Page:Weird Tales volume 30 number 06.djvu/66

716 white-faced. "Another of us, called by the Master!"

"Save me!" the receding Russian was screaming wildly. "Save me from the Master!"

Not one person made a move toward him; all shrank back in horrified dread, toward the shelter of the huts. The Russian strode stiffly on, and now had started up a steep path that climbed the cliff toward the brooding castle.

David, staring with Christa terrifiedly clinging to him, and with the German and Husper and O'Riley the only others now left in the clearing, saw the doomed man climbing straight toward the front of the monstrous black castle. He saw a door appear in the blank, black front of the building. The Russian strode stiffly through, his last wild despairing cry floating faintly down to them. Then the aperture closed after him.

Through the three men beside David and Christa went a sigh of horror. Von Hausman's keen eyes were haunted as he told David, "You see now why we all dread the Master so. We never know at what moment he will call us, nor what dark, unholy doom he deals out to those whom he summons into the castle."

"But why did the man go up there, when he didn't want to?" David protested. "He was terrified, yet he walked straight on."

Halfdon Husper told him solemnly, "The will of the Master was on him and he could not resist—no human can resist when that call comes."

"Ja," said the German darkly. "Whatever thing it is that lairs up in that unholy place, it can throw its will on any of us, call us to it, whenever it wishes. It is so we shall all end in time, if we do not die first."

"Not Christa and I!" David declared passionately. "I'm going to get her away from this hellish island, somehow."

Red O'Riley's bruised face grinned approval.

"I'm with you there, lad," he declared. "Ten years I've been on this devil's place, ever since my schooner that was loaded with guns for Abd-el-Krim piled up here in the night. I've seen a plenty of men called up there by the old Satan that lives in that castle, and I'm damned if I'll sit around here longer twiddling my thumbs waitin' for him to call me. I'll risk anything to get away."

Von Hausman shrugged hopelessly. "It is useless to talk of it—you know what happens to anyone who tries to escape from the island. However, we can discuss that later. These two must have a place to live, so Halfdon and I will give them our hut."

the way along the street of wretched huts. It was growing dusky now. There was no sun or sunset visible in the flickering sky, but that sky steadily was darkening into a thick, strange twilight. The great forest loomed in deep shade now, gloomy and forbidding. Up on the cliff above the valley, the black stronghold of the dreaded Master bulked ominously against the dusking sky.

Von Hausman led them into a small bark cabin. It was unfurnished, save for beds of boughs, and a pile of strange-looking fruit in one corner. They sat down together in the dusky interior, and ate the fruit. David found it tasted as queer as it looked. Christa nestled nervously at his side, silent, still overwhelmed.

David could hardly yet believe in the reality of this strange place, this island invisible to the outer world, peopled by survivors of a hundred past wrecks, ruled by the mysterious, unseen occupant of the black castle. Yet Von Hausman and Husper and O'Riley ate with quiet