the Last -
Struck Down by the Lawless,
in the Pursuit of His Duty.
Sorely Missed, but Alive
in Our Memories,
Always.
A very sad thing. But the babbling creature in its grave was sadder by far ...
It was just as simple as Sir Keenan Gormley had tried to forewarn: the dead couldn't console him. Derek Stevens couldn't come to terms with his demise, wouldn't accept it, wasn't going to lie still for it. And despite that he knew in his innermost being (or unbeing) that he was dead, still he fought against it and cried his horror of it, until his plot and the entire graveyard reverberated with his silent shrieking and his coffin wasn't merely a box but a cel in a subterranean asylum.
An asylum in the worst possible sense of the word, that of the madhouse.
A madman? Harry asked of the dead moaning in their graves.
Driven mad by grief, frustration and horror, Necroscope! a shuddering voice answered. For the living aren't alone in their capacity for grief. We also mourn -for the absence of all the loved ones we left behind,, who don't know that we're still down here ... and must never know! Else they'd sit by our graves all day, and their brief sojourn in the land of the living would be wasted no less than ours in the darkness of death ...
So taken aback by the sheer soulfullness of it, the doom-fraught feeling in the voice, for a little while the Necroscope said nothing. But then:
Excuse me, Sir, for I don't know you, (Harry respectfully shielded his thoughts from the rest of the cemetery's dwellers in order to speak to this one alone). But I do know that while you are in the majority, still you are of a minority: a defeatist among optimists. For while I've spoken to a great many dead men, I honestly can't say I ever before heard the ... condition or the lot of the teeming dead expressed so mournfully, so hopelessly as you express it. Even vampires, who have lost not only life but undeath and immortality, too, seem a deal more accepting of their station than you are of yours! Which isn't so much to put you down as to inquire ... well, what is it that's made you this way?
For a moment the other was silent, perhaps shocked. Could this really be the Necroscope, whose compassion was universally acclaimed? Harry sensed the stiffness in the unquiet night, and to his relief felt its gradual easing. Until eventually: You're right, of course, said the unknown voice, but without its hopeless tremor now, stoic in the modern sense, yet submissive when faced with the truth. You must forgive me my doubts and my regrets, Harry, my lack of conviction. Ah, but it comes hard for a preacher to be preached to, for a man of the Faith to discover himself faithless! Made to discover it, and by one so young at that! And yet you're so - persuasive! You put it so very well! Perhaps you should have taken the cloth and been a preacher? Or maybe you'd make a better philosopher. Have you studied philosophy, Harry?
Some, the Necroscope answered, which was at least in part the truth. Or rather, I've played a few word-games in my time. And with experts, too. I know how to argue, if that's what you mean. He explained no further than that. But on the other hand, what the dead man had said to him explained a great deal.
Al of his life this man had preached of a God and a life after death. But now, in death ... where was He? Why had He not taken these souls to His bosom? Neither Necroscope nor preacher could answer that question; but in fact He had claimed them, or would eventually. Except Harry had always had his doubts, which this apparent delay in the promised deliverance only served to exacerbate. The whole truth of the matter was something he was yet to discover, albeit in another world, another time.
Harry's thoughts on the preacher's predicament were like spoken words, which the dead man answered. Again you are right. For if I thought it hard to convince my flock in life, how much harder in death, when the anticipated resurrection is not?
Harry nodded. It must be difficult, yes. But you do still talk like a priest.
I still think like one, deep down inside! It's just that now, well, my words seem so futile, so empty. Even to me, sometimes! And