Avon Fantasy Reader No. 8 — page 49: what you’re looking at

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

Ti Wan with ey eS ews by ed Belknap shone, eS Although more than twenty years have passed since The Man with a Thou. sand Legs appeared, we would venture to doubt that the plot has ever been repeated, or that anything quite like it for eeriness of conception will be found often today. In those early days, no formulae for fantasy had been beaten out, and a young writer such as Long could strike out in channels such as simply would not occur to today’s authors who generally find it easter to travel the well-worn plot ruts rather than strike out into imagina- tion's more uncharted regions. 3 Lf I. Statement of Horace Randall, Psychoanalyst OMEONE rapped loudly on the door of my bedroom. It was past midnight but I had been unable to sleep and I welcomed the disturbance. “Who's there?” I asked. | “A young man what iMsists on being admitted, sir, replied the raucous voice of my housekeeper. “A young man—and very thin and pale he is, sir— what says he’s business what won’t wait. ‘He’s in bed, I says, but then he says as how you're the only doctor what can help him now. He says as how he hasn’t slept. or ate for a-week, and he ain’t nothing but a boy, sir!” “Tell him he can come in,” I replied as I slid into my dressing gown and reached fora. cicar. , The door opened to admit a thin shaft of light and a young man s0 in- credibly emaciated that I stared at him in horror. He was six feet tall and extremely broad-shouldered, but I don’t think he weighed one hundred pounds. As he approached me he staggered and leaned against the wall for support. His eyes fairly blazed. It was obvious that some tremendous idea swayed him. I gently indicated a chair and he collapsed into it. ! For a moment he sat. and surveyed me. When I offered him a cigar he brushed it aside with a gesture of contempt. : “Why should f poison my body with such things?” he snapped. “Tobacco ts for weaklings and children.” - : 45 Cconnicloooks.c© im