The Project Gutenberg EBook of Cold Ghost, by Chester S. Geier

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Title: Cold Ghost

Author: Chester S. Geier

Release Date: June 4, 2010 [EBook #32685]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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Transcriber's Note:

This etext was produced from Amazing Stories November 1948. Extensive
research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this
publication was renewed.

COLD GHOST

by Chester S. Geier

All Hager had to do was slow the dogsled to a walk, and his
partner died. A perfect crime--no chance to get caught!

* * * * *

In the valley, with the sheltering hills now behind them, the bitterly
cold wind drove at the sled with unchecked ferocity. Gusts of snow
came with the wind, thick and dry, the separate particles of it
stinging on contact.

[Illustration: Hager huddled before the fire, trembling with cold that
filled him with terror.]

The dogs made slow progress through the deep drifts. Hager's
smoldering irritation blazed into abrupt rage. From his position at
the rear of the sled, he lashed out with the driver's whip that he
held in one heavily mittened hand, shouting behind the wool scarf
covering the lower half of his face. The dogs lunged in their traces,
whining. A couple floundered in the powdery footing and were
immediately snapped at by their companions behind them.

The snow was falling swiftly and with a sinister steadiness. It seemed
to hang like a vast white curtain over the valley, obscuring the hills
and the fanged outline of mountains beyond. The wind seized portions
of the curtain and twisted it into fantastic shapes--the shapes of
demons, Hager thought suddenly. For the scene through which he moved
was a kind of hell, a white and frozen hell, with the howl of the wind
like the despairing shrieks of tormented souls.

Hager pictured himself as one of them. And Cahill, huddled in fur