How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"You're lyin' to me," McCaslin said patiently. "I know it, these deputies know it, prob'ly even ole Moe knows it. I don't know how much you're lyin'— a little or a lot—but I know I can't prove you're lyin' as long as you both stick to the same story… I'd take you down just the same and put you to the inconvenience except I get a feelin' you ain't lyin' because you did somethin' against the law." (11.407)
Again, the vampire hunters have to lie to the law. Shortly after they refuse to tell Sheriff McCaslin about the vampires, he becomes a victim himself, leading Shmoop to wonder if lying was really the best way to go.
Quote #8
"And you came here alone?" she asked when he had finished. "You believed it and came up here alone?"
"Believed it?" He looked at her, honestly puzzled. "Sure I believed it. I saw it, didn't I?"
There was no response to that, and suddenly she was ashamed of her instant doubt (no, doubt was too kind a word) of Matt's story and of Ben's tentative acceptance. (12.27-29)
Mark is honest and straightforward, but Susan, the passage suggests, is deceiving herself. The vampires seem to rely on folks' self-deception even more than on outright lies. People lie to themselves about evil, which is how evil gets them.
Quote #9
Some of them had emerged enough from the shadows of death to have regained some rudimentary cunning… Glynis Mayberry called Mabel Werts, said she was frightened, and asked if she could come over and spend the evening with her until her husband got back from Waterville. Mabel agreed with almost pitiful relief, and when she opened the door ten minutes later, Glynis was standing there stark naked, her purse over her arm, grinning with huge, ravenous incisors. (15.12)
It's not really clear why the vampires need rudimentary cunning. They got people easily enough by just going out and getting them before they had the run of the whole town; why couldn't Glynis just head over to Mabel's window and hypnotize her into opening it? The answer is probably just that it's fun to read about the tricksy vampires and their sneakiness. Lies and deceit are seductive and, in this case, funny.