The Curse of the Wendigo Read Online Free PDF

many times, Will Henry, either a man controls his appetites or his appetites control him. You do know Dante devoted more than one circle of hell to the unregulated desires. For your transgressions of the flesh, you would be consigned to the third circle, where you would lie in total darkness while shit rained down upon you from the sky.”
    I nodded. “Yes, sir.”
    “‘Yes, sir.’ . . . Do you find it a pleasant prospect, Will Henry? Shit raining down upon you for all eternity?”
    “No, sir.”
    “But that is not what you said. You said, ‘yes, sir,’ as if you might find it agreeable.”
    “I was agreeing with
you
, Dr. Warthrop, not the idea of shit.”
    “‘The idea of shit.’ . . . Will Henry, I am beginning to believe you are far too obsequious for your own good—and certainly for
my
own good. Flattery lands you in the eighth circle,where you wallow in a river of the selfsame excrement.”
    “Then there doesn’t seem to be much hope for me, sir.”
    He grunted. “Not much, no.”
    I fought back a yawn.
    “Am I keeping you awake, Will Henry?”
    “Yes, sir. No, sir. I’m sorry, sir.”
    “For what?”
    “For . . . I don’t remember.”
    “You are sorry for something you’ve forgotten?”
    “No, sir. I’ve forgotten what I’m sorry for.”
    “You’re giving me a headache, Will Henry. A conversation with you is like negotiating Minos’s labyrinth.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “‘Yes, sir! Yes, sir!’” he mocked me, his voice rising an octave. “If I said pixies danced jigs upon the hearth, you would answer, ‘Yes, sir; yes, sir!’ If the house were on fire and I told you to throw gasoline upon it to quench the flames, you would cry, ‘Yes, sir! Yes, sir!’ and blow us both to kingdom come! You have a mind, do you not, William James Henry? You were born with that indispensable appendage, were you not?”
    The words were upon my lips—“Yes, sir!”—and in the nick of time I bit them back. He took no notice, however. The monstrumologist was on a tear.
    “Have all my efforts been for naught?” he cried to the ceiling, striking a fist against his pillow. “The sacrifices of time and privacy, the patient instruction and guidance, thespecial consideration I showed in honor of your father’s service to me—all for nothing? Really, what dividends have my efforts earned, Will Henry? For almost two years you’ve been with me, and when put to the test, your reply is the obsequious echo I might expect from the lowliest liveryman. So I shall ask it again: Do you have a brain?”
    “Y-yes, sir,” I stammered.
    “Oh, for the love of God, there you say it again!” he roared.
    “Of course I do!” I hollered back. I had finally reached the end of my endurance. This was not the first time I had been summoned by the shrill cry of
Will Henreeeeeee!
to the bedside of a self-absorbed lunatic who barely seemed to tolerate my existence. What did he want from me? Was I merely his whipping boy, a convenient dog to kick when frustration and childish angst overwhelmed him? Dark demons possessed him, I would never deny that, but they were not
my
demons.
    “The thing I said about appetite,” he said deliberately, clearly taken aback by my reaction, “applies to the emotions as well, Will Henry. There is no need to lose your temper.”
    “You lost yours,” I pointed out.
    “I had cause,” he returned, implying that I’d had none. “And at any rate, I would not advise you to follow my example in all things. Well, in hardly anything.” He laughed dryly. “Take the study of monstrumology . . .”
    I would rather not,
thought I, but held my tongue.
    “I believe I’ve told you, Will Henry, that there is nouniversity that offers instruction in the science of monstrumology—not yet, at any rate. Instead we receive our instruction from an acknowledged master. Though my own studies began under my father, in his day a monstrumologist of extraordinary gifts, they were finished under Abram von Helrung,