"You mean your parents?"
"No, I—" he waved his hand. "They had already died from the disease. I was all alone. That was why he chose me. In all the chaos of the epidemic, no one would ever realize I was gone... "
"How... how did he... save you?"
A few seconds passed before he answered. He seemed to choose his words carefully.
"It was difficult. Not many of us have the restraint to accomplish it. But Carlisle has always been the most humane and compassionate of us... I don't think you could find a vampire his equal in any of the history books."281 He paused. "For me, it was merely very, very painful."
I could tell from the set of his lips, he would say no more on this subject. I suppressed my curiosity, though it was far from idle. There were many things I needed to think through on this particular issue, things that were only beginning to occur to me.282
His velvet voice interrupted my thoughts. "He acted from loneliness. That's usually the reason behind the choice. I was the first in Carlisle's family, though he found Esme soon after. She fell from a cliff. They brought her straight to the hospital morgue, though somehow her heart was still beating."283
"So you must be dying, then, to become a... " I couldn't say the word.
"No, that's just Carlisle. He would never, ever do that to someone who had another choice." The respect in his voice was profound whenever he spoke of his surrogate father. "It is easier he says, though," he said, "if the blood is
281. It is unclear whether Fredward is saying that Carlisle is the only vampire unsavage enough to create more vampires, thus implying that he is the father of all vampires, or if he is indicating that the vampires who make it into academic histories are vicious brutes who are chosen solely to meet publishers' demands for elements of prurient interest. The field of vampire academia is too rarefied a field to determine which is the ultimate truth that Fredward is alluding to, and so it is ultimately frustrating to have Bella as both our sole narrative link to his thoughts and deeds, as well as the prime investigator into this matter. Would that Bella had not been his mistress but a true-blue investigator who'd been cast in the foundry of academia, I assure you that it would have been another story. Please see thought question #9 for more.
282. Should I not mention the city Chicago in conversation? Tuberculosis? What would constitute an insensitive comment?
283. As punishment for attempting to commit suicide, Carlisle made Esme immortal.