"SOME little atom may have taken, in some tiny crossroad of my brain, the wrong turning. Some infinitesimal dead leaf may have lodged itself, in my thought's stream, against some infinitesimal twig, and the consequences may prove incalculable."

Each of the twelve stories in Conrad Aiken's latest volume of short stories, "Among the Lost People," is a different application of the above quotation from "Gehenna," the twelfth, which depicts the hell through which the human mind goes to find "consciousness which is pure suffering." The tales are told with an implacable, pseudo-scientific introspectiveness that almost suggests Poe. They are tales of madness, weakness, and failure--of a man half-drunk who succumbs to the temptation to steal some unwanted object is caught, and his life is ruined. ("Impulse"): pathetic souls who laugh insincerely or tell unimportant lies simply to attract interest and who collapse when someone finds them out. The scenes are mostly familiar to local readers--the Harvard club, Majestic Theatre, and hotels easily identified.

In "Silent Snow, Secret Snow," Mr. Aiken gives a picture of an adolescent mind dwelling more and more in the realm of fantasy until the real world is finally obliterated. "Thistledown" is a very simply told story of a girl whose life is as "aimless and purposeless as the voyage of the dandelion thistle."

"Mr. Arcularis" is a study in delirious unconsciousness preceding death. In "No, No, Go Not to Lethe," Mr. Babcock, the hero, derives complete satisfaction and pleasure from imagining what goes on in the minds of other people. When the possibility arises that someone will do the same to him, his little world rocks crazily on its orbit.

Mr. Aiken's prose is simple, lucid, and straightforward. His choice of titles highly imaginative, and, if the test of a short story is an indelible imprint left on the mind of the reader, "Thistledown," "Silent Snow, Secret Snow," and Mr. Arcularis" will attain immortality as far as this writer is concerned.

But readers who dislike modern writing because it sacrifices the beauty of description to the intricate workings of the human mind will not enjoy "Among the Lost People."