You don't get used to that breed of mountain night noises, not even if you're born and raised there and live and die there. Noises too soft and sneaky to be real whispering voices. Noises like big slow wings, far off and then near. And, above and below the trail, noises like heavy soft paws keeping pace with you, sometimes two paws, sometimes four, sometimes many. They stay with you, such noises as that, all the hours you grope the night trail, all the way down to the valley so low, till you're ready to bless God for the little bitty crumb of light that means a human home, and you ache and pray to get to that home, be it ever so humble, so you can be safe inside with the light.
Manly Wade Wellman
Who Fears the Devil. 1963
I swear I'm licked before I start, trying to tell you all what Mr. Onseim looked like. Words give out sometimes. The way you're purely frozen to death for fit words to tell the favor of the girl you love. And Mr. Onselm and I pure poison hatred for each other from the start. That's a way that love and hate are alike.
Manly Wade Wellman
Who Fears the Devil. 1963
If we had to find a single word to describe the stories of Manly Wade Wellman, it would be:
INSIDIOUS
Allowed two words, we might say:
EARILY CHARMING
Three, and we could add:
HYPNOTIC, CHILLING, TENDER
(But that would leave out the humor)
Perhaps the hero himself describes the feeling of these stories most clearly when he says:
"...you'd best go expecting anything!"
Introduction to Manly Wade Wellman's Who Fears the Devil. 1963
Mark Twain
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. 1876
