Secrets of Haunted House #45 [1982]

Steve Ditko draws the 8-page story "Star-Trakker", written by Stan Timmons, in this issue of what was DC's then-quickly dwindling line of genre anthology titles. The fact that this is a science fiction story in one of the ghost/mystery titles suggests that they were using up the various inventory they had from cancelled titles like MYSTERY IN SPACE.

This is a really nice little story, opening with some mysterious scenes of a creature lurking the in Louisiana swamps, and a government agent named Stone sent down to take care of the situation, as we gradually get clues to what's really going on. Some tight writing and a very nice unexpected twist at the end.

Since a lot of the story is told in captions, Ditko's are really gets a chance to shine, with some nice panels to set the mood, especially in the swamp scenes, and some really good work on the action sequences.