Part 3 (1/2)

I took another breath--a very very slow breath. I turned around and went back to the davenport.

He was back again.

”They'll find that musket,” he said. ”I have no use for it now. You see I wanted it only to convince you, Mr. Anders.”

I put my hands on my knees and didn't look at him. I was suddenly trying to remember where I'd put that Luger I'd brought home from Germany a couple years back.

”You're not quite convinced yet, Mr. Anders?”

_Where in the h.e.l.l did I put it?_

”Very well, Mr. Anders. Now hear this, please. Now watch me.” He stirred at about hip height. A shelf-like section of the black ma.s.s protruded a little distance from the main part of him. On this shelf suddenly lay a rusted penknife.

”A very little boy, Mr. Anders. And a very long while ago. A talented boy, one of those who has what might be called an exceptional imagination. This boy cherished a penknife when he was quite small.

Pick up the knife, Mr. Anders.”

The knife was suddenly in my lap. I picked it up. It was rusty. It had a flat bone handle. ”Museums again,” I whispered to myself.

”So highly did this boy prize his knife that he went to great pains to carve his name very very carefully on one side of the bone handle.

Turn the knife over, Mr. Anders.”

The name was Edward Anders.

”You lost it when you were eleven. You wouldn't remember though. I found it in an attic where it lay unnoticed. As the years went by you gradually forgot about the knife, you see, and when your mind had completely abandoned the thoughts of it, it was mine--had I wanted it.

As a matter of fact I didn't. I retrieved it just today.”

I put the knife down. Sweat was coming on my forehead now, I could feel it. I was remembering. I was remembering the knife and what was scaring me even more was I was remembering the very day I had lost it.

In the attic.

I said very carefully, ”All right. You've made your point. You can take it from there.”

”Quite so, Mr. Anders. You now admit I exist, that I have extraordinary powers. I am your own creation, Mr. Anders. As I said before you have exceptional senses, including imagination. And yes, imagination is the greatest of all the senses.

”Some humans with this gift often imagine ludicrous things, exciting things, horrifying things--depending don't you see, on mood, emotion.

And the things these mortals imagine become real, are actually, created--only they don't know it, of course.”

He stopped. He was probably giving me time to soak that up. Then he went on. ”You've forgotten to keep trying to remember where you put that Luger, Mr. Anders. I just picked up the abandoned thought as it left your consciousness just now.”

I gulped down something that tried to rise in my throat. I didn't like this guy.

”You created me when you were fourteen, Mr. Anders. You imagined me as a swashbuckling pirate. The only difference between me and the others who have been created in times past is that I have attained the ninth dimension. I am the first to do that. Also the first to capture the secrets of your own third dimension. Naturally then, it would be a pity for me to die.”

”Get out,” I said.

”Forgive me, Mr. Anders. My time is short. I die tomorrow.”

”That's swell. Now get out.”