A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, April 1950 — page 58: what you’re looking at

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

: _Tott. fairly shouted. 58 A. MERRITT’S FANTASY door open the sound ceased utterly, and, search as he would, he could find nothing in the room to account for it. For a moment or two he stood there, staring around helplessly. ; He got his automatic pistol out of the wardrobe, and with a round in the cham- ber and the safety catch off went all over the flat, vainly as far as accounting for the purring sound was concerned. Then. knowing that Tott was waiting, he slipped the pistol into his hip pocket, stuffed into an attaché-case pyjamas and what else he would need, and added two spare magazines for the pistol, loaded with eight rounds apiece, before closing the case and bearing it down the stairs to his car. CHAPTER 11 The Red Sea took the seat in the Rolls-Bentley next to Gees. “I was just giving you up!” he exclaimed, and sat paralyzed as Gees’ car darted into movement, shot past a taxi, dived between a big Daimler and a truck, and came out ahead of the three miraculously —in Tott’s opinion — un- ] ee Tott chmbed in and ~ scathed. “Whew,” Tott breathed, after an event- less two hundred yards or so, “J haven't had any experience of your driving, till now.” told him equably. Again Tott held his breath—and the side of the car as well. He said, a little later, “There is a thirty-mile limit for all -London.” “With you aboard, I can forget it,” Gees told him, “and I’ve got to make up that fifteen minutes I kept you waiting.” Tott said: “You’d better—” and then exchanged speech for silent prayer, know- ing that the truckload of iron girders bear- ing down on them would grind him so small that eggspoons would be needed for scraping him off the street. When an- other miracle had put the truck behind them Gees said: “‘That’s what I am do- _ ing—can’t you see?” “Bum-bub-better keep that limit!” “Tf you don’t, Vil _fun you in and charge you myself,” “T thought you were in a hurry,” Gees Not another word was exchanged be- tween them until, far beyond Uxbridge and its speed limits, Tott said, “Eighty- five Suppose a car shot out of any of those crossroads we’ve passed ?”’ Gees answered: “How did you manage to get posted to this case? Did Gloucester- shire ask for a Scotland Yard man to give it the once-over ?” Tott glared at him. “T’m not posted to it, I’m on leave, til) next Monday.” Gees slowed for the long. long speed limit through Wycombe. and asked, cas- ually: “What’s your view of the whole business ?” ‘What's vours?” Tott snapped. “Ama- teur deductions are always interesting.” “Well, I told you you’d be surprised, but I’d better go back first. A very long way back of this case. From the earliest ages, from long before the beginnings of history, man has made gods for himself,” Gees said. ‘Gods within his comprehen- - sion, most of the time. Created them, say, out of belief and sacrifice. The belief gave them influence over the mass of their war- shippers, and the sacrifices gave them a sort of semi-material strength. You get an example of this—in the tenth plague as recorded in Genesis, the slaughter of all the firstborn of Egypt.” “T would very much like to know what you think you’re talking about,” Tott ob- served, very sourly indeed. “The beginning of one,” Gees answered “Yes. It must be obvious that that slaughter of the firstborn of Egypt wasn’t the work of the universal Power we are beginning today to recognize as the source and ruler of all life. The real God wouldn't go in for wholesale murder of his creatures and bring mourning into thousands of homes just to let a horde of Israelites loose to go and do more whole- sale slaughter in their promised land. Oh, no! “By beligh in their Jehovah, the collec- tive belief of many thousands of people, and by sacrifices to him, those same Israel- ites created an actual Jehovah and gave him tremendous power. And you'll find lots of tales in the Old Testament of how the said Jehovah got angry and ran amok, as long as their collective belief and con- tinual sacrifices kept him strong enough — com KE OD <i a= SR pea z —