reak, I have broken--to tear, I have
torn. The disease took command of me long before I knew its meaning.
When I was a child the sight of pretty things frightened me. I used to
shrink from them, and hide my face. I was only quiet and normal when
there were plain, colorless things about me. As I grew older the fear
developed into hatred--and with hatred grew, slowly and subtly, the
inclination to destroy. At first the opposition of all that was normal
in me sufficed to keep the desire in check, but day by day it grew
stronger and stronger, and day by day the power to resist became less
and less. The increase of the hatred into madness followed the growth of
the impulse towards the first surrender. It came upon me for the first
time when I was twelve. How well I remember that day! My sanity had
fought its strongest battle, and my head was still throbbing and
swimming with the strain of it. I was taken to a strange house, and left
alone in a bright room. On the wall there was a picture of a very
beautiful woman. I couldn't take my eyes off it. I couldn't move from in
front of it. New passions, that I had never felt before, were tearing
me. The picture seemed to be alive, to be mocking me. I hated it. I felt
that it was cruel and loathsome--that it had wronged me. My whole body
was on fire--my brain was flaming. Then something seemed to snap in my
head. I lost myself. Irresistible forces took possession of me, and used
me. When I came to myself ... the picture was lying at my feet ... in
fragments."

The voice settled down into an expressionless monotone, pursuing its
story without emotion.

"From that moment my doom lay on me. I had made the initial submission.
Any attempt at resistance after that was futile. I was helpless. Out of
my hatred of beauty in any shape or form came the desire to obtain the
most beautiful things I could find to enjoy the mad ecstasy of
shattering them. I had all the morbid secret longing to induce attacks
of my own madness--to enjoy the awful exaltation, the triumph of
destruction. I was not ashamed. I found myself entirely without
scruple, without conscience, incapable of remorse. When the periods of
desire were upon me, I hesitated at nothing to gratify them. At first
they were frequent--sometimes there were only a few days between--but as
I grew older the intervals lengthened, until sometimes I dared to think
myself free. But, sooner or later, it came again. I knew all the warning
signals--