Authentic Science Fiction Monthly, No. 67 — page 9: what you’re looking at

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

AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION veils, and went into her routine. I turned away in disgust to find Harry staring at me. He raised his eyebrows. “I had a mother,” I ex- plained. ““You were saying?” “If you think the Belt’s so bad then why do you stay?” ““Why do you?” He nodded, as if I’d an- swered his question, and looked around at the crowd. They were so intent on the floor-show that he could have committed murder and no one would have noticed. Even then he wasn’t satisfied. He jerked his head at me and slipped from his stool. “Tm going. I’d like you to come with me.” “Why ” did “To talk.”’ He smiled. “To find out why, if you think the Belt’s so bad, you haven’t done anything about it.” He moved off then, thrusting his way through the crowd and, after a couple of seconds, I followed him. He led me to Ku Fei’s. Ku Fei was a Eurasian 8 who had grown rich selling dreams. His pipe palace was known all over the seventh decant and he imported his stuff direct from Earth. Good stuff, too, top-grade opium from the poppy fields of China and, in a way, he was a craftsman at his trade. I stopped outside the door and stared at Harry. *““What’s the idea?” “I want to talk to you. If you know a more private place let me know. If you don’t, follow me and keep quiet.” He had a point there. Privacy, in the cramped quar- ters beneath the dome, was at a premium. The walls were thin, the place was crowded, and no one knew when a whisper might be picked up and amplified by a trick of acoustics. I was remembering all that as I followed Harry into the pipe palace. A doorman, a Jap or a Chinese—I wouldn’t know the difference—bowed and hissed at us as we entered. That was the only homage he paid to comicbooks.conn