Avon Murder Mystery Monthly No. 41 — page 137: what you’re looking at

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

A, MERRITT 1 39 “What can we do?” My anxiety was no less than his, but my realiza- — tidn of our helplessness was complete. “If we only knew how to talk to these Things,” he said. “If we could only have let the Disk know we wanted to get out—damn it, Goodwin, it would have helped us.” | | Grotesque as the idea sounded, I felt that he spoke the truth. The Emperor meant no harm to us; in fact in speeding us away I was not at all sure that he had not deliberately wished us well—there was that about 'the Keeper— , | Still up we sped along the shaft. I knew we must now be above the level of the valley. 7 “We've got to get back to Ruth! Goodwin—it’s night! And what may have happened to her?” “Drake, boy”—I dropped into his own colloquialism—‘“we'’re up against it. We can’t help it. And remember—she’s there in Norhala’s home. I don’t believe, I honestly don’t believe, Dick, that there’s any danger as long as she remains there. And Ventnor ties her fast.” “That’s true,” he said, more hopefully. “That’s true—and probably Norhala is with her by now.” | “IT don’t doubt it,” I said cheerfully. An idea came to me—I half be- lieved it myself. “And another thing. There’s not an action here that’s purposeless. We’re being driven on by the command of that Thing we call the Metal Emperor. It means us no harm. Maybe—maybe. this zs the way out.” ~ “Maybe so,” he shook his head doubtfully. “But I’m'not sure. Maybe that long push was just’ to get us away from there. And it strikes me that the impulse has begun to weaken. We're not going anywhere near _ as tast as we were.” | I had not realized it, but our speed was slackening. I looked back— hundreds of feet behind us fell the slide. An unpleasant chill went through me—should the magnetic grip upon us relax, withdraw, noth- ing could: stop us from falling back along that incline to be broken like eggs at its end; that our breaths would be snuffed out by the terrific descent long before we reached that end was scant comfort. “There are other passages opening up along this shaft,’ Drake said. “I’m not for trusting the Emperor too far—he has other things on his metallic mind, you know. The next one we get to, let’s try to slip into— if we can.” I had noticed; there had been openings along the ascending shaft; corridors running apparently transversely to its angled way. Slower ‘and slower became our. pace. A hundred yards above I. glimpsed one of the apertures. Could we reach it? Slower and slower. ECOMC OOO (GO)