The tale of the body thief - By Anne Rice Page 0,113

my neck. Ah, the pain when I lifted my head.

“It tastes so thin. It’s not like blood at all.”

Her lids were heavy and smooth over her downcast eyes. Like a Grecian woman painted by Picasso, so simple she seemed, large-boned and fine and strong. Had anybody ever kissed her nun’s mouth?

“People are dying here, aren’t they? That’s why the corridors are crowded. I hear people crying. It’s an epidemic, isn’t it?”

“It’s a bad time,” she said, her virginal lips barely moving. “But you’ll be all right. I’m here.”

Louis was so angry.

“But why, Lestat?”

Because she was beautiful, because she was dying, because I wanted to see if it would work. Because nobody wanted her and she was there, and I picked her up and held her in my arms. Because it was something I could accomplish, like the little candle flame in the church making another flame and still retaining its own light—my way of creating, my only way, don’t you see? One moment there were two of us, and then we were three.

He was so heartbroken, standing there in his long black cloak, yet he could not stop looking at her, at her polished ivory cheeks, her tiny wrists. Imagine it, a child vampire! One of us.

“I understand.”

Who spoke? I was startled, but it wasn’t Louis, it was David, David standing near with his copy of the Bible. Louis looked up slowly. He didn’t know who David was.

“Are we close to God when we create something out of nothing? When we pretend we are the tiny flame and we make other flames?”

David shook his bead. “A bad mistake.”

“And so is the whole world, then. She’s our daughter—”

“I’m not your daughter. I’m my mama’s daughter.”

“No, dear, not anymore.” I looked up at David. “Well, answer me.”

“Why do you claim such high aims for what you did?” he asked, but he was so compassionate, so gentle. Louis was still horrified, staring at her, at her small white feet. Such seductive little feet.

“And then I decided to do it, I didn’t care what he did with my body if he could put me into this human form for twenty-four hours so that I could see the sunlight, feel what mortals feel, know their weakness and their pain.” I pressed her hand as I spoke.

She nodded, wiping my forehead again, feeling my pulse with her firm warm fingers.

“ … and I decided to do it, simply do it. Oh, I know it was wrong, wrong to let him go with all the power, but can you imagine, and now you see, I can’t die in this body. The others won’t even know what’s happened to me. If they knew, they’d come … ”

“The other vampires,” she whispered.

“Yes.” And then I was telling her all about them, about my search so long ago to find the others, thinking that if I only knew the history of things, it would explain the mystery … On and on I talked to her, explaining us, what we were, all about my trek through the centuries, and then the lure of the rock music, the perfect theatre for me, and what I’d wanted to do, about David and God and the Devil in the Paris café, and David by the fire with the Bible in his hand, saying God is not perfect. Sometimes my eyes were closed; sometimes they were open. She was holding my hand all the while.

People came and went. Doctors argued. A woman was crying. Outside it was light again. I saw it when the door opened, and that cruel blast of cold air swept through the corridor. “How are we going to bathe all these patients?” a nurse asked. “That woman should be in isolation. Call the doctor. Tell him we have a case of meningitis on the floor.”

“It’s morning again, isn’t it? You must be so tired, you’ve been with me all through the afternoon and the night. I’m so scared, but I know you have to go.”

They were bringing in more sick people. The doctor came to her and told her they would have to turn all these gurneys so that their heads were against the wall.

The doctor told her she ought to go home. Several new nurses had just come on duty. She ought to rest.

Was I crying? The little needle hurt my arm, and how dry my throat was, how dry my lips.

“We can’t even officially admit all these patients.”

“Can you hear me, Gretchen?” I asked. “Can you follow what I’m