Astounding British Edition, Vol. 9, No. 10 — page 65: what you’re looking at

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

4 LADY WITH A PAST 3° up, frowning introspectively. “Maybe we don’t, Pete; I never understood that be- fore.” She gestured toward the villages gleaming on the distant bayshore in the golden light of the rising sun. “How did it happen, Pete?” “Our world, the way it is? Men can learn from old mistakes, you know. Not everyone was wiped out in the Suicide War. Most of the people in Africa and Australia survived; and there were pro- bably ten million scattered throughout Asia, with another million here. But the planet was wrecked and we had to re- build it or no one could have lived; and we had to work together to do it. Once we got the habit, it was easy. We’ve been working together ever since.” The light of the sun touched the field. As it did, the six receptors emitted a piercing, discordant scream, followed by throbbing drum beats. Hallen listened calmly. Diane held her hands over her ears, her eyes glazing with terror. After a time the din diminished and a resonant voice came from the grid. “We are the invisible power, living un- seen in the sky above. Bow down, you men of Earth, and worship us! Soon we shall come among you, and those who are true in their worship shall have nothing to fear. The rest: we shall grind into dust with the fire of our wrath. Bow down, Earthmen, and worship us!” The exhortation continued repetitively. Laughing, Hallen threw the cylinders far across the field, and greater distance made the voice relatively quiet. “Imagine a voice like that speaking out of nowhere in a village of primitives,” he said to Diane. “Highly effective—if the prognosis of* your psychologists had happened to be right.” “But how could we have been mis- taken?” Her voice was choked and stifled. “What happened in the beginning, Pete?” “There’s a charming legend in our children’s books. On the day the old cities were smashed in the Suicide War, a young Weikec ae of the few survivors —was dazed and half-mad through the mc He was carrying a book, the only whole thing he could find. He looked at the waste and he repeated over and over, “Iwo and two make four; two and two always make four. Didn’t they know that?’ Suddenly someone took his hand. She was a cook from one of the university living houses. “Yassah, boss,’ she said, ‘it sure do. Only trouble is, you ain’t never tol’ us what four means.’ He looked up at her and smiled. In spite of the flaming ruins, he felt confidence while he held her hand. ‘Next time we will,’ he said; ‘next time we will.’” After a silence, Diane asked, “And that’s all?” “That’s all. He was a teacher of mathe- matics, and that’s the way his mind worked—in terms of number logic. He and the woman became the leaders dur- ing the first generation afterward. They created the whole pattern_of our civiliza- tion for us.” “What was the book he found, Pete?” “ ‘Utopia,’ by Sir Thomas More, More- ville’s named after him.” “T’ve read it; we have it on microfilm in Magordo.” Abruptly she drew her pistol and plunged awkwardly to the top of the rocket ramp. She stood panting at the open port. “Stay where you are, Pete. I know what I’m doing.” “But you don’t need to run away, Diane! You saw what happened. The cylinders are harmless.” “But I’m not. I’m the virus of the past. If any of us comes Home, we'll bring the old ideas with us.” “And are we so instable that it would overthrow us?” “All of you, no; a few, yes. In time, that few would multiply into a multitude.” He moved tentatively up the ramp, but she leveled her pistol deliberately. “I’m going back to Magordo, Pete. I'll make sure none of us ever tries to come home again. In two or three generations, it won’t matter. We'll all be feeble-minded Expendables by that time, and as harm- less as a cage full of apes.” “Diane, you're thinking with your emotions, not your mind. You’re men in Magordo, just as we are. You belong here.” | “We're deserters; we ran away when the going got tough.” ' “All that’s over and forgotten. Your people reacted normally in terms of the thinking of their day.” Eomichbooksneo