Page:Weird Tales Volume 3 Number 4 (1923-04).djvu/73

 An Eventful Night in a Haunted Forest

OON-MADNESS? A touch of fever? I wish I could think so! But when I am alone after dark in the waste places where my wanderings take me, and hear across infinite voids the demon echoes of those screams and snarls, and that detestable crunching of bones, I shudder again at the memory of that eldritch night.

I knew less of woodcraft in those days, though the wilderness called just as strongly to me as it does now. Up to that night I had always been careful to employ a guide, but circumstances now suddenly forced me to a trial of my own skill. It was midsummer in Maine, and, despite my great need to get from Mayfair to Glendale by the next noon, I could find no person willing to pilot me. Unless I took the long route through Potowisset, which would not bring me to my goal in time, there would be dense forests to penetrate; yet whenever I asked for a guide I was met with refusal and evasion.



Stranger that I was, it seemed odd that everyone should have such glib excuses, There was too much "important business" on hand for such a sleepy village, and I knew that the natives were lying. But they all had "imperative duties," or said that they had; and would do no more than assure me that the trail through the woods was very plain, running due north, and not in the least difficult for a vigorous young fellow. I£ I started while the morning was still early, they averred, I could get to Glendale by sundown and avoid a night