The Reformed Vampire Support Group (26 page)

‘You mean those two McKinnon people know where
we
are?’ Gladys exclaimed.

I glared at her.

‘Of course not,’ I snapped. ‘Why would Nefley Irving tell them where I live?’ Then I turned back to Dave. ‘They’re not his friends, Dave. They tried to kill him, remember?’

‘If they tried to kill him, they might have twisted his arm as well,’ Dave replied. ‘They might have
forced
the address out of him – he
doesn’t look like a guy who’d need much forcing.’

‘But—’

‘Wait. Just wait a minute.’ Gladys sat up straight. ‘Are you saying that fat man upstairs knows
my
address?’

Horace heaved an impatient sigh.

‘That’s what we were talking about before,’ he said. ‘Don’t you listen? The man upstairs is the one who killed Casimir.’

‘We think,’ Dave amended. ‘Which means that he probably stole Casimir’s address book.’ Horace ignored Dave, fixing his attention on Gladys. ‘So, yes – he probably does know where you live. And where
I
live, as well.’

‘Which means that those other men might know, too? The men with the guns?’ Gladys demanded.

Horace shrugged. Dave said, ‘Maybe.’

Gladys surged to her feet.

‘Then we
have
to call the police! Right now!’ she cried. ‘Before those gunmen show up here!’

Dave and Horace exchanged glances.

‘I doubt they’ll do that,’ was Dave’s opinion.

‘Why should they?’ Horace agreed. ‘They’ve got their werewolf. They don’t need to come looking for us.’

‘But they
might!
’ wailed Gladys. She was getting worked up, the way she always does when her physical comfort is threatened. Bridget immediately took her hand.

‘Shhh,’ Bridget entreated. ‘Don’t worry, dear. It’ll be fine.’

‘We have to call the police!’

‘I’m sure we will.’ Blinking, Bridget looked to Dave for confirmation. ‘I’m sure that’s what we’re going to do. Isn’t it?’

Dave hesitated. His eyes swivelled in my direction.

Then his brow creased.

‘What’s the matter?’ he said.

I didn’t reply. I wasn’t able to. If I had, I would have vomited all over the basement rug.

It was one of those occasions when you can’t make polite excuses, or withdraw discreetly. Instead I jumped up, clapped my hand over my mouth and ran upstairs. I reached the bathroom just as George was emerging from it, and nearly knocked him over on my way to the toilet bowl. What happened next isn’t something you want to hear about. All I can say is that I’ve experienced much worse; when you’ve spent nearly three hours straight with your head in the toilet, a ten-minute session doesn’t seem so bad.

Mum heard me, of course. She always does. She came in, held back my hair, wiped my face, then led me off to my bedroom when I was done. ‘Just have a lie down,’ she recommended. ‘You’ll be fine in a moment.’

‘I feel so awful …’

‘I know you do.’

‘It isn’t fair.’

‘You’re right. It isn’t.’ Mum knew the drill. Having tucked me into bed, she draped a damp washcloth over my forehead and turned off all the lights. At the door she encountered Sanford.

‘Just leave her alone,’ Mum warned him. ‘She’s been overdoing it.’

‘She’s not in any pain?’

‘She’ll be fine.’

‘How’s your tummy, Nina?’

‘Go away,’ I moaned – because I hate having people hover over me when I’m sick. Mum gave it up long ago; she understands that if I’m left to myself, and don’t have to fight off suggestions about hot water bottles or extra pillows, I’ll be up and about soon enough. That’s probably why she ushered Sanford away from the threshold of my room, and why she closed the door with such authoritative, ‘out-of-bounds’ firmness.

Unfortunately, I was too depressed to be grateful. I kept remembering Reuben’s lopsided smile, and his bewildered anger, and his irrepressible vitality. To most of the others, Reuben was just an abstract concept. They didn’t see him as a flesh-and-blood human being. They didn’t realise that turning our backs on Reuben would be like tying up a dog, then leaving it to starve.

That’s how
I
felt, anyway.

I wondered if Dave was experiencing a similar sense of obligation. I wondered if he would vote in favour of an anonymous tip-off. Bridget would. The priest would. Gladys probably would – unless Sanford frightened her into submission with gory tales of sun exposure. As for Horace … well, it was impossible to tell what
he
would do. Except twit me about Reuben, of course, just to get up my nose.

That was another thing that really, really depressed me: the fact that people might think I was in love with Reuben. The fact that
Dave
might think I was in love with Reuben, just because Horace had been shooting his stupid mouth off.

‘
Sssst! Nina!
’

It was Horace. He’d pushed open the door and stuck his head into my room; when I turned to squint at him, the rest of his body quickly followed his head.

‘Are you awake?’ he whispered, leaning against the door so that it softly clicked shut behind him. ‘Can you talk, or are you sick?’

‘What is it?’ I mumbled. ‘What do you want?’

‘It’s not what
I
want. It’s what
you
want,’ he rejoined. And I stared at him in sheer perplexity.

‘Wh-what?’

‘Nina …’ Stealthily he approached the bed, his black cape swishing around his ankles. Before I could order him to keep his distance, he knelt down on my woolly bedside mat, thrust his face into mine, and hissed, ‘
We’ve got to go and rescue Reuben!
’

‘What?’ I said
vaguely. ‘What do you mean?’

‘We have to get Reuben back ourselves,’ Horace insisted.

‘We have to!’

‘Why?’

‘Because …’ He hesitated, glancing at the door. ‘Because I can’t afford to get involved with the police, Nina.’

‘None of us can,’ I pointed out. But he shook his head.

‘No, I
really
can’t. More than anyone else,’ he assured me.

‘Why?’ The question was hardly out of my mouth before I realised why. ‘You’ve been running a scam,’ I concluded, without waiting for an answer. ‘Some kind of Internet scam. I knew it. I
knew
it.’

‘As a matter of fact, you don’t know anything,’ he retorted. ‘And the less you know, the better.’

‘For God’s sake.’ I turned away from him, peevishly rubbing my eyes. ‘What’s the matter with you, Horace?’

‘The matter with me is that I have to pay rates! Unlike
some
people who live with their
mothers
,’ Horace snarled. Then he recalled that he was trying to be persuasive, and quickly changed his tone. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Sorry, it’s just that I’m … well, I’m a bit worried. I could go to
jail
, Nina.’

He went on to explain that, even if the police were called, they
might not pay any attention. ‘What if they think Father Ramon’s a lunatic?’ he continued softly. ‘Or what if they get there too late?’ It was more than likely, he added, that one of the McKinnons would drive by the presbytery, just to make sure that it had burned to the ground. And if they saw that it hadn’t? ‘They’ll take off,’ he opined. ‘They’ll be gone before the police even get to Nefley’s place.’

‘I – I suppose so.’ Despite my fuzzy head, I could understand Horace’s reasoning. ‘But Dave was right, Horace – even if we do manage to rescue Reuben, the McKinnons will come after us—’

‘No, they won’t.’

‘Horace—’

‘
Not if we tell them we’re vampires
.’

I peered up at him, floundering.

‘What?’ I croaked.

‘Nina, they think you’re dead. You said it yourself.’ The relish in his voice was all too obvious. His eyes glittered. His teeth gleamed. ‘If they see you, and they see
me
, and we play things right, they’ll be too scared to come after us.’ He gestured at his outfit – at his cape and boots and frockcoat – with the air of somebody clinching an argument. ‘If you like, I can lend you my cape,’ he offered.

‘But …’ I was very tired. I wasn’t thinking clearly. ‘But what about the guns?’ was my next objection. ‘It’s probably true, what Dave said. We might not have a chance to say that we’re vampires. Barry will shoot first and ask questions later.’

‘Only if he can see what he’s shooting at.’

‘Huh?’

‘You’ve forgotten something.’ He rubbed his hands together, like a super-villain on a cartoon show. ‘Everyone has. You’re so caught up in how we can’t fly or shape-shift or go out in the sun that you’re not focusing on what we
can
do.’ Suddenly he leaned forward, grabbing my wrist. ‘We can see in the dark, Nina,’ he
reminded me. ‘If the lights are off, Barry won’t shoot first. He won’t know what’s going on. We will, though. We’ll have that gun off him before he can say “Dracula”.’

‘Who will?’ I queried, disengaging myself. ‘Who are you talking about? You and me and who else?’

There was a pause.

‘No one,’ Horace replied at last, trying to sound nonchalant. ‘Just us.’

‘By
ourselves
?’ I should have turned him down right there and then. I probably would have, if I’d been in good health. The trouble was that I felt confused; despite my reservations about Horace, I could see his point. The police might
not
respond. The McKinnons
might
leave early. And Horace’s plan of attack didn’t seem utterly unrealistic.

‘Have you asked anyone else?’ I inquired. ‘What did Dave say?’

‘What do you think?’ Horace waved his hand dismissively. ‘Dave wouldn’t listen. Neither would Sanford. They’re both too scared – not like you. You have
guts
.’

‘So has Dave,’ I objected. My mind started to wander. I thought about Dave advancing into the McKinnons’ basement, and climbing the presbytery stairs ahead of me. I remembered watching him square his bony shoulders before he went to check the front of the orange van. Though he might have been tall, he wasn’t that strong; he had the same brittle-looking wrists and hesitant, shuffling tread as I did. Yet over the past few days, he had demonstrated the most enormous courage – unlike certain other vampires of my acquaintance.

You couldn’t help admiring him. At least,
I
couldn’t.

‘Nina, we don’t have much time,’ Horace urged. ‘It’s now or never.’

‘But—’

‘Sanford and your mum are shut away in the guestroom. Everyone else is down in the basement. When Father Ramon gets back, it’ll be too late.’ His fingers closed on a handful of doona; the muscles in his neck were taut. ‘We can’t mess around, Nina. It’s your decision. Do you want to save Reuben or not?’

‘Of course I do.’ The implied criticism annoyed me. ‘But how are we going to get there, if Dave won’t drive us?’

‘We’ll take a cab.’

‘A
cab?
’

‘You’ve been blooded, haven’t you? It’ll be fine.’ Releasing the bedclothes, Horace whipped a mobile phone out of his pocket. ‘I’ll book one. We can pick it up around the corner. I’ve got plenty of cash.’

‘It’s a long way, though—’

‘Come
on
, Nina! Will you or won’t you?’ he demanded. ‘I can’t go by myself – the McKinnons don’t know me. They don’t think I’m dead.’

‘All right, all right.’ Throwing off my doona, I sat up. Immediately my head began to swim. ‘Oh God. I hope I can do this.’

‘Of course you can.’ Horace passed me my boots. ‘You’ll be fine. We’ll look out for each other. And when we’ve freed the werewolf, he can deal with the McKinnons himself.’ Horace gave a snort of amusement as I lurched to my feet. ‘That’s something else Dave hasn’t considered: how the McKinnons are supposed to come after us if the werewolf has bitten their legs off!’

‘Reuben won’t do that,’ I weakly protested. ‘He
can’t
do that – not right now. He’s got teeth just like everyone else, except when it’s a full moon.’

Horace, however, wasn’t listening. He had dialled a taxi service, and was quietly ordering a cab. I was impressed that he knew what to do; it’s not as if vampires go around ordering cabs every day of
the week. I was also amazed that he could remember Nefley Irving’s address, which had completely slipped
my
mind.

I was having a hard time trying to remember anything – even the fact that Horace should never, ever be trusted.

‘All right,’ he finally declared, snapping his mobile shut. ‘Are you ready? Are your boots on?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where are your sunglasses?’

‘Uh – I don’t know.’ I had to think for a moment. ‘The McKinnons took them.’

‘Don’t you have a spare set?’

‘No.’

‘What about your mum? She must have a pair.’ After a brief wait (during which I struggled to recall something –
anything
– about my mother’s sunglasses), Horace said, ‘Would they be in her handbag?’

‘Probably.’

‘Then we’ll pick them up on our way out. Her handbag is on the hall table.’ He took my hand. ‘Just follow me. And keep the noise down. We don’t want anyone hearing us.’

By now you must be wondering if I’d gone mad. I don’t blame you, really; to have gone in a taxi with Horace – let
alone
on a rescue mission – was something I wouldn’t normally have done. Don’t forget, however, that I still hadn’t fully recovered from what Sanford would have called my ‘gastric upset’. I was groggy and disoriented. I was also afraid of the police. And though I wasn’t completely convinced that Horace and I could pull it off alone, I did believe that his scheme might just work.

Creak. Cre-e-eak
. It was astonishing that no one heard us, as we crept down the old wooden stairs. I can only assume that somewhere behind the closed door of the guestroom, Mum was receiving
instructions from Sanford – instructions so exhaustive that she missed our stealthy footsteps. (Normally she has the ears of a lynx.) Upon arriving in the vestibule, Horace fished around in Mum’s handbag while I reached for my yellow coat. But Horace stopped me. He shook his head.

Only after we had slipped out the front door, holding our breaths at the
snap
of the deadlock, did he feel secure enough to speak.

‘You wouldn’t have scared anyone in that coat,’ he muttered. ‘The blouse is bad enough, but that coat makes you look like Tweety Bird.’