The Dark Door | Page 5

mind, the horror of darkness, of
damp slimy walls and scurrying rodents, of the clinging, stale humidity
of dungeon passageways? He himself had seldom recalled it, except in
his most hideous dreams, yet he had known such fear as a boy, so many
years ago, and now it was all around him. They had known somehow
and used it against him.
Why?

He sank down on the floor, his head in his hands, trying to think
straight, to find some clue in the turmoil bubbling through his mind that
would tell him what had happened.
He had started down the hallway from his room, to find Dr. Webber
and tell him about the other people--
He stopped short, looked up wide-eyed. Had he been going to Dr.
Webber? Had he actually decided to go? Perhaps--yes, perhaps he had,
though Webber would only laugh at such a ridiculous story. But the
not-men who had hunted him would not laugh; to them, it would not be
funny. They knew that it was true. And they knew he knew it was true.
But why not kill him? Why this torture? Why this horrible persecution
that dug into the depths of his own nightmares to haunt him?
His breath came fast and a chilly sweat broke out on his forehead.
Where was he? Was this some long forgotten vault in the depths of the
Old City? Or was this another place, another world, perhaps, that the
not-men, with their impossible powers, had created to torture him?
His eyes sought the end of the hall, saw the turn at the end, saw the
light which seemed to come from the end; and then in an instant he was
running down the damp passageway, his pulse pounding at his temples,
until he could hardly gasp enough breath as he ran. Finally he reached
the turn in the corridor where the light was brighter, and he swung
around to stare at the source of the light, a huge, burning, smoky torch
which hung from the wall.
Even as he looked at it, the torch went out, shutting him into inky
blackness. The only sound at first was the desperation of his own
breath; then he heard little scurrying sounds around his feet, and
screamed involuntarily as something sleek and four-footed jumped at
his chest with snapping jaws.
Shuddering, he fought the thing off, his fingers closing on wiry fur as
he caught and squeezed. The thing went limp, and suddenly melted in
his hands. He heard it splash as it struck the damp ground at his feet.

What were they doing to his mind?
He screamed out in horror, and followed the echoes of his own scream
as he ran down the stone corridor, blindly, slipping on the wet stone
floor, falling on his knees into inches of brackish water, scraping back
to his feet with an uncontrollable convulsion of fear and loathing, only
to run more--
The corridor suddenly broke into two and he stopped short. He didn't
know how far, or how long, he had run, but it suddenly occurred to him
that he was still alive, still safe. Only his mind was under attack, only
his mind was afraid, teetering on the edge of control. And this maze of
dungeon tunnels--where could such a thing exist, so perfectly outfitted
to horrify him, so neatly fitting into his own pattern of childhood fears
and terrors; from where could such a very individual attack on his
sanity have sprung? From nowhere except....
Except from his own mind!
For an instant, he saw a flicker of light, thought he grasped the edge of
a concept previously obscure to him. He stared around him, at the mist
swirling down the damp, dark corridor, and thought of the rat that had
melted in his hand. Suddenly, his mind was afire, searching through his
experience with the strange not-men he had learned to detect, trying to
remember everything he had learned and deduced about them before
they began their brutal persecution.
They were men, and they looked like men, but they were different.
They had other properties of mind, other capabilities that men did not
have.
They were not-men. They could exist, and co-exist, two people in one
frame, one person known, realized by all who saw, the other one
concealed except from those who learned how to look. They could use
their minds; they could rationalize correctly; they could use their
curious four-dimensional knowledge to bring them to answers no
three-dimensional man could reach.

But they couldn't project into men's minds!
Carefully, Harry peered down the misty tunnels. They were clever,
these creatures, and powerful. Since they had discovered that he knew
them, they had done their work of fear and terror on his mind skillfully.
But they were limited, too; they