Lee Falk - [Story of the Phantom 12]

by The Vampires

  “Now tell me what happened here.”

  Among the three of them, they told the story. Three masked men (they looked fearfully at the Phantom’s mask) had broken in, assaulted the priest, and dragged the children out without saying a word.

  “Without a word?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Maybe some of them were afraid you’d recognize their voices.”

  “Recognize vampire voices?”

  “What makes you think they were vampires?”

  “What else?”

  “Does this one look like a vampire?”

  He looked quite ordinary.

  “If they weren’t vampires, why did they come?” said the mother. She was a strong peasant woman and was regaining her strength and composure rapidly.

  “I don’t know. We’ll find out.”

  “Who are you?” asked the boy.

  “Your friend,” said the Phantom. “Now tell me quickly, where did you see the witch?”

  The children looked fearfully at their mother. She nodded.

  “Tell him.”

  “Up in the old ruins."

  ‘Tell me what you saw.”

  They appeared afraid to talk about it. It had been a scary experience. Patiently, he drew it out of them. They had been climbing in the ruins, against their mother’s orders, as she reminded them sternly. They heard strange sounds.

  “Like what?”

  “Like somebody who was hurt.”

  “Moaning and groaning?”

  “Yes, like that,” said the boy eagerly. “And we peeked through an old window that had bars on it, and we saw her.”

  “What did you see?”

  Both children started to talk at once. He stopped them to get a clear picture.

  “It was an old lady, very old, lots of wrinkles and long white hair down to here.” The girl pointed to her waist. “And she was tied to a post.”

  ‘Tied to a post?”

  “With chains, iron chains. And she moaned and she groaned.”

  The Phantom’s mind reeled for a moment. What had Old Mozz said, so far away in the Deep Woods? “He chained her securely to a pillar of stone, and she shrieked and she wailed.”

  “Was she chained to a wooden post?” he asked softly. “No, to a stone post,” said the boy.

  “Are you sure you saw this?”

  “Oh, yes. We saw it, didn’t we,” said the boy.

  The girl nodded anxiously.

  “They saw what everyone has always known, that the old witch of Hunda is chained there through eternity for she was evil and that is her punishment,” said the mother, as though repeating an old ritual.

  Hunda? The chronicles, three hundred years ago, called her ‘Hanta.’

  “How many people did you tell about this?”

  The children thought for a moment.

  “We told mama and daddy,” their faces twitched with pain at the thought of their late father. “We told Uncle Roko.”

  “Uncle Roko?”

  “My brother,” said the mother.

  Naturally, almost everyone in this tiny place was related. That made Roko the late Piotr’s brother-in-law. “Did he offer to buy your land and animals?”

  “He offered to help. He is my brother,” she said, looking confused at this turn in the talk.

  He looked through the chapel window. There was a light gray line in the sky.

  “It is almost dawn. I must go. Does your brother live by the crossroads beyond the town in the big brown house?”

  “Yes. Off Cemetery Road.”

  “When daylight comes, you have nothing to fear. The three of you go together to get a doctor for the priest.”

  “Then we will tell the police.”

  “No, not yet.” He couldn’t have them blundering so close to his trail now.

  “Thank you for helping us,” said the mother.

  “Mister, if you hadn’t found us, what would they do to us?” asked the little boy.

  “Nothing much. Make you stand in the comer.”

  He smiled and his voice was light as he said that. Who knows what horrible fate had been intended for them?

  They smiled at their mother. She hugged and kissed them. When they looked up, the stranger was gone.

  “Wasn’t he nice?” said the girl.

  “Why did he wear a mask like those bad men?”

  The mother’s eyes suddenly widened.

  “He said he had to leave because it was almost daylight.”

  “Mama, isn’t that what they have to do?”

  The children stared at their mother. Was that a vampire, too? Could there be a good vampire? They huddled together. This world of Koqania had become a terrifying place.

  Chapter 11

  As he raced to the edge of town with Devil, who had been waiting patiently all the while, dawn was breaking in the east. In distant houses, people were moving out of doors to start their morning chores. As he reached his deserted barn, he could see a few carts coming down the road, some piled high with household articles. More families fleeing? Inside the bam, he lowered his hood, and using rainwater from an old trough, he bathed his head. There was a small break in the skin. The bleeding had stopped. A lucky escape from more serious injury. He opened the small emergency kit that accompanied him everywhere, applied antiseptic ointment and a small patch, then replaced the hood.

  It had been quite a night. First, the snoring Lord Mayor, then the men in black, then the widow and children. Why had her husband Piotr been killed? At least now he knew that the so-called vampires, whoever they were, were not imaginary. The bump on his head was proof of that. Why had they kidnapped the children? To kill them? In that case, why carry them off? To use them in some ghoulish ceremony? Was it all because they had seen the witch? So it seemed. Who knew that they had seen the witch? Their late father, mother, and her brother Roko, the stubborn one who wouldn’t move, who bought terrorized neighbors’ farm animals at bargain prices and perhaps their land as well. The big brown house off Cemetery Road, where Roko lived, was the next stop.

  He stretched out on the straw with Devil next to him, and slept for an hour. Like the jungle animals they knew so well, both man and wolf slept with “one eye open,” able to instantly awake from deep sleep on a moment’s notice when danger threatened. Like the jungle animals— except the lordly lion who slept twelve or fourteen hours every day because he feared nothing—the Phantom was used to quick cat-naps, taken at odd times. He awoke after an hour, refreshed and rested.

  He watched the country road, Old County Road, from the bam door. Normally, it would be busy with traffic from the farms to town. Now, only an occasional wagon rumbled by, always heavily loaded, with women and children perched on top, a man leading the horse. More rarely, a car bounced by on the bumpy dirt road, usually an ancient jalopy. One car was not ancient. It was a long shiny closed car and it raced over the road. He could only see vague figures inside.

  It was time to eat. His last meal had been a quick sandwich at a train station more than twenty-four hours earlier. Devil was hungry, too. The Phantom petted his big gray companion, and said a single word, “Eat.” Devil dashed out of the barn. The Phantom carried enough firepower to drop a big deer or a bear. But he would do no hunting now. He waited. Ten minutes later, Devil trotted in, carrying a freshly killed rabbit in his jaws. He dropped his catch at the Phantom’s feet, received a rewarding pat, then turned and ran out again. While he was gone, the Phantom quickly skinned and dressed the animal, sharpened a skewer out of wood in the barn, then built a small fire. He placed the animal on the skewer, the skewer on two uprights on either side of the fire, and slowly roasted the meat. Devil returned with another catch. Rabbits were plentiful here, it seemed. Probably more so now that the humans were leaving. Devil lay on the floor with the kill between his paws and watched his master. The wolf was hungry, but he waited. When the meat was properly roasted, the Phantom stamped out the fire.

  He sat next to Devil and held the roast poised in the
air, ready to eat. The wolf watched him sharply, as he slowly brought the roast near his lips. Devil’s jaws slowly approached the kill between his paws. The man held the roast tantalizingly close to his own mouth. The hungry wolf’s jaws were a half inch from his own meal, but he waited. Then the Phantom suddenly bit into the roast, and Devil tore into his meal. It was a game both enjoyed and often played. The Phantom added a little salt to his meal, another item he always carried in his kit. There was an old well a short distance from the bam. Making certain he wasn’t being observed, he drew pure cold water from it with the old wooden bucket for Devil and himself.

  The meal finished, they swept their eating place with straw, leaving no trace of their activity. Then the Phantom donned his outer city clothes. It was easier to travel in daylight with the civilian outfit covering his skintight costume. He avoided the road, moving through the woods that banked the fields. The police—that odd pair—would be looking for him, especially the fire-eater, Sergeant Malo. The sight of a stranger with a" “dog” would be reported. He moved carefully among the trees toward the brown house on the hill off Cemetery Road.

  In response to his knock, a pair of suspicious eyes peered through an opening in the window shutters. The eyes looked at the big man and the gray animal. He knocked again. A rough voice came through the locked door.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want to talk to you, Roko.”

  The door opened a few inches. The man inside had a rifle. He was stocky, with a bald head, strong jaw, and thick neck. He was wearing brown denim trousers.

  “I told you people to let me alone. I’m not interested,” he said angrily.

  “What people?”

  “Aren’t you with the ones that came here yesterday and the day before that?”

  “No.”

  “You another buyer?”

  “No.”

  “Then what in damnation do you want?”

  “Who is it, Jebbon?” said a woman’s voice inside.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Tell him to go away,” continued the voice, more shrilly now.

  “What do you want?”

  “To talk to you.”

  “About what?”

  The Phantom watched the rifle. The barrel was pointed at his waist.

  “Let’s talk inside, Roko.”

  “You got a name?”

  “Walker.”

  “We can talk like this. Talk.”

  “I want to know about the vampires and the witch of Hunda.”

  The rifle jerked up as the man jolted with surprise. The Phantom’s hand darted to the rifle barrel, turning it aside as it blasted into the doorframe. Inside, the woman screamed. The Phantom twisted the rifle out of Roko’s hands and at the same moment kicked open the door, knocking Roko back so he fell to his knees. The Phantom moved in with Devil and the rifle, and slammed the door behind him. A middle-aged woman peeling potatoes at a table stared at him in terror.

  “I came to talk to you, not to hurt you. Relax,” he said quietly.

  “I didn’t mean to fire. The gun just went off,” said Roko, backing away on Ms knees, his face still showing terror.

  “I might believe that. That depends. Get up, Roko.”

  Roko climbed slowly to his feet. He was a heavy man, and had hurt his knees falling.

  “Depends on what?”

  “What else you tell me. Sit down.”

  Roko sat at the table next to his wife. She had dropped her paring knife into the wooden bowl of potatoes. She clutched her husband’s hand in terror. The couple stared at the big stranger.

  “First, tell me what you know about the vampires.”

  “Are you ... one of them?” said Roko.

  “You know better than that.”

  “How would we know?” said the wife shrilly.

  “Shh,” said her husband. “She is right. We’ve never seen them. We’ve heard them.”

  “When?”

  “Every night for the last few weeks. Moaning and scratching outside the house.”

  “Moaning and scratching,” repeated the wife, shaking as though describing a nightmare.

  “What did you do?”

  “Nothing. I wanted to go outside and shoot them. She wouldn’t let me,” said Roko.

  “You can’t shoot them. Bullets don’t bother them. Chief Peta tried,” said Mrs. Roko.

  “The police chief? How do you know?”

  “He told us. He’s my cousin,” said the woman, stressing the relationship proudly.

  More of these family connections. Was everyone in Koqania related?

  “When your neighbors moved out, you bought their farm animals at very low prices.”

  “I gave all I could. They had to have some money. No one else would buy. They’re all afraid,” he added scornfully.

  “Aren’t you afraid?”

  “Yes, every night.”

  “Every night,” echoed the woman.

  “I worked all my life to make this a good farm. Nobody’s driving me off—not even vampires. They’ll have to carry me off dead!” he shouted, his heavy face reddening. “He keeps saying that,” said the wife angrily. “But I’m not putting up with this much longer. The next time those men come, we’re selling.”

  “We are not. I’ll never sell to those thieves.”

  “What men?”

  “I don’t know who they are. They gave me their card, but I can’t read,” he added apologetically.

  “Have you bought land from the people who left their farms?”

  “I don’t have that kind of money.” He looked at his wife and shrugged.

  “He wanted to,” she shouted. “Wanted our life savings. All my milk and egg money. ‘No! I said. ‘No!’ ”

  “It was such a temptation. The farm next door—so cheap. Going for a song and nobody else wanted it. Better than mine. I watched it all my life. Then with Piotr dead—”

  “Your brother-in-law.”

  Roko looked at him sharply.

  “How did you know that?”

  “What about the witch?”

  Husband and wife stared at him. This word always seemed to stun these people.

  “We never saw her,” Roko stammered. “But Elise and Tondo did. They’re Piotr’s children.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “They told us right here at this table,” said the wife. “They saw her down there. She was old, and chained to a stone pillar, and she moaned and groaned.” continued the wife, terrified by the image she was describing.

  “When did you first hear about the witch?”

  “When? All our lives. She’s always been there.”

  “Did anyone see her when you were children?”

  They tried to remember. They looked at each other. “Some said they did.”

  “Anybody you knew?”

  “It’s hard to remember,” said Roko.

  “Who did you tell that Piotr’s children saw the witch?” The couple looked at each other, puzzled. They shook their heads.

  “Nobody.”

  “Now about those people who are trying to buy this place. Have they bought other farms?”

  “Yes, several. All for nothing. The cheap—!” he said with a string of Koqania oaths.

  “Jebbon!” said his wife reprovingly.

  “You said they gave you a card. A business card?”

  “I guess that’s what it was.”

  “Have you got it?”

  Roko glanced at his rifle in the stranger’s hands. “Can I get up?”

  “Yes.”

  He went to an old bureau and began going through the drawers.

  “I put it away someplace, didn’t I, Enna?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t look at your things.”

  There was a sound of a motor outside, an automobile.

  Roko looked through the shutters.

  “It’s them!” he cried. “I told them not to come back.” He turned to the Phantom.

  “You want to t
alk to them?”

  “Not yet. You talk to them. I don’t want to-be seen— understand?” Roko nodded, understanding nothing. He pointed to a closet with a drapery for a door. The Phantom stepped behind it.

  Roko opened the door. Since the Phantom still had his rifle, he was unarmed.

  “We’ve come back to talk about your land, Mr. Roko,” said one man. The Phantom peered through the wall. This was not difficult since the old siding was warped and there were many cracks. He could see the speaker, a stout, well-dressed man in dark city clothes. He had a foreign guttural accent.

  “I told you yesterday, and the day before, it is not for sale,” said Roko. He spoke respectfully, evidently impressed by these city men in their expensive clothes.

  “Please understand that we are buying most of the land in this valley to farm on a big scale. The small farms are no longer economical. They are doomed. We intend to bring modern farming methods here.” He spoke convincingly, like a bond salesman. The other man remained quiet. He was bigger, heavier, also well dressed.

  “You told me all that before,” said Roko.

  “Only two or three farms in this area remain unsold. Yours is one of them. We will raise our offer to four thousand levana.”

  Roko snorted. “I have three hundred hectares. My land is worth ten times what you offer.”

  “The value of land depends on the availability of a buyer,” said the spokesman. “Who else would buy your land today?”

  “I told you. I’m not selling,” said Roko, his voice louder ; now. “That’s my final word!”

  “That is unfortunate, Mr. Roko,” said the man almost || sadly. “Because we must obtain this farm to complete our plans. Here is our last and final offer, five thousand le-vana.”

  The Phantom peered through the cracks, wondering if there were other men as well. The car was out on the road, the motor idling. It was the big, expensive car he had seen earlier in the day. More men were inside, he saw, but too far away to be seen clearly.

  “No to five thousand. No to twenty thousand. This land was my father’s and my grandfather’s before him. I was born here. I will die here,” said Roko angrily.

  “That is touching, Mr. Roko. But you are letting sentiment outweigh your good sense. I told you, we must have this land—at a fair price, of course.”