“‘Ah, what a marvelous tabernacle! It moves and Goliath follows. It points and Goliath runs after it. An infatuated tabernacle that fancies itself going to Heaven! It is proud. It struts. Goliath shuffles after it like a forlorn little nigger in the wake of a circus. It leaps. And Goliath gallops after it. Aha! he lies on his back impaled. But she!’
[One Hundred Fifty-nine]
“They were on the couch. She sat beside him but her eyes still sought me. Noises issued from Goliath. He rolled on his back, kicking crooked legs and yelping.
“I watched her white body spread over him. Her eyes left me and my rhetoric dwindled into a sigh. I was alone with a spectacle. Goliath, masturbating with a phantom—but not as Mallare had done. No, not as Mallare who had lain indifferent beside his Frankenstein. For Goliath’s arms were around her, his legs entwined her. His body, an insanity in itself, made a mate beneath her more incredible than she. There was silence. Then she screamed!——
“Yes, Mallare closed his eyes. A coldness tip-toed out of his heart. She was laughing. Her laughter entered his ears—a noise that was like a witch’s flight of sound. But who was it laughed? Mallare, Mallare laughed. It was his voice in the phantom that laughed at him. It was his hallucination he had loved that now gave itself to a little monster. And it was his hate that designed this laugh, a thing that [One Hundred Sixty] pierced the heaven in which he sat. Mallare closed his eyes, a God shuddering before His own atheism. Yes, rhetoric now. It is easy to write. My words embroider themselves.
“But then, when the laugh struck Mallare! Ah, there was curious mutiny. They went away. The little Mallares who worship me went away, all but one. The dumb one. Yes, I write of him again. He came to me then and his tears were more horrible than the scream I had heard. His weeping came too close. His weeping grew too loud. His arms embraced me and he held his face too close to mine. And my name rose from his lips.
“I was alone with him and my fingers fought with his throat. This blubberer who had followed me home in the snow, yes this insufferable melancholiac who rained his tears into my Heaven—Mallare would have killed him.
“But he was too sly. He slipped away and sprawled around the room. He beat his hands against walls and tore at his hair. I followed [One Hundred Sixty-one] watching him and coaxing him to come close once more. I smiled at him to come near again. But no, he avoided me. He stood against the curtains facing me and pointing his finger at me. His mouth was open but no sound came from it. There was only the noise of my phantom laughing.
“He stood pointing and I watched my name come like a dead shout from his lip. His throat was alive with my name.
“‘Mallare!’ it said.
“I smiled at him. And I worshipped aloud so that he might hear. I whispered to him to come close—this lugubrious blasphemer who wears my name in his throat. But his face grew white. His arms dropped and he leaned against the curtains. His eyes closed and he fell. The Indifferent One remained. The smile of Mallare remained contemplating the prostrate ones.