A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, October 1950 — page 63: what you’re looking at

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

62 A. MERRITT’S FANTASY Vecchio over him, even had he been so minded. No longer did his thoughts re- vert to the cave-mystery; no longer had. he any impulse or desire to study out tbat cipher book, to ponder the questions at issue or to prosecute the investigations so eagerly begun. Lulled in a drowsy well-being, lapped in physical perfection, surrounded by every comfort, every beauty, he fell gradually into a beatified half-somnoles- cence, a land-o’-dreams condition, a lotus- eater’s bliss, such as Tennyson tells of in. the country “‘where it was always af- ternoon.”’ And so, drifting, happy, beyond the rightful happiness of man, glorious in perfect bodily grace, beautiful as Nar- cissus, he felt the magic of the Alkahest mold him to symmetry in every part. Only once, during that enchanted fort- night, did straffge, uneasy thoughts cross his mind. It was on the evening of the twelfth day since I] Vecchio had promised him the love of Stasia. Idly he had been looking over a pile of medical and popular reviews, down in the pergola. All at once his eye fell on a marked paragraph in the Annales Contem- poraines. Had I! Vecchio arranged so that he must see it? Dennison did not know. - He hardly wondered, so keen his interest suddenly had grown. ““What’s this?” said he, scanning the heading with eager eyes. ‘“‘ Another treat- ment for senility ?”’ And quickly he translated: PROFESSOR PETIT’S EPOCHAL DISCOVERY Astonishing Results of Intravenal Radium Treatment PARIS, Dec. 12.—The scientific world has just received with astonishment the latest news from the experimental station of Professor Gabriel Petit, at Alfort. Ac- cording to well-authenticated reports, Pro- fessor Petit’s claim seems to be substanti- ated that he has discovered in radium a veritable elixir of life. Having recently injected two doses of radium, of two milligrams each, into the jugular vein of an old and worn-out horse, he finds that now the animal is to all ap- pearances young again. It has put on fat, its coat is glossy, it has grown frisky and supple. A microscopic examination of its blood shows a marvelous quantity of new red corpuscles. Dr. Petit is continuing his experiments, which may prove of great value to man- kind. He refuses to be interviewed further on the subject, though he claims to have dis- covered definitely that radium, administered in intravenal injections, produces a lasting radioactivity in the whole organism, and that the effect is lasting. Most surprising of all his discoveries is this: that, having treated a second horse in the same manner, and then having ad- ministered a solution of sulphate of lead, reverse effects have been obtained, and the process of senility once more set in action. Lead, as is well known, is one of the few metals practically impermeable by radio- active emanations. Further developments are awaited with intense interest in the world of science. For a moment Dennison stared with astonishment at this momentous news. In these few paragraphs, thus singled out with heavy blue-penciling, he seemed to read something—though just what, he could not tell—far deeper and more weighty than the words themselves made manifest. And, with a clenching of the fist, a muttered oath, he flung the paper down upon the bench beside him, then fell to pacing up and down the summer- house. Bur presently this temporary uneasi- ness, this formless agitation passed. The lure and magic of the scene, the soft air and the blue rollers, creaming into windows of surf along the base of the titanic cliff, won him back to dreamy in- dolence again. “Ah, well,” thought he, relighting his cigar, ‘‘what matter, after all? How does this concern me? Let them delve and pry and dig for the unattainable, if they will! I—I have no further need to care!” Yet next morning again the indefin- able uneasiness possessed him, would not let him rest, drove him out for a walk. And, once more down the mountain and in the little city, he half-instinctively stopped in at a chemist’s shop and—in- pelled by some _ subconscious force— bought a flask of lead sulphate. At the Hotel des Anglais, he wrote a letter to Dr. Petit, Tequesting details as to the administration of the sulphate. The reply he requested to be sent to Cette, “‘poste restante,”’ or general delivery. Had you asked him, point-blank, the meaning of these moves, very likely he could not have told with any clearness. Almost as the Horla itself controlled the COMICLOC|S (C(O)