The Living Dead - Seymour Le Moyne

0:00The Living Dead by Seymour Lemoine Raylif was last seen when he entered the studio on that gray evening of October 30th. Some there were who called him insane. Some merely catalogued it, queerness. At any rate he was a lonely spirit who refused all intercourse with his kind, preferring to work alone. He was in his pictures now and then. When they found him lying dead in his studio with his brush in hand and a ghastly smile upon his face, it was a nine days wonder. His body was discovered beneath an immense canvas upon which he had painted huge blotches of lured color without form or reason. This was offered as an example of insanity. However it was, it has remained a mystery to the world.

1:02But my conscience troubles me. I have known for years the real truth. I found him there. I super-intended the disposition of the papers, being his closest friend. I may have done wrong to conceal the most important document. But, after all, one hesitates to give away the closest secrets of a friend's life. Now that Rayless pictures are all sold, his reputation established, I see no reason why the inside story of that tragic death should not be told. Here is the confession he wrote the night of the tragedy. Take it as it is. No writer should embellish it or tamper with so strange an event. I lay it before you in the form which I found it beside his body. Weird adventures have come to me these last few weeks, so weird that I must put them on

2:06paper. Twice now I have seen the form of a strange woman in my studio just at dusk. As she stands there on my models platform, her sad eyes gazing upon me with an ancient longing that thrills me to the roots of my being. I wonder who she is. I have dared to speak to her. I have gone to her side. Each time she has disappeared. My lifelong desire to paint the portrait of Cleopatra's soul must have been known to her. She seems to understand. She smiled when I looked across the dim room at her. She raised her arms in supplication the first time. I couldn't fathom her silence. Night after night she would appear and disappear, always with the provoking silence that hotting invitation in her eyes.

3:07This evening I returned to the studio and found her standing on the models platform. With a gasp of surprise I locked the door, threw off my coat and rushed to the large easel. A moment later I was at work. She did not move. I worked in a frenzy at last delirious with a dream and its final accomplishment. This would be my masterpiece. Ittle did I know that retribution waited upon my years of carelessness, disregard for convention, selfishness. Just a few hours ago I stopped working for a moment. I had not turned on the light, my only illumination being the sharp glow from the moon, which fell over my canvas. Her rigid attitude was beginning to perplex me. I could see her smiling in the half-darkness. She had wound about her a filmy robe which made her appear almost unreal.

4:12It confused me to see a model stand so long. I spoke to her. She did not answer. I dared not do more for fear that she would disappear again from my vision. Hounded by my dream I picked up my brush again. The hours fell away from me like leaves from a tree in fall. I was creating the greatest thing ever known, the soul of a mummified queen. Who shall know what I might have done had it not grown suddenly dark? The moonlight passed out of my window. I threw on the electricity. In its glow I looked at her. She did not move. I threw myself at her feet. I implored her to speak, to rest, to do anything rather than persevere in the coldness and calm. Without thinking I touched her hand.

5:12It was cold as ice. I drew back. A terrible suspicion entered my mind. It was the queen herself, the mummified body. I find it hard to write now, light mist before my eyes. Rivers of sound curtain me. I paint fiercely, still she moves not. I have torn her to pieces. I am groping for the air. Strange hands are about my throat. I have tottered here to throw this paper. I cannot see. This document may throw some light on the fact that in the studio they found the large plaster model of a woman broken into many pieces. It had been delivered by mistake the day before Reliff's death and belonged to the art class on the floor above.

6:15The end of The Living Dead by Seymour Lemoine