A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, February 1950 — page 11: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

en r = 6S, Sag oa fe com - : ey meek? En Pi ee RL! eee rt ee LES By dre ot se eek ‘THE SMOKING LAND 11 spider by the legs and stroke the fur of its back. That’s all right. It’s quite all right if you happen to be fond of spiders. But I prefer snakes. Spiders and mathe- matics give me the creeps.”’ “Ah, yes, I understand,” said the doc- tor. But I could see that he didn’t. In fact, he went right on. “I can make it perfectly simple, with a diagram and a few elemen- tary equations—”’ “Don't do it, doctor,” said I. “I know that you could make it simple, but it’s no good, Just the way a fellow who has taken the Keeley Cure can detect alcohol, no matter how it’s mixed up and dis- guised, in just the same way I can spot mathematics miles away, wearing a mask and a Spanish sash. It may promise a good time. It may look a good tie. But I spot it at once and get indigestion, and a swimming darkness before the eyes. I’ve been to nerve specialists and psycho- analysts, but they can’t keep me from dreaming about algebra all night. Even fractions I don’t like. I don’t like them, don’t use them, and IJ hate to talk about them. And a decimal point can spoil a whole day for me.”’ “Ah?” said the doctor. “In your case perhaps there has been a stoppage of the naturally developing—however, let that go, The difficulty is that I feel that I must give you an impression of the vast importance of Cleveland Darrell’s work, and without the aid of mathematics, it is a subject which I fear can only be ap- proached incompletely and indirectly.” “Be as incomplete as you like, doctor,” said I. ‘‘As for indirectness, I’m a regular buzzard—lI always fly in circles, You say that Cleve is doing Some great work. I take your word for it. He’s making a ray that will knock the spots out of every ray that ever rayed before. I gather that this ray will turn loose a lot of horsepower, which I understand, and equations, which I don’t. So let’s call it a drawn battle. Cleve is a great man and he’s doing a great work. [ take everything about it for granted. Now let’s whittle the idea down to my own size and tell me what I can do to help.” “T take it,” said Franklin, “that you’re an old friend of Dr. Darrell’s?” “The best friend J ever had,” said I. Beyond the windows the dusk was creeping over the range. Lights were winking in the big ranch house below us. “Cleve Darrell made all that possible,” I told the little doctor. “I’d be just an- other saddle tramp if it wasn’t for Cleve.” I grinned, remembering. “Tell you just how good a friend Cleve was. He used to lick me two times out of three, but before he went away to college, he taught me thg secret. It wasn’t much—just a simplé little thing—but oh, the difference to me| It was only a little uppercut that started out like an apology and wound up like the crack of a whip. The loaded end, if you understand.” i eee doctor gave an embarrassed laugh, such as a man uses when he’s out of his depth and turns to wade for dry land, “As a matter of fact,” said he, “there are certain obliquities in your speech that I don’t quite follow. Perhaps a little more familiarity—” “No,” said I, “study never would do it for you, Doctor Franklin. You could spend your life studying the lingo and never be clear in the use of it, It’s just one of those things that we were talking about —snakes or spiders. And I gather that you’re not at home with snakes.” “No,” said he, “it’s a matter into which I never have gone very deeply. I once wrote a little article on ophidians which—” “Well,” said I, turning a quick corner, “That’s all right too. But let’s get back to Cleve. What can I do for him?” “You can protect him,” said Franklin. I was glad to get the talk down to short sentences like that. ‘Protect him from whaete’ so “From danger. I gather that you’re a man of your hands—even with guns?” “T have used my hands, doctor,” said I. “Though I’ve seen times when I would have preferred to have a club. As for guns —well, I’m a lot more at home with them than I am with theorems and equations.” “Quite so,” says be. “But who in the world could have it in for old Cleve?” said I. “He was always the salt, and as quiet as a mouse until somebody picked on him. Then he could be thorny enough. Has he used his upper- cut on somebody who refuses to forget?” =comi » “ chooks.com ‘ ‘ Sete ances wate og eh ere ok soo ea el oy pee © Se he, a wel ee poate bree th o. ea S