The Green Lodge Cypher

My mother doesn’t get many through her shop. It’s a bit of a pity; if I could get brooches with the right clip, I would use them on necklines and vest-edges, ties and cuffs alike.” Eliot looked aside, and I grinned at her. "They're just what they say; a clip. You stick it on wherever your garment has an edge. I don't think they date to earlier than the 20s, and by the 50s they just didn't stick around. The Coro duette, or symmetrical dress-clips with uniting mount, were a flash in the pan. "So. Imagine my surprise when Mother called me in for these." I set out the photos. The clips were triangular, with leaf-curves along their long points, and about two inches long each. The whole surface was flat, unpunched or cut, and relieved only by applied gold-work. A round gem sat on the base-side of the triangle, its intaglio carving oriented so that the whole clip would point downwards. "They're not the style you'd usually see in a dress clip. The style is that of Castellani, and I have no idea whether that shop produced any such work. I'm still waiting on a call back, but I'm not holding out hope. "It is gold; the gems were carved, too, with the skill of Castellani. But look at the design! Nothing like that ever came out of the 'archeological' style." I passed the photos around. "Is it something that was remade into a clip?" Atwood conjectured. "Very possibly," I said. "So, the piece itself is odd; but I suppose someone considered it a matter of taste. It's the gems that were bizarre to me. The intaglio gems fit the rest of the style, as far as that goes; but the subject!" I spread my hands in near-ridicule. "Look at the two of them! That thing there, that's facing the right." "It's… cute?" Eliot said. "It's got great round eyes." "It took me a week to remember where I had seen it," I said. "Here." "Dear god, you're enjoying this too much," Sayers said. "It's a telescopefish," I told her. "Deep sea critter. Doesn't it look like one?" "I suppose it could," Atwood said. "And the other…" I trailed off. "Sea star?" Eliot asked. "A plant," Atwood said. "Or a face—" "No," Sayers said. "It does look like a fossil crinoid, doesn't it?" I said, grinning at her. "I wasn't going to say face-hugger." "Nonsense. The Romans didn't know what they were," Sayers said. "Or will you say they're ghost crinoids, hn?" "Not this time," I said. "And I'm sure the ancient Romans might have seen a fossil crinoid. And the jewels could be modern. There's just no telling." "So why did they come to you, then?" Sayers asked. "That's the funny part," I said. "So I have here someone's… journeyman art project, or perhaps a nineteen-twenties fusion that was tasteless at the time and simply reads as spooky now. But this didn't come from a customer, Sayers. I inherited it." "Ohhh," Eliot said quietly, smiling. "The plot thickens." "Some of you may recall my grandfather," I said. "He was a character; he spent some of his life in his parents' native Britain, but they never forgot their Scottish heritage. I think he'd never let us forget it, either, certainly not when it came to toll roads! But he loved sailing. And this, you understand, is something he found." "Found," Sayers said. "Oh yes," I said. "Found, out on the ocean."

The ballad of a Lackey character's ride, always the complaint of its subject? Maybe thought of a song about, not a bandit's ride, but the legend of Mike Jittlov, Wizard of Speed and Time? Filk is the medium for you. Legend has it that that's a typo for 'folk'. Filksings are where people meet up and perform theirs and others' music. Some local science fiction conventions used to have filksings, and some still do, if you ask around. The topics handled in filk range from Star Trek (and Star Wars) to scifi/fantasy novels, other filk singers, modern (often space-related) topics, and humanity's aspirations for the future. Modern social commentary can and does happen. One of the notable, and easy to overlook, aspects of filk is its crowd-participatory nature. Filksings are for the whole audience, and may allow any or all comers to take the stage. The folk-music nature of a lot of filk means that the crowd can learn and join in on the chorus of a song. A lot of filk is out-of-print and available on cassette tape only. All tapes by Off Centaur Productions (especially the Bayfilk/San Francisco crowd's work, including some by the incomparable Julia Ecklar) are out of print, but you might be able to pick them up used. Today, you can order some material from that era from Firebird Records, and Alexander Adams is still in print. There was a group called the Technical Difficulties on the East Coast, as well, who wrote some lovely original work and a delightful anthem to the Enterprise. If you'd like to explore filk, send the Cypher a note; the Anime Ramen crew has a couple of English-language scifi fen who have been around and would be willing to either run a tape copy or have you come listen. Maybe we can set up a filksing…

-Jeannie's Dream Journal: I dreamed that I was swimming in the Chesapeake. The water was cool and I felt slightly chill in my bones. There was a pale hand reaching up from out of the water behind me, holding on to me by the crook of my neck. Whoever it was, was trying to pull me down, and I felt so completely content about it. Everything was overwhelmingly peaceful. -From: Jeannie

EDITOR'S NOTE: That is not Freddi Caver's group, nor the work of anyone else we know. We hope that your son is feeling comfortable! Please drop by if you would like to discuss anything with us. There have been similar stories lately.

Contributors: Gillian, Kino, Freddi Caver and company, and readers. Weekly story by Cryptography column by Aivas. The weekly ciphertext originates from Processes of Perception, Conception, and Reporting by William K. Hartmann, published in the Condon Report, 1968. All products and media named in this issue are used in commentary, criticism, and for fun. Opinions are those of their respective writer. Please be civil. Have an ad, public service announcement, comment, query, or conundrum? Drop off a note at 504 Old Ensor Rd, box 5. The paper reserves the right to print your notes without recompense, cut them, and comment on them. Authors, please contact us for terms.

Part 2

It's about six feet tall, on all fours, and its head is rounded. It's been seen in the area between Hunt Valley and Parkton. We don't have any putative pre-European stories to put to this one; this is, as Keel might say, a modern-day phenomenon. Adria was kind enough to let me post this: I'd love to tackle a real X-file. If you've seen it, we'd like to hear from you.