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“ ‘A na away from him I could see no he’d fooled me, why his shadow had not fallen overdown those stone stairs to sit behindabout hi, and I reminded myself that he could in no way be trusted It seemed to me then that Armand, with his hypnotic power, aimed in some way for the maximum truth in presentation of himself: he had drawn out of me without words my state of mind But this vampire was a liar And I could feel his power, a crude, pounding power that was al as Armand

“ ‘You come to Paris in search of us, and then you sit alone on the stairs…’ he said, in a conciliatory tone ‘Why don’t you come up with us? Why don’t you speak to us and talk to us of this person whose name you spoke; I knoho it was, I know the name’

“ ‘You don’t know, you couldn’t know It was a mortal,’ I said now, ht of Lestat disturbed ht that this creature should know of Lestat’s death

“ ‘You came here to ponder mortals, justice done to mortals?’ he asked; but there was no reproach or mockery in his tone

“ ‘I came to be alone, let me not offend you It’s a fact,’ I murmured

“ ‘But alone in this frame of mind, when you don’t even hear my steps… I like you I want you to come upstairs’ And as he said this, he slowly pulled me to my feet beside him

“At that ht into the passage I heard hi there baffled Armand appeared at the foot of the steps, with Claudia in his arms She had that sa my talk with Armand It was as if she were deep in her own considerations and saw nothing around her; and I re what to think of it, that it persisted even now I took her quickly froainstto that paralytic sleep

“And then, with a powerful thrust of his aro away It seeain only to have Armand pull hi so swiftly I could only see the blur of their gar of their boots Then Armand stood alone at the head of the steps, and I went upward towards him

“ ‘You cannot safely leave the theater tonight,’ he whispered to ht you here, he feels that it is his right to know you better Our security depends on it’ He guided me slowly into the ballroom But then he turned to me and pressed his lips almost to my ear: ‘I must warn you Answer no questions Ask and you open one bud of truth for yourself after another But give nothing, nothing, especially concerning your origin’

“Hefor us to follow into the glooathered, clustered like remote marble statues, their faces and hands all too like our own I had the strong sense then of hoere all ht which had only occurred toyears in New Orleans; and it disturbed me, particularly when I saw one ormirrors that broke the density of those awful murals

“Claudia seemed to awaken as I found one of the carved oak chairs and settled into it She leaned towards ely incoherent, which see of our origin I wanted to talk with her now, but I could see that tall va slowly froathered around Ar as I saw them put their arms around his waist And what appalled me as I watched was not their exquisite forlass by va eyes which fixed on me now in a sudden silence; what appalled me was my own fierce jealousy I was afraid when I saw them so close to him, afraid when he turned and kissed theht them near to me noas unsure and confused

“Estelle and Celeste are the names I remember, porcelain beauties, who fondled Claudia with the license of the blind, running their hands over her radiant hair, touching even her lips, while she, her eyes stillwhat I also knew and what they seerasp: that a woman’s mind as sharp and distinct as their own lived within that s about for the coldly at their adoration, how otten, spoken to her as if she were the child, fondled her too freely, brought her into my arms with an adult’s abandon My ht in the Hotel Saint-Gabriel, which seeo, when she talked of love with rancor;shock at Armand’s revelations or lack of them; and a quiet absorption of the varotesque murals For I could learna question, and vampire life in Paris was all that I’d feared it to be, all that the little stage in the theater above had indicated it was

“ ‘The dis appreciated in full, added to al or picture by a contemporary artist into the house Celeste, with her cold hand on inators of these pictures, and Estelle, who now held Claudia on her lap, emphasized to me, the naive colonial, that vampires had not made such horrors the over and over that reater evil than vampires

“ ‘There is evil in s?’ Claudia asked softly in her toneless voice

“Celeste threw back her black curls and laughed