Cold Ghost
By Chester S. Geier
It was a rotten time for Cahill to have taken sick, Hager fumed. But it had happened. And it had left him with nothing else to do but pack their catch of furs, harness up the sled, and start with Cahill for the doctor in Moose Gulch.
He almost regretted having taken the furs. With Cahill an added burden on the sled, it was too large a load for the dogs to pull with the necessary speed and endurance. But he hadn’t dared to leave the entire season’s catch unguarded at the cabin. If some wanderer appeared in his and Cahill’s absence, the furs would be an irresistible temptation.
Fearing, thus, to leave the furs behind, and now endangered by their weight, Hager found the situation maddening. And the storm was making matters worse. It was near the end of winter, but the climate had chosen this moment to be at its most uncooperative.
Hager muttered blackly against the storm, wondering why he had allowed his trapper’s dream of wealth to lure him to this far northern corner of Alaska. It was a cold, bleak, and hostile country. Tiny settlements, like Moose Gulch, were few and far between. Of course, furs were at their best and most plentiful here. He and Cahill had proved that for their catch was a large one. Hager’s thoughts soared briefly above his bitter mood as he thought of the money the furs would bring. And of the things that the money would bring back to civilization.
Added to what he had so far managed to save, his share would make almost enough to start a fox-breeding ranch. Or a mink ranch. Almost enough—but not quite. That meant he would have to spend another winter in this location, and Hager flinched at the thought. He hated loneliness and the bitter, subzero cold. Most of all he hated the cold. Only a fur breeding ranch, with large, warm living quarters, would have made it bearable.
Hager didn’t know when the idea came to him. It must have been lying dormant for a long time in a far, dark corner of his mind, only now surging to the fore. Subconsciously he must have prepared himself for this moment of inspiration. He wasn’t sure. He was aware only of an interval while he plodded behind the sled, drawn by the struggling and panting team, cursing the dogs, cursing Cahill, and the fierce cold that mischievously searched out the most tender portions of his face beneath the hood of his parka.
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Chester S. Geier
Chester S. Geier (1921-1990) was an American author and editor who began publishing work of genre interest with “A Length of Rope” for Unknown in April 1941; he was very active in the Ziff-Davis stable (for Amazing and Fantastic Adventures) in the 1940s, where he published a large amount of routine material under his name and pseudonyms including Guy Archette and the House Names Alexander Blade, P F Costello, Warren Kastel (initially used for collaborations with his friend William L Hamling) (Geier had been deaf from the age of twelve; Hamling could do sign), S M Tenneshaw, Gerald Vance and Peter Worth.
Biography.
Book-length tales include “Minions of the Tiger” (September 1946 Fantastic Adventures), Forever is Too Long (March 1947 Fantastic Adventures; 2012 dos), and “Hidden City” (July 1947 Amazing); plus “Outlaw in the Sky” (February 1953 Amazing) as by Archette, which is essentially a Western with a few science fiction transpositions. Geier ran the Shaver Mystery Club (see Richard S Shaver) as a favor to Ray Palmer, editing the Shaver Mystery Magazine on its behalf; he had collaborated with Shaver on Ice City of the Gorgon (June 1948 Amazing). Although he was one of the more prolific Pulp-magazine writers, his short stories have never been collected in book form and only two, “Environment” (May 1944 Astounding) and “The Children” (April 1951 Fantastic Adventures), have been anthologized.
Some out-of-copyright titles have been reissued posthumously.
Chester S. Geier
