Robert W. Lowndes 6 min read

On the night the last war ends, a woman in barbaric festival dress begs her lover to flee, before he sees what's out the window.

Robert Lowndes's 1941 story opens on the eve of a hard-won peace, its heroine trembling behind a composed face as something terrible approaches through the glass. A brief, dread-soaked post-war mood piece that withholds its horror until the last possible moment. Read it for taut, atmospheric golden-age SF about the price of victory and what comes after the fighting stops.

In its time

Published in 1941, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

6 min read (a short story, a single idea, delivered and gone).

Illustrated by

John Giunta