Vicente paused with his hand still on the banister. He looked slightly out of breath. Caxton wondered if he’d ever seen a dead body before.
Together they stepped into the room where Jeff Montrose’s life had ended at approximately five-fifteen that morning, several hours before Caxton arrived back in town.
The walls of the room were lined with posters from various concerts, black ink on vibrantly colored paper. Clothes and books littered the floor, were heaped up by the cot that had served as Montrose’s bed. Videos and DVDs were stacked neatly on shelves, prominent among them a copy of Teeth .
Caxton hoped Vicente didn’t see it. A desk sat beneath the room’s single window, mostly covered in a big beige computer setup and thick sheaves of printer paper. In a chair before the computer Montrose remained just as Caxton had found him. He wore a white shirt open at the neck and wrists and a black cape lined with red velvet. He’d told her about that cape when she’d met him—he wore it when he did ghost tours in town. His eye makeup was impeccable, but the dark mascara and kohl stood in high contrast to the near-perfect whiteness of his face. Most of his neck had been torn away, but there was not a drop of blood anywhere in the room.
Vicente took one look at the body and started to vomit. He turned around in a circle until he found a trash can and hugged it to him as his chest and shoulders heaved.
Caxton waited patiently until he was done.
“The killer was our vampire, the original one. There’s no real question. He must have come here directly from the crime scene in the alleyway. He would have been told where to look for Montrose by Professor Geistdoerfer from the college.”
“The Running Wolf?” Vicente stared at her with wild eyes.
“Professor Geistdoerfer was the one who woke our vampire in the first place. I don’t think he understood what the consequences would be, at the time. Afterward the vampire controlled him through threats and intimidation. He’s…dead now.” Presumably dead again, and for the last time, she thought, but didn’t say.
“And this kid.” Vicente stepped a little closer to the body in the chair. He reached out and touched the cloth of Montrose’s cape. “Was he some kind of—Satanist?”
“No. A student of dark history.” Caxton frowned. “He was fascinated with ghosts and vampires and other unnatural things. That’s why he came to school here, to study the darkest period of American history. The people of the nineteenth century shared some of his more ghoulish interests.”
“So when a vampire came along he just jumped at the chance to help.”
Caxton shook her head. “Just because he was interested in vampires, that didn’t make him evil. My girlfriend was a goth, back in high school, and she read nothing but books on vampires. I can promise you she’s not evil. Lots of kids play vampires and victims.”
“Sure, we did that at my school, too. We’d tie black towels around our necks and run around pretending to bite each other, just like in the movies. Then we discovered girls and it all seemed kind of silly. This guy didn’t grow out of it, right?”
Caxton shrugged.
“And now he’s paid for it. Just a dumb kid.”
She pushed some papers aside on the desk and showed him what lay there. A simple wooden stake, a piece of wood about a foot long, sharpened at one end. “He was a lot of things, but he wasn’t an idiot,”
she said. “He knew something was up. I think he must have known all along, at least as soon as he heard on the news about how Officer Garrity had died. He must have known he was an accomplice, that he had helped bring the vampire back to life. He knew what was happening in this town.” She touched the pointy end of the stake. Montrose had probably known it was useless against a vampire that had already fed on blood that night. He’d studied vampires enough, had watched Teeth probably more than once.
The stake must have been the best thing he could get his hands on. “I don’t think he was a bad person, at heart. He just couldn’t seem to make up his mind which side he was on.”
Vicente shook his head. “I don’t understand, Trooper. Why did you want me to see this?”
Caxton leaned over the computer on the desk. “We found this when we discovered the body. He made no attempt to hide it.” The computer was in sleep mode. When she tapped the space bar the screen lit up right away. It displayed the client for Montrose’s student webmail account, with a message already opened:
Subject:
A Humble Request for Aid
From:
John Geistdoerfer
To:
Jeffrey Montrose
Priority:
Normal
My dear Montrose:
I’m afraid it’s come to the worst. The police are going to seal off the site, well, we should have expected that. I believe you met Trooper Caxton. She’s on her way just now to come interrogate me. Rubber hoses and the third degree. I think I’m man enough to take it, but what might be worse…Jeff, they’re going to seize the coffins and other artifacts and I doubt we’ll ever see them again. I know you share my passion for this find and I’d like to ask for your help.
What I have in mind may not be strictly adherent to the letter of the law. Don’t worry. I’ll take all responsibility, and pay whatever silly fine they want, if it comes to that. You will remember we discussed moving the coffins to a place where they could be better looked after. I’d like you to take the department van and start doing that today. Don’t tell anyone what you’re up to, though of course if you’re stopped en route don’t lie for my sake, either. Do it soon, Jeff, if you can.
I see big things for you, son, big things indeed. I see your name just below mine on the paper when we describe this find. There are times when the petty temporal concerns of we mortals must bow to the needs of history—I think in you I have found someone who shares that belief. You have my eternal thanks.
—John
62.
Hiram Morse had done his duty, according to general orders. When we first met resistance to our picket he had run back to the line as fast as he was able, & summoned aid, & much of it. He had brought the whole of the 3rd Maine with him, some twelve score men, & Colonel Lakeman at the front with his sword in the air. They carried lanterns through the wood to light their way, & it seemed like great fires moved through the trees there were so many. They made short work of Chess. The men got a length of rope around his neck, & hanged him from the tallest tree in his own yard, & settled in to watch him struggle & try to break free.
Eventually he seemed to realize the futility of his efforts & he let his body slacken on the line, yet still he did not die. It was during this part of his destruction that I asked to look on him, the creature who’d so utterly corrupted my Bill. It was allowed, & I was brought close, & looked in his red eyes. I had thought to spit on him, but when I saw the expression & great intelligence in his face I banked my wrath. For a good minute I did naught but look on him, & he on me. In the end I could muster up not enough hate to curse him.