The Tomb of Ligeia Page #2

- (door opErns)

- (VErdErn) It's wax.

It's a reproduction.

I managed to make it myself.

You see, I'm loath to open ancient tombs...

...rob a nation of its treasure

and call it archaeology.

It's quite good, really. Twenty... first dynasty?

No, o o, Do o,

o o o o ooooo

You can tell by the eyes.

The eyes...

...they confound me.

There is a blankness,

a mindless sort of malice

in some Egyptian eyes.

They do not readily yield up

the mystery they hold.

Verden... Verden

Hmm?

- You were saying?

- Oh.

Oh, yes, yes. Of course.

Forgive me.

Forgive my reverie.

Lately, I...

I seem to slip into reveries.

The Lady Rowena will join us presently.

And I have much to say to you before she does.

Christopher...

...not ten minutes ago, I...

...I tried to kill a stray cat with a cabbage,

and all but made love to the Lady Rowena.

I succeeded in squashing the cabbage,

and badly frightening the lady.

If only I could lay open my own brain

as easily as I did that vegetable,

what rot would be freed from its grey leaves?

- Let's go for a stroll.

- A stroll?

A walk. What difference does it make? Come on.

- What was she, Kenrick?

- "She", ma'am?

go Po oo o o oo oo,

oo o q o

So, what was she?

- Her hair was black, I believe.

- Do you? Excellent.

lack on one of her heads

and green on the other, perhaps?

- Only one head, madam.

- How disappointing.

ut her eyes, were they gold or silver? Ow

- I don't remember.

- ut she did have eyes, I take it?

(chnuckhEs) Never mind, Kenrick.

If you don't want to talk, I won't pry. Thank you.

I'm sorry, ma'am.

- Are you?

- Yes, ma'am.

Early this day, I found myself standing

once again before Ligeia's grave,

allowing me to observe

a rather singular circumstance.

The date of her death had disappeared

from Ligeia's tombstone,

oo o o o o o Roo

I don't know which confounds me more,

the defacing or the importance you place on it.

- Doesn't it seem odd?

- Yes, it does.

It seems grotesque, in fact. A malicious prank.

- Whose malicious prank?

- Good Lord, Verden, I don't know.

- What are you trying to tell me?

- Simply that it is neither a prank nor malicious.

Look at that stone, Christopher.

Consider what has been cut from the marble.

Not her name... not the inscription...

...only the date of her death.

Where's the date of her birth?

I never knew her age.

And consider, Christopher,

how carefully it has been cut.

Surely not the work of any malicious prank ster.

The ancients carved prophecies

in their stone tombs.

- This prank is also a prophecy.

- Of what? From whom?

- Verden, this is surely...

- Of return, Christopher. Of Ligeia's return.

Vooo

No No,, o o o

These words

were among the last she ever spoke to me...

"Nor lie in death forever."

(VErdErn) "Man need not kneel before the angels

nor lie in death forever,

save for the weakness of his feeble will."

Ligeia's will was as fierce as her...

as her body was frail.

Outwardly calm, even placid...

...she nevertheless pitted herself against death

with a passion words are impotent to convey.

As her body progressively wasted,

she seemed to turn to the very stones

of the abbey for renewed strength,

as if they could sustain

that burning desire for life...

...only for life, that ravaged her

as much as the fever of disease.

In a sense, Ligeia became the abbey.

She never entered or left a room,

never walked down the darkest passageway

without somehow illuminating it

like a single moving candle.

Like a blind man,

I could sense her presence, but not see her

oo o o o oc o c o

Her voice in the rustle of draperies,

the lightness of her footfall

in the fluttering of a moth's wing

against a closed window pane.

Even at the end,

she seemed to have vanquished death.

She smiled and said,

"I will always be your wife...

...your only wife."

"I have willed it."

(VErdErn) Have you ever tried

to recall to memory something forgotten,

oo o o ogo o ooco

...and yet, in the end, been unable to remember?

No

No, if I fear, it's...

...it's for my mind that I fear.

What, after all, is madness, but belief in...

in what does not exist?

I believed in Ligeia, in her will...

...and I believed too well.

Consider the skill and the instruments required

to cut the date of her death from that stone,

and consider my skill with such instruments.

And consider my hand

guilty with marble.

- I cut the date from that stone.

- And you didn't know?

No, not until now.

So, you see, if I fear, it's...

...it's for my mind.

- What? Why now?

- You must get away. You must find something...

- (bEhh tohhs)

(groarns)

(sobs)

(RowErna whnimpErs)

(RowErna wEEps)

(VErdErn) You're safe now, my darling.

You're safe with me

(bEhhs pEah)

(RowErna) When I was a child,

we stayed by the sea.

(VErdErn) I remember little of my childhood.

I lived with my father in the wild country.

- (RowErna) What was your father like?

- (VErdErn) He was a strong man.

His very manner was formed by the landscape.

In his forehead, you could see

the line of the hills against the sky.

(RowErna) I feel I want to begin again with you.

Take me somewhere I've never been before,

somewhere new, for us.

(VErdErn) In Celtic religion,

Stonehenge was a temple to the god of healing.

It was built over,000 years ago,

and do you know why it remains, Rowena?

It was built with a sense of purpose,

stone by stone, like the pyramids in Egypt

or the Aztec towers in Mexico.

- Like our abbey.

- Yes, my dear, yes, like our abbey.

(sighns) Where are we?

It won't be long now.

Christopher reached me by post in Rome.

The papers for the sale of the abbey

are in order.

Tomorrow, we'll have a party

to celebrate our return,

and our leaving.

Well, here we are, my dear.

Come along.

For the moment, this is your home, Rowena.

Welcome home, ma'am.

Yo oo o,

M:

Thank you. Oh, thank you. They're lovely.

Oh, Verden, I...

As long as we stay here, you will be comfortable.

(brushnirng)

Verden?

Verden?

(brushnirng)

I tell you, it's not the fox, Doctor,

it's the hunt. The hunt.

To pit your wits and the hounds'

against animal cunning is more than sport.

- For the fox at any rate.

- (haughns)

Your bride seems

in an unusually reflective mood tonight.

- The journey no doubt tired her.

- Yes. What news on the sale of the abbey?

- Something rather awkward.

- Difficulty over the estate lying in two counties?

No

W, o

The abbey is in Ligeia's name

and I can locate no certificate of her death.

- What can be done?

- Nothing without that.

- There never was a certification.

- ut surely...

The authorities insist

on ascertaining cause of death.

The confusion of the two counties.

Each assumed the other had seen to it.

It's not as simple as that.

The abbey, much of the estate is in her name.

Should this be discovered,

there'll be an inquest, possibly more.

No oo, o oo go o go go

We all hunt for different things

in our lives, aron.

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