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“ ‘I can hear the inhabitants of the house,’ I said to hiood I could feel the leather of ers

“ ‘Then you know that I can hear theh this didn’t contain a hint of reproach, I realized the implications of my oords

“ ‘And if they co him

“ ‘Can’t you tell by my manner that they won’t coht, and never speak of them I want you to know that if we speak of the, and perhaps I looked a little defeated, he said gently that they had long ago sealed off this tower and left it undisturbed; and if in fact they saw the sht in the , none of them would venture up until tomorrow

“I could see now there were several shelves of books at one side of the fireplace, and a writing table The pages on top ilted, but there was an inkstand and several pens I could iine the roo, as it was now, or after the fire had dried out the air

“ ‘You see,’ Armand said, ‘you really have no need of the rooms you have at the hotel You really have need of very little But each of us must decide how much he wants These people in this house have a name for me; encounters with me cause talk for twenty years They are only isolated instants inThey cannot hurt me, and I use their house to be alone No one of the Theatre des Va here This is my secret’

“I had watched hihts which had occurred to ain Vae, and I wondered how his youthful face and ht differ now from what he had been a century before or a century before that; for his face, though not deepened by the lessons of maturity, was certainly no mask It seemed powerfully expressive as was his unobtrusive voice, and I was at a loss finally to fully anatomize why I knew only I was as powerfully drawn to him as before; and to soe ‘But what holds you to the Theatre des Vampires?’ I asked

“ ‘A need, naturally But I’ve found what I need,’ he said ‘Why do you shun me?’

“ ‘I never shunned you,’ I said, trying to hide the excitement these words produced in me ‘You understand I have to protect Claudia, that she has no one but me Or at least she had no one until…’

“ ‘Until Madeleine came to live with you…’

“ ‘Yes…’ I said

“ But now Claudia has released you, yet still you stay with her, and stay bound to her as your paramour,’ he said

“ ‘No, she’s no paramour of mine; you don’t understand,’ I said ‘Rather, she’s my child, and I don’t know that she can release one over and over in my mind ‘I don’t know if

the child possesses the power to release the parent I don’t know that I won’t be bound to her for as long as she…’

“I stopped I was going to say, ‘for as long as she lives’ But I realized it was a hollow mortal cliché She would live forever, as I would live forever But wasn’t it so for hters live forever because these fathers die first I was at a loss suddenly; but conscious all the while of how Armand listened: that he listened in the way that we drea to reflect on everything said He did not start forward to seize onbefore the thought was finished, or to argue with a swift, irresistible iue impossible