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  THE MAGAZINE OF

  FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION

  March/April * 61st Year of Publication

  * * * *

  NOVELETS

  AMOR FUGIT by Alexandra Duncan

  STAR-CROSSED by Tim Sullivan

  WAITING FOR THE PHONE TO RING by Richard Bowes

  CLASS TRIP by Rand B. Lee

  SHORT STORIES

  FORT CLAY, LOUISIANA: A TRAGICAL HISTORY by Albert E. Cowdrey

  MAKE-BELIEVE by Michael Reaves

  EPIDAPHELES AND THE INSUFFICIENTLY AFFECTIONATE OCELOT by Ramsey Shehadeh

  THE FROG COMRADE by Benjamin Rosenbaum

  THE FAIRY PRINCESS by Dennis Danvers

  BLUE FIRE by Bruce McAllister

  DEPARTMENTS

  EDITORIAL by Gordon Van Gelder

  BOOKS TO LOOK FOR by Charles de Lint

  BOOKS by Elizabeth Hand

  PLUMAGE FROM PEGASUS: THROW THE BOOKS AT THEM! by Paul Di Filippo

  FILMS: A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY by Lucius Shepard

  SCIENCE: THE WILD BLUE YONDER by Pat Murphy and Paul Doherty

  COMING ATTRACTIONS

  CURIOSITIES by Rick Norwood

  Cartoons: Danny Shanahan, Arthur Masear, Bill Long, J. P. Rini.

  COVER ART BY TOMISLAV TIKULIN. FIRST PUBLISHED ON AFTER THE WAR BY TIM LEBBON (SUBTERRANEAN PRESS).

  GORDON VAN GELDER, Publisher/Editor

  BARBARA J. NORTON, Assistant Publisher

  ROBIN O'CONNOR, Assistant Editor

  KEITH KAHLA, Assistant Publisher

  HARLAN ELLISON, Film Editor

  JOHN J. ADAMS, Assistant Editor

  CAROL PINCHEFSKY, Contests Editor

  The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (ISSN 1095-8258), Volume 118, No. 3 & 4, Whole No. 688, March/April 2010. Published bimonthly by Spilogale, Inc. at $6.50 per copy. Annual subscription $39.00; $49.00 outside of the U.S. Postmaster: send form 3579 to Fantasy & Science Fiction, PO Box 3447, Hoboken, NJ 07030. Publication office, 105 Leonard St., Jersey City, NJ 07307. Periodical postage paid at Hoboken, NJ 07030, and at additional mailing offices. Printed in U.S.A. Copyright © 2010 by Spilogale, Inc. All rights reserved.

  Distributed by Curtis Circulation Co., 730 River Rd. New Milford, NJ 07646

  GENERAL AND EDITORIAL OFFICE: PO BOX 3447, HOBOKEN, NJ 07030

  www.fandsf.com

  CONTENTS

  Department: EDITORIAL by Gordon Van Gelder

  Novelet: AMOR FUGIT by Alexandra Duncan

  Department: BOOKS TO LOOK FOR by Charles de Lint

  Department: BOOKS by Elizabeth Hand

  Short Story: FORT CLAY, LOUISIANA: A TRAGICAL HISTORY by Albert E. Cowdrey

  Novelet: STAR-CROSSED by Tim Sullivan

  Short Story: MAKE-BELIEVE by Michael Reaves

  Novelet: WAITING FOR THE PHONE TO RING by Richard Bowes

  Short Story: EPIDAPHELES AND THE INSUFFICIENTLY AFFECTIONATE OCELOT by Ramsey Shehadeh

  Department: PLUMAGE FROM PEGASUS by Paul Di Filippo

  Short Story: THE FROG COMRADE by Benjamin Rosenbaum

  Short Story: THE FAIRY PRINCESS by Dennis Danvers

  Department: FILMS: A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY by Lucius Shepard

  Department: SCIENCE: THE WILD BLUE YONDER by Pat Murphy & Paul Doherty

  Short Story: BLUE FIRE by Bruce McAllister

  Novelet: CLASS TRIP by Rand B. Lee

  Department: FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION MARKET PLACE

  Department: CURIOSITIES: BEWARE THE CAT, by William Baldwin (1533)

  Department: COMING ATTRACTIONS

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  Department: EDITORIAL by Gordon Van Gelder

  The annual World Fantasy Convention is an event I try never to miss. I also try never to bore all of you with convention reports, but this year's WFC had several events I think are worth sharing.

  The greatest event of all took only an hour—it was a panel discussing F&SF's sixtieth anniversary. The hour proved to be too short and we wound up talking mostly about our magazine's first thirty years. Dick Lupoff drew on his years of friendship with the Bouchers and with Annette Pelz (McComas) to tell everyone about such things as the 1949 launch party for F&SF, where Basil Rathbone drew upon his immense thespic skills and spoke mellifluously for some time, earning a rousing ovation...after which everyone turned to their tablemates, only to discover that no one had actually made sense of what Mr. Rathbone said. (It was suggested that the great actor might have had a drink or two beforehand.)

  We also spoke at length of cofounding editor J. Francis McComas, about whom few people seem to know much—even folks who'd met him, like Ron Goulart and Bob Silverberg, had little to offer. Fortunately, I've been in touch recently with a woman named Maria Alonzo who happens to be McComas's grandniece. She has been tracking down this lost relative of hers and her path took her to F&SF, and she has some pieces of the puzzle that was his life. I hope to bring you soon a short article by her about “Mick."

  The other panelists included Nancy Etchemendy, who would have contributed more had we been able to discuss the ‘80s and ‘90s at greater length, and Grania Davis, who had wonderful anecdotes about life in the early ‘60s, when her husband Avram Davidson edited F&SF from his home in Mexico for $25 a month. (That's five times your current editor's salary, in case you're wondering.) The days before faxes, email, IMs, and FedEx might seem unreal to some readers, but Grania remembered for us what it was like to wait hours to use the one phone in town so Avram could call in corrections to the home offices of Mercury Press. Support Your Local Postal Worker Day was the most important holiday in her life back then.

  Audience members included a writer who had made his first sale to F&SF in 1964 and another who made his first sale in 2006. And perhaps there were people in the audience whose work will be appearing here in 2011 or beyond.

  Speaking of which, the weekend was one in which this editor felt the hands of time click forward. There were a couple of young men and women who claimed to be the adult versions of children I've known during my editorial career, but I was not deceived by such impossibilities (not even when they offered convincing remarks like, “I'm as tall as you now"). I was, however, tickled by the woman who, on meeting me, asked if my father had been an editor also. It seems that she had submitted stories to the editor of F&SF a decade ago and in her mind's eye, its editor was a graybearded veteran, so I couldn't possibly be the same person. It still astounds me to think that I've held the reins here for more than an eighth of a century.

  Assistant Editor John Joseph Adams made it known that after his own term of eight years as “the Slush God,” he's moving on to take the helm of a new Webzine called Lightspeed. These bigger bimonthly issues we're publishing now still aren't large enough to hold all the gratitude I feel for John and his invaluable contributions to F&SF over the years. I'm eager to see what he does with his own magazine and I wish him Godspeed with Lightspeed.

  As usual, there was plenty of fretting about print and the future of the printed word, but after sitting through the awards ceremony, and then afterward listening to the judges describe the judging process, I came away from the weekend thinking that the literature of the fantastic is in pretty good sha
pe overall. Reading through a big stack of submissions on the flight home only deepened my conviction. Stick around to see what I found in that pile.

  —Gordon Van Gelder

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Novelet: AMOR FUGIT by Alexandra Duncan

  Alexandra Duncan made her F&SF debut with “Bad Matter” in our Dec. 2009 issue. Her new story is a lovely tale steeped in mythology.

  In the soft space when the sun dips behind the trees and crickets fill the shadowed grass with their high metal voices, my mother and I ready our lanterns. Sunset is the vigil hour. My mother wraps herself in a heavy woven shawl, purple like the mountains looming to the west of our cottage. Fireflies bob and flicker over our wheat field. Our mouser takes up his post on top of the garden gate, regarding us with his bright stare. A crisp, early autumn breeze moves over the wheat. I shiver in my white linen chiton and rub my arms for warmth.

  "There,” Mother says, pointing.

  I squint into the dim. Yes, there. I catch a hint of movement along the brambles at the edge of our wood. I breathe in, letting the darkening air fill my mouth, lift my lungs. Dusk tastes sour honey sweet. Sweet because the fading light means my father is making his way to us through the far-off wood. Sour because my mother will snuff out her lantern and leave me alone as soon as he comes into sight.

  When I was a child, I would stand at the window and cry to see the sun go down.

  I am too old for that now.

  Mother opens the hinged glass door of her lantern and blows out the flame. In the moment before the light goes out, I see sadness written deep around her eyes and mouth. It's not the kind of sadness that makes her sullen and snappish at her work, or stare wistfully across the fields. It's something else. The only time I think I might have felt something like it was when our first mouser died. He was yellow like saffron and liked to rub against my legs when I fed him bits of meat. I called him Rumbler, for the sound he made in his throat when I was near. I have since learned not to name our farm animals.

  Mother squeezes my hand. I don't look as she sets down her lantern and steps backward into the night. It's easier that way, like looking away when she pricks the soft side of my arm with a lancet for inoculations. I try not to listen to the receding shuffle of her footsteps and concentrate instead on picking out the glimmers of light reflecting from my father's belt, the hilt of his hunting knife, the metal clasps on the shoulders of his traveling cloak. They flash in the moonlight as he approaches, like little stars moving through our fields. He has reached the foot of the hill leading up to our house. With one hand he supports a dead stag, slung across his shoulder. I know I should stand still to welcome him, like a dignified girl who is studying to become a woman, but I break into a run. The lantern swings beside me and my skirt flaps like a flag as I careen down the path. He meets me halfway, holding out his free arm and pulling me into a fierce hug.

  "Ourania.” Father breathes out my name as if he's been holding it in with his breath all day.

  I don't say anything, but bury my face into his shoulder, like a little girl. He smells of sweat, crushed leaves, and animal blood, and his cloak is rough against my nose.

  We walk up to the cottage, hand in hand. I kneel by the hearth and start a fire with my flints while he hangs the stag's carcass in the cellar. I set out a basin of warm water and a clean cloth so he can wash the blood and dirt from his arms. When he is clean and we are sitting at the table for our simple meal of bread, cheese, soup, and wine, he asks what he always asks.

  "Did your mother leave any words for me?” His face goes still and his shoulders tense as he waits for my answer, as if everything turns on what I might say.

  I pick up my wine cup and take a swallow. I don't like the way the drink dries my tongue, but I like that Father doesn't try to water it for me, the way Mother does. “She says to tell you she mended your heavy cloak, so it's ready for winter. We killed a rabbit and she added its fur at the collar. She thanks you for the meat."

  Father smiles to himself and takes a long drink. When he sets his cup down, his face is flushed. He's still smiling, and little points of light glitter in the folds of his eyes. I pick up my spoon and blow into my bowl to cool the broth. We both fall quiet for a time, focused on our food, making ourselves accustomed to each other's presence again after the long day apart. Later, he will tell stories by the hearth until our fire sinks down to an embered glow.

  * * * *

  Long ago, when Day was a young woman, she blazed across the sky with little care in her heart. When she laid her head down to rest, the world became dark. When the time came for her to bring light to the world, she warmed everything, from the heath balds to the ocean deeps. Her only joy came in giving warmth.

  But one night, she turned to look back into the dusk, and caught sight of a man. His robe was white and glistening like sun-warmed ice, his strong arms the pale blue of milk after the cream has been skimmed away, and his hair coiled and curled around his brow in midnight waves. This man was Night. He lifted his eyes, bright as two stars, and found her watching him.

  They each left their paths and went to one another. Day fed her light to Night, Night offered up his cool for Day to sip, and they found how they curved together to form a whole. Thus Day and Night first knew love.

  * * * *

  I wake with the sun on my face and the smell of fresh bread and olive oil hanging in the air. The mouser is curled up next to my feet at the end of my cot. I shove him off the bed and force myself up. The sun is high and hot already, and my head aches from too much wine. I've let myself sleep past dawn. I've missed Father's parting. Mother had no one to greet her. The goats will be sullen and stubborn when at last I get around to milking them. I pull on my ear in frustration and hurry to wrap my chiton around myself, stepping quickly toward the kitchen.

  Mother's face shines with sweat, but she smiles to herself as she pulls a loaf of bread from our stone oven on a long, wooden board. She must have passed within a hand's breadth of Father as he was parting, in the confusion between night and dawn a heavy mist can cause. She straightens and slides the bread onto the table for cutting. A pail of cool milk rests on the center board.

  "Why did you let me sleep so late?” I ask. Petulance sneaks into my voice. She's only being kind, giving me a morning off from my chores.

  "You looked so peaceful.” Mother rests her hands on her hips. She's tucked the hem of her long skirts up into her waistband to keep them out of the fire and I can see the broad arch of her calves, thick and strong from walking. I wonder where her trek takes her each night. Does she always make for the same place or does she wander? Does she rest? She must. But when, and where?

  Mother slices the bread and lays a plate of it on the table, next to a shallow bowl of spiced olive oil. She wipes her hands clean on a broadcloth, pours a small measure of wine into two mugs, and tops them off with water. She slides one to me and sits down at the table with the other.

  "Drink up,” she says, sipping from her mug and reaching for a slice of bread to dip into the olive oil.

  I wrinkle my nose at my own cup. I know the wine is for killing disease in the water, but my tongue curls at the slight, familiar bitterness of it. I sop my bread in oil and bite off a big, crackling chunk to scrub the taste from my mouth.

  Mother has me practice my Latin as we weed the garden. We bend our backs under the heat of the late morning sun, yanking invading threads of root from the spaces between the arugula, spinach, and tomatoes. Mother kneels in the dirt and calls out infinitive verbs over their leafy heads.

  "Colere,” she calls. She winds the stem of a prickly weed around her gloved hand and tugs.

  "Colere,” I repeat, then string out the conjugation. “To cultivate. Coleo, coleas, coleat, coleamus, coleatis, coleant.” A bead of sweat drips over my eyebrow and lands on one of the flowering yellow weeds that try to take over our garden each year. I rip it out and toss it in my compost pail.

  "Amare,” Mother returns, without missing
a breath.

  "Amo, amas, amat, amamus, amatis, amant,” I say into the dirt.

  "Consecrare. Exspectare. Invigilare. Demetere,” Mother calls, and I send each of the words back across the leafy rows in turn.

  After we finish weeding, we take small horsehair brushes and dust the stamens of our scarlet runner bean flowers with pollen from the pistils of a hearty green snap-bean. As she dips her brush into the well of each flower, Mother tells me how she hopes to breed a hybrid with the sweetness of the scarlet bean and the snap-bean's resistance to frost.

  When the sun nears its zenith, we retreat inside to escape the midday heat. Mother prepares a meal of greens from our garden and lies down on a low divan by the cool north wall to wait out the worst of the heat. I pocket one of the newest books she has brought home for me and lie down with it in my room. I can never sleep through the midday, like Mother does. Even when I draw the shades and strip off my dress, I can only lie on my back and sweat into the bedclothes. I sit up and lean against the stucco wall, sweat gathering in the hollow of my back. I trace the gold-leafed imprint of words on the book's cover. Sometimes I will sneak out and read up in the olive orchard, where the breeze reaches.

  I sit quietly until Mother's breath slows to a gentle snore. Then I slide my legs off the bed and walk barefoot through the common room, quiet and careful as a mouser on the hunt. As I pass the place where she lies, Mother's breath skips in her sleep. I freeze, looking down at her, and hug the book to my chest. Her lips move rapidly and her brow creases, as if she's arguing with someone in her dream. Then she breathes out. Her body relaxes into the divan cushions.

  I step carefully until I pass the threshold into the kitchen, and then I run, out the kitchen door, through the garden, over the gate, and up the hill behind our cottage, where a cluster of olive trees overlooks the valley. I settle at the base of the oldest tree, its branches curving over me like the whalebone parasol Mother brought back from her journeys one time. The canopy of tiny leaves shades my head, and a soft breeze cools my skin. I lay the open book across my lap and look down on the valley.