crowd silent, Nordgren’s expression as immobile as that of a crucified Christ. Then, ever so slowly, ever so reluctantly, as if there were too little left to drain, a few dark drops of blood began to trickle from the torn stump of Nordgren’s shoulder.
The crowd’s eyes began to turn upon Harrington, as Nordgren ever so slowly began to collapse like an unstrung marionette.
Harrington awoke the following noon, sprawled fully dressed across a couch in his own suite. He had a poisonous hangover and shuddered at the reflection of his face in the bathroom mirror. He made himself a breakfast of vitamin pills, aspirin, and Valium, then set about cutting a few wake-up lines to get him through the day.
Harrington was not really surprised to learn that Trevor Nordgren had died in his sleep sometime during the night before.
Everyone knew it was a drug overdose, but the medical examiner’s report ruled heart failure subsequent to extreme physical exhaustion and chronic substance abuse.
Several of the science fiction news magazines asked Harrington to write an obituary for Trevor Nordgren, but Harrington declined. He similarly declined offers from several fan presses to write a biography or critical survey of Nordgren, or to edit proposed anthologies of Nordgren’s uncollected writings, and he declined Warwick’s suggestion that he complete Nordgren’s final unfinished novel. Martin E. Binkley, in his Reader’s Guide to Trevor Nordgren, attributed this reticence to “Harrington’s longtime love-hate relationship with Nordgren that crystalized into professional jealousy with final rejection.”
Damon Harrington no longer attends conventions, nor does he autograph books. He does not answer his mail, and he has had his telephone disconnected.
Columbine Books offered Harrington a fat one million advance for a third trilogy in the best-selling Fall of the Golden Isles series. When Harrington returned the contract unsigned to Helen Hohenstein, she was able to get Columbine to increase the advance to one and a half million. Harrington threw the contract into the trash.
In his dreams Harrington still sees the faceless mass of hungry eyes, eyes turning from their drained victim and gazing now at him. Drugs seem to help a little, and friends have begun to express concern over his health.
The mystery of Damon Harrington’s sudden reclusion has excited the imagination of his public. As a consequence, sales of all of his books are presently at an all-time high.
Blue Lady, Come Back
•I•
This one starts with a blazing bright day and a trim split-level house looking woodsy against the pines.
Wind shrieked a howling toscin as John Chance slewed his Duesenberg Torpedo down the streaming mountain road. A sudden burst of lightning picked out the sinister silhouette of legend-haunted Corrington Manor, hunched starkly against the storm-swept Adirondacks. John Chance’s square jaw was grim-set as he scowled at the Georgian mansion just ahead. Why had lovely Gayle Corrington’s hysterical phone call been broken off in the midst of her plea for help? Could even John Chance thwart the horror of the Corrington Curse from striking terror on the eve of Gayle and young Hartley’s wedding?
“Humph,” was the sour comment of Curtiss Stryker, who four decades previous had thrilled thousands of pulp readers with his yarns of John Chance, psychic detective. He stretched his bony legs from the cramped interior of his friend’s brand-new Jensen Interceptor and stood scowling through the blacktop’s heat.
“Well, seems like that’s the way a haunted house ought to be approached,” Mandarin went on, joining him on the sticky asphalt driveway.
Stryker twitched a grin. Sixty years had left his tall, spare frame gristled and knobby, like an old pine on a rocky slope. His face was tanned and seamed, set off the bristling white mustache and close-cut hair that had once been blond. Mandarin always thought he looked like an old sea captain—and recalled that Stryker had sailed on a Norwegian whaler in his youth.
“Yeah, and here comes the snarling mastiff,” Stryker obliged him.
A curious border collie peered out from around the Corvette in the carport, wondered if it ought to bark. Russ whistled, and the dog wagged over to be petted.
The yard was just mowed, and someone had put a lot of care into the rose beds that bordered the flagstone walk. That and the pine woods gave the place a cool, inviting atmosphere—more like a mountain cabin than a house only minutes outside Knoxville’s sooty reach. The house had an expensive feel about it. Someone had hired an architect—and a good one—to do the design. Mountain stone and untreated redwood on the outside walls; cedar shakes on the roof; copper