Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 46 — page 59: what you’re looking at

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

AWTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION want to understand it you'll have to let me tell it from the beginning. All right?’ He saw from Patrick’s face that it was all right. So he started the story. “Before you were born, before your father was born and before the Deep Cities had even been thought of, before the war started, in fact, people were able to spend their time thinking about things other than how to kill their enemies and how to keep themselves alive. Not many of them, perhaps, could get them- selves excited about anything but making money, but some of them could. And one of the things that interested these odd people who were search- ing for knowledge was the fact that right through history there’d been accounts of strange happenings that their scientists couldn’t explain. Forces that could throw things about, break windows and so on, for instance. Or people who could tell what was happening to someone miles and miles away, just . by thinking about them. Even tales of people who could be standing right next to you one moment and the next moment——”’ He made a motion with his hand—“‘gone. Just like that. Then they'd 58 turn up somewhere else and not know what had happened to ’em. “Well, they started investi- gating these things some time in the early part of the last century—yreally investigating them, I mean. They built special colleges where such matters could be studied and where people who thought they had some kind of weird talent could go to be tested. And all that went on right up to the war. And then, of course, it had to pretty well stop. Yes, the war roughed things up for the investigators; and just when they were reaily getting to know something about the things they’d been tackling and worrying over for all that time. But war was war and that was that.” “But what did they find out ?”’ Patrick blurted, unable, this time, to contain himself. ““We’ll come to that after,” Whittam told him, firmly. “Just now I want to explain the pattern of events that led us up to: where we are now.” He looked up at the ceiling, remembering where he had got to in his story, then he went on: ““Once the war started, as you'll know from your history books, everyone started dig- ging out places to hide in when the bigger bombs came. comiclbooks.conn