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16 - The Island of Dr Moreau - H G Wells · Science Fiction Books - Daily

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Sixteen, how the beast folk taste blood. My experience as a writer betrays
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me, and I wander from the thread of my story. After I had
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breakfasted with Montgomery, he took me across the island to see the fumarole in
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the source of the hot spring into whose scalding waters I had blundered on the
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previous day. Both of us carried whips in loaded revolvers. While going through
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a leafy jungle on our road thither, we heard a rabbit squealing. We
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stopped and listened, but we heard no more, and presently we went on
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our way, and the incident dropped out of our minds. Montgomery called my
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attention to certain little pink animals with long hind legs that went leaping through the
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undergrowth. He told me they were creatures made of the offspring of the beast
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people that Moreau had invented. He had fancied they might serve for meat,
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but a rabbit like habit of devouring their young had defeated this intention. I
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had already encountered some of these creatures, once string my moonlight flight from the
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Leopard Man, and once during my pursuit by Moreau on the previous day.
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By chance, one hopping to avoid us, leapt into the hole caused by
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the uprooting of a wind blown tree. Before it could extricate itself, we
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managed to catch it. It spat like a cat, scratched and kicked vigorously
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with its hind legs, and made an attempt to bite, but its teeth
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were too feeble to inflict more than a painless pinch. Seemed to me rather
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a pretty little creature, And as Montgomery stated that it never destroyed the turf
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by burrowing, and was very cleanly in its habits, I should imagine it
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might prove a convenient substitute for the common rabbit in gentlemen's parks. We also
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saw on our way the trunk of a tree barked in long strips and splintered
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deeply. Montgomery called my attention to this, not to claw the bark of
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truth. That is the law, he said, much thumb of them care
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for it. It was after this, I think that we met the satyr
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and the ape man. The satyr was a gleam of classical memory on the
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part of Moreau. His face so vine an expression like the coarser Hebrew type,
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his voice a harsh bleat his nether extremity satanic. He was gnawing the
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husk of a part like fruit. As he passed us. Both of them
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saluted Montgomery. Hail, said they to the other with the whip. They're
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the third with a whip, now, said Montgomery. Though you'd better mind
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worth He not made, said the ape man. He said, he said
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he was made. The satire man looked curiously at me. The third with
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the whip, he that walks weeping into the sea, has a thin white
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face. He hath a thin long whip, said Montgomery. Yet did they
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he bled and wept, said the satier. You never bleed nor weep.
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The master does not bleed or weep. All n dorf hin beggar, said
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Montgomery. You'll bleed and weep if you don't look out. He has five
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fingers. He is a five man, like me, said the ape man.
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Come along, Prindick, said Montgomery, taking my arm, and I
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went on with him. The satier and the ape man stood watching us and
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making other remarks to each other. He says nothing, said the satier.
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Men have voices yeth to day. He asked me of things to eat,
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said the ape man. He did not know. Then they spoke inaudible things,
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and I heard the satier laughing. It was on our way back that
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we came upon the dead rabbit. The red body of the wretched little beast
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was rent to pieces, many of the ribs stripped white, and the backbone
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indisputably gnawed. At that, Montgomery stopped. Good God, said he stooping
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down and picking up some of the crushed vertebrae to examine them more closely.
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Good God, he repeated, What can this mean? Some carnivore of yours
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has remembered its old habits, I said, after a pause. This backbone
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has been bitten through. He stood staring, with his face white and his
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lip pulled askew. I don't like this, he said slowly. I saw
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something of the same kind, said I. The first day I came here,
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the devil you did. What was it? A rabbit with its head
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twisted off the day you came here, The day I came here, in
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the undergrowth at the back of the enclosure. When I went out in the
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evening, the head was completely wrung off. He gave a long, low
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whistle. And what is more, I have an idea of which your brutes
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did the thing. It's only a suspicion, you know. Before I came
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on the rabbit, I saw one of your monsters drinking in the stream,
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fucking his drink. Yes, not to Thirk, you'll drink. That is
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the law. Much the brutes care for the law, eh, would moreaud
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not about it was the brute who chased me, of course, said Montgomery.
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It's just the way with the carlive Worth. After a keel, they'd
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drink. It's the teeth of blood, you know. What was the brute
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like? He continued, Would you know him again? He glanced about us,
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standing astride over the mass of dead rabbit, his eyes roving among the
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shadows and screens of greenery, the lurking places and ambuse gards of the forest
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that bounded us in The teethte of blood, he said again. He took
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out his revolver, examined the cartridges in it, and replaced it. Then
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he began to pull at his dropping lip. I think I should know the
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brute again, I said. I stunned him. He ought to have a
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handsome bruise on the forehead of him. But then we have to prove that
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he killed the rabbit, said Montgomery, I with, I'd never brought the
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thing here. I should have gone on, But he stayed there, thinking
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over the mangled rabbit in a puzzle headed way. As it was, I
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went to such a distance that the rabbit's remains were hidden. Come on,
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I said. Presently, he woke and came towards me. You see,
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he said, almost in a whisper. They are all for both to have
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a fixed idea against eating anything that runs on land. If thumb brute hath
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by any accident, taithe did blood. We went on some way in silence.
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I wonder what can have happened, he said to himself. Then,
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after a pause, again, I did a foolish thing the other day.
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The servant of mine. I throwed him how to skin and cook a rabbit.
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He thought, I saw him licking his hands. It never occurred to
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me. Then we must put a stop to this. I must tell Moreau.
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He could think of nothing else on our homeward journey. Moreau took the
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matter even more seriously than Montgomery, and I need scarcely say that I was
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affected by the evident consternation. We must make an example, said Moreau.
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I've no doubt in my mind that the leopard man was the sinner, But
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how can we prove it? I wish, Montgomery, you had kept your
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taste for meat in hand and gone without these exciting novelties. We may find
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ourselves in a mess. Yet through it, I was a thiliath, said
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Montgomery. But the thing's done now, and you said I might have them.
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You know we must see to the thing at once, said Moreau.
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I suppose if anything should turn up, Imling can take care of himself.
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I'm not though sure of Imling, said Montgomery. I think I ought to
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know him. In the afternoon, Moreau, Montgomery, myself, and Imling
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went across the island to the huts in the ravine. We three were armed.
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Imling carried the little hatchet he used in chopping firewood and some coils of
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wire. Moreau had a huge coward's horn slung over his shoulder. You will
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see a gathering of the beast people, said Montgomery. It is a pretty
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fight. Moreau said, not a word on the way, but the expression
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of his heavy, white fringed face was grimly set. We crossed the ravine
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down which smoked the dream of hot water, and followed the winding pathway through
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the cane breaks until we reached a wide area covered over with a thick,
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powdery yellow substance, which I believe was sulfur, above the shoulder of a
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weedy bank, the sea glittered. We came to a kind of shallow natural
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amphitheater, and here the four of us halted. Then Moreau sounded the horn
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and broke the sleeping stillness of the tropical afternoon. He must have had strong
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lungs. The hooting note rose and rose amidst its echoes to at last an
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ear penetrating intensity, Ah, said Moreau, letting the curved instrument fall to
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his side again. Immediately there was a crashing through the yellow canes, and
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a sound of voices from the dinse green jungle that marked the morass through which
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I had run on the previous day. Then at three or four points on
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the edge of the sulfurous area appeared the grotesque forms of the beast people hurrying
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towards us. I could not help a creeping horror, as I perceived first
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one and then another trot out from the trees or reeds and come shambling along
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over the hot dust. But Moreau and Montgomery stood calmly enough and perforce I
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stuck beside them. First to arrive was the satyr, strangely unreal for all
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that he cast a shadow and tossed the dust with his hoofs After him from
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the break became a monstrous lout, a thing of horse and rhinoceros, chewing
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a straw as it came. Then appeared the swine woman, and two wolf
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women. Then the fox bare witch with her red eyes and her peaked red
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face, and then others, all hurrying eagerly. As they came forward,
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they began to cringe towards moreau enchant, quite regardless of one another, fragments
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of the latter half of the litany of the law. His is the hand
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that wounds, his is the hand that heals, and so forth. As
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soon as they had approached within a distance of perhaps thirty yards, they halted,
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and, bowing on knees and elbows, began flinging the white dust upon
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their heads. Imagine the scene, if you can. We three blue clad
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men, with our misshapen, black faced attendant, standing in a wide expanse
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of sunlit yellow dust under the blazing blue sky, and surrounded by this circle
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of crouching and gesticulating monstrosities, some almost human, save in their subtle expression
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and gestures, some like cripples, some so strangely distorted as to resemble nothing
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but the dinnizens of our wildest dreams. And beyond the ready lines of a
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cane break in one direction, a dense tangle of palm trees on the other,
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separating us from the ravine with the huts, and to the north the
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hazy horizon of the Pacific Ocean. Sixty two sixty three, counted Moreau.
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There are four more. I do not see, the leopard Man, said
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I. Presently Moreau sounded the great horn again, and at the sound of
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it, all the beast people writhed and graveled in the dust. Then,
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slinking out of the cane brake, stooping near the ground and trying to join
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the dust throwing circle. Behind Moreau's back, came the leopard Man. The
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last of the beast people to arrive was the little ape Man. The earlier
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animals, hot and weary with their groveling, shot vicious glances at him.
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Cease, said Moreau in his firm, loud voice, and the beast people
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sat back upon their hands and wrested from their worshiping where is the sayer of
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the law, said Moreau, And the hairy gray monster bowed his face in
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the dust. Say the words, said Moreau, forthwith all in the kneeling
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assembly, swaying from side to side, and dashing up the sulfur with their
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hands, first the right hand, and a puff of dust. And that
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the left began once more to chant their strange litany. When they reached not
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to eat flesh or fish, that is the law. Moreau held up his
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lank white hand. Stop, he cried, and there fell absolute silence upon
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them all. I think they all knew and dreaded what was coming. I
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looked round at their strange faces. When I saw their wincing attitudes and the
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firs of dread in their bright eyes, I wondered that I had ever believed
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them to be men. That law has been broken, said Moreau. None
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escape from the faceless creature with the silvery hair. None escape, repeated the
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kneeling circle of beast people. Who is he cried Moreau, and looked round
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at their faces, cracking his whip. I fancy the hyena swine looked dejected,
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so too did the leopard man. Moreau stopped facing this creature who cringed
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towards him with the memory and dread of infinite torment. Who is he,
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repeated Moreau in a voice of thunder. Evil is he who breaks the law?
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Chanted the sayer of the law? Moreau looked into the eyes of the
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leopard man and seemed to be dragging the very soul out of the creature.
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Who breaks the law? Said Moreau, taking his eyes off his victim and
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turning towards us. Seemed to me there was a touch of exultation in his
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voice. Goes back to the house of pain, they all clamored. Goes
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back to the house of pain, ol master work, to the house of
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pain work, to the house of pain, gabbled the ape man, as
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though the idea was sweet to him. Do you hear, said Moreau,
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turning back to the criminal, My friend, hullo for the leopard man,
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released from Moreau's eye, had risen straight from his knees, and now,
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with his eyes aflame and his huge feline tusks flashing out from under his curling
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lips, leaped towards his tormentor. I am convinced that only the madness of
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unendurable fear could have prompted this attack, the whole circle of three score monsters
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seemed to rise about us. I drew my revolver, the two figures collided.
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My saw Morle reeling back from the leper man's blow. There was a
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furious yelling and howling all about us. Every one was moving rapidly. For
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a moment I thought it was a general revolt. The furious face of the
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leopard man flashed by mine, with imling close in pursuit. I saw the
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yellow eyes of the hyena swine blazing with excitement his attitude, as if he
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were half resolved to attack me. The sat here, too, glared at
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me over the hyena Swine's hunched shoulders. I heard the crack of moreause pistol
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and saw the pink flash dart across the tumult The whole crowd seemed to swing
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round in the direction of the glint of fire, and I too was swung
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round by the magnetism of the movement. In another second, eye was running
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one of a tumultuous, shouting crowd in pursuit of the escaping leopard man.
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That is all I can tell. Definitely. I saw the leopard man strike
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Moreau, and then everything spun about me until I was running headlong. Immling
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was ahead, close in pursuit of the fugitive. Behind their tongues already lolling
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out ran the wolf women in great leaping strides. The swine folk followed,
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squealing with excitement, and the two bull men in their swathings of white.
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Then came a row and a cluster of the beast people. His wide brimmed
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straw had blown off, his revolver in hand, and his lank white hair
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streaming out. The hyena swine ran beside me, keeping pace with me and
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glancing furtively at me out of his feline eyes, and the others came pattering
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and shouting behind us. The leopard man went bursting his way through the long
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canes, which sprang back as he passed and rattled in Imling's face. We
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others in the rear found a trampled path for us when we reached the break.
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The chaise lay through the break for perhaps a quarter of a mile,
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and then plunged into a dense thicket which retarded our movements exceedingly, though we
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went through it in a crowd together, Franz flicking into our faces. Ropey
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creepers, catching us under the chin, or gripping our ankles, thorny plants,
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hooking into and tearing cloth and fleshed together. He has gone on all
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fours through this panted morreau, now just ahead of me. None escape,
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said the wolf bear, laughing into my face. With the exultation of hunting.
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We burst out again among rocks, and saw saw the quary ahead,
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running lightly on all fours and snarling at us over his shoulder. At that,
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the wolf folk howled with delight. The thing was still clothed, and
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at a distance its face still seemed human, but the carriage of its four
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limbs was feline, and the furtive droop of its shoulder was distinctly that of
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a hunted animal. It leaped over some thorny yellow flowering bushes and was hidden
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imling was half way across the space. Most of us now had lost the
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first speed of the chase, and had fallen into a longer and steadier stride.
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I saw as we traversed the open that the pursuit was now spreading from
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a column into a line. The hyena swine still rang close to me,
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watching me as it ran every now and then, puckering its muzzle with a
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snarling laugh. At the edge of the rocks, the leopard man, realizing
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that he was making for the projector cape upon which he had stalked me on
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the night of my arrival, had doubled in the undergrowth, but Montgomery had
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seen the maneuver and turned him again. So, panting, tumbling against rocks,
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torn by brambles, impeded by ferns and reeds, I helped to pursue
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the leopard man who had broken the law, and the hyena swine ran,
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laughing savagely by my side. I staggered on, my head, reeling and
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my heart beating against my ribs, tired almost to death, and yet not
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daring to lose sight of the chase lest I should be left alone with this
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horrible companion. I staggered on in spite of infinite fatigue and the dense heat
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of the tropical afternoon. At last, the fury of the hunt slackened.
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We had pinned the wretched brute into a corner of the island. Moreau whip
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hand marshaled us all into an irregular line, and we advanced, now slowly,
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shouting to one another as we advanced, and tightening the cordon about our
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victim. He lurked, noiseless and invisible, in the bushes through which I
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had run from him during that midnight pursuit. Steady, cried Moreau. Steady,
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as the ends of the line crept round the tangle of undergrowth and hemmed
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the brute in where the rush came the voice of Montgomery from beyond the thicket.
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I was on the slope above the bushes. Montgomery and Moreau beat along
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the beach beneath. Slowly we pushed in among the fretted network of branches and
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leaves. The quarry was silent. Back to the house of Pain, the
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house of pain, the house of Pain. Yelped the voice of the ape
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man, some twenty yards to the right. When I heard that, I
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forgave the poor wretch all the fear he had inspired in me. I heard
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the twigs snap and the boughs swish aside before the heavy tread of the horse
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Rhinoceros upon my right. Then, suddenly, through a polygon of green,
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in the half darkness, under the luxuriant growth, I saw the creature we
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were hunting. I halted. He was crouched together into the smallest possible compass.
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His luminous green eyes turned over his shoulder. Regarding me. It may
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seem a strange contradiction in me I cannot explain the fact. But now seeing
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the creature there in a perfectly animal attitude, with the light gleaming in its
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eyes and its imperfectly human face distorted with terror, I realized again the fact
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of its humanity. In another moment, other of its pursuers would see,
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and it would be overpowered and captured to experience once more the horrible tortures of
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the enclosure. Abruptly, I slipped out my revolver, aimed between its terror
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struck eyes, and fired. As I did so, the hyena swine saw
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the thing and flung itself upon it with an eager cry, thrusting thirsty teeth
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into its neck. All about me, the green masses of the thicket were
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swaying and cracking as the beast. People came rushing together. One face and
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then another appeared. Don't kill it, Prindick cried moreau don't kill it,
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And I saw him stooping as he pushed through under the fronds of the big
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ferns. In another moment, he had beaten off the hyena swine with the
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handle of his whip, and he and Montgomery were keeping away the excite did
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carnivorous beast people, and particularly imling from the still quivering body. The hairy
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gray thing came sniffing at the corpse under my arm. The other animals,
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in their animal ardor jostled me to get a nearer view. Confound you,
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prindick, said Moreau. I wanted him. I'm sorry, said I,
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though I was not. It was the impulse of the moment. I felt
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sick with exertion and excitement. Turning. I pushed my way out of the
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crowding beast people and went on alone up the slope towards the highest part of
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the headland. Under the shouted directions of Moreau. I heard the three white
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swathed bull men begin dragging the victim down towards the water. It was easy
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now for me to be alone. The beast people manifested a quite human curiosity
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about the dead body and followed it in a thick knot, sniffing and growling
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at it as the bull men dragged it down the beach. I went to
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the headland and watched the bull men black against the evening sky as they carried
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the weighted dead body out to sea, and like a wave across my mind
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came the realization of the unspeakable aimlessness of things upon the island. Upon the
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beach, among the rocks beneath me were the ape man, the hyena swine,
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and several other of the beast people standing about Montgomery and Moreau. They
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were all still intensely excited, and all overflowing with noisy expressions of their loyalty
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to the law. Yet I felt an absolute assurance in my own mind that
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the hyena swine was implicated in the rabbit killing. A strange persuasion came upon
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me that, save for the grossness of the line, the grotesqueness of the
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forms, I had here before me, the whole balance of human life in
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miniature, the whole interplay of instinct, reason and fate in its simplest form,
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the leopard man had happened to go under. That was all the difference,
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poor brute, poor brutes. I began to see the viler aspect of
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Moreau's cruelty. I had not thought before of the pain and trouble that came
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to these poor victims after they had passed from Moreau's hands. I had shivered
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only at the days of actual torment in the enclosure, but now that seemed
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to me the lesser part. Before there had been beasts, their instincts fitly
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adapted to their surroundings, and happy as living things may be. Now they
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stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in a fear that never died,
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fretted by a law they could not understand. Their mock human existence begun in
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an agony, was one long internal struggle, one long dread of Moreau,
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and for what it was the wantonness of it that stirred me. Had Moreau
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had any intelligible object, I could have sympathized at least a little with him.
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I am not so squeamish about pain as that I could have forgiven him
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a little, even had his motive been only hate. But he was so
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irresponsible, so utterly careless, His curiosity, his mad aimless investigations drove him
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on, and the things were thrown out to live a year or so,
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to struggle and blunder and suffer, and at last to die painfully. They
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were wretched in themselves. The old animal hate moved them to trouble one another.
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The law held them back from a brief heart struggle and a decisive end
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to their natural animosities. In those days, my fear of the beast people
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went the way of my personal fear of Moreau. I fell, indeed into
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a morbid state, deep and enduring and alien to fear, which has left
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permanent scars upon my mind. I must confess that I lost faith in the
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sanity of the world when I saw it suffering the painful disorder of this island.
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A blind fate, a vast, pitiless mechanism seemed to cut in shape
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the fabric of existence. And I Moreau, by his passion for research,
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Montgomery, by his passion for drink. The beast people, with their instincts
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and mental restrictions, were torn and crushed, ruthless, inevitably amid the infinite
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complexity of its incessant wheels. But this condition did not come all at once.
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I think, indeed, that I anticipate a little in speaking of it now,