Berenice and I were cousins, and we grew up together. Yet, we were very different. I was always ill and filled with gloom. And she was always graceful and filled with energy. I always lived inside myself, addicted to strong medication. And she always went through life carelessly with no bad thoughts.

When I say her name, “Berenice!” I see her image clearly in front of me. She was gorgeous and beautiful. But then, a disease – a deadly disease -- fell upon her. As I looked at her, I noticed she was changing. Her mind, her habits, her personality – everything was slowly changing. The disease changed her so much, that I could hardly recognize her as the once-beautiful Berenice.

This terrible disease was a form of epilepsy which caused trances – a trance that looked as if the person had died. She fell into the trances often, but would recover from them very quickly.

In the meantime, my own disease grew rapidly upon me. I had a condition known as “monomania.” This is very difficult to explain to you. Most people cannot understand it. I would sit for many, many hours thinking about one particular object. Sometimes, I would see something in a book and would think about it for hours. Other times I would sit and stare at a shadow on the floor for an entire day. I would lose all other thoughts while I would sit and watch the flame in a lamp all night long, or maybe the embers in the fireplace. I might dream away several days thinking of the perfume of a flower. Or repeat one word over and over and over until it lost all meaning. I would sit motionless for hours, not moving, forgetting that I was alive. These are just a few examples of my “monomania.”
This is different from daydreaming. Many people often daydream and think about something in their imagination, losing track of time. But with me, I would always fix my mind on something meaningless and unimportant. Then I would see the same thing over and over in my mind – losing hours and even days of my life.

Now you would think that my disease would help me deal with Berenice’s condition – that I wouldn’t be worrying about her because I would be thinking about one particular object. But this is not true. Her disease gave me pain. I thought about how gentle and beautiful she used to be, and how her physical body had changed so much. Even during the days when she was the most beautiful, I know I had never loved her. It is strange, but my feelings were never felt with my heart – only with my mind.

One gray night as I sat silently in my library, she had walked past and I had seen her – not as a living person, but as the Berenice of a dream. Not as a human, but as sort of an object. Not as someone to admire, but as someone to think about. Not as someone to love, but as someone to study. I grew pale when I saw her coming toward me that night. I felt sorry for her because of what the disease had done to her beauty, and I knew that she had loved me for many years. So in an evil moment, I asked her to marry me.

As time passed, it was getting closer to our marriage day. It was an unusually warm, calm, misty winter day. I sat (and thought) alone in my library. But, when I lifted up my eyes, I saw that Berenice stood in front of me.
Was it my imagination? Or the misty haze from outside? Or the dark lighting of the room? Or the gray clothes that hung from her body? What was it that made her look like a ghost? I couldn’t tell. She didn’t speak. And I could not have spoken if I had tried. An icy chill ran through my body. I had a terrible fear inside me. A curiosity filled my soul, and I sank back into my chair. I sat for a long time – breathless and motionless – staring at her figure. She was so thin – like a skeleton. Finally, I moved my eyes up to her face.

Her forehead was high and very pale, but peaceful. Her hair fell partially across it, covering her temples with hundreds of little yellow curls, filling me with melancholy. Her eyes looked empty – without any pupils. I looked away from her glassy stare, down to her thin, shrunken lips. They opened. In a strange smile, the teeth of this new Berenice revealed themselves to my eyes. I wish to God that I had never seen them, or if I had, that I had died after looking at them!

I heard a door shut, and I looked up suddenly. I found that my cousin had left the room. But the image had not left my brain! The white ghastly vision of her teeth would not leave my mind! There wasn’t a speck on their surface. Not a different color shade on the white enamel. Not the slightest dent on the edges. I saw them more clearly now than I did then! The TEETH! The TEETH! They were here – and there – and everywhere! Right in front of me -- long, narrow, and extremely white, with her pale lips around them. This thought caused me to enter a state of monomania, although I fought against it. I had no thoughts of anything but the teeth. I wanted them with a crazy desire. Everything else in the world disappeared and my interest in the teeth became my only thought. Only the teeth were in my mind. I imagined holding them. I thought about their characteristics. I thought about their strangeness. They had a power in my imagination. I felt that I was going mad! I felt that the only thing that would give my mind peace would be to have the teeth!

The evening passed, and darkness came and went, and the next day dawned, and then the second night was coming – but still, I sat motionless in that room, my mind buried with thoughts of the teeth. Their image was so clear, and they floated around the room in the shadows.

Suddenly, a sound of cries broke my dream-like state. After a pause, I heard several voices downstairs, and some low moanings of sorrow. I got up from my seat and opened the door of my room. Out in the hall stood a maid, in tears. She told me that Berenice – had died. She had been seized with epilepsy that morning, and now that night had come, her grave was ready for her.

Later, I found myself sitting alone in the library. It seemed like I had just woken up from a confusing and exciting dream. I knew that it was midnight, and I remembered that Berenice had died earlier that day. But I had no real comprehension of the past several hours. I did have an unclear memory, though. A memory of horror and of terror. It was like a fearful page in my life, written with words I couldn’t understand. It was like I was trying to read the words to figure out what was causing this feeling of terror in me, but I couldn’t. I kept hearing a piercing shriek of a female voice ringing in my ears. I had done something – what was it? I asked myself the question out loud – “What was it?”

On the table beside me burned a lamp, and beside it lay a little box. It was just an ordinary box. I had seen it many times before. It belonged to the family doctor. But how did it get there on my table? And why did I shudder when I looked at it? Why did it cause the hairs on my head to stand, and the blood in my veins to freeze?

Then, someone lightly tapped on the library door. A servant entered on tiptoe, pale as a corpse. His eyes were wild with terror, and he spoke in a shaking, quiet voice. What was he saying? I couldn’t understand. He was speaking in broken sentences. He was finally able to communicate a little. He told me about a wild shriek in the middle of the night that woke up everyone in the house – how everyone in the household gathered to search in the direction of the scream –

Then his voice became very clear as he whispered that Berenice’s grave had been opened – her body had removed – and she was still breathing – her heart was still beating – she was still alive!

He stopped and pointed to my clothes. They were muddy and clotted with gore. I didn’t speak, and he gently lifted my arm. It had been clawed with human fingernails. He pointed to something against the wall. I stared at it for several minutes. It was a shovel. With a scream, I bolted to the table and grabbed the little box that was on it. But I couldn’t force myself to open it. I was shaking, and it slipped out of my hands. It fell heavily on the floor and burst into pieces. With a rattling sound, there fell out some instruments for dental surgery and 32 small, white, square substances that were scattered around the floor.

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