Latest / Classic Science Fiction Books / 21 - The Death of the Curate - The War of the Worlds - H G Wells

Transcript

21 - The Death of the Curate - The War of the Worlds - H G Wells · Classic Science Fiction Books

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Chapter four, The Death of the Curate. It was on
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: the sixth day of our imprisonment that I peeped for
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: the last time and presently found myself alone. Instead of
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: keeping close to me and trying to oust me from
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: the slit, the Curate had gone back into the scullery.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: I was struck by a sudden thought. I went back
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: quickly and quietly into the scullery. In the darkness, I
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: heard the curate drinking. I snatched in the darkness, and
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: my fingers caught a bottle of Burgundy. For a few minutes,
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: there was a tussle. The bottle struck the floor and broke,
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: and I desisted and rose. We stood, panting and threatening
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: each other. In the end, I planted myself between him
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: and the food and told him of my determination to
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: begin a discipline. I divided the food in the pantry
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: into rations to last us ten days. I would not
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: let him eat any more. That day, in the afternoon
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: he made a feeble attempt to get at the food.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: I had been dozing, but in an instant I was awake.
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: All day and all night we sat face to face,
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: I weary but resolute, and he weeping and complaining of
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: his immediate hunger. It was, I know, a night and
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: a day, but to me it seemed it seems now
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: an interminable length of time. And so our widened incompatibility
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: ended at last in open conflict. The two vast days
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: we struggled in undertones and wrestling contests. There were times
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: when I beat and kicked him madly, times when I
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: cajoled and persuaded him, and once I tried to bribe
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: him with the last bottle of Burgundy, for there was
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: a rain water pump from which I could get water.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: But neither force nor kindness availed. He was indeed beyond reason.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: He would neither desist from his attacks on the food,
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: nor from his noisy babbling to himself. The rudimentary precautions
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: to keep our imprisonment endurable he would not observe. Slowly,
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: I began to realize the complete overthrow of his intelligence,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: to perceive that my sole companion in this close and
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: sickly darkness was a man insane. From certain vague memories
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: I am inclined to think. My own mind wandered at times.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: I had strange and hideous dreams. Whenever I slept. It
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: sounds paradoxical, but I am inclined to think that. The
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: weakness and insanity of the curate warned me, braced me,
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: and kept me a sane man. On the eighth day,
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: he began to talk aloud instead of whispering, and nothing
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: I could do would moderate his speech. It is just
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: o God, he would say, over and over again. It
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: is just on me and mine be the punishment laid.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: We have sinned, we have fallen short. There was poverty, sorrow,
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: the poor were trodden in the dust, and I held
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: my peace. I preached acceptable folly, My God, what folly
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: when I should have stood up, though I died for it,
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: and called upon them to repent, repent oppressors of the
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: poor and needy, the wine press of God. Then he
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: would suddenly revert to the matter of the food. I
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: withheld from him, praying, begging, weeping. At last, threatening, he
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: began to raise his voice. I prayed him not to.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: He perceived a hold on me. He threatened he would
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: shout and bring the Martians upon us. For a time.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: That scared me, but any concession would have shortened our
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: chance of escape. Beyond estimating, I defy him, although I
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: felt no assurance that he might not do this thing,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: but that day, at any rate, he did not. He
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: talked with his voice rising slowly through the greater part
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: of the eighth and ninth days, threats entreaties, mingled with
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: a torrent of half sane and always frothy repentance for
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: his vacant sham of God's service, such as made me
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: pity him. Then he slept awhile and began again with
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: renewed strength, so loudly that I must needs make him desist.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Be still, I implored. He rose to his knees, for
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: he had been sitting in the darkness near the copper.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: I have been still too long, he said, in a
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: tone that must have reached the pit. And now I
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: must bear my witness. Woe unto this unfaithful city, Woe, woe, woe, woe,
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: woe to the inhabitants of the earth. By reason of
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: the other voices of the trumpet. Shut up, I said,
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: rising to my feet, and in a terror, lest the
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: martians should hear us. For God's sake, nay, shouted the
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: curate at the top of his voice, standing likewise and
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: extending his arms, speak the word of the Lord is
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: upon me in three strides. He was at the door
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: leading into the kitchen. I must bear my witness. I go.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: It has already been too long delayed. I put out
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: my hand and felt the meat chopper hanging to the wall.
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: In a flash, I was after him. I was fierce
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: with fear. Before he was half way across the kitchen,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: I had overtaken him. With one last touch of humanity,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: I turned the blade back and struck him with the butt.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: He went headlong forward and lay stretched on the ground.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: I stumbled over him and stood panting. He lay still.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: Suddenly I heard a noise without the run and smash
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: of slipping plaster, and the triangular aperture in the wall
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: was darkened. I looked up and saw the lower surface
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: for handling machine coming slowly across the hole. One of
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: its gripping limbs curled amid the debris. Another limb appeared,
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: feeling its way over the fallen beams. I stood petrified, staring.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: Then I saw through a sort of glass plate near
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: the edge of the body, the face as we may
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: call it, and the large dark eyes of a martian peering.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: And then a long metallic snake of tentacle came feeling
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: slowly through the hole. I turned by an effort, stumbled
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: over the curate, and stopped at the scullery door. The
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: tentacle was now some way two yards or more in
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: the room, and twisting and turning with were sudden movements
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: this way and that. For a while I stood fascinated
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: by that slow, fitful advance. Then with a faint, hoarse cry,
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: I forced myself across the scullery. I trembled violently, I
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: could scarcely stand upright. I opened the door of the
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: coal cellar and stood there in the darkness, staring at
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: the faintly lit doorway into the kitchen and listening. Had
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: the Martian seen me? What was it doing? Now? Something
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: was moving to and fro there, very quietly. Every now
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: and then it tapped against the wall or started on
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: its movements with a faint metallic ringing like the movements
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: of keys on a split ring. Then a heavy body.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: I knew too well what was dragged across the floor
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: of the kitchen towards the opening. Irresistibly attracted. I crept
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: to the door and peeped into the kitchen. In the
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: triangle of bright outer sunlight, I saw the Martian in
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: its briarius of a handling machine, scrutinizing the curate's head.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: I thought at once that it would infer my presence
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: from the mark of the blow I had given him.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: I crept back to the coal cellar, shut the door,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: and began to cover myself up as much as I could,
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: and as noiselessly as possible in the darkness amid the
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: firewood and coal therein. Every now and then I paused,
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: rigid to hear if the Martian had thrust its tentacles
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: through the opening again. Then the faint metallic jingle returned.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: I traced it slowly, feeling over the kitchen. Presently I
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: heard it nearer in the scullery. As I judged, I
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: thought that its length might be insufficient to reach me.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: I prayed copiously. It passed, scraping faintly across the cellar door,
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: an aide which of almost intolerable suspense intervened. Then I
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: heard it fumbling at the latch. It had found the door.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: The Martians understood doors. It worried at the catch for
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: a minute perhaps, and then the door opened. In the darkness,
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: I could just see the thing like an elephant's trunk,
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: more than anything else, waving towards me and touching and
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: examining the wall, coals, wood, and ceiling. It was like
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: a black worm, swaying its blind head to and fro.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: Once even it touched the heel of my boot. I
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: was on the verge of screaming. I bit my hand.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: For a time, the tentacle was silent. I could have
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: fancied it had been withdrawn. Presently, with an abrupt click,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: it gripped something I thought it had me, and seemed
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: to go out of the cellar again. For a minute,
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: I was not. Apparently it had taken a lump of
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: coal to examine. I seized the opportunity of slightly shifting
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: my position, which had become cramped, and then listened. I
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: whispered passionate prayers for safety. Then I heard the slow,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: deliberate sound creeping towards me again, slowly, slowly, it drew near,
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: scratching against the walls and tapping the furniture. While I
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: was still doubtful, it rapped smartly against the cellar door
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: and closed it. I heard it go into the pantry,
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: and the biscuit tins rattled, and a bottle smashed, and
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: then came a heavy bump against the cellar door, then
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: silence that passed into an infinity of suspense. Had it
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: gone at last? I decided that it had it came
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: into the scullery no more, but I lay all the
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: tenth day in the close darkness, buried among coals and firewood,
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: not daring even to crawl out for the drink for
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: which I craved. It was the eleventh day before I
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: ventured so far from my security end of Section twenty
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: one