HEARTTHROB Read Online Free PDF Page A

them had passed the
ninety mark. "A hundred!" Alma gasped as she reached that
number. The landlady cackled. "A hundred is not but half of
them!" she said. And then the moaning wind began to intensify.
    "Hurry!" the husband urged, and the landlady hurried,
sighing with relief when the very last candle was lighted. Neither of
the Glades had completed the count when it happened. There was a
crashing of glass, the cold wind from outside now entered the room —
which was plunged into darkness as the gust of air, with a dreadful
sound, put out each and every one of the candles which had been in
flame. In the pale of the moonlight Alma and Eldon could see the
smoke wisp and curl upward from the top of the cake... wisp and curl
and turn and... and then at the very top of the column of smoke there
was a face. White... pale... with hollowed eyes... and skin, which
looked as if it had been deep in its grave for a long, long time.
    "Happy birthday, Clarisse!" the landlady and her husband
said joyously. The woman looked at the Glades. "Aren't you going
to wish the dear girl happy birthday?"
    But, alas, the Glades did not think to do so. They were too busy
screaming...
    Parties? Ah yes, they really know
how to throw a party in Remorse...
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THERE'S SOMETHING IN THE SOUP
The
story of the Rajah Bersiong
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    I always find it amusing when I hear well-to-do
people complaining about what they call the "servant problem."
I frequently am reminded of a saying they have on the Malay
Peninsula, which translates "Don't bleed the cook." The
saying is used when one member of the household is cautioning another
not to insist upon a certain dish prepared for a certain meal, and at
first foreigners do not make the connection between the meaning of
the warning and the words of its content. Not until they hear the
story behind the saying, the true story of a local Malay ruler who
came to be known as the Rajah Bersiong ... Rajah with fangs. As
we have our dinner, I shall tell you the tale...
    It happened more than five hundred years ago in
the vicinity of what is now known as Kedah. The rich ruler of the
area was a proud man, proud of his military
might, his immense wealth, his palace with its immense and finely
woven tapestries, his handsome looks, his wives and his children, the
fine marriages he had arranged for his sons and daughters. Of all
these things was the Rajah proud, but he took perhaps his greatest
delight in the culinary delights with which he continually surprised
his guests at table. For the Rajah had, within his kitchen retinue,
an old man who, based upon the testimony of many of the nobility as
well as the testimony of his own palate, was the finest cook in that
part of the country, and perhaps in any part of the East. And so it
was that the Rajah never dictated to the kitchen as to what was to be
served — never. While the number of people to be fed and their
relative importance always was communicated to the august preparer of
the meals, always the decision regarding what to serve and how was
left to the cook himself.
    Until that one night...
    It was to be a special soup, something the cook never had prepared
before. The basic ingredients of the new effort are unknown today,
because whenever the old cook created something new, he allowed no
one else in the kitchen with him. Whatever those ingredients were,
however, this much is known: One of the elements to be stirred into
the broth required some extra fine chopping. And it was while
performing this operation that the old cook inadvertently placed his
left index finger just a bit too close to the flashing blade of his
chopping knife. It was a reflexive motion that caused the painful
hand to jerk up from the cutting board and stop at a point directly
over the cooking pot of boiling broth. And into the pot something
fell. Three drops of blood.
    At first the cook thought his effort had been
ruined, and he was considering whether he should begin
the entire process again.