Free Riot Most Uncouth by Daniel Friedman Page A

ask what is at stake?”
    â€œI have heard that the body was drained of its blood. Is that what drew your interest? You can’t seriously believe that this crime is somehow connected to those vampires you’re always talking about?”
    That was exactly what I believed, but I was ashamed to admit it. I said: “I believe a woman is dead and a killer is loose. I cannot tolerate the idea that something like this can happen arbitrarily and that it might not be set right. How can we believe anything has meaning in a world so disordered that fathers leave their sons and never return, and girls are slaughtered for whimsy and sick pleasure? How can anyone bear to witness such injustice?”
    â€œThat’s an interesting question to ask while you lie with a married woman in another man’s bed.”
    â€œI commit no injustice; I’m merely a fornicator. You, however, are an adulteress.”
    If she was piqued by the insult, she didn’t show it. Her voice remained even. “But our sins violate society’s order and flout its strictures, just as the murder does. And we sin arbitrarily, for no reason, and against an undeserving victim.”
    â€œWho says your husband is undeserving? He made the mortal error of marrying you. I would not have.” I thought this was funny, but I suppose I should not have been surprised that she didn’t share my amusement.
    â€œYou like to hide behind your quips when your delicate vanity is wounded, and you try to use your humor to lighten the weight of the wrongs you commit,” she said. “But you know better, and so do I. My husband is quite affectionate. He adores me. He cares for his students and he dotes upon his children. He is a fine man. We commit acts that would surely harm him, were they discovered. Our conduct is in no way justified. And why do we do it? Fleeting pleasure. There’s no man alive better suited than you to carrying the banner for selfishness and indifference, for social disorder. I’d think you’d tear the world down to sate your own appetites.”
    â€œI don’t need to hear these things. This is not why I come here. This is not what I need from you.”
    â€œI care about you, Byron, and I am concerned. Your personality has grown inconsistent and erratic.” Perhaps she cared, but she didn’t know me. My personality had always been inconsistent and erratic; it was one of the few ways in which I resembled my mother.
    â€œIf what happened to Felicity Whippleby was arbitrary, then the things that happen to me are likely arbitrary as well,” I said. “That is an unacceptable premise, and one I cannot abide. Events must be animated by purpose. There must be a reason why I spent my childhood in poverty. There must be a reason my mother sank into despondency and failed to protect me. There must be a reason my father left me alone. There must be a reason for this.” I pulled the sheets off my naked, shriveled leg, and then, ashamed of the way it looked, I covered it again. “Either the indignities of my past were preparing me for the special destiny I’ve always believed I was meant for, or they are just a bunch of things that happened.”
    Violet crawled across the bed to touch my shoulder. “Byron, I don’t know what to say.”
    â€œThat’s all right,” I told her. “I didn’t come here to listen to you talk.” Then, because my lust and vigor had returned, I flipped her over and took her from behind.

 
    Chapter 12
    And vain was each effort to raise and recall
    The brightness of old to illumine our Hall;
    And vain was the hope to avert our decline,
    And the fate of my fathers had faded to mine.
    And theirs was the wealth and the fulness of Fame,
    And mine to inherit too haughty a name;
    And theirs were the times and the triumphs of yore,
    And mine to regret, but renew them no more.
    And Ruin is fixed on my tower and my wall,
    Too hoary to