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.Indeed, they might be looking for me right now.That was more than a good possibility.They might be out there in a pirogue with flashlights and lanterns.“Didn’t that argue for me staying where I was?“I set the plate of light down on the desk, and I went out the front door, down the steps, and crossed the clearing before the Hermitage so that I stood near to the bank.“It was quite amazing how the few candles illuminated the windows of the Hermitage.Indeed, nobody coming close in a pirogue could have missed it.Maybe it was best to sit tight.“But if so, why did it seem such a cowardly decision? Why did I feel I should get back to reassure those who loved me that I was all right?“I checked in the pirogue.No, I did not have a flashlight or lantern.Big surprise.“Then I peered into the swamp.I tried to see what lay before me.I tried to make out the small channel by which I had come to this point.I could see nothing in the blackness.“I walked around the island as best I could.Why precisely I wasn’t sure.Maybe I wanted to feel that I was doing something, and I listened, listened very carefully in case anyone out there was calling my name.“Of course I heard the countless night birds and low gurgling noises coming from the water, but there was no human voice.“I came back to the point where I’d tied up the pirogue and there stood Goblin, my perfect mirror image, watching me intently, his figure apparently illuminated, just as if it was solid, by the candlelight that came from the house.“What a marvelous spectacle, it seemed to me, that could create such an illusion, and I racked my brain to remember if he had ever done something so spectacular before.“I had seen him in shadows, in darkness and in light, of course, but never had I seen light falling on him, outlining his shoulder and his face.He made a sudden gesture with his right hand, beckoning me to come closer to where he stood.“ ‘What do you want?’ I asked.‘You don’t mean to tell me you’re going to be useful.’ I moved towards him and he reached out with his left arm to guide me in a turn.Then he pointed out into the swamp.“For a moment I was only aware of a distant pool of moonlight—that is, an opening in the thick growth many yards from where we stood, where the water sparkled with clear radiance.Then I heard the sound of lapping.And Goblin’s left hand tightened on my arm, and he made the symbol to me with his right index finger that I should be very quiet.“Again he pointed to this distant spot of visibility, and into it glided a pirogue apparently helmed by one man.And quite distinctly I made out the figure of that man.“He wore a jacket and trousers, perhaps jeans for all I could see, and as I watched with Goblin he lifted up a human body from the pirogue and slipped it into the water slowly with hardly a splash!“I was confounded.Goblin hurt my shoulder he squeezed it so tight.“The distant figure now appeared to do the same thing again.With inconceivable dexterity and strength he lifted another body and dropped it down into the muck.“I stood stock-still.I was horrified.The thought of danger to myself didn’t even occur to me.What filled my mind was the bitter sense that two dead bodies had just been fed to the swamp’s lethal darkness, and no one, no one, would believe me when I returned home with this tale.“Only gradually did I realize that the figure was now motionless and in all probability facing me, and that he looked on steadily and that Goblin and I were partially illuminated for the figure by the candles in the house.“Across the black water there came a sound of laughter.It was low, simmering, as the voices of my visions had been simmering, but it was real, this laughter, it wasn’t spectral.It came from the figure.“And as I watched, as Goblin and I watched together, the figure guided his pirogue into the blackness and was gone.“For some long agonizing moments Goblin and I stood together, and it was more than a comfort to feel Goblin’s left arm around me, and to rest my weight against him in an intimacy I would never have shown with a human being.“But I knew he couldn’t keep up the solid shape for very long [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]