The Midnight Mess Trilogy: Part 3 (Concerto for Violin and Werewolf)

Sacha Barak, the famed concert violinist, clutched his precious stradivarius protectively to his breast and caused softly to himself as the old coach rumbled and bumped over the rutted road through the Romanian countryside. The old coach had been the only means of transportation available to Sacha. Taxi drivers had looked at him wide-eyed and turned away when he told them his destination. So he had climbed into the ancient vehicle with it's tight-lipped driver and now he was being whipped and jostled about as it thundered into the night.

SACHA: "Blast! These confounded Transylvanian highways are even worse than I remember them. If it wren't to see Vasile Iorga, I would never even attempt such a journey!"

The foam-flecked horse charged into the ominous black hills without slackening it's mad pace. Sacha leaned from the coach window and shouted at the driver, who remained as he had been from the start of the trip, sullen and mute.

SACHA: "Slow down, you fool! Do you want to get us both killed?!"

So the famed violinist could only pray for safe deliverance to his destination. Soon, the creaking, groaning coach clattered loudly over the cobblestones. They were passing through a town that Sacha recognized.

SACHA: "Chisasi! Thank heavens! Only seven more miles to Brudja."

The last seven miles between Chisasi and Brudja were even worse than what had gone before. The coach bounced and heaved over the pitted and scarred dirt road. But at last...

SACHA: "So this is Brudja. No wonder they don't pave the road here. Only a fool would come to this godforsaken town now. Why everything is moldering with decay and rot."

Vasile Iorga lived in an ancient house at the edge of town. Sacha stood before the man he had dreamed so long of seeing. But time had done it's work on his old teacher.

VASILE: "No! I don't recognize you! Who are you? What do you want?"

SACHA: "Maestro! It's your old pupil, Sacha! Sacha Barak!"

Sacha almost wept as he looked at the face of his teacher. A face that had once been handsome and powerful and noble, but now was withered and toothless with faded, watery eyes. Vasili was a mere shell of the strict, stern maestro Sacha had so long revered.

VASILE: "Forgive me, Sacha. I do not see as well as I used to. How good of you to remember."

SACHA: "As if I could ever forget the man who recognized my talent when I was but a child and taught me all I know."

Suddenly, Sacha noticed the old man stiffen. Saw his face grow grey and his eyes fill with terror.

VASILE: "Sacha! You should never have to visit me here in Brudja! It is dangerous!"

SACHA: "Dangerous? Why, maestro?"

The old man looked around uneasily, then stared at his former pupil and whispered.

VASILE: "Don't you remember, Sacha? This is werewolf country! Don't you recall the incident that took place almost twenty years ago when I was living in Chisasi and you used to come to me for lessons?"

SACHA: "How could I? So many things have happened since. What incident?"

VASILE: "Don't you remember that young couple? They had driven here from Budapest, impulsively risking a tour through the Transylvanian Alps. The rugged road between Chisasi and Brudja had proven too much for their motor car.'

RUDOLF: Be patient, Marta! I will find the trouble in a moment!

MARTA: "If you don't, I shall freeze in this mountain night air, Rudolf!"

'A full moon had risen, filtering through the gnarled old trees and an ominous silence enveloped the lonely surrounding countryside. A rustling of nearby brambles caused the woman to turn her head and what she saw brought a soul-piercing scream from her throat.'

MARTA: "RUDOLF! EEEEAAA!"

RUDOLF: "What is it, Marta?!"

'It was a werewolf! It sprang upon the young woman, sinking it's razor-sharp fangs into her soft, white flesh while the young man scrambled from beneath the car.'

MARTA: "AAAAAAGHHHHHHH!"

RUDOLF: "Marta! My god!"

'As the young man came at the slavering, snarling, bloodthirsty werewolf, it fled. Shaking with horror, he flung his lantern after the fleeing beast. The lantern shattered against a tree trunk, bursting into flame and he saw, by the sudden light, his wife's arm dangling from the werewolf's drooling mouth.'

RUDOLF: "...*choke*..."

'Don't you remember, Sacha? You heard the screams, the growls, the commotion outside. You wanted to go.'

VASILE: "Nevermind, Sacha! Your debut is only two weeks off. We must practice. Get back to your music stand."

SACHA: "But, maestro! There must be something wrong! Look! Men running with lanterns!"

'Don't you remember the woman lying beside the car? Her eyes staring, her face ashen and her husband listening in horror to the words.'

VILLAGERS: "She's dead!" "No! Oh, lord! No!"

SACHA: "Maestro, what happened to her?"

VASILE: "Come away, Sacha. Come away."

The old teacher finished his story with a sigh. Sacha noticed that he was shaking and covered with sweat and his toothless old mouth quivered.

VASILE: "Don't you remember?"

SACHA: "Oh, yes, maestro. I do remember. But the explanation of the incident was simple enough. The woods are full of wolves. They've been known to attack a man."

VASILE: "There have been more incidents, Sacha! Here! Read this newspaper sent to me from Bucharest!"

SACHA: "Do you expect me to believe there is a werewolf here in Brudja?"

VASILE: "I ask you to believe this! See the date? Nearly two months ago! Read!"

SACHA: "'A member of Bucharest Society paid with his life last night when he ignored the warning to stay away from the Transylvanian town of Brudja. There was a full moon and his body, stripped of flesh, was found...'"

The old man pointed to the article in the newspaper.

VASILE: "There was a full moon, Sacha! A lycanthropic moon! In two days, there will be another! I beg of you, do not stay in Brudja!"

SACHA: "Nonsense, maestro. I am as safe here as you are. If I am not welcome in your home, I will go to the inn. But I will not be frightened into leaving Brudja."

The old maestro shrugged his shoulders.

VASILE: "You were always stubborn, Sacha. And I do want you to stay. It's just that, at this tome of the month and a stranger in town, well...promise me you'll keep your bedroom windows and door locked."

SACHA: "Of course, maestro. I know how to take care of myself. Look."

Sacha opened his suitcase and took out his revolver.

SACHA: "I carry it to protect myself and my stradivarius."

VASILE: "A stradivarius?! A genuine stradivarius!? Let me see!"

Old Vasile opened Sacha's violin case and drew forth the stradivarius. He fondled it reverently as Sacha stared at his gun.

SACHA: "If it remember right, maestro, legend has it that only a silver bullet can kill a werewolf."

VASILE: "Beautiful. Beautiful! It...eh? Sacha, what are you thinking?"

Sacha's eyes narrowed. He smiled grimly.

SACHA: "I'm thinking about killing me a werewolf, Vasile. Do you have an iron kettle I may use to must down some silver-?"

VASILE: "Don't be a fool, Sacha! Why risk your life?"

SACHA: "I am no fool, maestro! Think of the publicity I will receive. Headlines in all the papers throughout Europe! 'Famed violinist frees Romany town of rampaging werewolf'! You see, Vasile, there's more success than mere genius! Even I must have publicity! So stop worrying about me. Tell you what. You may play my stradivarius as long as I stay here. Now get me that kettle."

Sacha spent the next few hours in the cellar, melting down silver coins and pouring the molten silver into a mold he made by pressing the slug from an ordinary bullet into the moist earth. And as he worked, elegiac strains of a sad gypsy air played on the stradivarius by the faltering hands of his old teacher filtered down from the parlor.

SACHA: "Hmmm. The old boy can still play."

When the silver slugs were cooled, Sacha removed the lead slugs from the regular bullets and replaced the silver ones in the steel jackets. He went upstairs, filled the chambers of his revolver with his handiwork and placed the gun in his overcoat pocket.

SACHA: "There, maestro. Now I'm ready for the werewolf of Brudja."

VASILE: "Such tone, Sacha. Such mellow sounds come from this glorious instrument."

The next morning, even though the old maestro, warned him against it, Sacha walked into town. The sun beat down on the marketplace, but the warmth it brought was not enough to offset the cold, suspicious stares of the townsfolk.

SACHA: "Hmmm! Not a friendly face among them. The way they look at me, you'd think I was the werewolf."

But there was more than suspicion and coldness in the townspeople's stares. Sacha seemed to sense a certain tenseness. Perhaps hostility. He plunged his hand into his overcoat pockets, feeling for the reassuring steel of his revolver.

SACHA: "My gun! It's gone!"

Sacha returned at once to Vasile Iorga's house. He was very upset and spoke excitedly to the old violin teacher.

SACHA: "I thought it was accidental that someone jostled me when I first entered the marketplace, but now I realize that he must have stolen my gun. Do you know what that means, Vasile? One of your townspeople if the werewolf!"

VASILE: "Now that you're gun is gone, perhaps you will leave."

Sacha stared at his toothless maestro.

SACHA: "Wait a minute. How did anyone know I had a gun? How did they know it was loaded with silver bullets? How could they? Vasile! You...!"

VASILE: "Yes, Sacha. It was I. I took the gun from your pocket and threw it down the well. It was only because I am afraid for you."

The old man began to cry.

VASILE: "I did it for your own good, Sacha! Now you are angry at me!"

SACHA: "Angry at you? No, maestro! I am touched by your concern for my safety. But I have no intention of leaving Brudja."

That night, a gibbous moon, not quite full, bathed the old maestro's house in a cold pale light. Inside, Sacha scanned the newspaper while Vasile played the valuable violin.

SACHA: "Why this is last month's Bucharest journal, Vasile. And it came today."

VASILE: "The mail is slow coming to Brudja, Sacha. You can understand."

Sacha was well into the paper before a report caught his eye. He leaped up with a start.

SACHA: "Vasile! Listen to this! 'There was a full moon last night when five persons from Chisasi became drunk while celebrating a wedding anniversary and wandered into the ill-famed town of Brudja. A searching party found the five bodies the next day outside the town. They had all been stripped of their flesh. Bare skeletons. Unidentifiable.'!"

VASILE: "Yes, Sacha. That happened last month. You see, it has happened so many times to so many hundreds of poor unfortunate people over the years that we here in Brudja are no longer shocked by it."

SACHA: "I recall something I read on my last concert tour, Vasile. I wonder...hmmm. Of course! How stupid of me! Tomorrow, I am going to Chisasi for another gun."

Early the next morning, Sacha Barak, the famed violinist, walked the seven miles to Chisasi in order to purchase the gun and bullets he needed. He carried his empty violin case.

SACHA: "I should have guessed. Well, tonight the moon will be full and I will be waiting for them in the marketplace."

It was past noon when he returned to Vasile's home. He grinned confidentially as he showed the old man the gun he had bought.

SACHA: "...and tonight, I will go into town carrying my violin case. And who would suspect it conceals a gun?"

VASILE: "No one! Of course!"

The rest of the afternoon was spent in the cellar, carefully molding bullets from molten silver. And when twilight was beginning to shroud the town, Sacha returned to the parlor with his silver ammunition, loaded his gun and replaced it in the violin case.

SACHA: "There! Done! And now...good heavens, Vasile! Don't you ever tire of playing the violin?"

VASILE: "Not this one, Sacha. Not a stradivarius. Besides, you said I could play it while you stayed."

Sacha rested in his room, listening to the lilting strains of the violin. Suddenly, he felt Vasile's hands shaking him.

VASILE: "It is almost time, Sacha! The moon is almost full! Come! Let us go!"

SACHA: "Us? No sir, old man. You're staying here. You told me yourself it would be dangerous."

But Vasile insisted that he would follow Sacha anyway. So they walked into town together. Above, the moon cast an eerie glow upon the cobblestone streets. The marketplace was deserted, yet Sacha was aware of a frightening presence. Something he could only feel instinctively. The weight of the weapon in the violin case comforted him. And then, slowly, the frightening presence made itself known. The townspeople, all of the population of Brudja, began to appear from the alleys and doorways and deep shadows. They came toward Sacha and Vasile.

And as they came, Sacha could see their red eyes glowing in the full moonlight and their hair bristling on their faces and their gleaming white faces dripping with spittle. He could see their snarling, drooling, werewolf faces and he retched in disgust. And then Sacha began to laugh. He knelt and placed the violin case on the cobblestones, fumbling with the latches.

SACHA: "I knew I was right! When I read in the paper that five bodies were stripped of their flesh, I knew there had to be more than one werewolf!"

He shrieked shrilly at them, his words mingling with their low-throated growls. He opened the violin case.

SACHA: "And then I remembered a story I'd read in an American comic book on my last concert tour! A story called 'Midnight Mess' in a magazine called Tales from the Crypt, about a town full of vampires! And I knew! I knew that Brudja was a town full of werewolves! And I knew I'd have to be ready for you!"

The snarling beasts were almost upon him now and their howling sounded like laughter too. Sacha reached for the gun.

SACHA: "Well, I am ready for you. All of you! Because I've got a gun loaded with silver bullets! Not just any gun! A Thompson submachine gun! I'm ready for...for...good lord!"

Sacha's laughter choked back in his troat and the howling came up as the beasts sprang upon him. For there was no submachine gun in his violin case. Only a useless old stradivarius. And as flashing, rolling teeth tore and ripped and gored Sacha, he heard his old maestro's squealing voice.

VASILE: "Careful of the violin! And save some soft part for a toothless old werewolf! Remember! I brought him! I fixed things! I took out the gun!"