Of his return, and his assuming the role of a man, the Alien spoke evasively. It was to be assurred that this talk of his was not some repulsive caprice; to know that all of it was true, that I gripped him and beheld him. To my everlasting horror, I must know. Little in itself, what I saw, but sufficient to cause me to sink down on the stone bench in a convulsive huddle of fear. Never again in life can I tear this clutching terror from my soul. Only this: That when I looked into his staring eyes in the dimness of murky twilight, and before he understood and quickly avaunted, I glimpsed with astoundment and repugnance that between the muffling of his coat and black scarf the INTRUDER wore a meticulously painted metal mask—to hide what I must not see....
ASPHODEL:
by E. T. PINE
Down where skies are always dark,
Where is ever heard the bark
Of monstrous ebon hounds of hell,
In a dreadful fearsome knell,
Never fading, ever bright,
With a weird and spectral light,
Blooms a flower of ancient days,
Shining in a crimson maze;
When the black bat shrilly screams
Asphodel, you haunt my dreams—
From the lands of distant death
Steals the perfume of your breath:
Some night soon the wind will blow
Saffron seeds to fall and grow
By my casement window, where,
Sleeps my loved one, still and fair;
Then, the night you are to bloom
I shall creep from out my room,
From your blossom by the wall
Shall I hear her dear voice call:
Mournfully the wind will cry,
And shadows cover all the sky—
My lips will touch the loved dead
When where you nod I lay my head....