"Das schwatzende Herz" Krimi Hörbuch für Erwachsene von Edgar Allan Poe (Das verräterische Herz)

Hello and nice to have you here. I'm Rico. Stories are great. Today I'm reading something completely different than usual. A text by Edgar Allan Poe was requested by a listener. And even though I wasn't familiar with his work so far, I like this text. The story is told from the point of view of a madman who becomes a murderer. The text is intense. If you want to hear something gentle, better listen to another story. I'll link one in the video description. If you don't want to miss a story and haven't subscribed to the channel yet, then subscribe to it and activate the bell. And now, have fun listening. The Blackening Heart By Edgar Allan Poe Is it true? Nervous I was terribly nervous back then. And I still am. But why do you have to claim that I'm insane? My nervous state hadn't shattered my mind, but sharpened it. It hadn't dulled my senses, but made them more vigilant. Above all, my hearing had developed wonderfully fine. I heard all things in heaven and on earth. I heard many things in hell. And that's supposed to be madness? Listen and realize how factual, how calm I can tell the whole story. I can't say when the thought overtook me for the first time. It was there all of a sudden and followed me day and night. An important motive wasn't there. Hatred wasn't there. I loved the old man. He had never done me any harm. He had never inflicted an illness on me. I didn't have any desire for his money. I think it was his eye. Yes, that was it. One of his eyes equal to the eye of a goat. A pale blue eye with a little skin above it. Whenever he looked at me, the blood froze in me. And so, little by little, more and more forcefully, the thought of taking the old man's life and freeing me from the eye in this way, settled in me. Now you realize, you think I'm crazy. Crazy for nothing. But you should have seen me. You should have seen how smart I was. How careful I was. How meticulous I was. I was never friendlier to the old man than during the whole week before I killed him. And every night, around midnight, I pressed his doorbell and opened the door. Oh, so quiet. And when I was far enough to stick my head through, I held a darkened, completely closed lantern into the room. It was completely closed, so that no light came out. And then my head followed. Oh, you would have laughed if you had seen how skillfully I stretched it. I moved it very slowly forward so as not to disturb the sleep of the old man. It took me an hour to push my head so far through the opening that I could see the old man in his bed. Ha! Would a madman have gone that far? And then, when I had my head happily in the room, I carefully opened the lantern. Oh, so carefully. Very gently. Because the hinges were creaking. It was so far that a single fine beam fell on the eye of the geese. And I did that for seven nights. Every night, just around midnight. But I always found the eye closed. And so it was impossible to complete the work. Because it was not the old man who annoyed me, but his skull eye. And every morning when the day broke, I went up to him and spoke to him. I called him by his name and asked him if he had had a good night. So you see, he really had to be a very smart man to suspect that I came to him every night at twelve o'clock while he was asleep. On the eighth night, I went to work with very special caution when opening the door. The minute hand of a clock certainly moved faster than my hand at that time. Never before that night had I felt the magnitude of my power, of my sharpness. I could hardly suppress my triumph. So I was here and opened the door very gently, very slowly. And he did not even dream of my secret doing and thinking. I giggled at this thought and maybe he heard me, because he moved like he was frightened. Now you could think I had gone back. But no. His room was completely dark, because he had locked the window shop out of fear of burglars. It was pitch black. And I drove on, opening it slowly, slowly. I was with my head in the room and was about to open the lantern. Then my thumb slipped off the metal lock and the old man screamed in bed Who is there? I held myself very still and said nothing. I did not move a finger for an hour and all this time I did not hear that he was lying down again. He was still sitting upright in bed and moaning. Just as I moaned night after night at the ticking of the dead clock on the walls of the house. Then I heard a quiet groan and I knew it was the groan of deadly horror. So there was no pain and no grief. Oh no. It was the groan. It was the dull, suffocating sound coming from the depths of the soul when the groan held it. I knew this sound well. In some nights, when all the world was asleep, in some midnights, it was coming out of my own chest and with its terrible sound it was multiplying. I say I knew this groaning sound well. I knew what the old man was feeling and I accompanied him, even though I was peeping inside. I knew that he was awake from the first weak noise that had scared him. Since then his fear had grown from minute to minute. He had tried to look at her as groundless, but he could not. He had said to himself, It is nothing more than the wind in the chimney. Or, It is just a mouse running through the room. Or, It is just a cricket that has chirped once. Yes, he had tried to calm himself with these assumptions, but it was all in vain. All in vain, because the near death had already come to him and covered his victim with black shadow. And it was the dark force of the invisible shadow that made him, even though he neither saw nor heard, feel that my head was in the room. After I had waited patiently for a long time, without hearing that he was lying down again, I finally decided to open a small, a tiny, tiny gap in the lantern. So I began, you can not imagine how thoughtful, how quiet, to open the lantern, until finally a single matt, spider-web-fine ray came out and fell on the cricket's eye. Wide open, and I became raving when I stared at it. I saw it with complete clarity, nothing but a dull blue with a disgusting veil over it. I shivered to my stomach, but I could not see anything more of the old man's face and figure, because I had directed the beam And now, did I not tell you that what you think is madness is only an exaggeration of the senses? Now I say, a quiet, dull, fast noise took hold of my ear, a noise like the ticking of a clock that you have wrapped with a cloth. I knew this sound well, too. It was the old man's heart that beat so. My anger increased, as the beating of a drum stimulated the soldiers to act more courageously. But even now I forced myself and remained silent. I hardly breathed. I held the lantern without resistance. I tried to keep the beam as constant as possible on the eye. In the meantime, the beating of the drum became faster and faster every minute and louder and louder. The beating of the drum became louder, I say, louder from minute to minute. Do you hear me? I told you that I was nervous, and I am. However, this one strange noise aroused an immeasurable horror in me. But for a few minutes longer I forced myself and remained silent. But the beating became louder and louder. I thought my heart would burst. And now a new fear seized me. The noise could be heard by a neighbor. With a loud cry, I tore open the lantern and jumped into the room. He screamed, only once. At that moment I pulled him down to the floor and pulled the heavy feather bed over him. Then I smiled, happy to see the deed so far accomplished. But for many more minutes the noise could not be heard through the walls. Finally it stopped. The old man was dead. I removed the bed and examined the corpse. Yes, he was dead. Dead like a stone. I put my hand on his heart and let it lie there for minutes. He was finally dead. His eye would not bother me anymore. If you still think I'm crazy, you will certainly change your view when I tell you which smart precautions I took to hide the corpse. The night was passing and I was working in a hurry, but in great silence. I pulled out three nails from the floor of the room and prepared his grave for the dead below. Then I put the boards back in place. I did it so skillfully, so carefully that no human eye, not even his, could have noticed anything striking. There was nothing to wash away, no stain of any kind, not the smallest drop of blood. I was too careful. When I was done with this work, it was four o'clock, still as dark as midnight. When the clock struck for hours, it rang at the front door. I went down with a light heart to open it, because what was there to fear? Three men came in, a neighbor had screamed in the night. They had suspected, had informed the police, and they, the three officers, had been dispatched to investigate the cause. I smiled, because what was there to fear? I welcomed the gentlemen. I said, I would have thrown out the scream myself in a dream. The man was absent, gone to the country, I noticed. I took the guests through the entire house. I asked them to look around, look around well. I led them into his room. I showed them his valuables in full and untouched. Enthusiastic about my peace of mind, I brought chairs and he looked for the gentlemen and I, in the awareness of my complete victory, with a full-fledged audacity put my own chair exactly where the corpse of the victim was resting under the stilts. The officials were satisfied. My behavior had convinced them. I was unusually tidy. So they sat, and while I happily answered, they chatted about private affairs. But not long after, I felt that I was fading, and I wished them farewell. My head ached, and I thought I had eardrums. But they still sat there and chatted. The buzzing became clearer. It did not stop and became more and more clear. I spoke even more indifferently to get rid of the strange feeling. But it remained and became too clear. Until I finally realized that the noise was not in the ears themselves. Without a doubt. Now I became very pale. But I spoke even more eagerly and with a raised voice. But the noise became louder. And what could I do? It was a quiet, dull, fast noise. A noise like the ticking of a clock, which one has wrapped with a cloth. I was panting. And yet, the officials still did not hear it. I spoke faster, more intensely, but the noise grew constantly. I stood up and spoke enraged and angry. My voice was hoarse and I gesticulated wildly. But the noise grew constantly. Why did they not leave? I walked up and down with heavy steps as if the men's talk had angered me. But the noise continued. Oh God, what could I do? I was foaming. I was rasping. I was cursing. I grabbed the chair I was sitting on and scratched back and forth on the dials with it. But the noise rose above everything and continued. It became louder, louder, louder. And the men still chatted in a friendly way and smiled. Was it possible that they did not hear? Oh mighty God! No! No! They heard. They were angry. They knew. They were making fun of my outrage. That was what I thought. And I still think so. But everything else was better than this pain. Everything was more bearable than this pain. I could no longer bear this hideous smile. I felt that I had to scream out or die. And now again. Hush! Louder! Louder! Louder! Louder! Scream! I shouted. Don't hide any longer! I confess the crime! Tear up the dials! Here! Here! It is the beating of this terrible heart. Thank you for listening. If you liked the story and you are not sleeping yet, I would be happy about a thumbs up and a comment. And if you can't sleep yet, you can find another story here. See you soon.