Avon Murder Mystery Monthly No. 41 — page 197: what you’re looking at

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

A, MERRITT 199 interesting contents, or sat theorizing, discussing all phases of the. phe- nomena we had witnessed. We told Ruth what had occurred after she had thrown in her lot with Norhala; and of the enigmatic struggle between the glorious Disk and the sullenly flaming Thing I have called the Keeper. We told her of the entombment of Norhala. When she heard that she wept. 7 “She was sweet,” she sobbed; “she was lovely. And she was beauti- ful. Dearly she loved me. I know she loved me. Oh, I know that we and ours and that which was hers could not share the world together. But it comes to me that Earth would have been! far less poisonous with those that were-Norhala’s than it is with us and ours!” Weeping, she passed through the curtainings, going we knew to Nor- hala’s chamber. It was a strange thing indeed that she had said, I thought, watching her go. That the garden of the world would be far less poisonous blossoming with those Things of wedded crystal and metal and mag- netic fires than fertile as now with us of flesh and blood and bone. Tc me came appreciations of their harmonies, and mingled with those perceptions were others of humanity —'disharmonious, incoordinate. ever struggling, ever striving to destroy itself— | There was a plaintive whinnying at the open door. A long and hairy face, a pair of patient, inquiring eyes looked in. It was a pony. For a moment it regarded us—and then trotted trustfully through; ambled up to us; poked its head against my side. It had been ridden by one of the Persians whom Ruth had killed, for under it, slipped from the girths, a saddle dangled. And its owner must have been kind to it—we knew that from its lack of fear for us. ‘Driven by the tempest of the night before, it had been led back by in- stinct to the protection of man. “Some luck!” breathed Drake. | He busied himself with the pony, stripping away the hanging saddle, grooming it. CHAPTER XXXI blag! HAT NIGHT we slept well. Awakening, we found that the storm had grown violent again; the wind roaring and the rain falling in such volume that it was impossible to make our way to the Pit. GOGO .S (GO)