[Mad Reloader]

(Story time for all us ManBeefers! Hope you've got some munchys!)

The following is an excerpt from the classic H P Lovecraft story, "The Picture in the House."

In it, a traveller (mayhaps an ancestor of Clarice Sparrow?) circa 1896 takes a shortcut through the backwoods of New England, and stumbles upon a lone, dilapidated house dating from the late 1600's--which he thought was abandoned until after entering and finding not just some worn-out furniture of the 1700's, but a circa 1590's tome on the Congo region of Darkest Africa...and a singular, dishevelled old hermit fixated upon that same book. The excerpt below starts at the point where the hermit explains his "favourite part" of Pigafetta's account of Senhor Lopex the Portuguese mariner:

"As I says, 'tis queer how pitchers sets you thinkin'. D'ye know, young Sir, I'm right set on this one here." (The old man points to the twelfth plate in the 16th Century tome, the one that showed the Anzique cannibal butcher shop) "Art'er I got this book off Eben I uster look at it a lot, especial when I heered Parson Clark rant o' Sundays in his big old powdered wig! Once't I tried su'thin funny---here, young Sir, don't get skeert---all I done was ter look at the picter afore I kilt the sheep for market---killin the sheep was kinder more fun arter looking at it---" The tone of the old man now sank very low, sometimes becoming so faint that his words were hardly audible. The traveller listened to the rain, and to the rattling of the bleared and dirty small-paned windows, and marked a rumbling of approaching thunder quite unusual for the season. Once a terriffic flash of lightning shook the frail house to its foundations, but the aged whisperer seemed not to notice it.
"Killin' sheep was kinder more fun---but d'ye know, 'twa'nt quite satisfyin'. Queer haow a cravin' gits a holt on ye---As ye love the Almighty, young man, don't tell nobody, but I swear ter Gawd thet picter begun to make me hungry fer victuals I couldn't raise nor buy---here, set still, what's ailing ye?---I didn't do nothin', only I wondered haow 'twud be if I did---They say meat makes blood an' flesh, an' gives ye new life, so I wondered ef 'twas more the same---"

---Thee Mad Reloader's not going to give away the ending of this classic tale of horror (and ManBeef!) You'll have to read it for yourself!

Currently available in: The Best Of H P Lovecraft, DelRey books