Fantazius Mallare: A Mysterious Oath

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Chicago COVICI - MCGEE 1922

First Drawing
antazius Mallare considered himself mad because he was unable to behold in the meaningless gesturings of time, space and evolution a dramatic little pantomime adroitly centered about the routine of his existence. He was a silent looking man with black hair and an aquiline nose. His eyes were lifeless because they paid no homage to the world outside him.
His ideas were profoundly simple. The excitement of his neighborhood, his city, his country and his world left him unmoved. He found no diversion in interpreting them. A friend had once asked him what he thought of democracy. This was during a great war being waged in its behalf. Mallare replied: “Democracy is the honeymoon of stupidity.”
There lived with him as a servant a little monster whom he called Goliath and who was a dwarfed and paralytic negro. Goliath’s age was unknown. His deformities gave him the air of an old man and his hunched back made him seem too massive for a boy. But in studying him Mallare had concluded that he was a boy.
When they left the confetti-electrics of the park behind, Mallare spoke to the dwarf whose wrinkled hand he was holding.
“If you come home with me I will make you a servant and give you a fine red suit to wear. Also, I will call you Goliath for no reason at all, since I am at war with reason.”
Goliath said nothing but sat staring happily out of the window of an automobile as they rode home.
The home of Fantazius Mallare was filled with evidences of his past. There were clay and bronze figures and canvases covered with paintings. These had been the work of his hands. It was to be seen that he had once given himself with violence to the creation of images. And for this reason he was still known among a few people as an artist.
At the time of this curious tragedy Mallare was thirty. He kept a Journal in which he wrote infrequently. There was in this Journal little of interest. Apparently he had amused himself during his youth jotting down items of preposterous unimportance.