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$Unique_ID{bob01310}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{(A) Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Chapter 44}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Twain, Mark}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{boss
dead
hear
audio
hear
sound
}
$Date{1889}
$Log{Hear Merlin*49490018.aud
}
Title: (A) Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Author: Twain, Mark
Date: 1889
Chapter 44
A Postscript By Clarence
I, Clarence, must write it for him. He proposed that we two go out and
see if any help could be afforded the wounded. I was strenuous against the
project. I said that if there were many, we could do but little for them;
and it would not be wise for us to trust ourselves among them, anyway. But
he could seldom be turned from a purpose once formed; so we shut off the
electric current from the fences, took an escort along, climbed over the
enclosing ramparts of dead knights, and moved out upon the field. The first
wounded man who appealed for help, was sitting with his back against a dead
comrade. When the Boss bent over him and spoke to him, the man recognized
him and stabbed him. That knight was Sir Meliagraunce, as I found out by
tearing off his helmet. He will not ask for help any more.
We carried the Boss to the cave and gave his wound, which was not very
serious, the best care we could. In this service we had the help of Merlin,
though we did not know it. He was disguised as a woman and appeared to be a
simple old peasant goodwife. In this disguise, with brown-stained face and
smooth-shaven, he had appeared a few days after the Boss was hurt, and
offered to cook for us, saying her people had gone off to join certain new
camps which the enemy were forming, and that she was starving. The Boss had
been getting along very well, and had amused himself with finishing up his
record.
We were glad to have this woman, for we were shorthanded. We were in a
trap, you see - a trap of our own making. If we stayed where we were, our
dead would kill us; if we moved out of our defenses, we should no longer be
invincible. We had conquered; in turn we were conquered. The Boss
recognized this; we all recognized it. If we could go to one of those new
camps and patch up some kind of terms with the enemy - yes, but the Boss
could not go, and neither could I, for I was among the first that were made
sick by the poisonous air bred by those dead thousands. Others were taken
down, and still others. Tomorrow -
Tomorrow. It is here. And with it the end. About midnight I awoke,
and saw that hag making curious passes in the air about the Boss's head and
face, and wondered what it meant. Everybody but the dynamo-watch lay steeped
in sleep; there was no sound. The woman ceased from her mysterious foolery,
and started tiptoeing toward the door. I called out -
"Stop! What have you been doing!"
She halted, and said with an accent of malicious satisfaction:
"Ye were conquerors; ye are conquered! These others are perishing - you
also. Ye shall all die in this place - every one - except him. He sleepeth,
now - and shall sleep thirteen centuries. I am Merlin!"
[Hear Merlin]
Ye are conquered!
Then such a delirium of silly laughter overtook him that he reeled about
like a drunken man, and presently fetched up against one of our wires. His
mouth is spread open yet; apparently he is still laughing. I suppose the
face will retain that petrified laugh until the corpse turns to dust.
The Boss has never stirred - sleeps like a stone. If he does not wake
today we shall understand what kind of sleep it is, and his body will then be
borne to a place in one of the remote recesses of the cave where none will
ever find it to desecrate it. As for the rest of us - well, it is agreed
that if any one of us ever escapes alive from this place, he will write the
fact here, and loyally hide this Manuscript with the Boss, our dear good
chief, whose property it is, be he alive or dead.