Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 71 — page 149: what you’re looking at

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

AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION socket on the ship’s hull, fastening the other end to his belt. For a long minute he estimated the angle of the wretched Harry’s fall, then with a nasty tightening of his stomach he said to the silent Dick: ‘ll drop below him and try to pick him up. I hope to Heaven there’s enough rope! Give me one good -shove—and don’t let this rope come loose.’ ”’ Graves paused to light a long, slender cigar. “‘Now that took guts. Maybe you two think it takes a lot of courage anyway to leave Earth at seven miles a second in the first place, but I can tell you it took a very special form of courage to allow Tom to leap off that ship with noth- ing but a long length of rope between him and a potential murderer. ‘Did he fall or was he pushed’ didn’t come into it, Tom knew, where Harry was concerned. A tossed rope would have brought him back in a minute if Dick had cared to throw it immediately the ‘accident’ happened. “Dick, apparently valuing his own skin and the pilot’s, as an indirect means of returning them both to Earth, gave his full attention from then on to the rescue. The ropes were long enough and Tom did manage to grab Harry in passing, and Dick hauled them both back to the safety of their tiny air-filled world a few million miles from the rainbow’s end. “‘Harry was as sick as a dog as soon as they got him back through the airlock, so they shoved him on his bunk while Tom took the sullen Dick back with him outside to finish the repairs. When all was as safe as they could make it—and it was several hours before Tom was satisfied— they found Harry had re- covered, cleaned himself up and prepared some food. *“Tom didn’t know what to do about the incident. It was one thing to be certain in his own mind that murder had been intended, but there was only Harry’s word for it, and accidents, genuine ones, are only too frequent in space. And the two men seemed definite about an inquest on the matter when he tackled it. 148 conmiclsooks.conn