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.Her long white fingers were sticky with blood."Tit for tat", she said."Now your face is striped with blood.Look,there is a little of your skin hanging from one of mynails".It is true that my face felt like fire, but I felt no pain.I noticed thebed was wet with freshly-spilled blood.On the rug, alongside, the blade ofa long oriental knife gleamed in the sunlight.It was a ritual weapon whichOrgen used to keep on the altar of his deity, for what purposes I knewnot, but Roma had slain him with it and had attempted also to slayme.On Orgen's face had glowed the light of the inscrutable ecstasy, as ifhis death were not a catastrophe but an apotheosis.Perhaps he used toscarify his own flesh with the knife.I picked it up and, crossing to theshrine, propped it in its accustomed place.A heap of grey ash was all thatremained of the joss-sticks.I mused on this dust as it were Orgenhimself.Roma watched my every movement, then she lay backluxuriously on the bloodstained bed."I thought you were going home", I said coolly.88 Dance, Doll, Dance!"This is my home", she replied tonelessly, "I shall sleep here everynight"."But this is madness!""Who will tend the shrine, if not I?""I will", I cried, though the idea filled me with repugnance."You are the only one who knows - about Orgen", she whispered."Areyou going to tell?"I stared at her."Orgen was my friend", I said."To him, death was an apotheosis.Youmust have appeared, in his eyes, as a delivering angel, even though hateand revenge burned within you".Her eyes caught fire, then the flame died so that two pinpoints ofsmouldering fury fixed me malignantly."You swine", she murmured, "you have an answer for everything.Whyshould you spare me? Your clumsy beastliness is anathema to me.But Iwant no mercy.Nor do I wish any living being to go about knowing whathappened to Orgen.That is why I tried to kill you.But I think now that Iam almost growing to like you".A smile puckered her lips.When they parted it was to reveal the savagesharpness of her teeth.Yet she maddened me beyond anything I hadever known.o one seems to know what happened to Roma.When I awoke from theNsleep of sheer exhaustion which terminated our last meeting, itwas to find that she had gone; home, as IDance, Doll, Dance! 89thought: but apparently not.I grieved for a few days when I realised shehad flown for good.But it was all for the best.She gave me no peace,physically or mentally; and I required both, urgently, at this particularperiod.I was one of five more or less young men occupying a spacious bungalownamed Carfax, set in deep woods about a mile from Chalmer's Bay, nearKermstow, Gonave Island.The room adjoining mine was occupied by IanMarchester, who was writing a thesis on something or other.As well asbeing the eldest, he had been at Carfax longer than any of us.Aknowledgeable fellow, he struck me as ineffectual, though amiable enough.The room next to his was occupied by Oscar Reyluc, a poet like myself,who shut himself away from us as much as possible.One of the two roomson the other side of the hall was occupied by a 'psychic' who was, Isuspect, psychopathic as well.His name was Alistair Henderson.Isuppose a Scottish ancestry had endowed him with a peculiar brand ofsecond sight.He sometimes amused and intrigued us hugely with accountsof dreams and premonitions which were invariably saturnine and umbra-geous.And the room next his had been Oswald Orgen's, one of the mostenigmatic individuals I had ever met.He was deeply versed in manyphases of Oriental mysticism and philosophy, and had spent most of hislast months shut up with the idol before which he celebrated his ownpeculiar mass.Incidentally, it is the idol I wish to speak about; for it nowreposes in a cupboard in my room, still covered in the dark fabric inwhich Orgen kept it perpetually wrapped.But before doing so, I mustmention what may have been a possible reason for Roma's abruptdisappearance: a rumour concerning the letting of Orgen's now vacantroom to a girl-student, at present lodged in an over-crowded hostel on theoutskirts of Kermstow, far down the valley.I had not until recently heardthe rumour, but I now suspect that much of Roma's outrageous behaviourhad been sparked off by the idea of a strange female taking possession ofOrgen's room.Roma had absconded with all his belongings except theidol, which had resisted all her attempts at dislodging90 Dance, Doll, Dance!it.That she had tried was made obvious by the rents in the fabric whichcovered it.I studied the idol somewhat closely, when at last I succeeded inunriveting it.I am glad I went to such pains, because in the metal base Ifound a wad of papers concerning procedures for its worship, written inOrgen's flowery script.I know now why he always kept it covered, but Ishall come to that later.The image itself I could not identify, being unacquainted with thesubject of iconography; but that it was some sort of Asiatic, or perhapsPolynesian, goddess or she-demon I had no doubt, even before a study ofOrgen's papers revealed her actual - or part of her actual - provenance.What struck me forcibly, as soon as I had it uncovered, was the facialexpression, which reminded me of certain moods I had seen fleeting overRoma's features; and Roma had never looked upon the idol.To describe itwere futile, for it was not what it appeared to be.Outwardly, it exhibitedan attractive female form in a dancing posture.It was wrought in ashining black substance which gleamed curiously with a greenish glow.Silken cords and ornaments adorned the breasts and legs, giving to them amarkedly erotic aspect; and two dark bands girdling the thighs, below theloins, almost suggested stockings.But it was the atmosphere of the figurewhich caused me to wrap it up once more and to conceal it in the depths ofthe cupboard, for it emanated an intense unwholesomeness such as I hadnot previously encountered.It flowed over me like a wave when first Iunveiled it: a wave which was virtually palpable and which could, I amsure, have marshalled power sufficient to have thrown me down.Therewas some kind of energy locked up in the thing, and I had unwittinglyreleased it.I remember wondering what kind of dangerous game Orgenhad been playing there, all alone in his room, week after week, with thisas his sole companion [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]