His voice clipped off as Grannie began to read. She read slowly at first, then intoned the words and sentences faster and more dramatically.
And out in the swamp a vast hush fell as if unseen ears were listening.
"... the space liner was over on her beam ends now as another shot from the raider's vessel crashed into the stern hold. In the control cabin Cuthbert Strong twisted vainly at his bonds as he sought to free himself. Opposite him, lashed by strong Martian vinta ropes to the gravascope, Louise Belmont sobbed softly, wringing her hands in mute appeal."
A restless rustling sounded out in the marsh, as if hundreds of bodies were surging closer. Karn nodded in awe.
"She's got 'em!" he whispered. "Listen. They're eatin' up every word."
I heard it then, and I thought I must be dreaming. From somewhere out in the swamp a sound rose into the thick air. A high-pitched chuckle, it was. The chuckle came again. Now it was followed by another and another. An instant later a wave of low subdued laughter rose into the air.
Ezra Karn gulped. "Gripes!" he said. "They're laughing already. They're laughing at her book! And look, the old lady's gettin' sore."
Up on the roof of the envelope Grannie Annie halted her reading to glare savagely out into the darkness.
The laughter was a roar now. It rose louder and louder, peal after peal of mirthful yells and hysterical shouts. And for the first time in my life, I saw Annabella C. Flowers mad. She stamped her foot; she shook her fist at the unseen hordes out before her.
"Ignorant slap-happy fools!" she screamed. "You don't know good science fiction when you hear it."