by David Dean
Beckam’s bland expression had grown thoughtful during the briefing. After a few moments of silence, he asked, “So you believe Mister Howard then… about this… this Gabriel, is it?”
“I believe there is a boy,” Nick answered. “As to what exactly his role in all this is… well, that’s what we’re going to find out, aren’t we, Beck?”
Beckam’s expression lightened once more. “Yes sir, we are.”
Reaching into his desk, Nick pulled out a tiny portable radio with an earpiece and handed it to his subordinate. “It’s set to a frequency we only use during surveillance details. Naturally, I’ll have one, too. Be sure and plug my cell number into the speed dial on your phone as well, just in case we go out of range of one another on the radios.”
The younger officer turned to go. “You’ve got an off-duty holster?” Nick asked.
“Yes sir, I do.”
“Good. In thirty minutes I’m shoving Professor Howard out the door. You’ll be waiting. My guess is that the first place he’ll head for is the liquor store. After that, it’s up to you. Don’t lose him, Beck, whatever you do.”
“No chance of that, Chief.”
The younger man looked content, Nick thought, even happy. He had intentionally not informed him of having been removed from the case—if things went badly, it would allow the young officer an out—he was only obeying what he truly believed were lawful orders. “I’ll catch up to you before dark,” Nick promised.
“I hope so,” Beck replied, pausing at the door, a faint smile playing on his lips. “After all, that’s when he appears, isn’t it, Chief… twixt dusk and dawning?”
“Go to hell, Beck.”
“Yes sir,” Beck answered, softly closing the door behind him.
?
Gabriel raced along the sidewalks, his face lifted and nostrils distended, freed by the lowering sun and the costumes of the children he brushed by. Even above the cloyingly sweet scent of candy and the burnt flesh of jack o’ lanterns, the salty sweat of the children and the tang of their blood set him to drooling. Yet, he went unnoticed or remarked upon.
Through long watching and experience, he had come to know this night above all others—it was the single night of the year that he dared to walk openly amongst his prey. Yet, even on such an occasion, Gabriel understood that caution was still required.
Coursing along through the tinkling of their laughter, their shouts and cries, he dared not linger. Though his appearance in the growing dusk, amidst the fairies, witches, and savage monsters, allowed him a greater freedom than he normally enjoyed, he understood that he could not stand too close a scrutiny by the guardian adults. And these adults had grown ever more cautious with their young over the years, it seemed to him. Even more so when he had culled the herd in a particular area as he had here. He raced on, careful to avoid meeting the eyes of any he passed.
Halting outside the dwelling of Preston Howard, he watched with narrowed eyes as children trouped up to the door with cries of “Trick or treat!” A passing goblin, with overlarge head and plastic claws, slowed to study him through the eyeholes of his mask, but his adult shoved him on toward the opening door.
Gabriel saw the offspring of Preston Howard framed in the bright lights that blazed from within her home. She was smiling and handing out small paper packets tied with tiny ribbons. Even at a distance, Gabriel could perceive the tension in her posture and lean face. Nonetheless, she laughed aloud at something said by one of the female young at her door, reaching out to cup her chin in her hand.
An adult male waiting nearby for his ward muttered, “Not bad,” to his companion, who replied, “Big rack for a skinny girl,” both men chuckling as their children charged back up the walk to them.
Turning to leave, the goblin cried in a muffled voice, “You stink” and pelted Gabriel with a piece of hard candy. Gabriel started at being struck and shrank back with a hiss, his eyes blazing.
Seizing his child by the arm, the father began to haul him away. “Knock it off right now or we’re going home,” he promised. But as soon as they thought they were out of hearing distance, he remarked to his companion, “The boy’s right—that kid needs a bath.” His friend grimaced in agreement and they risked a look back. The scarecrow boy was no longer to be seen.
Slipping noiselessly along the side of the house as soon as Fanny had closed the door, Gabriel positioned himself to peer through the kitchen window from the backyard. With his long thin limbs he clambered onto the concrete bird bath, perching there like a large, white spider.
This was accomplished so rapidly that Fanny was only just coming down the hallway as he watched. The old man, Preston, also came into his view, exchanging words with his daughter, though Gabriel was unable to hear them distinctly at this distance. Even so, his great ears perceived the angry rattle and hum of their voices.
Clearly, the daughter was fearful for her father. For his part, Preston was frightened for her, as well, but clothed his fear in barks and snarls. The front doorbell rang, and both father and daughter started. Turning, Fanny began walking back to the front of the house and Preston made to follow, but she waved him off.
Preston watched her for a few moments more, then threw open a cabinet, reaching deep within to withdraw a bottle of the substance Gabriel knew him to feed upon. Slipping the liquor inside his shirt front, Preston hurried toward his bedroom. Dropping down from his vantage point, Gabriel followed.
The old man was just entering his room as Gabriel took up his new post, being careful to remain outside the nimbus of light that spilled onto the lawn. Closing the door behind him Preston uncapped the bottle, taking a long pull at the contents, his prominent Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. The sight of his unguarded throat made Gabriel thirsty as well and he salivated, panting quietly in the dark.
Preston sat heavily upon his narrow bed, bringing the bottle to his lips once more, this time with less hurry and more savor. Once done, he lay back and stretched his long legs out with a satisfied groan, closing his eyes. Several times he started at the sound of the Halloween revelers outside his home, glancing anxiously at the darkened world beyond his windows. But finally he lay still, and Gabriel could see the even rise and fall of his bony chest, the bottle still clutched and upright over his heart.
Gabriel knew from having tested them before which window to approach. The latch was old and loosely fitted, the rotted screen leaning against the outside of the house. Working one of his long, hard nails into the space between the upper and lower casements, he slid it along until it met with the latch and shifted it. Preston did not stir as Gabriel slid the old window up in its frame, a rush of crisp night air flowing into the room with him.
The doorbell rang once more, and here in the house its sudden alarm caused Gabriel to halt and look towards its source. With a cry, Preston sat bolt upright at the sound, only to find the vampire child within feet of his own bed. Just beyond his door came the delighted cries of children and the low, soft murmur of his daughter’s voice. He hurled the bottle at the creature.
Gabriel’s oversized hand struck out to snatch the bottle from its flight, holding it far from his face and sensitive nostrils. It appeared dwarfed in his nightmarish fingers and he regarded Preston with fury.
Pushing back against his headboard, Preston had nowhere to go. He eyed the door and the short distance to it. He could never make it, and even if he did… what then?
Looking back to Gabriel he found his expression changed, a cunning having entered into it. The vampire waggled the near empty bottle at him like bait. “Come with me now, old man,” he instructed him in his hoarse, sibilant whisper. “I must drink long and fresh once more before I sleep, and you must help me cull the herd.”
Preston felt himself shaking, but managed to answer with a calm voice, “I won’t go with you… I will not help you.”
Gabriel lifted his smeared face, inhaling hungrily. “Your daughter is mere paces away,” he assured Preston, “and she may serve, if need be—
you must choose.”
Preston studied the creature’s face, but it contained no hint of mercy or reason. Swinging his long legs off the side of the bed, he searched with his feet for his worn leather loafers, never taking his eyes from Gabriel’s. “We are not cattle,” he said, “and as far from bovine as you may find to your sorrow.” He stood unsteadily and waited.
Gabriel replied, “When first we met you desired my company. Now you wish me dead… What has changed, Preston Howard? Why do you not love me still?”
Preston blinked. “Do you even know what love is?” he asked at last. “Or are you just mimicking the ‘cattle’ you resemble?”
Gabriel continued to watch him, his broad, idiot face, that of a childish Bacchus. The ferocity and bloodlust rippled just beneath the placid expression like eels in a shallow pond. He said nothing.
“I thought as much,” Preston continued, made bold by the boy’s silence and the brandy he had consumed. “You can’t know love as we ‘cattle’ do for the simple reason that you are always and forever alone—you have no herd, no pack, no tribe, and exist only to prey on us. You love only your sustenance—our blood, and therefore cannot be human—you are a monster child that grows like a slow cancer in our midst.
“At first, I was mesmerized by your presence, intrigued—you are a conundrum, an enigma that harkens back to the dawn of man, and I was fascinated, God help me. Even when you took those awful boys that were going to hurt me, I thought of you as my discovery and my vengeance upon the ‘great unwashed.’”
Preston took a shaky breath, the small room blooming with the animal musk that he knew could induce a helpless lassitude. The vampire crouched lower and lower as if preparing to spring.
“You speak too much,” he spat at Preston. “You must come now with me.”
“I intend to finish what I have to say first,” Preston persisted, “in spite of the fact that it is clearly beyond your understanding.” He arched an eyebrow at the vampire, continuing, “When I saw what had become of those children that night in the graveyard, the scales fell from my eyes. You paraded their pitiful husks before me like prize sheep, and then I understood how far I had fallen. That is why I tried to kill you, as much for me as for them… how I wish I had succeeded!”
“You are too weak to kill me,” Gabriel replied evenly. “There is no strength in you.”
Preston felt his ballooning confidence burst with this simple observation—for all his grand philosophizing, the vampire child remained his master and was unmoved by his words, if he had even understood them. If he did not obey, his daughter would be slain. He knew Gabriel would be as good as his word on this.
Gabriel held out his filthy, stained hand. After several long moments, Preston placed his own within the boy’s sandpaper grasp, and with a shudder of revulsion was led out through the mudroom. Fanny remained occupied with the children coming to the front door. Gabriel returned his bottle and Preston concealed it in his pocket as he might the coin of betrayal. Hand-in-hand they joined the night parade of excited costumed children—a grandfather, with perhaps a “challenged” grandson, out to enjoy the crisp evening air and the timeworn festivities.
Along the way, Gabriel, ever alert to the antics of his prey, snatched a trash bag from a public receptacle, dumping its fetid contents upon the ground. Now the disguise was complete, and he hurried Preston to catch up to a knot of fellow trick-or-treaters that skipped and chattered at the next corner. He was anxious to play this night.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Preston felt himself dragged along the streets and avenues of Wessex Township as if he were in a nightmare from which he could not awaken. Towing him along as his passport to humanity, the creature tugged and pulled at him as impatiently as any actual child. It was clear to Preston that the vampire had become infected with the excitement of the strange evening, and was enjoying the role he was playing.
After several blocks of simply following the others, Gabriel pointed at a house guarded by a pair of upright plywood coffins set to either side of the doorway. Within lay ghoulish creatures lit by artfully concealed lights that cast a greenish glow. A gaggle of children approached this dread place with both hilarity and sincere trepidation.
“Dead,” he smiled, “just as those in the cemetery houses.” By this, Preston took him to mean the scattering of mausoleums in the graveyard. It was repulsive to think of this creature squatting there amongst the dead in contented repose.
“But they have no smell,” Gabriel added, his broad nose wrinkling in puzzlement.
Just then the ghouls, mere skeletons but for patches of rotting flesh, sprang forth from their coffins, their gaping maws wide, their bony fingers reaching out to grasp and pull down the nearest child. Screams of terror erupted, and the entire group of kids turned as one, fleeing to the arms of their parents. Behind them, ghastly laughter rang out in seeming triumph.
Gabriel leapt free of Preston’s hand, recoiling. “They live again,” he cried, turning to flee with the others.
The door of the haunted dwelling flew open and a laughing heavyset man with a shock of blonde hair called out to the children, “Wait… wait! It’s okay! It’s all a trick! Come and get your treats! Don’t run away!”
Gabriel hesitated.
The ghouls, picking up plastic cauldrons filled with wrapped candies, began to hand them out to any of the children brave enough to take them. Eventually, the more reticent were emboldened, claiming their prizes as well. Gabriel remained frozen, unwilling to trust the newly risen dead.
Seizing Preston’s hand once more, he pulled him on toward another group and less challenging environs. Preston winced at his grasp and felt a trickle of blood run down his ring finger. He could not read the creature’s expression.
Soon they found themselves within another earnest tribe of scavengers and Preston felt his hand released. Before he could speak, Gabriel slipped in amongst the children, making so bold as to go to the door of a nearby house with them. Turning, he smiled back at Preston, his previous fear having vanished as he renewed his hunt for a suitable victim.
Preston noticed Gabriel walking closely by the side of a small girl wearing a ballerina costume, complete with tiara. Clutching a glow-in-the-dark wand in one chubby fist, she toted her bag of loot in the other. Her skin beneath the intermittent street lamps was the color of café au lait.
This home, Preston observed, sported nothing more menacing than a giant bat made of black fabric, suspended over the porch by a nearly invisible fishing line. It wobbled in the slight breeze of the evening and Gabriel passed beneath it without alarm.
The group was greeted merrily by a plump older woman with a great pile of grey hair on her head. With a grunt, she bent to cast the required candies into each sack and this she did efficiently until she reached Gabriel. Upon reaching his she recoiled and withheld the proffered gift. Preston watched with growing concern as she appeared to scrutinize the creature and ask it questions. From where he stood, he could see Gabriel’s head nod once or twice, but could not tell if he spoke.
The woman took the stinking bag from him and disappeared within the house, leaving Gabriel alone as the other children returned to the street. He turned, watching the young girl with obvious longing, but did not follow or appear overly concerned with her departure. Gabriel caught Preston’s eye, pointing at the girl and smiling broadly.
Suddenly the woman returned to hand the creature a black cloth bag decorated with merry flying ghosts. Dumping far more candy into it than she had for the other children; she patted Gabriel’s large head. As he turned to follow the others, his expression was as happy as any that he pursued.
Sweeping past to catch up to the departing children, Gabriel commanded, “Follow,” and Preston turned, stumbling along in his wake.
He caught up with Gabriel at the next corner where the children regrouped for their next assault. The vampire boy lingered at the edges of the group, away from the light cast by the street lamp. Watchful, but conversing in pleasa
nt tones, the parents strolled behind their little ones.
As they neared the next house, Gabriel raced up to Preston and whispered, “You have seen the one I want, Preston Howard.” It was not a question. “She is young and fresh, without disease… I will have her.”
The image of the little ballerina stumbling among the headstones of the cemetery, her lovely color and vitality drained, made Preston physically ill.
Before he could protest, Gabriel went on, “Go over to her watchers and speak with them while I make her acquaintance.” He stopped, appearing to think something over. “Once they become excited and search for her, come and join me where last we met.”
Preston searched the small group of children for Gabriel’s next victim, his mind racing for what he should do.
Gabriel interrupted these thoughts. “Do not fail to join me, old man,” he instructed, catching Preston’s wavering gaze with the intensity of his own, “or your daughter surely will.”
Preston felt himself begin to quake with fear, a trembling that started from deep within him and surfaced in small rapid tremors. Robbed of his usual disdainful attitude, his alcoholic suavity, he approached the couple whom he identified as the little dancer’s parents.
Sidling up to the father, a healthy looking man in his early thirties with just the beginnings of a paunch, he tried to speak, but his words were hoarse whispers, inaudible. From the corner of his eye he saw the princess dancing her way to the next lit porch amidst the other children.
With a start, he noticed Gabriel moving up to her from the darkness of the lawn, his crisp new trick-or-treat bag swinging in his frightful grip. The creature threw him a quick look to see if Preston was holding up his end of things, and when he registered that Preston stood mute and impotent, his expression darkened.
Preston cleared his throat and both the girl’s young parents turned to regard him with ill-concealed distaste. The man gave him the once-over, and Preston understood, as Gabriel could not, that he was a suspicious presence to these parents—to all the parents escorting their children. He was old, disheveled, and none-too-clean, and it was unclear to them as to why he should be amongst them.