Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 72 — page 98: what you’re looking at

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

REWARD FOR VALOUR “That’s MacNab, son. And the wonder of it is, it never soured him. At least, not to notice. He ought to be one of the Mr. Bigs, instead of a back hills shuttle bum. But he keeps right on, just the same. I wonder about such a man. If maybe he don’t get real hungry for space, and doing big things. If inside he don’t grieve about things. I wonder about MacNab, son. I wonder a lot.” He fell silent, staring at a shelf of canned concentrates. I walked over to the doorway, and stared off across the bleak and monotonous landscape. “Trouble with MacNab,” the old man resumed to my back, “he don’t talk about himself. If he’d been a blow- hard and a bragger, maybe sometime when news was dull, they'd have picked him up and made a hero of him.” “Could be,”’ I answered. “But he don’t talk. He’s been on this run for over two years, and j’ll bet he ain’t never said fifty words to me. But then, none of us old timers like to talk. I reckon you noticed that.” 97 I grinned out into the land- -scape, and didn’t contradict him. I spat out into the yard at a particularly dry looking lichen. I felt a little sorry for it, and thought I could spare that much moisture. It leapt upon the spittle as a starving cur upon a juicy bone. I almost felt it waggle its leaves at me. The old geezik came up behind me and looked at the plant. “That one has been in the dog house for being too greedy,” he commented. ““But I reckon it’s had enough punishment.” He looked at me closely. “It likes tobacco juice better,” he said re- proachfully. “Long as you was giving it moisture, looks like you might of flavoured it a little.” “By the way,” I asked. “Do you carry stamps?” He changed character on me again. “IT was just about to open up the post office,” he an- swered. He went over to the other side of the store and opened a window by sliding back a panel. “Did I overhear you telling comliclooks.com