Transcriber's Note:
This etext was produced from Astounding Stories March 1933. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
Wanderer of Infinity
By Harl Vincent
Lenville! Bert Redmond had never heard of the place until he receivedJoan's letter. But here it was, a tiny straggling village cuddledamongst the Ramapo hills of lower New York State, only a few milesfrom Tuxedo. There was a prim, white-painted church, a general storewith the inevitable gasoline pump at the curb, and a dozen or so ofweatherbeaten frame houses. That was all. It was a typical, dustycross-roads hamlet of the vintage of thirty years before, utterlyisolated and apart from the rushing life of the broad concrete highwayso short a distance away.
Bert stopped his ancient and battered flivver at the corner where agroup of overalled loungers was gathered. Its asthmatic motor diedwith a despairing cough as he cut the ignition.
"Anyone tell me where to find the Carmody place?" he sang out.
No one answered, and for a moment there was no movement amongst hislisteners. Then one of the loungers, an old man with a stubble of graybeard, drew near and regarded him through thick spectacles.
"You ain't aimin' to go up there alone, be you?" the old fellow askedin a thin cracked voice.
"Certainly. Why?" Bert caught a peculiar gleam in the watery old eyesthat were enlarged so enormously by the thick lenses. It was fear ofthe supernatural that lurked there, stark terror, almost.
"Don't you go up to the Carmody place, young feller. They's queerdoin's in the big house, is why. Blue lights at night, an' noisesinside—an'—an' cracklin' like thunder overhead—"
"Aw shet up, Gramp!" Another of the idlers, a youngster with chubbyfeatures, and downy of lip and chin, sauntered over from the group,interrupting the old man's discourse. "Don't listen to him," he saidto Bert. "He's cracked a mite—been seein' things. The big house is upyonder on the hill. See, with the red chimbley showin' through thetrees. They's a windin' road down here a piece."
Bert followed the pointing finger with suddenly anxious gaze. It wasnot an inviting spot, that tangle of second-growth timber andunderbrush that hid the big house on the lonely hillside; it mightconceal almost anything. And Joan Parker was there!
The one called Gramp was screeching invectives at the grinningbystanders. "You passel o' young idjits!" he stormed. "I seen it, Itell you. An'—an' heard things, too, The devil hisself is upthere—an' his imps. We'd oughtn't to let this feller go...."
Bert waited to hear no more. Unreasoning fear came to him thatsomething was very much amiss up there at the big house, and hestarted the flivver with a thunderous barrage of its exhaust.
The words of Joan's note were vivid in his mind: "Come to me, Bert, atthe Carmody place in Lenville. Believe me, I need you." Only that, butit had been sufficient to bring young Redmond across three states tothis measly town that wasn't even on the road maps.
Bert yanked the bouncing car into the winding road that led up thehill, and thought grimly of the quarrel with Jo