The Empty Coffins (3 page)

“Then what do I do?” Blair demanded. “I can't chase something that doesn't exist!”

“It
does
exist, Sergeant—only it has the power to return to its starting point. Namely, the coffin from which it came. However, maybe there is a way of getting at it….”

The other men waited, huddled against the buff­eting wind and streaming rain.

“A vampire,” Meadows proceeded, “is technically a spirit, an evil presence. In its waking moments when it becomes a vampire it is visible much the same as when alive as a human being, except that it will wear a shroud. But, upon returning to the grave whence it came, it becomes invisible to mor­tal eyes because it is in a state of suspended animation. For the time being, that is, it is not pervaded by the demoniac life it possesses when on the rampage. Which means that wherever in this cemetery there is a totally empty coffin—there lies the vampire.”

“Oh!” Blair said, and the whites of his eyes showed as he glanced at Hawkins.

“If it's not there,” said Hawkins, “how do we kill it?”

“Obviously you can't, if it's invisible. The only thing to do is wait until it is on the ram­page—and visible— Then attack it and drive a stake through its heart. There is no other way.”

“It—it doesn't seem to be anywhere about to­night,” Hawkins said, with a glance around the dismal spaces. “So I suppose we'd better hold a nightly vigil here, starting tomorrow night, to see if we can locate this—thing.”

“You can try that, of course,” Meadows agreed. “But please remember that vampires do not nec­essarily haunt the churchyard. They move far and wide over the countryside. They can strike—anywhere.”

“But they have to
start
from the churchyard,” Peter pointed out. ‘It seems the best place to me.”

“That is up to our two good friends here,” Meadows said. “For my part I'm having nothing to do with the business. I've read enough to know what horror a vampire can inflict on a hapless hu­man being. I don't intend to lay myself open to possible attack.”

“We'd better get out of here,” Blair decided. “Maybe we'd better ask somebody from the Institute of Psychic Research to come down here and look the place over. Vampires are hardly in the line of police duty.”

“That's up to you,” Meadows said. “I'd add, though, that psychic investigators are more con­cerned with phantoms and poltergeists than vamp­ires.”

Nothing more was said as the journey through the cemetery continued. When presently the railings were reached a search was made to find an opening, through which Madge Paignton had presumably escaped. It was discovered finally: two railings being twist­ed apart far enough to permit of the passage of a body.

“Well, that's that,” Peter said, when they were back in the roadway with his car twenty yards distant. “Can I give you a lift home, doctor? You too, gentlemen?”

They all nodded their thanks in the glow of the torch, but said nothing. The sobering effect of the churchyard and Dr. Meadows' observations had made speech singularly difficult.

Peter led the way back to his car and dropped the two police officers in the village; then he carried on beyond it with Dr. Meadows seated beside him.

“All this talk about a vampire isn't just a—a leg-pull, is it, doc?” Peter asked, after a while.

Meadows gave him a glance. “Good heavens, Peter, you know me better than that! I'm convinced it is all too true—and that's why I'm worried. With a vampire loose, just anything can happen until it is destroyed.”

“I find it hard to believe in anything so hid­eous.”

“That's because you have never encountered it before. To you it probably seems as remote from possibility as a sea-serpent.”

“More so, I'm afraid.”

“Such things do exist, son,” Meadows said de­liberately. “I know they do. You see—my cousin died because of an attack by a vampire.”

Peter nearly released the steering wheel in his amazement.

“He—did?'

“It wasn't in this country,” Meadows continued soberly. “At that time I was practicing in a re­mote corner of Ireland, and if ever there was a place for manifestations it is Ireland. I was staying with my cousin at the time. He was attack­ed one night by something he could only describe as deathly white, which seemed to float through the air. On his neck were two scars. From the night of that attack he began to waste away, and finally died.

“At first we thought he had some kind of disease—we being myself and the villagers amongst whom I was living—then it occurred to somebody that he was perhaps being attacked nightly by a vampire which was drawing the blood from his body. It was only then that he had con­sciousness enough to describe the nightly visit of the white apparition. He had thought it a dream: we knew it was fact. We killed the vampire finally by driving a stake through its heart when it came one night. My cousin died shortly afterward. Pres­umably he too became a vampire— I didn't wait to see. I left Ireland post haste and came to England here.”

Peter drew up the car outside the doctor's home.

“I think,” Meadows said, climbing out into the rain and drawing him bag after him, “we're up against it, son. Quite a lot of unpleasant things may happen in this village of ours before we're much older.”

“Unless the vampire is caught.”

“Hope for the best…. Good night, Peter, and thanks for the lift—both ways.”

Meadows slammed the car door and went up the front door to his house. Peter sat thinking for a moment, the windscreen wiper clicking back and forth steadily; then he reversed the car and drove back through the streaming rain to his home.

CHAPTER THREE

THE EMPTY COFFIN

The mysterious attack that had been made on Madge Paignton was not repeated on any other member of the village, either men or woman. For some nights, Sergeant Blair and Constable Hawkins kept a watch on the cemetery, but nothing happened. So, grad­ually, things began to drift back to their former state of torpor and there was no more talk of vam­pires or things that go bump in the night.

Peter said nothing to Elsie of his experience. The girl was under strain enough; but inevitably, during her visits to the village, she heard of the vampire and its supposed attack on Madge Paignton. Not that she paid much heed: she seemed to consider such fantasy as not worthy of notice.

Peter for his part went ahead with the wedding arrangements, and a month after his experience with Madge Paignton he and Elsie were married. They honeymooned in London and returned to Little Pay­ling a month afterwards. By this time the worst inclemency of winter had passed and February was passing into March.

Upon their return they both expected to hear gossip about themselves, but instead it centred upon a totally different subject—one they had both believed had expired. Vampires! Or at least, one vampire.

The facts, as far as they could glean them in the village, were that during their absence two more attacks had succeeded. A farmer—and a week later, a well known local builder had both been foully murdered. Apparently their bodies had been discovered almost drained of blood. The farmer had been found in a ditch, and the builder in a pond. In both cases the men had deep wounds at either side of their necks, centring exactly on the jugular veins.

Scotland Yard had been busy, uprooting every­thing right and left and questioning nearly every­body in the village; but they had arrived at no concrete conclusion.

“And now,” Dr. Meadows said, shrugging, “the matter seems to have lapsed.”

He had come over for one of his routine exam­inations of Mrs. Burrows, who was still convinced her dyspeptic flutterings were connected with heart trouble.

“You mean,” Peter asked, amazed, “that the Yard have let the whole thing drop?”

“Little else they can do,” Meadows closed up his bag as it stood on the drawing room table. “Naturally, Blair end Hawkins found the business beyond them in no time, so the Yard had to be called in. I think the reason's pretty clear: they just don't believe in a vampire. They prefer to look for a flesh-and-blood murderer, but what they overlook is the disappearance of blood from the victims. No ordinary murderer could do
that
— So, of course, the Yard hasn't got anywhere. And won't, as long as it relies on material foundations.”

“Haven't you any ideas yourself, doctor?” Elsie asked quietly.

“One or two.” He looked at her pensively. “I've been wondering who in the local cemetery is a suic­ide—the first necessity for a vampire—and who hated the village people enough to wish to attack them so constantly. I can think of only one person.”

Elsie, her mother, and Peter waited expectantly.

“George Timperley,” Meadows said finally. “Your late husband, Elsie.”

The girl's expression changed. “But George
wasn't
a suicide! He died of—myocarditis, or something. Or so you said on the death certificate.”

Meadows smiled faintly. “Technically, he
did
die of myocarditis, which is only another name for heart-failure. But he was basically a suicide. But for his excessive drinking—my warnings about which he ignored—he would
not
have died. So, I class him as a suicide. As for his hatred of the village folk: we all know that he loathed them. They whispered and talked about his drinking, about the way he treated you....”

“Are you seriously suggesting that George became a vampire?” Mrs. Burrows asked blankly.

“I am. He was evil enough, in all conscience....” Meadows moved from the table and came over to where Peter and Elsie were seated on the divan, Mrs. Burr­ows opposite them.

“I think,” Meadows continued, “we are facing something dark, something diabolical, and I just can't help linking it with that mystic's warning to you, Elsie.”

“Oh...that.” Elsie's mouth tightened a little. “I have been trying my utmost to forget it. Now I look back on it I think it was crazy; or at least I keep telling myself so.”

“If my guess is right,” Meadows said slowly, “you, my dear, are the one person whom George, in his present state as a vampire, will seek. He knew you despised him even though you stuck to him: be knew you remained beside him only for what would come to you when he died.”

“Perhaps…,” Elsie muttered.

“He
did
. He told me so himself one day when he called for treatment, after too many nights on the bottle. I think he would have changed his will, too, only he died too abruptly to manage it. Just before his death, Elsie, he had guessed at last just how much you really hated him. Hatred, I would remark, is the motivating force which turns a dead being into a vampire, which makes it leave its resting place and, in the form of a blood­sucker, seek out those on whom it desires revenge, turning them in turn into vampires.”

“For heavens' sake, Doc, take it easy!” Peter protested,

“I would be doing a disservice if I did,” Mead­ows said, shaking his head. “If the vampire is really George, Elsie, then your life is in danger: it might be George who will make the warning of that mystic come true.”

Elsie gave a troubled frown. “If it be George why have I not been attacked before now? I don't mean whilst Peter and I were away, of course: I mean before that, after the first attack on Madge Paignton. Nothing has happened to me so far.”

“You are quite a distance from the cemetery in this house,” Meadows answered. “A vampire cannot go very far without sustenance. In each case attacks have been made on people either within, or just outside, the cemetery. My guess is that, as yet, George has not enough strength to reach you. He might need to kill at least three people in one night, withdrawing their blood into himself, before having sufficient energy to come this far and deal with you.”

“Then—what do we do?' Elsie asked helplessly.

“I would suggest you leave this district. Go as far away as you can, even to another country if possible. Then you ought to be safe. It can't be guaranteed, of course, but it is most probable.”

“And if it
isn't
George,” Peter pointed out, “we have run away from nothing. I will have left my business, which is now building up into something worthwhile, and Elsie will have left this home—in which we both have ownership now, by the way.”

“Up to you,” Meadows said, shrugging. “Just a warning, that's all—rendered all the more emphat­ic by Singh's forecast.”

“Isn't there some way of proving whether or not this vampire
is
George?” Elsie asked slowly.

“Only one. Open his grave and find out.”

“We'd never get permission,” Peter said, rising to his feet. “And in spite of your own belief in this vampire business, Doc, I still think it's a lot of rubbish! I also think Elsie is in no more danger than you or I. Last of all, I do
not
be­lieve what Rawnee Singh said.”

“I wish I felt the same,” Meadows said. “As far as George is concerned, the only way to open his grave is to do it ourselves. Certainly the Home Secretary won't agree to exhumation on the basis of vampires. The Government, like Scotland Yard, is singularly unimaginative in regard to matters of the—other world.”

“It's desecration,” Mrs. Burrows whispered. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, doctor!”

“I am thinking of the living,” he answered. “I'm thinking of the possible danger to Elsie. If George is
not
in his grave we know what to think. He has become a vampire. If we attempt to open his coffin it will be at night, when he too will presumably be on the rampage, and his coffin should be empty. By day it will be empty too, he being in a state of suspended animation.”

“I'm not attempting anything so—so horrible,” Elsie said at last. “I'm staying right where I am, and I'll live down my fears.”

“No more than I expected from you, my dear,” Meadows smiled, patting her shoulder. “Well, let us hope everything will work out for the best.... Now I must be going. And keep on with that pres­cription, Mrs. Burrows.”

She did not answer. Apparently his grave­ opening suggestion had revolted her completely; so with a nod to Elsie and Peter he picked up his bag and headed for the door.

“I'll see you out,” Peter said, and followed him into the hall. On the front doorstep Peter laid a hand on Meadows' arm.

“Yes?” Meadows asked, putting on his hat.

Peter glanced about him—back towards the drawing room, then on to the darkness of the driveway where Meadows' car stood.

“For Elsie's sake, doc,” he said, his voice low, “I'd like to satisfy myself about George. I still don't believe in vampires, but if there
is
danger for her— You know what I mean?”

“You mean you're willing to open his coffin?”

“For the sake of Elsie, yes. If George
has
gone, then I must see to it that Elsie leaves the district, and I'll go too, of course.”

Meadows glanced at his watch, then at the night sky.

“Seven-thirty,” he said. “The night looks as though it ought to be fine, and there's a full moon rising at quarter-to-ten. Tell you what you do. Meet me at the cemetery gates at midnight. Naturally you don't want Elsie to know what you're doing?”

“No. I'll see we get off to bed early, then I'll sneak out without her being any the wiser.”

Meadows fished inside his overcoat pocket and brought a capsule into view. From it he shook three tablets into his palm and handed them over.

“See these get into her last drink, tonight,” he said. “Harmless enough, but they'll ensure she doesn't wake until morning. And they won't leave a hangover, either.”

Peter looked at them. “Something new in sleep­ing tablets, eh?”

“Exactly.” Meadows gave a smile. “I spend quite a lot of my spare time, what there is of it, creating new drugs and cures. Some of them are in fair demand on the market; others are plain failures.... The only way a country doctor can ever hope to add to his finances, I'm afraid. These sleeping tablets are the only ones that produce healthy sleep without any after-effect. I've invented a new form of blood-capsule, too. Restores anaemics to full health, and cures all—or most—other blood diseases. I base my hopes of a for­tune on my blood-capsule.... Anyhow. I'll be talking shop all night if I'm not careful. See you midnight.”

“Sure enough,” Peter agreed, shaking hands; then when the doctor's car had started off down the drive Peter shut the front door and returned to the drawing room.

“What kept you so long?” Elsie enquired, glancing up from the divan—and breaking off conver­sation with her mother.

“Oh, nothing. Just talking shop—all about sleeping tablets and blood capsules. The doc's quite a manufacturer of patent medicines, it seems.”

“It's to be hoped some of them are better than this indigestion prescription he's made up,” Mrs. Burrows remarked sourly. “It doesn't seem to be doing me a bit of good.”

Peter smiled a little and then settled at El­sie's side on the divan. His hand under her chin forced her to look at him. Her blue eyes were half serious, half wistful.

“Still worrying, dearest, deep down?” he mur­mured.

She sighed. “Dr. Meadows brought it all back again. I had almost forgotten that horrible warning of death: now I just can't do anything but think about it. Peter, do you think that perhaps the doc was right? About George....”

“I think we'd both be more sensible to forget all about the horrible business,” Peter answered. “Best thing we can do is sleep on it.”

And here he deliberately dropped the subject. He saw to it that the three pills Meadows had given him found their way into Elsie's bedtime drink, and he noticed too that she fell asleep almost at the moment her head touched the pillow. He waited until eleven-thirty to be sure, but she did not stir; then he silently slipped out of the bed, dressed, armed himself with a torch, and left the house by a corridor window. Of Mrs. Burrows he had no fear. Nothing short of an earthquake had ever been known to awaken her, and in any case her room was at the far end of the passage.

For caution's sake, however, Peter did not use his car in case the engine was heard. He walked the distance to the cemetery, striding out swiftly in the pallid light of the full moon, the still wintry trees motionless at either side of the lane leading to the village.

At twelve-fifteen he reached the cemetery gates, to find Dr. Meadows' car parked there without lights. Meadows himself was waiting, a bag of tools in one hand and two shovels over his right shoulder.

“Everything all right?” he enquired.

“Yes—Elsie's none the wiser, and her mother's sound asleep.”

“Good. I think we'll get into the cemetery by that twisted railing. Easier than climbing with all this stuff.” Meadows started walking. “I've got a crowbar, screwdriver, torch, the two shovels, and some rope. And other odds and ends we may need. We ought to manage all right.”

“You know where George's grave is, of course?”

“On the right of the church. I was present when they put him down.”

Peter nodded in the moonlight and said no more for a while; then when they had found their way into the cemetery precincts via the broken rail­ing he remarked:

“This moonlight is going to show us up pretty clearly if anybody happens to be prowling.”

“I know—but it also helps us to see what we're doing. We will have to risk being spotted. Not that I think we will be. The talk of vampires has scared everybody away from here—including Scotland Yard, apparently.”