Authentic Science Fiction Monthly, No. 65 — page 124: what you’re looking at

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

THE CREEP She wasn’t, he decided as ‘, he watched her cross the , Cas The mink, the expensive hair-do and the elegant walk combined to give the im- pression that she was a thoroughbred. Sam had seen too many imitations to be deceived. But he couldn't see any harm in playing the game her way. He got up, pulled out a chair for her and bowed her into it with exaggerated courtesy. ‘““You’re a louse,”’ she said as she sat down. ““Sam Garnet, you’re a stinking, no-good louse.” “You’re drunk,” he an- swered, and was amazed to see_tears welling up in her She blinked the tears away and said: “I wish I was. Until your broadcast this morning, I had a comfortable present and the promise of a rosy future. Now I’ve noth- ing but a lousy past and what good is that to anybody? That’s what you did today, Sam Garnet—you wiped out the future for everybody, soured the present and left only the useless past.” 123 **T told the truth.” “Ye Gods, he told the truth! You’ve been a lying louse since ever I can re- member, from the first time I saw your ugly face on the news screen, and before that when you were a hack inkman. What good did it do to tell the truth? Everybody knew it, anyway. Why confirm it? If a man has cancer, he may guess at it and be worried and unhappy. He may suffer a lot of pain. But as long as his fear hasn’t been confirmed by a doctor he can put up with the pain in the hope that it won’t be there tomorrow. Tell him the truth, confirm it for him, and you take away his future.” ‘‘There are some men who would prefer to know,”’ said Sam. “Some say they would. Very few are strong enough to live with the truth.” “T didn’t invent the facts. The world has two hemis- pheres £3 Don’t do it all over again. I know the facts by heart. So does everybody else. Sam Garnet told them. comiclooks.comn