. ble of offering me a seat. “That’s all, then.” “That was fast. What did you I nodded, got to my feet. My do, run?” hand was on the doorknob when I regarded his paternal discon- he said tent: “I don’t have to tell you how im- Little fatty flecks beneath pale portant this is. Don’t treat them the eyes, thinning hair, and an Irish way you treat us.” nose; a voice a decibel louder than I closed the door behind me. anyone else’s . Hamlet to Claudius: “I was I don’t remember what I had working.” for lunch. I was nervous, but I “Hah! he snorted. “Come off it. knew instinctively that I would- No one’s ever seen you do any of n’t muff it. My Boston publishers that stuff.” expected a Martian Idyll, or at I shrugged my shoulders and least a Saint-Exuperay job on started to rise. space flight. The National Science “If that’s— what you called me Association wanted a complete re- down here port on the Rise and Fall of tlie “Sit down!” Martian Empire. He stood up. He walked around They would both be pleased. I his desk. He hovered above me and knew. glared down. (A hard trick, even That’s the reason everyone is when I’m in a low chair.) jealous —why they hate me. I al- “You are undoubtedly the most ways come through, and I can antagonistic bastard I’ve ever had come through better than anyone to work with!” he bellowed, like a else. belly-stung buffalo. “Why the hell I shovelled in a final anthill of don’t you act like a human being slop, and made my way to our car ” — A ROSE FOR ECCLESIASTES 7 barn. I drew one jeepster and She permitted herself a brief headed it toward Tircllian. Germanic giggle —more, at my Flames of sand, lousy with iron starting a sentence with “like” oxide, set fire to the buggy. They tlian at my discomfort— then she swarmed over the open top and bit started talking. (She is a top lin- through my scarf; they set to work guist, so a word from the Village pitting my goggles. Idiom still tickles her!) The jeepster, swaying and pant- I appreciate her precise, furry ing like a little donkey I onee rode talk; informational, and all that. 1 through the Himalayas, kept kiek- had enough in the way of social ing me in the seat of the pants. pleasantries before me to last at The Mountains oLTirellian shuf- least the rest of my life. I looked at fled their feet and moved toward her chocolate-bar eyes and perfect me at a coekeyed angle. teeth, at her sun-bleached hair, Suddenly I was heading uphill, close-cropped to the head (I hate and I shifted gears to accommo- blondes!), and decided that she date the engine’s braying. Not like was in love with me. Gobi, not like the Great South- “Mr. Gallinger, the Matriarch is western Desert, I mused. Just red, waiting inside to be introduced. just dead . without even a She has consented to open the eactus. Temple records for your study.” I reached the crest of the hill, She paused here to pat her hair and but I had raised too much dust to squirm a little. Did my gaze make see what was ahead. It didn’t mat- her nervous? ter, though, I have a head full of “They are religious documents, maps. I bore to the left and down- as well as their only history,” she hill, adjusting the throttle. A continued, “sort of like the Ma- cross-wind and sohd ground beat habharata. She expects you to ob- down the fires. I felt like Ulysses serve certain rituals in handling in Malebolge—with a terza-rima them, like repeating the sacred speeeh in one hand and an eye out words when you turn pages — she for Dante.

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