The Tale of the Body Thief (56 page)

Like a nightmare the old doctor with the stained whiskers. The doll-child in the chair. No, not there. Not there. Not there.

And what did it matter if they had been? It didn’t matter at all.

Beneath these deep enervating emotions, I was not unhappy; and to be aware of this, to know it truly, was perhaps a wondrous thing. Ah, yes, just my old self again.

Had to tell David all about this jungle! David must go to Rio before he returned to England. I would go with him, perhaps.

Perhaps.

I found two doors in the temple. The first was blocked with heavy irregular stones. But the other lay open, for the stones had long ago fallen away into a shapeless heap. Climbing over them, I made my way down a deep staircase, and then through several passages, until I came upon chambers to which no light penetrated at all. It was in one of these, very cool and utterly removed from the noises of the jungle, that I lay down to sleep.

Tiny slithering things dwelt there. As I laid my face against the damp cool floor, I felt these little creatures moving around the tips of my fingers. I heard their rustling. And then the heavy silken weight of a snake moved across my ankle. All this made me smile.

How my old mortal body would have cringed and shaken. But then my mortal eyes could have never seen into this deep place.

I began to tremble suddenly, to cry again softly, thinking of Gretchen. I knew there would never again be a dream of Claudia.

“What did you want of me?” I whispered. “Did you really think I could save my soul?” I saw her as I had in my delirium, in that old New Orleans hospital when I’d taken her by the shoulders. Or had we been in the old hotel? “I told you I would do it again. I told you.”

Something had been saved at that moment. The dark damnation of Lestat had been saved, and was now forever intact.

“Good-bye, darlings,” I whispered again.

And then I slept.

M
IAMI—ah, my beautiful southern metropolis, lying under the polished sky of the Caribbean, no matter what say the various maps! The air seemed sweeter even than in the islands—sweeping gently over the inevitable crowds of Ocean Drive.

Hurrying through the fancy art deco lobby of the Park Central, and to the rooms I kept there, I stripped off my jungle-worn clothes, and went into my own closets for a white turtleneck shirt, belted khaki jacket and pants, and a pair of smooth brown leather boots. It felt good to be free of clothing purchased by the Body Thief, well fitted or not.

Then I immediately rang the desk and discovered that David Talbot had been in the hotel since yesterday and was now waiting for me on the porch of Bailey’s Restaurant down the street.

I had no spirit for crowded public places. I’d persuade him to come back to my rooms. Surely he was still exhausted from the whole ordeal. The table and chairs here before the front windows would be a much better place for us to talk, as we were surely meant to do.

Out I went and up the busy sidewalk north until I saw Bailey’s with the inevitable sign in fancy neon script above its handsome white awnings, and all its little tables draped in pink linen and set with candles, already busy with the first wave of the evening crowd. There
was the familiar figure of David in the farthest corner of the porch, very proper in the suit of white linen he’d worn on the ship. He was watching for my approach with the usual quick and curious expression on his face.

In spite of my relief, I deliberately took him by surprise, slipping into the chair opposite so quickly that he gave a little start.

“Ah, you devil,” he whispered. I saw a little stiffening about his mouth for a minute as though he were really annoyed, but then he smiled. “Thank God you’re all right.”

“You really think that’s appropriate?” I asked.

When the handsome young waiter appeared I told him I wanted a glass of wine, just so that he would not continue to ask me about such things as the time passed. David had already been served some loathsome-colored exotic drink.

“What in the hell actually happened?” I asked, leaning in a little closer over the table to shut out some of the general noise.

“Well, it was mayhem,” he said. “He tried to attack me, and I had no choice but to use the gun. He got away, over the veranda, as a matter of fact, because I couldn’t hold the bloody gun steady. It was simply too big for these old hands.” He gave a sigh. He seemed tired, frayed at the edges. “After that, it was really a matter of calling the Motherhouse, and having them bail me out. Calls back and forth to Cunard in Liverpool.” He made a dismissive gesture. “I was on a plane for Miami at noon. Of course I didn’t want to leave you unattended aboard the vessel, but there really was no choice.”

“I was never in the slightest danger,” I said. “I feared for you. I told you not to fear for me.”

“Well, that’s what I thought would be the case. I sent them after James, of course, hoping to drive him from the ship. It became plain they could not even consider undertaking a cabin-by-cabin search of the vessel. So I thought you’d be left alone. I’m almost certain James disembarked right after the melee. Otherwise they would have apprehended him. I gave them a full description of course.”

He stopped, took a gingerly little sip of his fancy drink, and then laid it down.

“You don’t really like that, do you? Where’s your disgusting Scotch?”

“The drink of the islands,” he said. “No, I don’t like it, but it doesn’t matter. How did it go with you?”

I didn’t answer. I was of course seeing him with my old vision, and his skin was more translucent, and all the little infirmities of his body were plain. Yet he possessed the aura of the marvelous as do all mortals to a vampire’s eyes.

He seemed weary, racked with nervous tension. Indeed, his eyes were red around the edges, and again I saw that stiffness about his mouth. I also noted a sagging to his shoulders. Had this awful ordeal aged him further? I couldn’t bear to see this in him. But his face was full of concern now as he looked at me.

“Something bad has happened with you,” he said, softening even more and reaching across the table and laying his fingers on my hand. How warm they felt. “I can see this in your eyes.”

“I don’t want to talk here,” I said. “Come up to my rooms at the hotel.”

“No, let’s stay here,” he said very gently. “I feel anxious after all that’s happened. It was quite an ordeal, really, for a man my age. I’m exhausted. I hoped you would come last night.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t. I should have. I knew this was a terrible trial for you, even though you enjoyed it so much when it was going on.”

“You thought so?” He gave a slow sad smile. “I need another drink. What did you say? Scotch?”

“What did
I
say? I thought that was your favorite drink.”

“Now and then,” he said. He gestured to the waiter. “Sometimes it’s a bit too serious.” He asked for a single malt if they had it. They didn’t. Chivas Regal would be fine. “Thank you for indulging me. I like it here. I like the quiet commotion. I like the open air.”

Even his voice sounded tired; it lacked some bright spark. This was hardly the time to suggest a trip to Rio de Janeiro, obviously. And it was all my fault.

“Anything you wish,” I said.

“Now, tell me what happened,” he said, solicitously. “I can see it’s weighing on your soul.”

And then I realized how much I wanted to tell him about Gretchen, that indeed, this is why I’d rushed here as much as any concern I felt for him. I was ashamed, and yet I couldn’t prevent myself from telling him. I turned towards the beach, my elbow on the table, and my eyes sort of misted so that the colors of the evening world became muted and more luminescent than before. I told him that I’d gone to Gretchen because I’d promised to do it, though deep within
myself, I was hoping and praying to take her into my world with me. And then I explained about the hospital, the pure strangeness of it—the similarity of the doctor to the one of centuries ago, and the little ward itself, and that mad, crazy notion that Claudia was there.

“It was baffling,” I whispered. “I never dreamed that Gretchen would turn me away. You know what I thought? It sounds so foolish now. I thought she would find me irresistible! I thought it couldn’t possibly be any other way. I thought when she looked into my eyes—my eyes now, not those mortal eyes!—she’d see the true soul which she’d loved! I never imagined that there would be revulsion, or that it could be so total—both moral and physical—and that in the very moment of understanding what we are, she would recoil completely and turn away. I can’t understand how I could have been foolish, how I persist in my illusions! Is it vanity? Or am I simply mad? You’ve never found me repellent, have you, David? Or am I deluded on that score as well?”

“You are beautiful,” he whispered, the words softened with feeling. “But you are unnatural, and that is what this woman saw.” How deeply distressed he seemed. He had never sounded more solicitous in all his patient talks with me. Indeed, he looked as if he felt the pain I felt—acutely and totally. “She was no fit companion for you, don’t you see?” he said kindly.

“Yes, I see. I see.” I rested my forehead against my hand. I wished we were in the quiet of my rooms, but I didn’t push the matter. He was being my friend again, as no other being on earth had ever been, really, and I would do as he wished. “You know you are the only one,” I said suddenly, my own voice sounding ragged and tired. “The only one who will let me be my defeated self without turning away.”

“How so?”

“Oh. All the others must damn me for my temper, my impetuosity, my will! They enjoy it. But when I show the weakness in myself, they shut me out.” I thought then of Louis’s rejection, and that I would very soon see him again, and an evil satisfaction filled me. Ah, he would be so very surprised. Then a little fear came over me. How would I forgive him? How would I keep my precious temper from exploding like a great wanton flame?

“We would make our heroes shallow,” he answered, the words very slow and almost sad. “We would make them brittle. It is they who must remind us of the true meaning of strength.”

“Is that it?” I asked. I turned, and folded my arms on the table, facing him, staring at the finely turned glass of pale yellow wine. “Am I truly strong?”

“Oh, yes, strength you’ve always had. And that’s why they envy you and despise you and become so cross with you. But I needn’t tell you these things. Forget about the woman. It would have been wrong, so very wrong.”

“And what about you, David? It wouldn’t be wrong with you.” I looked up, and to my surprise, I saw his eyes were moist now, and truly reddened, and again came that stiffening of his mouth. “What is it, David?” I asked.

“No, it wouldn’t be wrong,” he said. “I do not think now that it would be wrong at all.”

“You’re saying … ?”

“Bring me into it, Lestat,” he whispered, and then he pulled back, the proper English gentleman, shocked and disapproving of his own emotions, and he looked out over the milling crowd and towards the distant sea.

“You mean this, David? You’re certain?” In truth I didn’t want to ask. I didn’t want to speak another word. And yet why? Why had he come to this decision? What had I done to him with this mad escapade? I wouldn’t be the Vampire Lestat now if it weren’t for him. But what a price he must have paid.

I thought of him on the beach in Grenada, and how he had refused the simple act of making love. He was in pain now as he had been then. And it seemed no mystery at all suddenly that he had come to this. I had brought him to it with our little adventure together to defeat the Body Thief.

“Come,” I said to him. “It
is
time to go now, away from all this and to where we can be alone.” I was trembling. How many times had I dreamed of this moment.

And yet it had come so quickly, and there were so many questions I should ask.

A sudden terrible shyness fell over me. I couldn’t look at him. I thought of the intimacy we would soon experience, and I couldn’t meet his gaze. My God, I was acting the way he had in New Orleans when I’d been in that strapping mortal body and pelting him with my rampant desire.

My heart was hammering with expectation. David, David in my
arms. The blood of David passing into me. And mine into David, and then we would stand on the edge of the sea together as dark immortal brothers. I could scarce speak or even think.

I got up without looking at him, and I walked across the porch and down the steps. I knew he was following me. I was like Orpheus. One backward glance and he’d be torn away from me. Perhaps the glaring lights of a passing car would flash on my hair and eyes in such a way that he would suddenly be paralyzed with fear.

I led the way back down the pavement, past the sluggish parade of mortals in their beach finery, past the little sidewalk tables of the cafés. I went directly into the Park Central and through the lobby again with all its sparkling high-toned glamour and up the stairs to my rooms.

I heard him close the door behind me.

I stood at the windows, looking out again at that shining evening sky. My heart, be quiet! Do not hurry it. It is too important that each step be made with care.

Look at the clouds scudding so quickly away from paradise. Stars mere specks of glitter struggling in the pale flood of evening light.

There were things I must tell him, things I must explain. He would be the same for all time as he was at this moment; was there any small physical thing he wished to change? Shave the beard closer; trim the hair.

“None of that matters,” he said, in that soft cultured English voice. “What’s wrong?” So kind, as if I were the one who needed reassurance. “Isn’t it what you wanted?”

“Oh, yes, truly yes. But you have to be sure you want it,” I said, and only now I turned around.

He stood there in the shadows, so composed in his trim white linen suit, pale silk tie properly knotted at the neck. The light from the street shone brightly on his eyes, and flashed for one instant on the tiny gold stud in the tie.

“I can’t explain it,” I whispered. “It’s happened so quickly, so suddenly, when I was sure it wouldn’t. I’m afraid for you. Afraid you’re making a terrible mistake.”