Fevre Dream Page 0,131

Captain Marsh. And strong. I admire you."

"Can't say I got much use for you."

Julian laughed. His laughter was pure music. His dark eyes shone. "Amusing," he said. "Such bluster."

"I don't know why you're tryin' to butter me up, but it ain't goin' to do you no good. All the fried chicken in the world ain't goin' to make me forget what you did to that damned baby, and to Mister Jeffers."

"You seem to forget that Jeffers had just run me through with a sword," Julian said. "That is not something one takes lightly."

"That baby didn't have no sword."

"A slave," Julian said lightly. "Property, by the laws of your own nation. Inferior, according to your own people. I spared it a life of bondage, Captain."

"Go to hell," said Marsh. "It was just a damned baby, and you cut off its hand like you was cutting the head off a chicken, and then you crushed its head in. It didn't do nothin' to you."

"No," said Julian. "Nor did Jean Ardant harm you or your people. Yet you and your mate crushed his skull in while he slept."

"We thought he was you."

"Ah," said Julian. He smiled. "A mistake, then. But whether you acted in error or not, you slaughtered an innocent man. You do not seem unduly consumed by guilt."

"He wasn't no man. He was one of you. A vampire."

Julian frowned. "Please. I share Joshua's distaste for that term."

Marsh shrugged.

"You contradict yourself, Captain Marsh," Julian said. "You judge me evil, for doing what you do without compunction-taking the lives of those unlike yourself. No matter. You defend your own kind. You even include the dark races. I admire that, you see. You know what you are, you understand your place, your nature. That is as it should be. You and I, we are alike in that"

"I ain't nothin' like you," Marsh said.

"Ah, but you are! We accept our natures, you and I, we do not seek to become things we are not, things we were never meant to be. I despise the weak, the changelings who so hate themselves that they must pretend to be something else. You feel the same way."

"I do not"

"No? Why do you hate Sour Billy so?"

"He's contemptible."

"Of course he is!" Julian looked highly amused. "Poor Billy is weak, and thirsts to be strong. He will do anything to be one of my people. Anything. I have known others like him, so many others. They are useful, often entertaining, but never admirable. You despise Billy because he apes our race and preys on your own, Captain Marsh. Dear Joshua feels the same way, little realizing that in Billy he sees his own reflection."

"Joshua and Billy Tipton ain't nothin' alike," Marsh said stoutly. "Billy is a goddamned weasel. Joshua's maybe done some vile things, but he's tryin' to make up for them. He would have helped you all."

"He would have made us as you are. Captain Marsh, your own nation is terribly divided on this issue of slavery, a slavery based on race. Suppose you could end it. Suppose you had a way to turn every white man in this land soot-black overnight. Would you do it?"

Abner Marsh scowled. He didn't much like the idea of turning soot-black, but he saw where Julian was heading and he didn't much want to go there either. So he said nothing.

Damon Julian sipped his wine and smiled. "Ah," he said. "You see. Even your abolitionists admit the dark races are inferior. They would have no patience with a slave trying to pretend at being white, and they would be disgusted if a white man should drink a potion in order to turn black. I did not hurt that slave child from malice, Captain Marsh. There is no malice in me. I did it to reach Joshua, dear Joshua. He is beautiful, but he sickens me.

"You are another case. Did you truly fear that I would harm you that night in August? Oh, perhaps I would have, in my pain and rage. But not before. Beauty draws me, Captain Marsh, and you have none of that" He laughed. "I don't think I've ever seen an uglier man. You are gross, rolling with fat, coveted with coarse hair and warts, you stink of sweat, you have a flat nose and a pig's eyes, your teeth are crooked and stained. You could no more wake the thirst in me than Billy could. Yet you are strong, and you have a gross courage, and you know your