The best short stories of 1921, and the yearbook of the American short story
General
The best short stories of 1921, and the yearbook of the American short story
American fiction -- 20th century; Short stories -- 20th century -- Bibliography; Short stories -- 20th century -- Indexes; Short stories, American
"Take anything from its natural surroundings," he went on, "and it is
meaningless. The dull-eyed men and women that wander through this Museum
of yours are just killing time. There's no education in that kind of
thing. Besides, what they see are dead things, anyway, and you can't
study human nature in a morgue."
He resumed his seat on the window sill, then took from an inner pocket a
leather wallet, and drew from that a photograph which he tossed across
so that it fell on the desk before me. I examined it carefully. It had
been badly developed and badly printed, and what was worse, roughly
handled. But still, one could distinguish certain features.
It pictured the interior of a building. It was roofless, and above the
rear wall was what I recognized as tropical vegetation, mainly by its
wild luxuriance. In the center of the rear wall was what seemed to be a
giant stone lizard, standing on its hind legs. The one foreleg that
showed was disproportionately short. The body, too, was more attenuated
than that of any lizard. The thing was headless and the statue, idol or
whatever it was, stood on a pedestal, and before that again, seemed to
be a slab of stone. Then my attention was caught by the head of the
thing, which was to be seen in a corner. It was shaped roughly
triangular. The jaws were broad at the base and the thing had, even in
the photograph, something of the same repulsive appearance as the head
of a vampire bat.
"It is the result of the imagination of some Indian," I said. "No
post-diluvian Saurian ever existed of that size."
"Good God, man, you jump to conclusions," he said. "This is only a
representation of the thing itself. Made in heroic size, so to say. But
see here!"
He leaned over my shoulder and pointed to a kind of border that ran
along the base of the pedestal. Examining closely, I made out a series
of lizards running on their hind legs.
"They," he explained, "are cut into the stone. It is a sort of red
sandstone. They are a little bigger than the thing itself as it is
living. But look at this."
The particular spot to which he pointed was blurred and dirty, as though
many fingers had pointed to it and I took the magnifying glass for
closer inspection. Even then I only saw dimly as something that bore a
resemblance to the carved figures.
"That," he said, "is as near as ever I came to seeing one of the little
devils. I think it was one of them though I am not sure. I caught sight
of it flashing across like a swiftly blown leaf. We took the picture by
flashlight you see, so I'm not sure. Somerfield, of course, was too busy
attending to his camera. He saw nothing."
"We might have another picture made," I said. "It would be interesting."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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