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I waited, wondering if I should force him to speak first. But then that's never been my favorite game. He was studying me very intensely, infinitely more intensely than I had studied him. He was memorizing me, using little devices he'd learned to record details so that he would remember them later no matter how great the shock of an experience while it was going on.
Tall, not heavy, not slender either. A good build. Large, very well-formed hands. Very well groomed, too. A true British gentleman; a lover of tweed and leather and dark woods, and tea, and dampness and the dark park outside, and the lovely wholesome feeling of this house.
And his age, sixty-five or so. A very good age. He knew things younger men just could not possibly know. This was the modern equivalent of Marius's age in ancient times. Not really old for the twentieth century at all.
Louis was still in the other room, but he knew Louis was there. He looked towards the doorway now. And then back to me.
Then he rose, and surprised me utterly. He extended his hand.
"How do you do?" he said.
I laughed. I took his hand and shook it firmly and politely, observing his reactions, his astonishment when he felt how cold my flesh was; how lifeless in any conventional sense.
He was frightened all right. But he was also powerfully curious; powerfully interested.
Then very agreeably and very courteously he said, "Jesse isn't dead, is she?"
Amazing what the British do with language; the nuances of politeness. The world's great diplomats, surely. I found myself wondering what their gangsters were like. Yet there was such grief there for Jesse, and who was I to dismiss another being's grief?
I looked at him solemnly. "Oh, yes," I said. "Make no mistake about it. Jesse is dead. " I held his gaze firmly; there was no misunderstanding. "Forget about Jesse," I said. He gave a little nod, eyes glancing off for a moment, and then he looked at me again, with as much curiosity as before. I made a little circle in the center of the room. Saw Louis back there in the shadows, standing against the side of the bedroom fireplace watching me with such scorn and disapproval. But this was no time to laugh. I didn't feel at all like laughing. I was thinking of something Khayman had told me. "I have a question for you now," I said. "Yes. "
"I'm here. Under your roof. Suppose when the sun rises, I go down into your cellar. I slip into unconsciousness there. You know. " I made a little offhand gesture. "What would you do? Would you kill me while I slept?" He thought about it for less than two seconds.
"No. "
"But you know what I am. There isn't the slightest doubt in your mind, is there? Why wouldn't you?"
"Many reasons," he said. "I'd want to know about you. I'd want to talk to you. No, I wouldn't kill you. Nothing could make me do that. " I studied him; he was telling the truth completely. He didn't elaborate on it, but he would have thought it frightfully callous and disrespectful to kill me, to kill a thing as mysterious and old as I was.
"Yes, precisely," he said, with a little smile.
Mind reader. Not very powerful however. Just the surface thoughts.
"Don't be so sure. " Again it was said with remarkable politeness.
"Second question for you," I said.
"By all means. " He was really intrigued now. The fear had absolutely melted away.
"Do you want the Dark Gift? You know. To become one of us. " Out of the corner of my eye I saw Louis shake his head. Then he turned his back. "I'm not saying that I'd ever give it you. Very likely, I would not. But do you want it? If I was willing, would you accept it from me?"
"No. "
"Oh, come now. "
"Not in a million years would I ever accept it. As God is my witness, no. "
"You don't believe in God, you know you don't. "
"Merely an expression. But the sentiment is true. "
I smiled. Such an affable, alert face. And I was so exhilarated; the blood was moving through my veins with a new vigor; I wondered if he could sense it; did I look any less like a monster? Were there all those little signs of humanity that I saw in others of our kind when they were exuberant or absorbed?
"I don't think it will take a million yea
rs for you to change your mind," I said. "You don't have very much time at all, really. When you think about it. "
"I will never change my mind," he said. He smiled, very sincerely. He was holding his pen in both hands. And he toyed with it, unconsciously and anxiously for a second, but then he was still.
