Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 71 — page 32: what you’re looking at

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

THE LITTLE CORPORAL energy on light, like a man on horseback, did he achieve what he wanted. Then. ..a good searchlight on Mars can reach Earth. What matter if it is only a pinpoint visible in perfect conditions through a telescope? The light reached Earth. And so did the field of madness. It was perfect. It was exactly what Barker needed. It was the most hideous, most power- ful weapon ever devised. It gave him at once the power he needed. But that was only what everyone knew. What only he and Winter, at first, knew was that it was not neatly enough. It could be beaten. Light could be _ stopped, shielded. Barker had built his second Empire on a terrible weapon, but one which would not save it. And then, at last, Winter knew he could trust Barker. Winter had sometimes won- dered why no one had noticed that all-revealing factor in the Second War. Barker used his weapon to kill millions, men, women and children, with shallow explanations of the fact that Barker had not swept Earth and Venus with such devastation that surren- der would have been auto- matic? For they were. They believed that Barker was not — as cruel as they had thought; that an emperor must have something to rule; that Barker had waited too long; that — there had been sabotage— anything but the truth, which was that Barker would kill millions without a qualm, but had never had any intention of destroying the Earth-Venus Alliance. The madness weapon went on being perfect. Once it was in operation, Barker had only to pretend to lose a battle gracefully. His ships killed whole cities, a careless beam from Mars destroyed more life than all his ships. And when Earth was duly warned, the beam from Mars enfolded Earth fully for the first time. The toll was still enormous, but nine out of ten people were screened by this time, and no one saw that Barker had planned that, too. It was easy to make the war costly and still lose it. = but not to rule the system. _ Why were people satisfied 31 — ‘conmiclaoolks.cohn