The next morning I awoke with a most peculiar feeling, and I immediately resolved to share my latest thoughts on our immortality experiments and the public presentation thereof. These thoughts were so recent that they had not yet fully formed in my mind, but I nevertheless went to my study (which had become Prof. Glauben’s bedroom) with the full intention of announcing my new opinions as they revealed themselves to me.
When I entered the room, which was bathed in the soft sunlight of morning, I saw the earthly remains of Prof. Glauben occupying the armchair in the same position in which I had left him the previous night. I walked over to the skeleton, a pleasant smile on my face, and listened to myself speak.
“My dear Professor, upon careful consideration, I have chosen to accept your suggestion that we present our discovery–and yourself–to a suitable audience.” The skull inclined upward to me with, I imagined, a look of bewilderment. “Does you mean zhis, Venwick?” I searched for a reply, but I was not even certain of what I had just said. My mouth, however, replied immediately. “Of course I mean it,” I heard myself say, “and the presentation shall be tomorrow night.” Prof. Glauben’s skull displayed an expression of disbelief, then of hope, and finally of elation. He jumped up from the chair and embraced me with his cold, bony arms. “You have chosen vell, mein boy! Sank you! Ve vill be famous und revered scientists!”
I must admit that I was affected by the emotion of the moment. I was pleased that I had lifted my friend from his misery. To look back on the conditions under which the poor creature suffered touched my heartstrings, and it hurt me worse to remember that so much of it was brought about by me. He had spent time in prison, not I, though we were both equally guilty of our wretched volunteer’s death. He alone had to suffer the horrors of a premature burial. He had been forced, by me, from the solitude and peace of the grave, only so that he could hide as a recluse away from his fellow man. And to make his misery complete, I had tried to deny him some much-deserved recognition of his work. It was with relief, therefore, that I now assured his tormented bones that I would begin making immediate preparations for tomorrow’s presentation, with him as the guest of honor. I went to bed that evening much relieved, yet with a vague feeling of dark foreboding.
PART 9 WILL APPEAR ON FRIDAY
Chasing Phantoms 