Dracula's Guest & Other Weird Tales - The Squaw

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Squaw by Bram Stoker. This is a LibriVox recording.
All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recorded
by David Houston. Nurrenberg. At the time was not so
much exploited as it has been since then. Irving had
not been playing faust, and the very name of the

(00:22):
old town was hardly known to the great bulk of
the traveling public. My wife and I, being in the
second week of our honeymoon, naturally wants some one else
to join our party, so that when the cheery stranger
Elias P. Hutcheson, hailing from Isthmian City, Bleeding Gulch, Maple
Tree County, Nebraska, turned up at the station at Frankfort
and casually remarked that he was going on to see

(00:43):
the most all fired old Methuselah of a town in Europe,
and that he guessed that so much traveling alone was
enough to send an intelligent, active citizen into the melancholy
ward of a daft house. We took the pretty broad
hint and suggested that we should join forces. We found
on comparing notes afterwards that we had each intended to
speak with some diffidence or hesitation, so as not to

(01:05):
appear too eager, such not being a good compliment to
the success of our married life. But the effect was
entirely marred by her both beginning to speak at the
same instant, stopping simultaneously, and then going on together again. Anyhow,
no matter how it was done, and Elias P. Hutcheson
became one of our party straightway, Amelia and I found
the pleasant benefit instead of quarreling as we had been doing,

(01:26):
We found that the restraining influence of a third party
was such that we now took every opportunity of spooning
in odd corners. Amelia declares that ever since she has,
as the result of that experience, advised all her friends
to take a friend on the honeymoon. Well, we did
Nuremberg together and much enjoyed the racy remarks of our
transatlantic friend, who, from his quaint speech and his wonderful

(01:46):
stock of adventures, might have stepped out of a novel.
We heard from the last object of interest in the
city to be visited, the Burg, and on the day
appointed for the visit, strolled around the outer wall of
the city by the eastern side. The burg is seated
on a rock dominating the town, and an immensely deep
foss guards it on the northern side. Nuremberg has been

(02:07):
happy in that it was never sacked. Had it been,
it would certainly not be so spick and span perfect
as it is at present. The ditch has not been
used for centuries, and now its base is spread with
tea gardens and orchards, of which some of the trees
are of quite respectable growth. As we wandered round the wall,
dawdling in the hot July sunshine, we often pause to

(02:28):
admire the views spread before us, and in especial the
great plain, covered with towns and villages, and bounded with
a blue line of hills, like a landscape of Claude, Lorraine.
From this we always turn with new delight to the
city itself, with its myriad of quaint old gables and
acre wide red roofs dotted with dormer windows, tier upon tier.

(02:48):
A little to our right rose the towers of the Burg,
and nearer, still standing grim the Torture Tower, which was
and is perhaps the most interesting place in the city
for centuries. The tradition of the iron version of Nurnberg
has been handed down as an instance of the horrors
of cruelty of which man is capable. We had long
looked forward to seeing it, and here at last was

(03:09):
its home. In one of our pauses, we leaned over
the wall the mountain looked down. The garden seemed quite
fifty or sixty feet below us, and the sun pouring
into it with an intense, moveless heat, like that of
an oven. Beyond rose the garden grim wall, seemingly of
endless height and losing itself right and left in the
angles of bastion and counterscarp trees and bushes crowned the wall,

(03:31):
and above again towered the lofty houses on whose massive
beauty time has only set the hand of approval. The
sun was hot, and we were lazy. Time was our own,
and we lingered leaning on the wall. Just below us
was a pretty sight, a great black cat lying stretched
in the sun, which drowned her gambled pretty a tiny
black kitten. The mother would wave her tail for the

(03:51):
kitten to play with, or would raise her feet and
push away the little one as an encouragement to further play.
They were just at the foot of the wall and
elias P hutcheson in order to help the play, stooped
and took from the walk a moderate sized pebble. See,
he said, I will drop it near the kitten, and
they will both wonder where it came from. Oh, be careful,

(04:11):
said my wife. You might hit the dear little thing.
Not me, ma'am, said elias P. Why I'm as tender
as a main cherry tree. Lord bless you, I wouldn't
hurt the poor pooty little critter, more nut scalp a baby,
And you may bet your very gay socks on that. See.
I'll drop it fur away on the outside, so it's
not to go so near. Thus saying, he leaned over

(04:31):
and held his arm out at full length, and drop
the stone. It may be that there is some attractive
force which draws lesser matters to greater, or more probably
that the wall was not plump, but sloped to its base.
We not noticing the inclination from above. But the stone
fell with a sickening thud that came up to us
through the hot air, right on the kitten's head and

(04:51):
shattered out its little brains. Then and there the black
cat cast a swift upward glance, and we saw her
eyes like green fire, fixed in an instant on Elias
p hutcheson. And then her attention was given to the kitten,
which lay still with just a quiver of her tiny limbs,
whilst a thin red stream trickled from a gaping wound.
With a muffled cry such as a human being might give.

(05:12):
She bent over the kitten, licking its wounds and moaning.
Suddenly she seemed to realize it was dead, and again
threw up her eyes at us. I shall never forget
the sight, for she looked the perfect incarnation of hate.
Her green eyes blazed with lurid fire, and the white
sharp teeth seemed to almost shine through the blood which
dabbled her mouth and whiskers. She gnashed her teeth, and

(05:34):
her claws stood out, stark and at full length on
every paw. Then she made a wild rush up the wall,
as if to reach us. When the momentum ended, fell
back and further added to her horrible appearance, for she
fell upon the kitten and rose with her black furs
smeared with its brains of blood. Amelia turned quite faint,
and I had to lift her back from the wall.
There was a seat close by in shade of a

(05:55):
spreading plane tree, and here I placed her whilst she
composed herself. Then I went back to Hutcheson, who stood
without moving, looking down on the angry cat below. As
I joined him, he said, well, I guess that air
the savagest beast I ever see set Once when Apache
Squaw had an edge on a half breathe, which they
nick named Splinters, cause the way he fixed up her papoose,

(06:18):
which he stole on a raid, just to show they
appreciate the way they'd given his mother the fire torture.
She got that kind of look so set on her
face that it just seemed to grow. There. She falls
Splinters more'n three years till at last the brave's gone
and handed him over to her. They did say it,
no man white Ora Injun had ever been so long
doing under the torches the apaches. The only time I

(06:38):
ever seen her smile was when I wiped her out.
I came on the camp just in time to see
Splinter's pass in his checks, and it wasn't sorry to
go either. He was a hard citizen, though one never
could shake with him. After that papoose business. What was
bitter bad, and he should have been a white man,
for he looked like one. I see you got pay
out in full during me. But I took a piece
of his hive from one of his skin imposts and

(06:59):
had made into a pocketbook. It's here now, and he
slapped the breast pocket of his coat. Whilst he was speaking,
the cat was continuing her frantic efforts to get up
the wall. She would take a run back and then
charge up, sometimes reaching an incredible height. She did not
seem to mind the heavy fall which she had each time,
but started with renewed vigor, and at every tumble her

(07:20):
appearance became more horrible. Hutcheson was a kind hearted man.
My wife and I had both noticed little lacks of
kindness to animals as well as to persons, and he
seemed concerned at the state of fury to which the
cat had wrought herself. Wow now, he said, I do
declare that our poor career seems quite desperate there there,
poor thing. It was all an accident, though that won't

(07:40):
bring back your little one to you say, I wouldn't
have had such a thing happen for a thousand just
shows what a clumsy fool of a man can do
when he tries to play. Seems I'm too darned slipperhanded
to even play with a cat, say Colonel, it was
a pleasant way he had to bestow titles freely. I
hope your wife don't hold no grudge against me on
count of this pleasantness. Why I wouldn't have had to

(08:02):
occur on no account. He came over to Amelia and
apologized profusely, and she, with her usual kindness of heart,
hastened to assure him that she quite understood that it
was an accident. Then we all went again to the
wall and looked over the cat. Missing Huncheson's face drawn
back across the moat, and was sitting on her haunches
as though ready to spring. Indeed, the very instant she

(08:22):
saw him, she did spring with a blind and reasoning fury,
which would have been grotesque only that it was so
frightfully real. She did not try to run up the wall,
but simply launched herself at him, as though hate and
fury could lead her wings to pass straight through the
great distance between them. Amelia womanlike, got quite concerned and
said to Elia's p in a warning voice, oh you

(08:43):
must be very careful. That animal would try to kill
you if she were here. Her eyes looked like positive murder,
he laughed out jovially. Excuse me, ma'am, he said, I
can't help but laughing. Fancy a man that has fought
grizzlies and injuns being careful of being murdered by a cat.
When the cat heard him laugh, her whole demeanor seemed
to change. She no longer tried to jump or run

(09:04):
up the wall, but went quietly over, and, sitting again
beside the dead kitten, began to lick and farmwood as
though it were alive. See said I the effect of
a really strong man. Even that animal, in the midst
of her fury, recognizes the voice of a master and
bows to him like a squaw, was the only comment
of Elias P. Hutcheson. As we moved on our way

(09:25):
around the city Foss, every now and then we looked
over the wall, and each time we saw the cat
following us. At first, she had kept going back to
the dead kitten, and then, as a distance grew greater,
took it in her mouth and so followed. After a while, however,
she abandoned this, for we saw her following all along,
she had evidently hidden the body somewhere. Amelia's alarm grew

(09:45):
at the cat's persistence, and more than once she repeated
her warning, but the American always laughed with amusement, till finally,
seeing that she's beginning to be worried, he said, I say, ma'am,
you needn't be scared over that cat. I go heeled,
I do, He slapped his pistol pocket at the back
of his lumber region. Why sooner and have you worry?
I'll shoot the critter right here and risk the police

(10:07):
interference with the citizen in the United States for carrying
arms contrary regulations. As he spoke, he looked over the wall,
but the cat, on seeing him, retreated with a growl
into a bed of tall flowers and was hidden. He
went on, blessed that our career aint got no more
sense of what is good for her than most Christians.
I guess we've seen a last of her. You bet
she'll go back now to that busted kitten and have

(10:28):
a private funeral of it. All orse, Amelia did not
want to say more, lest he might have mistaken kindness
to her. Fulfill his threat of shooting the cat, And
so she went on and crossed the little wooden bridge
leading into the gateway, whence ran the steep paved roadway
between the burg and the pentagonal torture tower. As we
crossed the bridge, we saw the cat again down below us.

(10:49):
When she saw us, her fury seemed to return, and
she made frantic efforts to get up the steep wall.
Hutchison laughed as he looked down at her and said, goodbye,
old girl. Sorry I injured feet, but you'll get over
it in time. So long, and then we passed through
the long dim archway and came to the gate of
the burg. When we came out again our survey of

(11:09):
this most beautiful old place, which not even the well
intentioned efforts the Gothic restorers of forty years ago had
been able to spoil. Though their restoration was then glaring white,
we seemed to have forgotten the unpleasant episode of the morning.
The old lime tree, with its great trunk gnarled with
the pressing of nearly nine centuries, the deep well cut
through the heart of the rock by those captives of old,

(11:29):
and the lovely view from the city wall, whence we
heard spread over almost a full quarter of an hour,
the multitudinous chimes of the city had all helped to
wipe out from our minds the incident of the slain kitten.
We were the only visitors who had entered the Torture
Tower that morning, so at least, said the old Custodian,
And as we had the place all to ourselves, were
able to make a minute and more satisfactory survey than

(11:52):
would have otherwise been possible. The Custodian looking to us
as the sole source of his gains, for they was
willing to meet our wishes in any way. The Torture
Tower is truly a grim place, even now, when many
thousands of visitors have sent a stream of life and
the joy that fallows life into the place. By the
time I mention it wore its grimmest and most gruesome aspect.

(12:13):
The dust of ages seemed to have settled on it,
and the darkness and the horror of its memories seemed
to have become sentient in a way that would have
satisfied the pantheistic souls of Philo or Spinoza. The lower
chamber where we entered was seemingly in its normal state,
filled with incarnate darkness, even the hot sunlight streaming in
through the door seemed to be lost in the vast

(12:34):
thickness of the walls, and only showed the masonry rough
as when the builders scaffolding had come down, but coated
with dust, and marked here and there with patches of
dark stain, which, if walls could speak, could have given
their own dread memories of fear and pain. We were
glad to pass up the dusty wooden staircase, the custodian
leaving the outer door open to light us somewhat on

(12:54):
our way, for to our eyes the one long, wicked,
evil smelling candle stuck in a sconce on the wada
gave an inadequate life. When we came up through the
open door trap in the corner of the chamber overhead,
Amelia held on to me so tightly that I could
actually feel her heart beat. I must say that for
my own part, that I was not surprised at her fear,
for this room was even more gruesome than that below.

(13:17):
Here there were certainly more light, but only just sufficient
to realize the horrible surroundings of the place. The builders
of the tower had evidently intended that only they she
gained the talk, should any have the joys of light
and prospect. There, as we had noticed from below, were
ranges of windows, albeit of medieval smallness. But elsewhere in
the tower were only a few very narrow slits, such

(13:37):
as were habitual in places of medieval defense. A few
of these things only lit the chamber, and those so
high up in the wall that from no part could
the sky be seen through the thickness of the walls.
In racks, and leaning in disorder against the walls were
a number of headsman's swords, great double handed weapons with
broad blade and keen edge. Hard By were several blocks,

(13:58):
whereupon the necks of the victims had lain, with here
and there deep notches where the steel had bidden through
the guard of flesh inshored into the wood round the chamber.
Placed in all sorts of irregular ways were many implements
of torture, which made one's heart ache to see chairs
and couches with dull mobs whose torture was seemingly less,
but which, though slower, were equally efficacious. Racks, belts, boots, gloves, collars,

(14:24):
all made for compressing at will, steel baskets in which
the head could be slowly crushed into a pulp. If necessary,
watchmen's hooks with long handle and knife that cut at resistance.
This especialty of the old Nuremberg police system, and many
many other devices from man's injury to man. Amelia grew
quite pale at the horror of these things, but fortunately

(14:46):
did not faint. For being a little overcome. She sat
down on a torture chair, but jumped up again with
a shriek, all tendency to faint. God, we both pretended
that it was the injury done to her dress by
the dustla chair and the rusty spikes which had upset her,
and mister Hutcheson acquiesced in accepting the explanation with a
kind hearted laugh. But the central object in the whole

(15:07):
of this chamber of pors was the engine known as
the Iron Virgin, which stood near the center of the room.
It was a rudely shaped figure of a woman, something
of the bell order, or, to make a closer comparison
of the figure of Missus Noah in the Children's arp,
but without that slimness of waste and perfect rondure of
hip which marks the aesthetic type of the Noah family.

(15:27):
One would have hardly recognized it as intended for human
figure at all, had not the founders shaped on the
forehead a rude semblance of a woman's face. This machine
was coated with rust without and covered with dust. A
rope was fastened to a ring in the front of
a figure about where the waist should have been, and
was drawn through a pulley fastened on the wooden pillar
which sustained the flooring above the custodium. Pulling this rope

(15:49):
showed that a section of the front was hinged like
a door at one side. We then saw that the
engine was of considerable thickness, leaving just room enough inside
for a man to be placed. The door was of
equalickness and of great weight. Foretook the custodian all his
strength aided. Though he was by the contrivance of the
pulley to open it this way, it was partly due
to the fact that the door was of manifest purpose,

(16:10):
hung so as to throw its weight downwards, so that
it might shut of its own accord. When the strain
was released. The inside was honeycomb with russ. Nay More,
the rest alone that comes through time would hardly have
eaten so deep into the iron walls. The rest of
the cruel stains was deep. Indeed, it was only, however,
when we came to look at the inside of the door,
that the diabolical intention was manifest to the full. Here

(16:33):
were several long spikes, square and massive, broad at the
base and sharp at the points, placed in such a
position that, when the door should close, the upper ones
would pierce the eyes of the victim, and the lower
ones his heart vitals. The sight was too much for
poor Amelia, and this time she fainted dead off, and
I had to carry her down the stairs and place
her on a bench outside, till she recovered that she

(16:55):
felt it to the quick was afterwards shown by the
fact that my eldest son bears to this day a
rude birth mark on his breast, which was, by family consent,
being accepted as representing the number of virgin. When we
got back to the chamber, we found Hutcheson still opposite
the iron virgin. He had been evidently philosophizing, and now
gave us the benefit of his thought in the shape

(17:15):
of a sort of exordium. While I guess I've been
learning something here, while Madame has been getting over a
faint appears to me that we're a long way behind
the times. On our side of the big drink. Weis
to think out in the planes that the engine give
us points in trying to make a man uncomfortable. But
I guess your old medieval law and order party could
raise him every time. Blinters were pretty good in his

(17:35):
bluff on the squaw. But this here, young mistress, held
a straight flush all high on him. The points of
those spikes are sharp enough still, though even the edges
are eaten out by whilst be on him. It'd be
a good thing for Indian Section to get some specimens
to hear playtoy to send him round the reservations, just
to knock the stuffin out of the bucks, and the
squaws too, by showing them as how old civilization lays

(17:58):
over them at their best. Guess, but I'll get Mount
Box a match just to see how it feels. Oh no, no,
said Amelia. It is too terrible, guess, ma'am. Nothing's too
terrible to the exploring mind. I've been in some queer
places my time. Spent a night side a dead horse
while a prairie fire slept over me in the tan
a territory and another time slept side a dead buffaler

(18:20):
when the Camaches was on the war path, and I
didn't care to leave my key on them. I've been
two days in a carved in tunnel and the Billy
Bronco gold mine in New Mexico, and was one of
the four shut up for three parts of a day
in the Ksum would slid over her sigh when she
was set in the foundations of Buffalo Bridge. I've not
funked in not experience yet, and I don't propose to
begin now. We saw he was set on the experiment,

(18:42):
so I said, well, hurry up, old man, and get
through it quick, all right, General said he, I calculate
we ain't quite ready yet. The gentleman, my predecessors would
stood in that there. Canister didn't volunteer for the office,
not much, and I guess there was some ornamental time
up before the big stroke. I want to go into
the singh fair and square so I might get fixed

(19:03):
up proper. First, I dare say, this old glue can
raise some string and tie me up the corn to
a sample. This was said interrogatively to the old custodian,
but the latter, who understood the drift of his speech,
though perhaps not appreciating to the full the niceties of
dialect and imagery, shook his head. His protest was, however,
only formal and made to be overcome. The American thrust

(19:26):
a gold piece into his hand, saying take it, Pard,
it's your pot, and don't be scared. This ain't no
neck type part of that. He asked to assistant. He
produced some thin, frayed rope and proceeded to bind our
companion with sufficient strictness for the purpose. When the upper
part of his body was bound, Hutchinson said, hold on
a moment, judge, guess I'm too heavy for you to

(19:46):
talk on the canister. You just let me walk in
and then you wash up, regarding my legs will speaking.
He had backed himself into the opening, which was just
enough to hold him. It was close fit and no mistake.
Amelia looked on with fear in her eye, but she
evidently did not like to say anything. Then the custodian
completed his task by tying the American's feet together, so

(20:06):
that he was now absolutely helpless and fixed into voluntary prison.
He seemed to really enjoy it, and the incipient smile,
which was habitual to his face blossomed into actuality as
he said, guess this here eve was made out of
the rib of a dwarf. Very much room for full
grown cysts in the United States. To hustle, we has
to make coffins more room near in Idaho Territory. Now, judge,

(20:28):
you just begin to let this door down. Slow on
to me. I want to feel the same pleasure as
the other jades had when those spikes began to move
toward their eyes. Oh no, no, no, broke in Amelia hysterically.
It is too terrible. I can't bear to see it.
I can't, I can't. But the American was obdurate, say
Colonel said he why not take Madame for a little promenade.

(20:50):
I wouldn't hurt her feelings for the world. But now
that I am here, having come eight thousand miles, wouldn't
it be hard to give up the very experience I'm
pinnan and panting for a man can't get to experience
like cant goods. Every time, me and the judge here'll
fix up the sing of no time, and then you'll
come back and we'll be all laughing together once more.
The resolution that is born of curiosity triumphed, and Emilia stayed,

(21:12):
holding tight to my arm and shivering, whilst the custodian
began to slacken slowly, inch by inch the rope that
held back the iron door. Hutchins's eyes were positively radiant
as his eyes followed the first movement of the spice. Wow,
he said, I guess I've not had enjoyment like this
since i left New York baris scrap with a French
sailor whopping, and that wasn't much of a picnic neither.

(21:35):
I've not had a show for real pleasure in this
DoD ridden continent where there ain't no bars nor engines.
A weirdinary man goes healed. Slow there, judge, don't you
rushless business? I want to show for my money this
game I do. Custodia must have had in him some
of the blood of his predecessors in that ghastly tower,
for he worked the engine with a deliberate and excruciating slowness, which,

(21:56):
after five minutes, which the outer edge of the door
had not moved half the many inches, began to overcome Amelia.
I saw her lips whiten and felt her hold upon
my arm relax. I looked around an instant for a
place whereupon delay her, And when I looked at her again,
found that her eyes had become fixed on the side
of the virgin. Following his direction, I saw the black
cat crouching out of sight. Her green eyes shone like

(22:18):
danger lamps in the gloom of the place, and their
color was heightened by the blood which still smeared her
coat reddened her mouth. I cried out, the cat, look
out for the cat, for even then she sprang out
before the engine. At this moment she looked like a
triumphant demon. Her eyes blazed with ferocity, her hair bristled
out till she seemed twice her normal size, and her

(22:39):
tail lashed about, as does the tiger's when the quarry
is behind it. Elias P. Hutchinson, when he saw her,
was amused, and his eyes positively sparkled with fun as
he said, Darna's squaw hadn't gone on all our war paint.
Just give her a shove off. She comes near any
tricks on me, and I'm so fixed everlastingly by the
boss that during my skin, if I can keep my
eyes from her, she wants easy there, Judge, don't you

(23:02):
slack that our rope where I'm mucherd. At this moment,
Amlia completed her faint, and I had to clutch hold
of her round the waist or she would have fallen
to the floor. Whilst attending to her, I saw the
black cat crouching for a spring and jumped up to
turn the creature out, but at that instant, with a
sort of hellish scream, she hurled herself, not as we
expect at Hutchinson the straight at the face of the custodian.

(23:24):
Her claws seemed to be tearing wildly, as one sees
in the Chinese drawings of the dragon rampant, and as
I looked, I saw one of them light on the
poor man's eye and actually tear through him down his cheek,
leaving a wide band of red where the blood seemed
to spurt from every vein with a yellow sheer terror
which came quicker than even his sense of pain. The
man leapt back, dropping as he did so the rope,

(23:45):
which held back beh iron door. I jumped for it,
but was too late. The cord ran like the lightning
through the pulley block, and the heavy mass fell forward
from its own weight. As the door closed, I caught
a glimpse of our poor companion's face. He seemed frozen
with terror. His eyes eyes stare with a horrible anguish,
as if dazed, and no sound came from his lips.
And then the spikes did their work happily. The end

(24:07):
was quick, for when I wrenched open the door, they
appeared so deep that they had locked in the bones
of the skull through which they had crushed, and actually
tore him it out of his iron prison. Till bound
as he was, he fell at length with a sickly
thud upon the floor, the face turning upward as he fell.
I rushed to my wife, lifted her up and carried

(24:27):
her out, for I feared for her very reason if
she would wake from her faint to such a scene.
I laid her on the bench outside and ran back.
Leaning against the wooden calm was Custodian, moaning in pain,
whilst he held his reddening handkerchief to his eyes. And
sitting on the head of the poor American was the cat,
purring loudly as she licked the blood which trickled through
the gashed socket of his eyes. I think no one

(24:49):
will call me cruel because I seized one of the
old executioner's swords and shore her in two as she
sat end of the squaw