Wraithlike, they came out of the darkness—dead
men who walked among the living. What grim secret lay
in their sightless eyes—a warning to all other men!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
October 1950
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
A chill touched Bryan as he looked down at the figure on the hospitalbed. He had seen dead men before—too many of them. He had seen themsprawled on European battlefields, had seen them huddled in wreckedcars or lying waxen and stiff on morgue slabs.
But he had never seen a dead man like the one who lay there on the bed.For, paradoxically, this man was still alive. He still breathed, hisheart still pulsed. Yet it was clear that these were little more thanautomatic processes. In the only respect that mattered, he was as trulydead as though in the last stages of dissolution and decay.
He lay on the bed with an unnatural supineness, his head lolling at aslack angle. His eyes were open in a blank stare, eyes as empty as awaiting grave. He did not move. He made no sound. A thread of salivaran from a corner of his gaping mouth and made a glistening path downthe side of his jaw.
A mindless idiot would have shown more animation than this man.Something vital and precious had gone from him, leaving him a mereshell. His was a death-in-life, a thing somehow more terrible than ashattered skull or a torn chest.
Bryan fought back a shudder and turned to the balding white-clad man athis side. "What can you tell me, Dave? Just what seems to be wrong withthis fellow?"
The doctor sighed. "Wish I knew, Terry. I've never seen anything likeit in over twenty years of medical practice. Not even the specialistsseem to know. And we have several good ones here, who donate theirservices to the hospital—men with experience in unusual cases."
"But don't you have any idea at all about how he got this way?" Bryanpersisted. "Isn't there any possibility that he has some sort of rarebrain disease?"
"We gave him a careful examination, Terry," the doctor returned. "Wecould find no evidence of disease—no evidence of concussion or injury,either. Except, maybe, for one thing."
"What's that?" Bryan asked quickly.
"When he was first brought in, we found a sort of reddish mark nearhis left shoulder. As though something hot had touched him. The skinwasn't broken or burned, however." The doctor shrugged. "It's gone now.I doubt if anything so light and temporary could have been important,anyway."
"This might be a case for the psychiatrists," Bryan suggested slowly."Maybe this fellow had a terrific shock of some kind—a psychic trauma,or whatever they call it."
"That's quite possible. But we've done the best we could at this end."The doctor's voice dropped. "I don't think there's going to be time foranything else, Terry."
"You mean that he—"
The doctor nodded. "He's dying. I've seen the signs. It's as thoughhe's lost all will to live."
Bryan looked at the man on the bed again, grim speculation in hiseyes. His voice was solemn and soft. "Maybe I'm just a superstitiousIrishman, Dave—but I think I know what's the matter with thisfellow. I knew it the first time I looked at him. He's lostsomething—something you can't see with microscopes or X-ray machines.It's something damned important—and that's why he's dying. What he'slost, Dave, is ... his soul."
"I'm not laughing, Terry. Oddly enough, I have the same opinion. Adoctor keeps running into situations like this, where ideas thrown intothe discard