Authentic Science Fiction Monthly, No. 66 — page 19: what you’re looking at

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

AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION long drumroll of sound buf- fetted around them. The bomb struck where they would have been. Looking at the cloud, Vaun laughed contemptuously. “They were so confident they didn’t even use atomics.” “Well, it’s no use our going after them in this old crate,’ Calshot said. “‘I don’t like: it." “This means we’re getting somewhere.” Vaun’s eyes blazed. ““The answer is on this planet, somewhere.” They landed the ship, ate a meal and then made con- tact again with Jorgen. The Mayor’s face was pale. He led them on a _ conducted tour of the whole operation going on outside, from the storage bins where the seed was received from last year’s harvest supplies, through to the actual planting machines in the field. Armed guards scowled at them throughout the entire procedure. A mouse couldn’t have broken that ring. 18 “Why didn’t you weed the fields. when the weed first showed ?”” Vaun asked. Jorgen shrugged. “The fields look normal, as you have seen from the tri-dis, until a few weeks before the harvest. Then the blue weed springs up at a fantastic rate of growth. By the time we come to harvest, the good crops are choked out. When the weed flowers——”’ His voice trailed off miserably. His assistant walked across, a yellow paper in one plump hand. The man had an open, intelligent face, clouded now, like all those on Mizrab IV, with the defeatism engendered by this fight against an un- unknown, plague-spreading enemy. “Cable from Mister Rah- ming, sir.” Jorgen took it, nodded and said to the Terrans: “Mister Rahming is expecting to return in two days.” The old firm knew what he meant. At the end of those two days they were expected to have results. Vaun scratched comiclooks.corn