Page:Amazing Stories Volume 15 Number 12.djvu/64

64 failed.

A man slouched past us, hesitating as though listening to our talk. Then he passed again, sat on a nearby bench, then on one still closer. Staring at us; at Doris' slim little figure, her pale-blonde gentle beauty. And then he came and sat down beside me.

"You look as though I could interest you," he said softly. "I am looking for young men and young—women."

He was a queer looking fellow, something about him so indefinably weird that involuntarily I hitched away from him on the bench, staring at him blankly. He was big, as big as myself and I am a good six feet tall. Wide, high thin shoulders—his figure lean, but with a suggestion of immense power. His clothes were queer—a suit, jacket and trousers of a black material that seemed to pick up and reflect the sheen of starlight. His hair was straight, black glistening like polished leather. He wore a white ruffled shirt, ruffled neckpiece edged with black.

But more than any of that, it was his face and his voice that startled me. Smooth-shaven face, lean, perhaps handsome with high-bridged nose, thin wide mouth, high cheek bones and deep-sunk dark eyes under thin pencilled brows. I try to recall it now. A face without age. Twenty—or fifty? The skin was smooth—the smooth, unlined skin of youth. But the greyness of age was in it so that here in the moonlight it had a waxen quality—like a man bloodless. A man who had died.

The thought stabbed into me as I heard myself murmuring:

"Interest me? How is that?"

His luminous gaze roved my shabby clothes. His lips drew apart with a faint ironic smile.

"You would like to improve things?" he suggested softly. "Life is not so good, for you and the young—woman?"

Queer voice. Measured words, with a strange rhythmic intonation. A voice so unusual, so unnatural that surely I had heard nothing like it before. He was smiling more broadly now.

"I can offer you a chance at a life—quite wonderful," he added. "You and your—woman."

Doris murmured,

"Bob, who is that? What does he say?"

"My name is Tork," the man said quickly. "Just—Tork. I am glad to meet you, my dear. You are blind?" His voice gave a little hiss of commiseration. "Terrible misfortune. But that can be fixed, that and all your other troubles. Do you want to hear more?"

He was a foreigner, an Oriental perhaps. A charlatan who now would see if, despite my down and out appearance, I might have ten dollars he could get away from me. I grinned at him, but I hitched myself forward on the bench so that I was squarely between him and Doris—so that his weird gaze might not rove over her.

"Go ahead," I said.

AM building a New Era," he responded slowly. "A little New Empire. We need—converts, you see? Men and young women. A new life, no troubles, no worries. The Empire of Tork. You two will like it, I am sure. Just to live—for love—with no troubles—no struggle. Everything you need or want is provided for you—"

Recruiting us into some Love Cult? Many fanatics have been lured into that sort of thing. Giving themselves into the hands of tricksters; and giving all their worldly possessions. There might be a news story in this. The Empire of Tork—that was a new one.

"What's it cost?" I said. "And where is it?"

"Cost? Why, nothing. Nothing at