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Spencer, Ned. Ned Spencer was created by J. Schlossel and appeared in “Hurled Into the Infinite” (Weird Tales, June-July 1925).

Ned Spencer is a Planetary Romance Hero. Spencer is in love with Grace Thomas, and they are engaged to be married, but one day Grace disappears. Before Ned and Grace began dating she’d been seeing a mysterious man named Kurt Hademan. Although there’s no apparent connection between Hademan (who had himself disappeared) and Grace’s disappearance, Ned is sure that Hademan had something to do with it, and begins looking for Grace. Six months later, Ned has not found her, but one night, during a storm, he seeks refuge in an abandoned house, and discovers that the house has underground passages which are currently in use: fifty men, wearing black, gathered around an altar, on which Grace is bound.

Ned is psychically paralyzed, but he can listen, and the men say that they are the Society of Man, a group which has been teleporting humans to other planets in an effort to explore them. They have gone through the nearest planets, which are uninhabitable, but have found a way to send people to habitable planets, which they intend to do with Grace (who is beautiful and so will make a fine breeder) and Kurt Hademan, who is one of the Society’s number. The Society concentrates on the teleportation, which allows Ned to break free and attack them. All he succeeds in doing, however, is getting himself sent to the new planet along with Grace and Hademan.

The new planet is Earth-like and has primitive humanoids. They treat Grace like a goddess, and Ned and Hademan are forced to work together. There is conflict, and Hademan dies, and there is dilemma, for Hademan explains that only a local group of psychics can send Ned and Grace home, and there is uplift, as Grace and Ned civilize the natives until they can produce the psychic power necessary to send Grace and Ned back to Earth, which they eventually succeed in doing.

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