A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, February 1950 — page 79: what you’re looking at

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

THE SMOKING LAND 79 He told me to put one on, and I was only too glad to. I got my doublet off, put the cuirass next to my shirt, and dressed again, while he was doing the same. He did not heed to tell me that there was the worst sort of danger and trouble ahead. When a man puts on armor, there is only one reason for it. He expects steel or bullets or both to be coming his way before long. “What is this stuff, Cleve? Is it fossil- ized something or other?” “Tt was made a century or so ago by one of the wisest of the Wise Men,”’ said Darrell. ‘‘Apparently he used a vegetable fiber, which he pressed almost to the con- sistency of wood. And then he worked on that vegetable substance in a way that no one understands today. By impregnat- ing the fibers, he finally turned out what you see, It’s light as wood, and as strong as steel—a good deal stronger than any steel I know about. A five-thousand ton ship, armored with this stuff properly, could laugh at allsthe big guns, and sub- marine mines, and airplane bombs in the world. But so far, these people never have been able to duplicate the work of the old fellow who made these. He died before he could communicate his secret process to anyone. They've tried for generations, day and night, to rediscover the process.” “But what about you? Have they been watching you?” “Every minute.” “Not-when I was there with vou.” “They wanted to tempt me into talk- ing; but even though there was no one in the room, I was being watched from every side.” “Do they suspect that you're holding out on them?” “T don’t know,” said Darrell, “I don’t think so. If they really did, they'd torture me until I died to tear the process out of me. I've grown white, I’ve turned into an old man, Smoky, in fear of that time of torture. I've prayed until my heart ached for the courage to stand the strain, when it comes. Becatise it stirely zezl come, and then if I give way, I’ve—destroyed the whole of civilization.” I reminded him that I had seen one of the cuirasses before, and he told me about the fugitive I had met to the south. “He was one of the guards. About two years ago he displeased one of the Wise Men, and he was slated to be flogged until the skin was flayed from his body.” I shuddered. “Is that one of their standard punishments?” “They are devils, pure and simple. They've lived as autocrats and tyrants for ‘too many centuries for the other people of the Smoking Land to rise against them.” “Have the people ever tried that?” I asked. 66 S. Only four or five years ago, I believe, there was a revolt. Half the men of the land were up in arms. But it was no good. They got as far as the inner rooms of the Wise Men, where they were killed like bugs by a neat little elec- trical device that I was shown once. I heard that when the poor devils tumbled over, there were actual wisps of smoke curling from their blackened flesh. “The Wise Men are the most arrogant and complacent blackguards I ever saw or heard of, and the only real spice of life to them is to plan what devils they'll turn loose on the sleeping world to the south— and to torture the lower classes up here in the Smoking Land, They use the god- dess as a naine to hide behind. They make the priestess their tool” “She wouldn’t stand for it,” I declared. “Not Sylvia!” “T don’t mean that the priestess is cor- rupt,”’ said he. “T simply mean that she’s worked on through suggestion. Her mind is made to work along the train of thought they want. You see?’ I nodded. “Well,” he went on, ‘‘the half white you met was a bold fellow, and when he heard of the sentence which had been imposed on him, he stole one of these cilitasses, and then ran. I don’t know ‘how he got through. But he was all iron and able to stand anything, I suppose. There was a terrible commotion here about it. They sent out the sky ships to hunt for him. And the fellow who was interested in having him punished fell into such a fury of sulky rage because the poor devil had got away, that he had to go to bed, very sick.” “Why, Cleve,” said I, “they must be ghouls!” I remembered how that run- + i SAK