Astounding Science Fiction (British Edition), August 1944 — page 40: what you’re looking at

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

38 He countered me sternly. “What do you do in the Chamber of the Guild?” “I know nothing of any guild. Where is the boy?” He looked at me again a long instant. “He is in this room.” I started, then gazed eagerly about. “Here, now—?” Something like a rough chuckle issued from the grim face. “Now now. In the past. Your past.” This made no sense. “What do these words mean,” I said. “How can someone be present in the past?” His dark features scowled. “Those of the Gammadion ask questions. They do not answer’ them. I am the Second of the Guild. Better you should give me aid in finding those I seek.” “I tried another gambit. Whatever else he was, this man was human, with human re- actions. “You seek someone, then?” “TI seek the renegade three, and now that we have the ship again, they shall not escape us. The marks on the arc tell true; this be one of their ports of entry.” , “TI will help you.” I was bolder, now. “But first—if I do, will my friend come back?” He looked down his big nose at me. “The Guild bargains with no man, in any age. Yet—there are things even we know not of. What place is this?” “Does my friend return?” Instinctively, I knew his promise would be a true promise. He stared at me. “Aye,” he said, finally. “If we find the three. Again, what place is this?” “Munich.” “Still Munich, even yet! And the*year— that of Our Lord one thousand nine hundred and—what?”’ I told him, and he pursed his bearded lips, muttering to himself. Suddenly he chuckled again, thrust out a rough, red paw and seized my own right hand. His own hand was warm and powerful. “Feel, oh man of my future, the hand of a man of your past.” Again his harsh chuckle. “More than seven centuries lie be- twixt flesh and flesh of us, and we span them with a handclasp.” Then, at the look on my face, he laughed like a pleased child who has astonished an elder, but when I said nothing—lI could not—he misinterpreted it. He dropped my hand. “You do not believe,” he said, harshly. He was right at that moment. I did not. ASTOUNDING SCIENCE-FICTION I had heard of time-machines, or read of them. Who would believe in them? And yet—I thought of Schmidt. Where was Schmidt? In this very chamber, the man who called himself the Second of the Guild, had said. In this same room, but in another time. I had heard theories—the idea that everything that ever happened is always happening— I spoke to the man. “I am not so ignorant of the past as you think.” I paused, to let the statement sink in. “On this same spot, or near by, in the year forty-nine, the forces of Germanicus Caesar fought a great battle with the Suevi. If you possess this power as you claim’—I caught my breath and went on—“doubtless you could visit that battle, bring a token of it here?” His eyes and nostrils seemed to dilate. With anger? I could not tell. I went on: “If the boy is here in this room, as you say, then by the same token, the battle with the Suevian hordes is likewise in this room.” He gave me a strange look. “Very well, man of the future,” he said. A stride or two, and he stood in the ship again, facing me. Bending, he touched the tiller, moved it on the quadrant. This time, it was quicker; hardly had the same eerie, confined spate of sound swelled up within the vessel, like voices in a room heard by one on the outside, than there was a small puff of air, and I blinked. Man and ship had vanished, utterly. | I waited; the minutes dropped away. Had I asked wisely? Now I was alone again. Suppose the ship did not return? Then my one tie to poor little Schmidt would be gone. Was that the meaning of the strange look he had given me? | | There was another minute gust of air, and man and ship stood there again before my eyes. The dark-robed figure stepped from the vessel and approached me. “Do you believe now, man of the future?” Suddenly he brought his right hand up, almost in my face, and held before my eyes a short, ugly, two-edged sword, the blade tapering to a squat point. Half its length was redness—wet and shining, and as I looked, a crimson drop fell from the point to the floor. “The blood of a Suevian warrior.” His voice was calm. “They fought bravely, then —and fiercely.” He threw the sword from him and it rang against the stones of the floor. It was the short-sword of a Roman legionary, the famed weapon that won half Comicbooks CO