Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 72 — page 150: what you’re looking at

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

REPLY DEFERRED vast torches, bathing the area in an angry glare. With a pang of conscience, he remembered the little girl and hurriedly glanced to where he had left her at the foot of the dune. To his dismay she was not there. Frantically he searched for her, calling her name, but she had vanished. Then he saw her little figure silhouetted against the glare on the top of the dune. She must have heard him, be- cause she turned and called back. “They are hurting my ball- ball.” Then she disappeared down the far side. When he reached the place where she had been, the child was running away from him across the blood-red beach. Toward her from the far end, moving in a strange, rolling motion, came the sphere. Sommers leaped down the dune waving his arms and yelling. His throat was so tight he could only produce a croak, but he kept on running. Off to the left confusion had broken out. Men were shout- ing, ammunition exploding and everywhere a sea of flame. He did not notice that the firing had stopped; not that it would make any difference now. He had to catch Katey before the thing got her. He was overtaking her fast, but the tiny figure kept on running. She was not more than twenty paces from the sphere. Then a rock snarled his foot and sent him sprawl- ing. Winded and frantic, he shook the sand from his face and struggled up. Katey had stopped and the thing was almost on top of her. Sommers let out a cry of despair, then stood still, swaying, his mouth open in astonishment. The sphere halted in front of the little girl and seemed to roll forward, the antenne arching over her. “Oh, poor ball-ball,” she cried. ““Were they nasty to you?’ The things she held in her hands glinted in the flickering light as she raised them to the top of the sphere —then she laid them down. At once they seemed to melt into the grey surface and were gone. The sphere rolled 149 comcloooks.comn