A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, December 1949 — page 104: what you’re looking at

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

om al Cos rs . i. seus tn PY ® * bear ere (TAGS GOLOR YR Och Ee |S “404 misty hands, glint of deepest sapphire blue eyes in shadowy face .. . another sat, dipping slender feet in the black of the pool; and her hair was blacker than its waters, black’ spume of blacker eyes green as emeralds but soft with promise glanced at me. They arose, the seven, and drifted to- ward me. One said, “He has too much of life.” Another said, “Too much—yet not enough.” A third said, “He must feed and drink, then come back, and we shall see.’ The girl whose eyes were sapphire blue asked, “Who sent you _ here, Shadow?” I said, “Dahut the White. Dahut of Ys.” They shrank from me. “Dahut sent you? Shadow, you are not for us. Shadow, pass on.” Creep, Shadow! ... I said, *‘I am weary, Let me rest here for a while.” The green-eyed girl said. “You have too much of life. If you had none you would not be weary. Only life grows weary,” The blue-eyed girl whispered, “And life is only weariness.’ “Nevertheless, I would rest. Also I am hungry, and I thirst.” “Shadow with too much of life... there is nothing here that you can eat; nothing here that you-can drink.” I pointed to the pool. “T drink of that.” They laughed. “Try, Shadow.” I dropped upon my belly and thrust my face toward the black water. The surface of the pool receded as I bent. It drew back from my lips .. . it was but the shadow of water... and I could not think. Thirst, Shadow ... and where I bid... The voice of Dahut ! I said to the girls, “Let me rest.” They answered, “Rest.” drink only when I CROUCHED upon the rim of jet. The silver girls drew away from me, clus- tered, shadowy arms entwined, whisper- ing. It was good to rest, although I felt no desire to sleep. I sat, hands clasping knees, head on breast. Loneliness fell A. MERRITT’s FANTASY _ gilver were not there. The armored man - became my loneliness, more torturing my — upon me like a garment; loneliness rained upon me. The girl whose eyes were blue slipped to my side. She threw an arm around my shoulders, leaned against me: i “When you have fed, ,when you have drunk, come back to me.’ I do not know how long I lay upon® the rim of jet around the black pool. Bu . when at last I arose the girls of tarnished — had said there was no time in this land, I © had liked the armored man. I wished that ~ his horse had been strong enough to carry © me wherever he had been going. a hunger had grown and so had my thirst, Again I dropped and tried to sip of the # pool. The shadow waters were not for © me. Something was tugging at me, dawing me on. It was the silver filament, and it — was shining like a thread of living light. I _ walked out of the garden, following ie thread. | ' The mountains were behind me. I was | threading my way through a vast marsh, Spectral rushes bordered a perilous path and in them lurked shadow shapes, un-— seen but hideous. They watched me as I : went, and I knew that here I must go © carefully lest a misstep give me to them. — 3 A mist hung over the marsh, a gray : dead mist that darkened when the hidden things furtively raised themselves . . . or fled ahead to crouch beside the path and wait my coming. I felt: their eyes upeas me—cold, dead, malignant. There was a ridge feathered with ghostly ferns behind which other taduerl shapes lurked, pushing and ite against each, other, following me as I threaded my way ‘through the specttaia rushes. And at every step more woeful © hunger and my thirst. a I passed the marsh and came out upon a dim path that quickly widened into a eS broad highway which, wavering, stretched — across an illimitable and cloudy plain. — There were other shadow shapes upon this 4 highway . . . shapes of men and women, — old and young, shapes of children and of — animals . . . but no shape inhuman or un- — earthly. | They were like shapes formed of heavy fog—of frozen fog. They flittered and a loitered, ran or stood forlorn, singly, in | Comicbooks.com : ak « > ay ~ :