Transcriber’s Notes
This etext was produced from "Astounding Science Fiction" December 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
The original page numbers from the magazine have been retained.
FAITHFULLY YOURS
BY LOU TABAKOW
Illustrated by Emsh
If it's too impossibly difficult to track down and recapture an escaped criminal ... there's a worse thing one might do....
JULY 18, 1949 A.D.
The fugitive lay face down in the fetid undergrowth, drawing in spasmodic lungfuls of air through cracked and swollen lips. Long before, his blue workshirt had been ripped to ribbons and his exposed chest showed a spiderwork of scratches, where branches and brambles had sought to restrain him in his frenzied flight. Across his back from shoulder to shoulder ran a deeper cut around which the caked blood attested to the needle-sharp viciousness of a thorn bush a mile to the north. With each tortured breath he winced, as drops of sweat ran down, following the spiderwork network and burning like acid. Incessantly he rubbed his bruised torso with mud-caked palms to dislodge the gnats and mosquitoes that clung to him, gorging shamelessly.