He placed his hand on my shoulder, fingers trying to close on the hard alien body which barely felt his touch, or rather felt it in such a wholly different way that he would never know. "I love you, my friend," he said in the same ardent whisper. "Please, don't leave me now. All this has brought us so close."
"No, David. It has not. In these last few days, we were close because we were both mortal men. We saw the same sun and the same twilight, we felt the same pull of the earth beneath our feet. We drank together and broke bread together. We might have made love together, if you had only allowed such a thing. But that's all changed. You have your youth, yes, and all the dizzying wonder that accompanies the miracle. But I still see death when I look at you, David. I see one who walks in the sun with death right at his shoulder. I know now I cannot be your companion, and you cannot be mine. It simply costs me too much pain."
He bowed his head, silently and valiantly struggling to maintain an inner control. "Don't leave me yet," he whispered. "Who else in all the world can understand?"
I wanted suddenly to plead with him. Think, David, immortality in this beautiful young form. I wanted to tell him of all the places we might go, immortals together, and the wonders we might see. I wanted to describe to him that dark temple I'd discovered in the very depths of the rain forest, and tell him of what it had been like to roam the jungle, fearless, and with a vision that could penetrate the darkest corners .. . Oh, all this threatened to break loose from me in a rush of words, and I made no effort to veil my thoughts or my feelings. Oh, yes, you are young again, and now you can be young for all time. It is the finest vehicle for your travel into darkness that anyone could have fashioned; it is as if the dark spirits had done all this to prepare you! Wisdom and beauty are both yours. Our gods have worked the charm. Come, come with me now.
But I didn't speak. I didn't plead. As I stood silent in the corridor, I let myself breathe the blood scent rising from him, the scent that rises from all mortals, and which is different with each in its own way. How it tormented me to mark this new vitality, this sharper heat, and the sounder, slower heartbeat which I could hear as if the body itself were speaking to me in a manner in which it could not speak to him.
In that cafe in New Orleans, I had caught the same sharp scent of life from this physical being, but it had not been the same. No, not at all the same.
It was a simple thing to shut this off. I did it. I shrank back into the brittle lonely quiet of an ordinary man. I avoided his eyes. I didn't want to hear any more apologetic and imperfect words.
"I'll see you soon," I said. "I know you will need me. You'll need your only witness when the horror and mystery of all this is too much. I'll come. But give me time. And remember. Call my man in Paris. Don't rely upon the Talamasca. Surely you don't mean to give them this life too?"
As I turned to go, I heard the distant muffled sound of the elevator doors. His friend had come-a smallish white-haired man, dressed as David had so often dressed, in a proper old-fashioned suit, complete with vest. How concerned he looked as he came towards us with quick sprightly steps, and then I saw his eyes close on me, and he slowed his pace.
I hurried away, ignoring the annoying realization that the man knew me, knew what I was and who I was. So much the better, I thought, for he will surely believe David when David begins his strange tale.
The night was waiting for me as always. And my thirst could wait no longer. I stood for a moment, head thrown back, eyes closed, and mouth open, feeling the thirst, and wanting to roar like a hungry beast. Yes, blood again when there is nothing else. When the world seems in all its beauty to be empty and heartless and I myself am utterly lost. Give me my old friend, death, and the blood that rushes with it. The Vampire Lestat is here, and he thirsts, and tonight of all nights, he will not be denied.
But I knew as I sought the dingy back streets, in search of the cruel victims I so loved, that I had lost my beautiful southern city of Miami. At least for a little while.
I kept seeing again in my mind's eye that smart little room in the Park Central, with its windows open to the sea, and the false David telling me he wanted the Dark Gift from me! And Gretchen. Would I ever think of those moments that I didn't remember Gretchen, and pouring out my story of Gretchen to the man I believed to be David before we climbed those steps to that chamber, as my heart had knocked inside me, and I had thought: At last! At last!
Bitter, and angry, and empty, I never wanted to see the pretty hotels of South Beach again.
ONCE OUT OF NATURE The Dolls by W. B. Yeats
TWENTY-NINE
IT WAS two nights later that I returned to New Orleans. I'd been wandering in the Florida Keys, and through quaint little southern cities, and walking for hours on southern beaches, even wriggling my naked toes in the white sand.
At last I was back, and the cold weather had been blown away by the inevitable winds. The air was almost balmy again- my New Orleans-and the sky was high and bright above the racing clouds.
I went immediately to my dear old lady tenant, and called to Mojo, who was in the back courtyard sleeping, for he found the little apartment too warm. He gave no growl when I stepped into the courtyard. But it was the sound of my voice which triggered recognition. As soon as I said his name he was mine again.
At once he came to me, leaping up to throw his soft heavy paws on my shoulders and lick my face again with his great ham-pink tongue. I nuzzled him and kissed him and buried my face in his sweet shining gray fur, I saw him again as I had that first night in Georgetown-his fierce stamina and his great gentleness.
Had ever a beast looked so frightening yet been so full of calm, sweet affection? It seemed a wondrous combination. I knelt down on the old flags, wrestling with him, rolling him over on his back, and burying my head in the big collar of fur on his chest. He gave forth all those little growls and squeaks and high-pitched sounds that dogs give when they love you. And how I loved him in return.
As for my tenant, the dear old woman, who watched all this from the kitchen doorway, she was in tears to have him gone.
At once we struck a bargain. She would be his keeper, and I should come for him through the garden gate whenever I wished. How perfectly divine, for surely it was not fair to him to expect him to sleep in a crypt with me, and I had no need of such a guardian, did I, no matter how graceful the image now and then seemed.
I kissed the old woman tenderly and quickly, lest she sense she was in close proximity to a demon, and then away I went with Mojo, walking the narrow pretty streets of the French Quarter and laughing to myself at how mortals stared at Mojo, and gave him a wide berth and seemed indeed to be terrified of him, when guess who was the one to fear?