The Project Gutenberg EBook of Garth and the Visitor, by L. J. Stecher

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Title: Garth and the Visitor

Author: L. J. Stecher

Illustrator: Dick Francis

Release Date: April 12, 2010 [EBook #31956]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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This etext was produced from Galaxy Science Fiction April
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Garth and the Visitor

BY L. J. STECHER

_If you could ask them, you might be greatly surprised--some
tabus very urgently want to be broken!_

Illustrated by DICK FRANCIS

Although as brash as any other ace newspaper reporter for a high
school weekly--and there is no one brasher--Garth was scared. His head
crest lifted spasmodically and the rudimentary webbing between his
fingers twitched. To answer a dare, Garth was about to attempt
something that had never been dared before: a newspaper interview with
The Visitor. There had been questions enough asked and answered during
the thousands of years The Visitor had sat in his egg-shaped palace on
the mountaintop, but no interviews. It was shocking even to think
about--something like requesting a gossippy chat with God.

Of course, nobody believed the fable any longer that The Visitor would
vanish if he was ever asked a personal question--and that he would
first destroy the man who asked. It was known, or at least suspected,
that the Palace was merely a mile-long spaceship.

Garth, as tradition required, climbed the seven-mile-long rock-hewn
path to the Palace on foot. He paused for a moment on the broad
platform at the top of the pyramid to catch his breath and let the
beating of his heart slow to normal after his long climb before he
entered The Palace. He sighed deeply. The sufferings a reporter was
willing to go through to get a story or take a dare!

"Well, come in if you're going to," said an impatient voice. "Don't
just stand there and pant."

"Yes, my Lord Visitor," G