Iron County record. [volume] (Cedar City, Utah) 1893-1982, 1920-11-05
CHAPTER ONE
The Street Of Strange Faces.
4 THE DARK CORNER.

I. THE DARK CORNER.
The way of the thing was ever the
same: II befell without warning; or
rather, the girl had never learned to
take heed of signs which seemed plain
enough in retrospect when she sat
alone and puzzled her pretty head
with the dark riddle of this shadow
life which set her so widely apart from
every girl she knew and, indeed, from
all the rest of humankind.
She had day of restlessness,
whose every hour brewed Its new pc
cullar mood. whose every mood was
purposeless, with times OF almost
feverlsh gayety, causeless, fitful, fugi.
tive. and other times when for no rea- |
son In her knowledge she caught her
self signing long nuttering signs that
shook her strangely. SO might ones
spirit sigh in WEAKNESS. faint with
the burden of incessaDt strife with
some great antagonist of unguessable
identity.
Toward nightfall all these were
soothed away into feeling OF serene
poise and self-possession; and sat
urate with consciousness of the rich
strong wine of vitality that qulckened
her. she thought Of life In the likeness
OF wide placid river, wherein she
drifted like fearless swimmer--a
stream whose waters were warm,
sweet and calm with n penetrating
quality of delicious calm she never
dreamed could be disturbed. so abso-
lutte It seemed, so permanent so i'm
perturbable.
Only the signs persisted oddly, as
II her spirit knew moments OF melan-
choly of which her mind knew moth
Ing.
And insidiously the tranquil surface
Of that contentment was fawed by APP
prehensions of nameless danger, OF
peril latent stealthy and implacable;
as though the swimmer surmlsed some
monstrous shape Of evil skulking I'M
seen In those Opaque deeps-or felt
herself subtly ensnared by a current
whose irresistible set wns altogether
toward destruction.
Now at length perceiving what was
TO come, panic paralyzed In her the
instinct of self-preservation though
horror brimmed the cup Of being, she
made no effort TO fight free but, as
one who knows that struggling must
prove vain, resigned herself and let
the baneful current work its will with
her. Fascination, too, was at work,
deep within her mad desire to go
again that wild why she had so often
gone. and once more be, and do, and
see.
so Il is. so II must be, with those
TO whom n drug has made Itself q
thing of Life and Death.
On ahead like bend in the river,
waited that turning In her psychic
life which she knew as the Dark Cor.
ner: while she lay passive In the
grasp of that power which so obscure
ly had it's rise In her yet was repug-
nant to her. being at once her VIII
and her Necessity. And as the Dark
Corner drew momentarily more near,
the TRANSMISSION which she termed the
Change was effected by what may only
be described as a convulsion OF her
very soul. after which came lassitude
vast enervatlon In which all llnger-
ING traces of reluctance were obliter'
ated.
Now she was no longer herself, but
another woman than the one she
knew. n strange woman clothed in hei
own flesh hut in no other way akin e
her Self of everyday, having ne
thought, impulse or emotion witt
which that Self could sympathize
save such as may be considered cor
mon 10 all her sex. Yet, incompre
hensibly, consciousness OF the oil
self-identity survived; and though tai
she conceived ~ dispossessed from
fits tenement, her Self continued b!
her bodys side, observant, critical. In
trigued. something amused. =.
In this wise rounding the Dark Cor
ner, she passed into that place whicl
she had named the Street Of Strang
Faces: and the enigma of this confu
sion of Self with non-Self was forgot
ten In the rush OF exotic sensation
and emotion. excitement and lawles
Joy, which invariably accompanie
definite and final commitment TO RI
newed pursuit Of these transcendents
adventures.