The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Dark Door, by Alan Edward Nourse

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Title: The Dark Door

Author: Alan Edward Nourse

Release Date: October 3, 2007 [EBook #22869]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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Transcriber's Note:

This etext was produced from _The Counterfeit Man More Science
Fiction Stories by Alan E. Nourse_ published in 1963. Extensive
research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on
this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical
errors have been corrected without note.

The
Dark
Door

1

It was almost dark when he awoke, and lay on the bed, motionless and
trembling, his heart sinking in the knowledge that he should never have
slept. For almost half a minute, eyes wide with fear, he lay in the
silence of the gloomy room, straining to hear some sound, some
indication of their presence.

But the only sound was the barely audible hum of his wrist watch and the
dismal splatter of raindrops on the cobbled street outside. There was no
sound to feed his fear, yet he knew then, without a flicker of doubt,
that they were going to kill him.

He shook his head, trying to clear the sleep from his brain as he turned
the idea over and over in his mind. He wondered why he hadn't realized
it before, long before, back when they had first started this horrible,
nerve-wracking cat-and-mouse game. The idea just hadn't occurred to him.
But he knew the game-playing was over. They wanted to kill him now. And
he knew that ultimately they _would_ kill him. There was no way for him
to escape.

He sat up on the edge of the bed, painfully, perspiration standing out
on his bare back, and he waited, listening. How could he have slept,
exposing himself so helplessly? Every ounce of his energy, all the skill
and wit and shrewdness at his command were necessary in this cruel hunt;
yet he had taken the incredibly terrible chance of sleeping, of losing
consciousness, leaving himself wide open and helple