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The Terran expeditionary force has landed on an alien planet. But some- thing is wrong: the scientist-leaders seem to be helping the extra-terres- trials! The suspicion mounts as this superb novelet LEFT HAND, RIGHT HAND by James H. Schmitz leads you into the beguiling world of the beyond!

also:

Here is a Classic Reprint that will appeal to your sense of adventure— PLANET OF THE DOUBLE SUN by Neil R. Jones

and a special plus:

Another article in Ben Bova's series which explores the possibilities

of life in the outermost reaches of the galaxy.

READ IT ALL IN NOVEMBER AMAZING! ON SALE NOW

FANTASTIC, Stories of Imagination, Vol. 11, No. 11, November, 1962, is published monthly by Ziff-Davis Publishing Company, at 434 South Wabash Avenue, Chicago 5, Illinois. Subscrip- tion rates: One year United States and possessions $3.50; Canada and Pan American Union Countries $4.00; all other foriegn countries $4.50. Second Class postage paid at Chicago, Illinois and at additional mailing offices. THERE are some things that cannot organization) an age-old brotherhood be generally told — things you ought to of learning, have preserved this secret know. Great truths are dangerous to wisdom in their archives for centu- some — but factors for personal power ries. They now invite you to share the and accomplishment in the hands of practical helpfulness of their teachings. those who understand them. Behind Write today for a free copy of the the tales of the miracles and mysteries book, "The Mastery of Life.” Within of the ancients, lie centuries of their its pages may lie a new life of oppor- secret probing into nature’s laws — tunity for you. Address: Scribe N.Z.V. their amazing discoveries of the hid- SEND THIS COUPON ------den processes of man’s mind, and the N.Z.V, mastery of life's problems. Once shroud* ! Scribe The ROSICRUCIANS (AMORC) ed in mystery to avoid their destruc- I i San Jose, California tion by mass fear and ignorance, these Please send me the free book. The Mastery J J facts remain a useful heritage for the of Life, which explains how 1 may learn to i j thousands of men and womenwho pri- i use my faculties and powers of mind. , vately use them in their homes today. Name I [

Addr << • THIS FREE BOOK | rity The Rosicrucians (not a religious ! J

Woe Rosicrucians (AMORO SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.

3 NOVEMBER 1962 FANTASTIC Volume 11 Number 11 STORIES OF IMAGINATION

REG. U. S. PAT. OFF NOVELET

ZIFF-DAVIS PUBLISHING COMPANT PIANETOID 127 (Fantasy Classic)

William B. Ziff. Chairman of the Board By Edgar Wallace 75 - ( 1946 1953 )

William Ziff. President SHORT STORIES W. Bradford Briggs. Executive Viee President AWARENESS PUN Hershel B. Sarbln. Vice President and General Manager By David R. Bunch 71

M. T. Birmingham, Jr.. Vice President and Treasurer THE MOZART ANNUITY

Robert P. Breeding. Circulation Di- By Arthur Porgcs 119 rector

Charles Housman. Financial Vice President SERIAL Stanley R. Greenfield. Vice President IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE By Jack Sharkey 8 (Part one of two parts) Editoriol Director NORMAN M. LOBSENZ FEATURES

Editor EDITORIAL 5 GOLDSMITH CEIE ACCORDING TO YOU 6 COMING NEXT MONTH 70

Ziff-Davis Publishing Company Editorial and Executive Offices Cover: Uoyd Birmingham One Park Avenue Illustrating It's Magic, You Dopel New York 16. New York ORegon 9-7200 Advertising Manager. Martin Gluekman SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE: All subscription corre- spondencc should be addressed to FANTASTIC, Cir- culation Department. 434 South Wabash Avenue. Chi- Midwestern and Circulation Office cago. Illinois. Please allow at least six weeks for 454 South Wabash Avenue change of address. Include your old address, as well as Chicago 5. Illinois now —enclosing if possible an address label from a W Abash 2-4911 recent issue.

Western Office EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTIONS must be accompanied 9025 Wilshlre Boulevard by return postage and will be handled with reenable Beverly Hills. California care: however publisher assumes no responsibility for CRestview 4-0265 return or safety of an work, photographs or manuscripts. dC\ Copyright © 19*2 by Zitt-Davli Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

4 : —

rom time to time one has hopes for the psy- Fchologist. As a man who probes about the mysterious recesses of the sensory system, one likes to think he develops a certain tolerance (if not understanding) of the ways whereby man manages to stand the turmoil of the world. But just when one gets one’s hopes up—some- body lowers the boom. In this case, the boom was lowered for me by an item in a recent issue of The American Psychologist, a monthly journal of The American Psychological Associ- ation. It first reprinted a small advertisement from a Washington, D.C., newspaper, which read as follows TOUCHSTONE What 18 a touchstone? It is a stone of secret calm- ness. Finely cut and exquisitely polished onyx. Pleas- ing to the touch, psychologists say they relax nerves and soothe daily tensions. Especially appealing to the doodler, key-chain twirier, excessive smoker—just about everybody. $4.95 Then the magazine’s commentator brusquely observed that such a “tranquilizing amulet” is “tops for the man who has everything—if he will also believe anything.” Now, that seems to us to be giving short shrift, indeed, to a device that has anciently been known to bring peace to the mind, to inhibit tensions, to induce creative thought. “Rubbing stones” are common possessions of wise men in the Orient; Middle Eastern people fondle “worry beads” to the same end. And who has not occasionally been lulled into at least temporary peace of mind by caressing a smooth and intricately shaped stone found, perhaps, on a beach or by a lake. Psychologists do not seem to object much to tranquilizing drugs which in their unknown side effects may be doing serious damage to both soma and psyche. Why, then, poke fun at a tranquilizing amulet, which has been an artifact of man for thousands of years. Or do the psychologists, who are beloved of stimulus-and-response, just naturally resent anything that cuts down the intensity of the response? Let me go a step further. Let me say that the world might be a better place to be in if there weren’t so darned many stimuli to respond to. Or if there weren’t so many leaders of nations ready to respond at a hair-trigger’s notice. Perhaps every President, Premier and Party Secretary should have a tranquilizing amulet with him at the next conference on nuclear disarmament.—N.L.

5 —

According to you...

Dear Editor: those passably.” Very generous Is Fred Patten some kind of a of him. Of course, I wouldn’t nut? Oh, I agree with him that know what he does in that maga- Barr and Schelling are good art- zine he mentioned, because I ists (especially Schelling—he’s avoid it like the plague. better in interior work in Galaxy “On the other hand, Summers though) and Emsh and Schom- should be axed entirely,” says burg are also very good but I al- he! Some (in fact most) of Sum- most flipped with dismay when mers’ covers have been a bit he said "get rid of Birmingham sloppy, and I’d be the first to ad- and Summers.” Concerning Bir- mit it, but on interiors he can be mingham, he must be referring great if he tries. So he is a bit to the July issue of amazing untidy here too sometimes. But that cover was, I admit, a terri- his illos have an atmosphere of ble goof, and sometimes his weirdness about them, which I paints do seem to be a bit watery. believe could not be achieved by But get rid of him? Just look good clear illos like those of Ad- back at his very first cover for kins for an sf story. However, it you—November 1961 fantastic would be interesting to see what —and then ahead to one particu- a good clear Adkins or Emsh illo lar masterpiece on your April would do for a weird tale. Maybe amazing. I’m just used to seeing Summers’

Mr. Patten becomes generous type illos on weirdies ; but if oth- when he says “you can use Bir- ers would work just as well, why mingham on interiors ; he’s didn’t Adkins take advantage of shown in analog that he can do his opportunity instead of illus- : - -

trating his story in a rather Summers-ish style? I hope I’ve made my point. By the way, the Aug. fantas- tic was great. Do you always on how to become save fantasies for your summer GOVERNMENT HUNTER issues ? Game Warden, Forest Ranger Bob Adolfsen 9 Prospect Ave. Aid or Assistant Type Sea Cliff, N.Y. Positions that Require Less Formal • Point made. Education. ,

office, Dear Miss Goldsmith -.or fac- tory machine. Prepart I have been reading fantastic now, in spare time, for outdoor man's dream job in Forestry it for about a year now and I must , Wildlife Conservation. Get the say that I think it to be a very facts. Plan to live the life you love. Mail coupon to- good magazine of fantasy. day! OPPORTUNITIES IN I have just finished reading THRILLS I ADVENTURE YOUR STATE? Many Forestry & Wildlife men hunt* We show you how to seek the August issue of fantastic mountain lions - parachute from out job openings in you? planes to help marooned animals own state and other states and I believe that it is the best or save life of injured campers Coast to Coast. Age limits ect forests- arrest game vio- J7 to 45, sometimes older rs. Adventure, public service, private farms issue you have put out since I K ., game good pay. 'ana hunt clubs. We 1 . first started reading the maga- SECURITY - RETIREMENT - tOW LIVING COSTS zine. Conservation careers are pe No layoffs. No woiry about ) “The Titan” by P. Schuyler check. Living costs fere low, r< government pemiott assures Miller was an excellent piece of come for lift when jrou Vedn HEALTHFUL OUTDOOR LIFE muscles, fantasy which I enjoyed thor- bronzed skin an&jAhapof.'g' ralch are oughly and sincerely hope you $p under will print more of his stories in ^VACATION JOES FOR STUDENTS No experience or preparation needed the future. However, I can’t say for vacation jobs in Natl. Parks it Forests. America’s vacation wonder- the same for Rosel George land. Many accepting Applications »w. FREE BOOKLET tells how Brown’s “And A Tooth,” Albert and where to apply. Teichner’s “Continuity,” or Rob- North American School of Conservation, D*pl. H247B 810 Dodsworth, Covina, California ert F. Young’s “Victim of the Year.” The first two stories men- tioned were interesting but con- fusing, as for “Victim of the Year,” does Mr. Young have to resort to Plot Manipulation to resolve the ending? It could al- most be considered a “Deus Ex

{Continued on page 126 ) 7 .

There teas this doorway, see, to a place called Drendon. Drendon was full of things— hotsys and kwis- tians and sarks and wumbles. There were also witches and satyrs and wood nymphs and the most unlikely collection of spells in any dimen- sion. In short a wild and woolly Sharkey world where the answer

to any question is. .

ITS MAGIC, YOU DOPE!

By JACK SHARKEY

(First of two parts)

CHAPTER 1 I was quite curious, but lacked T was the same two guys. I the nerve to approach them and I spotted them standing down ask what they wanted. They at the end of the dark street, just might want my wallet and watch, beyond the cone of light cast by and then where’d I be? So I just the street lamp. They were pre- slammed the door of my sedan, tending to be neighborhood peo- and started up the walk toward ple, carrying on a casual conver- Susan’s house, pretending I had- sation on the corner, but I knew n’t noticed them. I wished there they were the same guys I’d seen were more people out on their standing outside the library porches, but the autumn evenings when I’d left it a half hour be- had been turning colder, and fore, in downtown Chicago. hardly anyone came out. Illustrator BIRMINGHAM Ko • i 1 y Seen I rang the bell of the two-story “Thought you might like some bungalow where Susan lived with cookies and lemonade,” she ex- her folks, and was reassured to plained, setting the tray down hear the sound of footsteps com- on the endtable beside the sofa. ing to answer the chimes. Mrs. I thanked her, and she laughed Baker, Susan’s mother, opened and went out into the kitchen the door. again. “Hello, Al,” she said. “Susan’ll “Well,” said Garvey Baker, be down in a minute. Here, let me getting ponderously to his feet, take your hat.” She rambled and glancing at that gold watch, through some more mother- “better get on up to the store be- greeting-suitor talk, and I finally fore the thieves strip it bare.” I wound up in the living room, sit- was glad to hear the front door ting in the center of the sofa, close behind him. Then a light alone, while Mr. Baker, Susan’s patter of feet on the hall stairs father, puffed at his pipe and announced the arrival of Miss tried to engage me in light con- Susan Baker, and I jumped versation on the subject of bur- gratefully to my feet. glary. Garvey Baker was the “Al,” she smiled, coming night-watchman at the Marshall across the room to me, her hands Field’s store up near Lake Street outstretched to lightly grip mine. in Oak Park. He was usually “Hi, Susan,” I said, taking about to go out to work about the hold of her fingertips for that time I showed up to see Susan. brief moment before she’d deftly It helped. tug them free. “Do you like my dress?” she S long as we were on the sub- said, pirouetting. “Pop got it at A ject of crime, I mentioned his discount. Isn’t it adorable?” those two guys who seemed to I said it was, and she sat be- have followed me from the Loop. side me on the sofa. Perhaps “be- Mr. Baker laughed. “You’ve been side” is too strong. It was a

reading too many mystery three-seater ; she and I filled the books,” he said with an infuriat- one and three cushions. ingly paternal smile. "Your mother made lemonade “Yes, sir,” I said, anxiously for us,” I said. “Here it is, on the awaiting the moment when he tray.” would lift his gold watch from “Oh, how nice!” said Susan, his vest pocket, say, “Well, bet- her eyes dancing. “Wasn’t that ter get down to the store before nice of Mom, Al?” the thieves strip it bare,” and go. I said it was, and we sat a Mrs. Baker came in with a tray. while longer. Then, getting up a

10 FANTASTIC little courage, I turned to her “Nice,” oh, yes, I guess so. and said, “Would you like some?” “But what about your hours ?” “Oh, please,” said Susan, she said with a tiny pout. “You brightly. always come over so late, Al.” I arose and poured out two “You have to have seniority to glasses of lemonade, gave one to get the early shift.” her, and sat back with the other, “That may take years,” she on the two-cushion. sighed. “Al—” said Susan. “Please.” “I know,” I said. “But at least I moved back to the one-cush- I can sleep late in the mornings, ion. after we’re married.” “Cookie?” I asked. “Al!” said Susan. “Al!” gasped Susan, her eyes “Sorry,” I said, not sure for round and startled. what. "I mean, do you want a cookie ?” USAN flashed me a look of “Oh. No thank you. But thank S deep longing. “I think I will .” you for asking me.” She began have that cookie, now, Al . . to sip her lemonade. I began to she murmured. sip mine. I searched my mind for All at once, I wanted to a topic of conversation. (The scream. Bakers had no TV.) I found one “I said, I think I will have that and made the most of it. cookie, now, Al,” Susan repeated “Two men followed me from demurely. the library today.” I couldn’t stand it any longer. “Goodness," said Susan. Eschewing caution, I set my “Why?” lemonade back on the tray, “I don’t know,” I said. “To rob reached over and took Susan’s me, maybe.” and put it beside mine, then I “A librarian?” Susan laughed slid onto the two-cushion and lightly. “You barely make enough grabbed her by the upper arms. /” to support yourself, let alone sup- “Susan— !” port a wife . . “Al Her voice was a panicky “Mr. Garson says I will get squeak. “Have you gone mad? !” that ten percent increase at the Mother might come in end of November,” I pointed out. “I don’t care,” I grated. “I’ve “I will have been with the library got to talk to you about some- five years.” thing more important than cook- “And then we can have our ies or lemonade or my life at the June wedding, as we planned,” library.” said Susan. “Won’t it be nice?” “Al, you’re hurting me!” she

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 11 ” — ” ” ! said, tiny crystal tears twinkling onade. You. I—I don’t know. It’s

upon her lower lashes. “How can just that . . . Well, I keep having you behave so horridly to me?” the feeling that life has much “Susan,” I groaned, “you’re more to offer, that’s all.” not even listening to me! Once “What could it possibly?” she just this once—stop blathering asked. “You love me, and I love all your usual inanities and give you, and we will be married and !” me your attention, please live happily ever— “A gentleman,” blathered Su- “Stop!” san, “never uses fierce language She stopped. like that in the presence of a girl “Look, Susan—Honey—Dar-

he thinks of as a lady, so I can ling . . . Oh, what’s the use!” only assume that— Susan lowered her eyes and “Stop!” My growl was so fero- spoke in a hushed tone. “Are you cious that some of the painted- trying to tell me you don’t love doll cuteness faded from her me?” face, and a look of genuine adult apprehension overrode her fea- LOOKED at her, her long tures. She stared at me, blinking I black lashes lying against her rapidly, then said she would lis- pale rose cheek, her lovely hair a ten if I’d only let go of her arms. golden aurora about her head, I let go. She listened. her trim little figure a pulse- “Susan,” I said, talking fast, maddening package in a royal and trying to put all the misery blue dress with a lemon-colored

and frustration of my soul into belt . . . words, “there must be something Of course I loved her

more than this. I mean, I should “I love you more every time I be the happiest man in the world, see you. But I still want to scream but I’m not. I don’t know why. at you,” I sighed. “I don’t know Here I am, with a steady job, why—Maybe because I constant- .” chances for advancement and re- ly feel I’m not reaching you . . tirement, engaged to a lovely, “You know what Mom and young, intelligent girl, whose Pop feel about— folks like and approve of me, with "Not like that! I mean conver- a raise in pay due in a few sationally No, I don’t mean that, months, and my wedding date either. It’s like we don’t relate, set for next June, and it’s driving or mesh, or come in at the same me out of my mind!” terminal. Does that make sense?” “What is?” asked Susan, Susan looked into my eyes. blinking stupidly. “There’s Another Woman, isn’t

“This ! All of it Cookies. Lem- there!” she declared. She hadn’t

12 FANTASTIC I —

understood a word I said. I stood FELT like a heel as I drove up tall, glaring down at her. 1 away from the curb, trying to "I wish there were!” I de- get my mind back into a calm, clared back at her. “Maybe life orderly state. My own house was would have some excitement, just around the block from Su- !” then san’s, so I decided to drive the

“I suppose, Albert Hicks,” car there and leave it. I’d get said Susan, jumping up to face more thinking done walking than me, “You’d be happier if I did a driving. I pulled into my drive- fan-dance when you came over! way and doused the headlights. Would that be exciting?!” Just ahead of the nose of the “Darn tooting!” I snapped. car, and slightly to its left, I “Oh, Al,” she whimpered, hid- could see the bright yellow rec- ing her face in her hands. “That’s tangles that were the kitchen !” an awful thing to suggest windows of Susan’s house. Now

"I didn’t suggest it, I simply and then a shadow moved past endorsed it!” I strode angrily them. Probably Mrs. Baker, into the front hall, grabbed my making more cookies and lemon- hat from the hall tree, and was ade. A smaller shadow trailed just reaching for tlie doorknob after the first one. That would be when Susan came running after Timothy Baker, Susan’s younger me. brother. I’d met him relatively “Don’t go!” she said, catching few times, since Mrs. Baker me by the arm. “If—If you want bless her—felt that a boy of ap- a fan-dance, I’ll—I’ll do it. Even proximately ten years could get that. Anything, Al. Only—Don’t in the way of any even moder- go. Please don’t go!” ately romantic discussions be- I looked down into her earnest tween a girl and her fiance. little face and melted. I took her I got out of the car and locked gently into my arms and held it, but just as I was about to her, slowly shaking my head. walk back out toward the street “Honey, honey—I didn’t mean to begin my meditative peregri- that about the dance. I just— nations, I remembered the six- don’t know. Maybe I need to get pack of beer in my refrigerator off someplace and think. I’m a and the remnants of a loaf of rye little upset tonight. If I just bread and some ham from Sun- drive around for awhile, maybe day’s dinner. It took but a mo- I can settle my mind a little. I’ll ment’s thought to realize that see you later.” they were just what I needed to I kissed her lightly, then went take away the taste of cookies out and shut the door behind me. and lemonade. I abandoned my

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 13 walking plans, and went into the looked up. So was Susan’s house. house. Susan’s had been the last in a Relying on the light from Su- row of houses before a small san’s kitchen, I made my way park. Now the park was twenty- across my own kitchen in the five feet wider. Not even a hole dark and started hunting around where the foundation had been. for the bread. Just as I espied it And where the sofa I’d last seen on the cupboard shelf, a shadow Susan upon should have been, flitted across the light, and I there stood a lofty elm, looking turned my head to see the sil- as though it had been rooted houette of a man wut in Susan’s there for twenty years. yard, messing around with some- thing on the lawn. CHAPTER 2 With a small start, I recalled the two strangers who had fol- ACK in my own house, a few lowed me from the library. I B dazed moments later, I held couldn’t tell in the dimness if off calling the police. I’d seen too this were one of them, but who- many movies about people trying ever he was, he had no business to convince policemen of the in Susan’s yard. truth when the truth was slight- I spun about and raced for my ly out of the ordinary; and this front door. I hurried to the cor- was anything but a slight extra- ner, raced for Susan’s street, and ordinariness. What I needed was turned onto it, figuring to trap someone to back up my story, the guy between me and Susan’s and the likely person would be

back fence. Halfway there, I saw Garvey Baker. the second man on the front Looking up the Marshall lawn of her house, also fooling Field’s number, I dialed quickly, around with some kind of gadget. and stood tapping my foot as the The thing glinted with metal buzzing at the other end of the and glass, and stood on a short wire repeated without interrup- tripod. Suddenly, the other man tion. On the fifteenth buzz, some- joined him, carrying his own one picked up the phone. counterpart of the gadget, and “Watchman,” said a voice. they jumped into a car and drove “Mr. Baker?” I said. “This is off. AL" Baffled by their conduct, I kept “This ain’t Mr. Baker. This is on toward Susan’s, and turned to the watchman. Call back tomor- start up her front walk. My feet ra, maybe he’ll be in then.” brushed autumn grass. I looked It wasn’t even Garvey’s voice. down. The path was gone. I As I tried to explain my distress,

14 FANTASTIC the man hung up and left me like outraged tigers a few with a dead line to talk to. I months back, with Annabel dropped the phone back into the vowing she’d rather go to the cradle, more shaken than before electric chair than ever see my I'd made the call. One more un- face again. likelihood to tell the police. One “You—You’re not mad, Anna- that might buy me a jacket with bel?” I said shakily. buckles in the back, and not Ivy “Mad? Mad, Albert? About League, either. what?” There was one other way left “The fight. The fight we had.” —Or was there? "Fight?” Her bewilderment Feeling an uneasy tremor in sounded genuine. “What fight my stomach, I reached out a slow are you talking about?” hand for the phone book, and “Look—” I persisted, evading carefully checked through the Bs. the query. “When was—precise- There were seven Bakers listed. ly, now—the very last time you But not a Garvey, Susan, Timo- saw me?” thy, or Maggie (Mrs. Baker’s “Oh—As precisely as I can re- given name). And not one at call, it was something in the the right address. neighborhood of fifteen minutes Susan’s picture! Upstairs on ago. You just now brought me my bureau ! I raced up the stairs home, Albert. Remember?” to look for it. The frame was “That’s impossible,” I groaned, there, and there was a picture in and hung up. it, too. A picture of Annabel Simmons, the girl I’d dated be- N approximately thirty sec- fore meeting Susan. I’d certainly I onds, the phone jangled sharp- not kept her picture . . . After a ly, and when I lifted it to my ear, brain-racking moment, I remem- it was Annabel again. bered definitely that I had thrown "Albert, are you all right?” it away. But here it was, as if it she said. “Because if you’re feel- had never been gone; as though ing under the weather or any- I were still going around with thing, I don’t mind dropping

Annabel. over . . On a sudden unearthly hunch, “No,” I said swiftly. “Don’t I raced downstairs and dialed come over.” Anabel’s number. In a few sec- “Why not?” she said, with a onds, there was a soft, slightly definite shading of suspicion in husky voice awakening pangs of her tone. I vividly recalled Anna- nostalgia in my ear. One would bel’s excitably jealous nature, never believe we’d separated then, and thought fast.

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 15 —

“Because it’s—too late, uh kle’s representatives, with rabid honey—It wouldn’t be right for urgings to sell out. So, in some- you to come to a man’s house all thing which involved such a sud- alone. It’s past midnight.” den extension of Porkle Park, “Silly,” she said. "I’ll bring Geoffrey Porkle was the natural Elizabeth, then.” Elizabeth was suspect. Annabel’s niece, who sometimes While I was still wondering stayed with her when her parents what to do with my suspicions, were on vacation. “I’ll pry the the doorbell rang, and I went to child loose from the Late Late let Annabel in. She entered, with Show and drag her along.” her short blonde monster in tow, I was out of excuses. “Sure,” and began to remove her gloves. I sighed. “Why not?” Elizabeth tilted back her curly My head was whirling as I golden head and gave a loud hung up. Then I had my first shriek. I was about to formulate flash of realistic inspiration. some innocuous question that Suppose, instead of trying to fig- would clarify my curiosity about ure what had happened, I thought my unremembered recent asso- about why. Never mind how the ciation with Annabel without

house was made to vanish ; figure making her think I’d popped my by whom. And I could guess that cork when the doorbell rang already. again. “Who can that be?” asked An- HE man for whom the now-ex- nabel with green suspicion. Tpanded park beside Susan’s “Who might that be?” I cor- house was named. Geoffrey Por- rected, my pre-library master’s kle. Porkle Park was only a few degree in English coming to the houseless lots, really. Barely a fore. “It ‘could’ be anybody; it stretch of grass and trees. He ‘might’ be relatively few people.” had been trying, with little avail, “Oh, shut up and answer the to persuade the home-owners in door,” said Annabel, smoothing the neighborhood to sell out to Elizabeth’s hair. Elizabeth him, that he might further ex- grunted like a pig, then gave an- tend the confines of his pent-up other scream. I went to the door park. The comfortably settled and opened it. suburbanites had all refused. “Evening, Hicks,” said Mr. Garvey Baker, and I myself, had Garson, my superior at the li- each been approached. I doubt if brary, lumbering in. “I was driv- there was a casual passerby in ing by and saw your lights, and Oak Park who had not been col- thought I’d drop in and see how lared at one time by one of Por- you were doing on your report.”

16 FANTASTIC ”

A T that moment, Elizabeth genius, “Elizabeth could be per- screamed again. Garson was suaded to sing a few numbers visibly shaken. “Good grief, for you while I finish that report, Hicks, what was that?!" sir?” “That was Elizabeth,” I said, Before I even completed the gesturing him ahead of me and sentence, Annabel was moving following him into the parlor. toward my spinet, flexing her “She screams.” fingers, and Elizabeth was inflat- Annabel rose to her niece’s de- ing her bony chest. “Hicks— fense immediately. “It’s for her said Garson, trying to think of lungs,” she said. “Her singing some way to avoid the impending teacher says that a little scream- menace of Elizabeth’s lungs. ing now and then develops lung- “Only be a short while, sir,” I power.” smiled, opening my study door As I made introductions, Eliz- and hurrying inside. I shut the abeth grunted like a pig. door, locked it, then ducked out “Lowers the voice,” explained the connecting door to the kitch- Annabel. “I want her to sing en and locked that, too. As I got Carmen some day, don’t I, sweet- into my sedan, even the walls of ums ! But it calls for a contralto.” my house could not quite muffle “She—does this all the time?” the shrills and grunts that split asked Garson, his face a blend of the air of my living room. fascination and revulsion. * “Only indoors,” I said. * * “Elizabeth can sing The Song of the Flea in Russian,” said An- T)ORKLE’S house was midway nabel, with unpardonable pride. between my house and Mar- Elizabeth stuck her tongue out shall Field’s store. There were at Mr. Garson and made a vulgar lights on at the side window. I sound. parked up the street, then hur- “How nice,” he murmured, ried back on tiptoe. looking nervous. “But isn’t that The windowsill was just a baritone number?” higher than my head, but by I shook my head. “Bass. Any- resting one shoe atop a garden- one can sing Carmen-, Lizzie has hose faucet beneath it, I could her sights on Boris Goudanov." raise myself high enough to see “Albert!” Annabel was smil- into the room. ing, but her undertone was a Inside, a man sat at a desk, hacksaw on broken glass. Garson talking to a taller, thinner man, cowered like a trapped rabbit. who was smiling to himself as he “Perhaps,” I said with evil filled the bottom of a snifter with

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 17 ” ”

brandy. I couldn’t be sure they tered Porkle, much to my annoy- were the two men I’d seen loiter- ance. I’d been itching to find out ing earlier from their faces, but what or wnere this mysterious any doubts I might have had Drendon was. “But,” continued were dispelled by the presence of Porkle, “you said something to the two tripod-gadgets near the me about the unlikelihood of sur- desk. vival there." “You’re sure there’s no return “Their occupation while being from Drendon?” said the man at transferred does, of course, in- the desk. fluence their Drendon-shape, “No, Geoffrey,” said the other somewhat. But even a person who man to the would-be Park Czar. is adapted into Drendon-form “I’m not at all sure. If people can will find that life there is fraught be sent there, there’s undoubted- with dangers, even for the regu- ly a way to get them back. How, lar inhabitants.” I don’t know, but the probability I tried to recall what the Ba- does exist.” kers might have been involved in

“Damn it, Courtland,” growled when this odd translation oc- Porkle, “I wish you’d stop trying curred. Maggie Baker had been to be so inscrutable ! Are we safe, out in the kitchen, probably or not?!” cooking. Timothy would have Courtland, swirling his brandy been tagging after her, asking in the snifter and inhaling its kid-questions about her prepara- bouquet luxuriously, said, “Be- tions, like a student of domestic lieve me, the odds are well with science. Garvey Baker would us. These vanishments—objects have been at work watching the plus all record of their existence store. As to Susan, I didn’t know. —have an opposite reaction, a Last I saw of her, she’d been sit- sort of mental corollary in the ting mournfully on the sofa, minds of the vanishees.” looking lost and lorn, in the spot “You mean they won’t re- where the tree had materialized. member Oak Park? The U.S.? I hoped earnestly that she hadn’t Earth?” said Porkle, his eyes become a Drendon-type weeping widening. “But that’s marvel- willow. ous! Fat chance of returning if “You see,” Courtland was con- they don’t recall— tinuing, “Drendon is an entity, “But they do recall that there as befits any enchanted woods. is an Earth, Geoffrey. Don’t for- Drendon does not precisely have

get Drendon is a relative of a tree ; part of Drendon is a tree. Earth’s, due to— And all the trees, like Drendon, “Spare me the details!” mut- are quite alive, and more or less

18 FANTASTIC intelligent according to age and beasts, furry fauns, sly satyrs, species. vampires, werewolves, wyverns, “Oh, you can’t tell it at a centaurs and such. Always, day glance, but just attempting to upon day, in this overgrown, veg- take an axe to one might bring etation-choked locale, every mo- on frightful results. And then, ment of life is precious, every it has animals, too.” His voice life is in deadly peril, what lowered here, and reminded me with deadfalls, quicksands, pits, chillingly of one of those old- things that scream, things that time horror-tale tellers on radio slurp, things that impale you on in the thirties. “Some animals their horns, things that crush slither in the gloom on nefarious you in their grasp, things that missions of slimy terror, some bite, things that stomp, and bound about in gay abandon, things that can do anything the frolicking on the sward in the other things can do, and much hot glow of that ridiculous sun better.” which only sets on certain occa- “Please,” said Porkle, weakly. sions. Some you can go up to and “No more. I take your word for kick without temerity; others it. It’s very unlikely we’ll ever you dare not even let know hear of the Bakers again, or that you’re within shouting distance Hicks character.” if you know what’s healthy. And this latter sort are not only mon- HIS last phrase stymied me strous, they are well in the ma- Tfor a second, until I recalled jority, and you can count it a day that these two men had followed well spent if you narrowly es- me to Susan’s house. Then it cape death walking from the started making sense. Susan’s front door of your house to the father had refused to sell ; so had mailbox. They prowl the forest I. The plan might have been to incessantly, and are never kill two birds with one stone, get- sated!” ting me while I was inside Su- “Stop !” said Porkle, his plump san’s house along with the fam- face grey and greasy with sweat. ily. But they hadn’t known I’d He swabbed his thick features leave the house so soon, or that I with a silken kerchief. “That’s had left in fact. They still as- enough. I get the picture!” sumed that I had been translated “It’s an intriguing place, re- into Drendon—wherever it was ally,” said Courtland, disap- —with the others. Which gave pointed in the other’s lack of me a slight leverage. enthusiasm. “A mythophile’s Dropping to the ground from dream, Porkle, with its monsters, my perch, I dusted the window-

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 19 sill grit from my fingers and to shunt other people into strange strolled around to the front door. woods without asking them A touch of the bell evoked muted first.” chimes inside the house, and in “What?” gasped Porkle, jump- a moment, the tall scientific half ing to his feet. “Who is this guy, of the duo, Courtland, was open- Courtland?” ing the door to me. “Yes?!” he “I’m Albert Hicks,” I said said, scowling deeply. (It was, grimly. “Lately of Drendon.” after all, nearly two in the morn- ing.) “What is it? What do you pORKLE’S face went chalky to want?” the hairline, and he dropped “My name is Albert Hicks,” I back into his swivel chair with a said, pleased to hear the quick soft squeal of alarm. I turned to intake of his breath. “And I Courtland. “Doc, when you send want your scalp, if you don’t people away like that, you ought mind.” to make sure it’s for good. Your “Hicks!” he echoed numbly. gimmick wore off in an hour, ?” “But how could you— Then a and we all popped right back trace of his suave demeanor re- where we belonged. Shame on turned, and he said smoothly, you.” "I’m afraid I don’t follow you. “You’re lying,” Courtland de- But won’t you come in?” clared flatly, his eyes lustreless I kept my eyes on him as he and deadly. “That cannot hap- shut the door behind me. Court- pen.” land wasn’t the sort I trusted “But it has!” quailed Porkle. where I couldn’t see him. He led “Look! Here he is. If he didn’t the way toward the room in go there and back, then how does which I’d seen himself and Por- he know about Drendon?” kle discussing my supposed fate, Courtland’s shrewd eyes and I went inside warily. At the flicked about the room, and I felt desk. Porkle looked up blankly. a faint chill of panic as his “Who— ?” he began, but a glance came to rest upon the wave of Courtland’s hand si- window, its lower edge slightly lenced him. ajar. A mirthless smile uptilted “You were saying something the corners of his thin mouth. about a scalp?” smiled Court- “I think I understand,” he said, land, as I sat gingerly on the stepping back from me and edge of a chair. drawing a slim blueblack auto- “Yes,” I said, keeping my matic from inside his suit jacket. voice as politely sardonic as pos- I stared helplessly into the bar- sible. “I think it’s rude of people rel of the gun, no longer feeling

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 21 ” — very clever, as Courtland reached expression of uncertainty was for one of the tripod-things and all the impetus Porkle needed to touched a dial on its back. A soft crack. throbbing hum began to issue “You idiot!” he raged at from the odd construction atop Courtland, coming out from be- the tripod, and in another instant hind the desk. “I told you your the sound was received and stupid scheme was— !” echoed by the other machine, a “Porkle 1” Courtland yelped, few feet away. spinning to face him. “Watch Between the two things, the where you’re— air began to shimmer and But Geoffrey Porkle’s pudgy writhe, like air above a hot pave- form was already a frozen statue ment in summertime. I didn’t of stupefaction in the grip of need a scientific education to that eerie force between the tri- know I was looking at the door- pods, and then, with a gentle way to Drendon. Courtland mo- pop, he was gone. And that’s tioned to me with the muzzle of when I stepped forward and his automatic. shoved the distracted Courtland “If you’ll just step between right after him. the transmitters?” he said gent- Caught off guard, he had only ly. Something in his tone told me an instant to turn his malevo- that he didn’t much care if I lently contorted face toward went through alive or dead. This mine, his lips forming a curse gadget of his, discounting any Then he vanished. other advantages it might have, was the ideal way to dispose of N instant later, the house did occasional corpses. If I didn’t A the same, and I was drop- walk through that shimeriing ping down about five feet to the gateway, there was a good chance ground. My landing was cush- I’d be plugged through the head ioned by soft grass, and when I and simply dumped through. looked about, there was nothing I got to my feet and tried the left of Porkle’s house but the only trump I seemed to have, two gadgets on their tripods, ly- Porkle’s distrust of science. With ing on the velvet lawn. I went a smile and a shrug, I stepped over to them, but their humming toward that pulsing blur as if I had ceased. I lifted one and wasn’t scared stiff, and said, “All shook it. A rasping tinkle inside right, if you insist. But I’ll only it told me that something had reappear in an hour.” gone bust in the crash. However Even Courtland looked uneasy they’d functioned, they were be- at my bluff, and his momentary yond it now.

22 FANTASTIC —

And there went my last chanee As I tiptoed into the kitchen of locating Susan. and once more let myself into my Still dazed from the fall and study, I had a momentary pang my narrow escape, I got back to of regret about the callousness my car—the driveway was gone with which I’d shoved Courtland with the house, leaving my car smack out of this world. “Well,” in the midst of an open lawn I said to myself, sagging wearily and drove wearily back home- against the paneling of the door ward. I felt lost, and sick. I was to the living room (awaiting the completely out of schemes, now. climax of Elizabeth’s number, No matter how I tried, my mind unable to forge the smile of re- could supply no solution to the quired enjoyment on my face if problem. Susan and her family I emerged while she was still at were lost, and there didn’t seem it), “it was him or me!” to be much anyone could do about Stubbornly trying to reinforce it. my decision with a jut of my Porkle and Courtland were lower lip, my English back- likewise lost, but that in itself ground came to mind, and I au- was a small loss. I could only tomatically self-corrected, “That hope that whatever they’d be- is, ‘he or I’.” come translated into in Drendon Out of the darkness behind would not be as menacing to Su- me, a voice asked, “What’s the san as their Earth-counterparts difference?” had been. “A pronominal object of the If only there were someone I verb ‘to be’ always remains in the could tell, someone who’d believe nominative case, rather than the me despite the way the facts objective, because—” I frowned. looked. But the only one I’d ever By all rights, I should have been felt that close to was Susan. And completely alone in my study. I she already knew more of Dren- had the only key to either door, don than I did. and they’d both been locked while It was only as I rolled the car I was gone. back into my driveway that I “Because what?” the voice heard the shrill gurgle and growl prompted. from within the house, and re- “Because ‘to be’ expresses an membered Annabel, Garson and equality rather than a result

Elizabeth. Elizabeth was busily . . I said, slowly turning rendering—maybe ‘rending’ is a around. I saw no one, what with better word—Old Mart River, at the blinds being down. I reached a pitch that made William War- out a hand for the light switch, field’s seem like a soprano. intensely curious . . .

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 23 “No, please!” said the voice. —if you’ll stand still, I’ll stand For the first time, and with a still.” sudden quiver in my stomach, I "All right. But if you move, I noted that it was a female voice. move.” A rather pretty one. "Why not?” I asked. T NODDED, then grunted at the “Because,” said the voice, "I *- foolishness of nodding into have no clothes on.” the dark, and seated myself care- “You’re joking,” I replied, fully in the armchair. The situa- knowing somehow that she was- tion was without precedent in my n’t My forehead went clammy at life. I wasn’t quite sure how to the thought, when I considered proceed. Or even if to proceed. that my boss and Annabel were “Now then—” I snapped on just beyond the door. The sturdy my lighter, going through the oak door suddenly assumed all motions of igniting my cigarette, the protective qualities of saw- but actually trying to pierce the dust to my shaken mind. gloom by the dancing flame of “Well,” said the voice, “drama- the wick, “What are you doing tizing, maybe. But I’m certainly here dressed like that? Or per- not clothed by your standards.” haps I should say wof-dressed “You leave my standards out like that?” of this,” I snapped. “Where do “Right now, I’m observing you you get off prying into my stand- from the bookcase.” ards?” “In the dark?” I almost ig- “I mean people’s standards in nited the end of my nose. I hur- this era.” The voice had changed riedly thrust the lighter into my location, and now seemed to pocket. Smoking could wait. come from the vicinity of my un- “Why not?” said the voice, and seen leather armchair. then the speaker laughed, and I “This—This era?” I asked, suddenly found myself a boy groping toward the chair. again, on a hot day in July, run- "Yes,” came the reply from the ning barefoot through warm bookcase, halfway across the grass toward a glittering cold room. creek. Then I was back again. I began to feel irritated. “Stop “Laugh again,” I said. moving around like that!” “All right,” said the voice. “I have to,” said the soft, “Say something funny.” thrilling voice, "or you’ll catch “I don’t know anything fun- me.” Her logic was beyond dis- ny,” I admitted sadly. pute. "That’s funny enough,” said “Well,” I said, disgruntled, “if the voice, laughing again.

24 FANTASTIC ”

Once more I was on my way CHAPTER 3 through the grass to the creek. And back again. “That’s the T CONFESS I sat quite still for damnedest thing. You won’t be- a long moment, thinking this lieve this, but when you laugh it's over. Then I said slowly, still as if—” quite dizzy, “You’re a wood- “You’re out on the countryside, nymph—Like in the stories? right?” Young, beautiful, diaphanous “Uh—Yes,” I said, surprised. gown, hair like the color of au- “Does this always happen when tumn leaves, and all that?” people hear you, laugh?” “Yes,” said the voice, sweetly. “Retention of childhood mem- Completely nuts. I sighed to ories. Called nostalgia. You re- myself sadly. And such a nice member hearing me laugh as a voice, too. But nuts or not, she child, and whatever you were do- might still be young and beauti- ing at the time, it comes back ful. Would Annabel or Mr. Gar- when I laugh again. Simple.” son believe that she was nuts ? It I frowned, growing apprehen- took me two seconds to answer sive. “See here, now, are you that. someone I knew as a child?” My No. That was the likely con- slowly forming image of a curvy clusion. Of course, if I said, “Tell cutie was fading into oblivion. them who you are,” and she said, After all, she might be twice my “A woodnymph,” they’d think age. I hated older women with she was nuts. But if I walked out girlish voices. Especially alone of my study with a girl who in the dark with me. Not dressed wasn’t “dressed according to my according to my standards. standards”. I’d never have a “Honestly!” Exasperation col- chance to play quiz with them. ored her words. “I never saw you Then again, maybe she wasn’t before in my life. When I say me, in anything wispy—She might I mean we, but really mean me be wadded into a Mother Hub- as a profession rather than as a bard and combat boots for all I person.” knew. A nut wouldn’t know the “Profession?” I choked. This difference, would she? had dire associations in my “May I turn on the light?” mind; moreso with Annabel and "Why?”

Garson in the next room. I was "I’ve never seen a . . . um . . . cold all over. “What is your pro- woodnymph before— fession?” “No one has,” said the voice, “I’m a woodnymph,” tinkled with finality. the voice. “Well—I wouldn’t mind being

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 25 the first man to see one," I haz- pointy, inch-long horns, it was a arded. youth of about ten years, but

“Who would ! ?” said the voice, from the waist down it seemed and that strangely nostalgic to be wearing dark brown angora laugh tinkled again. I had to for- tights. It smelt slightly. cibly wrench my emotions back "You’re a woodnymph?” I from that warm grassy stream- gasped, disappointment mingling side field. with shock at the sight. Wood- “I can't just talk to a voice. nymph it might not be, but hu- Do you have a name?” man being it could not be. For "My name is Lorn,” she said, answer, I received a guttural in a voice that was a velvet ca- growl from the thing. ress. It made the backs of my And at the same moment, a knees itch. suppressed giggle came from be- "It’s certainly a pretty name,” hind my armchair. “Lorn?” I I said sincerely. queried, hopefully taking a step “Naturally. All our names are toward the chair. pretty. Because all of us are pretty.” HE thing in the center of the Curiosity was killing me. I be- T rug made a motion with its gan to wonder if I could edge to- head that demonstrated force- ward the light without her notic- fully the fact that those horns ing. She might just be kidding were more than ornamental. Its about seeing me in the dark. small cloven hooves pawed the “This requires some thinking,” I carpet like those of an animal said, as a ruse to preclude the about to attack. necessity of my speaking for a “Timtik!” said Lorn from be- few moments. Carefully, I eased hind the chair. “Don’t gore him myself out of the chair and unless you have to. He’s really groped my way toward the light rather nice.” switch. My fingers touched it, “I don’t trust humans!” and I whirled as the fluorescent rasped Timtik, his voice the kind ceiling light sputtered and of sound you hear over a tin-can- popped on. The top of the book- and-string telephone. “You saw case was void of tenants. the way he tried to sneak a peek However, in the center of the at you, Lorn!” room, something was standing, I was nonplussed. “Who or watching me balefully from be- what is this thing. Lorn? He neath lowered brows topped with looks something like a satyr, but bone-colored horns. From the his size is too—” At this mo- waist upward, excluding those ment, a bit of lore regarding the

26 FANTASTIC ? behavior of woodnymphs and “How did you know my satyrs passed across my mind. name?” I asked.

Their almost symbiotic relation- “I heard your wife mention it, ship was so firmly rooted in an- Albert,” answered Lorn. cient mythologies that somehow “My wife?” I was momentar- I began to feel that if she was a ily perplexed. Then a small light woodnymph, and this was her flickered in my head. “Oh, you current flame, and he was only mean Annabel.— She’s not my four feet tall—Might not she wife. She’s ” I glanced at the also be— door, then lowered my voice. “Lorn—” I said haltingly. “She’s not even much fun to have ‘Are you—Are you and he—um around for long. Much too bossy.” —” I stopped, dismayed. “I’m s® glad!” Then Lorn’s “Nonsense,” said Lorn. “Tim- voice quickly extinguished the tik is a faun, and that’s not quite sparkle in its intonation and the same as a satyr. He and I are added, “But you do have a wife just good friends. Why, I don’t around, don’t you?” even have a steady satyr!” “No,” I admitted, shaking my I felt ice in my stomach and head. “At the moment, I have my heart seemed to be pumping nary wife, nor fiancee, nor even gelid sludge. “Then—You do .. . a close friend of the opposite ?” um . . . date satyrs sex.” “Well, of course! Why not!” “Oh," said Lorn. I scratched my head. “I dun- no. But in all the portraits I’ve HERE was a pause of about seen, they look so—well—repul- Tten seconds’ duration, during sive.” which Timtik scratched idly at “Let me put it this way,” said the thatch of fur on his haunch Lorn. “If you lived in a world with talon-like fingernails. peopled by, say, bald-headed “Oh, well, in that case—” Lorn women with bad teeth, what said, and stood up into view from would you do?” behind the armchair. “Shoot myself,” I said. I sat down. On the floor. Hard. Lorn sighed. “I mean if you She stood there, smiling at me, did go out with someone. You deep blue eyes crinkling beneath see, Albert, satyrs are all I’ve flaming copper brows, long un- got. That’s the reason I date ruly coils of hair falling to her them. Those stories you heard creamy shoulders like a sunrise were just about the bad satyrs. —like a sunset—like an explo- Some of them are perfect gentle- sion in a ketchup factory! Her men, and a few are even shy.” lips were soft, pink, and un-

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 27 — painted, and I coud feel their wanted to put my hands on her moist warmth at ten feet. Those bare back. And suddenly I waves of flaming hair fell like wanted to, very much, but she’d coiling cataracts to her bare already completed her rotation shoulders, and below that—Well and my chance was gone. “It never falls off?” I said, I looked in wonder as I clam- amazed. “Kind of looks as though bered back to my feet. if a gust of wind came prowling She’d been right. She had no if clothes on at all by my stand- Lorn shook her head decisive- ards, but she was not exactly ly. “Not unless I wish it off.” bare, either. From her arching Timtik began to show some in- clavicles to her tiny toes she was terest in the conversation. “Lorn swathed, or wrapped, or fes- is the only one who knows the tooned, by a silky, satiny, gauzy, magic words that drop the drape. fluffy veil-type thing, its shades Maggot taught her when she mingling emerald and viridian, wove it.” like the color of moss on a bright “ Who taught her?” I’d been but overcast day. oddly stirred by the name. How it stayed up, on, or “Maggot,” said Timtik, impa- around, I had no idea. tiently. “She’s a witch lives in “That’s an unusual garment Drendon.” you’re—uh—wearing, Lorn. How “Drendon ...” I echoed, sa- —How in the world do you keep voring the word. And then real- it up? !” I blurted. ized. with a dizzy feeling in my “It’s magic, you dope!” Tim- brain, that I knew these two here tik muttered, clomping his impa- before me in my study. tient hooves on the rug. He’d It was Susan Baker and her ceased his guard-stance once brother Timothy. And “Maggot” Lorn had risen up from behind could only have rung that dull the chair like the sun coming bell in my mind if it were Mrs. over a jungle valley at dawn Maggie Baker, Susan’s mother. like a torch-haired South Seas volcano-goddess—like ... I re- LOT of things danced strained myself from bursting A through my brain in a few into poetry. It was an effort. short instants, even as my lips "It’s my diaphanous drapery,” tried to make intelligent response Lorn beamed, turning about to to the faun’s statement. Maggie give me the complete vista. It Baker, switched into Drendon dipped so low in back that I could from cooking things in her have counted all her ribs if I’d kitchen—simply became the

28 FANTASTIC Drendon equivalent of a mixer, “Humans!” he spat. “Who brewer, or concocter: a witch. could name something as lovely And Susan, still in the throes of as a park something like ‘Por- her unwonted urge to do me that kle’!?” fan-dance, sitting sad and—of “I’m glad we live in Drendon,” course—lorn in the spot where said Lorn. “It’s a much prettier the tree had appeared, had be- name.” come a tempting, winsome, lovely “Then,” I said, wonderingly, creature whose proper appelation “it is contiguous with Porkle would be wood-goddess, or tree- Park?” goddess. “Only right here,” Lorn said Not that I was sure yet. The briskly. “Our homeland is tan- face of Lorn might be the face gent to the park here, but we live of Susan, but where Susan’s had in an entirely different—what?” always been reserved, vapid, and she asked Timtik quizzically. a bit lovably dopey, Lorn’s was “Dimension is the closest pert, peppery, and lovably dopey. word the humans have for it,” The flame-colored hair had been muttered the faun. a distraction, as had that “dia- “You see, that’s why we’re phanous drapery”. But a sharp here in the first place,” said Lorn, look now made me surer than smiling a blithe smile that any ever that I was facing the girl self-respecting temptress would I’d lost forever scant hours ear- have depleted her bank account lier. She was disguised some- to learn. what, but all the differences I fought a vertiginous impulse seemed to be for the better. to leap the distance between us And she treated me like a and cover her face with smolder- stranger. ing kisses, and quaked a little at I wondered if some word-asso- the unfamiliarity of the feeling ciations might trigger her mem- within myself. This wasn’t like ory. “Drendon,” I said carefully. me. I was a librarian and a gen- “Why, that’s the name of a for- tleman. And she was, after all, est, isn’t it? Sort of contiguous only a rag, a bone, a hank of

with —um— Earth-Normal? hair . . . But what a rag ! What Here, where only a little of it a bone! What a hank of hair! shows, we call it Porkle Park.” I cleared my throat, and said I didn’t know how much of what puzzledly, “What made you come I said was true, but I had to see calling on me?" if they’d react at all. For the first time since I’d Timtik reacted first. With dis- seen him, Timtik lost some of his gust. sullen impertinence. He actually

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 29 —”"

looked embarassed. “It’s kind of with numb joy. She’s beautiful my fault, Albert,” he admitted, when she’s mad, I thought, and hanging his head. “I tried to wished with biting regret that hide the key from Lorn, and— someone hadn’t already coined “Timtik is a prankster, Al- that phrase. Then the happy bert,” said Lorn. “He took the thought occurred to me that per- key from me to hold it for me haps the cliche hadn’t yet pene- (he said) because— I didn’t have trated her dimension. any pockets ” (A bad choice of “You’re beautiful when you’re topic; my eyes were again drawn angry,” I ventured. to those draperies of hers, and Lorn stopped harassing Tim- my breathing became slightly tik. “Why—Why, Albert! That’s impaired.) “Albert— ?” said the loveliest thing anyone ever Lorn, a little concerned. “Maybe said to me. I’m so glad I showed I should leave. You don’t look so myself to you.” well.” "You’re glad!” I said, my “I’m fine. I’m just not used to stomach doing cartwheels. “I’ve —to—I’m fine. Please go on.” never been so happy in my life.” “Well, now that he knows why ELL, once Timtik had the we’re here, let’s take the key and Wkey, he tried to make me go,” said Timtik, peering about catch him to get it back, and you the room. know how no one can outrun a “Go!?” I felt my world crum- faun, but he tripped, and I man- bling into—well—crumbs. I’d aged to lay hold of his hoof— been somehow deluding myself " (I had to repress a shudder) that I was going to spend the so he threw the key, and it came rest of my life just looking at in here, and just as we’d sneaked Lorn, just staring at and drink- inside to find it, you came in. ing in her loveliness, not eating, That’s all.” sleeping or anything, never “All but one thing,” I said. leaving the room again. Just me “What key?” and Lorn, and—Well, maybe “The key to Drendon, stupid !’* Timtik could’ve been bribed to grunted the faun in his metallic leave us. But would a faun have rasp. “We can’t get back to our any use for a quarter? Or an ice dimension without it, and Lorn’ll cream cone? catch hell from Maggot for keep- “We have to go, Albert,” said !” ing me out this late as it is Lorn, her face sweetly sad. “But “Me keeping you out?!” Her I will remember you always, and lovely face was alive with icy all that sort of stuff. Now, rancor. I watched her features where’s that key?!” 30 FANTASTIC —

I felt she could have looked a few extra inches of smooth just a little more miserable about pale flesh. But it was enough to our parting, but Lorn was al- turn my knees to water and bring ready down on her hands and the water to a boil. “I guess,” I knees, peering under furniture, ventured not unhappily, “you’re and Timtik was clumping about stuck in this dimension, huh?” making an awful racket, yelling, The resultant anguish on their “Here key!” faces made me feel that high. Nothing happened, except to “Well, maybe—Maybe it’s be- Lorn’s expression. She became cause you don’t belong here that pale and apprehensive. “Call your magic didn’t work. Maybe again!” she said. if I called Here, key!" Timtik, too, looked uneasy. “See me? See me?” squeaked “Here, key!” he shouted. Again a little voice. “Whee! Me! Me!” nothing happened. Timtik looked “There she is!” said Timtik genuinely scared. “The spell pointing. doesn’t work, Lorn!” “But it has to!” she said, ris- T LOOKED atop the bookcase ing gracefully from her ungainly and saw what at first seemed crouch on the carpet. "If a spell to be a dry twig; then it wrig- works, it works, that’s all. If the gled, and I saw that it was alive key can hear you, it must an- after a fashion. Lorn and I swer.” sprang for it at the same mo- I felt a growing concern for ment. We crashed front to front, their plight, despite ihy desire and somehow I found my arm that they both remain until I around her waist, while my free could get them unbrainwashed hand scooped up the key. My and back into their proper iden- hand scooped reftexively, because tities—Though I wasn’t sure I at the moment of contact be- wanted Susan to change all the tween us, everything was forgot-

way back . . . ten but Lorn, Lorn, Lorn! And “Maybe,” I said helpfully, she certainly was staring at me “Magic won’t work in this di- as though something marvelous mension?” had occurred. Timtik stopped clumping. “Albert,” she sighed, with “That’s a horrible idea—Maybe wonder in her voice. —Hey, Lorn!” Timtik watched, aghast. She gave a tiny shriek, but her “Lorn, he’s from another dimen- hands moved in time. That dia- sion!” he warned. phanous drapery of hers hadn’t At that moment, the key w-rig-

sagged much, and only exposed gled in my hand. I looked at it,

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 31 —

and realized that I held the “No, Lorn,” I said. “Don’t go. well, the key—to Lorn’s depar- You must stay —with me.” ture, and that without it . . , “Well, Albert ” Lorn looked I repressed an urge to chuckle, perplexed. “I want to, of course, but could not repress the surge but I did promise Maggot I’d

of just plain selfish desirous bring him home tonight. I’ll be meanness that welled up inside back. Honestly I will.” me as I brought up my other I fought for time, hoping to hand behind Lorn and prepared alter her decision. “But why did to crumple and snap the key like you come here in the first place, the twig it most resembled—Fire then? Merely to enchant me and lanced through my fingers! I al- then leave me a broken husk, most dropped the thing, but the seeking in vain for beauty I glow which had momentarily shall never view again?” heated the twig faded as soon as Timtik gagged. “Boy, is he

I ceased twisting it. corny!” He seemed quite recov- Timtik went pale (to the ered from his spate of tears. wr aist). “Lorn! He tried to de- Lorn shot him a cold glance of stroy the key! He did ! And Mag- deep reproach. “I think he’s got’s counter-spell worked ; I saw charming!” she said staunchly. it. He doesn’t want us to go!” Then to me, “I’d never heard Lorn was looking into my of Earth, or anywhere outside face, sighing gently, her breath Drendon, until Maggot decided in my nostrils sweet and warm to send Timtik out to spy on hu- and moist as fresh-cut grass. mans, to get experience. She “Who cares?” she said dreamily. needs someone to make the tran- “This beats satyrs all get-out!” sition now and then, to keep her Timtik’s face contorted tear- posted, especially on anything fully. “But Lorn. Maggot will be scientific. She likes to think she expecting us, and you’re sup- keeps Drendon up-to-date in its posed to be taking care of me, technology.” and I’ll never get home again, “I’m studying under her," and—” Here he broke down com- said Timtik, proudly. “I’m an pletely and blubbered salty tears apprentice witch.” into the hem of Lorn’s diapha- nous drapery, the horns coming Y knowledge of gender tri- dangerously near to snagging it. M umphed over strained credi- Lorn put her hand gently to my bility. “Warlock,” I corrected. chest and pushed me back, with “Boys can’t be witches.” a reluctant smile. “He’s right; “All right,” Timtik muttered I’ll have to take him home.” darkly. “Warlock, then.”

32 FANTASTIC ” ” — ”

“He had to see people,” Lorn who’d forgotten to read his part went on. “It’s part of his train- of the script. They were talking ing so that, someday, when he my brain into a tangle. “Look, has to cast a spell on a human, Lorn,” I said, taking advantage he’ll know how to make the doll.” of the speaking of her name to The hair prickled on my neck. hold her closer, as if for empha- “Dolls? You mean voodoo?” sis, “if the key won’t answer A light shone in Lorn’s eyes. when you call, maybe it w’on’t “You know’ voodoo, Albert?!” work to take you anywhere. May- “Just the word,” I admitted be it only works for me— anticlimactically. “Well, I like that!” the key “It figures,” Timtik muttered, shrilled angrily. “I would too again darkly. work for them, except that it was “Well, anyhow— Maggot so warm and cozy in here that I thought Timtik was too young got just a wee bit sleepy and to go alone, and she was mixing dropped off just the teensiest bit a batch of hell-brew to feed the and didn’t hear them calling me, Thrake, so the Kwistians could- but I did hear you, so that’s n’t get into our section of Dren- when I answered, so there!” don, and so she sent me. I’ll do Timtik wT as intrigued. “If anything for excitement, and that’s so, then why did Lorn’s Maggot knows it, so she sent me drapery start to sag ?” A shocked to watch humans with him, and expression widened his eyes. !” w’e were on our way back when “Unless she wanted it to— he tossed the key in here— “I did not!” said Lorn, pink “Wait,” I said. “If there are with indignation. “When it was no humans in Drendon, why intimated that spells might not learn how to voodoo them?” work here, I simply tried my “Practice, you bonehead!” drape-dropping spell to test the snarled the faun. theory. It worked perfectly. I bestowed my most withering That’s all. Of all the nerve, Tim- glance upon his horny forehead. tik!” She w’as quite put out, and “People who live in glass houses I was about to intercede to pre- »» vent any physical violence, when “ —shouldn’t take baths!” fin- suddenly ished Lorn. "That’s an oldie. Do The faun froze in position, you know' this one: Too many eyes alert, breath hushed. Lorn, cooks— too, had gone rigid, tense. I “Make light work,” finished looked left and right. “What’s Timtik. wrong?” I said, feeling uneasy ?” I felt like a character onstage myself. “Is something—

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 33 — —

UNT ANNABEL!” came a strange duo’s precipitate depar- A familiar shriek behind me. ture. I watched the last trailing “Albert has a lady in there with gossamer bit of the viridian no clothes on!” drapery slither like a foaming Too late I slapped my hand green mist over the sill, then over the keyhole. snapped out of my bewildered “Elizabeth,” I said lamely. trance. I dove through the air, “She spies.” fingers out to grasp that last “No time to lose! Come on, fleeing foot Lorn!” said Timtik. “Albert!” Annabel was shriek- “Hicks!” came Garson’s ing. “Open this door at once! shocked voice through the oaken How could you! And in your paneling. “What’s going on in own home!" there! Open this door!” I could- But even while Garson was n’t tell from his tone if he wanted cursing, and Annabel was alter- to stop the scandalous goings-on nately urging and egging him or take part in them. on and begging Elizabeth not to “Oh, Albert,” said Lorn, tak- listen to him, and the hinges ing the key from my numb fin- were screaming with the pound- gers. “I can’t come back if there’s ing strain, I was coming down going to be trouble. Maybe it’s toward the windowsill like a best if we never see each other pouncing leopard after its prey, .” again . . and my fingers were closing Her beauty was unmarred, tightly over the wisp of veil re- enhanced, really, by two crystal maining, and I was yelling loud- tears issuing over her rose- ly a single word "Lorn!” flushed cheeks. Her lovely eyes There was an abrupt, sharp were cloudy, and my heart click, a strange sort of tremor wrenched painfully to see them throughout my trunk and limbs so. “No, Lorn,” I pleaded. “Don’t and mind, and then my face !” go— smacked stunningly against hot, My outstretched hand clutched moist earth where it should have the air she was just vacating, as met the parquet flooring of my she glided swiftly toward the study. window, soundless and deft on her small bare feet. Timtik had CHAPTER 4 the window swiftly yawning wide against the night, and was LAY there, slightly stunned, helping her over the sill. I stood I for an instant, then managed, frozen, dazed at the abruptness with a soft groan, to roll over on of Elizabeth’s yelp and the my back. I tried to catch my

34 FANTASTIC breath and get my mind in or- Lorn nodded briskly. “Very der. As my mind sent out fingers well, then. I’ll cross my legs, and to test for broken limbs or at you do the rest, and maybe if we least a few frayed tendons, I hold hands it’ll work. What do heard the voices of Lorn and you think?” Timtik, and slitted my eyes to Timtik pursed his lips. “Not see them. I was prone at their a bad idea. Let’s try.” feet, or rather, at her feet and Lorn carefully crossed her his hooves. I lay where I was, legs, gripping the faun’s hand and simply listened, for the mo- for a reason that seemed to be ment. equal portions of necromancy “Pour water on him, Lorn,” and balance, and Timtik began suggested Timtik. his spell. It was quite a spell. His “Do you have any?” Her voice cabalistic incantation was punc- was plaintive with worry about tuated with waving arms, and me. I liked that. grunts and groans, sounding like “No, but I think I can make a banshee in a beartrap. Sud- some. Maggot showed me how,” denly, a tiny cloud, pink in color, he said. Timtik proceeded to began to materialize about two cross his fetlocks, fall down, feet over my face. swear, get up again, re-cross his Timtik frowned and howled fetlocks, fall down again, and some more. The cloud darkened swear again. and began to quiver. The faun “That’s a fascinating spell," emitted a savage curse, and the Lorn enthused. cloud sparked a bolt of lightning “Spell, nothing !” muttered the about three inches long. faun. “I can’t even assume the Lorn whistled in appreciation. primary position. Oh, for a pair “It’s working!”

of feet ! Sometime you try stand- “Quiet!” growled Timtik. “I’m !” ing with your fetlocks crossed not through yet!” Lorn frowned prettily. “May- He began snapping his fingers, be you could tell me what to do, increased his howl, and moved and I could assume the primary his haunches in that motion position?” Hawaiians call “around the is- Timtik rubbed his beardless land” when the hula is in full chin between thumb and forefin- swing. ger, carefully sheathing his tal- The cloud was quite black ons as he did so. “Well—All now, like a blob of inked cotton, spells are very secret, you know. and the lightning bolts were I can’t give them away; Maggot flashing on and off like flash- would be awfully angry.” bulbs at a Hollywood premiere.

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 35 Suddenly there was a grinding such as a woman might do on noise, a little gasp, and the hearing the word “bug”. Her cloud exploded into nothingness. eyes widened. “You’re right, And at that same moment, I re- Timtik! Let’s go, quickly. Come ceived about a cupful of water on, Albert.” full in my upturned face. I looked again at the globe, I sat up gasping and sputter- which was now the size of a ing. “That was cold!” I com- grapefruit. “A hotsy!? What plained, wiping at my dripping does it do?” features. Lorn and Timtik each grabbed Timtik, crowing his delight, an arm and hove me to my feet. was dancing on the sunlit sward. “We’ll explain later. Don’t just “Oh what a witch I'm gonna sit there, it’s almost ripe!” make!” I found myself stumbling “Warlock!” said Lorn, then along toward the encroaching looked to me for approval. I edge of the woods with them. I smiled my approval back at her. shook their grips free of my Who could disapprove of Lorn! arms, impatiently. “But what is "All right—Warlock!” Tim- a hotsy?” I looked back at it tik muttered. “But whatever I again. It was easy to see it. Al- become, I’ll be the best damned ready the size of a medicine ball, enchanter this forest has ever it was turning dull crimson. seen, that’s for sure!” Then the grass about this ruddy spheroid began, abruptly, to T TOOK a deep breath of the smoke. Then it turned black and warm fresh air and sighed, died. And still the hotsy grew, then looked around at the bright swollen and' bloated, and radiat- greenery of the forest that im- ing raw heat that I began to feel, pinged upon the glade in which a good sixty feet away. I no I’d landed. “It’s certainly beauti- longer needed warnings from ful here,” I said. “A guy could the woodnymph and faun. I sit here and look at nature for- turned on my heel and dashed ever.” after them (they hadn’t halted Timtik suddenly turned his their flight when I had). gaze upon a dusty grey globe, Then, just as they were about about the size of an orange, bur- to penetrate the first fringe of geoning on the ground near my the woods, Lorn halted dead, and right hand. “No you couldn’t, Timtik jumped backwards a good Albert,” he said. "That’s a hot- yard. “They’re coming!” she sy!” cried, throwing herself flat on Lorn took a backward step the earth. Timtik was pivoting

36 FANTASTIC about on one hoof, looking from cence that was nearly blinding. the quivering globe to the forest This gleaming glut of globes lay and back again. Then I heard there for only an instant, and the sound. Off in the tangle- then the whizzing sound, which wood, there was a hissing, buzz- had been growing more piercing ing, swishing, whizzing of angry by the instant, reached a peak, noise. The sound was too much and I cringed back, startled by for Lorn. She jumped up again. the blue-white cloud of tiny fly- “I’m afraid!” she whimpered to ing things that came out of the Timtik. “I can’t stay here!” other rim of the woods, at speeds “The other side of the hotsy, well surpassing any bug I’d it’s our only chance!” shrieked seen, ever. the faun, galloping off without Lorn clutched my arm, leaned her. I stood as he passed me, his her mouth to my ringing ear, head down and tiny hooves and shouted, over the chaotic throwing up divots from the racket, “Frost flies!" sod. Then Lorn rushed up to me, As the insects reached the and right by me, yelling, “Run. goal of the globes, and crashed Albert! Run!” I ran. head-on, there came a keening screech, such as a warm coin HE three of us, with Tim- makes on a block of dry ice, ex- Ttik’s lead growing by the sec- cept that it would take all the ond, skirted the bulging diame- coins in the U.S.A. on all the dry ter of the hotsy at a distance of ice in the world to duplicate ten feet, and even there my en- the volume of the shattering tire hotsy-side felt half-cooked sound. The blue-white bugs before I got beyond it. The thing glowed red, the globules shiveled was almost ten feet high, now, into rime-coated raisins, and the and sagging horribly, like a huge erstwhile blast of heat became a scarlet-and-orange paper bag sudden wintry chill in the air. filled with wet mud. And just as As quickly as they’d come, the we stumbled to a panting halt at flies left, their reddish bodies the edge of woods bordering the turning blue-white again as they opposite side of the glade, the zoomed off and disappeared in a hotsy was riven from within by direction at right angles to the its internal pressures, and one they’d approached the glade splayed sluggishly open, dis- at. The ensuing calm was down- gorging a steaming red viscosity right soothing. cluttered with small spheres. It Lorn sagged against me and looked like overgrown salmon sighed. “That was very close. roe, glowing with an incandes- We were almost destroyed, you

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 37 ”

know.” I hadn’t known, of course, his hand, and I took hers, and we but I’d most certainly suspected headed back across the glade, something of the sort. past the scene of the fly-hotsy "Are those things as danger- encounter. In the circle of with- ous as they sound?” ered black grass, nothing re- “They live on heat. Any kind mained, not even a wrinkled rai- of heat. Body heat, for one,” said sin. But my eyes stayed peeled Timtik. “And the hotsies live on for any more of those swift- cold. So they get along fine.” growing grey globes. It had

“They—they fly so fast . . been a close call, I began to I remarked, shivering. realize, with delayed shock. One “Have to,” said Lorn. “To get had a choice of running from the from one hotsy to the next. They flies into that hellish heat, or need the heat for enough pep to from the heat into the deadly get from one hotsy to the other. bullets of heat-hungry bugs. They use it up fast. If they don’t make it, they die. Not that A S though sensing my anyone cares.” thoughts over that scorched “I guess a metabolism like earth, Lorn said, “I saw Dalinda, that would keep you on the go,” another woodnymph, get caught I agreed. Then, to change from in the middle, once. It was aw- an unpleasant topic, “By the ful. She ran from the flies, and way, where are we bound?” fell against the side of the hotsy, “Well,” said Lorn, “I have to and as her front burnt up and take Timtik— back to Maggot, turned black, the flies struck, first, then ” She gave me a and her back turned blue with sideways look. spots of frostbite. It took more “Then?” I said, my voice than five minutes until she was cracking. completely gone. The flies sat on Lorn shrugged, and gave me a her, and as the hotsy heated up a friendly twitch in the ribs with hunk of her they bit into it, her elbow. “We can maybe play and she screamed and kicked, charades or something.” and— Inside my collar, my neck did “Lorn,” I choked, feeling a brief imitation of a hotsy. deathly ill, “I get the pictui-e!” “Uh—” I said intelligently. “But don’t you see what we Timtik tugged impatiently at missed, Albert?” Lorn’s diaphanous drapery, then. I saw, and nodded. “And I’m “Let’s go, Lorn. I’m getting hun- going to follow you and Timtik gry- and do every single thing you “All right, Timtik.” Lorn took say.”

38 FANTASTIC —

Timtik tugged Lorn's hand. “Sometimes yes, sometimes “Come on, Lorn, huh? I’ll be no,” Timtik explained. “Her late for supper, and Maggot will dwelling changes with her whip me.” Lorn nodded and moods.”

picked up her pace. Together, Lorn tugged at me, as I lagged the three of us entered the emer- behind for another look at the ald gloom of the forest. The froggish thing, which was now ground under my feet was in the process of being consumed springy as the base of a needle- alive by another froggish thing, floored pine forest, and the bush- and looking quite rapturous es were very strange. about its grisly fate. “They’re As we’d near one in the gloam- making love,” said Lorn, pulling ing, it seemed to fold back upon me along. itself until we passed, then close “But—It looks like the big one up the gap behind us. is devouring the little one!” “Hey,” I said, slowing my "Why not?” Lorn’s voice was pace. “The way these things go tinged with impatience, as a par- shifting around, I'd never get ent speaking to a beloved im- out of here without help. Is the becile child. “Haven’t you ever woods always so lively?” heard of being so deeply in love Lorn smiled. “That’s one of with a person you felt like just the handy things about being a eating him up?” woodnymph. The trees and “Well, sure. But if they really

shrubs and vines move aside for do it, how do they reproduce?” you. But don’t worry, Albert. “They don’t,” said Lorn with You’ll have me with you on a shrug. “They never get the trips.” chance. One look and it’s love, “If Maggot lets him make and the next thing you know, any,” said Timtik, mysteriously. it’s dinner.” “She might not want a non-resi- “But,” I persisted, peering dent roaming around the woods.” back into the fronded gloom, “You’re teasing,” I said un- trying to catch the finale of the easily. “She wouldn’t stop me.” catastrophe, “if that goes on, “Of course not, Albert,” said the species will dwindle!” Lorn. “I’ll even take you on a “Oh,” said Lorn, matter-of- tour as soon as we get Timtik to factly, “it has.” Maggot’s cave.” “Then why haven’t the forest “She lives in a cave?” I asked, people set up a sort of—um stepping around an idiotically- preservation program?” grinning froggish thing that Lorn looked at me. “Who’d squatted lazily upon our path. want to preserve one of those?”

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 39 ” ”

T that moment, a mewling thing plunged to the path ahead A twang in the region of my of us with a sickening crunch. upper trunk reminded me that I I thought some magnificent never had gotten around to mak- bird had crashed, but only for a ing myself that ham sandwich moment. As the bushes twisted back home. It seemed ages since out of our way, I saw that the

I’d first thought of doing it. broken wings, a good fifteen feet “Lorn,” I said, “I’m getting from tip to tip, were growing out hungry, too. Are there any res- of the back of a mannish crea- taurants, or—No, I guess that’s ture, bronzed of flesh, right fist out of the question. But is there still clutching the haft of a slen- any food available?” der, wicked-pointed brass tri- Lorn paused, despite Timtik’s dent. “A Kwistian,” said Lorn. impatient grumble. “I think “That means we’re getting near Maggot should have enough to the Thrake.” go around. I’d planned on join- “Thrake?” I stepped gingerly ing her and Timtik for supper. about the corpse. “What’s that?” You can probably sit in, too, if “A blue thing about five inches you don’t mind a meal cooked by long, and it does something no a witch.” one understands to the wings of “Well, if it’s something fa- the Kwistians,” said Timtik, miliar, I suppose I could manage kicking the corpse over on its to swallow— back. The face was only semi- Lorn proceeded to move on- human, I saw with near-nausea. ward. “If you’re that choosy, In lieu of nose and mouth, it Albert, you’re not as hungry as sported a beak like a parrot’s. you think.” And the eyes, human in size and “But Lorn,” I pleaded. “A shape, had no lids or lashes, just witch’s cooking sounds so— a nictitating membrane just She had not paused, however, now moving to cover the glazing so I had to drop the subject and yellow sclera. It was a mean hurry to keep up with her before face. Lorn shivered. the shrubbery snapped back into “Those beaks—Horrible. They my path. I came abreast of her, eat people, you know.” and she gripped my arm sudden- Just about to touch the beak, ly, making me go warm all over I withdrew my hand in haste. for the next five steps. Above us, “Eat people? Lorn, isn’t there then, something screamed, a anything friendly in this for- raucous sort of scream, and a est?” moment later, there came a “Just me . . she said soft- crackling of branches, and some- ly, closing one dark-lashed eye in

40 FANTASTIC ”

a slow wink. Then she turned knows how it stops the Kwis- back to the path again. "But tians from flying, but it does. come on. I have to get Timtik Some people say it’s really the home.” soul of a maiden who died in a “People,” I said thoughtfully flame-pit, and this is how she as we moved onward, “should be gets her vengeance for her aw- rough on those beaks. You need ful fate!” teeth to get through thick mus- “Gosh,” I said, impressed, “it cle. They might give a sharp must be a handy thing for the nip, or take off a finger or toe, woodnymphs, this Thrake.” but— “You said a mouthful,” said “They—They cook their vic- Timtik. tims first,” said Lorn, with a “But,” I asked, still at sea, kind of uneasy twitch of her “don’t the Kwistians know by slim shoulders. now not to fly anywhere near the “In the flame-pits!” embel- Thrake?” lished Timtik, his eyes a-sparkle “They don’t know where it’s with excitement. "Alive!” at,” Lorn said. “They know only Lorn went ashy pale. “Timtik that it’s in Maggot’s hut. But —Please!” At her words, he be- she keeps her dwelling on the came suddenly subdued and re- move, so they won't find it. The pentant. forest folk are all very glad to have Maggot around.” FELT some of their tension, Timtik nodded proudly. “She’s I and asked, "What is it, Lorn? the oldest, wrinkledest, wisest For a girl who described death- witch there is. Everyone always by-hotsy a few minutes ago, you says, ‘If the monsters make you look almost ill.” holler, Maggot ha3 counter- ” Lorn smiled wanly. “It seems spells, five for a dollar.’ that the Kwistians prefer wood- “Of course,” the woodnymph nymphs on their menu. They interjected, brushing idly at her don’t always get us, of course, burnished tresses, where they’d but they’re always trying. Some- fallen across her cheek, “no one times they get a lot at once, and knows where she lives, and if eat them one at a time, fattening they did, no one uses dollars up the rest in cells in that dread- here.” ful Sark!” “But the free word-of-mouth “Where did you get this in- advertising helps her reputation formation?” I said, puzzled. considerably, and she always gets “I think the Thrake told Mag- enough things in barter to keep got,” said Timtik. “No one her in health, so she can go on

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 41 making her hell-brew for the “It never takes too long,” said Thrake.” Lorn to me. “Maggot sometimes I pretended to follow most senses our approach.” of their dizzying conversation, I eyed the clustering heavily and trailed along for about ten vined growths through which we paces. Then I stopped dead. were wending our labyrinthine “Lorn—?” way, and said, in some doubt, “Yes?” Her eyes were inquisi- “Through this?” tive, and she paused. “She uses magic, you dope!” "You don’t know what this Hot and hungry, and sore of dwelling looks like, currently?” foot, I had suddenly had enough The golden-red head shook of the faun’s impudence. “Half- lightly from side to side. goat or not,” I snapped, “you “And if you did know, it might still have a behind I can pad- still be anywhere in Drendon?” dle!” I lunged for him and my I added, while my stomach hands closed on the breeze of his growled piteously. She nodded. departure. With a crow of de- “Then,” I said in annoyed light, he was leaping away, gur- perplexity, jamming my fists gling his enjoyment. No one can against my hips, “how do you catch a faun in full flight, bar- know where we’re heading?” ring a faunic mishap, and in the “I don’t,” she said brightly. tanglewood we trod I couldn’t “It’s always this way, Albert. have paced a whale on roller- We just meander here and there, skates, but I was too mad to act hoping she’s outside gathering with intelligence. herbs or something. Though Lorn ran after me, as I crashed Timtik can spot her place nine and plunged through the grasp- times out of ten.” ing shrubbery after Timtik. She shouted my name, and grabbed T ORN turned back toward our my sleeve just as I broke through path again, and I could only an intricately tough tangle of sigh and go tagging along after the growths. I found myself her. I couldn’t think of an argu- swaying giddily on the brink of ment with such total illogicality. a short but steep embankment, In a way, I kind of missed the and then Lorn came up too fast Susan-side of Lorn. Susan was- against me and we both went n’t so flashily seductive, but she sprawling down the sunny slope had a brain on her shoulders, so through a welter of musky- to speak. scented flowers, and slid for a “Let’s hurry,” said Timtik, short distance on some sort of picking up the pace. glassy-topped substance.

42 FANTASTIC —

When I clambered to my hands We could only go forward. To and knees, I saw that we were on the castle where the parrot- a bright green glossy path, in beaked flying cannibals were the midst of thick purplish moss. waiting. I was debating the use- The moss spread out in all direc- fulness of sitting down beside tions, as broad as the surface of Lorn and joining her in a good a mountain lake, but quite still. long cry, when I remembered the Then I noticed that—although I faun. “Where’s Timtik?” I said, could have sworn we’d slid from glancing about. “If he’s still the base of the embankment near the brink, he can tell Mag- there was nothing but more moss got, can’t he?” between us and the edge of the Lorn’s face lighted with the woods, a good broadjump away. first trace of hope I’d seen since Lorn sat up, looked about, our skid onto the green path. then gave a frightened whim- “Of course!” she said. “We can per. wait here till she figures out “What is it?” I stared at her, some way to rescue us.” apprehensive. Gone was the self- “Timtik!" we yelled together. !” composure she’d heretofore ex- “TIMTIK hibited. She was squealing and moaning, and biting her lower HE all-enshrouding green lip in terror, and wringing her Tgrowths at the edge of the hands. “Albert—” she said weak- woods remained unbroken. It ly, “we’re in the mossfields of was as though Timtik had never Sark!” been with us at all. The sun beat “The what?” down upon us, stark and hot. “They surround the castle. And a few inches at the end of Sark is the castle where the the path made an impatient dis- Kwistians dwell. That’s where appearance, forcing us to move this path leads, and there’s no backward, and the instant we did getting back.” so, even more path evaporated. I looked at the edge of the We were a good thirty feet from path behind us, cut off as the embankment’s nearest point. smoothly as with a knife, and “Is that moss as dangerous as took a step back from the edge it looks?” I said, its alien pur- to get a running start for the ple hue having repelled any jump that might take me to the thoughts I’d had of trying to embankment. A distance of path tread upon it. "What’s under it equal to my pace shimmered, —Monsters? Quicksand?” faded and vanished. Behind us, “No one knows,” said Lorn, the path was self-destructive. her voice panicky. “But it’s sup-

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 43 ”

posed to be death to fall into it. CHAPTER 5 Don’t leave me!” I hesitated, then took a step OW, shortly before this time onto the soft velvet stuff. It N (albeit I didn’t learn of it in gave, parted, and I oozed down- detail until much later from ward into black muddy bog to Maggot—who can apparently the knees as I swiftly grabbed find out anything she has a for the edge of the path. Then, mind to) there were things afoot just as Lorn gripped my arms, that were going to have extraor- the soft wet feel of the mud dinary, if not downright dire, changed, as something slithered effects on my fate. It seems that, in the thick slime, and then at the moment Lorn and I were sharp burning pain grated on asprawl on the edge of that weird my flesh like razor-scrapes, and green path, still confused from I was yelping as Lorn managed our tumble down the embank- to drag me back onto the path. ment, things were happening at I looked down. My legs were that ancient cannibal strong- spotted with pinkish burns, and hold, the castle of Sark . . . a few ugly white blisters; my * * * trousers, shoes and socks were The green buzzer flashed and gone wherever the mud had crackled. flowed. I had slightly less pants Cort, drowsing in the sunlight left than go into a pair of Ber- by the great stone casement of muda shorts. his laboratory, clacked his beak “It’s no use, Albert,” Lorn in annoyance and peered at the sighed. “We’ll have to either go panel of lights. As his eye ascer- onward to the castle of Sark, or tained the source of the noise, stay here and fall into that stuff his insouciance fell away from when the— path vanishes again.” him like a cloak, and he hurried “Well ” I said uncertainly, over to the panel, his long, cruel- “the moss is sure death ... I ly taloned index finger punching guess the castle’s our best bet, the Stop button. The buzzing and if only because it’ll put off our flashing ceased instantly, and destruction until we can get help the core of a dull crystal disc from Maggot, maybe— upon a squat stone tripod began “I hope,” said Lorn, lovely be- to coruscate with jabs of cold yond my wildest dreams, “Tim- blue light. Cort passed a hand tik gets to Maggot in time.” commandingly above its surface, “And,” I added with a weak peered into its depths, and the smile, “that Maggot gets to us face of Kwist, the winged em- in time.” peror, swam into sharp focus.

44 FANTASTIC —

"Well?” snarled Kwist, evilly. stood, until it merged by perspec- “Woodnymph,” said Cort. tive into a solid dark color, which "Just now hit the path.” still continued onward and on- Kwist wiped a hit of spittle ward. “That’s impossible,” I off his beaktip. “How soon is she said. “It has to end, doesn’t it?” expected?” “Give her about an hour,” ORN shrugged. “Who knows? said Cort, after a quick mental L Maybe it does, maybe it calculation. doesn’t. No one has ever been “I’ll have the flame-pits stoked ambitious enough to walk far up,” said the emperor, with a enough to see.” blissful glow in his bright yel- “But if this place is a plane, low eyes. His image faded swift- how can it be contiguous with ly, and the crystal went dull and Earth?” I asked, scratching my opaque. head. Cort rubbed his hands to- “Well,” said the woodnymph, gether gleefully, and hummed scowling as she searched her tunelessly as he moved to the mind for a solution, “it's—it’s casement to survey the vista of as though your planet were an the purple mossfields. The vista orange, and our land were a ta- from that high vantage point ble on which the orange lay. At was a broad one indeed. Not only the point where the orange due to the giddy height of the touched the table, the two would casement, but also to a salient have a common point of exist- feature of this strange dimen- ence.” sion that made it exceedingly I suddenly got the picture. alien to the ordinary topography “And Porkle Park is the contact of Earth point! The gateway to your di- # * « mension !” “There’s no horizon!" I “Right,” said Lorn. “By now, gasped. we’re probably miles from the Lorn shook her head. “No, park, and centuries from your there isn’t. Drendon is a perfect era.”

plane surface.” “Centuries. . . ?” I felt sud- I looked with wonder at the denly cold inside. sight I’d just become aware of, “Yes. The farther we get from the sight I'd been unable to de- the park, the farther from that tect in the depths of the forest. moment when we left Earth. We Land, moss-covered to the rim have no time here as you do of the distant forest, rolled back there. Your time depends on in all directions from where I when, ours on where."

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 45 — ” ”

T PUZZLED this out slowly. If “History? But Arthur is a .’’ it were true, it meant that legend, a myth . . there were an infinity of contact- “Is Drendon a myth?” asked points with Earth, each at a dif- the woodnymph. ferent age of Earth’s existence I looked at the unsetting sun,

. . . “Um—What time is it the horizonless vista, the purple now?” moss and the green path. “I Lorn frowned, glanced about guess not,” I had to admit. Even her, and seemed to be calculat- minus those clues, Timtik’s ing. “Well, Albert, in this direc- hooves were proof enough. tion it’s about late eighteenth “Well then!” said Lorn. “So century, your time. If we had a he banished Drendon— key, we could arrive on the “Why?” I asked. Earth that touched Drendon at “The Kwistians, naturally!” this point, during the French she said irritably. “They were Revolution. I believe.” spoiling all his knight’s fun. It “That’s better than the flame- was hard enough slaying drag- pits, isn’t it? And I can speak a ons and things without having little French ‘Voulez-vous ’— flying men always pricking your No, maybe she could speak a lit- horse’s flanks with their tridents, tle French, too. “How,” I went and sometimes swiping your on, “did Drendon happen to con- lance, or carrying off the maiden tact Earth in the first place?” you’d ridden for leagues to res- “It didn’t come to Earth. It al- cue. So Arthur banished them. most went from it. Remember Merlin made a powerful spell, that orange I mentioned?” I re- and sent the Kwistians and their membered. “Well, it’s as though ilk away from Earth, leaving only our dimension had once been the one contact-point, in case they skin of that orange. But at the should become better-behaved, Edict of Banishment, it spread or that Arthur should change his away, leaving Earth except at one mind. He planned on checking point. It’s always touched the every so often.” Earth since then, but always at a “You say ‘planned’ as though different time, and a new point." he flubbed up,” I observed, com- “What was this Edict of Ban- pletely fascinated. “What went ishment?” I asked. wrong?” “Merlin did it,” said Lorn. “The scheme backfired. The “With his semi-scientific thau- dragons went with the Kwis- maturgics. It was at King Ar- tians, and so did the other so- thur’s request. Don’t you know called mythological entities of your own history?” Earth, and the knights were left

46 FANTASTIC — with nothing to fight. So they her lovely face between her got lazy, and then Lancelot hands, and closed her eyes tight- started giving Guinevere the ly, trying to evoke an elusive eye, and things kind of went to memory. Then she shook her pot. Arthur decided to switch head and dropped her hands. back, fast, then. It’s better to “The trouble is,” she said with a have a dragon in the garden friendly glance, “the timeless- than a paramour on the porch. ness here gets at your memory,

But Merlin couldn’t do it. In ban- and you find it hard to think of ishing Drendon, he’d weakened anything that might have hap- .” himself more than he’d planned pened—before . . —he was part-monster himself, “Then why haven’t 1 you recall—and in his weak hu- changed?” I asked. “I’m here man condition, he couldn’t pull a ft rabbit out of a hat, let alone a “Oh,” she said nonchalantly, whole dimension back from “you will. It just takes a while to limbo.” readjust to environment. If the “Funny,” I remarked, “but I change were a swift one, Timtik don’t remember any mention of and I would have reverted to flying cannibals in the Arthurian some sort of Earth-creatures Legend. Dragons, yes them, when we showed at your ; up no.” house. But we weren’t out that “Well, of course not, Albert!” long.” Lorn said scornfully. “When “Well why didn’t you stay, they were officially banished, for pete’s sake!” I moaned, just their names were struck from realizing the opportunity I’d the rosters of creatures. It was muffed back in my study. forbidden to even mention them, Lorn was incredulous. “And let alone write their history. So leave Maggot here alone?! She’d here we are, in Drendon.” She go out of her mind without us.” passed a hand before her face, “Why couldn’t she leave with and a lot of her Susan-self shone you, then?” I inquired reasona- through her features for a con- bly. fused moment. “Anyone who “Because of the Thrake, silly! who enters here—has to attune, She can’t leave it and she can’t or perish.” take it away.” “Attune?” I asked, although I shook my head, dizzily aware “perish” was the word that both- that she was getting me onto one ered me. of those conversational merry- To fit with things here, like go-rounds again. “I give up. like me and Timtik.” She held This is too much natural history

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 47 ”

in one dose. Look, Lorn, why “Columbus,” I retorted auto- don’t you and I scoot out of here matically, before I had a chance to the French Revolution? We’ll to wonder why she’d asked. be safer among the jacquerie “How did he travel?” she than with flying cannibals. And went inexplicably on. Maggot can probably reach us “By boat.— The Nina, the Pin- sooner or later . . ta, and “But I have the key to your “Can you sail a boat?” time, not that one.” She held it “Well, no ...” I admitted. up for my inspection. “This only “Furl a sail?” .’’ works at one point in Drendon, “No . . the spot where it touches Porkle “Chart a course?” Park.” I looked at the little “No.” thing, which resembled an un- “Command an expedition? dernourished mandrake root, Speak Italian and Spanish?” and an idea glimmered into life. “No,” I said, my replies grow-

“Lorn . . . that thing can ing softer by the second. talk, right? Well, it’s light “Columbus could!” said Lorn, enough to travel over the moss. as though she’d made a point. I We could send a message to stood there on that strange Maggot!” green path, staring into her face “What message?” Lorn for a long moment. Then my sighed. ‘‘Goodbye?" frustrated soul wrenched a cry I grimaced in exasperation. of misery from my heart. “Lorn, how can you be so intel- “So what?!" I shrieked. lectual in your speech some- “Albert,” said Lorn, with times, and then revert to down- weary patience, “can’t you see right idiocy?" that your position is exactly like "Rote,” said Lorn. “I sound mine? You know Columbus dis- bright when I’m quoting infor- covered America by boat after mation I’ve gotten from Mag- getting money from the Spanish got, but it’s all rote. I can recite, queen and you let it go at that. but I can’t figure very well. All I You couldn’t explain how he just told you about Drendon was sailed to the west, or what he memorized fact. I couldn’t ex- said to cozen the queen, or where plain any of it.” they got the lumber for the “That’s crazy—” I protested, ships, or why he picked that “If you know you don’t know time to make his trip, could » you ?” “Who,” said Lorn stubbornly, “No,” I said, “I guess not. “discovered America?” But—”

48 FANTASTIC —” ”!

“So,” she interrupted trium- Her brains can’t be much bigger phantly, “how do you expect me than a grain of sand.” to understand precisely how “Help?” giggled the key, scur- Drendon came to be when you rying about in an eager dance of an adult male of supposedly impatience. “Help? Is that average intelligence—cannot right?” even explain the discovery of “Perfect,” said Lorn. “Now, ?” !” America 1 hurry With a shrill snicker of mirth, STOOD there, completely the key danced away from us I stripped of erudition, feeling over the lavender moss-tufts, intellectually naked. What, after screaming “Help!” at every all, did anyone know about any- bound. thing, when you got right down “There!” I said, happy that to it? Taking discretion as the the moss didn’t suck it into that better part of valor, I changed corrosive mud with its slithery the subject violently back to occupants, “I guess we’re all set, where it had been a few moments now. When Maggot gets the key before. “Lorn, about this key— and hears the message, she’ll “What about it?” she said know we’re in trouble, and— brightly. “How?” said Lorn, looking I almost shouted, then con- suddenly pleased. trolled my vexation and said A numb apprehensiveness softly, “If we send this key- touched my heart. “Lorn—This twig thing to Maggot with a key—It’s the only one to the message, then she can save ns, woods, isn’t it?” can’t she?” Lorn stepped back from me, Lorn wrinkled her brow. “I apparently frightened by my don’t know, Albert. —But I sup- cold intensity. “No. Maggot will pose it is worth a try ” She set give them to any reliable person the key upon the path, where it who wants a peep at the Earth stood expectantly on its skimpy people . . . Why? Is it impor- root-legs. “Key, can you take a tant?” message to Maggot?” I smacked the palm of my The key squeaked delightedly. hand to my brow. “Important? "Yes. What message?” Lorn, how the hell will Maggot “Help!” said Lorn. know who sent the message?” “Isn’t that rather brief?” I “I don’t know. I didn’t think asked. of that.” Lorn shrugged. “We’ll be I turned and stared futilely in

lucky if the key remembers that . the direction the key had gone.

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 49 It was no longer visible, but I “Wonderful,” said Lorn clap- could hear a wispy treble repeat- ping her hands and doing a ing, “Help! Help! Help!” in the small dance of delight on that dim distance. fatal brink before I grabbed her I turned and glared at Lorn, again. “So what shall we do?” my hands clenching— Then, see- she asked. ing her eyes fill with fright, I “Stay right here,” I replied. melted, and simply reached out “Maybe Timtik will get to Mag- and pulled her to me. She tensed got with news of us, or she’ll as I touched her, then slipped her figure out where the key came own arms about me and relaxed from. But it’s better than walk- against my chest, sniffing softly. ing.” I held her tighter. “Much “I’m sorry,” she said. “I told you better than walking.” I wasn’t very bright!” “Will we be rescued soon?” Holding her there in my arms, asked Lorn, cuddling near me, warm, soft and helpless, I could- her flaming hair wafting a scent n’t stay even a little angry. of fresh blossoms to my nearby “Lorn, Lorn ...” I sighed. “I nose. don’t know, I just don’t know!” “I sincerely hope not.” I chuckled with helpless hysteria at the stupidity of what had just CHAPTER 6 happened. “You’re such a lova- ble dope!” I kissed her behind WO hours!” growled Kwist, the ear. “And I’m nuts about Tstanding arms akimbo in the you.” archway of Cort’s laboratory. Lorn sighed and snuggled Cort, jerked awake by the words, closer. Then something occurred took a second to orient himself, to me. I looked back at the edge and then realized that it was in- of the green path. It was clear up deed later than he’d expected. to my heels, but had advanced no Hiding his own puzzlement, he further. “Lorn," I said elatedly, said testily, “So?” “we’ve been here for many min- “So where’s the woodnymph? !” utes, and the path hasn’t dis- I’m as empty as—as your head solved any further!” the emperor grunted. “And while

She looked. “Is it broken?” we’re at it, how come no ‘Your she queried hopefully. Imperial Majesty’ in your re- “I don’t believe so. It’s psy- sponses, eh? I thought we had chological! It wants to scare us that out the other day!” into moving, but doesn’t want us “We did, Kwist, and I won the falling into the moss fields. By toss, remember?” Cort deliver- standing still, we call its bluff!” ately turned his back on the em-

50 FANTASTIC !

peror and stalked to his lab ta- the other’s tall powerful frame. ble, his huge white wings rus- “I don’t know,” he replied desul- tling in fury. torily. “Let me look at the in- “Ha!” shrieked Kwist. “You dicator board.” used some of that stinking magic He waved a hand through a of yours to win. You never lose a bank of lights on the wall, and a !” toss large blank panel glowed into “All the more fool you for topographic life, a map of the bothering to call the toss.” moss fields. From the black Kwist strode to his vizier and square at its base, marking the spun him about with a snarl. location of Castle Sark, a thin Then he took a quick backward green ribbon ran erratically up step as Cort’s sparking yellow the board. Its upper extremity, eyes flashed ominously. “Don’t within the heart of the moss you ever do that again, Kwist! fields, lay motionless. Let’s get it straight who’s run- “Damn that woodnymph ning things around here. You She’s staying put!” snapped wouldn’t last that long—” he Cort. “I thought those creatures flipped thumb and forefinger were too dumb to reason out the with a sharp crack “—without path’s operation.” my science and wizardry to back “Are you sure it is a wood- you. I’m the power behind your nymph?” asked the emperor. throne, and the sooner you stop Cort quirked a feathery eye- pretending otherwise, the better brow. “Certainly. If any other for all of us!” creature fell into the moss fields, Kwist seethed in impotent it would sink and be destroyed. rage. “All right—Maybe I can’t Only a woodnymph can activate run the empire alone, but listen the path. Once activated, of here: You have certain responsi- course, it will take any amount bilities, whether you like it or of traffic that cares to join her in not, and the primary one at the her fate, but there must be at moment is the getting of food least one woodnymph present to

for the rest of us ! And I simply trigger the path’s initiation.” wish to know, where is it!?” “Well,” said the monarch, im- His anger was a physical pain, patiently, “what do we do about setting his great wing-muscles her? Let her loaf while we quivering. starve?” Cort, albeit the brighter, was Cort looked coldly at the em- the weaker of the two, almost in peror. “You’re the ruler around inverse ratio. He frowned, un- here; pull some rank on your easily, at the visible tension in Imperial Guards, and send a

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 51 —— eouple of them out after her.” mering green pathway. Lorn Kwist, about to challenge the flopped gracefully beside me, other’s impertinent attitude, de- and we lay there in silence. Then cided it could wait until his hun- ger was assuaged. He simply “The path is cold and hard, nodded. “All right, Cort.” Then Albert,” said Lorn. “May I rest he had an afterthought. His my head upon your strong warm physical advantage was of no shoulder?” use when Cort used wizardry or “Oh . , . Why not!” I science against him. Might as croaked, nervously. well make harmony among the Her head, with its glorious upper echelons—“And,” he said tresses, snuggled down against with bad grace, “I’m sorry I my right biceps and pectoral. shouted at you like that. Lost There was a lull. Then my head.” “May I slip my arms about “Ha ha,” Cort said mirthless- you?” she asked gently. ly. Kwist turned a bit pink, but While I tried to think of a re- spun about and strode away ply that wouldn’t abet the without further argument, van- adolescent squeak which was ishing through the great stone starting to possess my larynx, archway. Cort listened to the she went ahead and did it any- monarch’s voice raging in a dis- how. Another lull. Then tant corridor and then the air in “May I give you a fond kiss?” the courtyard below his open asked Lorn. casement was thumped by great I tried to come up with an pinions. In another moment, two answer, pursed my lips in deep graceul Imperial Guards, tri- thought, and then her soft warm dents poised deftly, soared up mouth was pressing lightly down into the open sky and sailed upon mine, and if I had felt swiftly out over the path snak- about one percent happier, my ing through the moss fields, hair would have caught fire. seeking their prey . . . “Comfy ?” Lorn whispered, returning her head to my shoul- # # # der. “Uh-huh,” I grunted, after T ET’S lie down,” said Lorn, swallowing three times in suc- adding, as my eyes bulged a cession. bit, “I’m tired of just standing “Ssh!” Lorn held a finger to here.” My voice wouldn’t quite my lips. “Don’t talk. It spoils work, so I nodded bravely and it.” slowly lay back onto the shim- "I won’t," I promised.

52 FANTASTIC “Now,” she sighed, “let’s have didn’t, until I plowed my way a nap, and maybe when we against the resisting water to waken, Maggot will be here, and the shore. She turned then, shy- we’ll be rescued.’’ ly, and gazed serenely at me with “Good thinking,” I mumbled. warm brown eyes. Her smile was

The sun was warm and soothing, gentle, mature for her years. I and I felt I had been awake an returned her gaze, unashamed, awfully long time. Even Lorn’s she blushed and lowered her eyes. presence didn’t alleviate the Then those selfsame eyes weariness in my body, more used opened very wide, and her mouth to sitting in a chair while I followed suit. “Your knees!” she pored over dusty tomes than said, backing away and point- pushing its way through a tan- ing. “Albert! You’re knock- glewood. I closed my eyes, sighed kneed!” A giggle broke from and relaxed. her, and then she was joined by When I was still hovering on a covey of girls her own age. the border of sleep, I felt Lorn “Albert is a knock-knee, Albert stir. I guess she’d grown tired of is a knock-knee!” They sang it leaning on me, once my attention loudly, and gestured at me, and had lagged. Not to mention the one imitated my stance as she sharp stubble sprouting on my crossed her eyes and stuck out face, undoubtedly irritating to a her pink tongue. woodnymph’s tender skin. I I turned about and plunged peeked up at her, but she was once more into the concealing only standing with a hand shad- waves of ocean, striking out for ing her eyes, peering out over the horizon, my face stinging the fields in the direction the key hot with agonized mortification. had taken. Then my fatigue I wanted to drown, to die, to get caught up with me, and I dozed a chill, to never see them or any- off . . . one again. Then I got a mouthful * * * of water, and it gagged me, and Blue water foamed on baked I sputtered and turned back. sand, and white froth boiled Drowning was much too unpleas- about my waist, while surging ant a termination. But I would seas tugged strongly against my never speak to Rosemarie again. legs. I was watching her, there Never! . . . on the shore. Rosemarie, my first * love. I was ten, and she was • * seven. I waved to her, shouted her name, and then she saw me, HE taste of salt was strong and immediately pretended she Tin my mouth as I came awake.

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 53 but as the hot flicker of the with a long hardwood pole, and burning sun dappled my closed actually making progress to- eyelids with lemon and orange ward us in that muck. Behind flashes, the taste faded along him, twisting into the distance, with the mental image from my lay his wake, where the thick childhood, and I realized that it black ooze had not yet been re- had been, after all, only a pain- covered by the furry purple fully traumatic dream-memory. growth. His progress must have I lay there a moment, eyes shut, been about one foot per stroke of thinking. Thinking about Lorn, that pole, and the strain was with whom—Susan-side or no showing in his face. His upper Susan-side— I was suddenly very body, the non-goatish part, was much in love, the very least rea- a perfect scintilla of shiny sweat. son for which being that al- “Hi!” he croaked weakly, in though the moss had eroded my that tin-telephone voice, as the trousers to the thighs, exposing nose of the log nuzzled the end of to her eyes my secret shame, the path near my heels. “You she’d never said a word, cast a dopes could’ve stopped walking glance, smothered a smile. My about a mile back, couldn’t heart thumped cheerily in my you?!” he grunted. “This is chest, percolating— with passion. hard work.” “Lorn ” I said, sitting up on “Oh, Timtik,” Lorn said com- the path and blinking my eyes passionately, “You look nearly into focus. '‘Albert . . . Albert. dead.” 1” . . carried her voice. “Don’t worry,” he said in his I got my vision functioning grumpy way. “On the return and stared. About thirty feet trip, Albert can do the work. down the path, Lorn was run- This is my contribution to this ning frantically toward me, her rescue. Let his muscles sprain face alight with happiness. For for awhile.” a moment, I couldn’t see how Lorn had run to the edge of our situation was any different the path, and was about to step than it had been, then I fol- aboard the log, but Timtik waved lowed her line of sight and saw her back. “Hold it, dopey!” he the short, straining figure mov- snarled. “Let Albert get aboard ing toward us through the moss. first. Soon’s you step off, the Timtik, balancing precarious- path’ll vanish, and I’m not up to ly upon the upper curve of a tugging Albert out of the moss.” vaguely saurian-shaped log, was “Thank you,” I said sincerely, shoving strenuously into the hurrying forward and stepping deep black bog beneath the moss carefully onto the rough cylin-

54 FANTASTIC der. Balance, I could see at once, effort. After ten hearty shoves, was going to be somewhat of a my back and shoulders started problem. I was actually grateful mumbling polite protests. After when he handed me the end of twenty, they were murmuring the pole. Poling might be work, uneasily, and after twenty-five but it’d keep me upright. I hung they were starting to whimper. on tightly, as Timtik sheathed And Lorn and Timtik let me his claws and assisted Lorn struggle alone.

gracefully onto the corrugated “Hard work,” I said between bark surface. The instant her tight lips, shaking my head to rearward foot left the path, the flick away the sweat droplets entire green serpentine hissed from my eyebrows. like a drop of ginger ale on a hot “What did you think it would griddle, and shimmered quietly be?” asked the faun, with an un- out of existence. pleasantly contented smile. Lorn took a seat near the I opened my mouth to reply, shoreward end of the log, lean- but Lorn, sensing a hum of an- ing comfortably back against tagonism in our tones, inter- the upthrust of a short stumpy rupted deftly, “Timtik, tell us limb. How she managed com- what happened since we last fort with her bare back against saw you. Why didn’t you answer that rough surface, I don’t when we called?” know ; I guess her being a wood- “Didn’t hear you,” he said nymph had something to do with simply. “And of course, I never it. She was quite at home with expected you to go near the moss

anything wooden. I fields ; forgot you had old Fum- Timtik lay gently down upon blefoot along.” the logtop on his back and lazily “Now look— !” I muttered crossed his fetlocks. “Pole away, angrily. Albert,” he smiled, and shut his “Please tell us what hap- eyes. pened,” said Lorn, swiftly. “Oh, all right,” said the faun, T SHOVED with the pole, aim- with easy nonchalance. “Right ing the shoreward end of the after Albert started chasing me, .” log by means of Timtik’s still- I located Maggot . . visible wake in the bog, and we As his metallic voice droned started moving. My stroke was onward, I managed to cut down just a bit better than his, if only slightly on my stroke. If they because I had longer arms, and noticed, they were nice enough we started sliding slowly over not to mention it. And I listened the muck at about three feet per in interest to his tale . . .

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 55 —

N the shadowy thickets of whippets when aroused, and they I Drendon, beside a sluggish were aroused by anything that swampy morass of dank fetid looked even a little bit edible, earth, lurked a blob. It gave a and they ate anything at all, quiver now and then, its off-pink so color deepening to red, then back Well, it was at this particular to off-pink. Every so often it thing that Timtik ran, full tilt, hissed and seemed to shrug. To just after avoiding my clutching most of the forest folk, it had fingers. Had he been an ele- the outward appearance of a phant, he might possibly had Wumbl. A Wumbl, to the un- stood to defeat a Wumbl, for his initiated, was a protoplasmic tusks could rip a gaping hole in atavism. Very like an amoeba, it the hideous body and let the differed mainly in size. It stood viscous matter burst out, sure about eight feet high (when it death for a one-celled creature. was standing), but attained a But Timtik’s horns were barely mean horizontal diameter of long enough to be worthy of the about thirty feet when it flat- name, and he wnuld be helpless tened out to expand its pseu- against such a monstrosity. dopods and flow along the But rather than cease his pre- ground after food. Worse still, cipitate pace, he only moved the it took on the color of the ground faster when he espied it. “Ho, over which it slithered, and un- Maggot!” he cried, dashing up less a traveler were quite careful to the side of the awful thing. about where he set his foot, he There was a moment’s quivering might suddenly find himself in- hesitation in the Wumbloid, gested whole into that loathsome then a rectangular slab ap- body, encased abruptly in tough, peared in its side, and swung rubbery walls filled with a viscous outward on creaky hinges. jelly which would then begin to “Come in, Timtik,” said Mag- ooze digestive juices all over got the witch. Timtik sprang him. Wumbls were very unpleas- lithely through the gap, and the ant creatures. gap sealed over immediately. But, as noted, this thing had a Maggot looked up at the faun Wumbl’s outward appearance. from over a steaming cauldron Actually, it was not any such of noisome stuff, her coarse grey thing, but just seemed to be, as hair dank from the rising fumes, camouflage from prying eyes. No her eyes bleary from lack of one who spotted a Wumbl ever sleep. “You’re late,” she chided paused to check its authenticity. as she stirred the mess. “Sit Wumbls could move faster than down and have your supper.”

56 FANTASTIC “Lorn’s in love with a hu- tik averted his nose. With no man!" said Timtik, glad to be ceremony, Maggot deposited the the primal purveyor of the latest dripping glup on the shelf. scandal. “There,” she said. “That’ll hold “Do tell,” Maggot muttered you for awhile.” toothlessly. Well, not quite tooth- From out of the heap of refuse lessly; she had upper and lower cluttered upon the shelf, a tiny canines yet, and when she blue tentacle snaked. It hovered yawned, they resembled nothing over the mess, prodded it to make so much as stalactites and sta- sure it was all it should be, and lagmites in a greasy red cavern. then a small blue thing popped The upper canines protruded out its tiny head and sniffed the over her lower lip when her rancid aroma. It nodded as mouth was closed, and were hor- though pleased, and with a ribly yellow and rotted. Timtik squeal of delight, pounced upon often wondered if she ever the hell-brew and began to slup bathed, but he’d thought the it up with repulsive enjoyment, topic too delicate to mention to grunting and gurgling with one of her finer feelings. He slowly sated hunger pangs. Tim- glanced toward a heap of cob- tik suddenly didn’t feel much webby odds and ends on a dusty like eating. wooden shelf over the fireplace. “You haven’t touched your “How’s the Thrake?” he in- food,” said Maggot. “Little quired. queasy about the tummy? Well, old Maggot’ll fix that up.” From AGGOT mumbled scornful- beside the gobbling Thrake she M ly, “If anything had hap- took a small copper flask and pened to it, would I be wasting twisted out the cork. “Here, my time with this hell-brew?” drink.” A muted squeal came from the Timtik took it carefully, then !” shelf. “Patience, patience shut his eyes and swallowed a grumbled the witch, throwing a manly mouthful of it. His eyes fistful of dandelion fluff into the widened, and blurred with mois- stew. “I have to let it simmer a ture. “Hey, that’s good !” he ex- bit.” claimed, wiping his lips with the The squeal repeated, more back of his hand. “What is it?” shrilly, but a bit weakly. Maggot smiled a secret smile. Maggot shrugged and 8tuck a “It’s called ‘90 proof’, dearie.” dipper into the cauldron, draw- “It makes my ears burn,” said ing off a slimy clot of hell-brew. Timtik, holding his slightly point- It steamed and stank, and Tim- ed extrusions.

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 57 I ”

"It’s supposed to,” Maggot “You see,” he said carefully, "Al- crooned, running a claw-like bert grabbed Lorn’s drapery just hand through his hair. Her eyes as she was turning the key, and flicked the entrance. “But suddenly he popped into Dren- where’s Lorn?” she asked. "Not don along with us. He almost hungry?” materialized on a hotsy, and the Timtik paused in his dinner frost-flies came and— and frowned. “I wonder—She Maggot was suddenly all over may have gone back, but— him, prodding, prying, feeling, didn’t think she’d go without sensing. “Frost-flies! Oh, my .” saying goodbye, at least . . little baby faun, they didn’t hurt “Back? Back?” Maggot’s eyes you? Didn’t touch you? You’re were suddenly hot red and pro- all right?” Her sudden concern truding from their sockets as was a relief after her anger, al- she leaned over the faun like a beit Timtik writhed under her hungry hawk. “Back where?” touch, which was clammy and Timtik shrank down in his repulsive upon his flesh. chair, thoroughly frightened. He kept answering “No, Mag- “To Earth. She was going back got,” over and over, till she

with Albert . . stopped her anxious tactile in- “With?” grated Maggot, her spection. Maggot was, in her canines clacking and sparking in witch-like way, harsh-appearing her fury. “He’s here? In dren- on its surface, quite fond of the don?” little creature, and her hot dry eyes would shed their first tears r PIMTIK nodded mutely, slid- if anything happened to rob her ing down in his chair until of her beloved apprentice. his shoulderblades touched the “You’re sure— ?” she said, re- seat. Maggot hung over him a luctantly releasing him. moment more, then cracked her “I’m fine,” Timtik insisted. "I palms together. “A human,” she led Albert and Lorn to the other murmurred thoughtfully. “Here side of the hotsy from the frost-

in Drendon . . . Hmmm.” flies, and we weren’t even “We didn’t mean to bring him, touched.” Maggot plopped into a .” Maggot . . Timtik had never chair and sagged. seen her so aroused before, ex- “What a scare you gave me, cept once when he’d curiously Tikky. My poor old heart can’t tried to touch the Thrake. She’d take that sort of thing.” blasted him clear across the Timtik laughed hoarsely. room with a bolt of red light- “Your poor old heart is as strong ning, and he’d tingled for days. as solid oak. You did it with a

58 FANTASTIC — " spell. You told me you did it." Timtik shook his head. “No, Maggot sniffed and wiped a it was in the deep woods, just be- grimy forefinger across her nos- tween here and the moss fields .” trils. “Well, it’s the principle of . . He stopped speaking, the thing, Tikky. If my heart chilled with a terrible thought. were weak, it’d surely have Maggot had the same thought. stopped ... But where is “My crystal, quickly!” she Lorn?” she said, peering out shrieked. through the wall of the Timtik bounded across the “Wumbl”, which was, of course, room to a great casket of a quite transparent to her eyes. trunk, and began rummaging

Timtik shifted uneasily. “She within it. Over his shoulder flew was right behind me,” he mused, the contents as he groped away. “and when Albert tried to spank A shredded bit of cloth-of-gold, me a bottle of grave mold, clumps of “Spank YOU ? !” Maggot reared leaves from the grey ivy vine, up. “A mere human dared two used mandrake roots, a wax to—” doll bristling with pins, a box of “It was my fault,” Timtik ad- assorted rare earths, liquid herb mitted. “I goaded him into it, juices, some bat squeezings, and because I got mad at Lorn for an old dog-eared copy of Moby paying so much attention to Dick. No crystal. Timtik turned him.” to face the witch. “It’s gone!” “Oh,” said Maggot, un- rearing a trifle. “Oh,” she said, AGGOT slapped her fore- relaxing. Then she shrugged. M head. “What an idiot I am!

“Well, if you had it coming . . . Of course ! I lent it to my cousin You say he tried to? What Hortense, yesterweek, for the .” stopped him?” Black Carnival . . “I ducked, and he fell, and I “Help!” said a small voice out- ran here, and—” The faun side the entrance. Maggot hissed paused. “You don’t think he got a mystic word, and the door hurt? Maybe he fell into a opened. In clambered the forest Wumbl or something.” key, struggling across the high Maggot shook her head. “Non- sill. “Help!” it giggled dutifully. sense. Lorn could have saved "That might be Lorn’s key!” him from that fate. Any tree said Timtik. “Come to tell us !” would be happy to slash the what happened to her Wumbl’s membrane for a wood- “Nonsense. Nymphs aren’t that nymph—Unless this was out in brainy. She’d never think to send the open?” a message—

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 59 "But maybe Albert thought “Maybe I could retrace my steps, of it,” suggested the faun. and see if Lorn fell off the edge “Hmmm,” Maggot mur- of the woods?” murred. “Could be.” “Too long!” muttered the “Help!” the key re-giggled. witch. “The Kwistians might be “This is fun. I’ve never been in feasting on Lorn’s spareribs be- an adventure before.” fore you found your way back to “Who sent you?” demanded the same spot. No, this calls for Timtik. swift measures.” The key whim- “Help?” the key said hope- pered a little. Maggot threw it a fully. Lorn’s estimation of its piece of pickled ham, and it car- brain-size was more generous ried its prize off to a corner and than she knew. began to munch contentedly. “Where is Lorn, and Albert “EEEEE!” said a voice from the human?!” asked Maggot, the shelf. transfixing the key with a steely “The Thrake!” groaned Mag- gaze. got. “I got so engrossed, I forgot “Help?” it offered despond- to feed it again. It eats every ently. “Is that right?" fifteen minutes lately. I spend Timtik scowled. “This is get- all my time making this hell ting us nowhere.” brew to keep it alive, and all I get “Wait,” said Maggot. “I’ll for my pains is hunger-tan- check the serial number in the trums!” The Thrake squealed sign-out book.” She waddled again. grossly over to a thick ledger on the table and peered myopically A TAGGOT scooped up a fistful at the page that opened to her of mess from the cauldron automatically as she approached. and threw it on the shelf. The “Lorn’s signed out for key num- Thrake quieted. Maggot wiped ber X-54. What’s this key’s off her fingers on her dress, leav- number?” ing clinging bits of the stuff Timtik picked it up, turned it still between her knuckly fin- over, shook it, then scratched gers. Now, where were we?” she his head deftly with an extended asked. claw. “It’s rubbed out, mostly. I Timtik jumped up, suddenly can hardly see it at all.” joyous. “Maggot!” he said, .“Key!” Maggot accused harsh- “Don’t you have a Finders- ly. “You’ve been scratching!” Weepers spell on the crystal?” The key sniveled piteously. “Of course!” Maggot snapped “But I itched!" her fingers and looked annoyed Timtik pondered the matter. at her own lack of hindsight.

60 FANTASTIC ” ” ”

“Just let me remember the words moss fields? I—can hurry right . . . Hmmm . . She dipped out there, and into a pocket of her voluminous “I could bring them back by dress, and pulled forth a pinch spell,” said the witch. "It’s only of blue powder, which she flung fifteen minutes work to assem- into the flames licking the ble the paraphernalia, and— scorched sides of the cauldron. The Thrake, its shelf once A brilliant tongue of blue flame again cleared of hell-brew, start- shot up, and as it splashed hotly ed quizzical little whines of hun- off the ceiling, Maggot chanted: ger. “Damn,” said Maggot. “This just isn’t my day! Tell “Flame get hotter than a pistol; you what, Tikky—You start out Bring me back my peeking- !” looking for them, and in the crystal meantime, I’ll try to rig a pickup There was a hum, a twang, spell on them. If you get there and a crackling snap, and the first, fine. If not, I’ll pick them crystal appeared in the air be- up sooner or later.” tween Maggot and the faun. Timtik was dancing up and Both grabbed it before it could down with impatience. “Tell me shatter on the floor. Maggot how to do the spell, and I’ll get picked up her spectacles from them!” he cried. the table, got them on upside- Maggot hesitated, then down, cursed virulently, righted reached for some more of the them, and peered into the crys- blue powder. “Well, I suppose tal. it’d be all—No!” She replaced “Oh my!” she said. Timtik, the powder with decision. straining his eyes at the sphere, “You’re too young to learn how could detect nothing but cloudy to get anything you want. It’d be swirlings. He was still three les- dangerous to know at your age. sons away from crystal-gazing. I’m sorry, Tikky, but you’ll have It was one of the more advanced to go by boat or something over courses, hard to master. “Well, the bog.” my stars!” said Maggot, “Oh, all right,” the faun “They’re all right. They did mumbled, scuffing one hoof. strike the path, but Albert has “But it’s a lot of work, when a enough sense not to go any far- few magic words could— ther, so they’ll be safe until that “That’s enough, Tikky!” said Cort sends someone to find what the witch. She had that red- the delay is.”* lightning tone in her voice. Tim- “But where are they?” shout- tik stopped complaining, made ed the faun. “What part of the his goodbyes, and, after ascer-

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 61 — taining the approximate loca- swoop of the downrushing crea- tion of his quarry, hurried out tures.

into the forest . . . Even as I raised my mud- “ —and here I am,” he fin- dripping weapon skyward, I ished, yawning lazily. knew I’d made a fatal error. The I’d stopped counting my tugging of the pole had unbal- strokes by now. After the one anced me, and my quick grab for hundred mark, the less accurate- the upright stump against ly my muscles knew of their la- which Lorn had been lolling bors,the better. “Maggot sounds was an even worse mistake. The charming.” I said. Timtik peered entire log began to turn slowly up at me from beneath furry on its longitudinal axis, and the brows. three of us started to topple, “I wouldn’t be sarcastic in woodnymph, faun and myself, front of her, if I were you.” tottering back toward the deadly “Now, look—" I said, but was bog beneath the purple moss. interrupted by a sharp cry. I expected to be impaled like “Look !” gasped Lorn, point- an olive on one of those tridents

ing off behind me. even before I struck the moss, so I turned my head, but the sun- close were our airborne adversa- light was in my eyes and made ries, but they had plans only for seeing difficult. Then I saw the Lorn. dark shadows undulating along She shrieked in fright as the swiftly over the purple surface tall bronzed Kwistians, their of the moss, and high in the sky magnificent pinions spread wide above them, I caught the glint of to slow their descent, reached out a polished brass trident. —each with his tridentless hand “Kwistians !” rasped Timtik, —to clutch her arms as she sem- springing upright. “Pole, Al- aphored for balance. And even bert! Pole!” as they neared her, Timtik—in I shoved and grunted and mid-air on his way into the bog strained, but our progress was —waved his fingers in a strange like that of a turtle fleeing a way at her, and shouted a weird, flock of eagles. In another mo- short phrase that buzzed like an- ment, I heard the thump of im- gry bees through the air. mense wings on the hot bright Then the Kwistians had Lorn air, and the whistling of the can- by the arms and were soaring

nibals’ rapid passage. I turned skyward with their catch, and about, yanking out the pole from And Lorn was still beside me and the muck as the only handy Timtik, in mid-fall on that twist- weapon to fend off a murderous ing log, as the cannibals swooped

62 FANTASTIC — off with the other her in their Had she wanted, she said, she grasp . . . could have been young-looking, All this had happened within and rather pretty, but she took a moment of my yanking the great pride in her witchiness, pole from the bog, in one bewil- tradition being a powerful spur dering, rushing speck of time. in any union, and there was also Then my back struck the yield- the notorious prestige involved ing moss, and black ooze started in aiming for the title of Most to close over my face, and Dreadful. Not that Maggot was Reality shifted, vanished, yet the ghastliest sight availa- and reappeared. ble. but she was always in there Lorn, Timtik and myself were pitching, taking ugly-pills, wart- standing inside a small, musty sustainer, skin wrinkler, hair- hut, and I found myself staring greyer, breath-fetidation cap- into a wizened fanged face, that sules, and all the latest creams under its wild grizzled hair could and lotions from the nearest only be—“Maggot?” I said, Black Apothecary Shoppe, to dazed. keep abreast of the latest fash- “Howdy-do!” said the witch. ions in hideousness. She glanced at me, her eyes giv- However, this was her say-so, ing a shrewd once-over. Then she that she was far from being the smiled, as though in approval, worst sight in Drendon. So far and said, “You’re knock-kneed!” as I was concerned, she was the I blushed in shame. ugliest, most raucous, smelliest, slimiest creature I’d ever beheld CHAPTER 7 in my life, and I’d seen some corkers. FTER I had—thanks to a “Another piece of pie?” asked A healthy swig from that cop- Maggot, holding out a crisply per flask—recovered somewhat crusted wedge of peach-choked from the shock of my abrupt pastry. transition, I had a few moments “Yes, thank you,” I said, wip- of queasy dread about this griz- ing my lips on the embroidered zled creature with whom I was linen napkin, and extending my temporarily entombed in the en- plate with an effort—the plate trails of the false Wumbl. I sup- was solid gold, and quite weighty pose that Maggot was not at all for all its delicately sculptured bad-looking, as witches go, but filagrees. I had to admit she was her appearance clung too tightly a damned nice, almost genteel to the traits demanded by pro- hostess, if a bit horrible to view. tocol to suit my esthetic senses. Maggot beamed as I slowly

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 63 forked the wedge in wolf-size “I take it,” I said respectfully, bites down my gullet and sub- “it’s a secret?” dued the minor temblor of a “One I shall carry to my sated belch. grave,” said the witch. “Can’t “All through?” she crooned, have those Kwistians zooming and at my nod snapped her fin- around here day and night, hoot- gers, and whispered a certain ing and hollering, and spearing syllable. My dishes and utensils poor forest folk on their tridents. vanished with a sparking crack. Makes for unrest.” I confess I jumped a little. It was I recalled the pair that nearly still hard to accept sorcery, even impaled me back on that log, given the other odd goings-on in and shuddered. “Hope the thing this dimension. Neither Lorn nor doesn’t wear out,” I said, looking Timtik batted an eye. But I fig- at the voracious Thrake, slup- ured if they could believe in ping up mess from the shelf. Drendon, they could believe any- “What’s night?” asked Tim- thing. tik, looking toward Maggot. .” The Thrake chose that mo- "You just said ‘night’ . . ment to squeal, in a sort of crow- "That’s when the sun goes ing sigh unlike its hunger-plaint. down,” said Maggot. “Like it “Hot dog!” said Maggot, draw- was when you and Lorn went on ing a transverse line through your little tour to Earth.” four upright ones on the rough “Oh,” said Timtik, returning oaken wall. “That’s the fifth to- to his pie. “I thought it was day!” black there all the time.” “Fifth what?” I asked. "Another Kwistian knocked RAISED an inquiring eye- out of the sky,” said Lorn. I brow. “No night here at all?” “Thrake kind of gloats each I said.

time it crimps their wings,” "Only on special occasions,” mumbled Timtik, aborbed in his said Maggot, swirling the gluey third helping of pie. roiling mess in the cauldron

I eyed the tiny blue horror with a 1 ong wooden spoon. with misgivings. “How does it “Such as?” do it?” “Such as the sun going down. Maggot pursued her lips and That’s always a special occa- nodded her head sagely. “There’s sion.” many a one in Drendon Wood I thought this over. The logic wishes he knew the answer to seemed a bit circuitous. “How’s that!" she said, throwing weeds that again?” I murmured. into the cauldron. Maggot eased up on her hell-

64 FANTASTIC brew stirring for a moment. ed, “It’s about that other Lorn, .” “You see, we use the same sun Maggot . . you do, but we don’t revolve on “Other Lorn?” she said, drop- our axis, so it’s always noon, ping the spoon into the cauldron, here. The only time it gets dark handle and all. "What other is during an eclipse.” Lorn?” “Makes for short nights,” I “It’s okay,” said Timtik, with remarked. ill-concealed pride. 7 did that!” Maggot shivered. “The shorter “Did what?” snapped the the better. When night falls witch, in a voice so terrible that here, the Thrake sleeps, and all the three of us nearly turned to hell breaks loose. Kwistians stone. “Tikky . . . You didn’t zooming around, killing off use the Scapegoat Spell?!” creatures for the fun of it, or The faun, his monumental carrying them off alive for their aplomb fading, murmurred,

flame-pits . . “Why—Sure I did. Just like you Her statement reminded me of taught me. I made a duplicate of something that had been bug- Lorn, to confuse the Kwistians. ging me since before our arrival, You said the spell was handy to but my attempts at speech had baffle an enemy, to make him hitherto been shushed by the take a false image of a person witch, as she ordered us all to instead of the real person . . eat first, talk later. As an ab- “Fool!" shrieked the witch, stracted wave of her gnarled her eyes crackling with red hand caused three delicate ala- sparks. “That spell is never to baster demitasses to appear be- be used on others!” fore Lorn, Timtik and myself, I “But—” faltered Timtik, very assumed it was the hour for aft- pale and afraid. er-dinner chatting, and cleared “On yourself, fine!” howled my throat. Maggot, jabbing a forefinger at Maggot raised a fuzzy grey his chest. “Because even after eyebrow at me, and her luminous the bifurcation, you know which glittering eye fixed me with more is you and which is your false absolute attention than I really self, and can let the false self be wanted. “Yes, Albert,” she said, captured with impunity. But on as if with resignation. “Now you another— !” she rasped furious- can tell me whatever it is that’s ly. “ Which Lorn did they take?" been troubling you since your Timtik’s eyes, already wide arrival.” and apprehensive, turned to “It’s—” I fumbled awkwardly Lorn pleadingly. “Lorn— ?” he for a starting point, then blurt- said. “This is you, isn’t it?”

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 65 ”

“Of course it is,” said the ing is out of the question. Since woodnymph, after a swift glance we are not sure, we must act as downward to see if she were still though that is the true Lorn who

present. “I know it is . . was taken, and proceed accord- “How?" spat Maggot. “A ingly. That other Lorn is in ter- Scapegoat Image believes itself rible danger. Every second to be real, too. But there is a ter- brings her closer to flaming rible difference between the true death!” creature and the false.” If true, why had we sat calm- “What difference?” I asked, ly eating pie!? I trembled with with an almost clairvoyant in- frustrated rage. “We’ve got to tuition of the terrible truth. do something! Can’t you bring “Either one,” said the witch, the other. Lorn here as you beginning to pace the floor of the brought us? Then maybe Tim- hut, her voluminous garments tik can kind of—um—merge the .” swirling in her wake, “will pass two, again . . any test of existence one cares to Maggot nodded kindly. “A

make upon it . . . But—If the good thought, Albert. But you true self perishes, then so does see, although such a merger is the false!” possible, it cannot be done unless “You mean,” I said numbly, the other image is present, and “that if the Kwistians have the I am afraid that Cort, the wiz- false Lorn, and destroy her, this ard, has a neutralizer enchant- Lorn will continue on alive and ment on Sark. My magic won’t healthy, but if they’ve taken the work in Sark from so great a .” true one . . range. If I were there, of course “She will die in the flame-pits, —But that’s impossible. I can- and this one will simply pop into not leave the Thrake. The forest nothingness,” said the witch. folk count on me.” “Oh, dear!” said Lorn. “What “But your house—moves,” I in- can we do to find out which is sisted. “Can’t you which ?” “It won’t go near the castle,” explained Lorn sadly. “Cort has A/TAGGOT regarded her with a the forest bugged with proxim- smile of irony. “We can sit ity alarms that shoot thunder- here and wait, and if you don’t bolts if the Thrake gets within vanish, you are the real Lorn.” range.” “But if the other Lorn is real “But,” I said to Maggot, — !” gasped the woodnymph. “you’ve got to do something!” “Exactly!” Maggot said sav- “I can do nothing,” she said agely. “Death for both! So wait- pointedly. Then, she, Timtik and

66 FANTASTIC ”

Lorn turned their heads slowly UT why not?” whined Tim- until their eyes rested on my B tik, irritably stamping his face. I felt uneasy under their pointed cloven hooves. unblinking gazes. “I can help Maggot was at her wit’s end.

. . said the witch, “but I can’t “No!” she rasped, nearly in go in person. We need someone tears, her voice suddenly as old who is willing to risk his life, to as her appearance. “You can’t face terrible danger, to dare the go with him, it’s too danger-

journey to Sark . . ous!” “Me,” I realized, my stomach “But Albert doesn’t know the hollow and cold and sinking. forest. He doesn’t realize the .” “You want me to go . . dangers; he almost got killed by Timtik and Lorn nodded that hotsy!” Timtik rationalized, eagerly, hopefully. Maggot tugging at her copious skirt. watched me through slitted eyes, Maggot sat down and held her her bated breath keeping her head in her hands. “But Tikky, nostrils aflare. “Yes,” she hissed you’re all I’ve got ... If any- softly. “You are the logical one. thing happened to you— Timtik is too young, too little. "But it won’t!” Timtik sobbed Lorn is too weak, too stupid. I furiously. “I know all the spells am too valuable right here. you’ve taught me, and even with- Whom else have we to send? out them, there’s nothing in

You’re our only hope.” Drendon can catch me when I I looked at Lorn—if this was run full speed. And you’re giving Lorn—with her deep blue eyes, Albert some protective spells, copper brows, flaming hair . . . and you can watch us through Could I chance her being the the crystal and help us out. true Lorn? Could I stake her Please, Maggot, please!?” young life on odds no better Maggot gave a hopeless shake than a coin-flip? I took a deep of her grey head, and smiled breath, faced Maggot, and gave wryly at me. “I suppose I’d be a short, mute nod. annoyed if he didn’t feel this "You’ll go?” said Timtik, half- way. I’ve raised him to be con- rising from his place. Maggot siderate of others, and kind, and

clenched her gnarled fingers till I guess he’s learnt his lessons .” the blood-throb showed in her too well . . She looked at old white knuckles. Lorn sat Timtik. “Very well,” she said, tensely, her beautiful eyes locked wiping at the tip of her nose, in half-hope, half-despair, upon and sniffling miserably. my face. And I found, abruptly, that I “I’ll go,” I said. had become fond of the ugly old

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPE! 67 — creature. “Look—” I said clum- of thread, a tube of depilatory sily, “I don’t think I need tell cream, and a solid gold molar, you I’ll try my best to look out roots and all. Then Maggot lifted .’’ for him . . out something quite heavy from Maggot’s withered hand the bottom recesses of the trunk, pressed shakily down upon mine. and set it on the floor with a “I know you will, Albert,’’ she grunt. It was an ancient Span- sighed. “You’re a good man. And ish-style cuirass, dull grey, and Lorn will be a help, too, if she rather thick, with heavy leath- doesn’t do something imbecilical- ern straps to anchor it upon the ly fatal, as is sometimes her wearer’s breast. wont.” Maggot stood up and dusted She went to her cavernous her palms together. “There!” trunk, still sniffling. “I wish it Realization suddenly flashed were possible to give you a map, upon me. "Those?” I choked, but it would be no use in Dren- waggling a forefinger at the don. The forest layout changes heap. “Those are the spells?” I constantly.” felt a sudden letdown, like the “Tribes move about,” Lorn time I had—at the tender age of amplified, “animals change their six—received a new suit for water-holes, trees decide to un- Christmas when I’d been pray- grow and turn back into seeds ing for a bicycle. A map a minute wouldn’t keep “Certainly,” said Maggot. you up to date.” “Hold on while I get you a wal- Maggot, rummaging through let for them.” the trunk, grunted happily and From a stumpy peg on the set something on the floor beside wall, she lifted down a dusty her with a clink. I thought it leather wallet, the old-style wal- looked suspiciously like a bottle let, the kind worn with a long of Scklitz. “It is,” said Maggot, shoulder-strap, and is about the before I could word my query. size of a fishing creel. She lifted Then she took out a crisp its upper flap and began to drop piece of pasteboard and tossed the first five items into it, one by it onto the floor beside the bot- incomprehensible one. The beer, tle. I squinted curiously at the the ticket, the tube of cream, the printing upon it. Maggot again spool of thread, and that molar. answered my unspoken question As she did so, she chuckled. over her shoulder. “Commuter’s ticket: Long Island Railroad.” CAME forward and slowly The pile grew; to the ticket I took the filled wallet from and the beer were added a spool her. “Maggot—" I didn’t quite

68 FANTASTIC I

know what to say, but once “But the spells ...” 1 wor- again she was ready with an an- ried aloud. swer to unspoken questions. “Use one for each peril,” Mag- “You Earth people!” she got advised. “It really doesn’t snorted in disgust. “What did matter which is used for which, you expect, Albert? I have to much, but now and then one will make do with whatever is on adapt better than another.” hand, don’t I? These items hap- “But how do I set them pened to pop through into Dren- off? What do I do? Or say?” don, so they’re as good as any- “You’ll figure it out,” said the thing. Remember, a spell is witch. “The usage may not al- judged not by its trigger, but by ways be the same, so I won’t its effect! I suppose you were burden you with instructions expecting mystic powders, distil- that could be subject to change lations of ogre sweat, magic in certain circumstances. They ?” wands— will serve you well, though. I felt silly, but I nodded. Really.” “Something like that.” I was staggering slightly un- “Mark me well, Earthman,” der the weight of the metal said Maggot. “These spells will breastplate. Timtik clutched my work when you need them. Have hand and tugged me toward the no doubts on that!” door, which opened of its own Timtik was jumping up and accord to permit the two of us to down impatiently, and Lorn emerge into the sunlight. Lorn seemed to be starting a slow and Maggot trailed after us, but fidget. “Let’s hurry,” said the Maggot halted in the doorway. faun. “That other Lorn may be "This thing must be made out of on the brink of the flame-pit lead,” I remarked uncomforta- right now!” bly.

“Hush, Tikky,” said Maggot. Maggot smiled gently. “It is, “Albert, you three will have to Albert,” she said, waving fare- get there before those Kwistians well. arrive at Sark with the other “But— said. The door re- Lorn. This—” She placed the sealed, and Maggot was gone in- cuirass upon my breast, fasten- side the hidden recesses of the ing the straps tightly with a false Wumbl. Already I was magic word, “you must not re- sweltering in the heavy armor, move until it is time.” She halted as the sun beat down through my question with an upraised the overhanging fronds and finger. “You will know it, when leaves of the thicket. the time comes. I promise you.” I looked helplessly at Timtik

IT'S MAGIC, YOU DOPEI 69 and Lorn, who were awaiting me Lorn and Timtik entered the at the edge of the woods. “But forest, and I followed uneasily why is it made out of lead?” I after them. “How thoughtful of asked them. “Why not iron or Maggot—” I mumbled, going steel?” frozen-hearted despite the ex- Timtik shrugged. “In case we ternal heat. meet a radioactive dragon, you “You never know,” said Tim- dope!” tik, darkly.

( Concluded next month )

COMING NEXT MONTH

Prepare for a blockbuster of a December FANTASTIC! For example, three short novelets:

1) Cocoon, by Keith Lau- mer, in which man makes a last great effort to free his im- FANTASTIC prisoned spirit. 2) Imbalance, by Murray Leinster, a light-hearted fan- tasy in which two and two COCOCKY make five—for good reason. by Keith laumer / 3) Heritage, by E. J. Der- WBAlAHCt ringer, a Fantasy Classic in ff] which man reverses the na- by Hhttay Lzlrxtet <• t | tural order of things. HERITAGE M And we are happy to an- <2M*ia A , : nounce December FANTASTIC will feature the return of a fine artist— Lee Brown Coye, well known for his illustrations in WEIRD TALES. Mr. Coye's work does much to enhance the pages of FANTASTIC. We're sure you'll be pleased to see his art again. •

PLUS, of course, the exciting conclusion to It's Magic, You Dope/

Don't miss the great December FANTASTIC. It will be on sale at newsstands November 20. Be sure to reserve a copy now.

70 FANTASTIC Choose your weapons and take your places, gentlemen—

and ladies. Once again we plan to incite the “antis” and

gratify the “pros” with a typically Bunchian vignette.

ILUA was a long man, thin of a top about to spin. Men never H and metal-sharp. With said this, however, to Lofa, be- stomach flat as a reptile’s he sat cause Lofa was at times a hard at his copper-colored desk in the man, though mostly a fantastic State Building and had plans. dreamer, some held. But he and He was number one. Hilua made quite a team at the Lofa was a sturdy man, his State Building. Lofa was num- shoulders broad, his stomach ber two. round. Sometimes, at a certain The State Building was pretty view, the way he sloped into his much as the name said. And it thighs and his guardsman’s long was Supreme Headquarters for boots, Lofa reminded some men the wide-spreading services of

71 Awareness Plans. Hilua had long that rock-solid seat to their sit- been chief of Awareness and ting? Remember how they lay on Lofa had long been his lieuten- their beds smiling all the time, ant. Sometimes these two dis- just smiling—even when the agreed almost completely on how homage people went through the best to carry out their assign- towns? Remember how when the ments. But usually from some gorgeous metal flowers came deep-set regard for one anoth- through the yard holes in Loran- er’s position they came to amia- tan last spring, to celebrate Con- ble agreement in the end, and the solidation Day and World Vic- results, generally, were good. tory Hour, the Lorantanos did “Lofa,” Hilua was speaking in not rise to the occasion? And his captain’s authoritative voice, when the tin Birds swam the “from Piltragon, our headquar- colored-vapor air in Maximum ters of assignments, we have an Diversion Company’s great assignment. It is a medium-large Shape Display, staged to honor assignment and will call for our World Supremacy Times, the Lo- best planning. —Here is the best rantanos just lay and dozed, not plan.” looking at the Birds, not think- Lofa shifted his turnip shape ing of the Birds. Even when the a little and spun two small quar- up-up music of empire played, ter arcs where he stood in front from invisible orchestras swung of Hilua’s gleaming desk. —Here between giant gas bags of silk in is the best plan ! Just like that. — the beautiful pink air over Lo- Hilua was so preoccupied with rantan, did these torpid subject the incontestable rightness of people rise and sing? Hah! They “the best plan” that he almost did not. —Recall, oh recall !” and failed to notice Lofa’s agitation. Hilua’s voice was vibrant now, But he noticed in time and he “how when the Supreme One’s thought, since it would cost best political disk recited elo- nothing, he might as well placate quence through the land these his sub-commandant. grinning nothing-folk did not rise from their beds or their N Lorantan,” Hilua continued, pleasant sitting to rap out any I speaking more softly now, hand-claps! Do you not remem- “that pleasant province in North ber, Lofa, how the Lorantanos Laparan, where we vacationed were dead to all things but ease last April, there is need of an and pleasant smiling? Entirely Awareness Plan. Remember how passive, they gave their conquer- the people there were getting ors no respect, no regard, no rec- that moon look in their faces and ognition whatsoever. Oh yes,

72 FANTASTIC they’d accepted the pleasant liv- isregarding, indeed not ing of our technology with a D noticing, the contemptuous smile, smile, smile! But would condescending smirk of his chief, they wave flags? Hah! No flags! Lofa launched into his plan. “I —Lofa, if you remember, then would take no less than five thou- you know what our problem is. sand machines,” said Lofa. "In How many Awareness machines, other words, I would take a thou- and which ones, would you dis- sand each of the Basics. The In- patch there?” dicates are for a people far less Lofa beamed at once and gone than the Lorantanos. With glowed with the look of a sub- my five thousand Basics I would commandant suddenly promoted fan out in a C curve until I sat to supreme chief. “I remember on the ridges hemming all Lo- well the Lorantanos,” he said. rantan to the coast. There I “Ah well. Their plight has would sit quietly through the haunted me day after day in the day and the Lorantanos would State Building, day after day on not see me, sleeping as they smile my duty assignments among the and waking as they smile, vacant lesser tribes. I have longed for as all the Automatics they are this assignment I have prayed served by. When night came I to all the blue and gold new satel- would open with no less than a lites; I feel about these great thousand Blams. With maxi- people strongly; I wish to help mum intensifies on the muzzles them.—Before it is too late!” I would sit back and point them Hilua leaned forward a little at the sky. For a full hour. While at his copper-colored desk, his that bedlam was yet echoing off flat-as-a-reptile’s stomach eased the pink vapor shield that is Lo- into the concave velvet of the rantan’s provincial trade-mark

kidney curve. Only a few times, now, I would come in with the or maybe never before, had he thousand Phewsos. Awakened by seen Lofa act so stirred. Hilua the Blams, with at least half a was becoming more than ever smile erased now, for at least convinced that his lieutenant thirty minutes the vacant ones could act the sentimental idiot as must come to terms with reality well as be almost a complete fool again and know again that when it came to tactical affairs. stench that lies just a few dead And Hilua was more than ever days and a skin’s depth beneath glad, for the good of the Consoli- the surface of all life’s conquered dation, that there were such things. Next I would open with trusty clear-eyed men as he, my thousand Starstandos with Hilua, for the top spots. reflectors and burn the country-

AWARENESS PLAN 73 side with light, followed closely a drink with us, straight out of by the Sanders shelling the air my Dispenseros. And afterwards, with grits and jagged glass.” being restored to full awareness “You have used four thousand and capability for fear, they’ll Basics,” said Hilua. “And you give out tons of respect to their pointed your Blam guns at the conquerors ; they’ll remember the sky! Are you through now with hand-claps, Sir, when the Su- your jesting?” preme One’s best political record “No, not quite through,” said plays!” Lofa, beaming Hilua as much of a dark frown as he thought he TN the cold silence of no-answer safely could. “And if you read Lofa looked into the blue-ice but jest in my words, you are gaze of his Captain and felt him- misunderstanding. The remain- self shrinking back into the per- ing thousand Basics are a thou- fect picture of the useful sub- sand Dispenseros for me and my commandant—gross, sturdy, a men. We shall sit back on the little sub-par in the big-decision high ground on that C curve department, not quite gifted around Lorantan and drink to enough by nature to author the our great victory. If the Com- super-plan, even a little senti- mandant will trouble to notice, mental at times, perhaps. Silent Sir, you will notice, Sir, that the and aloof now, as befit a Su- Lorantanos have been given back preme Commandant of Aware- four senses in my Awareness ness Plans, Hilua handed Lofa Plan. Count them! The Blams his orders. And the sub-com- brought back their ears ; the mandant accepted these orders Starstandos returned them their almost gracefully, with just the eyes; the Sanders with grits and merest twitch into two quarter jagged glass made them feel arcs of spin before he saluted again; and of course the Phew- crisply, spun on his heel and sos cleared the nostrils of all. went away reading the brief di- They can think now, and suffer. rective that began: “To imple- Is it not enough ? And perchance ment the Awareness Mission to many will come to awareness Lorantan with all good dispatch sufficiently to crawl us. to For- speed one Super Blasto . . getting for awhile the Automa- Lofa’s eyes blurred and he could tics and the wonderful dead life read no farther. He did not need of having everything served-as- to. planned perhaps they shall taste THE END

74 FANTASTIC PLANETOID 127

By EDGAR WALLACE

Introduction by Sam Moskowitz >

Illustrator SUMMERS

ACH writer makes a choice marily, because they sold best, E of whether to write for the he was a skilled short story writ- times or write for the ages and er, excellent at dialogue and pol- then fate decides haw successful ished in phraseology. his bid. To many of today’s In addition to his books, 17 of younger readers the name Edgar his plays were produced, the Wallace does not even conjure a most successful, On the Spot, legend, but during his heyday was based on the life of Al Ca- from World War 1 to 1932 his pone. popularity as a mystery writer Born in England, December was so enormous that Erie Stan- 1875, Wallace received his liter- ley Gardner, with all the accept- ary apprenticeship as a corre- ance of Perry Mason, scarcely spondent for THE LONDON DAILY approaches it. It teas estimated mail. He sold easily and readily that during the Roaring Twen- on the side and soon teas devot- ties, one out of every four books ing his full time to writing. His in the English language, exclu- income from his stories and sive of the bible and texts was a plays was fabulous but he was work of Edgar Wallace! so prodigal in his handling of fi- His character J. G. Reeder nances that, following his death was known throughout the Eng- (Feb. 10, 1932), it took years of lish speaking world and in all he royalties from his books to bail had published 150 novels of his wife and children out of tight which the most famous was Four financial straits. Just Men. He teas a master of the Shortly before his death he cloak and dagger adventure and came to the United States to plot was so adroit that he could torite and work on the script of Kin? any sort of theme well. Kong, which upon its release in Though he wrote novels pri- 1933 was destined to become one

Reprinted from Planetoid 127 and The Sweizer Pump, Copyright Edition, published by The Readers Library Publishing Company Ltd. Reprinted by permission. 75 of the most acclaimed science fic- brary edition published in Lon- tion films of all time. don in 1929. The same volume To those familiar with Edgar contained a "crook" story titled Wallace, science fiction seems a The Sweizer Pump. Readers Li- strange area for him to be writ- brary was distinguished for hav- ing in, but Wallace liked science ing published in the Twenties fiction and had written a number and early Thirties a series of of stories in that vein before. pocket-sized hard cover books None of them had been too suc- which were sold in the United cessful, so, with his eye on the States for 254. Planetoid 127 is cash return he had not wasted one of the earliest and one of too much time on the medium. the best examples of the “Twin A novel Green Rust had appeared Earths" theme in science fiction, as early as 1920, but almost for- a gambit that teas even used as gotten today is his short novel a syndicated comic strip for a “1925”: the story of a fatal period. This is the theme that peace, which makes the predic- presupposes that there orbits tion that an inadequate peace around the sun, always out of would make possible a fatal inva- sight of our telescopes, another sion of England by the Germans ivorld which is virtually a twin at a later date. His short story of our oum, even to parallel de- The Black Grippe which deals velopment. In this story, Wal- with the results of a disease that lace hypothesizes a duplicate set renders the entire world simul- of people but with a time se- taneously blind, originally ap- quence running slightly ahead peared in the strand magazine of ours so that an observer can and was only recently reprinted virtually see our future. The occa- in the British edition of the sional anachronisms in this saint’s mystery magazine. story dissolve when we realize Planetoid 127 saw its first and Wallace was among the pioneers only publication in a Readers Li- of this theme, not a follower.

CHAPTER 1 punt, groaning his relief. He was HAP” West, who was never a lank youth, somewhat short- C an enthusiast for work, laid sighted, and the huge horn- down the long pole that had rimmed spectacles which deco- brought him from Bisham to the rated his knobbly face lent him shade of a backwater west of an air of scholarship which his Murley Lock, and dropped to the school record hardly endorsed. cushions at the bottom of the Elsie West woke from a doze,

76 PLANETOID 127 77 — ” ” —” took one glance at her surround- Elsie, roused by the bump of ings and settled herself more the punt side against the bank, comfortably. sat up and stared at the unprom- "Light the stove and make ising landing-place. some tea,’’ she murmured. “Why don’t you go farther “I’m finished for the day,” along?” she asked. “You can’t grunted her brother. “The hooter make tea here without— sounded ten minutes ago; and “Woman, have you no thought cooking was never a hobby of before food?” demanded her mine.” brother sternly. "Don’t you thrill "Light the stove and make at the thought that you are an- tea," she said faintly. chored to the sacred terrain of Chap glared down at the doz- the learned Professor Colson, ing figure; then glared past her doctor of science, bug expert, to where, paddle in hand, Tim performer on the isobar and oth- Lensman was bringing the punt er musical instruments and— to the shore. “Chap, you talk too much Tim was the same age as his and I should love a cup of tea.” school friend, though he looked “We'll have tea with the pro- younger. A good-looking young fessor,” said Chap firmly. “Hav- man, he had been head of the ing cut through the briars to his house which had the honor of enchanted palace, we will be sheltering Chapston West. They served in crystal cups reclining had both been school prefects at on couches of lapis lazuli.” Mildram and had entered and passed out on the same day. HE frowned up at the dark Tim Lensman was looking S and unpromising woods. disparagingly at the tangle of “Does he really live here?” she bush and high grass which addressed Tim, and he nodded. fringed the wooded slope. "He really lives here,” he said; “Trespassers will be prose- “at least, I think so; his driving cuted," he read. “That seems al- directions were very explicit and most an invitation—can you see I seem to remember that he said the house, Chap?” we might have some difficulty in Chap shook his head. finding the house—

“No; I’ll bet it is the most hor- “He said, ‘Keep on climbing rible shanty you can imagine. until you come to the top,’ ” in- Old Colson is just naturally a terrupted Chap. fug. And he’s a science master “But how does he reach the one of those Johnnies who ought house,” asked the puzzled girl. to know the value of fresh air. “By airplane,” said Chap, as

78 FANTASTIC ” he tied the punt to the thick root Timothy Titus, because Tim’s of a laurel bush. “Or maybe he his favorite child.” comes on his magic carpet. Sci- He helped the girl to land and ence masters carry a stock of made a brief survey of the bank. ’em. Or perhaps he comes It was a wilderness of a place, through a front gate from a pro- and though his eyes roved saic road—there must be roads around seeking a path through even in Berkshire.” the jungle, his search was in Tim was laughing quietly. vain. An ancient signboard “It is the sort of crib old Col- warned all and sundry that the son would choose,” he said. “You land was private property, but at ought to meet him, Elsie. He is the spot at which they had the queerest old bird. Why he brought the punt to land the teaches at all I don’t know, be- bank had, at some remote period, cause he has tons of money, and been propped up. he really is something of a magi- “Do you want me to come with cian. I was on the science side at you?” asked Elsie, obviously not Mildram and it isn’t his amazing enamored with the prospect of gifts as a mathematician that the forthcoming call. are so astounding. The head told “Would you rather stay here?” me that Colson is the greatest asked Chap looking up from his living astronomer. Of course the stove. stories they tell about his being She gave one glance along the able to foretell the future— gloomy backwater with its weedy “He can, too!” bed and the overhanging osiers. Chap was lighting the stove, A water-rat was swimming for, in spite of his roseate anti- across the still water and this cipations, he wished to be on the spectacle decided her. safe side, and he was in need of “No ; I think I will come with refreshment after a strenuous you,” she said. afternoon’s punting. “He told the school the day the HAP poured out the tea and war would end—to the very min- C the girl was raising it to her ute! And he foretold the big ex- lips when her eyes caught sight plosion in the gas works at Hel- of the man who was watching wick—he was nearly pinched by them from between the trees, the police for knowing so much and she had hard work to sup- about it. I asked him last year if press the scream that rose to her he knew what was going to win lips. the Grand National and he near- "What is it?” ly bit my head off. He’d have told Tim had seen her face change

PLANETOID 127 79 ; and now, following the direction he’s not mad he’s a crook. Where of her eyes, he too saw the did he get all his information stranger. from? Why, fifteen years ago he There was nothing that was in hadn’t fifty pounds. This place the slightest degree sinister cost him ten thousand, and the about the stranger; he was in- house cost another ten thousand deed the most commonplace fig- and he couldn’t have got his in- ure Tim had ever seen. A short, struments and things under an- stout man with a round and red- other ten thousand!” dish face, which was decorated Tim had been too much taken with a heavy ginger moustache; aback to interrupt. he stood twiddling his watch “Information? I don’t quite ?” chain, his small eyes watching understand . . . the party. “About stocks and things . . . “Hello!” said Tim as he he’s made a hundred thousand walked toward the stranger. “We this year out of cotton. How did have permission to land here.” he know that the boll-weevil was He thought the man was some going to play the devil with the sort of caretaker or bailiff of South, eh? How did he know? "Helmwood.” And when I asked him just now “Got permission?” he repeat- to tell me about the corn market ed. “Of course you have—which for a friend of mine, he talked to of you is Lensman?” me like a dog!” “That’s my name,” smiled Chap had been listening open- Tim, and the man nodded. mouthed. “He is expecting you and West “Are you a friend of Mr. Col- and Miss Elsie West.” son?” he asked. Tim’s eyes opened wide in as- “His cousin,” was the reply. tonishment. “Harry Dewes by name. His own He had certainly promised the aunt’s child—and his only rela- professor that he would call one tion.” day during vacation, but he had Suddenly he made a step to- not intended taking Chap nor his wards them and his voice sank to sister. It was only by accident he a confidential tone. had met his school friend at “You young gentlemen know Bisham that morning, and Chap all about him—he’s got delu- had decided to come with him. sions, hasn’t he? Now, suppose I As though divining his brought a couple of doctors to thoughts, the stout man went see him, maybe they’d like to ask on: you a few questions about him. ft “He knows a lot of things. If • • •

80 FANTASTIC —

Tim, the son of a great bar- stiff climb brought them to the rister, and himself studying for crest and in view of the house. the bar, saw the drift of the Tim had expected to find a res- question and would have under- idence in harmony with the un- stood, even if he had not seen kempt grounds. But the first view the avaricious gleam in the of “Helmwood” made him gasp. man’s eyes. A solid and handsome stone “You’d put him into an asylum house stood behind a broad and control his estate, eh?” he stretch of shaven lawn. Flower asked with a cold smile. “I’m beds bright with the blooms of afraid that you cannot rely upon late summer surrounded the us for help.” lawn and bordered the walls of The man went red. the house itself. At the farther “Not that exactly,” he said end, but attached to the building, awkwardly. “And listen, young was a stone tower, broad and

fellow . . .” he paused. “When squat, and on the top of this was you see Colson, I’d take it as a erected a hollow structure favor if you didn’t mention the criss-crossed without any appar-

fact that you’ve seen me . . . ent order or method—with a net- I’m going to walk down to the work of wires which glittered in lock . . . you’ll find your way the sunlight.

up between those poplars . . . “A silver wire-box aerial!” so long!” said Chap. “That’s a new idea, And turning abruptly he went isn’t it? Gosh, Tim! Look at the stumbling through the bushes telescope !" and was almost at once out of By the side of the tower was sight. the bell-roof of a big observa- tory. The roof was closed, so that HAT a iad!” said Chap ad- Chap’s "telescope” was largely Wmiringly. “And what a imaginary. scheme! And to jump it at us “Great Moses!” said Chap straight away almost without an awe-stricken. “Why, it’s as big as introduction !” the Lick!” “How did Mr. Colson know I Tim was impressed and as- was coming?” asked Elsie in tounded. He had guessed that wonder. the old science master was in Tim was not prepared with an comfortable circumstances, and answer. After some difficulty knew that indeed he could af- they found the scarcely worn ford the luxury of a car, but he track that led up through the had never dreamt that the pro- trees, and a quarter of an hour’s fessor was a man wealthy

PLANETOID 127 81 ” —

enough to own a house like this Girl-like, she first noted his ex- and an observatory which must traordinary cleanliness. His lin- have cost thousands to equip. en was spotless, his neat black “Look, it’s turning!” whis- suit showed no speck of dust. pered Elsie. “You probably met a-er-rela- The big, square superstruc- tive of mine,” he said gently. “A ture on the tower was moving crude fellow—a very crude fel- slowly, and then Tim saw two low. The uncouth in life jars me projecting cones of some crystal- terribly. Will you come in, Miss line material, for they glittered West?” dazzlingly in the sunlight. They passed into a wide hall “That is certainly new,” he and down a long broad corridor said. “It is rather like the gadget which was lighted on one side by they are using for the new beam narrow windows through which transmission; or whatever they the girl had a glimpse of a neat- call it—and yet it isn’t— ly flagged courtyard, also sur- As he stood there, he saw a rounded by gay flower-beds. long french window open and a On the other side of the corri- bent figure come out on to the dor, doors were set at intervals lawn. and it was on the second of these Tim hastened towards the man that Tim, in passing, read an in- of science and in a few minutes scription. It was tidily painted Chap was introducing his sister. in small, gold lettering: “I hope you didn’t mind my PLANETOID 127. coming, sir,” said Chap. “Lens- man told me he was calling.” The professor saw the young “You did well to come,” said man’s puzzled glance and smiled. Mr. Colson courteously. “And it “A little conceit ef mine,” he is a pleasure to meet your sis- said. ter.” “Is that the number of an as- teroid?” asked Tim, a dabbler in C’LSIE was observing him astronomy. ^ closely and her first impres- “No—you may search the Ber- sion was one of pleasant sur- lin Year Book in vain for No. prise. A thin, clean-shaven old 127,” said the professor as he man, with a mass of white hair opened the door of a large and that fell over his collar and airy library and ushered them bushy eye-brows, beneath which in. “There must be an asteroid twinkled eyes of deepest blue. by which, young lady, is meant There was a hint of good humor one of those tiny planets which in his delicately-moulded face. abound in the zone between Mars

82 FANTASTIC ” and J upiter, and of which, Witts which Chap was grateful—“that D.Q.—now named Eros—is a re- between Mercury, which is the markable example. My Planetoid nearest planet to the sun and the was discovered on a certain 12th sun itself, there is no planetary of July-1/7. And it was not even body, though some foolish people an asteroid!” think there is and have chris- He chuckled and rubbed his tened it Vulcan— long white hands together. An elderly footman had ap- The library with its walnut peared in the doorway and the bookshelves, its deep chairs and professor hurried across to him. faint fragrance of Russian leath- There was a brief consultation er, was a pleasant place, thought (Elsie suspected a domestic Elsie. Huge china bowls laden problem, and was right) and with roses stood in every possible with a word of apology, he went point where bowls could stand. out. Through the open windows came “He’s a rum bird,” began Chap a gentle breeze laden with the and stopped dead. perfume of flowers. From the black cavity above “Tea will be ready in a min- the fireplace came a thin whine ute,” said Mr. Colson. “I ordered of sound and then a deafening it when I saw you. Yes, I am in- splutter like exaggerated and in- terested in asteroids.” tensified “atmospherics.” His eyes went mechanically to “What is that?” whispered the the cornice of the room above the girl. stone fireplace and Tim, looking Before Tim could answer, the up, saw that there was a square spluttering ceased, and then a black cavity in the oaken panel- soft, sweet voice spoke: ling and wondered what was its “’Lo . . . Col—son! Jaize ga significance. shtt? I speak you, Col—son . . .

“They are more real and tan- Planetoi’ 127 . . . Big fire in my .” gible to me than the great plane- zehba . . . city . . . big fire . . tary masses. Jupiter—a vapor There was a click and the voice mass; Saturn—a molten mass, ceased abruptly, and at that mo- yielding the secret of its rings ment Professor Colson came in. to the spectroscope; Vulcan—no He saw the amazed group star- planet at all, but a myth and a ing at the square hole in the wall, dream of imaginative and roman- and his lips twitched. ?” tic astronomers—there are no in- “You heard— I cut off the tra-mercurial planets, by which connection, though I’m afraid I I mean”—he seemed to find it may not get him again tonight.” necessary to explain to Elsie, for “Who is he, sir?” asked Tim

PLANETOID 127 83 frowning. “Was that a transmis- ‘They’ve had signals from sion from any great distance?” Mars on Vancouver, sir,” he said. The professor did not answer “I saw it in this morning’s pa- at once. He glanced keenly and pers.” suspiciously at the girl, as Again the professor smiled. though it was her intelligence “You think they were atmos- he feared. And then: pherics?” suggested Elsie; and, “The man who spoke was a to her surprise, Colson shook his man named Colson,” he said de- head. liberately ; “and he spoke from a “No ; they were not atmospher- distance of 186 million miles!” ics,” he said quietly, “but they were not from Mars. I doubt if CHAPTER H there is any organic life on Mars, HEY listened, dumbfounded. unless it be a lowly form of vege- TWas the old professor mad? tation.” The voice that had spoken to “The canals—” began Chap. them was the voice of Colson? “That may be an optical illu- “A hundred and eighty-six sion,” said the science master. million miles?” said Tim incred- “Our own moon, seen at a dis- ulously. “But, Mr. Colson, that tance of forty million miles, ” was not your voice I heard would appear to be intersected He smiled faintly and shook very much as Mars seems to be. his head. The truth is, we can never get “That was literally my alter Mars to stand still long enough

ego—my other self,” he said ; and to get a definite photograph!” it seemed that he was going to “From Jupiter?” suggested say something else, but he Chap, now thoroughly interested. changed the subject abruptly. Again Mr. Colson smiled. “Let us have tea,” he said, “A semi-molten mass on which smiling at Elsie. life could not possibly exist. Nor Elsie was fascinated by the could it come from Saturn,” he old man and a little scared, too. went on tantalizingly, “nor from She alone of that party realized Venus.” that the reference he had made “Then where on earth do these to the voice that came one hun- signals come from?” blurted dred and eighty-six million miles Chap and this time Mr. Colson was no je3t on his part. laughed outright. It was Chap who, in his awk- ward way, brought the conversa- S they sat at tea, Elsie tion back to the subject of mys- A glanced out admiringly upon terious voices. the brilliant-hued garden that

84 FANTASTIC was visible through the long who was watching the newcom- window, and then she saw some- ers, saw them turn their heads thing which filled her with as- as with one accord and walk out tonishment. Two men had come of sight, evidently towards the into view round the end of a professor. When the old man square-cut hedge. One was the came back there was a faint man they had seen half-an-hour flush in his cheek and a light in previously—the commonplace lit- his eye which Tim did not re- tle fellow who had claimed to be member having seen before. a relative of the professor. The “They are returning in half an second was taller and older, and, hour,” he said, unnecessarily it she judged, of a better class. His seemed to Elsie. She had an idea long, hawk-like face was bent that the old man wras in the habit down towards his companion, of speaking his thoughts aloud, and they were evidently talking and here she was not far wr rong. on some weighty matter, to judge Once or twice she had the un- by the gesticulations of the comfortable feeling that she was stranger. in the way, for she was a girl of “By Jove!” said Chap sudden- quick intuitions, and though ly. “Isn’t that Hildreth?” Professor Colson was a man of Mr. Colson looked up quickly; irreproachable manners, even his keen blue eyes took in the the most scrupulous of hosts scene at once. could not wholly hide his anxiety “Yes, that is Mr. Hildreth,” he for the little meal to end. said quietly. “Do you know “We’re taking up your valu- him?” able time, Mr. Colson,” she said “Rather!” said Chap. “He has with a dazzling smile, as she rose often been to our house. My fa- when tea was over and offered ther is on the stock exchange, him her hand. "I think there’s and Mr. Hildreth is a big shot in going to be a storm, so we had the City.” better get back. Are you coming Colson nodded. with us, Tim?”— “Yes, he is a very important “Why, surely ” began Chap, person in the City,” he said, with but she interrupted him. just a touch of hidden sarcasm “Tim said he had an engage- in his voice. “But he is not a very ment near and was leaving us important person here, and I am here,” she said. wondering why he has come Tim had opened his mouth to again.” deny having made any such He rose quickly and went out statement, when a look from her of the room, and presently Tim, silenced him. A little later, whilst

PLANETOID 127 85 Chap was blundering through usual significance, he was cer- his half-baked theories on the tain. And, most of all, he wanted subject of Mars—Chap had the- to discover whether the science ories on everything under and master had been indulging in a above the sun—she managed to little joke at the expense of the speak with Tim alone. party when he claimed to have heard voices that had come to ’M quite sure Mr. Colson wants him from one hundred and I to speak to you,” she said; eighty-six million miles away. “and if he does, you are not “Return when you can,” said to worry about us: we can get Colson in a low voice; “and the back, it is down-stream all the sooner the better. There are one way.” or two things that I want to talk “But why on earth do you over with you—I waited an op- think that?” portunity to do so last term, but “I don’t know.” She shook her it never arose. Can you get rid head. “But I have that feeling. of your friends?” And I’m sure he did not want to Tim nodded. see you until those two men “Very good, then. I will say came.” goodbye to them.” How miraculously right she Tim saw his companions on was, was soon proved. As they their way until the punt had walked into the garden towards turned out of sight round the the path leading to the riverside, osiers at the end of the backwa- Colson took the arm of his fa- ter, and then he retraced his vorite pupil and, waiting until steps up the hill. He found the the others were ahead, he said: professor waiting for him, pac- “Would it be possible for you ing up and down the garden, his to come back and spend the night head on his breast, his hands here, Lensman?” clasped behind him. “Why, yes, sir,” said Tim in “Come back into the library, astonishment. Lensman,” he said; and then, In his heart of hearts he want- with a note of anxiety in his ed to explore the place, to see voice: “You did not see those some of the wonders of that great precious scoundrels?” instrument-house which, up to “Which precious scoundrels? now Colson had made no offer to You mean Dawes and Hildreth?” show them. What was in the “Those are the gentlemen,” room marked “Planetoid 127”? said the other. “You wouldn't And the queer receiver on the imagine, from my excited ap- square tower—that had some un- pearance when I returned to you,

86 FANTASTIC that they had offered me no less sigh into the depths of a large than a million pounds?” armchair. Tim stared in amazement at “If I had only known what I the master. know now,” he said, “I doubt “A million pounds, sir?” he very much whether, even in the said incredulously, and for the interests of science, I would have first time began to doubt the subjected myself to the ordeal other’s reason. through which I have been pass- “A million pounds,” repeated ing during the last four years.” Colson, quietly enjoying the sen- Tim did not answer, and Mr. sation he had created. “You will Colson went on: be able to judge by your own "There are moments when I ears whether I am insane, as I doubt my own sanity—when I be- imagine you believe me to be, or lieve that I shall awake from a whether this wretched relative dream, and find that all these of mine and his friend are simi- amazing discoveries of mine are larly afflicted. And, by the way, the figments of imagination due, you will be interested to learn in all probability, to an indis- that there have been three bur- creet supper at a very late hour glaries in this house during the of night!” last month.” He chuckled softly at his own Tim gaped. “But surely, sir, little joke. that is very serious?” “Lensman, I have a secret so “It would have been very seri- profound that I have been ous for the burglars if I had, on obliged to follow the practice of either occasion, the slightest sus- the ancient astronomers." picion that they were on the He pointed through the win- grounds,” said Mr. Colson. “They dow to a square stone that stood would have been certainly elec- in the center of the garden, a trified and possibly killed! But stone which the boy had noticed on every occasion when they ar- before, though he had dismissed rived, it happened that I did not it at once as a piece of meaning- wish for a live electric current to less ornamentation. surround the house: that would “That stone?” he asked. have been quite sufficient to have Colson nodded. thrown out of gear the delicate “Come, I will show it to you,” instruments I was using at the he said, rising to his feet. He time.” opened a door in what appeared to be the solid wall, and Tim fol- E led the way into his library, lowed him into the garden. H and sank down with a weary The stone stood upon an orna-

PLANETOID 127 87 : mental plinth and waa carved pressed. There was something with two columns of figures and about those hard eyes which was letters almost repellent. After perfunctory greetings E6 0 1 had passed, there was an awk- T 2 D 4 ward pause, and the financier M 4 L 1 looked at Tim. A 1 N 3 “My friend, Mr. Lensman, W 1 U 1 will be present at this inter- R 2 B 1 view,” said Colson, interpreting I 3 S 2 the meaning of that glance. “But what on earth does that "He is rather young to dabble mean ?” in high finance, isn’t he?” “It is a cryptogram,” said Mr. “Young or old, he’s staying,” Colson quietly. “When Heyghen said Colson, and the man made his discovery about Sat- shrugged his shoulders. urn’s rings, he adopted this “I hope this discussion will be method to prevent himself from carried on in a calm atmos- being forestalled in the discov- phere,” he said. “As your young ery. I have done the same.” friend probably knows, I have “But what does it mean?” made you an offer of a million asked the puzzled Tim. pounds, on the understanding “That you will one day learn,” that you will turn over to me all said the professor, as they the information—which comes to walked back to the house. you by—er—a ” his lip curled His keen ears heard a sound —“mysterious method, into and he pulled out his watch. which we will not probe too “Our friends are here al- deeply.” ready,” he said in a lower voice. “You might have saved your- The attitude of the two new- self the journey,” said Colson comers was in remarkable con- calmly. “Indeed, I could have my trast. Mr. Hildreth was self-as- answer a little more final, if it sured, a man of the world to his were possible; but it was my finger-tips, and greeted the pro- wish that you should be refused fessor as though he were his in the presence of a trustworthy oldest friend and had come at his witness. I do not want your mil- special invitation. Mr. Dawes, on lions—I wish to have nothing the contrary, looked thoroughly whatever to do with you.” uncomfortable. “Be reasonable," murmured Tim had a look at the great Dawes, who took no important financier, and he was not im- part in the conversation.

88 FANTASTIC —

HE old man ignored him, and “That is your last word?” Tstood waiting for the finan- Colson nodded. cier’s reply. “My very last.” “I’ll put it very plainly to you, The two men walked to the Colson,” said Hildreth, sitting door, and turned. easily on the edge of the table. “It is not mine,” said Hil- “You’ve cost me a lot of money. dreth, and there was no mistak- I don’t know where you get your ing the ominous note in his tone. market ‘tips’ from, but you’re They stood at the window most infernally right. You un- watching the two men until they dercut my market a month ago, had gone out of sight, and then and took the greater part of a Tim turned to his host. hundred thousand pounds out of “What does he want really?” my pocket. I offer to pay you the he asked. sum to put me in touch with the Mr. Colson roused himself source of your information. You from his reverie with a start. have a wireless plant here, and “What does he want? I will somewhere else in the world you show you. The cause of all our have a miracle-man who seems to burglaries, the cause of this be able to foretell the future visit. Come with me.” with disastrous consequences to They turned into the passage, myself. I may tell you—and this and as the professor stopped be- you will know—that, but for the fore the door labelled “Planetoid fact that your correspondent 127,” Tim’s heart began to beat speaks in a peculiar language, I a little faster. Colson opened the should have had your secret long door with two keys and ushered ago. Now, Mr. Colson, are you him into the strangest room going to be sensible?” which Tim had ever seen. Colson smiled slowly. A confused picture of instru-

“I’m afraid I shall not oblige ments, of wires that spun across you. I know that you have been the room like the web of a spider, listening in—I know also that of strange little machines which you have been baffled. I shall con- seemed to be endowed with per- tinue to operate in your or any petual motion—for they worked other market, and I give you full all the time—these were his first liberty to go to the person who is impressions. my informant, and who will be The room was lined with grey just as glad to tell you as he is felt, except on one side, where to tell me, everything he knows.” there was a strip of fibrous panel- Hildreth took up his hat with ling. The professor went towards an ugly smile. this. Pushing aside a panel, he

PLANETOID 127 89 disclosed the circular door of a of these tongues. Yet there is a safe and, reaching in his hand, tribe on the Upper Congo which took out a small red-covered has a vocabulary of four thou- book. sand words with which to voice “This is what the burglars its hopes, its sufferings and its want!” he said exultantly. “The joys. And in those four thou- Code! The Code of the Stars!” sand words lies the sum of their CHAPTER IH poetry, history, and science! If we were as intelligent as we IM LENSMAN could only think we are, we should adopt Tstare at the professor. the language of the Upper Con- “I don’t understand you, Mr. golese as the universal speech.” Colson,” he said, puzzled. “You Tim’s head was swimming: mean that book is a code ... an codes, languages, Upper Congo- ordinary commercial code?” lese and the mysterious “they.”

Colson shook his head. . . . Surely there must be some- “No, my boy,” he said quietly; thing in Dawes’ ominous hints, “that is something more than a and this old man must be sick of code, it is a vocabulary—a vo- overmuch learning. As though cabulary of six thousand words, he realized what was passing the simplest and the most com- through the boy’s mind, Colson prehensive language that hu- shook his head. manity has ever known ! That is “No, I am not mad,” he said, why they are so infinitely more as he locked the book away in clever than we,” he mused. “I the safe and put the key in his have not yet learned the process pocket, “unless this is a symp- by which this language was tom of my dementia.” evolved, but it is certain that it He waved his hand to the wire- is their universal tongue.” laden room, and presently Tim, He turned with a smile to the as in a dream, heard his com- bewildered boy. panion explaining the functions “You speak English, probably of the various instruments with French; you may have a smat- which the room was littered. For tering of German and Spanish the most part it was Greek to and Italian. And when you have him, for the professor had named these languages, you reached that stage of mechanical probably imagine that you have knowledge where he outstripped exhausted all that matter, and his pupil’s understanding. It was that the highest expression of as though a professor of higher human speech is bound up in mathematics had strolled into one or the other, or perhaps all. the algebra class and lectured

90 FANTASTIC — upon ultimate factors. Now and the monotonous hum was re- again he recognized some for- sumed. mula, or caught a mental glimpse “Let us go back to the li- of the other’s meaning, but for brary,” said the professor the main part the old man was abruptly. talking a language he did not He came out of the room last, comprehend. turned out the lights and dou- “I’m afraid you’re going a lit- ble-locked the door, before he tle beyond me, sir,” he said, with took his companion’s arm and a smile, and the old man nodded. led him back to the library they “Yes, there is much for you to had recently vacated. learn,” he said “and it must be “Do you realize, Lensman,” he ; learned !” said as he closed the door, “that there are in this world sounds E paused before a large glass which never reach the human H case, which contained what brain? The lower animals, more looked to Tim to be a tiny model sensitive to vibratory waves, can of a reciprocating engine, except hear noises which are never reg- that dozens of little pistons istered upon the human ear. thrust out from unexpected cy- The wireless expert listened in at linders, and all seemed to be the approach of Mars to the working independent of the oth- earth, hoping to secure a mes- ers, producing no central and sage of some kind. But what did general result. he expect? A similar clatter to “What is that, sir ?” that which he could pick up from Colson smoothed his chin some passing steamer. And, sup- thoughtfully. pose somebody was signalling “I’m trying to bring the de- not from Mars, because there is scription within the scope of no analogy to human life on that your understanding,” he said. planet, but from some—some “It would not be inexact to de- other world, big or little—is it scribe this as a ‘strainer of not possible that the sound may sound.’ Yet neither would it be be of such a character that not exact.” only the ear, even when assisted He touched a switch and a by the most powerful of micro- dozen colored lights gleamed and phones, cannot detect, but which died amidst the whirling ma- no instrument man has devised chinery. The hum which Tim can translate to an audible key ?” had heard was broken into stac- “Do you suggest, sir, that sig- cato dots and dashes of sound. nals of that nature are coming He turned the switch again and through from outer space?”

PLANETOID 127 91 "

asked Tim in surprise. And Mr. gone into nothingness. I have Colson inclined his head. given the matter a great deal of “Undoubtedly. There are at thought, passing under review least three worlds signalling to the great scientists of the age. us,” said the science master. But they are mainly old men: it “Sometimes the operators make is necessary that I should have some mechanical blunder, and an assistant who has many years there is an accidental emission before him, and I have chosen of sound which is picked up on you.” this earth and credited to Mars. For a second the horrible re- One of the most definite of the sponsibility which the professor three comes from a system which was putting upon him struck a is probably thousands of light- chill to the boy’s heart. And then years away. In their words, from the curiosity of youth, the ad- a planet that is'part of a system venturous spirit which is in ev- beyond our ken. The most pow- ery boy’s heart, warmed him to erful telescope cannot even de- enthusiasm. tect the sun around which this “That will be topping, sir,” he planet whirls ! Another, and said. “Of course, I’m an awful fainter, signal comes from an duffer, but willing to learn any- undetected planet beyond the or- thing you can teach me. It was bit of Neptune.” about Planetoid 127 you wanted “But life could not exist be- to speak?” yond the orbit of Neptune?” sug- The professor nodded. gested Tim. “Yes,” he said, "it is about "Not life as we understand it,” Planetoid 127. I have left noth- said the professor. “I admit that ing to chance. As I say, I am an these signals are faint and unin- old man and anything may hap- telligible. But the third planet— pen. For the past few months I “Is it your Planetoid 127?” have been engaged in putting

asked Tim eagerly ; and Colson into writing the story of my ex- nodded. traordinary discovery: a discov- "I asked you to stay tonight,” ery made possible by the years of he said, “because I wanted to tell unremitting thought and toil I you something of vital interest to have applied to perfecting the me, if not to science. I am an old instruments which have placed man, Lensman, and it is unlikely me in contact with this strange that I shall live for many years and almost terrifying world.” longer. I wish somebody to share my secret—somebody who can T seemed as though he were carry on the work after I have I going to continue, and Tim

92 FANTASTIC ”

was listening with all ears, but They dined at eight. Neither in his definite way the old man during the meal nor the period changed the subject. which intervened before bedtime “You would like to see round did Mr. Colson make any fur- the rest of the house?” he said; ther reference to his discoveries. and the next hour was spent in He disappeared about ten, after strolling around the magnifi- showing Tim to his room. The cent range of hothouses. boy had undressed and was doz- As Tim was shown from one ing off, when there came a tap point of interest to another, it at his door. began to dawn upon him that “Come in, sir,” he said, and the there was truth in Hildreth’s professor entered. From his face accusation, that Mr. Colson was Tim guessed that something had something of a speculator. The happened. house and grounds must have "Lensman,” he said, and there cost thousands; the renovations was a sharp quality in his voice. which had been recently intro- “Do you remember somebody duced, the erection of the tele- speaking . . . the wireless voice? scope—when Colson mentioned I was not in the library when the the cost of this, the sum took his call came through, so I did not breath away—could only have hear it distinctly.” been possible to a man of un- Tim recalled the mysterious limited income. Yet it was the voice that had spoken in the li- last thing in the world he would brary from the aperture above have imagined, for Colson was of the fireplace. the dreamy, unmaterial type, and “Yes,—sir; you told me it was it was difficult to associate him Colson with a successful career in the “I know, I know,” said the Stock Exchange. When Mr. Col- professor impatiently. “But tell son opened the gates of the big me how he spoke?” His tone was garage the boy expected to see almost querulous with anxiety. something magnificent in the “I only heard the end. Was it a way of cars; but the building gruff voice, rather like mine?” was empty except for his old mo- Tim shook his head. tor bicycle, which was so famil- “No, sir,” he said in surprise; iar to the boys of Mildram. “it was a very thin voice, a sort .” “No, I do not drive a car,” said of whine. . . Colson, in answer to his ques- “A whine?” The professor al- tion. “I have so little time, and I most shouted the question. find that a motor-bicycle supplies “Yes, sir.” all my needs.” Colson was fingering his chin.

PLANETOID 127 93 ”

“That is strange,” he said, door and the tremulous voice of speaking half to himself. “I have the butler. been trying to get him all the “Is anything wrong, sir?” evening, and usually it is simple. “What did you hear?” asked

I received his carrier wave . . . Tim quickly. why should his assistant speak “I thought I heard a shot.”

. . . ? I have not heard him for Tim ran down the stairs, three days. What did he say?” stumbling in the darkness, and presently came to the passage IM told him, as far as he from which opened the doors of Tcould remember, the gist of the library and the room of the message which had come Planetoid 127. through, and for a long time the The library was empty: two professor was silent. lights burned, accentuating the “He does not speak English gloom. A quick glance told him very well—the assistant, I mean that it was not here the professor —and he would find a difficulty was to be sought. He had no in putting into words . . . you doubt that in his sleep he had see, our language is very com- heard the cry of the old man. He plicated.” And then, with a turned on the light in the corri- smile: “I interrupted your dor, and, trying the door of the sleep.” Planetoid room, to his consterna- He walked slowly to the door. tion found it was open. The room “If anything should happen, you was in darkness, but again mem- will find my account in the most ory served him. There were four obvious place.” He smiled faint- light switches near the door, and ly. “I’m afraid I am not a very these he found. Even as he had good amateur mason— opened the door he could detect With these cryptic words he the acrid smell of cordite, and took his departure. Tim tossed when the light switched on he from side to side and presently was not unprepared for the sight dropped into an uneasy doze. which met his eyes. The little Suddenly there was a sharp machine which Colson had de- crash of sound, and Tim sat up scribed as the “sound strainer” in bed, the perspiration stream- was a mass of tangled wreckage. ing from every pore. Something Another instrument had been had wakened him. In an instant overturned: ends of cut wires he had slipped out of bed and dangled from roof and wall. But had raced out into the corridor. his eyes were for the moment A deep silence reigned, broken concentrated upon the figure that only by the sound of an opening lay beneath the open safe. It

94 FANTASTIC — was Professor Colson, and Tim was the path which led down to knew instinctively that the old the backwater. man was dead. He considered the situation rapidly: he CHAPTER IV was unarmed, and, even if the assassin was in no OLSON was dead! better shape (which he obviously He had been shot at close was not) he would not be a match quarters, for the hair about the for a powerfully built man. He wound was black and singed. vaulted up to the window-sill as Tim looked over his shoulder to the shivering butler made his the shivering butler who stood reappearance. in the doorway. “I’ve telephoned the police: “Get on the telephone to the they’re coming up at once,” he police,” he said; and, when the said. man had gone, he made a brief “Is there a gun in the house examination of the apartment. any kind?” asked Lensman The destruction which the un- quickly. known murderer had wrought “There’s one in the hall cup- was hurried but thorough. Half board, sir.” a dozen delicate pieces of appa- Tim flew along the corridor, ratus, the value and use of which wrenched open the door, found Tim had no idea, had been the shot-gun and, providentially, smashed ; two main wires lead- a box of cartridges. Stopping ing from the room had been cut; only to snatch an electric hand- but the safe had obviously been lamp from the hall-stand, he sped opened without violence, for the into the grounds and made his key was still in the lock. It was way down the path to the river. the shot which had wakened the boy, and he realized that the safe E had switched on the light must have been opened subse- H of the hand-lamp the mo- quent to the murder. ment he had left the house, and One of the heavy shutters here he was at an advantage which covered the windows had over the man he followed, who been forced open, and the case- was working in the dark and ment window was ajar. Without dared not show a light for fear hesitation, Tim jumped through of detection. the window on to a garden bed. As he approached the river he Which way had the murderer heard the sound of stumbling f^She? Not to the high road, that footsteps, and challenged his was certain. There could only be quarry. one avenue to escape, and that “Halt, or I’U shoot!”

PLANETOID 127 95 The words were hardly out of The bullet just missed his his mouth when a pencil of flame head. Hastily extinguishing the quivered ahead in the darkness, light, he waited. Somebody was something “wanged” past his working frantically at the head and struck the bole of a launch’s propeller, and again tree with a thud. Instantly Tim raising his gun, he fired. This extinguished his lamp. The muz- time his shot struck home, for he zle of his gun advanced, his fin- heard a howl of fury and pain. ger on the trigger, he moved very But in another few seconds the cautiously in pursuit. launch was moving again, and The man must be somewhere had disappeared into the open near the river now: the ground river. There was nothing for Tim was falling more steeply. There to do now but to retrace his was no sound ahead until he steps to the house. He came into heard a splash of water, the hol- the room of death, hot, dishev- low sound of feet striking the elled, his pajamas torn to ribbons bottom of a boat, and a faint by the brambles through which “chug-chug” of engines. A mo- he had struggled, to find two po- tor-launch! Even as he reached lice officers in the room. One was the riverside he saw the dark kneeling by the side of the dead shape slipping out towards the man; the other was surveying river under cover of the trees. the damaged apparatus. Raising his gun, he fired. In- stantly another shot came back T his appearance, the officers at him. He fired again he A turned their to ; might attention not hit the assassin, but he Tim. would at any rate alarm the lock- In a few words he described keeper. Then, as the little launch what he had seen, and while one reached the opening which of the policemen telephoned a brought it to the river, he saw it warning to the lock-keepers, he slow and come almost to a stand- gave an account of the other still. For a second he thought the events of that night so far as he man was returning, and then the knew them. explanation flashed upon him. “There have been several bur- The backwater was choked with glaries here,” said the sergeant. weeds and the little propeller of “I shouldn’t be surprised if this the launch must have caught is the same fellow that tried to them. If he could only find a do the other jobs. Do you know

boat ! He flashed his lamp vainly anything about this?” up and down the bank. He held a sheet of paper to the “Plopr boy, and Tim took it. It was

96 FANTASTIC ”

covered with Colson’s fine writ- from Scotland Yard, and Mr. ing. Colson’s lawyer : a stout, middle- “It looks almost as though it aged man, who had some infor- were a message he’d been writ- mation to give. ing down. He’d been listening-in “Poor Colson always expected —the receivers are still on his such a death. He had made an ears,” said the officer. “But who enemy, a powerful enemy, and he could tell him stuff like that?” told me only two days ago that this man would stop at nothing.” Tim read the message: “Did he give his name?” “Colson was killed by rob- asked the detective. bers in the third part of the Tim waited breathlessly, ex- first division of the day. No- pecting to hear Hildreth’s name ' body knows who did this, mentioned, but the lawyer shook but the correctors are his head. searching. Colson said there “Why did you see him two was a great earthquake in days ago? On any particular the island beyond the yellow business?” sea. This happened in the “Yes,” said Mr. Stamford, the sixth division of the day and lawyer. “I came here to make a many were killed. This place will, by which this young gentle- corresponds to Japan, but man was named as sole heir!” we call it the Island of the “I,” said Tim incredulously. Yellow Sea. The great oil- "Surely you’re mistaken?” fields of the Inland Sea have “No, Mr. Lensman. I don’t become very rich, and those mind admitting that, when he who own the fields have told me how he wished to dispose made millions in the past of his property, I urged him few days. There will be— against leaving his money to one Here the writing ended. who, I understand, is a com- “What does he mean by “Col- parative stranger. But Mr. Col- son was killed in the third divi- son had great faith in you, and sion’ or whatever it is?” said the said that he had made a study of dumbfounded policeman. “He your character and was satisfied must have known he was going that you could carry on his work. to be killed ... it beats me.” That was the one thing which “It beats me, too," said Tim worried him, the possibility of sadly. his life’s work being broken off with no successor to take it up. T eleven o’clock came simul- There is a clause in the will A taneously Inspector Bennett, which makes it possible for you

PLANETOID 127 97 to operate his property immedi- “Hildreth?” Tim stared at him ately." open-mouthed. “Has Hildreth Tim smiled sadly. got a property near here?” “I don’t know what ‘operating “Oh, yes; he has a big estate his property’ means,” he said. about three miles down the riv- And then, as a thought struck ei\” The detective was eyeing the him: “Unless he refers to his boy keenly. “What do you know speculations. The Stock Ex- about Mr. Hildreth?” change is an unknown country to me. Has any discovery been TN a few words Tim told of the made about the man in the mo- interview which he had wit- tor-launch ?” nessed, and the detective Inspector Bennett nodded. frowned. “The launch was found aban- “It can only be a coincidence doned in a local reach of the that the man was found on his Thames,” he said. “The murder- estate,” he said. “Mr. Hildreth is er must have landed and made a very rich man and a Justice of his way on foot. By the way, do the Peace.” you know he is wounded? We Nevertheless, he did not speak found traces of blood on the with any great conviction, and launch.” Tim had the impression that Tim nodded. Bennett’s view of Hildreth was “I had an idea I winged him.” not such an exalted one as he Late that afternoon there was made out. a sensational discovery : the body Borrowing the old motor-bi- of a man was found lying amidst cycle of the science master, he the weeds three miles down the rode over to Bisham and broke river. He had been shot with a the news to Chap West and his revolver. sister. The girl was horrified. “He is our man undoubtedly,” “But, Tim, it doesn’t seem pos- said the inspector who brought sible!” she said. “Why should the news. “There is a shot wound they do it? The poor old man!” in his shoulder.” When Chap had recovered “But I did not use a rifle or a from the shock of the news, he revolver,” said Tim, puzzled. advanced a dozen theories in rap- “Somebody else did,” said the id succession, each more wildly inspector grimly. “Dead men tell improbable than the last; but all no tales.” his theorizing was silenced when “Where was he found?” Tim told him of Colson’s will. "Near Mr. Hildreth’s private "I’m only a kid, and absolutely landing stage.” unfitted for the task he has set

98 FANTASTIC me,” Tim said quietly ; “but I am his assistants—there were two determined to go on with his at the house—but he never took work, and shall secure the best them into his confidence. The technical help I can to reconsti- only hint they can give me is tute the apparatus which has that when poor Mr. Colson was been destroyed.” listening-in to these mysterious “What do you think is behind voices he invariably had the re- it?” asked Chap. ceiving gear directed towards Tim shook his head. the sun. You know, of course, “Something beyond my under- that he did not use the ordinary standing,” he replied. “Mr. Col- aerial, but an apparatus shaped son made a discovery, but what like a convex mirror.” that discovery was we have to “Towards the sun?” gasped learn. One of the last things he Chap. “But there can’t be any told me was that he had written life on the sun! Dash it all, I out a full account of his investi- don’t profess to be a scientific gations, and I am starting an expert but I know enough of immediate search for that man- physics to see that it’s as impos- uscript. And then there is the sible for life to exist on the sun stone in the grounds, with all as it would be to exist in a coke those queer figures and letters oven! Why, the temperature of which have to be deciphered.” the sun is umpteen thousand de-

“Have you any idea what the grees centigrade . . . and any- nature of the discovery was?” way, nobody has ever seen the

asked Chap. sun : you only see the photo- .” Tim hesitated. scope. . . “Yes, I think I have,” he said. “I know all this,” said Tim, lis- “Mr. Colson was undoubtedly in tening patiently, “but there is communication with another the fact: the receiving mirror planet !” was not only directed towards CHAPTER V the sun, but it moved by clock- work so that it was directed to HEN it was Mars!” cried the sun at all hours of the day, T Chap triumphantly. even when the sky was overcast “Of course it was not Mars,” and the sun was invisible. I ad- interrupted his sister scornfully. mit that the whole thing sounds “Mr. Colson told us distinctly incredible, but Colson was not that there was no life on Mars.” mad. That voice we heard was

“Where is it, Tim?” he asked. very distinct.” “I don’t know.” Tim shook his “But from what planet could head. “I have been questioning it be?” insisted Chap. “Go 6ver

PLANETOID 127 99 —

’em all: eliminate Mara and the were columns of intricate figures Sun, of course, and where is this which were so much Greek; but world? Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, presently his eye caught a head- Saturn, Uranus, Neptune line: phew! You’re not suggesting “BLACK SEA OIL SYNDICATE. that it is one of the minor plan- CHARLES HILDRETH’S GLOOMY ets, are you? Ceres, Pallas, Juno, REPORT TO THE ?” Vesta. . . SHAREHOLDERS. Tim shook his head. "A meeting of the Black “I am as much puzzled as you, Sea Oil Syndicate was held but I am going to spend my life at the Cannon Street Hotel looking for that world.” yesterday afternoon, and Mr. Hildreth, Chairman of E went back to the house. the Company, presiding, H The body of the old man had said that he had very little been moved to a near-by hospi- news for the shareholders tal, and the place was alive with that was pleasant. A num- detectives. Mr. Stamford was ber of the wells had run dry, there when he returned, and gave but borings were being him a number of names and ad- made on a new part of the dresses which he thought might concession, though there be useful to the young man. was scarcely any hope that “I don’t know that I want to they would be successful.” know any stockbrokers,” said Tim, looking at the list with a IM frowned. Black Sea Oil wry face. TSyndicate. . .? Hildreth? He “You never know,” said Mr. put a question to the lawyer. Stamford. “After all, Mr. Colson “Oh, yes,” said Mr. Stamford. expected you to carry on his “Hildreth is deep in the oil mar- work, and probably it will be ket. There’s some talk of his rig- part of your duties to continue ging Black Seas.” his operations. I happen to know “What do you mean by ‘rig- that he paid minute attention to ging’?” asked Tim. the markets.” “In this case the suggestion, He indicated a number of fi- which was made to me by a nancial newspapers that lay un- knowledgeable authority,” said opened on the table, and Tim Mr. Stamford, “is that Hildreth took up one, opened it and was depressing the shares issu- glanced down the columns. In ing unpromising reports which the main the items of news were would induce shareholders to put meaningless to him. All he saw their shares on the market at a

100 FANTASTIC !

low figure. Of course, there may strolled in to dinner, and the be nothing in it: Black Sea Oils footman handed him his paper, are not a very prosperous con- he opened the page mechanically cern. On the other hand, he may to the Stock Exchange column have secret information from and ran his eyes down the list of his engineers.” quotations. That morning Black “Such as— ?” suggested Tim. Sea Oils had stood in the market “They may have struck oil in at 3s. 3d., and almost the first large quantities on another part note that reached his eye was in of the property and may be keep- the stop-press column. ing this fact dark, in which case “Boom in Black Sea Oils. they could buy up shares cheaply, There have been heavy buy- and when the news was made ings in Black Sea Oil shares, known the scrip would go sky- which stood this morning in high and they would make a for- the neighborhood of 3s., but tune.” which closed firm at 42s. Tim read the report again. 6d.” “Do you think there is any Hildreth’s face went livid. His chance of oil being found on this great coup had failed property,” Stamford smiled. N the weeks which followed the “I am a lawyer, not a magi- I death and funeral of Profes- cian,” he said good-humouredly. sor Colson, Tim found every wak- After he had gone, Tim found ing minute occupied. He had en- himself reading the paper: the listed the services of the clever- paragraph fascinated him. Black est of scientists, and from the

Sea Oil . . . shattered apparatus one of the Suddenly he leapt to his feet most brilliant of mechanical with a cry. That was the mes- minds of the country was re- sage which Mr. Colson had writ- building the broken instruments. ten on the paper—the Oilfields Sir Charles Layman, one of the of the Inland Sea! foremost scientific minds in Eng- He ran out of the room and land, had been called into consul- went in search of Stamford. tation by the lawyer, and to him “I am going to buy Black Sea Tim had related as much as he Oils,” he said breathlessly. “Will knew of Professor Colson’s se- you tell me what I must do?” cret. In a few moments the tele- “I knew Colson,” said Sir phone wire was busy. Charles; “he was undoubtedly a Mr. Hildreth had not been to genius. But this story you tell his office that day, and when he me takes us into the realm of

PLANETOID 127 101 — fantasy. It isn’t possible that life bushy white beard, his brows can exist on the sun ; and really, corrugated in a grimace of baf- young man, I can’t help feeling fled wonder. that you have been deceived over “Most scientists,” he said at these mysterious voices.” last, “work to the observations “Then three people were de- of some pet observer—did the ceived,” said Tim firmly. “My Professor ever mention an as- friend Chap West and his sister tronomer whose calculations he ” both heard the speaker. And Mr. was endeavoring to verify Colson was not the kind of man Tim thought for a moment. who would descend to trickery.” “Yes, sir, I remember he spoke Sir Charles pursed his lips and once or twice of Professor Wat- shook his head. son, an American. I remember “It does seem most extraordi- once he was lecturing to our nary. And frankly, I cannot un- school on Kepler’s Law, and he derstand the functions of these mentioned the discoveries of Mr. instruments. It is quite possible, Watson.” as Colson said, that there are “Watson?” said Sir Charles sounds come to this earth so fine, slowly. “Surely he was the fellow and pitched in such a key, that who thought he found Vulcan, a the human ear cannot catch planet supposed by some people them. And I am pretty sure that to revolve about the sun within what he called a ‘sound strainer’ the orbit of Mercury. As a mat- was an amplifier on normal lines. ter of fact, what he saw, during But the mysterious world an eclipse of the sun, was the two where is it? Life in some form stars, Theta and Zeta Cankri, or, may exist on a planetoid, but it more likely, the star 20 Cankri, is almost certain that these small which must have been some- masses which whirl through where in the position that Wat- space in the zone between Mars son described on the day he made and Jupiter are barren globules his discovery.” of rock as dead as the moon and Then he asked, with sudden in- innocent of atmosphere. There terest : are a thousand-and-one reasons “Did Professor Colson believe why life could not exist on these in the existence of Vulcan?” planetoids; and of course the Tim shook his head. suggestion that there can be life "No, sir, he derided the idea.” on the sun is preposterous.” “He was right,” nodded Sir Charles. “Vulcan is a myth. E walked up and down the There may be intra-Mercurial H library, smoothing his bodies revolving about the sun

102 FANTASTIC but it is extremely unlikely. You “But it is on all the negatives,” have found no data, no photo- said Sir Charles emphatically. graphs?” “No, I cannot be sure for the The word “photograph” re- moment, but if that is not Zeta minded Tim. or Theta Cankris—it is too large “Yes, there is a book full of big for the star 20 Cankris—then enlargements, but mostly of a we may be on the way to redis- solar eclipse,” he said. “They covering Professor Colson’s !” were taken on Friday Island last world year.” At his request, Tim left him, “Would you get them for me?” while, with the aid of chai-ts and Tim went out and returned almanacs, he plunged into intri- with a portfolio, which he opened cate calculations. on the table. Sir Chai-les turned picture after picture without HEN Tim closed the door speaking a word, then he laid Wand came into the corridor half a dozen apparently similar he saw the old butler waiting. photographs side by side and “Mr. Hildreth is here, sir. I’ve pored over them with the aid of put him in the blue drawing- a magnifying-glass. They were l'oom: will you see him, sir?” the conventional type of astro- Tim nodded and followed the nomical photo: the black disc of servant. the moon, the bubbling white Hildreth was standing by a edges of the corona ; but evident- window, looking out upon the ly Sir Charles had seen some- lawn, his hands behind him, and thing else, for presently he indi- he turned, with a quick, bird-like cated a speck with a stylo. motion as he heard the sound of “These photographs were tak- the tui-ning handle. en by different cameras,” he said. “Mr. Lensman,” he said, “I “And yet they all have this.” want a few words with you He pointed to the pin-point of alone.” white which had escaped Tim’s The young man dismissed the observation. It was so much part butler. of the flame of the corona that it “Well, sir?” he asked quietly. seemed as though it were a spark “I understand that you have thrown out by one of those gi- engaged in a little speculation. gantic erruptions of ignited gas You are rather young to dabble that flame up from the sun’s in high finance,” drawled Hil- surface. dreth. “Sui-ely that is a speck of dust “Do you mean Black Sea on the negative?” said Tim. Oils?” asked Tim bluntly.

PLANETOID 127 103 ” —

“I had that stock in mind. with Mr. Colson. He was con- What made you buy, Mr. Lens- stantly spoiling your market man—or rather, what made your you said as much. You believed trustee buy, for I suppose that, that he was possessed of infor- as you’re under age, you would mation which enabled him to op- hardly carry out the transaction erate to your detriment, and you yourself.” knew this information came by “I bought because I am satis- wireless, because you had lis- fied that Black Sea Oils will rise.” tened-in, without, however, un- A slow smile dawned on Hil- derstanding the language in dreth’s hawklike face.’ which the messages came. You “If you had come to me,” he guessed there was a code, and I said coolly, “I could have saved believe that you made one or two you a great deal of money. Black efforts to secure that code. Your Sea Oils to-day stand at fifty last effort ended in the death of shillings: they are worth less my friend!” than fivepence! You are little CHAPTER VI more than a boy,” he went on suavely, “and I can well under- ILDRETH’S face went white. stand how the temptation to H “Do you suggest that I gamble may have overcome you. am responsible for Colson’s But I was a friend of Colson’s, death?" and I do not like the thought of "You were responsible directly your money being wasted. I will and indirectly,” said Tim. “You take all the stock off your hands, sent a man here to steal the code- paying you at the price you paid book—a man who has been iden- for it.” tified this afternoon as a notori- “That is very generous of ous criminal. Whether you told you,” said Tim drily, “but I am him to shoot, or whether he shot not selling. And as for Mr. Col- to save his skin, we shall never son being a friend of yours— know. The burglar was killed so “A very good friend,” inter- that he could not talk.” rupted the other quickly, “and if “By whom?” asked Hildreth you tell people that he and I were steadily. enemies it may cost you more “You know best,” was the curt than you bargain for!” reply. There was no mistaking the Tim opened the door and stood threat in his tone. waiting. The man had regained “Mr. Hildreth,” Tim said qui- some of his composure, and, with etly, “nobody knows better than an easy laugh, walked into the

you that you were on ill terms corridor.

104 FANTASTIC ”

“You will hear from me “It is as I thought,” said the again,” he said. scientist; “neither Zeta nor The-

“Thank you for the warning,” ta ! It is, in fact, a distinct body was Tim’s rejoinder. of some kind, and, in my judg- After he had seen his unwel- ment, well outside the orbit of come visitor off the premises, the hypothetical Vulcan. If you Tim went in search of Stamford, look at the back of the photo- who, with his two assistants, was graph— working in a little study getting He turned it over, and Tim out particulars of the old man’s saw that, written in pencil in the investments. The lawyer listened microscopic caligraphy of the in silence while Tim narrated Professor, were a dozen lines of what had passed. writing. “He is a very dangerous man,” “I knew, of course, that said Mr. Stamford at last; “and, this was a dead world, with- so far from being rich, I happen out atmosphere or even wa- to know that he is on the verge ter. There can be no life of ruin. There are some queer there. I made an enlarge- stories about Hildreth. I have ment by my new process, had a hint that he was once in and this revealed a series of an Australian prison, but, of flat, rocky valleys.” course, there is no evidence to connect him with this crime. TV7HAT the deuce his new What are your immediate ’’ ’ process was, heaven only plans?” knows!” said Sir Charles in de- “The voice amplifier has been spair. “Poor Colson must have reconstituted,” said Tim. “The been the most versatile genius experts are making a test to-day, the world has known. At any though I very much doubt rate, that disposes of the sugges- whether they will succeed in es- tion that this planetary body is tablishing communication.” that whence come the signals—if A smile fluttered at the corner they come at all.” of the lawyer’s mouth. Sir Charles waited until the “Do you still believe that Mr. experts had finished the work of Colson was in communication reassembling two of the more with another planet?” complicated machines; but, “I’m certain,” said Jim em- though experimenting until mid- phatically. night, they could not establish He went back to the blue draw- communication, and at last, with ing-room, and had hardly en- a sense of despair, Tim ordered tered before Sir Charles came in. the work to cease for the night.

PLANETOID 127 105 ”

The whole thing was becoming solution. Night came, and the a nightmare to him : he could not two were on the point of de- sleep at nights. Chap and his sis- parture, when Chap said sud- ter came over in the morning to denly: assist him in a search, which had “Do you think you were wise, gone on ever since the death of Tim, to tell that reporter all you Professor Colson. did?” “We can do no more,” said (Tim had given an interview Tim helplessly, “until we have to a local newspaper, which had seen the Professor’s manuscript. described more fully than he had Until then we do not know for intended—more fully, indeed, what we are searching.” than his evidence at the in- “What about that stone in the quest—what had happened im- garden? Won’t that tell you any- mediately preceding Colson’s thing?” asked Chap. “I’d like to death.) see it.” “Because, y’ know, it struck They went out into the court- me,” said Chap, "that the poor yard together and stood before old Professor’s manuscript the stone in silence. would be very valuable to a cer- tain person. Does it occur to you E 6 0 1 that our friend might also be T 2 D 4 searching for this narrative ?” H 4 LI This was a new idea to Tim. A 1 N 3 “Why, yes,” he said slowly; “I W 1 U 1 never thought of that. No; that R 2 B 1 didn’t strike me. But I don’t

13 S 2 know where he would find it. We’ve taken out every likely “Of course, that isn’t as dif- stone in the building;— I’ve had ficult as it appears,” said Chap, the cellars searched to whom cryptograms were a “What makes you think it’s passion. “There is a sentence behind a stone?” asked Chap. written there, containing so “His reference to a mason. My many ‘e’s’, so many ‘h’s’, etcete- guess—and I may not be far ra, and perhaps, when we find the wide of the mark—is that Mr. sentence, the mystery will be Colson, having written his man- half solved.” uscript, hid it in one of the walls. But so far I have not been able E jotted the inscription down to discover the hiding-place.” H in a notebook, and through- He walked to the end of the out the day was puzzling over a drive to see his friends off, and

106 FANTASTIC then returned to the study. He which shaded his face, stood was alone in the house now, save clearly revealed. It was touching for the servants. Sir Charles had the stone, and even as Tim gone back to town by the last looked the little obelisk fell with train, and Stamford had accom- a crash. panied him. In a second Tim was out of the room and speeding along the cor- TTE had taken up his quarters ridor. As he came into view of in a spare room immediately the figure, it stooped and picked above the library, and for an something from the ground. hour after his visitors had de- The manuscript! What a fool parted he sat on the broad win- he had been! That was where dow-seat, looking down into the the old man had concealed the

courtyard, now bathed in the story of his discovery ! But there

faint radiance of the crescent was no time for regret : the mys- moon. The light shone whitely terious visitant had already dis- upon the cryptogram stone, and appeared into the shadows. Was absently, he fixed his eyes upon he making for the river? Tim this, the least of the old man’s was uncertain. He was halfway mysteries. And then—was his down the slope before he realized eye playing tricks with him? He that he had made a mistake. Be- could have sworn he saw a dark hind him he heard the soft purr figure melt out of the darkness of a motor-car, and, racing up and move along the shadow of the the slope, he came into view of a box hedge. red tail-light as it disappeared He pushed open the casement down the broad drive towards window, but could see nothing. the road. The great iron gates “I’m getting jumpy,” he said were closed, and that would give to himself, and rising with a him a momentary advantage, yawn, took off his coat prepara- though he knew he could not tory to undressing. As he did so, reach the car before they were he glanced out of the window open. again and started. Now he was sure: he could see the shapeless HEN he remembered Colson’s black shadow, and it was moving Tmotor-bicycle: he had left it towards the cryptogram stone. leaning against the wall and had His pulse beat a little quicker forgotten to bring it in after the as he watched. There was no trip he had made to Bisham that doubt about it now. In the moon- morning. Yes, there it was! He light the figure in the long black had hardly started the machine coat and the broad sombrero going when he heard a crash.

PLANETOID 127 107 The unknown had driven his car inside-pocket and his fingers through the frail iron gates and touched a heavy roll of paper. was flying along the road to In a flash the packet was in his Maidenhead. hand, and then he saw the moon- Tim came out in pursuit and light gleam on something which put his machine all out. The car the man held. ahead gained until it came to the The car was now almost at a foot of a long and tiring hill, and standstill, and, leaping over the then the gap between them side, Tim plunged into the hedge closed. Once the driver looked by the side of the road. As he back, and a minute later some- did so, he heard the “zip!” of a thing dropped in the road. Tim bullet and the patter of leaves. only just avoided the spare tire He ran on wildly, his breath com- which had been thrown over- ing in short gasps. To his ears board to trip him. came the blundering feet of his The car reached the crest of pursuer. He was out of breath the hill as Tim came up to its and in no condition to meet the rear, and, heedless of danger, murderous onrush of his enemy. stretched out his hand, and, And then, as he felt he could catching hold of the hood, let not go a step farther, the ground the motor-bicycle slip from be- opened underneath his feet and tween his knees. he went down, down, down. For For a second he held on des- a second he lost consciousness. perately, his feet swinging in All that remained of his breath the air, and then, with an effort, was knocked from his body, and he threw his leg over the edge of he could only lie and gape at the the hood and dropped breathless- starlit sky. ly on to the seat behind the driv- CHAPTER Vn er. At first the man at the wheel did not realize what had hap- OOKING up, he saw a head pened, and then, with a yell of L and shoulders come over the rage, he turned and struck blind- edge of the quarry into which he ly at the unauthorized passenger. had fallen. Apparently the man The blow missed him by a was not prepared to take the risk fraction of an inch, and in an- of following, for presently the other second his arm was around sound of his footsteps died away the driver’s neck. The car swayed and there was silence. and slowed, and then an involun- He lay for half an hour mo- tary movement of the man re- tionless, recovering his breath. vealed the whereabouts of the Although his arm was bruised, manuscript. Tim thrust into the he could move it and no bones

108 FANTASTIC were broken. He rose cautiously of strong coffee, brought at in- to his knees and explored the tervals, he sat poring over the position so far as it was revealed manuscript, page by page, al- by the moonlight. most incredulous of his own eyes He had fallen twenty or thirty and senses. The sunlight poured feet down a steep, chalky slope; in through the windows of the but he was by no means at the little study and found him still bottom of the quarry face, and sitting, his chin on his palms, he had to move with the greatest the manuscript before him. He care and circumspection. Pres- had read it again and again until ently, however, he found a rough he knew almost every word. path, which seemed to run inter- Then, locking the papers away in minably upwards. It was nearly the safe, he walked slowly to the half-an-hour later when he came instrument room, and gazed in to the road. The car was gone, awe at this evidence of the dead and he walked back the way he man’s genius. had come, hoping that he would be able to retrieve his motor- OMETHING within him told bicycle intact, though he had his S him that never in the future doubts whether it would be usa- would human speech pulsate ble. To his delight, when he came through this network of wires; upon the machine, he discovered never again would that queer it had suffered little damage little amplifier bring within hu- other than twisted handlebars. man hearing the thin sounds of His run home was without event. space. Even the code was gone: Apparently his hasty exit had that vocabulary, reduced with been heard, for the house was such labor to a dictionary of six aroused and two manservants thousand words. were searching the grounds He turned the switch and set when he came in. the little machine working; saw “I heard the crash at the gate, the multi-colored lights gleam sir,” said the butler. “Lord! I’m and glow. This much the me- glad to see you back. Some- chanics had succeeded in doing. body’s thrown over that stone in But the words that filtered the courtyard. . . through light and charcoal He babbled on, and Tim was would, he thought, be dead for so glad to hear the sound of a everlasting. He turned another human voice that he did not in- switch and set something work- terrupt him. ing which Sir Charles had de- There was no sleep for him scribed as a miniature air pump, that night. With successive cups and stood watching absent-mind-

PLANETOID 127 109 : — edly as the piston thrust it and pass—nearly seventeen minutes out. If he only had one tenth of —before his voice could reach Colson’s genius! through space to the man who His hand had gone out to turn was listening. the switch that stopped the ma- How had he made the machine chine, when: work? Perhaps the mechanism “Oh, Colson, why do you not had succeeded before, but there speak to me?" had been nobody at the other end The voice came from the very —wherever the other end might center of the machine. There was be. And then: no visible microphone. It was as “Oh, Colson, they are here though the lights and the whirl- . . . goodbye!” ing wheels had become endowed There came to him the sound with a voice. Tim’s heart nearly of a queer tap-tap-tap and then a stopped beating. crackle as though of splintered “Oh, Colson,” wailed the voice, glass, and then a scream, so “they are breaking the machines. shrill, so full of pain and horror, I have come to tell you this be- that involuntarily he stepped fore they arrive. He is dead—he, back. Then came a crash, and si- the master, the wizard, the won- lence. He waited, hardly daring .” derful man . . to breathe, but no sound came. The servant! Mr. Colson had At the end of an hour he turned told him that it was the servant off the switch and went slowly up who had spoken. The astral Col- to his room. son was dead. How should he reply? E awoke to find a youth sit- “Where are you?” he asked H ting on the edge of his bed. hoarsely, but there was no an- He was so weary and dulled that swer, and soon he understood he did not recognize Chap, even why. after he spoke. Presently “Wake up: I’ve got some news “I will wait for you to speak. for you, dear old bird,” said When I hear you I will answer. Chap, staring owlishly through Speak to me, Colson! In a thou- his thick, heavy glasses. “There’s .” sand seconds. . . a Nemesis in this business—you A thousand seconds! Colson may have heard of the lady had told him once that wireless Miss Nemesis of Nowhere. First waves travel at the s&me speed the burglar man is killed and as light. Then he was a hundred then his boss is smashed to and eighty million miles away, smithereens.” and a thousand seconds must Tim struggled up.

110 FANTASTIC ”

“Who?” he asked. “Not Hil- pened in the night. Bennett, who dreth?” arrived soon after, was able to

Chap nodded. fill in some of the gaps of the “He was found just outside story. Maidenhead, his car broken to bits—they think his steering- ILDRETH,” he said, “in spite wheel went wrong when he was H of hia wealth and security, doing sixty an hour. At any rate, was a crook of crooks. It is per- he smashed into a tree, and all fectly true that he was tried in that’s left of his machine is hot Australia and sent to penal ser- !” iron vitude. He had installed a big “Hildreth! Was he killed?” wireless plant in his house, and Chap nodded. there is no doubt that for many “Com-pletely,” he said callous- years he had made large sums of ly. “And perhaps it’s as well for money by picking up commer- him, for Bennett was waiting at cial messages that have been his house to arrest him. They’ve sent by radio and decoding and got proof that he hired that bur- using them to his own purpose. glar. Do you know what time it In this way he must have learnt is? It’s two o’clock, you lazy dev- something about Mr. Colson’s il, and Sir Charles and Stamford correspondent—he was under the are waiting to see you. Sir impression that Colson received Charles has a theory— messages in code and was anx- Tim swung out of bed and ious to get the code-book. By the walked to the window, blinking way, we found the charred rem- into the sunlit garden. nants of that book in the car. It “All the theories in the world was burnt out, as you probably are going to evaporate before know. That alone would have the facts,” he said. Putting his been sufficient to convict Hil- hand under his pillow, he took dreth of complicity in the mur- out the Professor's manuscript. der. Fortunately, we have been “I’ll read something to you this saved the trouble of a trial.” afternoon. Is Elsie here?” "None of the code remains?” Chap nodded. asked Tim anxiously. “I’ll be down in half an hour,” The detective shook his head. he said. “No, sir, none. There are one His breakfast was also his or two words—for instance, ‘Ze- luncheon, but it was not until lith’ means ‘the Parliamentary after the meal was over, and they system of the third decade,’ had adjourned to the library, whatever that may mean. It that he told them what had hap- seems a queer sort of code.”

PLANETOID 127 111 ” ”

“That is very unfortunate,” because it is invisible,” said Tim. said Tim. “I had hoped to devote “Invisible? How can a planet my time to telling the history of be invisible? Neptune is much this strange people, and the book farther distant from the sun—

would have been invaluable.” “Nevertheless, it is invisible," “Which people is this?” asked said Tim. “And now,” he said, as Sir Charles puzzled. “Did our he took the manuscript from his friend get into communication pocket, “if you will give me your with one of the lost tribes?” attention, I will tell you the story Tim laughed, in spite of him- of Neo. Incidentally, the crypto- self. gram on the stone reads: ‘Be- !’ ” “No, sir. I think the best ex- hind the sun is another world planation I can offer you is to CHAPTER VHI read Mr. Colson’s manuscript, which I discovered last night. It IM turned the flyleaf of the is one of the most remarkable Tmanuscript and began read- stories that has ever been told, ing in an even tone. and I’ll be glad to have you here, “THE STORY OF NEO.” Sir Charles, so that you may supply explanations which do not “My name” (the manuscript occur to me.” began) “is Charles Royton Col- “Is it about the planet?” asked son. I am a Master of Arts of Sir Charles quickly, and Tim the University of Cambridge, nodded. science lecturer to Mildram “Then you have discovered it! School, and I have for many It is a planetoid— years been engaged in the study Tim shook his head. of the Hertzian waves, and that “No, sir,” he said quietly. “It branch of science commonly is a world as big as ours.” known as radiology. I claim The scientist looked at him in all modesty to have applied open-mouthed. the principles which Marconi “A world as big as ours, and brought nearer to perfection, never been discovered by our as- when wireless telegraphy was tronomers? How far away?” unknown. And I was amongst “At its nearest, a hundred and the pioneers of wireless teleph- eighty million miles,” said Tim. ony. As is also generally known,

“Impossible!” cried Sir I am a v mathematician and Charles scornfully. “It would have written several textbooks have been detected years ago. It upon astronomy. I am also the is absolutely impossible!" author of a well-known mono- “It has never been detected graph on the subject of the In-

112 FANTASTIC clinations of the Planetary Or- European War, and when, in

bits ; and my treatise on the star 1915, the same German engineer Oyonis is familiar to most as- stated that he had received a dis- tronomers. tinct message of a similar char- “For many years I engaged acter, the world, and particularly myself in studying the altera- the Allied world, rejected the tions of ellipses following the story, for the credibility of the calculations and reasonings of Germans at that period did not Lagrange, who to my mind was stand very high. considerably less of a genius than Professor Adams, to whom YEAR later, the wireless sta- the credit for the discovery of A tion at Cape Cod also report-

Neptune should be given. . . ed signals, as did a private sta- [Here followed a long and tion in Connecticut; whilst the learned examination of the inci- Government station at Rio de dence of Neptune’s orbit, as in- Janeiro reported that it had fluenced by Uranus.] heard a sound like ‘a flattened “. . . My astronomical and ra- voice.’ It was obvious that these diological studies were practical- stories were not inventions, and ly carried on at the same time. I set to work on an experimental In June, 1914, my attention was station which I had been allowed called to a statement made by to set up at the school, and after the Superintendent of the great about six months of hard toil I wireless telegraph station out- succeeded in fashioning an in- side Berlin, that he had on three strument which enabled me to separate occasions taken what test my theories. My main the- he described as ‘slurred recep- ory was that, if the sound came tions’ from an unknown station. from another world, it would in He gave excellent technical rea- all probability be pitched in a sons why these receptions could key that would be inaudible to not have come from any known human ears. For example, there station and he expressed the is a dog-whistle which makes no opinion, which was generally sound that we can detect, but scoffed at, that the messages he which is audible to every dog. had taken came from some extra- My rough amplifier had not been terrestrial source. There imme- operating for a week when I be- diately followed a suggestion gan to pick up scraps of signals that these mysterious dashes and scraps of words—unintelli- and dots had come from Mars. ble to me, but obviously human The matter was lost sight of speech. Not only was I able to owing to the outbreak of the hear, but I was able to make my-

PLANETOID 127 113 self heard ; and the first startling there are practically no verbs discovery I made was that it took and few adjectives. Very much is my voice a thousand and seven indicated by a certain inflexion seconds to reach the person who of voice; even the tenses are was speaking to me. similarly expressed; and yet, in “I was satisfied now that I was spite of this, the Neothians to talking to the inhabitants of an- whom I spoke had no very great other world, though, for my rep- difficulty, once I had learnt the utation’s sake, I dared not make art of the inflexion, in supplying my discovery known. After hard the English equivalent. experimental work, I succeeded in clarifying the voices, and evi- LL the time I was searching' dently the person at the other A the heavens in the vain en- end was as anxious as I to make deavour to discover the exact lo- himself understood and to un- cation of this world, which was, derstand the nature of his un- from the description I had, ex- known correspondent’s speech. actly the same size as ours, and “You may imagine what a therefore should have been visi- heart-breaking business it was, ble. I had maps of the southern with no common vocabulary, in- hemispheres, reports from the visible to one another, and living astronomers of Capetown and possibly in conditions widely dif- Brisbane, but they could offer me ferent, to make our meaning no assistance. It was certain that clear to one another. We made a - there was in the heavens no visi- start with the cardinal numbers, ble planetary body as big as Neo. and after a week’s interchange “The chief difficulty I had lay we had mastered these. I was in the fact that the voices invar- then struck with the idea of iably came from the direction of

pouring a glass of water from a the sun ; and it was as certain as tumbler near to my microphone, anything could be that life could and using the word ‘water.’ In not exist on that great golden half-an-hour I heard the sound mass. Notwithstanding this, un- of falling water from the other less my mirror was turned to the end and the equivalent word, sun, I received no message what- which will be found in the vocab- ever; and even in the middle of ulary. I then clapped my hands the night, when I was communi- together, and used the word cating with Neo, it was neces- ‘hand.’ With these little illustra- sary that I should follow the tions, which took a great deal of sun’s course. time, began the formation of the “Then came the great eclipse, dictionary. In the Neo language and, as you know, I went to the

114 FANTASTIC ! —

South Sea Islands to make ob- perfectly! It was a stupendous servations. It was our good for- thought tune to have fine weather, and at the moment of total eclipse I T CONVEYED to my unknown took several particularly excel- A friend, who called himself Col- lent photographs, some of which son, though I am under the im- you will find in'Hhe portfolio pression that that was due to a marked ‘L.’ In these and photo- misconception on his part as to graphs taken by other astrono- what Colson meant—he probably mers, you will see, if you make a thought that ‘Colson’ was the careful observation, close to the English word for ‘scientist’ corona, a tiny speck of light, and I asked him to make obser- which at first I thought was my vations. These he sent to me world, but which afterwards I after a few days, confirming my discovered was a dead mass of theory. It was after we had be- material upon which it was im- gun to talk a little more freely, possible for life to exist. and my acquaintance with the “One night, when I was turn- language had increased so that I ing over the matter in my mind, could express myself clearly, that and examining each photograph it occurred to me there was an in the study of my house on the extraordinary similarity both in Thames, the solution flashed on our lives and our environment. me. This tiny speck, which was And this is the part in my nar- not a star, and was certainly not rative which you wiU find dif- Vulcan, was the satellite of an- ficult to believe—I discovered other world, and that world was that these two worlds were not moving on the same orbit as our only geographically exact, but own earth, following exactly the that the incidents of life ran same course, but being, as it was, along on parallel lines. There immediately opposite to us be- were great wars in Neo, great hind the sun, was never visible! disasters, which were invariably On whatever part of the ellipse duplicated on our earth, general- we might be, the sun hid our sis- ly from two to three days before ter world from us, and that was or after they had happened in why the voice apparently came this new world. Nor was it only from the sun, for it was through the convulsions of nature that the solar center that the waves were so faithfully reproduced. must pass. Two earths chasing Men and women were doing in one another along the same path, that world exactly as we were never overtaking, never being doing in ours. There were Stock overtaken, balancing one another Exchanges and street cars, rail-

PLANETOID 127 115 — ways, airplanes, as though twin consulted an eminent Harley worlds had produced twin identi- Street specialist. He assured me ties; twin inspirations. that I was perfectly normal and “I learnt this first when my sane, and offered me the conven- friend told me that he had been tional advice that I should go seeking me for some time. He away for a holiday. said that he had had a broken “Then one day my astral knee some five years ago, and friend, Colson, incidentally men- during his enforced leisure he tioned that there was great ex- had pointed out the possibility of citement in his town because a his having another identity. He man had bought some steel stock said he was frequently feeling which had since risen consider- that the person he met for the ably in price—he mentioned the first time was one in reality name—and, glancing through a whom he had seen before ; and he newspaper, I saw the name of a was conscious that the thing he stock which sounded very simi- did to-day, he had done a week lar to that of which he had told before. That is a sensation which me. Moreover, the price was very I also have had, and which every much as he had mentioned it; human being has experienced. and the wild idea occurred to me that if happenings were actually "DUT to go back to the story of duplicated, I might possibly ben- -*-* his having been laid up with efit by my knowledge. With great a broken knee. He had no sooner trepidation I invested the whole told me this than I realized that of my savings, which were not I also had had a broken knee very considerable, in these I had a spill on my motor-bicycle shares, and a few days later had —and that I had spent the hours the gratification of selling out at of my leisure pondering the pos- a colossal profit. I explained to sibility of there being another my friend at the next opportu- inhabited planet ! There is a vul- nity what I had done, and he gar expression, frequently met was considerably amused, and with amongst neurotic people, afterwards took an almost child- that they have twin souls. In ish delight in advising me as to very truth this man was my the violent fluctuations in vari- twin soul: was me, had lived my ous stocks. For years I have life, thought my thoughts, per- bought and sold with consider- formed every action which I per- able benefit to myself. Not only formed. The discovery staggered that, but I have been able to me, and I began to fear for my warn Governments of impend- reason ; so I went to London and ing disasters. I informed the

116 FANTASTIC —

Turkish Government of the great differences in their methods of Armenian earthquake, and government, but these differ- warned the Lamborn Shipping ences are not vital. In Neo men Company of the terrible disaster are taught the use of arms, and which overtook one of their larg- receive their guerdon of citizen- est liners—though I was not ship (which I presume is the thanked for my pains. vote) only on production of a “After this had been going on certificate of proficiency. But in for some years, I was prepared the main their lives run parallel to learn that my friend had in- with ours. The very character of curred the enmity of a rich man, their streets, their systems of whom he called Frez on his side, transportation, even their prison and that this had been brought system, are replicas of those on about unwittingly through me. this earth. The main difference, For this is a curious fact: not of course, is that their one lan- everything on this new world is guage is universal. I intend at a three days in advance of ours. later date writing at greater Often it happened that the earth length on the institutions of Neo, was in advance, and I was able, but for the moment it is most in our exchanges, to tell him necessary that I should get down things that were happening here particulars of the machines and which had not yet occurred in apparatus employed by me in Neo, with the result that he fol- communicating with our neigh-

lowed my example, and in the bors. . . space of a year had become a Here followed twenty closely- very rich man. written pages of technical de- scription. Tim folded the man- /^OLSON, as I called him, had uscript and looked around at the ^ a servant, whose name I have astonished faces. Stamford was never learnt; he was called the the first to break the silence. equivalent to ‘helper,’ and I “Preposterous !” he spluttered. guess, rather than know, that he “Impossible! Absurd! . . . It’s is a much younger man than my a nightmare! Another world double, for he said that he had good God!” been to school as a pupil of Col- “I believe every word of it.” son’s. He too learnt quickly; and It was Sir Charles’ quiet voice if there is any difference in the that stilled the agitated lawyer. two worlds, it is a keener intelli- “Of course, that is the speck by gence: they are more receptive, the side of the corona! Not the quicker to grasp essentials. world which poor Colson found, “There are necessarily certain but the moon of that world.”

PLANETOID 127 117 “But couldn’t it be visible at versation he had had before the some time?" cry of the dying servant, and Sir Charles shook his head. the crash of broken instruments, “Not if it followed the exact had brought the voice to an orbit of the earth and was placed abrupt end. directly opposite—that is to say, After the lawyer and the scien- immediately on the other side of tist had departed, he went with the sun. It might overlap at peri- Elsie into the instrument room, ods, but in the glare of the sun and they gazed in silence upon it would be impossible to see so the motionless apparatus. tiny an object. No, there is every “The link is broken,” he said possibility that Colson’s story is at last; “it can never be forged stark truth.” again, unless a new Colson ar- rives on both earths.” E took the manuscript from She slipped her arm in his. H Tim’s hand and read rapidly “Aren’t you glad?” she asked through the technical descrip- softly. “Do you want to know tion. what will happen to-morrow or “With this,” he said, touching the next day?” the paper, “we shall be able to He shivered. get into communication with “No, I don’t think so. But I these people. If we only had the should like to know’ what will vocabulary!” he groaned. happen in a few’ years’ time, “I am afraid you will never when I’m a little older and you’re hear from Neo again, sir,” said a little older?" Tim quietly, and told of that “Perhaps we’ll find a new- brief but poignant minute of con- world of our own,” said Elsie.

THE END

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HE greatest interpreter of his day, isolated in lonely emi- T Mozart who ever lived was nence. He was also quite wealthy, undoubtedly Ernst von Karman. not only from his fees as a con- Beginning, somewhat like his cert artist, and the sales of his own idol, as a music prodigy at stereo-tapes, but from his volu- the age of six, he soon became minous writings on eighteenth not only a virtuoso pianist, but century music in general, and a highly gifted conductor as well. Mozart in particular. At twenty, he had captivated Above all, he acted as a public Europe; at thirty, his fame was relations man for his idol, now world-wide. And now, still under dead almost two hundred years. forty, he was the Toscanini of To those who saw nothing but a

119 !:

simple-minded serenity in the would have topped them all composer, he pointed out the Bach, Beethoven, Brahms.” stormy episodes in the great D One morning, as he sat at his Minor Piano Concerto; the magnificent Bechstein, practis- sweep and power of the G Minor ing Sonata Number 15, in C, his Symphony. If anybody referred fury reached new heights, and to Mozart as “uncomplicated,” slamming those huge, sinewy he was lucky to escape with mi- hands on the keys, Von Karman nor injuries, since Von Karman roared; “I’d sell my soul to the was a husky giant, with long devil for a chance to help Mozart arms and a short temper. I was born too late, damn the “There is more subtlety, depth, luck.” and compassion in the slow There was a faint cough be- movement of nearly any Mozart hind him. concerto than in the whole mass “That won’t be necessary, of dissonant rubbish churned Ernst,” a mild voice said. “Even out since 1900,” Von Karman if the devil dared meddle with a had informed more than one dolt, soul like yours.” usually with a saddle-sized hand Von Karman whirled on the at the victim’s collar. stool. It was his unalterable convic- “Oh, it’s you, Karl. What—out tion that the composer had died of the laboratory so early?” too young to realize the full po- His younger brother, a tal- tentialities of his genius. Von ented if unorthodox inventor, Karman, reading about Mozart’s shared the ten-room house with struggle against poverty and the him—expense free, being penni- thick teutonic skulls of petty less like most of his class—and princes, was not ashamed to experimented in the basement. weep. So far he had taken out eight patents, all for gadgets so com- OR a few pitiful coins,” he plicated nobody could use them. Fwould snarl, “this incompara- None of them, consequently, had ble genius—the man who wrote earned a dime. the world’s only perfect opera, “I may have solved your prob- ‘Don Giovanni,’—might have lem,” Karl said shyly, giving his lived to be as old as Verdi, and brother a warm smile. He was done far better work than that completely devoid of envy, and erratic organ-grinder. Why, his loved Ernst. last compositions are superior to “Nobody can do that,” Von much of Beethoven’s output. In Karman said'moodily. “The past my opinion, Mozart at sixty. is gone; Mozart is dead—killed

120 FANTASTIC ” —

by poverty and stupidity!" he the large, sunny room in his agi- added in a near yell of rage. tation. “But, of course. Karl, you "Ah, but you see,” Karl said, are a genius! I shall go to the “the machine is done. My ma- bank at once, and—” Here he chine—you remember, Ernst. I saw Karl’s head shaking a firm finally solved that last equation negative, and stopped. that was blocking me. An infin- “Our money—American mon- ite matrix— He broke off the ey in 1760?” his brother jibed. explanation, as his brother’s face “Come, Ernst, you should know reddened. Ernst hated mathema- better. You, the eighteenth cen- tics as much as he loved music. tury expert.” “Sorry,” Karl mumbled. He The older man flushed. should have remembered that any technical term from his own ’M a fool—too excited. You are field was a dirty word to Ernst. I right. But what then?” He “But, don’t you see,” he said, was silent a moment. “Wunder- “with this time machine, it may lich!” he cried. “We’ll just get actually be possible, for the first some old money—from a dealer; time, to help Mozart.” say, that coin man; what’s his Ernst was off the stool in a name? Larkin. On Hollywood flash, his eyes shining. Boulevard. Thalers—that’s it.” “You mean I could go back “Maybe.” Karl was dubious. back to 1760? See him; talk to “I don’t think you could ever find him; God, to hear him play enough eighteenth century tha- even touch him! I can’t believe lers for a life annuity, not in it.” 1965.” “You’d better not,” Karl re- “Well, then?” his brother said plied. “Slow down, Ernst. I said impatiently. nothing about sending you back. “You could send some gold.

The machine is far too small ; be- Gold is always good, and doesn’t

sides, I have no idea whatsoever tell where it comes from, or what about its effect on living matter. year.”

It might be dangerous ; even fa- “Now you are wrong,” Ernst tal. Do you think I’d risk your said in triumph. “One cannot life—you, my brother? No, buy gold at all in this country.”

Ernst, what I think is this : Why Karl was unperturbed. not send Mozart some money? “Silver, then,” he said calmly. That, I know my machine can “That, anybody can still buy. do.” You could send Mozart a hun- “Money!” his brother ex- dred, two hundred pounds of claimed, striding up and down pure silver. From that, many

THE MOZART ANNUITY 121 ; — thousands of thalers could be But,” he added gravely, “we minted, I imagine.” must be extremely careful Ernst was thinking hard. about the best time to help Mo- “But this needs careful zart. It shouldn’t be too early or thought,” he said slowly. “It too late in his career. Have you would not due to send so much any idea of the effect?” he de- money to a child, or even a youth manded. “What will happen at yet Mozart should get help while this end, so to speak?” still young and plastic.” “I don’t know,” was the frank “We’ll send it to Leopold, then. reply. “Nobody could say. You His father.” can’t change the past without “Maybe. But again, that might affecting the future. I would not be good. Leopold was honest, guess from the mathematics”— but very ambitious—a man of here Ernst winced “that you great drive. He might try to im- will suddenly become aware, prove the money by investment. with no surprise, as if you had Perhaps it should be out of both always known them, of many their hands. Yes, that would be more Mozart works—sympho- safest.” nies, concertos, chamber music. “Then I have it!” Karl cried. At the same time, probably, all “A bank! Just as today. Put the the reference works will have money in trust—so much a new and different biographies month to the Mozarts, but they and catalogs of the man and his can’t meddle with the capital.” compositions. No doubt certain “A bank,” Ernst repeated. minor things about his contem- “That makes sense.” poraries will also change. But I

“The Hartmanns,” his brother can’t be too positive ; there might said. “We’ll send the silver direct be some kind of a time-lag, just to them—with a note; you could after the money reaches them. write it. The stuff will appear After all, the effects of financial right in their office in—where security are not felt immediately. will it be, Ernst?” But, again, those years are long “I don’t know yet. Vienna, gone.” He shrugged. “I just don’t probably.” know, Ernst; it will have to be “We can trust the Hartmann your gamble.” Bank, isn’t that so?” “All right,” his brother said. “It is certainly so,” Ernst said. “We have to risk it. The main “They built their financial em- problem is still when. Go away pire on trust. They were honest. for a while, and let me figure it And you are right; that is the out I’ll call you when I’ve settled only way to handle the affair. on the time."

122 FANTASTIC ;

WO hours later, they con- 'If your machine really works, Tsulted each other again. what else could go wrong? StiU, “I have decided,” Ernst told just in case something develops, his brother crisply. “Mozart and or if I should be criticized for his father were in trouble even helping Mozart instead of Schu- in 1765. Right after their con- bert or Chopin, I’ll burn all rec- cert tour earlier in that year, ords of the silver transaction.”

Mozart became seriously ill. He So three days later, huddled almost died, in fact. Maybe with- over the machine in the base- out those financial problems, the ment, the two Von Karman boy might not have sickened. brothers watched the stack of And, in that case, it's possible gleaming silver slugs vanish, his life-long health could have along with a carefully worded improved. So therefore, instead note to the Hartmann Bank of of waiting, as some considera- Vienna. tions would suggest, I shall en- “It’s done,” Karl said, his dow both of them, through Hart- voice ringing with triumph.

mann in Vienna, as of January 1, “This is the high point of my 1765. Eh, Karl, what do you life,” Ernst said, his own voice think?” strangely quiet. His brother smiled. * * * “You are the expert here,” he said. “Who am I to question the The greatest interpreter of time. I answer only for my ma- Haydn who ever lived was un- chine.” doubtedly Ernst von Karman.

"Then it’s settled. I’ll buy In addition, he was the foremost enough silver for a good annuity expert on eighteenth century —say one hundred thousand tha- music, generally. Right now, he lers—and you’ll send it to the was revising the article on that Hartmann Bank. I have plenty period in the new edition of of manuscripts from the eight- Groves’ famous Dictionary. At eenth century in my collection: the entry, Mozart, Wolfgang

I’ll write the note on some scrap Amadeus, he frowned. It was a from it. That will tell the banker distressing reminder. What a just how to set up the trust.” pity that after such a brilliant “It might be best to destroy beginning—the clavier pieces all the records at this end imme- the early symphonies—the prod- diately,” Karl said. “In case igy should fold up like a col- there’s any trouble. What we’re lapsed tent. It was probably the doing could be illegal in some fault of that infernal meddler, way.” name still unknown to history,

THE MOZART ANNUITY 123 : who left the Mozarts an annuity. Grimacing with distaste, he Tradition held that the money began to list the later operas of had appeared in the form of sil- Mozart, most of them still fre- ver metal. But whatever its form quently murdered by novice pi- or donor, the result had been to- anists and pop concert conduc- tal disaster. Leopold, so strong tors. In his sprawling hand he and full of integrity, had been wrote completely demoralized by The Burning of Rome wealth, and had ruined his son. Poet and Peasant Instead of fulfilling the golden Invitation to the Dance promise of his childhood, Wolf- In a Chinese Temple Garden gang had become a playboy of Le Beau Danube the eighteenth century, famous Melody in F for his pursuit of pleasure, most- A Hunt in the Black Forest ly feminine. During his long ca- The roll-call of garbage seemed reer—he lived to be ninety-four endless. —Mozart had turned out some Then for one fleeting moment of the worst, and most famous, of deja vue Ernst von Karman potboilers in the history of mu- heard a burst of glorious music, sic. and found himself beginning to Von Karman studied the long write, “Piano Concerto in C Mi- list of compositions again, and nor.” Then he snapped the pen shuddered. To think that Mozart away in annoyance. He must had lived almost a century writ- have been thinking of Rachman- ing such trash, while the mag- inoff or something. How stupid nificent Schubert had died so —a C Minor for Mozart, of all young. Nature had surely blun- people. dered there. THE END

124 FANTASTIC . —

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ACCORDING TO YOU . . . Dear Editor 0Continued from page 7) I am a keen fan of science fic- tion novels and have just read Machina” ending and is most your last fantastic and amaz- reminiscent of the way Poe saves ing of May 1962. Kindly permit his protagonist in his “Pit and me to extend my congratulations the Pendulum.” In the future I to Jesse Roarke and George hope Mr. Young stays away from Whitley on “Ripeness Is All” and this type of ending. “Change of Heart” respectively. Regarding Mr. Patten’s com- I would like to correspond with ments on who should do the cov- your sf readers who are willing ers and interior illustrations, I to hear from me. Due to currency begin to wonder if Mr. Patten regulations it is practically not reads any of the stories or does possible to obtain the “Cross he just look at the art work and World books and periodicals” criticize. If he is so interested in publications of the Russian sf the cover artistry and illustra- books. If any of your readers are tions for the stories, I suggest he willing to exchange them for any go back to reading comic books other articles from here they are which I’m sure will satiate his more than welcome. desire for “ideal illustrations.” A I am also interested in obtain- good cover may attract and pos- ing back copies of fantastic, sibly even persuade a person to amazing and the other old sci- buy a magazine, but after read- ence fiction magazines that are ing it, I’m sure any further pur- now not available here—Planet chases of the magazine will be Comics included. based on its printed contents and I would like to advise all of the quality of those contents and your readers that if they have not on the “pretty” pictures in- these magazines lying about in side the magazine or its “pretty” their attics, here is a person who cover which apparently moti- would treasure them more and vates Mr. Patten’s purchase of a would make an attempt to meet magazine. in some way the postage involved A1 Andriuskevicius in sending them. 2730 Burnside Street T. Retnaraja Detroit 12, Michigan 40, Talan Mastid, • You can’t catch us in the Kuala Trengganu, middle of a fight over the rela- Trengganu, Malaya tive worth of artists and tenters. • We hope some of you will Our aim is to get the best of both correspond with this far away worlds. fan.

126 FANTASTIC Dear Miss Goldsmith: It being apparent to a corre- OVID WAS spondent in your September issue HER MASTER that I am almost a plagiarist, I He Guided Her From feel called upon to offer some de- the First Flirtation to the Ultimate Conquest fense, even though it means ad- rrom- him she learned the mitting something else that does ancient mysteries of love, its unsuspected pleasures. Under little credit: that is, I have me his tutelage her dormant not read “Rasselas.” I thank Mr. womanhood awakened and she became irresistible. Men Bodkin for his perceptive thrust, broke down the doors in sur* render to her will. which makes it incumbent upon Ovid’s ART OF LOVE is now me to fill this gap, and am an- available to those who arc not afraid to try the unusual. ticipating the discovery of just Banned when first published closely Dr. Johnson’s ro- and still hard to get in an how untampered version, the book mance parallels “Ripeness Is All.” tells all in clear unashamed language. Everything is de* I wrote my story, incidentally, tailed from the first approach to the final conquest. It’s as at all consciously with no models old as the oldest love ritual, in mind, though I think I was per- newer than the newest -sex book. Completely illustrated and haps helped somewhat by trans- muted memories of “Pilgrim’s SEND NO MONEY... TRY 10 DAYS Progi-ess’ and the revisiting of BONO BOOK CO.. Dapt. 0*1611 “Erewhon,” not to speak of mat- 43 W. 61st St., New York 33, H. Y. Please send Ovid's THE ART OF LOVE on ters even more obscure. 10-day free trial in plain wrapper. If not pleased, I get my purchase price refunded I wish to record my admiration at once. I enclose SI.98. Send Postpaid. for the apparent, which philos- Send C.O.D. I'll pay postman S1.98 plus postage. ophers seem never to tire of dis- tinguishing from the real. Addr»t< Jesse Roarke City.- - Zone State——— Dear Editor: I just finished the September Fantastic and I liked it very WE ARE GROWING . . . much, except for “New Worlds” and you can grow with us by placing a small classified ad in FANTASTIC'* Shop* which I thought was not worth ping Guide. printing. For as little as $2.50 (25* per word; 10 word minimum) your classified message It seems that Bunch is gaining will be read by more than 50.000 active a following at last. I’m glad to buyers each month. find I’m not alone. Test them today! You'll be delighted with the results! Arnold Katz For complete details, write: 98 Patton Blvd. Martin Lincoln. Classified Advertising Man- ager New Park, N.J. Hyde One Park Avenue. New York 16, New York ACCORDING TO YOU 127 .

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NOW ON SALE ONLY $1.25 The machine was a mass of tangled ivreckage. Another instrument had been smashed and the Professor latj dead beneath the open safe. See PLANETOID 127

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