The Beetle, Richard Marsh [general ebook reader .txt] 📗

as if you were a clerk.” There was a flame of scorn in his voice which scorched me even then. “What sort of a clerk are you?”

“I am out of a situation.”

“You look as if you were out of a situation.” Again the scorn. “Are you the sort of clerk who is always out of a situation? You are a thief.”

“I am not a thief.”

“Do clerks come through the window?” I was still⁠—he putting no constraint on me to speak. “Why did you come through the window?”

“Because it was open.”

“So!⁠—Do you always come through a window which is open?”

“No.”

“Then why through this?”

“Because I was wet⁠—and cold⁠—and hungry⁠—and tired.”

The words came from me as if he had dragged them one by one⁠—which, in fact, he did.

“Have you no home?”

“No.”

“Money?”

“No.”

“Friends?”

“No.”

“Then what sort of a clerk are you?”

I did not answer him⁠—I did not know what it was he wished me to say. I was the victim of bad luck, nothing else⁠—I swear it. Misfortune had followed hard upon misfortune. The firm by whom I had been employed for years suspended payment. I obtained a situation with one of their creditors, at a lower salary. They reduced their staff, which entailed my going. After an interval I obtained a temporary engagement; the occasion which required my services passed, and I with it. After another, and a longer interval, I again found temporary employment, the pay for which was but a pittance. When that was over I could find nothing. That was nine months ago, and since then I had not earned a penny. It is so easy to grow shabby, when you are on the everlasting tramp, and are living on your stock of clothes. I had trudged all over London in search of work⁠—work of any kind would have been welcome, so long as it would have enabled me to keep body and soul together. And I had trudged in vain. Now I had been refused admittance as a casual⁠—how easy is the descent! But I did not tell the man lying on the bed all this. He did not wish to hear⁠—had he wished he would have made me tell him.

It may be that he read my story, unspoken though it was⁠—it is conceivable. His eyes had powers of penetration which were peculiarly their own⁠—that I know.

“Undress!”

When he spoke again that was what he said, in those guttural tones of his in which there was a reminiscence of some foreign land. I obeyed, letting my sodden, shabby clothes fall anyhow upon the floor. A look came on his face, as I stood naked in front of him, which, if it was meant for a smile, was a satyr’s smile, and which filled me with a sensation of shuddering repulsion.

“What a white skin you have⁠—how white! What would I not give for a skin as white as that⁠—ah yes!” He paused, devouring me with his glances; then continued. “Go to the cupboard; you will find a cloak; put it on.”

I went to a cupboard which was in a corner of the room, his eyes following me as I moved. It was full of clothing⁠—garments which might have formed the stock-in-trade of a costumier whose speciality was providing costumes for masquerades. A long dark cloak hung on a peg. My hand moved towards it, apparently of its own volition. I put it on, its ample folds falling to my feet.

“In the other cupboard you will find meat, and bread, and wine. Eat and drink.”

On the opposite side of the room, near the head of his bed, there was a second cupboard. In this, upon a shelf, I found what looked like pressed beef, several round cakes of what tasted like rye bread, and some thin, sour wine, in a straw-covered flask. But I was in no mood to criticise; I crammed myself, I believe, like some famished wolf, he watching me, in silence, all the time. When I had done, which was when I had eaten and drunk as much as I could hold, there returned to his face that satyr’s grin.

“I would that I could eat and drink like that⁠—ah yes!⁠—Put back what is left.” I put it back⁠—which seemed an unnecessary exertion, there was so little to put. “Look me in the face.”

I looked him in the face⁠—and immediately became conscious, as I did so, that something was going from me⁠—the capacity, as it were, to be myself. His eyes grew larger and larger, till they seemed to fill all space⁠—till I became lost in their immensity. He moved his hand, doing something to me, I know not what, as it passed through the air⁠—cutting the solid ground from underneath my feet, so that I fell headlong to the ground. Where I fell, there I lay, like a log.

And the light went out.

IV A Lonely Vigil

I knew that the light went out. For not the least singular, nor, indeed, the least distressing part of my condition was the fact that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, I never once lost consciousness during the long hours which followed. I was aware of the extinction of the lamp, and of the black darkness which ensued. I heard a rustling sound, as if the man in the bed was settling himself between the sheets. Then all was still. And throughout that interminable night I remained, my brain awake, my body dead, waiting, watching, for the day. What had happened to me I could not guess. That I probably wore some of the external evidences of death my instinct told me⁠—I knew I did. Paradoxical though it may sound, I felt as a man might feel who had actually died⁠—as, in moments of speculation, in the days gone by, I had imagined it as quite possible that he would feel. It is very far from certain that feeling necessarily expires with what we call life. I continually asked myself if I could be dead⁠—the inquiry pressed itself on me