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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/76112-0.txt b/76112-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d60c553 --- /dev/null +++ b/76112-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,365 @@ + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76112 *** + + + + + + Vallisneria Madness + + By RALPH MILNE FARLEY + + _A strange and curious little story, about + the moonlight mating of flowers_ + + [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from + Weird Tales May 1937. + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that + the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] + + +Seated comfortably on the broad terrace of Professor Gordon’s palatial +mansion, Tom Spencer stared abstractedly at the red disk of the setting +sun, reflected in the turgid waters of the pool in the garden beyond the +edge of the terrace as he listened to his host recount the fascinating +story of the love-life of the vallisneria. + +The cameo-face of the white-haired botany professor bore a whimsical +expression as he declaimed, “Beneath the black surface of that muddy +pool out there, the flowers of a score or so of this rare plant which I +brought from tropical Asia, pass their entire humdrum life, except for +one brief night of moonlit love—not unlike our human existence.” + +Tom Spencer shifted his keen gray eyes to stare at the matted, +ribbon-like leaves, floating on top of the water, which gave little +indication of floral life below. + +The old professor continued, “As you know from my lectures at Columbia, +the vallisneria is a diœcious plant. On one night of each year, the +night of the vernal full moon, the stem of each female flower begins to +stretch, until its ghostly green and white bloom rises to the surface. +Each male flower too feels that same impelling urge, ‘an instinct within +it that reaches and towers,’ as James Russell Lowell says. Listen to how +Maeterlinck, that great poet and scientist, describes their fatal +wooing.” + +He opened a book which lay on his lap, tilted it so that its pages were +illumined by the fading sunlight, and read aloud: + + “The green-coated male flowers rise in turn, full of hope, + toward the flowers which already sway above them in the + moonlight, awaiting them and summoning them to the magic world + which lies beyond their native obscurity. But, when half their + upward journey is done, they reach the limit that their too + short stems can stretch, and are checked abruptly, before they + can win their way to their indifferent sweethearts, who + pridefully refuse to bend to caress them. + + “Filled with yearning, the little heart of each male flower + swells and swells until it breaks. In a magnificent effort to + achieve his bliss, he tears himself from his stem, and in one + incomparable flight rises to perish in love on the surface of + the pool. Dying, but free and radiant, he floats for one brief + ecstatic moment beside his beloved, then shrivels and floats + away; while his mate closes the petals in which she has + imprisoned his last breath of life, and shrinks back into the + depths, there to ripen the fruit of that fatal union.” + +The sun set, as Professor Gordon closed his copy of Maeterlinck. A +twilight mist began to form above the surface of the garden pool. “How +much more noble are the flowers than we,” he mused. “As Shakespeare +says, ‘Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but +not for love.’” + +His athletic young guest narrowed his gray eyes and stared inwardly at +the vision conjured up by the older man’s reading. “I wonder,” he +breathed. + +Professor Gordon broke the spell by saying in a matter-of-fact tone, +“Well, my boy, you are to see tonight the mating of vallisneria, a sight +which my colleagues would give their eye-teeth to witness.” + +“I feel flattered——” Spencer began diffidently, shifting his broad +shoulders in an embarrassed manner. + +But the fine-featured old man silenced him with a deprecatory, “Don’t, +then! You are more outstanding as a football player than as a student of +botany. I invited you for other reasons than any outstanding ability you +may have shown in your four years of studies under me.” + +(Spencer thought, “Most likely to rub in on his colleagues his +non-invitation of them, by asking instead a mere athlete, who is taking +botany merely because it’s a cinch course.”) + +Meanwhile the professor was continuing, “I am sorry that I can’t stay +out here with you. The mists affect my throat. And I’m sorry my daughter +Natalie isn’t here either. She helps me take care of the plants, and +you’d find her quite intelligent about them. But she had to go over to +her aunt’s.” + +“I shouldn’t think she’d care to miss——” + +“Oh, it’s an old story with Natalie. She’s seen the phenomenon before. +And now I must caution you about one thing. Don’t go any nearer the pool +than the edge of the terrace. The flowers, when in bloom, exude a strong +narcotic fragrance, which is rather dangerous. Anyhow, you can see quite +clearly from here.” + +He rose, and held out one slender blue-veined hand. + +“Good night, sir,” said Spencer, taking the frail hand in his big strong +one. “And thank you for inviting me.” + + * * * * * + +Tom Spencer eased his athletic frame down into one of the terrace +chairs, and gazed abstractedly at the purpling pink of the western sky. + +“Just as well that that brat of his isn’t here tonight,” he mused. “What +on earth could I do to amuse her?” He remembered having seen Natalie +Gordon several times during his Freshman year, hanging around the door +of the Botany Building at Morningside Heights, waiting for her father. A +gawky, pug-nosed, freckle-faced, little thing, with two tightly braided +pigtails—about fourteen or fifteen years old, so he judged. Just as +well the brat wasn’t here. + +Spencer turned his attention back to the garden pool. But pitch-darkness +had now fallen, and he could see nothing except the outline of the +shrubs against the deep purple of the western sky. Then trees in the +distance became dimly lit by the full moon, which was rising behind the +house; but the long shadow of the house still obscured the garden and +its pool. A vagrant zephyr wafted a damp, muddy scent of mist up from +the hidden pool. + +“I wonder if those water-plants have any consciousness, any volition, +about their tragic mating,” mused Spencer, “or is it all merely +automatic, mechanistic?” + +He leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and visualized the passage +from Maeterlinck, which the old botany professor had read to him. + + * * * * * + +He opened his eyes again with a start, and sat erect. The shadow of the +house had receded to the edge of the terrace, and the entire garden, +with the pool in its midst, was now bathed in the chalky light of the +moon almost overhead. + +Above the surface of the water hung a cottony swirling mist, which +seemed to portend some sort of boiling activity in the depths of the +muddy pool. The mist thickened and spilled out onto the surrounding +garden. + +“Humph!” sniffed Spencer, getting up out of his chair. “Can’t see a +thing from here.” And, forgetful of Professor Gordon’s express +injunction, he ambled down off the terrace, and along the garden walk to +the edge of the pool. + +Through gaps in the swirling mist, he could see the matted ribbon-like +vegetation floating inertly in the water. Not a sign of a flower. So he +swung back to the terrace, and slumped down again in his chair. + +The mist continued to thicken. + +“I guess there’ll be no show tonight,” Spencer grumbled disgustedly. +Then suddenly he sat erect, thrust his broad shoulders forward, and +peered intently through the gathering fog, where dark shapes—human-like +shapes—seemed to be moving. + +Brushing the mist away, shedding it, rising above it, and yet still +seeming to be a part of it, they stood out at last, clear in the +moonlight; majestic women, Valkyries, with proudly-held blond heads, and +flashing eyes. Filmy, floating, luna-green robes set off the chalky +whiteness of their perfect features. + +A heady perfume wafted across from the hidden pool. + +The mist receded until it concealed merely the feet of the beautiful +creatures. Where they stood, whether on the surface of the pool or on +its banks, Spencer could not tell. Swaying slightly, as though rooted, +they undulated their green-swathed arms like seaweed in the tide. Their +heads thrown back with an almost defiant gesture, they bathed their +perfect features in the glaring white light of the zenith moon. + +Never had Tom Spencer seen such sheer feminine beauty. He had no +recollection of leaving his seat, but now he found himself standing at +the edge of the terrace, irresistibly drawn by a strange yearning toward +that galaxy of pulchritude. There were some twenty or so of the young +women, their faces all different, each a face of character and +personality, each more beautiful than the last. + +Irresolute, Spencer held out his arms toward the entire group. +Which—which one drew him? To which one should he drift? The uncertainty +held him back—that, and the subconscious memory of some warning, some +prohibition—and some third as yet undefined prompting. + +And, while he hesitated, there appeared, poking up through the mist at +the feet of the strange regal women, the points of a score of +green-peaked hats. Up they came, and faces appeared beneath them, dark, +cleanly-cut, handsome faces of men; tense, yearning faces, with +flashing, fanatic eyes, each pair of eyes fixed on one of the beautiful +women who towered above. + +Gradually they rose, until each man, clad in dark Lincoln green, stood +beside one of the pale, diaphanous women. + +And then a strange, inexplicable paradox! The beautiful women were +slender, completely feminine, utterly adorable. The men were well-built, +athletic, thoroughly masculine, seemingly tall rather than short. And +yet the women towered above them. + +Tom Spencer’s mind flashed incongruously back to the scrapbooks of his +childhood days, in which he had frequently pasted figures from pictures +taken in different scales, with the result that each figure, properly +proportioned by itself, failed to match the others in size. + +Each of the men now clasped his arms around the waist of his beloved, +and stretched and stretched, every sinew of his athletic body taut with +the effort. Although Spencer could not see their feet for the mist which +covered them, he knew that they were standing on tiptoe. An inarticulate +sigh went up from all of them. “Kiss me! Kiss me!” it pleaded. “Kiss me, +though I die!” + +But the stately women stiffened, and held themselves more aloof, and +towered even more inaccessibly, with a beauty so flaming that it hurt. +Then their sea-swaying arms floated down until their slim white hands +rested on the shoulders of the men. The pearly faces of the women +inclined slightly—not enough to meet the upward-straining lips of their +mates, but just enough so that they could gaze coldly but enticingly +down. A silvery ripple of sound floated through the moonlight. The women +were speaking, but what they were saying Spencer could not tell. + +A strangled flush spread over the faces of the men, as, lifted by the +hands of the women, they rose slowly, until white now with a livid +whiteness, their lips met in one passionate, soul-searing embrace. + +Tom Spencer drew in a deep breath, and his fingers clenched, then sprang +open with a sudden gesture of horror, as he realized that those male +heads, so tightly clinging lip to lip with the beautiful mist-women, +were bodiless! The green-clad bodies, which had strained so tautly to +thrust their heads up to that kiss of death, were now slowly slumping, +settling downward, shriveling, turning brown, drifting away in the +swirling mists which bathed the feet of the majestic women. + +The heads themselves had lost their realness. The skin had become +wrinkled, leathery, deflated, flabby. The features were scarcely +distinguishable. + +Then one by one, with a contemptuous gesture of satiation, the women +flung away the sucked-dry rinds. And Tom Spencer, his gaze intent upon +the expressions on the women’s faces, took no heed what became of the +cast-off rinds. + +For a subtle change was taking place in those beautiful but cruel +creatures. A certain matronly smugness coarsened their features, and +they seemed less tall. Yes, they were visibly shrinking, shrinking and +becoming squat and ugly, shrinking back into the mists which masked the +muddy pool. All, all returning to the slime which had spawned them. + +All but one! Alone she stood, unmated, still towering slim and beautiful +in the moonlight. And then Tom Spencer knew why he had waited, why he +had not gone to any of the others. For, transcendently beautiful though +they had all been, yet this sole survivor of that glorious company +outshone them all. + +Erect she stood, her golden head thrown back, her arms stretched to each +side and raised a little, so that the filmy pale green gauze of her gown +hung from them like the wings of a luna moth. + + * * * * * + +Spencer gasped and rose from his chair. Forgotten were the warnings of +Professor Gordon, as the young man moved steadily out off the terrace +into the misty moonlight. + +Her lips parted, a smile of welcome overspread her cameo face, and then +she spoke—a tinkly, silver, moonlit, rippling voice. “Have you been +waiting long for me?” + +“All my life!” breathed Spencer. + +She laughed, a friendly, silvery laugh. + +Like a sleep-walker, Spencer continued to plod toward her. + +Six-feet one he was, a gridiron star, and yet this frail, slim wisp of a +feminine creature towered inaccessibly above him in the mists of the +pool. + +Spencer reached her. He clasped his arms around her waist, and stretched +and stretched, every sinew of his athletic body taut with the effort. He +raised his heels from the ground, and strained on tiptoe. A sigh +breathed upward from his lips. + +“Kiss me! Kiss me!” he pleaded. “Kiss me, though I die.” + +But she stiffened, and held herself more aloof, and towered even more +inaccessibly, while her beauty flamed out so intensely that it gripped +Spencer’s heart with a stabbing pain. + +Then her wide-spread arms floated down, until her slim, cool, white +hands rested on Spencer’s shoulders. Her cameo-cut face inclined +slightly, not enough to meet the upward-straining lips of the young man, +but merely enough so that she could gaze coldly but enticingly down into +his eyes. + +Like a drowning man, there swept through his mind the vision of heads +wrenched from male shoulders, sucked dry, and cast aside; male bodies +shriveling and drifting away. Well, it was worth it, for that one moment +of transcendent ecstasy. But, at the memory-picture of the +transformation wrought in the beautiful mist-woman by that long, +passionate embrace, he shuddered momentarily. However, he would be gone +then—he would not be there to see it. Once more he strained to reach +his beloved. + +But the expected strangling wrench on his neck did not come. Instead the +stiff aloofness of the beautiful girl softened. An expression of +yielding consecration suffused her lovely face. She leaned, she bent +over him, and floated down into his arms. + +Their lips met and clung. + + * * * * * + +A breeze whipped her moon-green gown about him. Opening his eyes, he saw +the mists blown away from the stone bench on which she had been +standing, by the edge of the garden pool. + +Now, nestled in his arms, she no longer seemed terrifyingly dominating +and aloof, but instead small and sweet and soft. And she did not coarsen +and sink back into the slime of the pool. + +Side by side they sat down together on the stone bench, his arm about +her slender waist, her golden head against his shoulder. + +For a long time they sat thus in silence. Then, “Tom,” she breathed. + +“You know my name?” he asked in surprise. + +“Why not?” she laughed a silvery moonlit laugh. + +Again they sat in silence. + +At last she pushed softly away from him. “Well, dear,” she said, “it is +very late, and we really ought to be going in.” + +“In? Into the pool?” + +“No, silly! Into the house.” + +He turned, and seized her by the shoulders, and stared fixedly down at +her in the moonlight. Then, with a sigh of gladness, he clasped her to +him. + +“You’re Natalie Gordon!” he breathed. “You’re real! And I like you much +better that way.” + +“I don’t know what on earth you’re talking about,” said she, “but it’s +all right with me.” + +She held up her face, and once more his lips closed on hers, this time +in a wholly human embrace. + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76112 *** diff --git a/76112-h/76112-h.htm b/76112-h/76112-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..08d28ee --- /dev/null +++ b/76112-h/76112-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,585 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> + <title> Vallisneria Madness | Project Gutenberg</title> + <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg"/> + <style type="text/css"> + body { margin-left:8%;margin-right:10%; } + .it { font-style:italic; } + .bold { font-weight:bold; } + + .summary { + margin-top:1em; + margin-bottom:1em; + padding-left:1.5em; + padding-right:1.5em; + text-indent:0em; + text-align-last:center; + text-align:center; + } + .summary .pindent { + text-indent:0; + text-align-last:center; + } + p { text-indent:0; margin-top:0.5em; margin-bottom:0.5em; + text-align: justify; } + div.lgc { } + div.lgl { } + div.lgc p { text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } + div.lgl p { text-indent: -17px; margin-left:17px; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } + hr.tbk { border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; width:30%; margin-left:35%; margin-right:35%; } + hr.pbk { border:none; border-bottom:1px solid silver; width:100%; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:2em } + .figcenter { + text-align:center; + margin:1em auto; + page-break-inside: avoid; + } + + div.blockquote { margin:1em 2em; text-align:justify; } + p.line { text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } + .pindent { margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; text-indent:1.5em; } + .noindent { margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; text-indent:0; } + .hang { padding-left:1.5em; text-indent:-1.5em; } + </style> + <style type="text/css"> + .poetry-container { margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em } + .literal-container { margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em } + div.lgc { margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em } + p { margin-top:0em; margin-bottom:0em; } + </style> + </head> + <body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76112 ***</div> + + +<div class='lgc' style=''> <!-- rend=';' --> +<p class='line' style='font-size:3em;'>Vallisneria Madness</p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'>By</p> +<p class='line'><span style='font-size:x-large'>RALPH MILNE FARLEY</span></p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<div class='summary'> +<p class='pindent'><span class='it'>A strange and curious little story, about the moonlight mating of flowers</span></p> +</div> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> +Weird Tales May 1937.<br /> +Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> +the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> +</div> <!-- end rend --> + + +<p class='pindent'>Seated comfortably on the broad +terrace of Professor Gordon’s palatial +mansion, Tom Spencer stared +abstractedly at the red disk of the setting +sun, reflected in the turgid waters of the +pool in the garden beyond the edge of +the terrace as he listened to his host recount +the fascinating story of the love-life +of the vallisneria.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The cameo-face of the white-haired +botany professor bore a whimsical expression +as he declaimed, “Beneath the black +surface of that muddy pool out there, the +flowers of a score or so of this rare plant +which I brought from tropical Asia, pass +their entire humdrum life, except for one +brief night of moonlit love—not unlike +our human existence.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Tom Spencer shifted his keen gray +eyes to stare at the matted, ribbon-like +leaves, floating on top of the water, which +gave little indication of floral life below.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The old professor continued, “As you +know from my lectures at Columbia, the +vallisneria is a diœcious plant. On one +night of each year, the night of the vernal +full moon, the stem of each female +flower begins to stretch, until its ghostly +green and white bloom rises to the surface. +Each male flower too feels that +same impelling urge, ‘an instinct within +it that reaches and towers,’ as James Russell +Lowell says. Listen to how Maeterlinck, +that great poet and scientist, describes +their fatal wooing.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He opened a book which lay on his +lap, tilted it so that its pages were illumined +by the fading sunlight, and read +aloud:</p> + +<div class='blockquote'> + +<p class='pindent'>“The green-coated male flowers rise in turn, +full of hope, toward the flowers which already +sway above them in the moonlight, awaiting them +and summoning them to the magic world which +lies beyond their native obscurity. But, when half +their upward journey is done, they reach the limit +that their too short stems can stretch, and are +checked abruptly, before they can win their way +to their indifferent sweethearts, who pridefully refuse +to bend to caress them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Filled with yearning, the little heart of each +male flower swells and swells until it breaks. In +a magnificent effort to achieve his bliss, he tears +himself from his stem, and in one incomparable +flight rises to perish in love on the surface of the +pool. Dying, but free and radiant, he floats for +one brief ecstatic moment beside his beloved, then +shrivels and floats away; while his mate closes the +petals in which she has imprisoned his last breath +of life, and shrinks back into the depths, there to +ripen the fruit of that fatal union.”</p> + +</div> + +<p class='pindent'>The sun set, as Professor Gordon +closed his copy of Maeterlinck. A twilight +mist began to form above the surface +of the garden pool. “How much +more noble are the flowers than we,” he +mused. “As Shakespeare says, ‘Men have +died from time to time, and worms have +eaten them, but not for love.’ ”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>His athletic young guest narrowed his +gray eyes and stared inwardly at the +vision conjured up by the older man’s +reading. “I wonder,” he breathed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Professor Gordon broke the spell by +saying in a matter-of-fact tone, “Well, +my boy, you are to see tonight the mating +of vallisneria, a sight which my colleagues +would give their eye-teeth to +witness.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I feel flattered——” Spencer began +diffidently, shifting his broad shoulders +in an embarrassed manner.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But the fine-featured old man silenced +him with a deprecatory, “Don’t, then! +You are more outstanding as a football +player than as a student of botany. I invited +you for other reasons than any outstanding +ability you may have shown in +your four years of studies under me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>(Spencer thought, “Most likely to rub +in on his colleagues his non-invitation of +them, by asking instead a mere athlete, +who is taking botany merely because it’s +a cinch course.”)</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Meanwhile the professor was continuing, +“I am sorry that I can’t stay out here +with you. The mists affect my throat. +And I’m sorry my daughter Natalie isn’t +here either. She helps me take care of the +plants, and you’d find her quite intelligent +about them. But she had to go +over to her aunt’s.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I shouldn’t think she’d care to +miss——”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, it’s an old story with Natalie. +She’s seen the phenomenon before. And +now I must caution you about one thing. +Don’t go any nearer the pool than the +edge of the terrace. The flowers, when in +bloom, exude a strong narcotic fragrance, +which is rather dangerous. Anyhow, you +can see quite clearly from here.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He rose, and held out one slender +blue-veined hand.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good night, sir,” said Spencer, taking +the frail hand in his big strong one. +“And thank you for inviting me.”</p> + +<hr class='tbk'/> + +<p class='pindent'>Tom Spencer eased his athletic frame +down into one of the terrace chairs, +and gazed abstractedly at the purpling +pink of the western sky.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Just as well that that brat of his isn’t +here tonight,” he mused. “What on earth +could I do to amuse her?” He remembered +having seen Natalie Gordon several +times during his Freshman year, hanging +around the door of the Botany Building +at Morningside Heights, waiting for her +father. A gawky, pug-nosed, freckle-faced, +little thing, with two tightly braided +pigtails—about fourteen or fifteen +years old, so he judged. Just as well the +brat wasn’t here.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Spencer turned his attention back to +the garden pool. But pitch-darkness had +now fallen, and he could see nothing except +the outline of the shrubs against the +deep purple of the western sky. Then +trees in the distance became dimly lit by +the full moon, which was rising behind +the house; but the long shadow of the +house still obscured the garden and its +pool. A vagrant zephyr wafted a damp, +muddy scent of mist up from the hidden +pool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wonder if those water-plants have +any consciousness, any volition, about +their tragic mating,” mused Spencer, “or +is it all merely automatic, mechanistic?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He leaned back in his chair, closed his +eyes, and visualized the passage from +Maeterlinck, which the old botany professor +had read to him.</p> + +<hr class='tbk'/> + +<p class='pindent'>He opened his eyes again with a +start, and sat erect. The shadow of +the house had receded to the edge of the +terrace, and the entire garden, with the +pool in its midst, was now bathed in the +chalky light of the moon almost overhead.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Above the surface of the water hung +a cottony swirling mist, which seemed to +portend some sort of boiling activity in +the depths of the muddy pool. The mist +thickened and spilled out onto the surrounding +garden.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Humph!” sniffed Spencer, getting up +out of his chair. “Can’t see a thing from +here.” And, forgetful of Professor Gordon’s +express injunction, he ambled down +off the terrace, and along the garden walk +to the edge of the pool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Through gaps in the swirling mist, he +could see the matted ribbon-like vegetation +floating inertly in the water. Not a +sign of a flower. So he swung back to the +terrace, and slumped down again in his +chair.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The mist continued to thicken.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I guess there’ll be no show tonight,” +Spencer grumbled disgustedly. Then suddenly +he sat erect, thrust his broad shoulders +forward, and peered intently through +the gathering fog, where dark shapes—human-like +shapes—seemed to be moving.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Brushing the mist away, shedding it, +rising above it, and yet still seeming to be +a part of it, they stood out at last, clear +in the moonlight; majestic women, +Valkyries, with proudly-held blond heads, +and flashing eyes. Filmy, floating, luna-green +robes set off the chalky whiteness +of their perfect features.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>A heady perfume wafted across from +the hidden pool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The mist receded until it concealed +merely the feet of the beautiful creatures. +Where they stood, whether on the surface +of the pool or on its banks, Spencer +could not tell. Swaying slightly, as though +rooted, they undulated their green-swathed +arms like seaweed in the tide. +Their heads thrown back with an almost +defiant gesture, they bathed their perfect +features in the glaring white light of the +zenith moon.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Never had Tom Spencer seen such +sheer feminine beauty. He had no recollection +of leaving his seat, but now he +found himself standing at the edge of the +terrace, irresistibly drawn by a strange +yearning toward that galaxy of pulchritude. +There were some twenty or so of +the young women, their faces all different, +each a face of character and personality, +each more beautiful than the last.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Irresolute, Spencer held out his arms +toward the entire group. Which—which +one drew him? To which one should he +drift? The uncertainty held him back—that, +and the subconscious memory of +some warning, some prohibition—and +some third as yet undefined prompting.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And, while he hesitated, there appeared, +poking up through the mist at the +feet of the strange regal women, the +points of a score of green-peaked hats. +Up they came, and faces appeared beneath +them, dark, cleanly-cut, handsome +faces of men; tense, yearning faces, with +flashing, fanatic eyes, each pair of eyes +fixed on one of the beautiful women who +towered above.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Gradually they rose, until each man, +clad in dark Lincoln green, stood beside +one of the pale, diaphanous women.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And then a strange, inexplicable paradox! +The beautiful women were slender, +completely feminine, utterly adorable. +The men were well-built, athletic, thoroughly +masculine, seemingly tall rather +than short. And yet the women towered +above them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Tom Spencer’s mind flashed incongruously +back to the scrapbooks of his childhood +days, in which he had frequently +pasted figures from pictures taken in different +scales, with the result that each +figure, properly proportioned by itself, +failed to match the others in size.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Each of the men now clasped his arms +around the waist of his beloved, and +stretched and stretched, every sinew of +his athletic body taut with the effort. Although +Spencer could not see their feet +for the mist which covered them, he +knew that they were standing on tiptoe. +An inarticulate sigh went up from all of +them. “Kiss me! Kiss me!” it pleaded. +“Kiss me, though I die!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But the stately women stiffened, and +held themselves more aloof, and towered +even more inaccessibly, with a beauty so +flaming that it hurt. Then their sea-swaying +arms floated down until their slim +white hands rested on the shoulders of +the men. The pearly faces of the women +inclined slightly—not enough to meet the +upward-straining lips of their mates, but +just enough so that they could gaze coldly +but enticingly down. A silvery ripple of +sound floated through the moonlight. The +women were speaking, but what they +were saying Spencer could not tell.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>A strangled flush spread over the faces +of the men, as, lifted by the hands of the +women, they rose slowly, until white now +with a livid whiteness, their lips met in +one passionate, soul-searing embrace.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Tom Spencer drew in a deep breath, +and his fingers clenched, then sprang +open with a sudden gesture of horror, as +he realized that those male heads, so +tightly clinging lip to lip with the beautiful +mist-women, were bodiless! The +green-clad bodies, which had strained so +tautly to thrust their heads up to that kiss +of death, were now slowly slumping, settling +downward, shriveling, turning +brown, drifting away in the swirling +mists which bathed the feet of the majestic +women.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The heads themselves had lost their +realness. The skin had become wrinkled, +leathery, deflated, flabby. The features +were scarcely distinguishable.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then one by one, with a contemptuous +gesture of satiation, the women flung +away the sucked-dry rinds. And Tom +Spencer, his gaze intent upon the expressions +on the women’s faces, took no heed +what became of the cast-off rinds.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>For a subtle change was taking place in +those beautiful but cruel creatures. A certain +matronly smugness coarsened their +features, and they seemed less tall. Yes, +they were visibly shrinking, shrinking +and becoming squat and ugly, shrinking +back into the mists which masked the +muddy pool. All, all returning to the +slime which had spawned them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>All but one! Alone she stood, unmated, +still towering slim and beautiful +in the moonlight. And then Tom Spencer +knew why he had waited, why he had not +gone to any of the others. For, transcendently +beautiful though they had all +been, yet this sole survivor of that glorious +company outshone them all.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Erect she stood, her golden head +thrown back, her arms stretched to each +side and raised a little, so that the filmy +pale green gauze of her gown hung from +them like the wings of a luna moth.</p> + +<hr class='tbk'/> + +<p class='pindent'>Spencer gasped and rose from his +chair. Forgotten were the warnings +of Professor Gordon, as the young man +moved steadily out off the terrace into +the misty moonlight.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Her lips parted, a smile of welcome +overspread her cameo face, and then she +spoke—a tinkly, silver, moonlit, rippling +voice. “Have you been waiting long for +me?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All my life!” breathed Spencer.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She laughed, a friendly, silvery laugh.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Like a sleep-walker, Spencer continued +to plod toward her.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Six-feet one he was, a gridiron star, +and yet this frail, slim wisp of a feminine +creature towered inaccessibly above him +in the mists of the pool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Spencer reached her. He clasped his +arms around her waist, and stretched and +stretched, every sinew of his athletic body +taut with the effort. He raised his heels +from the ground, and strained on tiptoe. +A sigh breathed upward from his lips.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Kiss me! Kiss me!” he pleaded. +“Kiss me, though I die.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But she stiffened, and held herself +more aloof, and towered even more inaccessibly, +while her beauty flamed out so +intensely that it gripped Spencer’s heart +with a stabbing pain.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then her wide-spread arms floated +down, until her slim, cool, white hands +rested on Spencer’s shoulders. Her cameo-cut +face inclined slightly, not enough to +meet the upward-straining lips of the +young man, but merely enough so that +she could gaze coldly but enticingly down +into his eyes.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Like a drowning man, there swept +through his mind the vision of heads +wrenched from male shoulders, sucked +dry, and cast aside; male bodies shriveling +and drifting away. Well, it was +worth it, for that one moment of transcendent +ecstasy. But, at the memory-picture +of the transformation wrought in +the beautiful mist-woman by that long, +passionate embrace, he shuddered momentarily. +However, he would be gone +then—he would not be there to see it. +Once more he strained to reach his beloved.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But the expected strangling wrench on +his neck did not come. Instead the stiff +aloofness of the beautiful girl softened. +An expression of yielding consecration +suffused her lovely face. She leaned, she +bent over him, and floated down into his +arms.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Their lips met and clung.</p> + +<hr class='tbk'/> + +<p class='pindent'>A breeze whipped her moon-green +gown about him. Opening his eyes, +he saw the mists blown away from the +stone bench on which she had been standing, +by the edge of the garden pool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Now, nestled in his arms, she no longer +seemed terrifyingly dominating and aloof, +but instead small and sweet and soft. +And she did not coarsen and sink back +into the slime of the pool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Side by side they sat down together on +the stone bench, his arm about her slender +waist, her golden head against his +shoulder.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>For a long time they sat thus in silence. +Then, “Tom,” she breathed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know my name?” he asked in +surprise.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why not?” she laughed a silvery +moonlit laugh.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Again they sat in silence.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>At last she pushed softly away from +him. “Well, dear,” she said, “it is very +late, and we really ought to be going in.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“In? Into the pool?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, silly! Into the house.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He turned, and seized her by the shoulders, +and stared fixedly down at her in +the moonlight. Then, with a sigh of +gladness, he clasped her to him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’re Natalie Gordon!” he breathed. +“You’re real! And I like you much better +that way.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know what on earth you’re +talking about,” said she, “but it’s all +right with me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She held up her face, and once more +his lips closed on hers, this time in a +wholly human embrace.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76112 ***</div> + </body> + +</html> + diff --git a/76112-h/images/cover.jpg b/76112-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..82889a2 --- /dev/null +++ b/76112-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b5dba15 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This book, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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