Stalking the Vampire (7 page)

The first mage stopped, surprised. “Bernie!” he exclaimed. “What are
you
doing here?”

“Hi, Sam,” said Bernie. “How's the wife?”

“Just fine. Your boy still at college?”

“Yeah. He graduates next month.” Bernie's face glowed with pride. “He's coming into the family business.”

“
Mazel tov!
” said Sam. “As soon as I'm through bringing this poor son of a bitch back, let's go out for a drink.”

“You talking about Horace here?”

Sam pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and read it. “Yeah, that's his name. How'd you know it?”

“Because Horace hired me to let him sleep the Sleep of Eternity,” said Bernie.

“He knew he was going to die?”

“If you were married to a
yenta
like that, wouldn't you figure your days were numbered—or at least hope they were?”

“Well, I like that!” bellowed the burly woman.

“Hey, lady, take a hike,” said Bernie. “We're talking business here.”

“You!” yelled the woman, pointing at Sam. “I hired you to bring him back from the dead! If you're not going to do what I've paid for, I want a full refund and I'll get someone who keeps his bargains.”

“Lady, that suits me just fine,” said Sam. He made a mystic sign in the air and the woman froze, motionless. Sam pulled a twenty-dollar bill out of a hidden pocket, walked over, and slid it between her lips. Then he turned back to Bernie. “Let the poor bastard stay dead. Who can blame him?”

“Sounds good to me,” said Bernie. “Come on. I'm buying the first round.”

The two mages walked off, arm in arm. As they reached an exit, Sam turned back and snapped his fingers, and the woman came back to life. She pulled the bill out of her mouth, stared at Horace's corpse for a moment, then cursed and shook her fist in the air. “You're not getting out of it that easily, you no-good deadbeat! I'll be back with another mage, and then another, until one of them finally does what I pay him to do. But one way or the other, Horace Neiderkamp, you're raking the yard and painting the closets, and that's all there is to it.” She glared at him. “If you think a little thing like death is going to get you off the hook…”

She wandered off, still muttering threats and imprecations, and Mallory kept looking at corpses, some lying quietly on their slabs, some cursing a blue streak, some seeming to exist in a confused state midway between life and death.

“The kid
would
have to get himself killed on All Hallows' Eve,” he complained, not even aware that he was speaking aloud. “It couldn't be some normal night when they only schlep a dozen or so corpses into this joint.”

“Maybe we can come back on Some Hallows' Eve and it will only be half as crowded,” suggested Felina helpfully.

“Thanks for the tip,” said Mallory sardonically. “Hop up onto one of these tables and see if you can spot McGuire, and let me know if he's making any progress at all.”

Felina leaped lightly to a table and peered across the room, then giggled.

“What is it?” asked Mallory.

“He thought he was pinching a real woman, but it was a witch,” explained Felina. “Now she's beating him with her broom.”

“Little bastard's really got to watch his appetites,” remarked Mallory. “You never met Rupert Newton, did you?”

“No.”

“Then there's no sense asking you if you can see him, is there?”

“Certainly there is,” said Felina.

“Okay, can you see him?”

“I don't know,” she answered. “What does he look like?”

Mallory resisted the urge to say that he looked exactly like a Rupert Newton. Instead he pointed to the floor. “Down.”

She jumped down from the table, and they began walking again, until their way was blocked by a balding man in religious robes. A number of black-clad acolytes stood around him as he began chanting over the body of a well-dressed dead man.

“Thanks!” said the corpse, suddenly sitting up. “I feel ever so much better now.”

“Be quiet,” said the robed man. “I haven't finished commending your soul into Satan's hands yet.”

“Well, now you don't have to,” said the corpse. “The strength and purity of your belief has brought me back.”

“Damn it, man,” said the robed figure, “the black mass isn't
supposed
to bring you back.”

“Well, it did,” said the corpse. “I think we should drop to our knees and thank God.”

“Blasphemy!” thundered the robed man.

“Second race at Belmont,” called a voice from across the room. “Ten to one if it comes up muddy.”

“What are you talking about?” demanded the robed man irritably.

“Weren't you just asking for the odds on Blasphemy? He's running at Belmont tomorrow.”

“Leave me alone. I'm a high priest and I'm conducting a black mass.”

“Well, strictly speaking, I think it's probably a gray mass, now that I'm alive,” said the corpse.

“Silence!” said the high priest, sounding like he might burst into tears any moment. “All right, I've said the prayer, now I'm lighting the candles. What comes next? Ah, yes, the vessels of lust—where are Jezebel and Lilith?”

“Right here,” said a lovely young girl wearing a black cloak.

“But we have to talk,” said her equally pretty companion.

“There's nothing to say,” replied the high priest. “Remove your cloaks and assume your position on the altar.”

“That's what we have to talk about,” said the second girl. “If this is only a gray mass, then we're only going to be
semi-naked
sacrifices to Satan.”

“Right,” said the first girl. “Fair is fair.”

“There is nothing fair about a black mass!” thundered the high priest.

“
Gray
mass,” the corpse corrected him.

“Besides, the candle dripped wax all over my hair the last time,” said the first girl.

“And it smells bad,” said the second.

“Worse than me?” asked the corpse.

The girl sniffed at him, then at the candle. “Yes.”

“I
knew
I was alive again!” said the corpse happily, swinging his feet over the side of the table. “What say we all go out for something to eat? Dying can be pretty hungry work.”

“You're ruining everything!” whined the high priest.

“Oh, come on now,” said the corpse. “There are bodies all the hell over here. Go perform your mass on one of them.”

“But they aren't my parishioners!” complained the high priest.

“What better way to add to the membership?” said the corpse, standing up and walking off with an arm around each girl.

“By Satan, I never thought of that!” said the high priest. He turned to his acolytes. “Come on. Let's find a rich one!”

Mallory stood aside as they marched off in pursuit of a new parishioner—and almost bumped into a gray-skinned uniformed policeman with two bullet holes clean through his skull. He had his arms folded across his chest, and his jaw jutted out pugnaciously.

“Oh, come on, Clarence, be reasonable,” said a man with City Planning Commission credentials clipped to his vest pocket. “We're offering you a monument, an eternal flame, consecrated ground, and a round-the-clock uniformed guard.”

“I don't care,” said Clarence. “My job is catching villains, not lying there in that damned tomb so people can pay their respects to me. I mean, hell, they won't even know who I am.”

“That's the whole point of the Tomb of the Unknown Policeman,” explained the official.

“But I'm
not
unknown! I'm Clarence Weatherbee IV, and I want them respecting
me
, not some poor slob who got shot breaking up a card game in the City Council's executive bathroom.”

“I don't think you get the idea at all,” said the official in frustrated tones.

“Of course I get it,” snapped Clarence. “That's why I climbed out and ran away.”

“Look, Clarence, we're consecrating the ground, we're giving you an eternal flame, we're…”

“I heard all that. The answer is no.”

“Is there no way you'll reconsider?” asked the official.

Clarence narrowed his eyes in thought for a moment. “Okay,” he said at last. “Here's a list of my nonnegotiable demands.”

“I'm listening.”

“Listening only counts in horseshoes. Pull out your pen and write this down.”

“All right,” said the official, producing a pen and a small notebook.

“I like marigolds. There have to be marigolds around the tomb every day of the year.”

“But they're not in bloom year-round.”

“I don't care where you get ‘em from. I've got to have them. Now, do I continue, or are we through already?”

“We'll find them, even if we have to force them in the conservatory. What's next?”

“I want a chapter of my favorite book to be read in front of the tomb every day at high noon.”

“Easily done,” said the official. “Something by Whitman, I'm guessing? Or perhaps Thoreau or Emerson?”

“I don't know who wrote it, but there's a copy of it in my desk back at the office.”

“And the title?”

“
Meter Maids in Bondage.
”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me. Do I continue?”

The official sighed wearily. “Go on.”

Clarence went through forty-three more demands, including his own monthly comic book to be called
Superhero Cop vs. the Underworld Scum of Manhattan.
Finally he couldn't come up with any more demands.

“All right,” said the official. “I'll get cracking on your list, and we should have you entombed again within forty-eight hours. I assume I can find you here at that time?”

“Right here,” confirmed Clarence. As the official started off, Clarence called after him, “It gets mighty lonely down in that tomb.”

“Surely you aren't suggesting that we kill you a female companion!” demanded the official.

“Nah,” said Clarence. “This place is loaded with them. I'll have one chosen by the time you get back.”

“This is most irregular!”

“No one will ever know,” said Clarence. “Unless, of course, you'd prefer to change the inscription to read the Tomb of the Unknown Policeman and His Current Ladyfriend.”

“
Current?
” said the official in shocked tones.

“Eternity's a long time,” said Clarence. “And it's a small tomb. Tastes change.”

The official glared at him for a long moment, then turned on his heel and stalked off.

“Bureaucrats!” said Clarence to Mallory with a contemptuous snort. “They always give in. Hell, if he'd stood his ground, I could have done without the mah-jongg set and the Norman Rockwell print.” Clarence turned and began surveying the room. “Excuse me, pal, but I got to go select a running mate.”

“Are you sure that's the term you want?” asked Mallory.

Clarence shrugged and smiled. “What's the fun of catching ‘em if they don't run a little?”

“I don't know what you're catching,” said Felina, “but leave the mice alone.”

“I promise, cat-girl,” said Clarence, heading off.

“And the birds,” she called after him. “And the fish. And the rabbits. And the squirrels. And—”

“Enough,” said Mallory. “We've still got work to do.”

“Still?” repeated Felina. “Were we working?”

“One of us was,” said Mallory. Suddenly something near the back wall caught his eye. “And I think it just paid off.” 

“What do you mean?”

He pointed to the body of a young man, lying alone and isolated in the darkest corner of the immense room.

“I think I finally spotted Rupert Newton.”

“Hey, Bats!” hollered Mallory.

Twenty-seven vampires turned to face him.

“McGuire!” yelled Mallory, ignoring them. “I found him!”

The little vampire signaled the detective that he'd heard him and began making his way across the huge room. So did seven other vampires, each with a lean and hungry look.

“Felina,” said Mallory, “hop onto this table and flash your claws at them.”

“Do I get to eat them?” she asked, leaping atop a nearby slab.

“You can do whatever you want to any of them that gets within reach of me.”

“Including
him?
” she said, pointing to McGuire.

“No,” answered Mallory. “He's on our side.”

The other vampires saw the cat-girl displaying her three-inch claws and decided that whatever Mallory was summoning McGuire for, it wasn't worth the effort to join the proceedings.

“Okay,” said Mallory. “Hop down.”

“I like it up here.”

“Hop down anyway.”

“You never let me have any fun,” she sniffed, jumping lightly to the floor.”

My heart bleeds for you,” said Mallory.

A corpse with overdeveloped eyeteeth suddenly sat up and stared hungrily at him.

“A figure of speech,” explained Mallory. “Go back to sleep.”

The corpse muttered something, then lay back down.

“You found him?” asked McGuire, approaching them.

“Yeah,” said Mallory. “Off in the corner there.”

“It doesn't look like anyone's examined him yet,” said McGuire.

“They're not as well organized as they might be.”

“Well, let's go have a look at him,” said McGuire eagerly.

“Bats, you're drooling again,” said Mallory.

“I'm sorry,” said the little vampire. “But it's like being locked in a candy shop.”

“Don't they have to be alive to appeal to you?”

“Around here it's hard to tell the difference, if you know what I mean.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” said the detective. “But this is Winnifred's kin, and no one touches him without severe consequences, if
you
know what
I
mean.”

“I get the point,” said McGuire.

“I hope so,” said Mallory. “Because if you try to take a bite of the kid, you're going to get ten more points.” He jerked a thumb in Felina's direction. “
Hers.
”

Felina smiled in anticipation. “Yum!” she said.

Mallory began walking toward the slab that held Rupert Newton's body. When he was about thirty feet away, he found his way blocked by a leprechaun, an elf, a goblin, a gremlin, and a troll.

“That's far enough, pal,” said the leprechaun.

“I want to examine the body,” said Mallory.

“Yeah, that's what they all say.”

“Then they do terrible, hideous, grotesque things to them,” said the goblin.

“But fun,” admitted the elf.

“We're wasting time,” said Mallory. “I need to see that body.”

“No way, Mallory,” said the troll. “We're under orders. No one examines the corpse until the pathologist gets first shot at it.”

“If you know my name, you know I'm a detective. Why don't you just stand aside and let me get to work?”

“Big tough guy!” sneered the first leprechaun. “You don't scare us!”

“Right!” said the elf. “Take another step and we'll tear you limb from limb!”

“We'll kill you with such skill and finesse that we'll be awarded both ears and the tail!” added the troll.

“Uh…I hate to be a spoilsport,” said the goblin, “but he doesn't have a tail.”

“Don't hassle us with details when we're working ourselves into a killing rage,” said the leprechaun.

“Right!” said the elf. “You're a walking dead man, Mallory. Turn around and maybe we'll let you make it to the exit.”

“Otherwise, we'll hit you so hard it'll kill your grandchildren!” said the troll.

“You did it again,” complained the goblin. “Excuse me, Mallory, but would you clarify a point before we rip you to shreds?”

“What point?” asked Mallory.

“Are you a father?”

“No,” said Mallory.

“See?” said the goblin furiously. “How can we kill his grandchildren if he doesn't have any?”

“He just said he didn't have any children,” said the troll defensively. “He never mentioned grandchildren.”

“Maybe he adopted some children,” offered the elf.

“Would they let him?” asked the leprechaun. “After all, he's in a dangerous profession. I mean, here we are about to kill him, and we've only known him for maybe a minute and a half.”

“Enough talk,” said Mallory, starting to lose his patience. “I came here to examine that corpse, and that's what I'm about to do.”

“Don't interrupt!” snapped the elf. “We're having a serious discussion here!”

“Have it somewhere else,” said Mallory, taking a step forward.

“That's it, Mallory! snapped the leprechaun. Take one more step, even a little one, and my partner here will kill you.”

“Uh…which partner was that?” asked the goblin nervously.

“You,” said the leprechaun.

“I can't,” said the goblin.

“Why not?”

“You know,” replied the goblin uneasily. “My
problem.
”

“What the hell does an enlarged prostate have to do with dismembering a detective?” demanded the leprechaun.

“I never know when I might have to run to the bathroom.”

“Then kill him quick,” said the leprechaun. “What's another ten seconds, more or less?”

“I'd love to kill him, really I would,” said the goblin. “But I never know when this thing will act up, and I hate to start something and not finish it.”

“No problem,” said the leprechaun. “Just start, and if you have to run off to answer a call of Nature, Herbie here can finish it for you.”

“Me?” said the elf.

“Yes, you,” said the leprechaun. “You hate humans, don't you?”

“Yes, of course I do, but…”

“Then pull his arms and legs out of their sockets, rip his head off, and spit down his neck.”

“Why did you have to say that?” demanded the gremlin. “Now I'm going to be sick!” He wandered off into the shadows, making retching noises.

The elf looked up at Mallory, who towered above him. “There's nothing I'd rather do than pull his limbs from his body,” he said. “But my lumbago has been acting up…”

“I thought you had rheumatism…” said the leprechaun suspiciously.

“I do.”

“Then what's this lumbago crap?”

“I can't spell rheumatism,” said the elf defensively.

“What a bunch of wimps!” snapped the leprechaun. “Okay, Phil—kill the sonofabitch.”

“But he's my friend,” said the troll, putting an arm around the elf's shoulders.

“The
other
sonofabitch!” yelled the leprechaun.

“That's almost too easy,” answered the troll. “Let's outsmart him instead.”

“I don't care if you behead him or dazzle him with your wit, as long as he's just as dead at the end of it,” said the leprechaun.

“Watch this now,” said the troll confidently, pulling out a cigarette. “Hey, cat thing, I'll bet you ten to one that you can't kill Mallory before I finish smoking this cigarette.”

“Ten whats?” asked Felina curiously.

“You name it.”

“Whales,” said Felina.

“Aw, come on, cat thing—be reasonable,” said the troll. “Where am I going to get ten whales at this time of night? Especially in October?”

“I guess you're going to have to dazzle me some other way,” said Mallory.

“You keep out of this,” said the troll. “You're just the victim.”

“You like bets, I'll make you one,” said the detective.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I'll bet you two hundred to one that if you try to stop me from examining the corpse, I tell Felina to slash your face down to the bones.”

“Make it three hundred to one,” said the leprechaun, reaching into his pocket for his wallet.

“Hey!” complained the troll.

“Felina,” said Mallory. “You want to give him a sample?”

“Wait! No! Stop!” cried the troll, backing away. “You're cheating!”

“What are you talking about?” said Mallory.

“Trolls are terrified of cat-people! You're taking unfair advantage of my genetic shortcomings!”

“Are trolls afraid of vampires?”

“Certainly not!” said the troll with dignity. “We're a race of warrior heroes. Except for this one tiny flaw in our makeup, we fear nothing and no one.”

“Bats,” said Mallory, “are you feeling thirsty?” He pointed to the troll. “Have a drink.”

“Wait!” cried the troll as McGuire took a step toward him. “Let's consider this like civilized men.”

“You're not a man, you're a troll,” said Mallory. “And about to become a dead one.”

“You can't scare my buddy!” said the leprechaun. “You heard him: Trolls fear nothing and no one.”

“Well, now, that wasn't entirely true,” said the troll nervously as McGuire took another step. “We don't like to mention it, but we have an innate fear of IRS audits, high blood pressure, blondes named Hortense, one-eyed giants with battle-axes and steel teeth, Ford Pintos…” The troll rattled off about fifty more things trolls were afraid of.

“But you're not afraid of vampires?” said the leprechaun.

“No.”

“So stand your ground.”

“There's one more thing we're afraid of,” said the troll, still backing away.

“Just one?” said the leprechaun. “What is it?”

“Pain!” yelled the troll, turning and running off across the room.

McGuire turned to the elf.

“Uh…boss, I'd better go after Phil and make sure he's okay,” said the elf, breaking into a run.

“Well,” said Mallory, “I guess it's just you and me, now. Are you going to let me examine the body?”

“Only after a battle to the death,” vowed the leprechaun.

“That suits me fine,” said Mallory.

“It's a deal,” said the leprechaun. “I'll take the cat thing, you take the ugly little bloodsucker.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The battle to the death,” responded the leprechaun. “If she wins, you get to examine the corpse. If he wins, you apologize to Phil and Herbie and promise to go home.”

“You got it all wrong,” said Mallory. “The battle to the death is between you and me.”

“What are you talking about?” shrieked the leprechaun. “I can't indulge in battles to the death! I've got a wife and three kids and a mortgage and car payments and…”

“Then step aside,” said Mallory.

“I'll tell you what,” said the leprechaun. “My cousin Vinny gets out of stir in February. If you could just go home and come back then, I guarantee
he'll
be happy to battle you to the death, as long as he gets choice of weapons. And since he only weighs fifty-seven pounds, I think we should make you carry extra weights on your shoes or your sword arm or something.”

“Forget it.”

“Where's your sense of fair play?” demanded the leprechaun. “What kind of fiend are you, Mallory?”

“An impatient one. Felina, if he doesn't stand aside, he's all yours.”

The cat-girl grinned and displayed her claws.

“Quick question,” said the leprechaun. “Are prostate problems contagious?”

“I don't know. Why?”

“'Cause I gotta go to the bathroom!” he said, racing off.

Mallory walked over to Rupert's body, but before he reached it a middle-
aged man in a white lab coat appeared. He had wild unruly hair, even wilder eyes, and a stethoscope, which struck Mallory as an extraneous instrument in this particular place, hung down from his neck.

“You're the pathologist?” asked Mallory.

“Maximillian,” he said, extending an ice-cold hand. “Maximillian Mabuse, late of Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Prague, Budapest, Bucharest, and Great Falls, Montana.”

“Dr. Mabuse,” said Mallory, frowning. “I think I read something about a Dr. Mabuse somewhere.”

“Lies, all lies, spread by enemies and jealous colleagues,” said Dr. Mabuse. “Besides, she said she was seventeen.” He turned to Rupert Newton's body. “Now, what have we here?”

“I need to know what killed him,” said Mallory.

“Society,” said Dr. Mabuse promptly.

“What the hell does that mean?”

Dr. Mabuse shrugged. “I don't know. But it sounds good in interviews and usually buys me a few seconds to come up with my next answer.” He turned Rupert's head to a side and studied the bite marks on his neck. “He was definitely turning, but he hadn't joined the undead yet. Another bite or two and he'd have been indestructible.”

“Really?”

“Well, that's a generalization, of course,” said Dr. Mabuse. “Actually, there are one hundred thirty-seven known ways to kill a vampire, and that doesn't include being eaten by piranhas or succumbing to untreated social diseases.” He continued examining the body. “No bullet holes, no knife wounds. Clearly he hasn't been gored by a rhinoceros. I wouldn't entirely rule out sunstroke, but it
has
been cloudy for the past week.” Suddenly he ran his hands over Rupert's head. “Ah!”