Tours of the Black Clock

104

I HAVE GIVEN HER a child.

This is the beginning of my revenge. For many years I had no reason to believe revenge was possible. I didn’t imagine I’d have the opportunity for it, or if I did that there was a revenge commensurate and fitting. For many years I had no reason to believe I was worthy of exacting revenge from anyone but myself. I only know revenge insists upon itself and that now the opportunity for it is in my hands. My wife and daughter who died twenty-five years ago cannot be denied, my own unworthiness and guilt notwithstanding. This revenge will light up his ancient eyes with loss and grief. I can’t sleep at night, the prospect so thrills me. I’m sure he’s not yet so old his eyes can’t cry anymore, or that he’s so beyond the beat of life his heart can’t break. There’s just enough life left in him as to still hold the most terrible sorrow of a lifetime. Alone in my small room beneath the sea, seized by my revenge, I shake my fists with a mean fevered joy.