Page 7 (1/1)

But the third Sister, who is also the youngest - ! Hush! whisper whilst we talk of her! Her kingdoe, or else no flesh should live; but within that kingdom all power is hers Her head, turreted like that of Cybele, rises alht She droops not; and her eyes, rising so high,what they are, they cannot be hidden; through the treble veil of crape which she wears the fierce light of a blazing misery, that rests not for ht, for ebbing or for flowing tide, round She is the defier of God She also is the estress of suicides Deep lie the roots of her power; but narrow is the nation that she rules For she can approach only those in whom a profound nature has been upheaved by central convulsions; in whom the heart trembles and the brain rocks under conspiracies of tempest from without and tempest from within Madonna ic grace Our Lady of Sighs creeps tiest Sister er's leaps She carries no key; for, though cost men, she storms all doors at which she is permitted to enter at all And her name is Mater Tenebrarum - our Lady of Darkness

- Thomas De Quincey, "Levana and Our Three Ladies of Sorrow", Suspiria de Profundis

1

The solitary, steep hill called Corona Heights was black as pitch and very silent, like the heart of the unknown It looked steadily doard and northeast away at the nervous, bright lights of don San Francisco as if it were a great predatory beast of night surveying its territory in patient search of prey

The waxing gibbous moon had set, and the stars at the top of the black heavens were still dia But to the east, beyond the city's business center and the fog-surfaced Bay, the narrow ghostly ribbon of the dawn's earliest light lay along the tops of the low hills behind Berkeley, Oakland, and Alameda, and still more distant Devil's Mountain - Mount Diablo

On every side of Corona Heights the street and house lights of San Francisco, weakest at end of night, heerous aniht An observer beloould have found it aled spine and the weird crags crowning its top (which even the gulls avoided); and breaking out here and there froh so of rain for months

Sorown even greater than it is today and awe of primeval nature even less, but now it could still awaken panic terror

Too savage and cantankerous for a park, it was inadequately designated as a playground True, there were sos and little stands of thick pine around its base; but above those it rose rough, naked, and contemptuously aloof

And now so seemed to stir in the massed darkness there (Hard to tell what) Perhaps one or enerations, yet able to pass as ta about his business,at no one - in fact, behaving like a good citizen ork to do and no ti or collar, then you lectful owner, but is wild - and well adjusted) Perhaps some wilder and more secret animal that had never subst hiery or psychosis that he (or she) didn't need light Or perhaps only the wind

And now the eastern ribbon grew dark red, the whole sky lightened fro, and Corona Heights began to show its raw, dry, pale brown surface

Yet the i at last decided on its victim