The Beyonders by Manly Wade Wellman, Lou Feck Page B

said Gander Eye.
    "Your mother was a wise woman, then." Struve smiled. "You can call me a sort of advance agent for a diligent firm that might have the Beyonders for a name. Beyonders, Incorporated."
    "Beyond what?" inquired Gander Eye.
    "Just now, beyond the notice of folks who wouldn't understand the true nature of their activity. You seem to be thinking deeply, Mr. Gentry. What about?"
    Gander Eye crinkled his brow. "I was recollecting a tale I heard back yonder when I was a boy. It was a dog met a wolf in the woods, and he said why didn't the wolf come and live with people. Said, you ate good like that and didn't have to be a-hunting for your food, you slept all warm in next to the fire, all like that. So the wolf inquired him, 'How come you're a-wearing that collar?' And the dog replied him, 'Oh, that's just got my master's name on it, tells who I belong to.' And the wolf said, 'Well, I do thank you, but I'll just keep on in these here woods where I ain't got no master with his name on me."
    Struve puffed on his cigar. "I remember that fable, too. I believe it was written by La Fontaine. But there's a consideration to go along with it. Anywhere you may go, Mr. Gentry, you always see dogs. Prosperous, well fed-dogs, helping their masters hunt or guarding their masters' front doors, or just lying happily on the porch or in the yard. But I think you'd have to go a long way to see a wolf."
    "Yes," agreed Gander Eye. "Wolves are a right much scarced out."
    "In fact, you'd have to go into a town where there's a zoo. Where there may be a wolf, in there behind the bars. So much for the wolf's gospel of freedom and no collar."
    Gander Eye had fallen silent. He saw a stir in the hemlock thicket behind the rock on which Struve leaned. The growth was a dense one, and he could not make out what stirred in its depths, only that it was there.
    "Do you think you see something, Mr. Gentry? Something to scare you?"
    The stir was some sort of shape. Gander Eye made out a dark, dark substance in there among the tussocks of green needles. He had seen a surface like that before, but not so close by daylight. The shape swayed there. It was the size of a man but not the form of a man, not quite. Now it stood still, and another shape stirred at its side. So there were two of them. Maybe more than two.
    "You're scared, aren't you, Mr. Gentry?"
    Gander tightened his fingers on his belt. "No, sir," he said. "I'm just as sorry as can be, but I ain't scared a hoot."
    Even as he spoke, he knew that he spoke the truth.
    Struve drew a deep sigh, as though disappointed. "I'm obliged to say that I believe you. But you're going to be scared eventually, and you'll be sorry about that, too."
    "You can kill me," said Gander Eye, "but you can't scare me."
    In yonder among the hemlocks, the dark shapes stirred. Gander Eye thought they made a sound, a sort of soft, hissing sound, not unlike a snake.
    "There are several excellent reasons why you won't be killed," said Struve, blowing smoke. "However, I predict that you'll be scared one of these days. That's a healthy little experience, Mr. Gentry. It's supposed to increase the secretions of the thyroid and pituitary glands, and those help the brain. If you get scared, maybe you'll get sensible. Does that figure?"
    "Never you mind if it figures," said Gander Eye coldly. "Let me just tell you one thing. If you scare me, kill me trying to do it. I don't figure to live being scared."
    "Request noted," said Struve. He tapped ashes. "I hope to see you again, talk to you again. Just now, have a happy day."
    He turned his broad back and walked in among the hemlocks where those things, whatever they might be, waited.
    Gander Eye watched him go. He saw the branches of the hemlocks stir behind Struve's going, watched them fall quiet again. He stood for long enough to draw half a dozen breaths, then he headed quickly up the trail toward the road once more. Once he glanced back into the hollow at the pool and the cavern far