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🟡 House of the Vampire (Full Audiobook) | George Sylvester Viereck · Weird Fiction Audiobooks: Cosmic Horror, Strange Realities & Uncanny Tales

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  Speaker 1: Section one of the House of the Vampire. This is
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  Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Elisabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by
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  Speaker 1: George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter one. The freakish little leader of
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  Speaker 1: the orchestra, newly imported from Sicily to New York, tossed
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  Speaker 1: his conductor's wand excitedly through the air, drowning with musical thunders,
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  Speaker 1: the hum of conversation, and the clatter of plates. Yet
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  Speaker 1: neither his apish demeanor nor the deafening noises that responded
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  Speaker 1: to every movement of his agile body detracted attention from
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  Speaker 1: the figure of Reginald Clark and the young man at
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  Speaker 1: his side, as they smilingly wound their way to the exit.
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  Speaker 1: The boy's expression was pleasant, with an inkling of wistfulness,
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  Speaker 1: while the soft glimmer of his lucid eyes betrayed the
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  Speaker 1: poet and the dreamer. The smile of Reginald Clark was
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  Speaker 1: the smile of a conqueror, a suspicion of silver in
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  Speaker 1: his crown of dark hair. Only added dignity to his bearing,
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  Speaker 1: while the infinitely ramified lines above the heavy set mouth
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  Speaker 1: spoke at once of subtlety and of strength. Without stretch
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  Speaker 1: of the imagination, one might have likened him to a
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  Speaker 1: Roman cardinal in the days of the Borgias, who had
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  Speaker 1: miraculously stepped forth from a time stained canvass and slipped
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  Speaker 1: into twentieth century evening clothes with the affability of complete
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  Speaker 1: self possession. He nodded in response to greetings from all sides,
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  Speaker 1: inclining his head with special politeness to a young woman
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  Speaker 1: whose sea blue eyes were riveted upon his features with
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  Speaker 1: a look of mingled hate and admiration. The woman, disregarding
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  Speaker 1: his silent salutation, continued to stare at him, wild eyed,
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  Speaker 1: as a damned soul and purgatory might look at Satan.
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  Speaker 1: Passing in regal splendor through the seventy times sevenfold circles
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  Speaker 1: of Hell, Reginald Clark walked on unconcernedly through the rows
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  Speaker 1: of gay diners, still smiling affable calm. But his companion
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  Speaker 1: bethought himself of certain rumors he had heard concerning Ethel
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  Speaker 1: Brandenburg's mad love for the man from whose features she
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: could not even now turn her eyes. Evidently her passion
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: was unreciprocated. It had not always been so. There was
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  Speaker 1: a time in her career, some years ago in Paris,
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  Speaker 1: when it was whispered that she had secretly married him,
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  Speaker 1: and not much later obtained a divorce. The matter was
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  Speaker 1: never cleared up, as both preserved an uncompromising silence upon
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  Speaker 1: the subject of their matrimonial experience. Certain it was that
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  Speaker 1: for a space the genius of Reginald Clark had completely
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  Speaker 1: dominated her brush, and that ever since he had thrown
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  Speaker 1: her aside, her pictures were but plagiarisms of her former
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  Speaker 1: artistic self. The cause of the rupture between them was
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  Speaker 1: a matter only of surmise, but the effect it had
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  Speaker 1: on the woman testified clearly to the remarkable power of
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  Speaker 1: Reginald Clark. He had entered her life, and behold, the
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  Speaker 1: world was transfixed on her canvases in myriad hues of
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  Speaker 1: transcending radiance. He had passed from it, and with him
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  Speaker 1: vanished the brilliancy of her coloring, as at sunset, the
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  Speaker 1: borrowed amber and gold fade from the face of the clouds.
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  Speaker 1: The glamor of Clark's name may have partly explained the
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  Speaker 1: secret of his charm. But even in circles where literary
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  Speaker 1: fame is no passport, he could, if he chose, exercise
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  Speaker 1: an almost terrible fascination. Subtle and profound. He had ransacked
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  Speaker 1: the coffers of medieval dialecticians and plundered the arsenals of
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  Speaker 1: the sophists. Many years later, when the vultures of misfortune
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  Speaker 1: had swooped down upon him and his name was no
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  Speaker 1: longer mentioned without a sneer, he was still remembered in
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  Speaker 1: New York drawing rooms as the man who had brought
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  Speaker 1: to perfection the art of talking. Even to dine with
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  Speaker 1: him was a liberal education. Clark's marvelous conversational power was
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  Speaker 1: equalled only by his marvelous style. Ernest Fielding's heart leaped
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  Speaker 1: in him the thought that henceforth he would be privileged
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  Speaker 1: to live under one roof with the only writer of
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  Speaker 1: his generation who could lend to the English language the rich,
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  Speaker 1: strength and rugged music of the Elizabethans. Reginald Clark was
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  Speaker 1: a master of many instruments. Milton's mighty organ was no
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  Speaker 1: less obedient to his touch than the little lute of
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  Speaker 1: the troubadour. He was never the same, that was his strength.
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  Speaker 1: Clark's style possessed at once the chiseled chasteness of a
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  Speaker 1: Greek marble column and the elaborate deviltry of the Late Renaissance.
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  Speaker 1: At times, his winged words seemed to flutter down the
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  Speaker 1: page frantically, like Baroque angels. At other times, nothing could
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  Speaker 1: have more adequately described his manner than the timeless calm
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  Speaker 1: of the gaunt pyramids. The two men had reached the street,
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  Speaker 1: Reginald wrapped his long spring coat round him. I shall
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  Speaker 1: expect you tomorrow at four, he said, the tone of
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  Speaker 1: his voice was deep and melodious, suggesting hidden depths and cadences.
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  Speaker 1: I shall be punctual. The younger man's voice trembled as
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  Speaker 1: he spoke. I look forward to your coming with much pleasure.
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  Speaker 1: I am interested in you. The glad blood mounted to
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  Speaker 1: Ernest's cheeks. At praise from the austere lips of this
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  Speaker 1: arbiter of literary elegance, an almost imperceptible smile crept over
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  Speaker 1: the other man's features. I am proud that my work
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  Speaker 1: interests you, was all the boy could say. I think
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  Speaker 1: it is quite amazing. But at present. Here Clark drew
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  Speaker 1: out a watch set with jewels. I am afraid, I
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  Speaker 1: must bid you good bye. He held Ernest's hand for
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  Speaker 1: a moment in a firm, genial grasp, then turned away briskly,
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  Speaker 1: while the boy remained standing, open mouthed. The crowd jostling
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  Speaker 1: against him carried him almost off his feet, but his
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  Speaker 1: eyes followed far into the night, the masterful figure of
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  Speaker 1: Reginald Clark, toward whom he felt himself drawn with every
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  Speaker 1: fiber of his body and the warm enthusiasm of his
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  Speaker 1: generous youth Chapter two. With elastic step inhaling the night
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  Speaker 1: air with voluptuous delight, Reginald Clarke made his way down Broadway,
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  Speaker 1: lying stretched out before him, bathed in light and pulsating
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  Speaker 1: with life. His world embracing intellect was powerfully attracted by
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  Speaker 1: the giant city's motley activities. On the street, as in
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  Speaker 1: the salon, his magnetic power compelled recognition, and he stepped
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  Speaker 1: through the midst of the crowd as a Circassian blade
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  Speaker 1: cleaves water. After walking a block or two, he suddenly
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  Speaker 1: halted before a jeweler's shop. Arrayed in the window were
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  Speaker 1: priceless gems that shone in the glare of electricity like
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  Speaker 1: mystical serpent eyes, green, pomegranate, and water blue. And as
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  Speaker 1: he stood there, the dazzling radiance before him was transformed
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  Speaker 1: in the prism of his mind into something great and
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  Speaker 1: very wonderful that might some day be a poem. Then
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  Speaker 1: his attention was diverted by a small group of tiny
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  Speaker 1: girls dancing on the sidewalk to the husky strains of
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  Speaker 1: an old hurdy gurdy. He joined the circle of amused
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  Speaker 1: spectators to watch those pink ribboned bits of femininity swaying
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  Speaker 1: airily to and fro in unison with the tune. One
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  Speaker 1: especially attracted his notice, a slim, olive colored girl from
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  Speaker 1: a land where it is always spring, her whole being
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  Speaker 1: translated into music. With hair disheveled and feet hardly touching
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  Speaker 1: the ground, the girl suggested an orange leaf dancing on
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  Speaker 1: a sunbeam. The rasping street organ, perchance, brought to her
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  Speaker 1: melodious reminiscences of some flute playing savoyard boy, brown limbed,
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  Speaker 1: and dark of hair. For several minutes, Reginald Clark followed
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  Speaker 1: with keen delight, each delicate curve her graceful limbs described.
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  Speaker 1: Then was it that she grew tired or that the
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  Speaker 1: stranger's persistent scrutiny embarrassed her. The music oozed out of
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  Speaker 1: her movements. They grew slower, angular, almost clumsy. The look
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  Speaker 1: of interest in Clark's eyes died, but his whole form quivered,
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  Speaker 1: as if the rhythm of the music and the dance
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  Speaker 1: had mysteriously entered into his blood. He continued his stroll,
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  Speaker 1: seemingly without aim. In reality, he followed with nervous intensity,
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  Speaker 1: the multiform undulations of the populace swarming through Broadway in
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  Speaker 1: either direction. Like the giant whose strength was rekindled every
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  Speaker 1: time he touched his mother the earth, Reginald Clark seemed
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  Speaker 1: to draw fresh vitality from every contact with life. He
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  Speaker 1: turned east along Fourteenth Street, where cheap vaudevilles are strung
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  Speaker 1: together as glass pearls on the throat of a wanton
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  Speaker 1: Gaudy billboards drenched in clamorous red proclaimed the tawdry attractions within,
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: much to the surprise of the doorkeeper. At a particularly
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  Speaker 1: evil looking music hall, Reginald Clark lingered in the lobby
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  Speaker 1: and finally even bought a ticket that entitled him to
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  Speaker 1: enter this sordid wilderness of Decolette art Street snipes. A
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  Speaker 1: few workingmen, dilapidated sportsmen, and women whose ruined youth, thick
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  Speaker 1: layers of powder and paint, even in this artificial light,
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  Speaker 1: could not restore constituted the bulk of the audience. Reginald Clark,
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  Speaker 1: apparently unconscious of the curiosity, surprise, and envy that his
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  Speaker 1: appearance excited, seated himself at a table near the stage,
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  Speaker 1: ordering from the solicitous waiter only a cocktail and a program.
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  Speaker 1: The drink he left untouched while his eyes greedily ran
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  Speaker 1: down the lines of the announcement. When he had found
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  Speaker 1: what he sought, he lit a cigar, paying no attention
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  Speaker 1: to the boards, but studying the audience with cursory interest
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  Speaker 1: until the appearance of Betsy the Hyacinth Girl. When she
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  Speaker 1: began to sing, his mind still wandered. The words of
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  Speaker 1: her song were crude, but not without a certain lilt
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  Speaker 1: that delighted the uncultured ear, while the girl's voice was
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  Speaker 1: thin to the point of being unpleasant. When, however, she
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  Speaker 1: came to the burden of the song, Clark's manner changed. Suddenly,
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  Speaker 1: laying down his cigar, he listened with rapt attention, eagerly
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  Speaker 1: gazing at her for as she sang the last line
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  Speaker 1: and tore the hyacinthe blossoms from her. There crept into
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  Speaker 1: her voice a strangely poignant, pathetic little trill that redeemed
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  Speaker 1: the execrable faultiness of her singing and brought the rude
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  Speaker 1: audience under her spell. Clark, too, was captivated by that tremor,
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  Speaker 1: the infinite sadness of which suggested the plaintive souls moaning
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  Speaker 1: low at night when lust praise on creatures marked for
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  Speaker 1: its spoil. The singer paused still. Those luminous eyes were
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  Speaker 1: upon her. She grew nervous. It was only with tremendous
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  Speaker 1: difficulty that she reached the refrain. As she sang the
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  Speaker 1: opening lines of the last stanza, an inscrutable smile curled
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  Speaker 1: on Clark's lips. She noticed the man's relentless gaze and faltered.
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  Speaker 1: When the burden came. Her singing was hard and cracked.
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  Speaker 1: The tremor had gone from her voice. End of Section one,
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  Speaker 1: Section two of the House of the Vampire. This LibriVox
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  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Recording by Elizabeth Klett.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter three,
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  Speaker 1: long before the appointed time, Ernest walked up and down
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  Speaker 1: in front of the abode of Reginald Clark, a stately
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  Speaker 1: apartment house overlooking Riverside Drive. Misshapen automobiles were chasing by,
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  Speaker 1: carrying to the cool River's marge the restlessness and the
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  Speaker 1: fever of American life. But the bustle and the noise
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  Speaker 1: seemed to the boy only auspicious omens of the future. Jack,
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  Speaker 1: his room mate and dearest friend, had left him a
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  Speaker 1: month ago, and for a space he had felt very lonely.
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  Speaker 1: His young and delicate soul found it difficult to grapple
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  Speaker 1: with the vague fears that his nervous brain engendered. When
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  Speaker 1: whispered sounds seemed to float from hidden corners and the
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  Speaker 1: stairs creaked under mysterious feet. He needed the voice of
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  Speaker 1: loving kindness to call him back from the valley of
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  Speaker 1: haunting shadows, where his poet's soul was wont to linger
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  Speaker 1: over long in his hours of weakness, The light caress
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  Speaker 1: of a comrade renewed his strength and rekindled in his
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  Speaker 1: hand the flaming sword of song, and at nightfall he
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  Speaker 1: would bring the day's harvest to Clark as a worshiper
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  Speaker 1: scattering precious stones, incense, and tapestries at the feet of
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  Speaker 1: a god. Surely he would be very happy. And as
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  Speaker 1: the heart at times leads the feet to the goal
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  Speaker 1: of its desire, while multi colored dreams like dancing girls
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  Speaker 1: lull the will to sleep, he suddenly found himself stepping
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  Speaker 1: from the elevator car to Reginald Clark's apartment. Already was
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  Speaker 1: he raising his hand to strike the electric bell when
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  Speaker 1: a sound from within made him pause half way. No,
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  Speaker 1: there's no help, he heard Clark say. His voice had
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  Speaker 1: a hard, metallic clangor a boyish voice answered plaintively. What
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  Speaker 1: the words were. Ernest could not distinctly hear, but the
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  Speaker 1: suppressed sob in them almost brought the tears to his eyes.
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  Speaker 1: He instinctively knew that this was the finale of some tragedy.
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  Speaker 1: He withdrew hastily so as not to be a witness
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  Speaker 1: of an interview that was not meant for his ears.
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  Speaker 1: Reginald Clark probably had good reason for parting with his
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  Speaker 1: young friend, whom Ernest surmised to be Abel Felton, a
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  Speaker 1: talented boy whom the Master had taken under his wings.
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  Speaker 1: In the apartment, a momentary silence had ensued. This was
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  Speaker 1: interrupted by Clark. It will come again in a month,
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  Speaker 1: in a year, in two years. No, no, it is
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  Speaker 1: all gone, sobbed the boy. Nonsense. You are merely nervous.
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  Speaker 1: But that is just why we must part. There is
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  Speaker 1: no room in one house for two nervous people. I
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  Speaker 1: was not such a nervous wreck before I met you.
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  Speaker 1: Am I to blame for it? For your morbid fancy,
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  Speaker 1: your extravagance, the slow tread of a nervous disease. Perhaps?
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  Speaker 1: Who can tell? But I am all confused. I don't
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  Speaker 1: know what I am saying. Everything is so puzzling life, friendship.
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  Speaker 1: You I fancied, You cared for my career, and now
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  Speaker 1: you end our friendship without a thought. We must all
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  Speaker 1: follow the law of our being. The laws are within
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: us and in our control. They are within us and
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  Speaker 1: beyond us. It is the physiological structure of our brains,
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  Speaker 1: our nerve cells, that makes and mars our lives. Our
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  Speaker 1: mental companionship was so beautiful, It was meant to last.
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  Speaker 1: That is the dream of youth. Nothing lasts, Everything flows pontarey.
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  Speaker 1: We are all but sojourners in an inn. Friendship, as
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  Speaker 1: love is an illusion. Life has nothing to take from
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: a man who has no illusions. It has nothing to
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  Speaker 1: give him. They said good bye. At the door, Ernest
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: met Abel, where are you going? He asked for a
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: little pleasure trip. Ernest knew that the boy lied. He
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: remembered that Abel Felton was at work upon some book,
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: a play, or a novel. It occurred to him to
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: inquire how far he had progressed with it. Abel smiled sadly,
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: I am not writing it. Not writing it, Reginald is
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: I am afraid I don't understand. Never mind, some day
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  Speaker 1: you will. Chapter four. I am so happy you came,
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: Reginald Clark said as he conducted Ernest into his studio.
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  Speaker 1: It was a large, luxuriously furnished room overlooking the Hudson
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  Speaker 1: and Riverside Drive. Dazzled and bewildered, the boy's eyes wandered
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: from object to object, from picture to statue. Despite seemingly
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: incongruous details, the whole arrangement possessed style and distinction. A
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: satyr on the mantelpiece whispered of scene's secrets into the
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: ears of Saint Cecilia. The argent limbs of Antinous brushed
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: against the garments of Mona Lisa, and from a corner
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: a little rococo lady peered coquettishly at the gray image
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: of an Egyptian sphinx. There was a picture of Napoleon
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: facing the image of the crucified. Above all, in the
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: semi darkness, artificially produced by heavy draperies towered two busts
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: Shakespeare and Balzac. Ernest exclaimed with some surprise. Yes, explained Reginald.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: They are my gods, his gods. Surely there was a
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: key to Clark's character. Our gods are ourselves raised to
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: the highest power Clark and Shakespeare. Even to Ernest's admiring mind,
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: it seemed almost blasphemous to name a contemporary, however, esteemed
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: in one breath with the mighty Master of song, whose grins,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: great gaunt shadow, thrown against the background of the years,
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: has assumed immense, unproportionate, monstrous dimensions. Yet something might be
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: said for the comparison. Clark undoubtedly was universally broad, and
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: undoubtedly concealed with no less exquisite taste than the Elizabethan
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: his own personality under the splendid raiment of his art.
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: They certainly were affinities it would not have been surprising
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: to him to see the clear, calm head of Shakespeare
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: rise from behind his host. Perhaps, who knows the very
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: presence of the bust in his room had to some
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: extent subtly and secretly molded Reginald Clarke's life. A man's soul,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: like the chameleon, takes color from its environment. Even comparative trifles.
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: The number of the house in which we live, or
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: the color of the wall paper of a room, may
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: determine a destiny. The boy's eyes were again surveying the
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: fantastic surroundings in which he found himself, while from a
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: cour ow, Clark's eyes were watching his every movement, as
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: if to follow his thoughts into the innermost labyrinth of
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: the mind. It seemed to earnest under the spell of
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: this passing fancy, as though each vase, each picture, each
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: curio in the room was reflected in Clark's work. In
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: a long cued porcelain Chinese Mandarin, he distinctly recognized a
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: quaint quatrain in one of Clark's most marvelous poems, and
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: he could have sworn that the grin of the Hindoo
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: monkey god on the writing table reappeared in the weird
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: rhythm of the two stanzas, whose grotesque cadence had haunted
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: him for years. At last, Clark broke the silence. You
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: like my studio, he asked. The simple question brought Ernest
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: back to reality. Like it? Why it's stunning? It set
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: up in me the queerest train of thought. I too
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: have been in a whimsical mood to night. Fancy, unlike genius,
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: is an infectious disease. What is the peculiar for assumed?
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: In your case, I've been wondering whether all the things
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: that environ us day by day are in a measure
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: fashioning our thought life. I sometimes think that even my
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: little Mandarin and this monkey idol, which by the way,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: I brought from India, are exerting a mysterious, but none
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: the less real influence upon my work. Great God, Ernest replied,
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: I have had the identical thought. How very strange, Clark exclaimed,
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: with seeming surprise. It is said, tritely but truly, that
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: great minds travel the same roads. Ernest observed, inwardly pleased. No,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: the older man subtly remarked, but they reach the same
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: conclusion by a different route, and you attach serious importance
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: to our fancy. Why not Clark was gazing abstractedly at
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: the bust of Balzac. A man's genius is commensurate with
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: his ability of obs absorbing from life the elements essential
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: to his artistic completion. Balzac possessed this power and a
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: remarkable degree. But strange to say it was evil that
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: attracted him most. He absorbed it as a sponge absorbs water.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Perhaps because there was so little of it in his
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: own make up. He must have purified the atmosphere around
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: him for miles by bringing all the evil that was
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: floating in the air or slumbering in men's souls to
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: the point of his pen. And he his eyes were
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: resting on Shakespeare's features as a man might look upon
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: the base of a brother. He too was such a nature.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: In fact, he was the most perfect type of the artist.
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: Nothing escaped his mind from life and from books. He
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: drew his material, each time reshaping it for the master hand.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: Creation is a divine prerogative. Recreation, infinitely more wonderful than
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: mere calling into existence, is the prerogative of the poet.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: Shakespeare took his colors from many palets. That is why
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: he is so great, and why his work is incredibly
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: greater than he. It alone explains his unique achievement. Who
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: was he? What education did he have? What opportunities? None?
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: And yet we find in his work the wisdom of
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: Bacon Sir Walter Wawley's fancies and discoveries, Marlowe's verbal thunders,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: and the mysterious loveliness of mister w h. Ernest listened,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: entranced by the sound of Clark's mollifluous voice. He was,
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: indeed a master of the spoken word, and possessed a
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: miraculous power of giving to the wildest fancies an air
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: of resemblence. End of section two, Section three of the
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: House of the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: public domain recording by Elizabeth Klett The House of the
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter five. Yes, said Walcom
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: the sculptor. It's a most curious thing. What is asked Ernest,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: who had been dreaming over the sphinx that was looking
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: at him from its corner with the sarcastic smile of
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: five thousand years. How our dreams of yesterday stare at
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: us like strangers to day. On the contrary, remarked Reginald.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: It would be strange if they were still to know us.
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: In fact, it would be unnatural. The skies above us
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: and the earth underfoot are in perpetual motion. Each atom
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: of our physical nature is vibrating with unimaginable rapidity. Change
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: is identical with life, it sometimes seems, said the sculptor,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: as if evaporated like water, Why not under favorable conditions?
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: But where do they go? Surely they cannot perish utterly? Yes,
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: that is the question. Or rather it is not a question.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: Nothing is ever lost in the spiritual universe. But what inquired,
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: Ernest is the particular reason for your reflection. It is this,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: the sculptor replied. I had a striking motive and lost it.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: Do you remember, he continued speaking to Reginald, the narcissus
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: I was working on the last time when you called
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: at my studio. Yes, it was a striking thing and
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: impressed me very much, though I cannot recall it at
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: the moment. Well, it was a commission. An eccentric young
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: millionaire had offered me eight thousand dollars for it. I
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: had an absolutely original conception, but I cannot execute it.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: It's as if a breeze had carried it away. That
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: is very regrettable, I should say so, replied the sculptor.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: Ernest smiled, For everybody knew of Walcom's domestic troubles, having
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: twice figured in the divorce court, he was at present
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: defraying the expenses of three households. The sculptor had meanwhile
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: seated himself at Reginald's writing table, unintentionally scanning a typewritten
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: page that was lying before him. Like all artists, something
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: of a madman and something of a child, he at
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: first glanced over its contents, distractedly, then with an interest
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: so intense that he was no longer aware of the
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: impropriety of his action. By jove, he cried, what is this?
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: It is an epoch of the French Revolution. Reginald replied,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: not without surprise. But man, do you know that I
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: have discovered my motive in it? What do you mean?
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: Asked Ernest, looking first at Reginald and then at Walcom,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: whose sanity he began to doubt. Listen, and the sculptor read,
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: trembling with emotion, a long passage whose measured cadence delighted
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: Ernest's ear. Without however, enlightening his mind. As to the
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: purport of Walcom's cryptic remark, Reginald said nothing, but the
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: gleam in his eye showed that this time, at least
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: his interest was alert. Walcom saw the hopelessness of making
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: clear his meaning without an explanation. I forget you haven't
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: a sculptor's mind. I am so constituted that with me
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: all impressions are immediately translated into the sense of form.
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: I do not hear music. I see it rise with
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: domes and spires, with painted windows and arabesques. The scent
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: of the rose is to me tangible. I can almost
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: feel it with my hand. So your prose suggested to me,
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: by its rhythmic flow, something which at first indefinite, crystallized
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: finally into my lost conception of narcissus. It is extraordinary,
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: murmured Reginald. I had not dreamed of it, so you
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: do not think it rather fantastic, remarked Ernest, circumscribing his
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: true meaning. No, it was quite possible. Perhaps his Narcissus
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: was engaging the subconscious strata of my mind while I
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: was writing this passage, And surely it would be strange
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: if the undercurrents of our minds were not reflected in
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: our style. Do you mean, then, that a subtle psychologist
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: ought to be able to read between and beneath our lines,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: not only what we express, but also what we leave unexpressed. Undoubtedly,
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: even if while we are writing we are unconscious of
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: our state of mind, that would open a new field
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: to psychology, only to those that have the key, that
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: can read the hidden symbols. It is to me a
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: matter of course that every mind movement below or above
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: the threshold of consciousness must of a necessity leave its imprint,
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: faintly or clearly, as the case may be, upon our activities.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: This may explain my books that seem intolerably dull to
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: the majority, delight the hearts of the few ernest interjected Yes,
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: to the few that possess the key. I distinctly remember
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: how an uncle of mine once laid down a discussion
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: on higher mathematics and blushed fearfully when his innocent wife
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: looked over his shoulder. The man who had written it
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: was a ruet. Then, the seemingly most harmless books may
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: secretly possess the power of scattering in young minds the
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: seed of corruption. Walcom remarked, if they happen to understand,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Clark observed, thoughtfully, I can very well conceive of a
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: leacherous text book of the calculus, or of a reporter's
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: story of a picnic in which burnt under the surface,
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: undiscoverable save to the initiate, the tragic passion of Tristram
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: and result chapter six. Several weeks had elapsed since the
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: conversation in Reginald Clark's studio. The spring was now well
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: advanced and had sprinkled the meadows with flowers, and the
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: book shells of the reviewers with fiction. The latter Ernest
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: turned to in good account, But from the flowers no
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: poem blossomed. Forth. In writing about other men's books, he
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: almost forgot that the spring tide had brought to him
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: no bouquet of song. Only now and then, like a
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: rippling of water, disquietude troubled his soul. The strange personality
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: of the Master of the house had enveloped the lad's
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: thoughts with an impenetrable maze. The day before, Jack had
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: come on a flying visit from Harvard, but even he
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: was unable to free Earnest's soul from the obsession of
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: Reginald Clark. Ernest was lazily stretching himself on a couch,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: waving the smoke of his cigarette to Reginald, who was
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: writing at his desk. Your friend Jack is delightful, Reginald remarked,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: looking up from his papers, and his Ebben colored hair
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: contrasts prettily with the gold and yours. I should imagine
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: that you are temperamental antipodes. So we are. But friendship
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: bridges the chasm between. How long have you known him?
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: We've been chums ever since our sophomore year. What attracted
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: you in him? It is no simple matter to define
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: exactly one's likes and dislikes. Even a tiny protoplasmic animal
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: appears to be highly complex under the microscope. How can
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: we hope to analyze with any degree of certitude our souls,
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: especially when under the influence of feeling, we see as
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: through a glass darkly. It is true that personal feeling
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: colors our spectacles and distorts the perspective. Still, we should
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: not shrink from self analysis. We must learn to see
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: clearly into our own hearts. If we would give vitality
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: to our work. Indiscretion is the better part of literature,
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: and it behooves us to hound down each delicate, elusive
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: shadow of emotion and convert it into copy. It is
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: because I am so self analytical that I realize the
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: complexity of my nature, and a matter loss to define
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: my emotions. Conflicting forces sway us hither and thither without
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: neutralizing each other. Physicology isn't physics. There were many things
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: to attract me to Jack. He was a subtler, more sympathetic,
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: more feminine, perhaps than the rest of my college mates
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: that I have noticed. In fact, his lashes are those
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: of a girl. You still care for him very much.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: It isn't a matter of caring. We are two beings
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: that live one life, a sort of psychic Siamese twins
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: almost why The matter is very simple. Our hearts root
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: in the same soil, The same books have nourished us,
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: the same great winds have shaken our being, and the
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: same sunshine called forth the beautiful blossom of friendship. He
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: struck me, if you will pardon my saying so, as
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: a rather commonplace companion. There is in him a hidden
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: sweetness and a depth of feeling which only intimate contact reveals.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: He is now taking his postgraduate course at Harvard, and
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: for well nigh two months we have not met yet.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: So many invisible threads of common experience unite us that
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: we could meet after years and still be near each other.
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: You are very young, Reginald replied, what do you mean, Ah,
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: never mind, So you do not believe that two hearts
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: may ever beat his one? No, that is an auditory delusion.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: Not even two clocks beat in unison. There is always
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: a discrepancy, infinitesimal, perhaps, but a discrepancy. Nevertheless, A sharp
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: ring of the bell interrupted the conversation. A moment later,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: a curly head peeped through the door. Hallo, Ernest, how
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: are you, old man? The intruder cried, with a laugh
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: in his voice. Then, noticing Clark, he shook hands with
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: the great man unceremoniously, with the nonchalance of the healthy
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: young animal bred in the atmosphere of an American college.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: His touch seemed to thrill Clark, who breathed heavily and
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: then stepped to the window as if to conceal the
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: flush of vitality on his cheek. It was a breath
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: of spring tide that Jack had brought with him. Youth
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: is a prince charming to shriveled veins. The pressure of
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: his hand imparts a spark of animation, and middle age
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: unfolds its petals in his presence, as a sunflower gazing
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: at late noon once more upon its lord. I have
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: come to take Ernest away from you, said Jack. He
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: looks a trifle paler than usual, and a day's outing
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: will stir the red corpuscles in his blood. I have
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: no doubt that you will take very good care of him,
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: Reginald replied, Where shall we go? Ernest asked absent mindedly,
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: but he did not hear the answer, for Reginald's skepticisms
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: had more deeply impressed him than he cared to confess
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: to himself. And of section three, Section four of the
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: House of the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: public domain recording by Elisabeth Klett. The House of the
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter seven. The two boys
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: had bathed their souls in the sea breeze, and their
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: eyes in light. The tide of pleasure loving humanity jostling
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: against them, had carried their feet to the Lion Palace.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: From there, seated at table and quenching their thirst with
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: high balls. They watched the feverish palpitations of the city's
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: life blood pulsating in the veins of Coney Island, to
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: which they had drifted from Brighton Beach. Earnest blue thoughtful
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: rings of smoke into the air. Do you notice the
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: ferocious look in the mien of the average frequenter of
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: this island resort, He said to Jack, whose eyes, following
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: the impulse of his more robust youth, were examining specimens
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: of feminine flotsam on the waves of the crowd. It is,
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: he continued, speaking to himself, for want of an audience,
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: the American who is in for having a good time,
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: and he is going to get it. Like a huntsman.
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: He follows the scent of happiness. But I warrant that
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: always it eludes him. Perhaps his mad race is only
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: the epitome of humanity's vain pursuit of pleasure, the eternal
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: cry that is never answered. But Jack was not listening.
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: There are times in the life of every man when
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: a petticoat is more attractive to him than all the
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: philosophy of the world. Ernest was a little hurt and
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: It was not without some silent remonstrance that he acquiesced
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: when Jack invited to their table two creatures that once
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: were women. Why but they are interesting I cannot find
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: so they both had seen better times. Of course, then
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: moneylaws came, with work in shop or factory and the
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: voice of the tempter in the commercial wilderness. One, a frail,
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: nervous little creature, who had instinctively chosen a seat at
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: Ernest's side, kept prattling in his ear, ready to tell
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: the story of her life to any one who was
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: willing to treat her to a drink. Something in her
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: demeanor interested him, And then I had a stroke of luck.
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: The manager of a vaudeville was my friend and decided
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: to give me a trial. He thought I had a voice.
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: They called me Betsy, the Hyacinth girl. At first it
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: seemed as if people liked to hear me, But I
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: suppose that was because I was new. After a month
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: or two they discharged me. And why, I suppose I
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: was just used up. That's all frightful. I never had
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: much of a voice. And the tobacco smoke and the wine.
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: I love wine. She gulped down her glass and do
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: you like your present occupation? Why not? Am I not young?
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: Am I not pretty? This? She said, not parrot wise,
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: but with a simple coquettishness that was all her own.
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: On the way to the steamer a few moments later,
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: Ernest asked, half reproachfully, Jack, And you really enjoyed this conversation,
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: didn't you? Do you mean this? Why? Yes? She was
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: very agreeable. Ernest frowned. We're twenty, Earnest, And then you see,
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: it's like a course in sociology. Susie, Susie that was
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: her name. Yes, so she had an aim. Of course
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: she shouldn't. It should be a number. They may not
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: be pillars of society, still they're human, yes, said Ernest.
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: That is the most horrible part of it. Chapter eight.
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: The moon was shining brightly, swift and sure. The prow
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: of the night boat parted, the silvery foam, the smell
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: of young flesh, peals of laughter, a breathless pianola, the
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: tripping of dancing feet, voices husked with drink and voices
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: soft with love, The shrill accents of vulgarity, hustling waiters,
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: shop girls, bourgeois couples, tired families of fore and upward,
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: sleeping children, a boy selling candy, the crying of babies.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: The two friends were sitting on the upper deck, muffled
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: in their long raincoats. In the distance, the empire city
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: rose radiant from the mist, say Ernest, you should spelt
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: some poetry as of old. Are your lips stricken mute?
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: Or are you still thinking of Coney Island? Oh? No,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: the swift wind has taken it away. I am clean,
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: I am pure. Life has past me, it has kissed me,
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: but it has left no trace. He looked upon the
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: face of his friend. Their hands met. They felt with
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: keen enjoyment the beauty of the night, of their friendship,
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: and of the city beyond. Then Earnest's lips moved softly, musically,
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: twitching with a strange, ascetic passion that trembled in his voice.
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: As he began. Hued, steel ribbed monsters rise into the air.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: Her Babylonian towers, while on high like gilt scaled serpents
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: glide the swift trains by or under foot, creep to
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: their secret lair. A thousand lights are jewels in her hair,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: the sea, her girdle, and her crown, the sky, her life,
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: blood throbs, the fevered pulses fly, immense, defiant, breathless. She
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: stands there and ever listens in the ceaseless din, waiting
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: for him, her lover, who shall come, whose singing lips
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: shall boldly claim their own and render sonent? What in
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: her was dumb, the splendor and the madness and the sin,
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: her dreams in iron and her thoughts of stone. He paused,
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: The boat glided on for a long time, neither spoke
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: a word. After a while, Jack broke the silence, and
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: are you dreaming of becoming the lyric mouth of the
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: city of giving utterance to all its yearnings, its dreams
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: in iron and thoughts of stone? No, replied Ernest, simply
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: not yet. It is strange to what impressions the brain
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: will respond. In Clark's house, in the midst of inspiring things,
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: inspiration failed me. But while I was with that girl,
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: an idea came to me, an idea big, real. Will
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: it deal with her? Ernest smiled, Oh no, she personally
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: has nothing to do with it, at least not directly.
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: It was the commotion of blood and brain, the air,
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: the change. I don't know what what will it be?
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: Asked Jack, with interest all alert a play, a wonderful play,
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: and its heroine will be a princess, a little princess
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: with a yellow veil. What of the plot that I
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: shall not tell you to day, I shall not breathe
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: a word to any one. It will take you all
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: by surprise and the public by storm. So it will
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: be playable, if I am not very much mistaken. You
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: will see it on Broadway within a year, And he
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: added graciously, I will let you have two box seats
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: for the first night. They both chuckled at the thought,
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: and their hearts leaped within them. I hope you will
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: finish it soon. Jack observed, after a while, you haven't
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: done much of late. A similar reflection was on my
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: mind when you came yesterday. That accounts for the low
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: spirits in which you found me. Ah indeed, Jack replied,
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: measuring Ernest with a look of wonder. But now your
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: face is a glow. It seems that the blood rushes
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: to your head swifter at the call of an idea
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: than at the kiss of a girl. Thank god, Ernest
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: remarked with a sigh of relief. Mighty forces within me
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: are fashioning the limpid thought passion may grip us by
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: the throat momentarily upon our backs. We may feel the
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: lashes of desire and bathe our souls, and flames of
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: many hues. But the joy of activity is the ultimate passion.
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: End of section four, Section five of the House of
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: recording by Elisabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter nine. It seemed, indeed, as if
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: work was to earnest what the sting of pleasure is
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: to the average human animal. The interplay of his mental
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: forces gave him the sensuous satisfaction of a woman's embrace.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: His eyes sparkled, his muscle tightened. The joy of creation
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: was upon him. Often very material reasons, like stone weights
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: tied to the wing of a bird, stayed the flight
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: of his imagination. Magazines were waiting for his copy, and
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: he was not in the position to let them wait.
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: They supplied his bread and butter. Between the bread and butter, however,
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: the play was growing seen by scene. In the lone
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: hours of the night, he spun upon the loom of
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: his fancy a brilliant weft of swift desire, heavy, perfumed, oriental,
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: interwoven with bits of gruesome tenderness, the thread of his
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: own life intertwined with the thread of the story. All
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: genuine art is autobiography. It is, not, however, necessarily a
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: revelation of the artist's actual self, but of a myriad
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: of potential selves. Ah our own potential selves. They are
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: sometimes beautiful, often horrible, and always fascinating. They loom to
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: heavens none too high for our reach. They stray to
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: yawning hells beneath our very feet. The man who encompasses
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: heaven and hell is a perfect man. But there are
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: many heavens and more hells. The artist snatches fire from both. Surely,
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: the assassin feels no more intensely the lust of murder
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: than the poet, who depicts it in glowing words. The
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: things he writes are as real to him as the
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: things that he lives. But in his realm the poet
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: is supreme. His hands may be read with blood or
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: white with leprosy. He still remains king. Woe to him, however,
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: if he transcends the limits of his kingdom and translates
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: into action the secret of his dreams. The throng that
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: before applauded him, will stone his quivering body, or nail
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: to the cross his delicate hands and feet. Sometimes days
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: passed before Ernest could concentrate his mind upon his play.
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: Then the fever seized him again, and he strung pearl
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: on pearl, line on line, without intrusting a word to paper.
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: Even to discuss his work before it had received the
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: final brushstrokes would have seemed indecent to him. Reginald, too,
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: seemed to be in a turmoil of work. Ernest had
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: little chance to speak to him, and to drop even
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: a hint of his plans between the courses at breakfast
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: would have been desecration. Sunset followed sunset, night followed night.
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: The stripling April had made room for the lady May.
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: The play was almost completed in Ernest's mind, and he thought,
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: with a little shudder, of the physical travail of the
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: actual writing. He felt that the transcript from brain to
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: paper would demand all his powers, for of late, his
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: thoughts seemed strangely evanescent. They seemed to run away from
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: him whenever he attempted to seize them. The day was
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: glad with sunshine, and he decided to take a long walk,
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: and the solitude of the palisades, to steady hand and
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: nerve for the final task. He told Reginald of his intention,
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: but met with little response. Reginald's face was wan and
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: bore the peculiar pallor of one who had work late
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: at night. You must be frightfully busy, Ernest asked, with
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: genuine concern. So I am, Reginald replied, I always work
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: in a white heat. I am restless, nervous, feverish, and
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: can find no peace until I have given utterance to
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: all that clamors after birth. What is it that is
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: so engaging your mind? The epic of the French Revolution?
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: Oh no, I should never have undertaken that. I haven't
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: done a stroke of work on it for several weeks.
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: In fact, ever since Walcom called, I simply couldn't. It
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: seemed as if a rough hand had in some way
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: destroyed the web of my thought. Poetry in the writing
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: is like red hot glass before the master blower has
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: fashioned it into birds and trees and strange fantastic shapes.
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: A draft caused by the opening of a door may
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: distort it. But at present I am engaged upon more
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: important work. I am modeling a vessel not of fine
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: spun glass, but of gold. You make me exceedingly anxious
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: to know what you have in store for us. It
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: seems to me you have reached a point where even
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: you can no longer surpass yourself. Reginald smiled. Your praise
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: is too generous. Yet it warms like sunshine. I will
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: confess that my conception is unique. It combines with the
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: ripeness of my technique, the freshness of a second spring.
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: Ernest was bubbling with anticipated delights. His soul responded to
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: Reginald's touch as a harp to the winds. When he cried,
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: shall we be privileged to see it? Reginald's eyes were
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: already straying back to his writing table. If the gods
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: are propitious, he remarked, I shall complete it tonight. Tomorrow
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: is my reception, and I have promised to read it.
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: Then perhaps I shall be in the position soon to
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: let you see my play. Let us hope, so, Reginald replied,
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: absent mindedly. The egotism of the artist had once more
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: chained him to his work. Chapter ten. That night, a
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: brilliant crowd had gathered in Reginald Clark's house from the studio.
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: In the adjoining salon rose a continual murmur of well
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: tuned voices on bare white throats. Jewels shone as if
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: in each a soul were imprisoned, and voluptuously rustled the
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: silk that clung to the fair, slim forms of its
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: bears in an undulating caress. Subtle perfumes emanated from the
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: hair and the hands of siren women, commingling with the soft,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: plump scent of their flesh. Fragrant tapers burning in precious
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: crystal globules stained with exquisite colors, sprinkled their shimmering light
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: over the fashionable semblage and lent a false radiance to
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: the faces of the men, while in the hair and
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: the jewels of the women, each ray seemed to dance
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: like an imp with its mate. A seat like a
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: throne covered with furs of tropic beasts of prey stood
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: in one corner of the room, and the full glare
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: of the light, waiting for the monarch to come above,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: were arranged with artistic rafaiement weird oriental draperies resembling a
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: crimson canopy. In the total effect, chattering visitors were standing
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: in groups, or had seated themselves on the divans and
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: curiously fashioned chairs that were scattered in seeming disorder. Throughout
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: the salon there were critics and writers and men of
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: the world. Everybody who was anybody and a little bigger
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: than somebody else was holding court in his own small
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: circle of enthusiastic admirers. The bohemian element was subdued, but
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: not entirely. Lacking the magic of Reginald Clarke's name made
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: stately dames blind to the presence of some individuals whom
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: they would have passed on the street without recognition. Ernest
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: surveyed this gorgeous assembly with the absent look of a
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: sleep walker, not that his sensuous soul was unsusceptible to
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: the atmosphere of culture and corruption that permeated the whole,
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: nor to the dazzling color effect that tantale while they
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: delighted the eye, but to night they shriveled into insignificance
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: before the splendor of his inner vision, a radiant dreamland palace.
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: His play had risen from the night of inchoate thought.
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: It was wonderful, it was real, and needed for its
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: completion only the detail of actual construction, and now the
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: characters were hovering in the recesses of his brain, were
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: yearning to leave that many winded labyrinth to become real
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: beings of paper and ink. He would probably have tarried
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: over long in this fanciful mansion had not the reappearance
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: of an unexpected guest broken his reverie. Jack, He exclaimed,
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: in surprise, I thought you a hundred miles away from here.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: That shows that you no longer care for me. Jack
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: playfully answered, when our friendship was young, you always had
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: a presentiment of my presence. Ah, perhaps I had, But
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: tell me where do you hail from? Clark called me
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: up on the telephone long distance. You know, I suppose
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: it was I meant as a surprise for you, and
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: he certainly looked surprised, not even pleasantly. I am really
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: head over heels at work. But you know how it
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: is sometimes a little imp whispers into my ears, daring
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: me to do a thing which I know is foolish.
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: But what of it. My legs are strong enough not
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: to permit my follies to overtake me. It was certainly
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: good of you to come. In fact, you make me
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: very glad. I feel that I need you to night.
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: I don't know why the feeling came suddenly suddenly as you.
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: I only know I need you. How long can you stay?
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: I must leave you tomorrow morning. I have to hustle somewhat.
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: You know, my examinations are taking place in a day
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: or two, and I've got to cram up a lot
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: of things. Still, remarked Ernest, your visit will repay you
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: for the loss of time. Clark will read to us
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: to night his masterpiece. What is it? I don't know,
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: I only know it's the real thing. It's worth all
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: the wisdom bald headed professors may administer to you in
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: concentrated doses at five thousand a year. Come now, Jack
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: could not help saying, is your memory giving way? Don't
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: you remember your own days in college, especially the mathematical examinations.
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: You know that yourmarks came always pretty near the absolute zero,
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: Jack cried Ernest in honest indignation. Not the last time,
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: the last time I didn't flunk. No, because your sonnet
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: on Cartesian geometry roused even the math fiend to compassion.
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: And don't you remember Professor Squealer, whose heart seemed to
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: leap with delight? Whenever he could tell you that, in
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: spite of incessant toil on your part, he had again
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: flunked you in physics with fifty nine and a half percent,
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: and he wouldn't raise the mark to sixty. God forgive him.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: I cannot here their exchange of reminiscences was interrupted. There
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: was a stir. The little potentates of conversation hastened to
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: their seats, before their minions had wholly deserted them. The
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: king was moving to his throne assuredly. Reginald Clarke had
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: the bearing of a king. Leisurely. He took his seat
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: under the canopy. A hush fell on the audience. Not
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: a fan stirred as he slowly unfolded his manuscript. End
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: of section five, Section six of the House of the Vampire.
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: Elisabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck,
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: Chapter eleven. The music of Reginald Clark's intonation captivated every ear,
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: voluptuously in measured cadence. It rose and fell, now full
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: and strong like the sound of an organ, now soft
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: and clear, like the tinkling of bells, his voice detracted
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: by its very tunefulness from what he said. The powerful
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: spell charmed even Earnest's accustomed ear. The first page gracefully
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: glided from Reginald's head to the carpet, before the boy
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: dimly realized that he was intimately familiar with every word
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: that fell from Reginald's lips. When the second page slipped,
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: with seeming carelessness, from the reader's hand, a sudden shudder
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: ran through the boy's frame. It was as if an
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: icy hand had gripped his heart. There could be no
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: doubt of it. This was more than mere coincidence. It
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: was plagiarism. He wanted to cry out, but the room
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: swam before his eyes. Surely he must be dreaming. It
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: was a dream. The faces of the audience, the lights,
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: Reginald Jack all phantasmagoria of a dream. Perhaps he'd been
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: ill for a long time. Perhaps Clarke was reading the
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: play for him. He did not remember having written it,
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: but he probably had fallen sick after its completion. What
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: strange pranks our memories will play us. But no, he
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: was not dreaming, and he had not been ill. He
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: could endure the horrible uncertainty no longer. His overstrung nerves
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: must find relaxation in some way or break with a twang.
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: He turned to his friend, who was listening with rapt attention.
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: Jack Jack, He whispered, what is it that is my play?
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: You mean that you inspired it? No? I have written it,
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: or rather was going to write it. Quake up, Ernest,
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: you are mad. No, in all seriousness, it is mine.
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: I told you. Don't you remember when we returned from
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: Coney Island that I was writing a play. Not but
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: not this play. Yes, this play. I conceived it, I
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: practically wrote it. The more's the pity that Clark had
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: preconceived it. But it is mine. Did you tell him
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: a word about it? No? To be sure, did you
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: leave the manuscript in your room? I had, in fact
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: not written a line of it. No, I had not
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: begun the actual writing. Why should a man of Clark's
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: reputation plagiarize your plays, written or unwritten? I can see
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: no reason but tut for already this whispered conversation had
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: elicited a look like a stab from a lady before them.
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: Ernest held fast to the edge of his chair. He
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: must cling to some reality or else drift rudderless in
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: a dim sea of vague apprehensions? Or was Jack right?
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: Was his mind giving way? No, no, no, There must
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: be a monstrous secret somewhere. But what matter? Did anything matter?
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: He had called on his mate, like a ship lost
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: in the fog for the first time. He had not responded,
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: He had not understood. The bitterness of tears rose to
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: the boy's eyes. Above it, all melodiously ebbed and flowed
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: the rich accents of Reginald Clark. Ernest listened to the
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: words of his own play coming from the older man's mouth.
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: The horrible fascination of the scene held him entranced. He
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: saw the creations of his mind pass in review before him,
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: as a man might look upon the face of his
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: double grinning at him from behind a door in the
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: hideous hours of night. They were all there, the mad King,
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: the subtle witted courtiers, the somber hearted Prince, the queen mother,
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: who had loved a jester better than her royal mate,
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: and the fruit of their shameful alliance, the Princess Marigold,
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: a creature woven of sunshine and sin. Swiftly the action progressed,
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: shadows of impending death darkened the house of the King.
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: In the horrible agony of the rack, the old jesture confessed,
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: stripped of his cap and bells, crowned with a wreath
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: of blood, he looked so pathetically funny that the Princess
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: Marigold could not help laughing between her tears. The Queen
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: stood there, all trembling and pale, without a complaint. She
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: saw her lover die. The executioner's sword smote the old
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: man's head straight from the trunk. It rolled at the
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: feet of the King, who tossed it to Marigold. The
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: little princess kissed it and covered the grinning horror with
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: her yellow veil. The last words died away. There was
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: no applause, only silence. All were stricken with the dread
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: that men feel in the house of God or his
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: awful presence ingenius. But the boy lay back in his chair.
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: The cold sweat had gathered on his brow, and his
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: temples throbbed. Nature had mercifully clogged his head with blood.
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: The rush of it drowned the crying voice of the nerves,
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: deadening for a while both consciousness and pain Chapter twelve.
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: Somehow the night had passed, somehow in bitterness, in anguish,
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: But it had passed. Ernest's lips were parched, and sleeplessness
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: had left its trace in the black rings under the eyes.
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: When the next morning he confronted Reginald in the studio,
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: Reginald was sitting at the writing table in his most
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: characteristic pose, supporting his head with his hand, and looking
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: with clear, piercing eyes searchingly at the boy. Yes, he observed,
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: it's a most curious physical phenomenon. You cannot imagine how
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: real it all seemed to me. The boy spoke painfully day,
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: as if struck by a blow. Even now it is
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: as if something has gone from me, some struggling thought
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: that I cannot cannot remember. Reginald regarded him as a
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: physical experimenter might look upon the subject of a particularly
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: baffling mental disease. You must not think, my boy, that
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: I bear you any malice for your extraordinary delusion. Before
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: Jack went away, he gave me an exact account of
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: all that has happened. Divers incidents recurred to him, from
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: which it appears that at various times in the past
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: you have been on the verge of a nervous collapse,
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: a nervous collapse. What was the use of this term
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: but a euphemism for insanity? Do not despair, dear child,
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: Reginald caressingly remarked, your disorder is not hopeless, not incurable.
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: Such crises come to every man who writes. It is
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: the tribute we pay to the lords of song. The
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: menacinger of the past wrote with his heart's blood. But
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: we moderns dip our pen into the sap of our nerves.
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: We analyze life, love, art, and the dissecting knife that
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: we use on other men's souls finally turns against ourselves.
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: But what shall a man do? Shall he sacrifice art
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: to hygiene and surrender the one attribute that makes him
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: chiefest of created things? Animals too think, some walk on
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: two legs, But introspection differentiates man from the rest. Shall
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: we yield up the sweet consciousness of self that we
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: derive from the analysis of our emotion, for the contentment
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: of the bull that ruminates in the shade of a tree,
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: or the healthful stupidity of a mule. Assuredly not. But
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: what shall a man do? Ah that I cannot tell?
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: Mathematics offers definite problems that admit of a definite solution.
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: Life states its problems with less exactness, and offers for
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: each a different solution. One and one one are two
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: to day and tomorrow. Psychical values on each manipulation will
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: yield a different result. Still, your case is quite clear.
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: You have overworked yourself in the past, mentally and emotionally.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: You have sown unrest and must not be surprised if
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: neurasthenia is the harvest thereof. Do you think that I
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: should go to some sanitarium? The boy falteringly asked God forbid,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: go to the sea shore, somewhere where you can sleep
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: and play. Take your body along, but leave your brain behind.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: At least, do not take more of it with you
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: than is necessary. The summer season in Atlantic City has
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: just begun. There, as everywhere in American society, you will
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: be much more welcome if you come without brains. Reginald's
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: half bantering tone reassured Earnest. A little timidly, he dared
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: approach once more the strange event that had wrought such
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: havoc with his nervous equilibrium. How do you count for
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: my strange obsession? One might almost call it a mania.
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: If it could be accounted for, it would not be strange.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: Can you suggest no possible explanation? Perhaps a stray leaf
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: on my desk, a few indications of the plot, a remark,
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: who knows? Perhaps thought matter is floating in the air. Perhaps,
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: but we had better not talk of it now. It
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: would needlessly excite you. You are right, answered Ernest gloomily.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: Let us not talk of it. But whatever may be said,
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: it is a marvelous play. You flatter me. There is
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: nothing in it that you may not be able to
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: do equally well some day. Ah No, the boy replied,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: looking up to Reginald with admiration. You are the master.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: End of section six Section seven of the House of
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: Recording by Elisabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter thirteen. Lazily Earnest stretched his limbs
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: on the beach of Atlantic City. The sea that perjure
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: of sick souls had washed away the fever and the
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: fret of the last few days. The wind was in
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: his hair, and the spray was in his breath, while
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: the rays of the sun kissed his bare arms and legs.
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: He rolled over in the glittering sand, in the sheer
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: joy of living now. And then a wavelet stole far
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: into the beach, as if to caress him, but pined
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: away ere it could reach its goal. It was as
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: if the enamored sea was stretching out its arms to him.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: Who knows. Perhaps through the clear water, some green eyed
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: nymph or young sea god, with the tang of the
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: sea in his hair, was peering amorously at the boy's
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: red mouth. The people of the deep love the red,
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: warm blood of human kind. It is always the young
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: that they lured their watery haunts, never the shriveled limbs
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: that totter shivering to the grave. Such fancies came to
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: Earnest as he lay on the shore in his bathing attire, happy,
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: thoughtless animal. The sun and the sea seemed to him
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: two lovers vying for his favor. The sudden change of
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: environment had brought complete relaxation, and had quieted his rebellious,
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: assertive soul. He was no longer a solitary unit, but
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: one with wind and water, herb and beech and shell.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: Almost voluptuously, his hand toyed with the hot sand that
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: glided caressingly through his fingers, and buried his breast and
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: shoulder under its glittering burden. A summer girl who passed
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: lowered her eyes coquettishly. He watched her without stirring. Even
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: to open his mouth or to smile, would have seemed
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: too much exertion. Thus he lay for hours. When at
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: length noon drew nigh, it cost him a great effort
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: of will to shake off his drowsy mood and exchange
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: his airy costume for the convention habiliments of the dining room.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: He had taken lodgings in a fashionable hotel, an unusual
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: stroke of good luck. Hack work that paid outrageously well,
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: had made it possible for him to idle for a
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: time without a thought of the unpleasant necessity of making money.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: One single article, to which he signed his name only
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: with reluctance, had brought to him more gear than a
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: series of golden sonnets. Surely, he thought the social revolution
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: ought to begin from above? What right has the bricklayer
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: to grumble when he receives for a week's work almost
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: more than I for a song. Thus soliloquising, he reached
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: the dining room. The scene that unfolded itself before him
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: was typical. The table overloaded, the women over dressed, the
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: luncheon was already in full course when he came. He
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: mumbled an apology and seated himself on the only remaining chair,
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: next to a youth who reminded him of a well
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: dressed dummy with slight weariness. His eyes wandered in all
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: directions for more congenial faces when they were arrested by
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: a lady on the opposite side of the table. She
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: was clad in a silk robe with curiously embroidered net
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: work that revealed a nervous and delicate throat. The rich
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: effect of the network was relieved by the studied simplicity
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: with which her heavy chestnut colored hair was gathered in
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: a single knot. Her face was turned away from him,
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: but there was something in the carriage of her head
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: that struck him as familiar. When at last she looked
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: him in the face, the glass almost fell from his hand.
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: It was Ethel Brandenburg. She seemed to notice his embarrassment
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: and smiled. When she opened her lips to speak. He
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: knew by the haunting sweetness of the voice that he
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: was not mistaken. Tell me, she said, wistfully, you have
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: forgotten me. They all have. He hastened to assure her
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: that he had not forgotten her. He recollected now that
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: he had first been introduced to her in Walcom's house
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: some years ago, when a mere college boy he had
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: been privileged to attend one of that master's famous receptions.
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: She had looked quite resolute and very happy, then, not
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: at all like the woman who had stared so strangely
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: at Reginald and the Broadway restaurant. He regarded this encounter
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: as very fortunate. He knew so much of her personal
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: history that it almost seemed to him as if they
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: had been intimate for years. She too, felt on familiar
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: ground with him, neither as much as whispered the name
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: of Reginald Clark. Yet it was he and the knowledge
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: of what he was to them, that linked their souls
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: with a common bond. Chapter fourteen. It was the third
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: day after their meeting. Hour by hour, their intimacy had increased.
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: Ethel was sitting in a large wicker chair. She restlessly
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: fingered her parasol, mechanically describing magic circles in the sand.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: Ernest lay at her feet, with his knees clasped between
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: his hands, he gazed into her eyes. Why are you
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: trying so hard to make love to me? The woman asked,
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: with the half amused smile with which the eve near
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: thirty received the homage of a boy. There is an
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: element of insincerity in that smile, but it is a
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: weapon of defense against love's artillery. Sometimes, indeed, the plea
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: in the boy's eyes and the cry of the blood
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: pierces the woman's smiling superiority. She listens, loves, and loses.
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: Ethel Brandenburg was listening, but the idea of love had
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: not yet entered into her mind. Her interest in Earnest
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: was due in part to his youth and the trembling
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: in his voice when he spoke of love. But what
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: probably attracted her most powerfully was the fact that he
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: intimately knew the man who still held her woman's heart
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: in the hollow of his hand. It was half in play, therefore,
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: that she had asked him that question. Why did he
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: make love to her? He did not know. Perhaps it
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: was the irresistible desire to be petted, which young poets
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: share with domesticated cats. But what should he tell her?
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: Polite platitudes were out of place between them. Besides, he
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: knew the penalty of all tender entanglements. Women treat love
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: as if it were an extremely tenuous wire that can
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: be drawn out indefinitely. This is a very expensive process.
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: It costs us the most precious, the only irretrievable thing
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: in the universe, time, And to him time was song
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: for money. He did not care. The Lord had hallowed
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: his lips with rhythmic speech. Only in the intervals of
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: his singing, might he listen to the voice of his heart,
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: strangest of all watches, that tells the time not by
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: minutes and hours, but by the coming and going of love.
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: The woman beside him seemed to read his thoughts, child, child,
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: She said, why will you toy with love like Jehovah?
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: He is a jealous god, and nothing but the whole
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: heart can placate him. Woe to the woman who takes
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: a poet for a lover. I admit it is fascinating,
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: but it is playing vabank. In fact, it is fatal
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: art or love will come to harm. No man can
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: minister equally to both. A genuine poet is incapable of
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: loving a woman. Pshaw, you exaggerate, Of course, there is
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: a measure of truth in what you say. But is
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: only one side of the truth. And the truth you
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: know is always Janus faced. In fact, it often has
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: more than two faces. I can assure you that I
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: cared deeply for the women to whom my love poetry
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: was written, and you will not deny that it is genuine.
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: God forbid. Only you have been using the wrong preposition.
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: You should have said that it was written at them.
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: Ernest stared at her in childlike wonder. By Jove, you
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: are too devilishly clever, he exclaimed. After a little silence,
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: he said, not without hesitation. And do you apply your
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: theory to all artists or only to us makers of rhyme?
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: To all? She replied, He looked at her questioningly. Yes,
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: she said, with a new sadness in her voice, I
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: too have paid the price. You mean, I loved and art.
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: That was the sacrifice. Perhaps you have chosen the better part,
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: Ernest said, without conviction. No, she replied, My tribute was
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: brought in vain. This she said calmly. But Ernest knew
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: that her words were of tradg import. You love him still,
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: he observed simply. Ethel made no reply. Sadness clouded her
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: face like a veil, or like gray mist over the
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: face of the waters. Her eyes went out to the sea,
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: following the somber flight of the sea. Meuse, in that
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: moment he could have taken her in his arms and
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: kissed her with infinite tenderness. But tenderness between man and
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: woman is like a match in a powder magazine. The
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: least provocation, and an amorous explosion will ensue tumbling down
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: the card houses of platonic affection. If he yielded to
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: the impulse of the moment, the wine of the spring
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: tide would set their blood a fire, and from the
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: flames within us there is no escape. Come, Come, she said,
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: you do not love me, he protested, Ah, she cried triumphantly.
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: How many sonnets would you give for me? If you
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: were a usurer in gold instead of in rhyme? I
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: would ask how many dollars? But it is unjust to
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: pay in a coin that we value little. To a
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: man starving in gold mines appear of bread weighs more
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: than all the treasures of the earth. To you, I
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: warrant your poems are the standard of appreciation. How many
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: would you give for me? One? Two, three more? Because
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: you think love would repay you with compound interest, she
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: observed merrily he laughed, And when love turns to laughter,
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: the danger is past for the moment end of section seven,
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: section eight of the House of the Vampire. This LibriVox
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain recording by Elisabeth Klett
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter fifteen. Thus,
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: three weeks passed without apparent change in their relations. Ernest
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: possessed a personal magnetism that, always emanating from him, was
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: felt most deeply when withdrawn. He was at all times
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: involuntarily exist his power, which she ever resisted, always on
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: the alert, always warding off. When at last pressure of
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: work made his immediate departure for New York imparative, he
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: had not apparently gained the least ground, But Ethel knew
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: in her heart that she was fascinated, if not in love.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: The personal vascination was supplemented by a motherly feeling toward
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: Ernest that sensuous in an essence was in itself not
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: far removed from love. She struggled bravely and with external success,
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: against her emotions, never losing sight of the fact that
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: twenty and thirty are fifty. Increasingly aware of her own weakness,
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: she constantly attempted to lead the conversation into impersonal channels,
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: speaking preferably of his work. Tell me, she said, negligently,
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: fanning herself, what new inspiration have you drawn from your
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: stay at the sea side? Why, he exclaimed enthusiastically, volumes
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: and volumes of it. I shall write the great novel
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 1: of my life after I am once more quietly installed
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: at riverside, the great American novel. She rejoined, Perhaps, who
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: will be your hero? Clark? There was a slight touch
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: of malice in her words, or rather in the pause
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 1: between the penultimate word and the last. Ernest detected its
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 1: presence and knew that her love for Reginald was dead,
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: stiff and cold. It lay in her heart's chamber, beside
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: how many others, all emboxed in the coffin of memory. No,
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: he replied, after a while, a little piqued by her suggestion,
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: Clark is not the hero. What makes you think that
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: he casts a spell on everything I do? Dear child,
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: she replied, I know him. He cannot fail to impress
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: his powerful personality upon all with whom he comes. In
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: contact to the injury of their intellectual independence. Moreover, he
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 1: is so brilliant and says everything so much better than
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: anybody else, that by his very splendor he discourages effort
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: in others. At best, his influence will shape your development
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: according to the tenets of his mind. Curious, subtle, and corrupted.
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: You will become mentally distorted, like one of those hunchback
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: Japanese trees, infinitely wrinkled and infinitely grotesque, whose laws of
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: growth are not determined by nature but by the diseased
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: imagination of the East. I am no weakling, ernest asserted,
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: and your picture of Clark is altogether out of perspective.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: His splendid successes are to me a source of constant inspiration.
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: We have some things in common, but I realize that
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: it is along entirely different lines that success will come
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: to me. He has never sought to influence me. In fact,
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: I never received the smallest suggestion from him. Here the
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: Princess Marigold seemed to peer at him through the veil
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: of the past, but he waved her aside as for
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: my story, he continued, you need not go so far
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: out of your way to find the leading character. Who
• 1:14:49
  Speaker 1: can it be, Ethel remarked with a merry twinkle. You Ethel,
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: he said, sulkily, be serious, you know that it is you.
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: I am immensely flattered, she replied. Really, nothing pleases me
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: better than to be immortalized in print, since I have
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: little hope nowadays of perpetuating my name by virtue of
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: pencil or brush. I have been put into novels before,
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: and am consumed with curiosity to hear the plot of yours.
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: If you don't mind, I had rather not tell you
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: just yet, Ernest said, it's going to be called Laantina.
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: That's you. But all depends on the treatment. You know,
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: it doesn't matter much what you say, so long as
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: you say it, well, that's what counts. At any rate,
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: any indication of the plot at this stage would be
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: decidedly inadequate. I think you are right, she ventured. By
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: all means, choose your own time to tell me. Let's
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: talk of something else. Have you written anything since your
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 1: delightful book of verse last spring? Surely now as your
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: singing season. By the time we are thirty, the springs
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: of pure lyric passion are usually exhausted. Ethel's inquiry somehow
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: startled him. In truth, he could find no satisfactory answer
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: a remark relative to his play. Clark's play rose to
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: the threshold of his lips, but he almost bit his
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 1: tongue as soon as he realized that the strange delusion
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: which had possessed him that night still dominated the undercurrents
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: of his cerebration. No, he had accomplished but little during
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: the last few months, at least by way of creative literature.
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 1: So he replied that he had made money. That is something,
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: he said. Besides, who can turn out a masterpiece every week?
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: An artist's brain is not a machine. And in the
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: respite from creative work, I have gathered strength for the future.
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: But he said, slightly annoyed, you are not listening. His
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: exclamation brought her back from the train of thoughts that
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: his words had suggested. For in his reasoning, she had
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: recognized the same arguments that she had hourly repeated to
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: herself in defense of her inactivity when she was living
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: under the baneful influence of Reginald Clark. Yes baneful. For
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 1: the first time, she dared to confess it to herself.
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 1: In a flash, the truth dawned upon her that it
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: was not her love alone, but something else, something irresistible
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: and very mysterious, that had dried up the well of
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: creation in her? Could it be that the same power
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: was now exerting its influence upon the struggling soul of
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: this talented boy. Rack her brains as she might, she
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: could not definitely formulate her apprehensions, and a troubled look
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: came into her eyes. Ethel, the boy repeated, impatiently, why
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: are you not listening? Do you realize that I must
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: leave you in half an hour? She looked at him
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: with deep tenderness. Something like a tear lent a soft
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 1: radiance to her large, childlike eyes. Ernest saw it and
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: was profoundly moved in that moment. He loved her passionately
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: foolish boy, she said softly, then, lowering her voice to
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: a whisper, you may kiss me before you go. His
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: lips gently touched hers, but she took his head between
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: her hands and pressed her mouth upon his in a
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: long kiss. Ernest drew back a little awkwardly. He had
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: not been kissed like this before. Poet. Though you are Ethel, whispered,
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: you have not yet learned to kiss. She was deeply
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: agitated when she noticed that his hand was fumbling for
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: the watch in his vest pocket, she suddenly released him
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: and said, a little hurt, no, you must not miss
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: your train. Go by all means vainly, Ernest remonstrated with her.
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: Go to him, she said, and again go to him
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: with a heavy heart. The boy obeyed. He waved his
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: hat to her once more from below, and then rapidly
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: disappeared in the crowd. For a moment, strange misgivings cramped
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: her heart, and something within her called out to him,
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: do not go, Do not return to that house, But
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: no sound issued from her lips. Worldly wisdom had sealed them,
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: had stifled the inner voice, and soon the boy's golden
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: head was swallowed up in the distance. Chapter sixteen. While
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: the train sped to New York, ethel Brandenburg was the
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: one object engaging Ernest's mind. He still felt the pressure
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: of her lips upon his and his nostrils dilated at
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: the thought of the fragrance of her hair brushing against
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: his forehead. But the moment his foot touched the fairy
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: boat that was to take him to Manhattan, the past
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: three weeks were for the time being, at least completely
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 1: obliterated from his memory. All his other interests that he
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: had suppressed in her company because she had no part
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: in them, came rushing back to him. He anticipated with
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 1: delight his meeting with Reginald Clark. The personal attractiveness of
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: the man had never seemed so powerful to Ernest as
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: when he had not heard from him for some time.
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: Reginald's letters were always brief, professional writers. He was wont
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: to say, cannot afford to put fine feeling into their
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: private correspondence. They must turn it into copy. He longed
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: to sit with the master and the studio, when the
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: last rays of the daylight were tremulously falling through the
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: stained window, and to discuss far into the darkening night,
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 1: philosophies young and old. He longed for Reginald's voice, his
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 1: little mannerisms, the very perfume of his rooms. There was
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 1: also a deluge of letters, likely to a him in
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 1: his apartment, for in his hurried departure he had purposely
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: left his friends in the dark as to his whereabouts.
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: Only to Jack he had dropped a little note. The
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: day after his meeting with Ethel, he earnestly hoped to
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: find Reginald at home though it was well nine ten
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: o'clock in the evening, and he cursed the rapid transit
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: for its inability to annihilate time and space. It is
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: indeed disconcerting to think how many months, if not years,
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: of our earthly sojourn the dwellers in cities spend in
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: transportation conveyances that must be set down as a dead
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: loss in the ledger of life. A nervous impatience against
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: things material overcame earnest in the subway. It is, ever,
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: the mere, stupid obstacle of matter that weighs down the
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: wings of the soul and prevents it from soaring upward
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: to the sun. When at last he had reached the house,
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: he learned from the hall boy that Clark had gone out.
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: Ruffled in temper, he entered his rooms and went over
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: his mail. There were letters from editors with commissions that
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: he could not afford to reject. Everywhere, newspapers and magazines
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 1: opened their yawning mouths to swallow up what time he had.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: He realized at once that he would have to postpone
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: the writing of his novel for several weeks, if not longer.
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: Among the letters was one from Jack. It bore the
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: postmark of a little place in the Adirondacks, where he
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 1: was staying with his parents. Ernest opened the missive, not
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: without hesitation. On reading and rereading it, the fine lines
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 1: on his forehead that would some day deepen into wrinkles,
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: became quite pronounced, and a look of displeasure darkened his face.
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 1: Something was wrong with Jack, a slight change that defied analysis.
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: Their souls were out of tune. It might only be
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: a passing disturbance. Perhaps it was his own fault. It
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: pained him. Nevertheless, somehow it seemed of late that Jack
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 1: was no longer able to follow the vagaries of his mind.
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: Only one person in the world possessed a similar mental vision.
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: Only one seemed to understand what he said and what
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 1: he left unsaid. Reginald Clarke, being a man and poet,
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: read in his soul as in an open book. Ethel
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: might have understood, had not love like a cloud, laid
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 1: itself between her eyes and the page. It was with
• 1:22:05
  Speaker 1: exultation that Ernest heard, near midnight the click of Reginald's
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: key in the door. He found him unchanged, completely radiantly himself.
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: Reginald possessed the psychic power of undressing the soul, of
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: seeing it before him in primal nakedness. Although no word
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 1: was said of Ethel Brandenburg, except the mere mention of
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: her presence in Atlantic City, Ernest intuitively knew that Reginald
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: was aware of the transformation that absence had wrought in him.
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: In the presence of this man, he could be absolutely himself,
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: without shame or fear of misunderstanding, and by a strange metamorphosis,
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 1: all his affection for Ethel and Jack went out for
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 1: the time being to Reginald Clark and of section eight
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 1: section nine of The House of the Vampire. This LibriVox
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain recording by Elisabeth Klett
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 1: The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter seventeen.
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 1: The next day Ernest wrote a letter of more or
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: less superficial tenderness to Ethel. She had wounded his pride
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 1: by proving victorious in the end over his passion and hers. Besides,
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 1: he was in the throes of work. When after the
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 1: third day no answer came, he was inclined to feel aggrieved.
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: It was plain now that she had not cared for
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: him in the least, but had simply played with him
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: for lack of another toy. A flush of shame rose
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: to his cheeks at the thought. He began to analyze
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: his own emotions and stunned, if not stabbed, his passions.
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: Step by step, work was calling to him. It was
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: that which gave life its meaning, not the love of
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: a season. How far away, how unreal, she now seemed
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: to him. Yes, she was right. He had not cared deeply,
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 1: and his novel, too, would be written only at her.
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 1: It was the heroine of his story that absorbed his interest,
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 1: not the living prototype. Once in a conversation with Reginald,
• 1:24:05
  Speaker 1: he touched upon the subject Reginald Herald that modern taste
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: no longer permitted even the photographer to portray life as
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: it is, but insisted upon an individual visualization. No man,
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: he remarked, was ever translated bodily into fiction, in contradiction
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: to life. Art is a process of artificial selection. Bearing
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 1: in mind this motive, Ernest went to work to mold
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 1: from the material in hand a new ethel more real
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 1: than life. Unfortunately, he found little time to devote to
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: his novel. It was only when, after a good day's work,
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: a pile of copy for a magazine lay on his
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: desk that he could think of concentrating his mind upon Laantina.
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: The result was that when he went to bed, his
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: imagination was busy with the plan of his book, and
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: the creatures of his own brain laid their fingers on
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: his eyelid, so that he could not sleep. When at
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: last sheer weariness overcame him, his mind was still at work,
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 1: not in orderly sequence, but along trails. Monstrous and grotesque
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: hobgoblins seemed to steal through the hall, and leering incubi
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: oppressed his soul with terrible burdens. In the morning, he
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 1: awoke unrested. The tan vanished from his face, and little
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: lines appeared in the corners of his mouth. It was
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: as if his nervous vitality were sapped from him in
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: some unaccountable way. He became excited, hysterical, often at night
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 1: when he wrote his pot boilers for the magazines. Fear
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: stood behind his seat, and only the buzzing of the
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 1: elevator outside brought him back to himself. In one of
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 1: his morbid moods, he wrote a sonnet, which he showed
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 1: to Reginald after the latter's returned from a short trip
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 1: out of town. Reginald read it, looking at the boy
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: with a curious, lurking expression. Oh, gentle sleep, turn not
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: thy face away, but place thy finger on my brow,
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 1: and take all burdens from me and all dream that
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: ache upon mine eyes A cooling balsam lay seeing. I
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 1: am a weary of the day. But lo, thy lips
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 1: are ashen, and they quake. What spectral vision sees thou
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: that can shake thy sweet composure and thy heart dismay?
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: Perhaps some murderer's cruel eye a gleam is fixed upon me,
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: or some monstrous dream might bring such fearful guilt upon
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 1: the head of my unvigilant soul, as would arouse the
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: Borgian snake from her envenomed bed, or startle Nero in
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 1: his golden house. Good stuff, Reginald remarked, laying down the manuscript,
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: When did you write it the night when you are
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: out of town? Ernest rejoined, I see, Reginald replied. There
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: was something startling in his intonation that at once aroused
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 1: Earnest's attention. What do you see, he asked, quickly, nothing,
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 1: Reginald replied, with immovable calm, only that your state of
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: nerves is still far from satisfaction. Chapter eighteen. After Ernest's departure,
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 1: Ethel Brandenburgh's heart was swaying hither and thither in a
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: hurricane of conflicting feelings. Before she had time to gain
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 1: an emotional equilibrium, his letter had hurled her back into chaos.
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 1: A false ring somewhere in Ernest's words, re echoing with
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: an ever increasing volume of sound, stifled the voice of love.
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: His jeweled sentences glittered but left her cold. They lacked
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 1: that spontaneity which renders even simple and hackneyed phrases wonderful
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: and unique. Ethel clearly realized that her hold upon the
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 1: boy's imagination had been a fleeting midsummer night's charm, and
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 1: that a word from Reginald's lips had broken the potency
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: of her spell. She almost saw the shadow of Reginald's
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: visage hovering over Ernest's letter and leering at her from
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: between the lines and sinister triumph. Finally, reason came and
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: whispered to her that it was extremely unwise to give
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: her heart into the keeping of the boy. His love,
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 1: she knew, would have been exacting, irritating at times. He
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: would have asked her to sympathize with every phase of
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 1: his life, and would have expected active interest on her part,
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: and much that she had done with long ago. Thus,
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: untruth would have stolen into her life and embittered it.
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 1: When mates are unequal, love must paint its cheeks, and,
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 1: in certain moods at least hide its face under a mask.
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 1: Its lips may be honeyed, but it brings fret and
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 1: sorrow in its train. These things she told herself over
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 1: and over again. While she penned a cool and calculating
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: answer to Ernest's letter. She rewrote it many times, and
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 1: every time it became more difficult to reply. At last,
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 1: she put her letter aside for a few days, and
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 1: when it fell again into her hand, it seemed so
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 1: unnatural and strained that she destroyed it. Thus several weeks
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 1: had passed and Ernest no longer exclusively occupied her mind,
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 1: when one day in early September, while glancing over a magazine,
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: she came upon his name in the table of contents.
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: Once more, she saw the boy's wistful face before her,
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 1: and a trembling so something stirred in her heart. Her
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 1: hand shook as she cut the pages and a mist
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: of tears clouded her vision as she attempted to read
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: his poem. It was a piece of somber brilliance, Like
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 1: black draped monks, half crazed with mystic devotion. The poet's
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: thoughts flitted across the page. It was the wail of
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: a soul that feels reason slipping from it, and behold's
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: madness rise over its life like a great pale moon.
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: A strange unrest emanated from it and took possession of her.
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: And again, with an insight that was prophetic, she distinctly recognized,
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 1: behind the vague fear that had haunted the poet, the
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: figure of Reginald Clark, a half forgotten dream struggling to consciousness,
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 1: staggered her by its vividness. She saw Clark as she
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: had seen him in days gone by, grotesquely transformed into
• 1:29:47
  Speaker 1: a slimy sea thing, whose hungry mouths shut sucking upon her,
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 1: and whose thousand tentacles encircled her form. She closed her
• 1:29:55
  Speaker 1: eyes in horror at the reminiscence, and in that moment
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: it became clear to her that she must take into
• 1:30:00
  Speaker 1: her hands the salvation of earnest Fielding from the clutches
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 1: of them malign power that had mysteriously enveloped his life.
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 1: Chapter nineteen. The summer was brief, and already by the
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: middle of September many had returned to the pleasures of
• 1:30:15
  Speaker 1: urban life. Ethel was among the first comers, for after
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: her resolve to enter the life of the young poet
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 1: once more, it would have been impossible for her to
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 1: stay away from the city much longer. Her plan was
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: already before attempting to see Ernest. She would go to
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: meet Reginald and implore him to free the boy from
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: his hideous spell. An element of curiosity unconsciously entered her determination.
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 1: When years ago she and Clark had parted, the man
• 1:30:40
  Speaker 1: had seemed for once greatly disturbed, and had promised in
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 1: his agitation that some day he would communicate to her
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: what would exonerate him. In her eyes, she had answered
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: that all words between them were purposeless, and that she
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 1: hoped never to see his face again. The experience that
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: the years had brought to her, instead of elucidating the
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: mystery of Reginald's personnel, had, on the contrary, made his
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 1: behavior appear more and more unaccountable. She had more than
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 1: once caught herself, wishing to meet him again and to
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: analyze dispassionately the puzzling influences he had exerted upon her,
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 1: and she could at last view him dispassionately. There was
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: triumph in that she was dimly aware that something had
• 1:31:17
  Speaker 1: passed from her, something by which he had held her,
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: and without which his magnetism was unable to play upon her. So,
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 1: when Walcom sent her an invitation to one of his
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 1: artistic at homes, she accepted in the hope of meeting Reginald.
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 1: It was his frequentation of Walcum's house that had for
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 1: several years effectively barred her foot from crossing the threshold.
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: It was with a very strange feeling that she greeted
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: the many familiar faces at Walcam's now, and when toward
• 1:31:43
  Speaker 1: ten o'clock Reginald entered politely, bowing in answer to the
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: welcome from all sides. Her heart beat in her like
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 1: a drum, but she calmed herself, and, catching his eye,
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 1: so arranged it that early in the evening they met
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: in an alcove of the drawing room. It was inevitable,
• 1:31:59
  Speaker 1: Reginald said, I expected it, Yes, she replied, we were
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: bound to meet like a great rush of water. Memory
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: came back to her. He was still horribly fascinating as
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 1: of old, only she was no longer susceptible to his fascination.
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 1: He had changed somewhat in those ears. The lines about
• 1:32:20
  Speaker 1: his mouth had grown harder, and a steel like look
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 1: had come into his eyes. Only for a moment. As
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 1: he looked at her, a flash of tenderness seemed to
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 1: come back to them. Then he said, with a touch
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 1: of sadness, why should the first word between us be
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: a lie? Ethel made no answer. Reginald looked at her,
• 1:32:38
  Speaker 1: half in wonder, and said, and is your love for
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 1: the boy so great that it overcame your hate of me? Ah?
• 1:32:46
  Speaker 1: He knew, She winced, He has told you not a word.
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: There was something superhuman in his power of penetration. Why
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 1: should she wear a mask before him when his eyes,
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: like the eyes of God, pierced to the core of
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 1: her being? No, she replied, it is not love but
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: compassion for him. Compassion, yes, compassion for your victim. You mean, Reginald,
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: I am all ere I implore you speak. You have
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: ruined one life. He raised his eyebrows derogatively. Yes, she continued, fiercely, ruined.
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: It is not that enough. I have never wilfully ruined
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: any one's life. You have ruined mine wilfully. How else
• 1:33:37
  Speaker 1: shall I explain your conduct? I warned you, warning, indeed
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 1: the warning that the snake gives to the sparrow helpless
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 1: under its gaze. Ah, But who tells you that the
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 1: snake is to blame? Is it not? Rather the occult
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 1: power that prescribes with blood on brazen scroll, the law
• 1:33:55
  Speaker 1: of our being. This is no solace to the sparrow.
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: But whatever be said, let us drop the past, let
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 1: us consider the present. I beg of you. Leave this boy,
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 1: Let him develop without your attempting to stifle the life
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: in him, or impressing upon it the stamp of your
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: alien mind. Ethel, he protested, you are unjust. If you knew,
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 1: then an idea seemed to take hold of him. He
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 1: looked at her curiously. What if I knew? She asked,
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: You shall know? He said, simply, are you strong, strong
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: to withstand anything at your hand? There is nothing that
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: you can give me, nothing that you can take away. No,
• 1:34:38
  Speaker 1: he remarked, nothing. Yes, you have changed. Still, when I
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: look upon you, the ghosts of the past seem to
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 1: rise like live things. We both have changed. We now
• 1:34:49
  Speaker 1: meet upon equal grounds. You are no longer the idol
• 1:34:52
  Speaker 1: I made of you. Don't you think that to the
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: idol this might be a relief, not a humiliation. It
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: is a terrible torture to sit in state with lips
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: eternally shut. Sometimes there comes over the most reticent of us,
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: a desire to break through the eternal loneliness that surrounds
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 1: the soul. It is this feeling that prompts madmen to
• 1:35:12
  Speaker 1: tear off their clothes and exhibit their nakedness in the
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: market place. It's madness on my part, or a whim,
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: or I don't know what. But it pleases me that
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 1: you should know the truth. You promised me long ago
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: that I should. To day I will redeem my promise,
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 1: and I will tell you another thing that you will
• 1:35:30
  Speaker 1: find hard to believe, and that is that I loved you.
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 1: Ethel smiled a little skeptically. You have loved often, no,
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 1: he replied, loved seriously, loved I have only once. End
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: of Section nine, Section ten of the House of the Vampire.
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: This Rivok's recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck,
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 1: Chapter twenty. They were sitting in a little Italian restaurant,
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: where they had often in the old days, lingered late
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 1: into the night over a glass of lachramee cristie. But
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 1: no pale ghost of the past rose from the wine,
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 1: only a wriggling something with serpent eyes that sent cold
• 1:36:26
  Speaker 1: shivers down her spine and telled her speechless and entranced.
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 1: When their order had been filled and the waiter had
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 1: posted himself at a respectful distance, Reginald began at first
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: leisurely a man of the world. But as he proceeded,
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 1: a strange exultation seemed to possess him, and from his
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 1: eyes leaped the flame of the mystic. You must pardon me,
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 1: he commenced, if I monopolized the conversation. But the revelations
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 1: I have to make are of such a nature that
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: I may well claim your attention. I will start with
• 1:36:58
  Speaker 1: my earliest childhood. You remember the picture of me that
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 1: was taken when I was five, she remembered. Indeed, each
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 1: detail of his life was deeply engraven on her mind
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 1: at that time. He continued, I was not held to
• 1:37:12
  Speaker 1: be particularly bright The reason was that my mind, being
• 1:37:16
  Speaker 1: pre eminently and extraordinarily receptive, needed a stimulus from without.
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: The moment I was sent to school, however, a curious
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 1: metamorphosis took place in me. I may say that I
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 1: became at once the most brilliant boy in my class.
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 1: You know that to this day I have always been
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 1: the most striking figure in any circle in which I
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: have ever moved. Ethel nodded assent, silently, watching the speaker.
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 1: She saw a gleam of the truth from afar, but
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 1: still very distant and very dim. Reginald lifted the glass
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 1: against the light and gulped its contents. Then, in a
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: lower voice, he recommenced, like the chameleon, I have the
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: power of absorbing the color of my environment. Do you
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 1: mean that you have the power of absorbing the special
• 1:38:03
  Speaker 1: virtues of other people? She interjected, that is exactly what
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 1: I mean. Oh, she cried, for in a heart beat,
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 1: many things had become clear to her. For the first time.
• 1:38:15
  Speaker 1: She realized, still vaguely, but with increasing vividness, the hidden
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: causes of her ruin, and still more plainly, the horrible
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 1: danger of earnest fielding. He noticed her agitation and a
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 1: look of psychological curiosity came into his eyes. Ah, but
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 1: that is not all, he observed, smilingly. That is nothing.
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 1: We all possess that faculty in a degree. The secret
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 1: of my strength is my ability to reject every element
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 1: that is harmful or inessential to the completion of myself.
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 1: This did not come to me easily, nor without a struggle.
• 1:38:49
  Speaker 1: But now, looking back upon my life, many things became
• 1:38:52
  Speaker 1: transparent that were obscure even to me at the time.
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 1: I can now follow the fine spun threads in the
• 1:38:58
  Speaker 1: intricate web of my fate, and to discover in the
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 1: wilderness of meshes a design awful and grandly planned. His
• 1:39:06
  Speaker 1: voice shook with conviction as he uttered these words. There
• 1:39:09
  Speaker 1: was something strangely gruesome in this man. It was thus
• 1:39:13
  Speaker 1: that she had pictured to herself the high priest of
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: some terrible and mysterious religion, demanding a human sacrifice to
• 1:39:19
  Speaker 1: appease the hunger of his God. She was fascinated by
• 1:39:23
  Speaker 1: the spell of his personality and listened with a feeling
• 1:39:26
  Speaker 1: not far removed from awe But Reginald suddenly changed his
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 1: tone and proceeded in a more conversational manner. The first
• 1:39:33
  Speaker 1: friend I ever cared for, was a boy marvelously in
• 1:39:35
  Speaker 1: doubt for the study of mathematics. At the time of
• 1:39:38
  Speaker 1: our first meeting at school, I was unable to solve
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 1: even the simplest algebraical problem. But when we had been
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: together only for half a month, when we exchanged parts,
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 1: it was I who was the mathematical genius. Now, whereas
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 1: he became hopelessly dull and stuttered through his recitations only
• 1:39:53
  Speaker 1: with a struggle that brought the tears to his eyes.
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 1: Then I discarded him heartly. You say, I have come
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: to know better. Have you ever tasted a bottle of
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 1: wine that had been uncorked for a long time? If
• 1:40:07
  Speaker 1: you have, you have probably found it flat. The essence
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 1: was gone, evaporated. Thus it is, and we care for people,
• 1:40:14
  Speaker 1: probably no assuredly, there is some principle prisoned in their
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 1: souls or in the windings of their brains, which when escaped,
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: leaves them insipid, unprofitable, and devoid of interest to us.
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: Sometimes this essence not necessarily the finest element in man's
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 1: or woman's nature, but soul stuff that we lack, disappears.
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: In fact, it invariably disappears. It may be that it
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 1: has been transformed in the process of their growth. It
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 1: may also be that it has utterly vanished by some inadvertence,
• 1:40:46
  Speaker 1: or that we ourselves have absorbed it. Then we throw
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: them away ethel asked, pale but dry eyed, A shudder
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 1: passed through her body, and she clinched her glass nervously.
• 1:40:58
  Speaker 1: At that moment, Reginald resembled air sable, prince of darkness,
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 1: sinister and beautiful, painted by the hand of a modern master.
• 1:41:06
  Speaker 1: Then for a space he again became the man of
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 1: the world. Smiling and self possessed. He filled the glasses,
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: took a long sip of the wine, and resumed his narrative.
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 1: That boy was followed by others. I absorbed many useless things,
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: and some that were evil. I realized that I must
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 1: direct my absorptive provensities. This I did. I selected, selected well,
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: and all the time the terrible power of which I
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: was only half conscious, grew within me. It is indeed
• 1:41:36
  Speaker 1: a terrible power, she cried, all the more terrible for
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 1: its subtlety. Had I not myself been its victim, I
• 1:41:42
  Speaker 1: should not now find it possible to believe in it.
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 1: The invisible hand that smites in the dark is certainly
• 1:41:49
  Speaker 1: more fearful than a visible foe. It is also more merciful.
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 1: Think how much you would have suffered had you been
• 1:41:57
  Speaker 1: conscious of your loss. Still seems even now to me
• 1:42:01
  Speaker 1: that it cannot have been an utter, irreparable loss. There
• 1:42:04
  Speaker 1: is no action without reaction. Even I, even we, must
• 1:42:08
  Speaker 1: have received from you some compensation for what you have
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 1: taken away in the ordinary processes of life. The law
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 1: of action and reaction is indeed potent, But no law
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 1: is without its exception. Think of radium, for instance, with
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 1: its constant and seemingly inexhaustible outflow of energy. It is
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 1: a difficult thing to imagine, but our scientific men have
• 1:42:29
  Speaker 1: accepted it as a fact. Why should we find it
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 1: more difficult to conceive of a tremendous and infinite absorbed development.
• 1:42:36
  Speaker 1: I feel sure that it must somewhere. Phenomenon in the
• 1:42:39
  Speaker 1: physical world finds its counterpart in the psychical universe. There
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 1: are radium souls that radiate without loss of energy, but
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: also without increase. And there are souls the reverse of radium,
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: with unlimited absorptive capabilities, vampire souls. She observed with a shudder,
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 1: and her face blanched. No, he said, don't say that,
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 1: and then he suddenly seemed to grow in stature. His
• 1:43:08
  Speaker 1: face was ablaze, like the face of a god in
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: every age. He replied with solemnity. There are giants who
• 1:43:16
  Speaker 1: attain to a greatness which by natural growth no men
• 1:43:18
  Speaker 1: could ever have reached. But in their youth a vision
• 1:43:21
  Speaker 1: came to them, which they set out to seek. They
• 1:43:24
  Speaker 1: take the stones of fancy to build them a palace
• 1:43:27
  Speaker 1: in the Kingdom of truth, projecting into reality dreams monstrous
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 1: and impossible. Often they fail, and, tumbling from their airy heights,
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: end a quixotic career. Some succeed. They are the chosen
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 1: Carpenter's sons. They are who have laid down the law
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 1: of a world for millenniums to come, or simple Corsicans
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 1: before whose eagle eyes have quaked the kingdoms of the earth.
• 1:43:52
  Speaker 1: But to accomplish their mission they need a will of
• 1:43:54
  Speaker 1: iron and the wit of a hundred men. And from
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 1: the iron they take the strength, and from a hundred
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: men brains they absorb their wisdom. Divine missionaries, they appear
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 1: in all departments of life. In their hand is gathered
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 1: to day the gold of the world. Mighty potentates of
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 1: peace and war, they unlock new seas, and from distant
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 1: continents lift the bars. Single handed, they accomplish what nations
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 1: dared not hope. With titan strides, they scale the stars
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 1: and succeed where millions fail. In art, they live the
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 1: makers of new periods, the dreamers of new styles. They
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 1: make themselves the vocal sunglasses of God, Homer and Shakespeare,
• 1:44:34
  Speaker 1: Hugo and Balzac. They concentrate the dispersed rays of a
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 1: thousand lesser luminaries in one singing flame that, like a
• 1:44:41
  Speaker 1: giant torch, lights up humanity's path. She gazed at him,
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 1: open mouthed. The light had gone from his visage. He paused, exhausted,
• 1:44:50
  Speaker 1: But even then he looked the incarnation of a force,
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 1: no less terrible, no less grand. She grasped the immensity
• 1:44:56
  Speaker 1: of his conception, but her woman's soul rebelled at the
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: horrible and end justice to those whose light is extinguished
• 1:45:02
  Speaker 1: as hers had been to feed an alien flame. And
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 1: then for a moment she saw the pale face of
• 1:45:08
  Speaker 1: Ernest staring at her out of the wine. Cruel, She sobbed,
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 1: How cruel? What matter? He asked, Their strength is taken
• 1:45:18
  Speaker 1: from them, but the spirit of humanity as embodied in
• 1:45:22
  Speaker 1: US triumphantly marches on end of section ten section eleven
• 1:45:33
  Speaker 1: of the House of the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 1: in the public domain recording by Elisabeth Klett. The House
• 1:45:41
  Speaker 1: of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter twenty one.
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 1: Reginald's revelations were followed by a long silence, interrupted only
• 1:45:52
  Speaker 1: by the officiousness of the waiter. The spell. Once broken,
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 1: they exchanged a number of more or less irrelevant observations.
• 1:45:59
  Speaker 1: Ethie's mind returned again and again to the word he
• 1:46:02
  Speaker 1: had not spoken. He had said nothing of the immediate
• 1:46:06
  Speaker 1: bearing of his monstrous power upon her own life and
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 1: that of Earnest Fielding. At last, somewhat timidly, she approached
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: the subject. You said you loved me, she remarked, I did.
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: But why then I could not help it? Did you
• 1:46:23
  Speaker 1: ever make the slightest attempt in the horrible night hours?
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: I struggled against it. I even implored you to leave me. Ah,
• 1:46:32
  Speaker 1: but I loved you. You would not be warned, you
• 1:46:35
  Speaker 1: would not listen. You stayed with me, and slowly, surely
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: the creative urge went out of your life. But what
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 1: on earth could you find in my poor art to
• 1:46:46
  Speaker 1: attract you? What were my pictures to you? I needed them,
• 1:46:51
  Speaker 1: I needed you. It was a certain something, a rich
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: color effect perhaps, And then under your very eyes the
• 1:46:59
  Speaker 1: color that vanish from your canvases or reappeared in my prose.
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 1: My style became more luxurious than it had been while
• 1:47:06
  Speaker 1: you tortured your soul in the vain attempt of calling
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 1: back to your brush. What was irretrievably lost? Why did
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 1: you not tell me? You would have laughed in my face,
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: and I could not have endured your laugh. Besides, I
• 1:47:21
  Speaker 1: always hoped, until it was too late, that I might
• 1:47:24
  Speaker 1: yet check the mysterious power within me. Soon, however, I
• 1:47:28
  Speaker 1: became aware that it was beyond my control. The unknown
• 1:47:31
  Speaker 1: God whose instrument I am had wisely made it stronger
• 1:47:35
  Speaker 1: than me. But why, retorted Ethel, was it necessary to
• 1:47:40
  Speaker 1: discard me like a cast off garment, like a wanton
• 1:47:43
  Speaker 1: who has lost the power to please her frame shook
• 1:47:46
  Speaker 1: with the remembered emotion of that moment, when years ago
• 1:47:49
  Speaker 1: he had politely told her that she was nothing to him.
• 1:47:52
  Speaker 1: The law of being, Reginald replied, almost sadly, the law
• 1:47:57
  Speaker 1: of my being. I should have you, But the eternal
• 1:48:01
  Speaker 1: reproach of your suffering only provoked my anger. I cared
• 1:48:05
  Speaker 1: less for you every day, and when I had absorbed
• 1:48:08
  Speaker 1: all of you that my growth required, you were to
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: me as one dead. As a stranger you were, there
• 1:48:14
  Speaker 1: was between us no further community of interest. Henceforth I
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: knew our lives must move in totally different spheres. You
• 1:48:22
  Speaker 1: remember that day when we said good bye. You mean
• 1:48:25
  Speaker 1: that day when I lay before you on my knees,
• 1:48:28
  Speaker 1: she corrected him, The day I buried my last dream
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 1: of personal happiness. I would have gladly raised you from
• 1:48:35
  Speaker 1: the floor, but love was utterly gone. If I am
• 1:48:39
  Speaker 1: tenderer to day than I am wont to be, it
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: is because you mean so much to me as the
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 1: symbol of my renunciation. When I realized that I could
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 1: not even say of the thing I loved from myself,
• 1:48:50
  Speaker 1: I became hardened and cruel to others. Not that I
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 1: know no kindly feeling, but no qualms of conscience lay
• 1:48:57
  Speaker 1: their prostrate forms across my path. There is nothing in
• 1:49:01
  Speaker 1: life for me but my mission. His face was bathed
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 1: in ecstasy. The pupils were luminous, large and threatening. He
• 1:49:08
  Speaker 1: had the look of a madman or a prophet. After
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 1: a while, Ethel remarked, but you have grown into one
• 1:49:15
  Speaker 1: of the master figures of the age. Why not be
• 1:49:17
  Speaker 1: content with that? Is there no limit to your ambition?
• 1:49:21
  Speaker 1: Reginald smiled. Ambition Shakespeare stopped when he had reached his
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 1: full growth, when he had exhausted the capacities of his contemporaries.
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 1: I am not yet ready to lay down my pen
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 1: and rest, and will you always continue in this criminal course?
• 1:49:38
  Speaker 1: A murderer of other lives? He looked her calmly in
• 1:49:42
  Speaker 1: the face. I do not know. Are you the slave
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 1: of your unknown God? We are all slaves, wire pulled marionettes.
• 1:49:52
  Speaker 1: You earnest I there is no freedom on the face
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 1: of the earth, nor above. The tiger that tears a
• 1:49:59
  Speaker 1: lamb is not free. I am not free. You are
• 1:50:02
  Speaker 1: not free. All that happens must happen. No word that
• 1:50:07
  Speaker 1: is said is said in vain, In vain is raised
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 1: no hand. Then Ethel retorted eagerly, if I attempted to
• 1:50:16
  Speaker 1: wrest your victim from you, I should also be the
• 1:50:18
  Speaker 1: tool of your God. Assuredly, but I am his chosen
• 1:50:24
  Speaker 1: Can you can you not set him free? I need
• 1:50:28
  Speaker 1: him a little longer then he is yours. But can
• 1:50:33
  Speaker 1: you not, if I beg you again on my knees,
• 1:50:35
  Speaker 1: at least loosen his chains before he is utterly ruined.
• 1:50:39
  Speaker 1: It is beyond my power if I could not rescue you,
• 1:50:43
  Speaker 1: whom I loved, What in heaven or on earth can
• 1:50:45
  Speaker 1: save him from his fate? Besides, he will not be
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 1: utterly ruined. It is only a part of him that
• 1:50:51
  Speaker 1: I absorb. In his soul are chords that I have
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 1: not touched. They may vibrate one day when he has
• 1:50:58
  Speaker 1: gathered new strength. You two would have spared yourself much pain,
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: had you striven to attain success in different fields, not
• 1:51:05
  Speaker 1: where I had garnered the harvest of a lifetime. It
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 1: is only a portion of his talent that I take
• 1:51:10
  Speaker 1: from him. The rest I cannot harm. Why should he
• 1:51:14
  Speaker 1: bury that remainder? His eyes strayed through the window to
• 1:51:18
  Speaker 1: the firmament, as if to say that words could no
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: more bend his indomitable will than alter the changeless course
• 1:51:23
  Speaker 1: of the stars. Ethel had half forgotten the wrong she
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 1: had herself suffered at his hands. He could not be
• 1:51:30
  Speaker 1: measured by ordinary standards, this dazzling madman, whose diseased will
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 1: power had assumed such uncanny proportions. But here a young
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: life was at stake. In her mind's eye, she saw
• 1:51:42
  Speaker 1: Reginald crush between his relentless hands, the delicate soul of
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 1: Earnest Fielding as a magnificent carnivorous flower might close its
• 1:51:50
  Speaker 1: glorious petals upon a fly. Love, All conquering love welled
• 1:51:56
  Speaker 1: up in her. She would fight for Ernest as a
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 1: tiger cat fights for its young. She would place herself
• 1:52:01
  Speaker 1: in the way of the awful force that had shattered
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 1: her own aspirations, and save, at any cost the brilliant
• 1:52:07
  Speaker 1: boy who did not love her. Chapter twenty two. The
• 1:52:13
  Speaker 1: last rays of the late afternoon sun fell slanting through
• 1:52:16
  Speaker 1: Ernest's window. He was lying on his couch in a leaden,
• 1:52:19
  Speaker 1: deathlike slumber that, for the moment at least was not
• 1:52:22
  Speaker 1: even perturbed by the presence of Reginald Clark. The latter
• 1:52:26
  Speaker 1: was standing at the boy's bedside, calm unmoved as ever.
• 1:52:31
  Speaker 1: The excitement of his conversation with Ethel had left no
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 1: trace on the chiseled contour of his forehead, smilingly fastening
• 1:52:37
  Speaker 1: an orchid of an indefinable purple tint in his evening coat, radiant,
• 1:52:42
  Speaker 1: buoyant with life, he looked down upon the sleeper. Then
• 1:52:46
  Speaker 1: he passed his hand over Ernest's forehead, as if to
• 1:52:49
  Speaker 1: wipe off beads of sweat. At the touch of his hand,
• 1:52:52
  Speaker 1: the boy stirred uneasily. When it was not withdrawn, his
• 1:52:55
  Speaker 1: countenance twitched in pain. He moaned as men moan under
• 1:52:59
  Speaker 1: the influence of some anesthetic, without possessing the power to
• 1:53:02
  Speaker 1: break through the narrow partition that separates them from death
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 1: on the one side and from consciousness on the other.
• 1:53:08
  Speaker 1: At last, a sigh struggled to his seemingly paralyzed lips,
• 1:53:12
  Speaker 1: then another. Finally, the babbling became articulate. For God's sake,
• 1:53:18
  Speaker 1: he cried in his sleep, take that hand away, and
• 1:53:22
  Speaker 1: all at once, the benignant smile on Reginald's features was
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: changed to a look of savage fierceness. He no longer
• 1:53:28
  Speaker 1: resembled the man of culture, but a disappointed, snarling beast
• 1:53:32
  Speaker 1: of prey. He took his hand from Ernest's forehead and
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 1: retired cautiously through the half open door. Hardly had he disappeared.
• 1:53:39
  Speaker 1: When Ernest woke for a moment, he looked around like
• 1:53:43
  Speaker 1: a hunted animal, then sighed with relief and buried his
• 1:53:46
  Speaker 1: head in his hand. At that moment, a knock at
• 1:53:48
  Speaker 1: the door was heard, and Reginald re entered. Calm as
• 1:53:52
  Speaker 1: before I declare, he exclaimed, you have certainly been sleeping
• 1:53:57
  Speaker 1: the sleep of the just. It isn't lazy, Ernest replied,
• 1:54:01
  Speaker 1: looking up rather pleased at the interruption. But I've a
• 1:54:04
  Speaker 1: splitting headache. Perhaps those naps are not good for your health. Probably,
• 1:54:11
  Speaker 1: But of late I have frequently found it necessary to
• 1:54:13
  Speaker 1: exact from the day hours the sleep which the night
• 1:54:15
  Speaker 1: refuses me. I suppose it is all due to indigestion.
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 1: As you have suggested. The stomach is the source of
• 1:54:22
  Speaker 1: all evil. It is also the source of all good.
• 1:54:26
  Speaker 1: The Greeks made it the seat of the soul. I
• 1:54:28
  Speaker 1: have always claimed that the most important item in a
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 1: great poet's biography is an exact reproduction of his menu. True,
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 1: a man who eats a heavy beefsteak for breakfast in
• 1:54:39
  Speaker 1: the morning is incapable of writing a sonnet in the afternoon. Yes,
• 1:54:44
  Speaker 1: Reginald added, we are what we eat and what our
• 1:54:47
  Speaker 1: forefathers have eaten before us. I ascribe the staleness of
• 1:54:52
  Speaker 1: American poetry to the griddle cakes of our Puritan ancestors.
• 1:54:56
  Speaker 1: I am sorry we cannot go deeper into the subject
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 1: at present, but I I have an invitation to dinner,
• 1:55:01
  Speaker 1: where I shall study experimentally the influence of French sauces
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 1: on my versification. Good Bye au Revoir, and with a
• 1:55:10
  Speaker 1: wave of the hand, Reginald left the room. When the
• 1:55:13
  Speaker 1: door had closed behind him, Ernest's thoughts took a more
• 1:55:17
  Speaker 1: serious turn. The tone of light bantering in which the
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: preceding conversation had taken place had been assumed on his part.
• 1:55:24
  Speaker 1: For the last few weeks, evil dreams had tortured his
• 1:55:27
  Speaker 1: sleep and cast their shadow upon his waking hours. They
• 1:55:30
  Speaker 1: had ever increased in reality, in intensity, and in hideousness.
• 1:55:35
  Speaker 1: Even now he could see the long, tapering fingers that
• 1:55:37
  Speaker 1: every night were groping in the windings of his brain.
• 1:55:41
  Speaker 1: It was a well formed, manicured hand that seemed to
• 1:55:44
  Speaker 1: reach under his skull, carefully feeling its way through the
• 1:55:47
  Speaker 1: myriad convolutions where thought resides. And oh the agony of
• 1:55:52
  Speaker 1: it all. A human mind is not a thing of stone,
• 1:55:55
  Speaker 1: but alive, horribly alive to pain. What was it those
• 1:55:59
  Speaker 1: fingers sought what mysterious treasures, what jewels hidden in the
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 1: under layer of his consciousness. His brain was like a
• 1:56:07
  Speaker 1: human gold mine, quaking under the blow of the pick
• 1:56:10
  Speaker 1: and the tread of the miner. The miner ah, the
• 1:56:13
  Speaker 1: miner ceaselessly, thoroughly, relentlessly. He opened vein after vein, and
• 1:56:18
  Speaker 1: rested untold riches from the quivering ground. But each vein
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 1: was alive vein, and each nugget of gold a thought,
• 1:56:27
  Speaker 1: no wonder. The boy was a nervous wreck. Whenever a
• 1:56:29
  Speaker 1: tremulous nascent idea was formulating itself, the dream hand clutched
• 1:56:33
  Speaker 1: it and took it away, brutally, severing the fine threads
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 1: that bind thought to thought. And when the morning came,
• 1:56:40
  Speaker 1: how his head ached. It was not an acute pain,
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 1: but dull, heavy, incessant. These sensations Ernest frequently told himself
• 1:56:50
  Speaker 1: were morbid phantasies. But then the monomaniac who imagines that
• 1:56:54
  Speaker 1: his arms have been mangled or cut from his body
• 1:56:57
  Speaker 1: might as well be without arms. Mind can annihilate obstacles,
• 1:57:01
  Speaker 1: it can also create them. Psychology was no unfamiliar ground
• 1:57:05
  Speaker 1: to Earnest, and it was not difficult for him to
• 1:57:07
  Speaker 1: seek in some casual suggestion an explanation for his delusion,
• 1:57:11
  Speaker 1: the fixed notion that haunted him day and night. But
• 1:57:15
  Speaker 1: he also realized that to explain a phenomenon is not
• 1:57:18
  Speaker 1: to explain it away. The man who analyzes his emotions
• 1:57:22
  Speaker 1: cannot wholly escape them, and the shadow of fear, primal,
• 1:57:25
  Speaker 1: inexplicable fear, may darken at moments of weakness the life
• 1:57:29
  Speaker 1: of the subtlest psychologist and the cleverest thinker. He had
• 1:57:33
  Speaker 1: never spoken to Reginald of his terrible nightmares coming on
• 1:57:36
  Speaker 1: the heel of the fancy that he Earnest had written
• 1:57:39
  Speaker 1: The Princess with the Yellow Veil, a fancy, by the way,
• 1:57:42
  Speaker 1: had again possessed him of late. This new delusion would
• 1:57:45
  Speaker 1: certainly arouse suspicion as to his sanity. In Reginald's mind,
• 1:57:49
  Speaker 1: he would probably send him to a sanitarium. He certainly
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 1: would not keep him in the house beneficence itself. In
• 1:57:55
  Speaker 1: all other things, his host was not to be trifled with.
• 1:57:57
  Speaker 1: In any matter that interfered with his work, he would
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: act swiftly and without mercy. For the first time in
• 1:58:04
  Speaker 1: many days, Ernest thought of Abel Felton, poor boy. What
• 1:58:08
  Speaker 1: had become of him after he had been turned from
• 1:58:10
  Speaker 1: the house. He would not wait for any one to
• 1:58:12
  Speaker 1: tell him to pack his bundle, But then that was impossible.
• 1:58:16
  Speaker 1: Reginald was fond of him. Suddenly, Ernest's meditations were interrupted
• 1:58:20
  Speaker 1: by a noise at the outer door. A key was
• 1:58:23
  Speaker 1: turned in the lock. It must be he, But why
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 1: so soon? What could have brought him back at this hour?
• 1:58:29
  Speaker 1: He opened the door and went out into the hall
• 1:58:31
  Speaker 1: to see what had happened. The figure that he beheld
• 1:58:33
  Speaker 1: was certainly not the person he expected, but a woman
• 1:58:36
  Speaker 1: from whose shoulders a theater cloak fell in graceful folds,
• 1:58:40
  Speaker 1: probably a visitor for Reginald. Ernest was about to withdraw
• 1:58:43
  Speaker 1: discreetly when the electric light that was burning in the
• 1:58:46
  Speaker 1: hallway fell upon her face and illumined it. Then, indeed,
• 1:58:50
  Speaker 1: surprise overcame him Ethel. He cried, is it you? End
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 1: of section eleven Section twelve of the House of the Vampire.
• 1:59:05
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
• 1:59:08
  Speaker 1: Elisabeth Klett The House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck,
• 1:59:14
  Speaker 1: Chapter twenty three. Ernest conducted Ethel Brandenburg to his room
• 1:59:19
  Speaker 1: and helped her to remove her cloak. While he was
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 1: placing the garment upon the back of a chair, she
• 1:59:24
  Speaker 1: slipped a little key into her hand bag. He looked
• 1:59:27
  Speaker 1: at her with a question in his eyes. Yes, she replied,
• 1:59:31
  Speaker 1: I kept the key, But I had not dreamed that
• 1:59:34
  Speaker 1: I would ever again cross this threshold. Meanwhile, it had
• 1:59:37
  Speaker 1: grown quite dark. The reflection of the street lanterns without
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 1: dimly lit the room, and through the twilight, fantastic shadows
• 1:59:44
  Speaker 1: seemed to dance. The perfume of her hair pervaded the
• 1:59:48
  Speaker 1: room and filled the boy's heart with romance. Tenderness, long suppressed,
• 1:59:52
  Speaker 1: called with a thousand voices the hour. The strangeness and
• 1:59:56
  Speaker 1: unexpectedness of her visit, Perhaps even a boy's pardonable anity,
• 2:00:00
  Speaker 1: roused passion from its slumbers, and once again wrought an
• 2:00:03
  Speaker 1: earnest soul the miracle of love. His arm encircled her neck,
• 2:00:07
  Speaker 1: and his lips stammered blind, sweet, crazy and caressing things.
• 2:00:12
  Speaker 1: Turn on the light, she pleaded, You are not always
• 2:00:16
  Speaker 1: so cruel, No matter, I have not come to speak
• 2:00:19
  Speaker 1: of love. Why then have you come? Ernest felt a
• 2:00:23
  Speaker 1: little awkward, disappointed as he uttered these words. What could
• 2:00:27
  Speaker 1: have induced her to come to his rooms. He loosened
• 2:00:29
  Speaker 1: his hold on her and did as she asked. How
• 2:00:32
  Speaker 1: pale she looked in the light, How beautiful? Surely she
• 2:00:35
  Speaker 1: had sorrowed for him. But why had she not answered
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 1: his letter? Yes? Why your letter? She smiled a little sadly.
• 2:00:43
  Speaker 1: Surely you did not expect me to answer that? Why not?
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 1: He had again approached her, and his lips were close
• 2:00:50
  Speaker 1: to hers. Why not I have yearned for you. I
• 2:00:54
  Speaker 1: love you. His breath intoxicated her. It was like a
• 2:00:57
  Speaker 1: subtle perfume. Still she did not yield. You love me?
• 2:01:02
  Speaker 1: Now you did not love me? Then? The music of
• 2:01:04
  Speaker 1: your words was cold, machine made, strained and superficial. I
• 2:01:09
  Speaker 1: shall not answer, I told myself in his heart. He
• 2:01:12
  Speaker 1: has forgotten you. I did not then realize that a
• 2:01:15
  Speaker 1: dangerous force had possessed your life and crushed in your
• 2:01:17
  Speaker 1: mind every image but its own. I don't understand. Do
• 2:01:22
  Speaker 1: you think I would have come here if it were
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 1: a mere like matter? No, I tell you it is
• 2:01:26
  Speaker 1: a matter of life and death to you, at least
• 2:01:29
  Speaker 1: as an artist. What do you mean by that? Have
• 2:01:32
  Speaker 1: you done a stroke of work since I last saw you? Yes,
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: let me see, surely? Magazine articles and a poem. That
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 1: is not what I want to know. Have you accomplished
• 2:01:45
  Speaker 1: anything big? Have you grown since this summer? How about
• 2:01:48
  Speaker 1: your novel? I? I have almost finished it in my mind,
• 2:01:52
  Speaker 1: but I have found no chance to begin with the
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: actual writing. I was sick of late, very sick, no
• 2:01:58
  Speaker 1: doubt of it. His face was pinched and pale, and
• 2:02:00
  Speaker 1: the lines about the mouth were curiously contorted, like those
• 2:02:04
  Speaker 1: of a man suffering from a painful internal disease. Tell me,
• 2:02:08
  Speaker 1: she ventured, do you ever miss anything? Do you mean
• 2:02:12
  Speaker 1: are there thieves? Thieves? Against thieves? One can protect one's self.
• 2:02:19
  Speaker 1: He stared at her wildly, half frightened, in anticipation of
• 2:02:23
  Speaker 1: some dreadful revelation. His dream, his dream, that hand, could
• 2:02:27
  Speaker 1: it be more than a dream? God? His lips quivered.
• 2:02:32
  Speaker 1: Ethel observed his agitation and continued more quietly, but with
• 2:02:36
  Speaker 1: the same insistence. Have you ever had ideas, plans that
• 2:02:40
  Speaker 1: you began without having strength to complete them? Have you
• 2:02:42
  Speaker 1: had glimpses of vocal visions that seemed to vanish no
• 2:02:45
  Speaker 1: sooner than seen? Did it ever seem to you as
• 2:02:48
  Speaker 1: if some mysterious and superior will brutally interfered with the
• 2:02:51
  Speaker 1: workings of your brain. Did it seem so to him?
• 2:02:54
  Speaker 1: He himself could not have stated more plainly the experience
• 2:02:57
  Speaker 1: of the last few months. Each word fell from her
• 2:03:00
  Speaker 1: lips like the blow of a hammer. Shivering, He put
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 1: his arm around her, seeking solace, not love. This time
• 2:03:07
  Speaker 1: she did not repulse him, and trustingly, as a child
• 2:03:10
  Speaker 1: confides to his mother, he depicted to her the suffering
• 2:03:13
  Speaker 1: that harrowed his life and made it a hell. As
• 2:03:16
  Speaker 1: she listened, indignation clouded her forehead, while rising tears of
• 2:03:20
  Speaker 1: anger and of love weighed down her lashes. She could
• 2:03:23
  Speaker 1: bear the pitiful sight. No longer child, she cried, do
• 2:03:28
  Speaker 1: you know who your tormentor is? And like a flash,
• 2:03:31
  Speaker 1: the truth passed from her to him. A sudden intimation
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 1: told him what her words had still concealed. Don't, for
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 1: Christ's sake, do not pronounce his name, he sobbed. Do
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 1: not breathe it. I could not endure it. I should
• 2:03:44
  Speaker 1: go mad Chapter twenty four. Very quietly, with difficulty, restraining
• 2:03:50
  Speaker 1: her own emotion so as not to excite him further,
• 2:03:53
  Speaker 1: Ethel had related to Ernest the story of her remarkable
• 2:03:56
  Speaker 1: interview with Reginald Clarke in the long silence that ensued,
• 2:04:00
  Speaker 1: the wings of his soul brushed against hers for the
• 2:04:02
  Speaker 1: first time, and love, by a thousand tender chains of
• 2:04:06
  Speaker 1: common suffering welded their beings into one. Caressingly. The ivory
• 2:04:10
  Speaker 1: of her fingers passed thro the gold of his hair
• 2:04:12
  Speaker 1: and over his brow, as if to banish the demon
• 2:04:15
  Speaker 1: eyes that stared at him across the hideous spaces of
• 2:04:17
  Speaker 1: the past. In a rush, a thousand incidents came back
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 1: to him, mute witnesses of a damning truth, his play,
• 2:04:25
  Speaker 1: the dreams that tormented him, his own inability to concentrate
• 2:04:29
  Speaker 1: his mind upon his novel, which hitherto he had ascribed
• 2:04:31
  Speaker 1: to a nervous disease. All piling fact on fact became
• 2:04:35
  Speaker 1: one monstrous monument of Reginald Clark's crime. At last, Ernest
• 2:04:40
  Speaker 1: understood the parting words of Abel Felton and the look
• 2:04:43
  Speaker 1: in Ethel's eye on the night when he had first
• 2:04:45
  Speaker 1: linked his fate with the other man's. Walcom's experience, too,
• 2:04:49
  Speaker 1: and Reginald's remarks on the busts of Shakespeare and Balzac
• 2:04:52
  Speaker 1: unmistakably pointed toward the new and horrible specter that Ethel's
• 2:04:56
  Speaker 1: revelation had raised in place of his host. And then
• 2:05:00
  Speaker 1: then again the other Reginald appeared, crowned with the lyric wreath.
• 2:05:04
  Speaker 1: From his lips, golden cadences fell sweeter than the smell
• 2:05:08
  Speaker 1: of many flowers or the sound of a silver bell.
• 2:05:10
  Speaker 1: He was once more the divine master, whose godlike features
• 2:05:14
  Speaker 1: bore no trace of malice, and who had raised him
• 2:05:16
  Speaker 1: to a place very near his heart. No, he cried,
• 2:05:20
  Speaker 1: it is impossible. It's all a dream, a horrible nightmare.
• 2:05:24
  Speaker 1: But he has himself confessed it, she interjected, Perhaps he
• 2:05:29
  Speaker 1: has spoken in symbols. We all absorbed to some extent
• 2:05:32
  Speaker 1: other men's ideas without robbing them and wrecking their thought life.
• 2:05:36
  Speaker 1: Reginald may be unscrupulous in the use of his power
• 2:05:38
  Speaker 1: of impressing upon others the stamp of his master mind.
• 2:05:41
  Speaker 1: So was Shakespeare. No, no, no, you are mistaken. We
• 2:05:45
  Speaker 1: were both deluded for the moment by his picturesque account
• 2:05:48
  Speaker 1: of a common not even a discreditable fact. He may
• 2:05:51
  Speaker 1: himself have played with the idea, but surely he cannot
• 2:05:53
  Speaker 1: have been serious. And your own experience and able feltons
• 2:05:58
  Speaker 1: and mine, can they too be mist With a shrug
• 2:06:00
  Speaker 1: of the shoulder. But come to think of it, the
• 2:06:03
  Speaker 1: whole theory seems absurd. It is unscientific. It is not
• 2:06:08
  Speaker 1: even a case of mesmerism. If he had said that
• 2:06:10
  Speaker 1: he hypnotized his victims, the matter would assume a totally
• 2:06:13
  Speaker 1: different aspect. I admit that something is wrong somewhere, and
• 2:06:17
  Speaker 1: that the home of Reginald Clarke is no healthful abode
• 2:06:19
  Speaker 1: for me. But you must also remember that probably we
• 2:06:22
  Speaker 1: are both unstrung to the point of hysteria. But to
• 2:06:25
  Speaker 1: Ethel his words carried no conviction. You are still under
• 2:06:29
  Speaker 1: his spell, she cried anxiously, A little shaken in his confidence,
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: Ernest resumed, Reginald is utterly incapable of such an action,
• 2:06:38
  Speaker 1: even granting that he possessed the terrible power of which
• 2:06:41
  Speaker 1: you speak. A man of his splendid resources, a literary midas,
• 2:06:45
  Speaker 1: at whose touch every word turns into gold, is under
• 2:06:48
  Speaker 1: no necessity to prey on the thoughts of others. Circumstances
• 2:06:51
  Speaker 1: I admit are suspicious. But in the light of common day,
• 2:06:54
  Speaker 1: this fanciful theory shrivels into nothing. Any court of law
• 2:06:58
  Speaker 1: would reject our evidence as madness. It is too utterly
• 2:07:01
  Speaker 1: fantastic utterly alien to any human experience, is it, though
• 2:07:06
  Speaker 1: Ethel replied with peculiar intonation, Why what do you mean? Surely,
• 2:07:13
  Speaker 1: she answered, you must know that in the legends of
• 2:07:16
  Speaker 1: every nation we read of men and women who were
• 2:07:18
  Speaker 1: called vampires. They are beings, not always wholly evil, whom
• 2:07:23
  Speaker 1: every night, some mysterious impulse leads to steal into unguarded
• 2:07:27
  Speaker 1: bed chambers, to suck the blood of the sleepers, and then,
• 2:07:30
  Speaker 1: having waxed strong on the life of their victims, cautiously
• 2:07:33
  Speaker 1: to retreat. Thence comes it that their lips are very red.
• 2:07:38
  Speaker 1: It is even said that they can find no rest
• 2:07:40
  Speaker 1: in the grave, but return to their former haunts long
• 2:07:42
  Speaker 1: after they are believed to be dead. Those whom they visit, however,
• 2:07:46
  Speaker 1: pine a way for no apparent reason. The physicians shake
• 2:07:49
  Speaker 1: their wise heads and speak of consumption, But sometimes ancient
• 2:07:54
  Speaker 1: chronicles assure us the people's suspicions were aroused, and under
• 2:07:58
  Speaker 1: the leadership of good priests, they went in solemn procession
• 2:08:00
  Speaker 1: to the graves of the person suspected, and on opening
• 2:08:03
  Speaker 1: the tombs it was found that their coffins had rotted away,
• 2:08:06
  Speaker 1: and the flowers in their hair were black, but their
• 2:08:09
  Speaker 1: bodies were white and whole, through no empty sockets crept
• 2:08:13
  Speaker 1: the vermin, and their sucking lips were still moist with
• 2:08:16
  Speaker 1: a little blood. Ernest was carried away in spite of
• 2:08:19
  Speaker 1: himself by her account, which vividly resembled his own experience.
• 2:08:23
  Speaker 1: Still he would not give in all. This is impressive,
• 2:08:27
  Speaker 1: I admit it is very impressive. But you yourself speak
• 2:08:30
  Speaker 1: of such stories as legends. They are unfounded upon any
• 2:08:33
  Speaker 1: tangible fact. And you cannot expect a man schooled in
• 2:08:36
  Speaker 1: modern sciences to admit as having any possible bearing upon
• 2:08:40
  Speaker 1: his life, the crude belief of the Middle Ages. Why not,
• 2:08:45
  Speaker 1: she responded, Our scientists have proved true the wildest theories
• 2:08:48
  Speaker 1: of medieval scholars. The transmutation of metals seems to day
• 2:08:52
  Speaker 1: no longer in idle speculation, and radium has transformed into
• 2:08:56
  Speaker 1: potential reality, the dream of perpetual motion. The fundamental notions
• 2:08:59
  Speaker 1: of mathematics are being undermined. One school of philosophers claims
• 2:09:03
  Speaker 1: that the number of angles in a triangle is equal
• 2:09:06
  Speaker 1: to more than two right angles. Another propounds that it
• 2:09:08
  Speaker 1: is less. Even great scientists who have studied the soul
• 2:09:12
  Speaker 1: of nature are turning to spiritualism. The world is overcoming
• 2:09:15
  Speaker 1: the shallow skepticism of the nineteenth century. Life has become
• 2:09:19
  Speaker 1: once more wonderful and very mysterious. But it also seems
• 2:09:23
  Speaker 1: that with the miracles of the old days, their terrors,
• 2:09:26
  Speaker 1: their nightmares, and their monsters are come back in a
• 2:09:28
  Speaker 1: modern guise. Ernest became even more thoughtful. Yes, he observed,
• 2:09:34
  Speaker 1: there is something in what you say. Then, pacing the
• 2:09:38
  Speaker 1: room nervously, he exclaimed, and still I find it impossible
• 2:09:41
  Speaker 1: to believe your explanation, Reginald A vampire. It seems so ludicrous.
• 2:09:46
  Speaker 1: If you had told me that such creatures exist somewhere
• 2:09:49
  Speaker 1: far away, I might have discussed the matter. But in
• 2:09:51
  Speaker 1: this great city, in the shadow of the flat iron building, no,
• 2:09:56
  Speaker 1: she replied with warmth. Yet they exist, have always existed,
• 2:10:01
  Speaker 1: not only in the Middle Ages, but at all times
• 2:10:03
  Speaker 1: and in all regions. There is no nation but has
• 2:10:06
  Speaker 1: some record of them, in one form or another. And
• 2:10:09
  Speaker 1: don't you think if we find a thought, no matter
• 2:10:11
  Speaker 1: how absurd it may seem to us, that has ever
• 2:10:13
  Speaker 1: occupied the minds of men, If we find, I say,
• 2:10:16
  Speaker 1: such a perennially recurrent thought, are we not justified in
• 2:10:19
  Speaker 1: assuming that it must have some basis in the actual
• 2:10:22
  Speaker 1: experience of mankind. Ernest's brow became very clouded, and infinite
• 2:10:27
  Speaker 1: numbers of hidden, premature wrinkles began to show how wan
• 2:10:31
  Speaker 1: he looked and how frail he was, as one lost
• 2:10:34
  Speaker 1: in a labyrinth in which he saw no light. Convinced
• 2:10:37
  Speaker 1: against his will, or rather against his scientific conviction, that
• 2:10:40
  Speaker 1: she was not wholly mistaken, still he observed triumphantly, your
• 2:10:46
  Speaker 1: vampires suck blood. But Reginald of vampire, he be praise
• 2:10:50
  Speaker 1: upon the soul. How can a man suck from another
• 2:10:53
  Speaker 1: man's brain a thing as intangible as quintessential as thought? Ah,
• 2:10:58
  Speaker 1: she replied, you forget yet thought is more real than blood.
• 2:11:04
  Speaker 1: End of section twelve, Section thirteen of the House of
• 2:11:13
  Speaker 1: the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 2:11:18
  Speaker 1: Recording by Elizabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by
• 2:11:23
  Speaker 1: George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter twenty five. Only three hours had
• 2:11:29
  Speaker 1: passed since Ethel had startled Earnest from his somber reveries.
• 2:11:33
  Speaker 1: But within this brief space their love had matured as
• 2:11:36
  Speaker 1: if each hour had been a year. The pallor had
• 2:11:39
  Speaker 1: vanished from his cheeks, and the restiveness from his eyes.
• 2:11:43
  Speaker 1: The intoxication of her presence had rekindled the light of
• 2:11:46
  Speaker 1: his countenance and given him strength to combat the mighty
• 2:11:49
  Speaker 1: forces embodied in Reginald Clarke. The child in him had
• 2:11:52
  Speaker 1: made room for the man. He would not hear of
• 2:11:55
  Speaker 1: surrendering without a struggle, and Ethel felt sure she might
• 2:11:59
  Speaker 1: leave his fate in his own hand. Love had lent
• 2:12:02
  Speaker 1: him a coat of mail, he was warned, and would
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 1: not succumb. Still, she made one more attempt to persuade
• 2:12:09
  Speaker 1: him to leave the house at once with her. I
• 2:12:12
  Speaker 1: must go now, she said, Will you not come with me?
• 2:12:15
  Speaker 1: After all? I am so afraid to think of you
• 2:12:17
  Speaker 1: still here. No, dear, he replied, I shall not desert
• 2:12:22
  Speaker 1: my post. I must solve the riddle of this man's life,
• 2:12:26
  Speaker 1: and if indeed he is the thing he seems to be,
• 2:12:28
  Speaker 1: I shall attempt to wrest from him what he has
• 2:12:30
  Speaker 1: stolen from me. I speak of my unwritten novel. Do
• 2:12:34
  Speaker 1: not attempt to oppose him openly. You cannot resist him.
• 2:12:39
  Speaker 1: Be assured that I shall be on my guard. I have,
• 2:12:41
  Speaker 1: in the last few hours lived through so much that
• 2:12:44
  Speaker 1: makes life worth living, that I would not wantonly expose
• 2:12:47
  Speaker 1: myself to any danger. Still, I cannot go without certainty,
• 2:12:51
  Speaker 1: cannot if there is some truth in our fears, leave
• 2:12:54
  Speaker 1: the best of me behind. What are you planning to
• 2:12:57
  Speaker 1: do my play? I am sure now that it is mine.
• 2:13:02
  Speaker 1: I cannot take from him that is irretrievably lost. He
• 2:13:06
  Speaker 1: has read it to his circle and prepared for its publication.
• 2:13:09
  Speaker 1: And no matter how firmly convinced you or I may
• 2:13:12
  Speaker 1: be of his strange power, no one would believe our testimony.
• 2:13:15
  Speaker 1: They would pronounce us mad. Perhaps we are mad. No,
• 2:13:20
  Speaker 1: we are not mad. But it is mad for you
• 2:13:22
  Speaker 1: to stay here. She asserted. I shall not stay here
• 2:13:26
  Speaker 1: one minute longer than is absolutely essential. Within a week,
• 2:13:30
  Speaker 1: I shall have conclusive proof of his guilt or innocence.
• 2:13:34
  Speaker 1: How will you go about it? His writing table? Ah, Yes,
• 2:13:39
  Speaker 1: perhaps I can discover some note, some indication, some proof.
• 2:13:43
  Speaker 1: It's a dangerous game. I have everything to gain. I
• 2:13:48
  Speaker 1: wish I could stay here with you, she said, Have
• 2:13:51
  Speaker 1: you no friend, no one whom you could trust in
• 2:13:53
  Speaker 1: this delicate matter? Why? Yes, Jack? A shadow passed over
• 2:13:58
  Speaker 1: her face. Do you know, she said, I have a
• 2:14:02
  Speaker 1: feeling that you care more for him than for me. Nonsense?
• 2:14:06
  Speaker 1: He said, he is my friend. You you immeasurably more.
• 2:14:12
  Speaker 1: Are you still as intimate with him as when I
• 2:14:14
  Speaker 1: first met you? Not quite? Of late? A troubling, something
• 2:14:19
  Speaker 1: like a thin veil seems to have passed between us.
• 2:14:22
  Speaker 1: But he will come when I call him. He will
• 2:14:24
  Speaker 1: not fail me in my hour of need. When can
• 2:14:27
  Speaker 1: he be here in two or three days? Meanwhile, be
• 2:14:31
  Speaker 1: very careful above all, lock your door at night. I
• 2:14:35
  Speaker 1: will not only lock, but barricade it. I shall try
• 2:14:38
  Speaker 1: with all my power to elucidate this mystery, without, however,
• 2:14:41
  Speaker 1: exposing myself to needless risks. I will go, then, kiss
• 2:14:45
  Speaker 1: me good bye. May I not take you to the car?
• 2:14:49
  Speaker 1: You had better not at the door? She turned back
• 2:14:52
  Speaker 1: once more, Write me every day, or call me up
• 2:14:56
  Speaker 1: on the telephone. He straightened himself as if to convince
• 2:15:00
  Speaker 1: her of his strength. Yet, when at last the door
• 2:15:02
  Speaker 1: had closed behind her, his courage forsook him for a moment.
• 2:15:06
  Speaker 1: And if he had not been ashamed to appear a
• 2:15:08
  Speaker 1: weakling before the woman he loved, who knows if any
• 2:15:11
  Speaker 1: power on earth could have kept him in that house,
• 2:15:13
  Speaker 1: where from every corner a secret seemed to lurk. There
• 2:15:17
  Speaker 1: was a misgiving too in the woman's heart as she
• 2:15:19
  Speaker 1: left the boy behind, a prey to the occult power
• 2:15:22
  Speaker 1: that seeking expression in multiple activities has made and unmade emperors, prophets,
• 2:15:27
  Speaker 1: and poets. As she stepped into a street car, she
• 2:15:31
  Speaker 1: saw from afar as in a vision, the face of
• 2:15:34
  Speaker 1: Reginald Clark. It seemed very white and hungry. There was
• 2:15:39
  Speaker 1: no human kindness in it, only a threat and a
• 2:15:42
  Speaker 1: sneer Chapter twenty six. For over an hour, Ernest paced
• 2:15:49
  Speaker 1: up and down his room, wildly excited by Ethel's revelations.
• 2:15:53
  Speaker 1: It required an immense amount of self control for him
• 2:15:55
  Speaker 1: to pen the following lines to Jack, I need you come.
• 2:16:00
  Speaker 1: After he had entrusted the letter to the hall boy,
• 2:16:03
  Speaker 1: a reaction set in, and he was able to consider
• 2:16:05
  Speaker 1: the matter, if not with equanimity, at least with a
• 2:16:08
  Speaker 1: degree of calmness. The strangest thing to him was that
• 2:16:12
  Speaker 1: he could not bring himself to hate Reginald, of whose
• 2:16:14
  Speaker 1: evil influence upon his life. He was now firmly convinced
• 2:16:18
  Speaker 1: here was another shattered idol, but one like the fragment
• 2:16:22
  Speaker 1: of a great godface in the desert, intensely fascinating even
• 2:16:26
  Speaker 1: in its ruin. Then yielding to a natural impulse, Ernest
• 2:16:29
  Speaker 1: looked over his photographs and at once laid hold upon
• 2:16:32
  Speaker 1: the austere image of his master and friend. No, it
• 2:16:36
  Speaker 1: was preposterous. There was no evil in this man. There
• 2:16:39
  Speaker 1: was no trace of malice in this face, the face
• 2:16:42
  Speaker 1: of a prophet, or an inspired madman, a poet. And
• 2:16:46
  Speaker 1: yet as he scrutinized the picture closely, a curious transformation
• 2:16:51
  Speaker 1: seemed to take place in the features. A sly little
• 2:16:54
  Speaker 1: line appeared insinuatingly about Reginald's well formed mouth, and the
• 2:16:58
  Speaker 1: serene calm of his Jupiter head seemed to turn into
• 2:17:01
  Speaker 1: the sneak smile of a thief. Nevertheless, Ernest was not afraid.
• 2:17:06
  Speaker 1: His anxieties had at last assumed definite shape. It was
• 2:17:10
  Speaker 1: possible now to be on his guard. It was only invisible,
• 2:17:13
  Speaker 1: incomprehensible fear crouching upon us from the night that drives
• 2:17:17
  Speaker 1: sensitive natures to the verge of madness and transforms stern
• 2:17:21
  Speaker 1: warriors into cowards. Ernest realized the necessity of postponing the
• 2:17:26
  Speaker 1: proposed investigation of Reginald's papers until the morning, as it
• 2:17:29
  Speaker 1: was now near eleven and he expected to hear at
• 2:17:32
  Speaker 1: any moment the sound of his feet at the door.
• 2:17:34
  Speaker 1: Before retiring, he took a number of precautions. Carefully, he
• 2:17:38
  Speaker 1: locked the door to his bedroom and placed a chair
• 2:17:40
  Speaker 1: in front of it. To make doubly sure. He fastened
• 2:17:43
  Speaker 1: the handle to an exquisite Chinese vase, a gift of Reginald's,
• 2:17:47
  Speaker 1: that at the least attempt to force an entrance from
• 2:17:49
  Speaker 1: without would come down with a crash. Then all those
• 2:17:53
  Speaker 1: sleep seemed out of the question. He went to bed.
• 2:17:56
  Speaker 1: He had hardly touched the pillow when a leaden weight
• 2:17:59
  Speaker 1: seemed to all upon his eyes. The day's commotion had
• 2:18:02
  Speaker 1: been too much for his delicate frame. By force of habit,
• 2:18:06
  Speaker 1: he pulled the cover over his ear and fell asleep.
• 2:18:09
  Speaker 1: All night. He slept heavily, and the morning was far
• 2:18:12
  Speaker 1: advanced when a knock at the door that at first
• 2:18:14
  Speaker 1: seemed to come across an immeasurable distance brought him back
• 2:18:17
  Speaker 1: to himself. It was Reginald's manservant, announcing that breakfast was waiting.
• 2:18:23
  Speaker 1: Ernest got up and rubbed his eyes. The barricade at
• 2:18:26
  Speaker 1: the door at once brought back to his mind with
• 2:18:28
  Speaker 1: startling clearness the events of the previous evening. Everything was
• 2:18:32
  Speaker 1: as he had left it. Evidently no one had attempted
• 2:18:35
  Speaker 1: to enter the room while he slept. He could not
• 2:18:38
  Speaker 1: help smiling at the arrangement, which reminded him of his childhood,
• 2:18:41
  Speaker 1: when he had sought by similar means security from burglars
• 2:18:44
  Speaker 1: and bogies. And in the broad daylight, Ethel's tales of
• 2:18:47
  Speaker 1: vampires seemed once more impossible and absurd. Still, he had
• 2:18:52
  Speaker 1: abundant evidence of Reginald's strange influence and was determined to
• 2:18:55
  Speaker 1: know the truth before nightfall. Her word that thought is
• 2:18:59
  Speaker 1: more than blood kept ringing in his ears. If such
• 2:19:03
  Speaker 1: was the case, he would find evidence of Reginald's intellectual
• 2:19:06
  Speaker 1: burglaries and possibly be able to regain a part of
• 2:19:08
  Speaker 1: his lost self that had been snatched from him by
• 2:19:11
  Speaker 1: the relentless dream hand. But under no circumstances could he
• 2:19:15
  Speaker 1: face Reginald in his present state of mind. He was
• 2:19:18
  Speaker 1: convinced that if, in the fleeting vision of a moment,
• 2:19:20
  Speaker 1: the other man's true nature should reveal itself to him,
• 2:19:23
  Speaker 1: he would be so terribly afraid as to shriek like
• 2:19:26
  Speaker 1: a maniac. So he dressed particularly slowly in the hope
• 2:19:30
  Speaker 1: of avoiding an encounter with his host. But fate thwarted
• 2:19:33
  Speaker 1: his hope. Reginald too lingered that morning, unusually long over
• 2:19:37
  Speaker 1: his coffee. He was just taking his last sip when
• 2:19:40
  Speaker 1: Ernest entered the room. His behavior was of an almost
• 2:19:44
  Speaker 1: bourgeois kindness. Benevolence fairly beamed from his face, but to
• 2:19:49
  Speaker 1: the boy's eyes it had assumed a new and sinister expression.
• 2:19:53
  Speaker 1: You are late this morning, Ernest, he remarked, in his
• 2:19:56
  Speaker 1: mildest manner. Have you been about town or writing poetry?
• 2:20:01
  Speaker 1: Both occupations are equally unhealthy. As he said this, he
• 2:20:06
  Speaker 1: watched the young man with an inscrutable smile that, at
• 2:20:09
  Speaker 1: moments was wont to curl upon his lips. Ernest had
• 2:20:12
  Speaker 1: once likened it to the smile of Mona Lisa, but
• 2:20:15
  Speaker 1: now he detected in it the suavity of the hypocrite
• 2:20:17
  Speaker 1: and the leer of the criminal. He could not endure it.
• 2:20:21
  Speaker 1: He could not look upon that face any longer. His
• 2:20:24
  Speaker 1: feet almost gave way under him. Cold sweat gathered on
• 2:20:27
  Speaker 1: his brow, and he sank on a chair, trembling and
• 2:20:29
  Speaker 1: studiously avoiding the other man's gaze. At last, Reginald rose
• 2:20:34
  Speaker 1: to go. It seemed impossible to accuse this splendid impersonation
• 2:20:38
  Speaker 1: of vigorous manhood, of cunning and underhand methods, of plagiarisms
• 2:20:42
  Speaker 1: and theft. As he stood there, he resembled, more than anything,
• 2:20:45
  Speaker 1: a beautiful tiger cat, a wonderful thing of strength and
• 2:20:49
  Speaker 1: will power, indomitable and insatiate. Yet who could tell whether
• 2:20:54
  Speaker 1: this strength was not, after all, parasitic. If Ethel's suspicions
• 2:20:58
  Speaker 1: were justified, then indeed more had been taken from him
• 2:21:01
  Speaker 1: than he could ever realize, For in that case, it
• 2:21:04
  Speaker 1: was his life blood that circled in those veins, and
• 2:21:07
  Speaker 1: the fire of his intellect that set those lips aflame.
• 2:21:12
  Speaker 1: End of section thirteen, Section fourteen of the House of
• 2:21:21
  Speaker 1: the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 2:21:25
  Speaker 1: Recording by Elizabeth Klett. The House of the Vampire by
• 2:21:29
  Speaker 1: George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter twenty seven. Reginald Clarke had hardly
• 2:21:36
  Speaker 1: left the room when Ernest hastily rose from his seat.
• 2:21:39
  Speaker 1: While it was likely that he would remain in undisturbed
• 2:21:42
  Speaker 1: possession of the apartment the whole morning, the stake at
• 2:21:45
  Speaker 1: hand was too great to permit of delay. Palpitating and
• 2:21:49
  Speaker 1: a little uncertain, he entered the studio where scarcely a
• 2:21:52
  Speaker 1: year ago Reginald Clarke had bidden him welcome. Nothing had
• 2:21:56
  Speaker 1: changed there since then, only in Ernest's mind the room
• 2:22:00
  Speaker 1: had assumed an aspect of evil. The antinous was there,
• 2:22:03
  Speaker 1: and the fawn and the christ Head, but their juxtaposition
• 2:22:06
  Speaker 1: to day partook of the nature of the blasphemous. The
• 2:22:09
  Speaker 1: statues of Shakespeare and Balzac seemed to frown from their pedestals.
• 2:22:13
  Speaker 1: As his fingers were running through Reginald's papers, he brushed
• 2:22:17
  Speaker 1: against a semblance of Napoleon that was standing on the
• 2:22:19
  Speaker 1: writing table, so that it toppled over and made a
• 2:22:22
  Speaker 1: noise that weirdly re echoed in the silence of the room.
• 2:22:25
  Speaker 1: At that moment, a curious family resemblance between Shakespeare, Balzac,
• 2:22:29
  Speaker 1: Napoleon and Reginald forcely impressed itself upon his mind. It
• 2:22:34
  Speaker 1: was the indisputable something that marks those who were chosen
• 2:22:37
  Speaker 1: to give ultimate expression to some gigantic world purpose, and
• 2:22:41
  Speaker 1: Balzac's face it was diffused with kindliness, and that of Napoleon,
• 2:22:45
  Speaker 1: sheer brutality predominated. The image of one who was said
• 2:22:49
  Speaker 1: to be the richest man of the world also rose
• 2:22:51
  Speaker 1: before his eyes. Perhaps it was only the play of
• 2:22:54
  Speaker 1: his fevered imagination, but he could have sworn that this
• 2:22:57
  Speaker 1: man's features too bore the mark of those unarriged great
• 2:23:00
  Speaker 1: absorptive minds, who, for better or for worse, are born
• 2:23:04
  Speaker 1: to rob and rule. They seemed to him monsters that
• 2:23:07
  Speaker 1: know neither justice nor pity, only the law of their being,
• 2:23:11
  Speaker 1: the law of growth. Common weapons would not avail against
• 2:23:16
  Speaker 1: such forces, being one they were stronger than armies, nor
• 2:23:20
  Speaker 1: could they be overcome in single combat. Stealth, trickery, the
• 2:23:24
  Speaker 1: outfit of the nave were legitimate weapons in such a fight.
• 2:23:28
  Speaker 1: In this case, the end justified the means, even if
• 2:23:31
  Speaker 1: the latter included burglary. After a brief and fruitless search
• 2:23:35
  Speaker 1: of the desk, he attempted to force open a secret drawer,
• 2:23:38
  Speaker 1: the presence of which he had one day accidentally discovered.
• 2:23:42
  Speaker 1: He tried a number of keys to no account, and
• 2:23:44
  Speaker 1: was thinking of giving up his researches for the day
• 2:23:47
  Speaker 1: until he had procured a skeleton key. When at last
• 2:23:50
  Speaker 1: the lock gave way, the drawer disclosed a large file
• 2:23:54
  Speaker 1: of manuscript Ernest paused for a moment to draw breath.
• 2:23:58
  Speaker 1: The paper rustled under his nervous face. And there at
• 2:24:02
  Speaker 1: last his eyes lit upon a bulky bundle that bore
• 2:24:05
  Speaker 1: this legend, Leontina, a novel. It was true, then, all
• 2:24:12
  Speaker 1: his dream, Reginald's confession, and the house that had opened
• 2:24:15
  Speaker 1: its doors so kindly to him was the house of
• 2:24:18
  Speaker 1: a vampire. Finally, curiosity overcame his burning indignation. He attempted
• 2:24:24
  Speaker 1: to read. The letters seemed to dance before his eyes,
• 2:24:27
  Speaker 1: his hands trembled. At last he succeeded. The words that
• 2:24:31
  Speaker 1: had first rolled over like drunken soldiers, now marched before
• 2:24:34
  Speaker 1: his vision in orderly sequence. He was delighted, then stunned.
• 2:24:39
  Speaker 1: This was indeed authentic literature. There could be no doubt
• 2:24:42
  Speaker 1: about it, and it was his. He was still a poet,
• 2:24:46
  Speaker 1: a great poet. He drew a deep breath, sudden joy,
• 2:24:50
  Speaker 1: tremble in his heart. This story, set down by a
• 2:24:53
  Speaker 1: foreign hand, had grown chapter by chapter in his brain.
• 2:24:57
  Speaker 1: There were some slight changes, slight dear from the original plan.
• 2:25:02
  Speaker 1: A defter hand than his had retouched it here and there.
• 2:25:05
  Speaker 1: But for all that it remained his very own. It
• 2:25:08
  Speaker 1: did not belong to that thief. The blood weld to
• 2:25:11
  Speaker 1: his cheek as he uttered the word that applied to
• 2:25:14
  Speaker 1: Reginald seemed almost sacrilegious. He had nearly reached the last
• 2:25:18
  Speaker 1: chapter when he heard steps in the hallway. Hurriedly, he
• 2:25:21
  Speaker 1: restored the manuscript to its place, closed the drawer, and
• 2:25:25
  Speaker 1: left the room on tiptoe. It was Reginald, but he
• 2:25:29
  Speaker 1: did not come alone. Some one was speaking to him.
• 2:25:32
  Speaker 1: The voice seemed familiar. Ernest could not make out what
• 2:25:35
  Speaker 1: it said. He listened intently, and was it possible? Jack?
• 2:25:40
  Speaker 1: Surely he could not yet have come in response to
• 2:25:42
  Speaker 1: his note? What mysterious power, what dim presentiment of his
• 2:25:46
  Speaker 1: friend's plight had led him thither? But why did he
• 2:25:49
  Speaker 1: linger so long in Reginald's room? Instead of hastening to
• 2:25:52
  Speaker 1: greet him. Cautiously he drew nearer. This time he caught
• 2:25:56
  Speaker 1: Jack's words, It would be convenient and pleasant. Still, some
• 2:26:00
  Speaker 1: way I feel that it is not right for me,
• 2:26:02
  Speaker 1: of all men, to take his place here. That need
• 2:26:05
  Speaker 1: not concern you, Reginald deliberately replied. The dear boy expressed
• 2:26:11
  Speaker 1: the desire to leave me within a fortnight. I think
• 2:26:14
  Speaker 1: he will go to some private sanitarium. His nerves are
• 2:26:17
  Speaker 1: frightfully overstrained. This seems hardly surprising, after the terrible attack
• 2:26:21
  Speaker 1: he had when you read your play, That idea has
• 2:26:25
  Speaker 1: since then developed into a monomania. I am awfully sorry
• 2:26:29
  Speaker 1: for him. I cared for him much, perhaps too much,
• 2:26:32
  Speaker 1: but I always feared that he would come to such
• 2:26:34
  Speaker 1: an end. Of late, his letters have been strangely unbalanced.
• 2:26:38
  Speaker 1: You will find him very much changed. In fact, he
• 2:26:41
  Speaker 1: is no longer the same, No, said Jack, he is
• 2:26:45
  Speaker 1: no longer the friend I loved. Ernest clutched for the wall,
• 2:26:50
  Speaker 1: his face was contorted with intense agony. Each word was
• 2:26:54
  Speaker 1: like a nail driven into his flesh, crucified upon the
• 2:26:57
  Speaker 1: cross of his own affection by the hand he loved.
• 2:27:00
  Speaker 1: All white and trembling, he stood there. Tears rushed to
• 2:27:03
  Speaker 1: his eyes, but he could not weep. Dry eyed. He
• 2:27:06
  Speaker 1: reached his room and threw himself upon his bed. Thus
• 2:27:09
  Speaker 1: he lay, uncomforted and alone Chapter twenty eight. Terrible as
• 2:27:17
  Speaker 1: was his loneliness, A meeting with Jack would have been
• 2:27:19
  Speaker 1: more terrible. And after all it was true a gulf
• 2:27:23
  Speaker 1: had opened between them. Ethel alone could bring solace to
• 2:27:27
  Speaker 1: his soul. There was a great void in his heart
• 2:27:29
  Speaker 1: which only she could fill. He hungered for the touch
• 2:27:32
  Speaker 1: of her hand. He longed for her presence, strongly, as
• 2:27:35
  Speaker 1: a wanton lusts for pleasure, and as sad men crave death.
• 2:27:40
  Speaker 1: Noiselessly he stole to the door so as not to
• 2:27:42
  Speaker 1: arouse the attention of the other two men, whose every
• 2:27:44
  Speaker 1: whisper pierced his heart like a dagger. When he came
• 2:27:48
  Speaker 1: to Ethel's home, he found that she had gone out
• 2:27:50
  Speaker 1: for a breath of air. The servant ushered him into
• 2:27:52
  Speaker 1: the parlor, and there he waited, waited, waited for her.
• 2:27:57
  Speaker 1: Greatly calmed by his walk, he turned the detailales of
• 2:28:00
  Speaker 1: Clark's conversation over in his mind, and the conviction grew
• 2:28:03
  Speaker 1: upon him that the friend of his boyhood was not
• 2:28:06
  Speaker 1: to blame for his course of action. Reginald probably had
• 2:28:09
  Speaker 1: encircled Jack's soul with his demonacal influence and singled him
• 2:28:13
  Speaker 1: out for another victim that must never be. It was
• 2:28:17
  Speaker 1: his turn to save. Now. He would warn his friend
• 2:28:19
  Speaker 1: of the danger that threatened him, even if his words
• 2:28:22
  Speaker 1: should be spoken into the wind. For Reginald, with an
• 2:28:25
  Speaker 1: ingenuity almost satanic, had already suggested that the delusion of
• 2:28:29
  Speaker 1: former days had developed into a monomania, and any attempt
• 2:28:32
  Speaker 1: on his part to warn Jack would only seem to
• 2:28:34
  Speaker 1: confirm this theory. In that case, only one way was
• 2:28:38
  Speaker 1: left open. He must plead with Reginald himself. Confronted all
• 2:28:43
  Speaker 1: risks that snatcher of souls. To night, he would not
• 2:28:46
  Speaker 1: fall asleep. He would keep his vigil, and if Reginald
• 2:28:49
  Speaker 1: should approach his room, if in some way he felt
• 2:28:52
  Speaker 1: the direful presence, he must speak out threaten if need be,
• 2:28:55
  Speaker 1: to save his friend from ruin. He had fully determined
• 2:28:58
  Speaker 1: upon this course. When a CROs I have joy from Ethel,
• 2:29:01
  Speaker 1: who had just returned from her walk, interrupted his reverie,
• 2:29:04
  Speaker 1: but her gladness changed to anxiety when she saw how
• 2:29:07
  Speaker 1: pale he was. Ernest recounted to her the happenings of
• 2:29:10
  Speaker 1: the day, from the discovery of his novel in Reginald's
• 2:29:13
  Speaker 1: desk to the conversation which he had accidentally overheard. He
• 2:29:17
  Speaker 1: noticed that her features brightened as he drew near the
• 2:29:19
  Speaker 1: end of his tale. Was your novel finished? She suddenly asked,
• 2:29:24
  Speaker 1: I think so, then you are out of danger. He
• 2:29:27
  Speaker 1: will want nothing else of you. But you should have
• 2:29:29
  Speaker 1: taken it with you. I had only sufficient presence of
• 2:29:32
  Speaker 1: mind to slip it back into the drawer tomorrow, I
• 2:29:35
  Speaker 1: shall simply demand it. You will do nothing of the kind.
• 2:29:38
  Speaker 1: It is in his handwriting, and you have no legal
• 2:29:41
  Speaker 1: proof that it is yours. You must take it away secretly,
• 2:29:45
  Speaker 1: and he will not dare to proclaim it. And Jack,
• 2:29:49
  Speaker 1: she had quite forgotten Jack. Women are invariably selfish for
• 2:29:53
  Speaker 1: those they love. You must warn him, she replied, He
• 2:29:57
  Speaker 1: would laugh at me. However, I must speak to Reginald.
• 2:30:01
  Speaker 1: It is of no avail to speak to him. At least,
• 2:30:03
  Speaker 1: you must not do so before you have obtained the manuscript.
• 2:30:06
  Speaker 1: It would unnecessarily jeopardize our plans. And after after perhaps,
• 2:30:12
  Speaker 1: But you must not expose yourself to any danger. No, dear,
• 2:30:16
  Speaker 1: he said, and kissed her. What danger is there? Provided
• 2:30:19
  Speaker 1: I keep my wits about me. He steals upon men
• 2:30:22
  Speaker 1: only in their sleep and in the dark. Be careful. Nevertheless,
• 2:30:27
  Speaker 1: I shall, In fact, I think he is not at
• 2:30:29
  Speaker 1: home at this moment. If I go now, I am
• 2:30:31
  Speaker 1: able to get hold of the manuscript and hide it
• 2:30:32
  Speaker 1: before he returns. I cannot but tremble to think of
• 2:30:36
  Speaker 1: you in that house. You shall have no more reason
• 2:30:39
  Speaker 1: to tremble in a day or two. Shall I see
• 2:30:41
  Speaker 1: you tomorrow? I don't think, so I must go over
• 2:30:44
  Speaker 1: my papers and things, who as to be ready at
• 2:30:46
  Speaker 1: any moment to leave the house. And then then he
• 2:30:51
  Speaker 1: took her in his arms and looked long and deeply
• 2:30:53
  Speaker 1: into her eyes. Yes, she replied, at least perhaps. Then
• 2:30:59
  Speaker 1: he turned to go, resolute and happy. How strangely he
• 2:31:03
  Speaker 1: had matured since the summer. Her heart swelled with the
• 2:31:06
  Speaker 1: consciousness that it was her love that had effected this transformation.
• 2:31:10
  Speaker 1: As I cannot expect you to morrow. I shall probably
• 2:31:13
  Speaker 1: go to the opera, but I shall be home before midnight.
• 2:31:15
  Speaker 1: Will you call me up? Then a word from you
• 2:31:18
  Speaker 1: will put me at ease for the night, even if
• 2:31:20
  Speaker 1: it comes over the telephone. I will call you up.
• 2:31:23
  Speaker 1: We moderns have an advantage over the ancients in this respect.
• 2:31:26
  Speaker 1: The twentieth century pyramids can speak to thisby even if
• 2:31:29
  Speaker 1: innumerable walls sever his body from hers, a quaint conceit.
• 2:31:35
  Speaker 1: But let us hope that our love story will end
• 2:31:36
  Speaker 1: less tragically, she said, tenderly, caressing his hair. Oh, we
• 2:31:41
  Speaker 1: shall be happy, you and I, she added, after a while.
• 2:31:44
  Speaker 1: The iron finger of faith that lay so heavily on
• 2:31:46
  Speaker 1: our lives is now withdrawn, almost withdrawn, Yes, almost only
• 2:31:52
  Speaker 1: almost and then a sudden fear came over her. No,
• 2:31:57
  Speaker 1: she cried, do not go, Do not go, Stay with me,
• 2:32:00
  Speaker 1: Stay here. I feel so frightened. I don't know what
• 2:32:03
  Speaker 1: comes over me. I am afraid, afraid for you. No, dear,
• 2:32:08
  Speaker 1: he rejoined. You need not be afraid in your heart.
• 2:32:11
  Speaker 1: You don't want me to desert a friend, and besides,
• 2:32:14
  Speaker 1: leave the best part of my artistic life in Reginald's clutch.
• 2:32:18
  Speaker 1: Why should you expose yourself to God knows what danger
• 2:32:21
  Speaker 1: for a friend who is ready to betray you. You
• 2:32:24
  Speaker 1: forget friendship is a gift. If it exacts payment in
• 2:32:27
  Speaker 1: any form, it is no longer either friendship or a gift.
• 2:32:30
  Speaker 1: And you yourself have assured me that I have nothing
• 2:32:32
  Speaker 1: to fear from Reginald. I have nothing to give to him.
• 2:32:36
  Speaker 1: She rallied under his words and had regained her self
• 2:32:38
  Speaker 1: possession when the door closed behind him. He walked a
• 2:32:42
  Speaker 1: few blocks very briskly. Then his pace slackened. Her words
• 2:32:46
  Speaker 1: had unsettled him a little, and when he reached home
• 2:32:48
  Speaker 1: he did not at once resume his exploration of Reginald's papers.
• 2:32:52
  Speaker 1: He had hardly lit a cigarette when, at an unusually
• 2:32:55
  Speaker 1: early hour he heard Reginald's key in the lock. Quickly
• 2:32:59
  Speaker 1: he turned the light out, and in the semi darkness,
• 2:33:02
  Speaker 1: lit up by an electric lantern below, barricaded the door,
• 2:33:05
  Speaker 1: as on the previous night. Then he went to bed
• 2:33:08
  Speaker 1: without finding sleep. Supreme's silence reigned over the house. Even
• 2:33:14
  Speaker 1: the elevator had ceased to run. Ernest's brain was all ear.
• 2:33:18
  Speaker 1: He heard Reginald walking up and down in the studio.
• 2:33:21
  Speaker 1: Not the smallest movement escaped his attention. Thus hours passed.
• 2:33:26
  Speaker 1: When the clock struck twelve, he was still walking up
• 2:33:29
  Speaker 1: and down, down and up, up and down one o'clock.
• 2:33:36
  Speaker 1: Still the measured beat of his footfall had not ceased.
• 2:33:39
  Speaker 1: There was something hypnotic in the regular tread. Nature at
• 2:33:42
  Speaker 1: last exacted its toll from the boy. He fell asleep,
• 2:33:47
  Speaker 1: hardly had he closed his eyes, when again that horrible nightmare,
• 2:33:51
  Speaker 1: no longer a nightmare, tormented him again. He felt the pointed,
• 2:33:56
  Speaker 1: delicate fingers, carefully feeling their way along the innumerable tangle
• 2:34:00
  Speaker 1: threads of nerve matter that lead to the innermost recesses
• 2:34:03
  Speaker 1: of self. A subconscious something strove to arouse him, and
• 2:34:07
  Speaker 1: he felt the fingers softly withdrawn. He could have sworn
• 2:34:11
  Speaker 1: that he heard the scurrying of feet in the room.
• 2:34:13
  Speaker 1: Bathed in perspiration, he made a leap for the electric light,
• 2:34:18
  Speaker 1: but there was no sign of any human presence. The
• 2:34:20
  Speaker 1: barricade at the door was undisturbed, but fear like a
• 2:34:24
  Speaker 1: great wind filled the wings of his soul. Yet there
• 2:34:27
  Speaker 1: was nothing, nothing to warrant his conviction that Reginald Clarke
• 2:34:31
  Speaker 1: had been with him only a few moments ago, plying
• 2:34:33
  Speaker 1: his horrible trade. The large mirror above the fireplace only
• 2:34:38
  Speaker 1: showed him his own face, white, excited, the face of
• 2:34:42
  Speaker 1: a madman. End of section fourteen Section fifteen of the
• 2:34:52
  Speaker 1: House of the Vampire. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 2:34:55
  Speaker 1: public domain recording by Elizabeth Klett. The House of the
• 2:35:00
  Speaker 1: Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck, Chapter twenty nine. The next
• 2:35:06
  Speaker 1: morning's mail brought a letter from Ethel a few lines
• 2:35:09
  Speaker 1: of encouragement and affection. Yes, she was right. It would
• 2:35:13
  Speaker 1: not do for him to stay under one roof with
• 2:35:15
  Speaker 1: Reginald any longer. He must only obtain the manuscript, and,
• 2:35:19
  Speaker 1: if possible, surprise him in the attempt to exercise his
• 2:35:22
  Speaker 1: mysterious and criminal power. Then he would be in the
• 2:35:24
  Speaker 1: position to dictate terms and to demand Jack's safety as
• 2:35:28
  Speaker 1: the price of his silence. Reginald, however, had closeted himself
• 2:35:32
  Speaker 1: that day in his studio, busily writing. Only the clatter
• 2:35:35
  Speaker 1: of his typewriter announced his presence in the house. There
• 2:35:38
  Speaker 1: was no chance for conversation or for obtaining the precious
• 2:35:42
  Speaker 1: manuscript of Laantina. Meanwhile, Ernest was looking over his papers
• 2:35:46
  Speaker 1: and preparing everything for a quick departure. Glancing over old
• 2:35:50
  Speaker 1: letters and notes, he became readily interested and hardly noticed
• 2:35:54
  Speaker 1: the passage of the hours. When the night came, he
• 2:35:56
  Speaker 1: only partly undressed and threw himself upon the bed. It
• 2:35:59
  Speaker 1: was now ten At twelve. He had promised Ethel to
• 2:36:02
  Speaker 1: speak to her over the telephone. He was determined not
• 2:36:05
  Speaker 1: to sleep at all that night. At last he would
• 2:36:08
  Speaker 1: discover whether or not the previous night and other nights.
• 2:36:11
  Speaker 1: Reginald had secretly entered his room. When one hour had
• 2:36:15
  Speaker 1: passed without incident, his attention relaxed a little. His eyes
• 2:36:18
  Speaker 1: were gradually closing, when suddenly something seemed to stir at
• 2:36:22
  Speaker 1: the door. The Chinese vase came rattling to the floor.
• 2:36:26
  Speaker 1: At once Ernest sprang up. His face had blanched with terror.
• 2:36:31
  Speaker 1: It was whiter than the linen in which they wrapped
• 2:36:33
  Speaker 1: the dead, but his soul was resolute. He touched a button,
• 2:36:37
  Speaker 1: and the electric light illuminated the whole chamber. There was
• 2:36:40
  Speaker 1: no nook for even a shadow to hide, yet there
• 2:36:43
  Speaker 1: was no one to be seen from Without the door
• 2:36:45
  Speaker 1: came no sound. Suddenly something soft touched his foot. He
• 2:36:50
  Speaker 1: gathered all his will powers as not to break out
• 2:36:52
  Speaker 1: into a frenzy shriek. Then he laughed, not a hearty laugh,
• 2:36:57
  Speaker 1: to be sure, a tiny nose and tail gracefully curled
• 2:37:01
  Speaker 1: or brushing against him. The source of the disturbance was
• 2:37:04
  Speaker 1: a little Maltese cat, his favorite, that by some chance,
• 2:37:08
  Speaker 1: had remained in his room after its essay at midnight gymnastics.
• 2:37:12
  Speaker 1: The animal quieted down and lay purring at the foot
• 2:37:15
  Speaker 1: of his bed. The presence of a living thing was
• 2:37:18
  Speaker 1: a certain comfort, and the reservoir of his strength was
• 2:37:21
  Speaker 1: well nigh exhausted. He dimly remembered his promise to ethel,
• 2:37:25
  Speaker 1: but his lids drooped with sheer weariness. Perhaps an hour
• 2:37:29
  Speaker 1: passed in this way, when suddenly his blood congealed with dread.
• 2:37:34
  Speaker 1: He felt the presence of the hand of Reginald Clark,
• 2:37:37
  Speaker 1: unmistakably groping in his brain, as if searching for something
• 2:37:41
  Speaker 1: that had still escaped him. He tried to move to
• 2:37:45
  Speaker 1: cry out, but his limbs were paralyzed. When by a
• 2:37:48
  Speaker 1: superhuman effort, he at last succeeded in shaking off the
• 2:37:51
  Speaker 1: numbness that held him unchained, He awoke just in time
• 2:37:54
  Speaker 1: to see a figure that of a man disappearing in
• 2:37:57
  Speaker 1: the wall that separated Reginald's apartments from his room. This
• 2:38:01
  Speaker 1: time it was no delusion of the senses. He heard
• 2:38:04
  Speaker 1: something like a secret door softly closing behind retreating steps.
• 2:38:09
  Speaker 1: A sudden, fierce anger seized him. He was oblivious of
• 2:38:12
  Speaker 1: the danger, of the terrible power of the older man,
• 2:38:15
  Speaker 1: oblivious of the love he had once borne him, oblivious
• 2:38:18
  Speaker 1: of everything save the sense of outraged humanity and outraged right.
• 2:38:23
  Speaker 1: The law permits us to shoot a burglar who goes
• 2:38:25
  Speaker 1: through our pockets at night? Must he tolerate the ravages
• 2:38:28
  Speaker 1: of this A thousand times more dastardly and dangerous spiritual thief?
• 2:38:34
  Speaker 1: Was Reginald to enjoy the fruit of other men's labor unpunished?
• 2:38:37
  Speaker 1: Was he to continue growing into the mightiest literary factor
• 2:38:40
  Speaker 1: of the century by preying upon his betters, Abel Walcum,
• 2:38:44
  Speaker 1: Ethel he Jack. Were they all to be victims of
• 2:38:47
  Speaker 1: this insatiable monster? Was this force resistless as it was relentless? No,
• 2:38:54
  Speaker 1: A thousand times No. He dashed himself against the wall
• 2:38:58
  Speaker 1: at the place where the shadow of Reginald Clarke had disappeared.
• 2:39:02
  Speaker 1: In doing so, he touched upon a secret spring. The
• 2:39:04
  Speaker 1: wall gave way noiselessly. Speechless with rage, he crossed the
• 2:39:08
  Speaker 1: next room in the one adjoining it, and stood in
• 2:39:11
  Speaker 1: Reginald's studio. The room was brilliantly lighted, and Reginald, still dressed,
• 2:39:16
  Speaker 1: was seated at his writing table, scribbling notes upon little
• 2:39:18
  Speaker 1: scraps of paper in his accustomed manner. At Ernest's approach,
• 2:39:22
  Speaker 1: he looked up, without evincing the least sign of terror
• 2:39:25
  Speaker 1: or surprise. Calmly, almost majestically, he folded his arms over
• 2:39:29
  Speaker 1: his breast, but there was a menacing glitter in his
• 2:39:32
  Speaker 1: eyes as he confronted his victim, Chapter thirty. Silently, the
• 2:39:38
  Speaker 1: two men faced each other. Then Ernest hissed thief. Reginald
• 2:39:44
  Speaker 1: shrugged his shoulders. Vampire, So Ethel has infected you with
• 2:39:50
  Speaker 1: her absurd fancies. Poor boy, I am afraid I have
• 2:39:55
  Speaker 1: been wanting to tell you for some time, but I
• 2:39:57
  Speaker 1: think we have reached the parting of our room, and
• 2:40:01
  Speaker 1: that you dare to tell me. The more he raged,
• 2:40:05
  Speaker 1: the calmer Reginald seemed to become. Really, he said, I
• 2:40:10
  Speaker 1: fail to understand. I must ask you to leave my room.
• 2:40:15
  Speaker 1: You fail to understand, you cad Ernest cried. He stepped
• 2:40:20
  Speaker 1: to the writing table and opened the secret drawer with
• 2:40:22
  Speaker 1: a blow. A bundle of manuscripts fell on the floor
• 2:40:25
  Speaker 1: with a strange rustling noise. Then, seizing his own story,
• 2:40:29
  Speaker 1: he hurled it upon the table and behold the last
• 2:40:33
  Speaker 1: pages bore corrections in ink that could have been made
• 2:40:35
  Speaker 1: only a few minutes ago. Reginald smiled, Have you come
• 2:40:40
  Speaker 1: to play havoc with my manuscripts? He remarked, your manuscripts,
• 2:40:46
  Speaker 1: Reginald clarke, You are an impudent impostor. You have written
• 2:40:49
  Speaker 1: no word that is your own. You are an embezzler
• 2:40:52
  Speaker 1: of the mind, strutting through life and borrowed and stolen plumes.
• 2:40:56
  Speaker 1: And at once the mask fell from Reginald's face. Why stolen?
• 2:41:02
  Speaker 1: He coolly said, with a slight touch, of irritation. I absorb,
• 2:41:07
  Speaker 1: I appropriate. That is the most any artist can say
• 2:41:10
  Speaker 1: for himself. God creates man molds, He gives us the colors.
• 2:41:15
  Speaker 1: We mix them. That is not the question. I charge
• 2:41:20
  Speaker 1: you with having wilfully and criminally interfered in my life.
• 2:41:23
  Speaker 1: I charge you with having robbed me of what was mine.
• 2:41:26
  Speaker 1: I charge you with being utterly vile and rapacious, a
• 2:41:28
  Speaker 1: hypocrite and a parasite, foolish boy Reginald rejoined austerely. It
• 2:41:35
  Speaker 1: is through me that the bestin you shall survive, even
• 2:41:38
  Speaker 1: as the obscure Lsabethans live in him. Of Avon. Shakespeare
• 2:41:42
  Speaker 1: absorbed it was great in little men, a greatness that
• 2:41:45
  Speaker 1: otherwise would have perished, and gave it a setting a life.
• 2:41:49
  Speaker 1: A thief may plead the same. I understand you better.
• 2:41:54
  Speaker 1: It is your inordinate vanity that prompts you to abuse
• 2:41:56
  Speaker 1: your monstrous power. You err self. Love has never entered
• 2:42:01
  Speaker 1: into my actions. I am careless of personal fame. Look
• 2:42:05
  Speaker 1: at me, boy, as I stand before you. I am Homer,
• 2:42:09
  Speaker 1: I am Shakespeare. I am every cosmic manifestation in art.
• 2:42:13
  Speaker 1: Men have doubted in each incarnation my individual existence. Historians
• 2:42:18
  Speaker 1: have more to tell of the meanest Athenian scribble or
• 2:42:20
  Speaker 1: Elizabethan poetaster than of me. The radiance of my work
• 2:42:24
  Speaker 1: obscured my very self. I care not. I have a mission.
• 2:42:29
  Speaker 1: I am the servant of the Lord. I am the
• 2:42:31
  Speaker 1: vessel that bears the host. He stood up at full length,
• 2:42:36
  Speaker 1: the personification of grandeur and power. A tremendous force trembled
• 2:42:40
  Speaker 1: in his very finger tips. He was like a gigantic dynamo,
• 2:42:44
  Speaker 1: charged with the might of ten thousand magnetic storms that
• 2:42:47
  Speaker 1: shake the Earth in its orbit, and lash myriads of
• 2:42:50
  Speaker 1: planets through infinities of space. Under ordinary circumstances, Earnest or
• 2:42:55
  Speaker 1: any other man would have quailed before him, But the boy,
• 2:42:58
  Speaker 1: in that epic moment had grown out of his stature.
• 2:43:01
  Speaker 1: He felt the sword of vengeance in his hands. To
• 2:43:04
  Speaker 1: him was entrusted the cause of Abel, and of Walcom,
• 2:43:07
  Speaker 1: of Ethel and of Jack. His was the struggle of
• 2:43:09
  Speaker 1: the individual's soul against the same blind and cruel fate
• 2:43:13
  Speaker 1: that in the past had fashioned the ichthiosaurus and the mastodon.
• 2:43:17
  Speaker 1: By what right, he cried, do you assume that you
• 2:43:21
  Speaker 1: are the literary messiah who appointed you? What divine powers
• 2:43:25
  Speaker 1: made you the steward of my might and of theirs
• 2:43:27
  Speaker 1: whom you have robbed. I am a light bearer. I
• 2:43:31
  Speaker 1: tread the high hills of mankind. I point the way
• 2:43:34
  Speaker 1: to the future. I light up. The abysses of the
• 2:43:37
  Speaker 1: past were not my stature gigantic? How could I hold
• 2:43:41
  Speaker 1: the torch in all men's sight. The very souls that
• 2:43:44
  Speaker 1: I tread underfoot realize as their dying gaze follows me
• 2:43:48
  Speaker 1: the possibilities with which the future is big, eternally secure.
• 2:43:52
  Speaker 1: I carried the essence of what is cosmic, of what
• 2:43:55
  Speaker 1: is divine. I am Homer Gerta Shakespeare. I am an
• 2:44:00
  Speaker 1: embodiment of the same force of which Alexander, Caesar, Confucius,
• 2:44:04
  Speaker 1: and the Cristos were also embodiments, none so strong as
• 2:44:09
  Speaker 1: to resist me. A sudden madness overcame earnest at this boast.
• 2:44:14
  Speaker 1: He must strike now or never. He must rid humanity
• 2:44:18
  Speaker 1: of this dangerous maniac, this demon of strength with the
• 2:44:21
  Speaker 1: power ten times intensified. He raised a heavy chair so
• 2:44:24
  Speaker 1: as to hurl it at Reginald's head and crush it.
• 2:44:28
  Speaker 1: Reginald stood there, calmly, a smile upon his lips. Primal
• 2:44:32
  Speaker 1: cruelties rose from the depth of his nature. Still he smiled,
• 2:44:37
  Speaker 1: turning his luminous gaze upon the boy, and behold. Ernest's
• 2:44:41
  Speaker 1: hand began to shake. The chair fell from his grasp.
• 2:44:44
  Speaker 1: He tried to call for help, but no sound issued
• 2:44:47
  Speaker 1: from his lips. Utterly paralyzed, he confronted the force. Minutes
• 2:44:53
  Speaker 1: eternities passed, and still those eyes were fixed upon him.
• 2:44:58
  Speaker 1: But this was no longer reginald. It was all brain,
• 2:45:03
  Speaker 1: only brain, a tremendous brain machine, infinitely complex, infinitely strong,
• 2:45:10
  Speaker 1: not more than a mile away. Ethel endeavor to call
• 2:45:12
  Speaker 1: to him through the night. The telephone rang once, twice, thrice, insistingly,
• 2:45:18
  Speaker 1: but Ernest heard it not. Something dragged him, dragged, the
• 2:45:22
  Speaker 1: nerves from his body, dragged, dragged, dragged. It was an
• 2:45:26
  Speaker 1: irresistible suction, pitiless, passionless. Immense sparks, blue, crimson, and violet
• 2:45:33
  Speaker 1: seemed to play around. The living battery had reached the
• 2:45:35
  Speaker 1: finest fibers of his mind. Slowly, every trace of mentality disappeared,
• 2:45:41
  Speaker 1: first the will, then feeling, judgment, memory, fear. Even all
• 2:45:47
  Speaker 1: that was stored in his brain cells came forth to
• 2:45:49
  Speaker 1: be absorbed by that mighty engine. The princess with the
• 2:45:53
  Speaker 1: yellow veil appeared, flitted across the room, and melted away.
• 2:45:57
  Speaker 1: She was followed by childhood memories, girls, beds, boys faces.
• 2:46:01
  Speaker 1: He saw his dead mother waving her arms to him
• 2:46:04
  Speaker 1: and expression of death agony distorted the placid features, then
• 2:46:08
  Speaker 1: throwing a kiss to him, she too disappeared. Picture on
• 2:46:11
  Speaker 1: picture followed words of love that he had spoken, sins, virtues, magnanimities, meannesses, terrors,
• 2:46:19
  Speaker 1: mathematical formulas, even and snatches of songs. Leontina came and
• 2:46:23
  Speaker 1: was swallowed up. No, it was Ethel who was trying
• 2:46:26
  Speaker 1: to speak to him, trying to warn. She waved her
• 2:46:29
  Speaker 1: hands in frantic despair. She was gone. A pale face, dark,
• 2:46:34
  Speaker 1: disheveled hair. Jack how he had changed. He was in
• 2:46:38
  Speaker 1: the circle of the vampire's transforming might Jack, He cried,
• 2:46:43
  Speaker 1: Surely Jack had something to explain, something to tell him,
• 2:46:46
  Speaker 1: some word that, if spoken, would bring rest to his soul.
• 2:46:49
  Speaker 1: He saw the words rise to the boy's lips, but
• 2:46:51
  Speaker 1: before he had time to utter them, his image also
• 2:46:54
  Speaker 1: had vanished, and Reginald. Reginald too was gone. There was
• 2:46:58
  Speaker 1: only the mighty brain, panting, whirling. Then there was nothing.
• 2:47:04
  Speaker 1: The annihilation of Earnest Fielding was complete. Vacantly, he stared
• 2:47:08
  Speaker 1: at the walls, at the room, and at his master.
• 2:47:11
  Speaker 1: The latter was wiping the sweat from his forehead. He
• 2:47:14
  Speaker 1: breathed deeply, The flush of youth spread over his features.
• 2:47:18
  Speaker 1: His eyes sparkled with a new and dangerous brilliancy. He
• 2:47:22
  Speaker 1: took the thing that had once been Earnest Fielding by
• 2:47:24
  Speaker 1: the hand and led it to its room Chapter thirty one.
• 2:47:31
  Speaker 1: With the first flush of the morning, Ethel appeared at
• 2:47:34
  Speaker 1: the door of the house on Riverside Drive. She had
• 2:47:36
  Speaker 1: not heard from Earnest and had been unable to obtain
• 2:47:39
  Speaker 1: connection with him at the telephone. Anxiety had hastened her steps.
• 2:47:43
  Speaker 1: She brushed against Jack, who was also directing his steps
• 2:47:47
  Speaker 1: to the abode of Reginald Clark. At the same time,
• 2:47:50
  Speaker 1: something that resembled Earnest Fielding passed from the house of
• 2:47:54
  Speaker 1: the Vampire. It was a dull and brutish thing, hideously
• 2:47:58
  Speaker 1: transformed without a stage of mind. Mister Fielding, cried. Ethel,
• 2:48:04
  Speaker 1: beside herself with fear as she saw him descending Earnest.
• 2:48:09
  Speaker 1: Jack gasped no less startled at the change in his
• 2:48:12
  Speaker 1: friend's appearance. Ernest's head followed the source of the sound,
• 2:48:16
  Speaker 1: but no spark of recognition illumined the deadness of his eyes.
• 2:48:20
  Speaker 1: Without a present and without a past. Blindly a gibbering idiot,
• 2:48:25
  Speaker 1: he stumbled down the stairs end of section fifteen, end
• 2:48:32
  Speaker 1: of the House of the Vampire by George Sylvester Viereck