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"Yes," Azriel answered I marveled that his eyebrows could be so thick, beautiful and brooding, and yet his entle as he smiled There was no double to die in her place He killed his own stepdaughter

"That's when I came, you see," he went on "That's when I came out of the darkness as if called by the master sorcerer, only there was none I appeared fully for down the New York street, only to witness her death, her cruel death, and to kill those who killed her"

"The three men? The men who stabbed Esther Belkin?" He didn't answer I remembered The men had been stabbed with their own ice picks only a block and a half away from the crime So thick was the crowd on Fifth Avenue that day that no one even connected the deaths of three street toughs with the slaughter of the beautiful girl inside the fashionable store of Henri Bendel Only the next day had the ice picks told the story of blood, her blood on three, their blood on the one chosen by someone to do aith them

"I suppose I thought it was part of his plot, then," I said "She was killed by terrorists, he said, and he had disposed of those hencher"

"No, those henchet away, so that he could er But I came there, and I killed theh thebefore she died, theof the ambulance that came to take her away, and she said my name: 'Azriel' "

"Then she called you"

"No, she was no sorceress; she didn't know the words She didn't have the Bones I was the Servant of the Bones" He fell back in the chair Quiet, looking at the fire, his eyes fierce and thick with dark curling eyelashes, the bones of his forehead strong as the line of his jaw

After a long tiht and innocent boyish smile "You're well now, Jonathan You're cured of your fever" He laughed

"Yes," I said I lay back enjoying the dry war oak I drank the coffee until I tasted the grounds in my teeth, then I put the cup on the circular stone hearth "Will you let me record what you tell me?" I asked

The light shone bright in his face again With a boy's enthusiasm, he leant forward in the chair, his massive hands on his knees "Would you do it? Would you write dohat I tell you?"

"I have a machine," I said, "that will remember every word for us"

"Oh, yes, I know," he said He smiled contentedly and put his head back "You mustn't think me an addlebrained spirit, Jonathan The Servant of the Bones was never that

"I wasspirit, I was ht forth, I knew all that I should know-of the tie, of the ways of the world near and far-all I need to know to serve my Master"

I begged him to wait "Let me turn on our little recorder," I said

It felt good to stand up, for my head not to swim, for my chest not to ache, and for most of the blur of the fever to have been banished

I put doo sh one I checked their batteries and that the stones were not too warm for them, and I put the tape cassettes inside and then I said, "Tell me" I pressed the buttons so that both little ears would be on full alert "And letforman to me, no more than twenty You've a hairy chest and hair on your arms, and it's dark and healthy, and your skin is an olive tone, and the hair of your head is lustrous and I would think the envy of women"