A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, February 1950 — page 29: what you’re looking at

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

THE SMOKING i.Avs 29 lying, this time. And my thought jumped back to the laboratory, and the dreadful night of the explosion, and that moment seemed to be only ten seconds, and not a whole year, before this. And I was robed with a new strength, because it seemed to me that now I could not fail. One always feels that way when, after following a dim idea, new and sud- den light strikes across the trail and shows you even a small part of truth in what you have been dreaming. I was not through with the Esquimau. I started to pump him some more; of course I wanted to rush at once.to ques- tions about Cleve Darrell, in that mys- terious northern country, wherever it might be. But I found that I had reached a stumbling block. “IT have said too much for fear of death,” said the Esquimau. “But already Iam dying. I can feel their hands on me, and their fire. Kill me when you please, because I shall be ready to die. To die by a bullet or the stroke of a knife is sweet- ness and a pleasure compared to what they will do! They will cut me in ten thousand pieces, and each separate piece shall die a separate death!” CHAPTER 8 Luck and a Rifle T WAS time, of course, to hold my horses. The man had more than he could stand; he was literally full to the lips with icy fear, so I stopped bearing down on him, I secured him by tying his hands behind him with all of the knots I could devise. For now there were the signs of an ap- proaching blizzard, and I set to work mak- ing a snow house against the blow. I got it roughed out and completed fairly before the real weight of the wind struck us, and washed over us like a tide of freezing water. One of those northern storms has such power that to stand against the wind is really like wading through the shooting tide that races down a flume. And when I got inside the shelter, and the Esquimau with me, I was fairly contented. If the blizzard lasted a few days, I cared not a straw. I had food enough to last both me and my dogs; I was not-far from Point Barrow to get new supplies later on, and in short, I felt that I was a master of circumstance—for the moment. My captive did not complain. He lay down and turned his face to the wall and soon fell asleep. It was like the sleep of an unhappy dog, for during hours and hours, his body would be twitching, and whimperings and moanings would come out of his throat. Once he sat bolt upright and stared about him with nightmare eyes, his face covered with sweat. When he saw me, the fear seemed to go out of him again; he lay down and slept once more. In the morning I.would put such screws on him as never had been put on a man before. I reasoned in this way: that he was a murderer, that he had shown the will to murder and tried a very good hand with me at the game; that therefore I was at liberty do as I pleased with him, as with a creature whose own life was forfeit. In short, though this does not make good reading, I had determined to get his secret | out of him. af steel could tear it, or fire burn ttuireel So I sat up and watched him, until sleep began to overpower me. Then, at last, I put the knife under my body. The revolver I hung under the pit of my arin. I lay down and slept. It couldn’t have been for very long. When I wakened, I sat up with a yawn, not very much refreshed, for the air is pretty dead inside an icehouse. And out- side it, where I should have to go soon to feed the dogs, the blizzard was screaming with a stronger voice than ever. I shook my head. And then the memory of the day before, and the thought of the Smoking Land, and poor Cleve Darrell, came. rushing back to me and roused me in earnest. The aches and the pains went out of me, and I turned to find my captive. . He was gone! After the first shudder, I made up my mind that he would quite soon re- turn. Nothing could face that blast, and few living things would care to even creep before it. He, being desperate to get away, inight have tried, but a few minutes would convirice him of his foolishness. I was prepared to smile when he came strug- gling in again, half frozen. I thought, too, comicbooks:com — al a tee ms