Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 71 — page 9: what you’re looking at

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

Pa: poe AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION “T wonder he had the nerve to be the one to tell us,”’ Hawkin growled. ‘‘He’s the navigator, isn’t he?” “That was one thing I wanted to talk to you about. It’s ridiculous to blame Shaw. You won’t find Souness doing it, or the Crispins, or me. And we should know.” “He took a chance he didn’t have to take, didn’t he ?” “On Earth,” said Winter carefully, ““you might want to sail from Cape Town to Melbourne. You could do it the safe way—round Africa, along the Indian coast, down among the East Indies, and round Australia, hardly ever out of sight of land. And if the boat sank on any day but three or four, you could always swim ashore. But no- body does it that way. They go straight—less than half the distance, and less than a quarter the time. If the boat does sink, you may be sorry you didn’t go round the coast —but you don’t blame the navigator.” He saw he had made some ‘sort of impression, so without adding detail he strolled to the door and left them. He tapped on Esther Max- well’s door, and the eager “Come in!” showed how Esther’s hopes at the knock had leaped toward safety. He set his expression to kill the hope as he entered. They were the inevitable team, Esther tall and fair, Marjory small and dark, and the contrasts seemed to follow dutifully right through. Esther had started to dress, but with her pyjama top changed for a blouse had realised how little it mattered. Neither of them wore any makeup or had brushed her hair. Soon, however, habit would reassert itself and Esther would realise she had put on a soiled blouse, and they would join the others looking like a couple of film stars again. He said almost exactly what he had said to the miners. The first difference came when Marjory asked: “Will it be very bad?” He stared at her, still ab- sorbed in the effort to explain that Shaw wasn’t to blame. conmiclsooks.con