New Folks' Home: And Other Stories (The Complete Short Fiction of Clifford D. Simak Book 6) by Clifford D. Simak Page A

this space-time,” objected Ann. “He’s somewhere else.”
    Carter smiled. “The Ghosts know all about him,” he said. “A few weeks ago they told me about a man lost outside of our space-time frame. It must have been your father. I didn’t know.”
    He looked squarely at the girl. “Please believe me, Ann. If I had known who it was I would have done something.”
    The girl nodded, her eyes bright.
    Silence fell upon the room. Finally Carter lifted the helmet from his head, set it back on the metal bench.
    “Did you—did the Ghosts know anything about it?” asked the girl.
    Her uncle nodded. “Ann,” he said, “your father will be returned. No mortal man could get him back into his normal dimensions, but the Ghosts can. They have ways of doing things. Warping of world lines and twisting of inter-dimensional co-ordinates.”
    “You really mean that?” Ann asked. “This isn’t just another of your practical jokes?”
    The golden beard grinned broadly and then sobered. “Child,” he said, “I don’t joke about things like this. They are too important.”
    He looked about the room, as if expecting something, someone.
    “Your father will be here any moment now,” he declared.
    “Here!” exclaimed Ann. “Here, in this room—”
    Her voice broke off suddenly. The room had suddenly filled with Ghosts, and in their midst stood a man, a man with stooped shoulders and heavy-lensed glasses and lines of puzzlement upon his face. Like a puff of wind the Ghosts were gone and the man stood alone.
    Ann flew at him. “Father,” she cried. “You’re back again, father.”
    She went into his arms and the man, looking over her shoulder, suddenly saw the man with the beard.
    “Yes, Ann,” he said, “I am back again.”
    His face hardened as Carter took a step toward them.
    “You here,” he snapped. “I might have known. Where there’s anything afoot you’re always around.”
    Laughter gurgled in the throat of the bearded giant. “So you went adventuring in the dimensions, did you?” he asked, mockery in his voice. “You always wanted to do that, John. The great John Smith, only man to ever go outside the four dimensional continuum.”
    His laughter seemed to rock the room.
    “I suppose you got me out,” said Smith, “so you could gloat over me.”
    The men stood, eyes locked, and Kent sensed between them an antagonism that was almost past understanding.
    “I won’t thank you for it,” said Smith.
    “Why, John, I never expected you to,” chortled Carter. “I knew you’d hate me for it. I didn’t do it for you. I did it for your little girl. She came from Landing City across hundreds of miles of deserts and canals to help you. She came down into Mad-Man’s. She’s the one I did it for. For her and the two brave men who came with her.”
    For the first time, apparently, Smith noticed Kent and Charley.
    “I do thank you,” he said, “for whatever you have done.”
    “Shucks,” said Charley, “it wasn’t nothin’. Nothin’ at all. I always wanted to see Mad-Man’s. Nobody ever came down here and came out sane. Most of them that came down didn’t come out at all.”
    “If it hadn’t been for my Ghosts neither would you,” Carter reminded him.
    “Father,” pleaded Ann, “you mustn’t be like this. Uncle brought you back. He was the only man who could have. If it hadn’t been for him, you would still be out in the extra-dimension.”
    “What was it like, John?” asked Carter. “Dark and nothing to see?”
    “As a matter of fact,” said Smith, “that is exactly what it was.”
    “That’s what you thought,” jeered Carter. “Because you had no sense of perception to see or hear or make any contacts or associations in that world. Did you actually think your pitiful little human senses would serve you in a place like that?”
    “What do you know about it?” snarled Smith.
    “The Ghosts,” said Carter. “You must not forget. The Ghosts tell me everything.”
    Carter