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The Squaw · Dracula's Guest & Other Weird Tales

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The Squaw by Bram Stoker. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings
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are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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LibriVox dot org. Recorded by David Houston. Nurrenberg. At the time was
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not so much exploited as it has been since then. Irving had not been
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playing faust, and the very name of the old town was hardly known to
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the great bulk of the traveling public. My wife and I, being in
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the second week of our honeymoon, naturally wants some one else to join our
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party, so that when the cheery stranger Elias P. Hutcheson, hailing from
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Isthmian City, Bleeding Gulch, Maple Tree County, Nebraska, turned up at
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the station at Frankfort and casually remarked that he was going on to see the
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most all fired old Methuselah of a town in Europe, and that he guessed
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that so much traveling alone was enough to send an intelligent, active citizen into
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the melancholy ward of a daft house. We took the pretty broad hint and
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suggested that we should join forces. We found on comparing notes afterwards that we
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had each intended to speak with some diffidence or hesitation, so as not to
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appear too eager, such not being a good compliment to the success of our
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married life. But the effect was entirely marred by her both beginning to speak
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at the same instant, stopping simultaneously, and then going on together again.
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Anyhow, no matter how it was done, and Elias P. Hutcheson became
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one of our party straightway, Amelia and I found the pleasant benefit instead of
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quarreling as we had been doing, We found that the restraining influence of a
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third party was such that we now took every opportunity of spooning in odd corners.
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Amelia declares that ever since she has, as the result of that experience,
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advised all her friends to take a friend on the honeymoon. Well,
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we did Nuremberg together and much enjoyed the racy remarks of our transatlantic friend,
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who, from his quaint speech and his wonderful stock of adventures, might have
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stepped out of a novel. We heard from the last object of interest in
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the city to be visited, the Burg, and on the day appointed for
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the visit, strolled around the outer wall of the city by the eastern side.
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The burg is seated on a rock dominating the town, and an immensely
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deep foss guards it on the northern side. Nuremberg has been happy in that
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it was never sacked. Had it been, it would certainly not be so
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spick and span perfect as it is at present. The ditch has not been
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used for centuries, and now its base is spread with tea gardens and orchards,
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of which some of the trees are of quite respectable growth. As we
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wandered round the wall, dawdling in the hot July sunshine, we often pause
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to admire the views spread before us, and in especial the great plain,
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covered with towns and villages, and bounded with a blue line of hills,
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like a landscape of Claude, Lorraine. From this we always turn with new
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delight to the city itself, with its myriad of quaint old gables and acre
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wide red roofs dotted with dormer windows, tier upon tier. A little to
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our right rose the towers of the Burg, and nearer, still standing grim
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the Torture Tower, which was and is perhaps the most interesting place in the
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city for centuries. The tradition of the iron version of Nurnberg has been handed
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down as an instance of the horrors of cruelty of which man is capable.
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We had long looked forward to seeing it, and here at last was its
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home. In one of our pauses, we leaned over the wall the mountain
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looked down. The garden seemed quite fifty or sixty feet below us, and
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the sun pouring into it with an intense, moveless heat, like that of
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an oven. Beyond rose the garden grim wall, seemingly of endless height and
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losing itself right and left in the angles of bastion and counterscarp trees and bushes
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crowned the wall, and above again towered the lofty houses on whose massive beauty
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time has only set the hand of approval. The sun was hot, and
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we were lazy. Time was our own, and we lingered leaning on the
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wall. Just below us was a pretty sight, a great black cat lying
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stretched in the sun, which drowned her gambled pretty a tiny black kitten.
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The mother would wave her tail for the kitten to play with, or would
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raise her feet and push away the little one as an encouragement to further play.
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They were just at the foot of the wall and elias P hutcheson in
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order to help the play, stooped and took from the walk a moderate sized
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pebble. See, he said, I will drop it near the kitten,
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and they will both wonder where it came from. Oh, be careful,
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said my wife. You might hit the dear little thing. Not me,
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ma'am, said elias P. Why I'm as tender as a main cherry tree.
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Lord bless you, I wouldn't hurt the poor pooty little critter, more
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nut scalp a baby, And you may bet your very gay socks on that.
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See. I'll drop it fur away on the outside, so it's not
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to go so near. Thus saying, he leaned over and held his arm
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out at full length, and drop the stone. It may be that there
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is some attractive force which draws lesser matters to greater, or more probably that
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the wall was not plump, but sloped to its base. We not noticing
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the inclination from above. But the stone fell with a sickening thud that came
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up to us through the hot air, right on the kitten's head and shattered
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out its little brains. Then and there the black cat cast a swift upward
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glance, and we saw her eyes like green fire, fixed in an instant
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on Elias p hutcheson. And then her attention was given to the kitten,
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which lay still with just a quiver of her tiny limbs, whilst a thin
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red stream trickled from a gaping wound. With a muffled cry such as a
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human being might give. She bent over the kitten, licking its wounds and
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moaning. Suddenly she seemed to realize it was dead, and again threw up
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her eyes at us. I shall never forget the sight, for she looked
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the perfect incarnation of hate. Her green eyes blazed with lurid fire, and
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the white sharp teeth seemed to almost shine through the blood which dabbled her mouth
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and whiskers. She gnashed her teeth, and her claws stood out, stark
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and at full length on every paw. Then she made a wild rush up
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the wall, as if to reach us. When the momentum ended, fell
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back and further added to her horrible appearance, for she fell upon the kitten
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and rose with her black furs smeared with its brains of blood. Amelia turned
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quite faint, and I had to lift her back from the wall. There
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was a seat close by in shade of a spreading plane tree, and here
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I placed her whilst she composed herself. Then I went back to Hutcheson,
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who stood without moving, looking down on the angry cat below. As I
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joined him, he said, well, I guess that air the savagest beast
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I ever see set Once when Apache Squaw had an edge on a half breathe,
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which they nick named Splinters, cause the way he fixed up her papoose,
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which he stole on a raid, just to show they appreciate the way
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they'd given his mother the fire torture. She got that kind of look so
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set on her face that it just seemed to grow. There. She falls
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Splinters more'n three years till at last the brave's gone and handed him over to
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her. They did say it, no man white Ora Injun had ever been
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so long doing under the torches the apaches. The only time I ever seen
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her smile was when I wiped her out. I came on the camp just
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in time to see Splinter's pass in his checks, and it wasn't sorry to
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go either. He was a hard citizen, though one never could shake with
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him. After that papoose business. What was bitter bad, and he should
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have been a white man, for he looked like one. I see you
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got pay out in full during me. But I took a piece of his
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hive from one of his skin imposts and had made into a pocketbook. It's
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here now, and he slapped the breast pocket of his coat. Whilst he
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was speaking, the cat was continuing her frantic efforts to get up the wall.
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She would take a run back and then charge up, sometimes reaching an
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incredible height. She did not seem to mind the heavy fall which she had
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each time, but started with renewed vigor, and at every tumble her appearance
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became more horrible. Hutcheson was a kind hearted man. My wife and I
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had both noticed little lacks of kindness to animals as well as to persons,
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and he seemed concerned at the state of fury to which the cat had wrought
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herself. Wow now, he said, I do declare that our poor career
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seems quite desperate there there, poor thing. It was all an accident,
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though that won't bring back your little one to you say, I wouldn't have
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had such a thing happen for a thousand just shows what a clumsy fool of
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a man can do when he tries to play. Seems I'm too darned slipperhanded
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to even play with a cat, say Colonel, it was a pleasant way
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he had to bestow titles freely. I hope your wife don't hold no grudge
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against me on count of this pleasantness. Why I wouldn't have had to occur
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on no account. He came over to Amelia and apologized profusely, and she,
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with her usual kindness of heart, hastened to assure him that she quite
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understood that it was an accident. Then we all went again to the wall
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and looked over the cat. Missing Huncheson's face drawn back across the moat,
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and was sitting on her haunches as though ready to spring. Indeed, the
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very instant she saw him, she did spring with a blind and reasoning fury,
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which would have been grotesque only that it was so frightfully real. She
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did not try to run up the wall, but simply launched herself at him,
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as though hate and fury could lead her wings to pass straight through the
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great distance between them. Amelia womanlike, got quite concerned and said to Elia's
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p in a warning voice, oh you must be very careful. That animal
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would try to kill you if she were here. Her eyes looked like positive
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murder, he laughed out jovially. Excuse me, ma'am, he said,
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I can't help but laughing. Fancy a man that has fought grizzlies and injuns
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being careful of being murdered by a cat. When the cat heard him laugh,
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her whole demeanor seemed to change. She no longer tried to jump or
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run up the wall, but went quietly over, and, sitting again beside
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the dead kitten, began to lick and farmwood as though it were alive.
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See said I the effect of a really strong man. Even that animal,
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in the midst of her fury, recognizes the voice of a master and bows
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to him like a squaw, was the only comment of Elias P. Hutcheson.
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As we moved on our way around the city Foss, every now and
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then we looked over the wall, and each time we saw the cat following
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us. At first, she had kept going back to the dead kitten,
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and then, as a distance grew greater, took it in her mouth and
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so followed. After a while, however, she abandoned this, for we
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saw her following all along, she had evidently hidden the body somewhere. Amelia's
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alarm grew at the cat's persistence, and more than once she repeated her warning,
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but the American always laughed with amusement, till finally, seeing that she's
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beginning to be worried, he said, I say, ma'am, you needn't
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be scared over that cat. I go heeled, I do, He slapped
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his pistol pocket at the back of his lumber region. Why sooner and have
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you worry? I'll shoot the critter right here and risk the police interference with
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the citizen in the United States for carrying arms contrary regulations. As he spoke,
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he looked over the wall, but the cat, on seeing him,
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retreated with a growl into a bed of tall flowers and was hidden. He
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went on, blessed that our career aint got no more sense of what is
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good for her than most Christians. I guess we've seen a last of her.
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You bet she'll go back now to that busted kitten and have a private
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funeral of it. All orse, Amelia did not want to say more,
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lest he might have mistaken kindness to her. Fulfill his threat of shooting the
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cat, And so she went on and crossed the little wooden bridge leading into
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the gateway, whence ran the steep paved roadway between the burg and the pentagonal
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torture tower. As we crossed the bridge, we saw the cat again down
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below us. When she saw us, her fury seemed to return, and
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she made frantic efforts to get up the steep wall. Hutchison laughed as he
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looked down at her and said, goodbye, old girl. Sorry I injured
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feet, but you'll get over it in time. So long, and then
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we passed through the long dim archway and came to the gate of the burg.
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When we came out again our survey of this most beautiful old place,
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which not even the well intentioned efforts the Gothic restorers of forty years ago had
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been able to spoil. Though their restoration was then glaring white, we seemed
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to have forgotten the unpleasant episode of the morning. The old lime tree,
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with its great trunk gnarled with the pressing of nearly nine centuries, the deep
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well cut through the heart of the rock by those captives of old, and
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the lovely view from the city wall, whence we heard spread over almost a
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full quarter of an hour, the multitudinous chimes of the city had all helped
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to wipe out from our minds the incident of the slain kitten. We were
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the only visitors who had entered the Torture Tower that morning, so at least,
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said the old Custodian, And as we had the place all to ourselves,
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were able to make a minute and more satisfactory survey than would have otherwise
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been possible. The Custodian looking to us as the sole source of his gains,
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for they was willing to meet our wishes in any way. The Torture
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Tower is truly a grim place, even now, when many thousands of visitors
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have sent a stream of life and the joy that fallows life into the place.
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By the time I mention it wore its grimmest and most gruesome aspect.
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The dust of ages seemed to have settled on it, and the darkness and
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the horror of its memories seemed to have become sentient in a way that would
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have satisfied the pantheistic souls of Philo or Spinoza. The lower chamber where we
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entered was seemingly in its normal state, filled with incarnate darkness, even the
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hot sunlight streaming in through the door seemed to be lost in the vast thickness
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of the walls, and only showed the masonry rough as when the builders scaffolding
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had come down, but coated with dust, and marked here and there with
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patches of dark stain, which, if walls could speak, could have given
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their own dread memories of fear and pain. We were glad to pass up
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the dusty wooden staircase, the custodian leaving the outer door open to light us
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somewhat on our way, for to our eyes the one long, wicked,
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evil smelling candle stuck in a sconce on the wada gave an inadequate life.
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When we came up through the open door trap in the corner of the chamber
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overhead, Amelia held on to me so tightly that I could actually feel her
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heart beat. I must say that for my own part, that I was
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not surprised at her fear, for this room was even more gruesome than that
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below. Here there were certainly more light, but only just sufficient to realize
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the horrible surroundings of the place. The builders of the tower had evidently intended
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that only they she gained the talk, should any have the joys of light
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and prospect. There, as we had noticed from below, were ranges of
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windows, albeit of medieval smallness. But elsewhere in the tower were only a
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few very narrow slits, such as were habitual in places of medieval defense.
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A few of these things only lit the chamber, and those so high up
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in the wall that from no part could the sky be seen through the thickness
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of the walls. In racks, and leaning in disorder against the walls were
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a number of headsman's swords, great double handed weapons with broad blade and keen
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edge. Hard By were several blocks, whereupon the necks of the victims had
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lain, with here and there deep notches where the steel had bidden through the
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guard of flesh inshored into the wood round the chamber. Placed in all sorts
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of irregular ways were many implements of torture, which made one's heart ache to
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see chairs and couches with dull mobs whose torture was seemingly less, but which,
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though slower, were equally efficacious. Racks, belts, boots, gloves,
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collars, all made for compressing at will, steel baskets in which the
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head could be slowly crushed into a pulp. If necessary, watchmen's hooks with
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long handle and knife that cut at resistance. This especialty of the old Nuremberg
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police system, and many many other devices from man's injury to man. Amelia
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grew quite pale at the horror of these things, but fortunately did not faint.
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For being a little overcome. She sat down on a torture chair,
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but jumped up again with a shriek, all tendency to faint. God,
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we both pretended that it was the injury done to her dress by the dustla
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chair and the rusty spikes which had upset her, and mister Hutcheson acquiesced in
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accepting the explanation with a kind hearted laugh. But the central object in the
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whole of this chamber of pors was the engine known as the Iron Virgin,
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which stood near the center of the room. It was a rudely shaped figure
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of a woman, something of the bell order, or, to make a
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closer comparison of the figure of Missus Noah in the Children's arp, but without
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that slimness of waste and perfect rondure of hip which marks the aesthetic type of
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the Noah family. One would have hardly recognized it as intended for human figure
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at all, had not the founders shaped on the forehead a rude semblance of
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a woman's face. This machine was coated with rust without and covered with dust.
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A rope was fastened to a ring in the front of a figure about
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where the waist should have been, and was drawn through a pulley fastened on
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the wooden pillar which sustained the flooring above the custodium. Pulling this rope showed
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that a section of the front was hinged like a door at one side.
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We then saw that the engine was of considerable thickness, leaving just room enough
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inside for a man to be placed. The door was of equalickness and of
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great weight. Foretook the custodian all his strength aided. Though he was by
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the contrivance of the pulley to open it this way, it was partly due
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to the fact that the door was of manifest purpose, hung so as to
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throw its weight downwards, so that it might shut of its own accord.
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When the strain was released. The inside was honeycomb with russ. Nay More,
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the rest alone that comes through time would hardly have eaten so deep into
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the iron walls. The rest of the cruel stains was deep. Indeed,
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it was only, however, when we came to look at the inside of
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the door, that the diabolical intention was manifest to the full. Here were
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several long spikes, square and massive, broad at the base and sharp at
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the points, placed in such a position that, when the door should close,
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the upper ones would pierce the eyes of the victim, and the lower
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ones his heart vitals. The sight was too much for poor Amelia, and
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this time she fainted dead off, and I had to carry her down the
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stairs and place her on a bench outside, till she recovered that she felt
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it to the quick was afterwards shown by the fact that my eldest son bears
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to this day a rude birth mark on his breast, which was, by
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family consent, being accepted as representing the number of virgin. When we got
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back to the chamber, we found Hutcheson still opposite the iron virgin. He
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had been evidently philosophizing, and now gave us the benefit of his thought in
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the shape of a sort of exordium. While I guess I've been learning something
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here, while Madame has been getting over a faint appears to me that we're
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a long way behind the times. On our side of the big drink.
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Weis to think out in the planes that the engine give us points in trying
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to make a man uncomfortable. But I guess your old medieval law and order
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party could raise him every time. Blinters were pretty good in his bluff on
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the squaw. But this here, young mistress, held a straight flush all
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high on him. The points of those spikes are sharp enough still, though
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even the edges are eaten out by whilst be on him. It'd be a
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good thing for Indian Section to get some specimens to hear playtoy to send him
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round the reservations, just to knock the stuffin out of the bucks, and
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the squaws too, by showing them as how old civilization lays over them at
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their best. Guess, but I'll get Mount Box a match just to see
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how it feels. Oh no, no, said Amelia. It is too
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terrible, guess, ma'am. Nothing's too terrible to the exploring mind. I've
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been in some queer places my time. Spent a night side a dead horse
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while a prairie fire slept over me in the tan a territory and another time
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slept side a dead buffaler when the Camaches was on the war path, and
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I didn't care to leave my key on them. I've been two days in
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a carved in tunnel and the Billy Bronco gold mine in New Mexico, and
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was one of the four shut up for three parts of a day in the
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Ksum would slid over her sigh when she was set in the foundations of Buffalo
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Bridge. I've not funked in not experience yet, and I don't propose to
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begin now. We saw he was set on the experiment, so I said,
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well, hurry up, old man, and get through it quick,
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all right, General said he, I calculate we ain't quite ready yet.
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The gentleman, my predecessors would stood in that there. Canister didn't volunteer for
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the office, not much, and I guess there was some ornamental time up
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before the big stroke. I want to go into the singh fair and square
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so I might get fixed up proper. First, I dare say, this
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old glue can raise some string and tie me up the corn to a sample.
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This was said interrogatively to the old custodian, but the latter, who
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understood the drift of his speech, though perhaps not appreciating to the full the
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niceties of dialect and imagery, shook his head. His protest was, however,
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only formal and made to be overcome. The American thrust a gold piece
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into his hand, saying take it, Pard, it's your pot, and
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don't be scared. This ain't no neck type part of that. He asked
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to assistant. He produced some thin, frayed rope and proceeded to bind our
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companion with sufficient strictness for the purpose. When the upper part of his body
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was bound, Hutchinson said, hold on a moment, judge, guess I'm
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too heavy for you to talk on the canister. You just let me walk
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in and then you wash up, regarding my legs will speaking. He had
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backed himself into the opening, which was just enough to hold him. It
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was close fit and no mistake. Amelia looked on with fear in her eye,
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but she evidently did not like to say anything. Then the custodian completed
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his task by tying the American's feet together, so that he was now absolutely
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helpless and fixed into voluntary prison. He seemed to really enjoy it, and
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the incipient smile, which was habitual to his face blossomed into actuality as he
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said, guess this here eve was made out of the rib of a dwarf.
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Very much room for full grown cysts in the United States. To hustle,
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we has to make coffins more room near in Idaho Territory. Now,
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judge, you just begin to let this door down. Slow on to me.
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I want to feel the same pleasure as the other jades had when those
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spikes began to move toward their eyes. Oh no, no, no,
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broke in Amelia hysterically. It is too terrible. I can't bear to see
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it. I can't, I can't. But the American was obdurate, say
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Colonel said he why not take Madame for a little promenade. I wouldn't hurt
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her feelings for the world. But now that I am here, having come
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eight thousand miles, wouldn't it be hard to give up the very experience I'm
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pinnan and panting for a man can't get to experience like cant goods. Every
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time, me and the judge here'll fix up the sing of no time,
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and then you'll come back and we'll be all laughing together once more. The
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resolution that is born of curiosity triumphed, and Emilia stayed, holding tight to
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my arm and shivering, whilst the custodian began to slacken slowly, inch by
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inch the rope that held back the iron door. Hutchins's eyes were positively radiant
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as his eyes followed the first movement of the spice. Wow, he said,
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I guess I've not had enjoyment like this since i left New York baris
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scrap with a French sailor whopping, and that wasn't much of a picnic neither.
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I've not had a show for real pleasure in this DoD ridden continent where
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there ain't no bars nor engines. A weirdinary man goes healed. Slow there,
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judge, don't you rushless business? I want to show for my money
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this game I do. Custodia must have had in him some of the blood
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of his predecessors in that ghastly tower, for he worked the engine with a
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deliberate and excruciating slowness, which, after five minutes, which the outer edge
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of the door had not moved half the many inches, began to overcome Amelia.
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I saw her lips whiten and felt her hold upon my arm relax.
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I looked around an instant for a place whereupon delay her, And when I
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looked at her again, found that her eyes had become fixed on the side
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of the virgin. Following his direction, I saw the black cat crouching out
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of sight. Her green eyes shone like danger lamps in the gloom of the
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place, and their color was heightened by the blood which still smeared her coat
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reddened her mouth. I cried out, the cat, look out for the
22:27
cat, for even then she sprang out before the engine. At this moment
22:32
she looked like a triumphant demon. Her eyes blazed with ferocity, her hair
22:36
bristled out till she seemed twice her normal size, and her tail lashed about,
22:40
as does the tiger's when the quarry is behind it. Elias P.
22:44
Hutchinson, when he saw her, was amused, and his eyes positively sparkled
22:47
with fun as he said, Darna's squaw hadn't gone on all our war paint.
22:51
Just give her a shove off. She comes near any tricks on me,
22:53
and I'm so fixed everlastingly by the boss that during my skin, if
22:57
I can keep my eyes from her, she wants easy there, Judge,
23:00
don't you slack that our rope where I'm mucherd. At this moment, Amlia
23:04
completed her faint, and I had to clutch hold of her round the waist
23:07
or she would have fallen to the floor. Whilst attending to her, I
23:11
saw the black cat crouching for a spring and jumped up to turn the creature
23:15
out, but at that instant, with a sort of hellish scream, she
23:18
hurled herself, not as we expect at Hutchinson the straight at the face of
23:22
the custodian. Her claws seemed to be tearing wildly, as one sees in
23:26
the Chinese drawings of the dragon rampant, and as I looked, I saw
23:30
one of them light on the poor man's eye and actually tear through him down
23:33
his cheek, leaving a wide band of red where the blood seemed to spurt
23:37
from every vein with a yellow sheer terror which came quicker than even his sense
23:41
of pain. The man leapt back, dropping as he did so the rope,
23:45
which held back beh iron door. I jumped for it, but was
23:48
too late. The cord ran like the lightning through the pulley block, and
23:51
the heavy mass fell forward from its own weight. As the door closed,
23:55
I caught a glimpse of our poor companion's face. He seemed frozen with terror.
23:59
His eyes eyes stare with a horrible anguish, as if dazed, and
24:02
no sound came from his lips. And then the spikes did their work happily.
24:07
The end was quick, for when I wrenched open the door, they
24:08
appeared so deep that they had locked in the bones of the skull through which
24:12
they had crushed, and actually tore him it out of his iron prison.
24:17
Till bound as he was, he fell at length with a sickly thud upon
24:21
the floor, the face turning upward as he fell. I rushed to my
24:25
wife, lifted her up and carried her out, for I feared for her
24:29
very reason if she would wake from her faint to such a scene. I
24:32
laid her on the bench outside and ran back. Leaning against the wooden calm
24:36
was Custodian, moaning in pain, whilst he held his reddening handkerchief to his
24:40
eyes. And sitting on the head of the poor American was the cat,
24:42
purring loudly as she licked the blood which trickled through the gashed socket of his
24:47
eyes. I think no one will call me cruel because I seized one of
24:51
the old executioner's swords and shore her in two as she sat end of the squaw