The Slender Poe Anthology by Edgar Allan Poe Read Free Book Online Page B

walls,falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue. Butin this chamber only, the color of the windows failed to correspond withthe decorations. The panes here were scarlet — a deep blood color. Now inno one of the seven apartments was there any lamp or candelabrum, amidthe profusion of golden ornaments that lay scattered to and fro ordepended from the roof. There was no light of any kind emanating fromlamp or candle within the suite of chambers. But in the corridorsthat followed the suite, there stood, opposite to each window, a heavytripod, bearing a brazier of fire that projected its rays through thetinted glass and so glaringly illumined the room. And thus were produceda multitude of gaudy and fantastic appearances. But in the western orblack chamber the effect of the fire-light that streamed upon the darkhangings through the blood-tinted panes, was ghastly in the extreme, andproduced so wild a look upon the countenances of those who entered,that there were few of the company bold enough to set foot within itsprecincts at all.
    It was in this apartment, also, that there stood against the westernwall, a gigantic clock of ebony. Its pendulum swung to and fro with adull, heavy, monotonous clang; and when the minute-hand made the circuitof the face, and the hour was to be stricken, there came from thebrazen lungs of the clock a sound which was clear and loud and deep andexceedingly musical, but of so peculiar a note and emphasis that, ateach lapse of an hour, the musicians of the orchestra were constrainedto pause, momentarily, in their performance, to hearken to the sound;and thus the waltzers perforce ceased their evolutions; and there was abrief disconcert of the whole gay company; and, while the chimes of theclock yet rang, it was observed that the giddiest grew pale, and themore aged and sedate passed their hands over their brows as if inconfused reverie or meditation. But when the echoes had fully ceased,a light laughter at once pervaded the assembly; the musicians looked ateach other and smiled as if at their own nervousness and folly, and madewhispering vows, each to the other, that the next chiming of the clockshould produce in them no similar emotion; and then, after the lapse ofsixty minutes, (which embrace three thousand and six hundred seconds ofthe Time that flies,) there came yet another chiming of the clock,and then were the same disconcert and tremulousness and meditation asbefore.
    But, in spite of these things, it was a gay and magnificent revel.The tastes of the duke were peculiar. He had a fine eye for colors andeffects. He disregarded the decora of mere fashion. His plans were boldand fiery, and his conceptions glowed with barbaric lustre. There aresome who would have thought him mad. His followers felt that he was not.It was necessary to hear and see and touch him to be sure that he wasnot.
    He had directed, in great part, the moveable embellishments of the sevenchambers, upon occasion of this great f ê te ; and it was his own guidingtaste which had given character to the masqueraders. Be sure theywere grotesque. There were much glare and glitter and piquancy andphantasm — much of what has been since seen in “Hernani.” There werearabesque figures with unsuited limbs and appointments. There weredelirious fancies such as the madman fashions. There was much of thebeautiful, much of the wanton, much of the bizarre, something of theterrible, and not a little of that which might have excited disgust.To and fro in the seven chambers there stalked, in fact, a multitude ofdreams. And these — the dreams — writhed in and about, taking hue from therooms, and causing the wild music of the orchestra to seem as the echoof their steps. And, anon, there strikes the ebony clock which stands inthe hall of the velvet. And then, for a moment, all is still, and all issilent save the voice of the clock. The dreams are stiff-frozen as theystand. But the echoes of the chime