October 22, 1971 - Friday
The Old House
Daybreak brought more than one surprise for the men sworn to take down the vampire.
Barnabas opened his eyes that morning at six o'clock to the ringing of his telephone. Elliot Stokes had been admitted to Collinsport Hospital with violent back and stomach pain. He had had to summon an ambulance in the early hours.
"Just a kidney stone," said Dr. Sloan cheerfully. "The poor man vomited all over my best nurses and is barely conscious. We're giving him pain medication and plenty of intravenous fluids. The thing's got to pass before very long. Anyway, every time the patient comes to, he demands that I phone you to explain the situation, and I'm doing so now in order to shut him up. Wanted to wait til you had an outside chance of being awake. I gather that you two had some sort of important appointment."
Barnabas had never heard of a kidney stone. I bet it's the gravel, he told himself. He's talking about an ailment that we called the gravel back in my day.
Barnabas thanked the physician and rang off. He tried to resist the sudden rush of dread that licked at his veins.
Then he couldn't find the wooden stakes that they'd had ready for the vampire.
He'd had only two stakes originally in the house, left over from old vampire wars. In the back of his mind he had worried about that. Two were not enough, surely? Those were the stakes he'd had beneath his cape the first time he, Roger, Elliot and Julia had tried to get into Kim Jansing's studio.
Now they were missing.
Barnabas, who didn't know what had happened at Collinwood last night and still understood that Burke was their target, knew the man was strong and quick. He'd been powerful enough to carry the injured Dr. Liska out of the street, the Brazil misadventure notwithstanding. Two wooden stakes were not enough for three men going in for the kill. What if they found more of the creatures than they were expecting?
He stumbled about the Old House cursing, flinging things out of his way, looking under this and on top of that, and finally shouted for Willie to come help him.
After another precious hour had passed, they finally located the stakes in a cabinet beneath the kitchen sink. Barnabas blew his top and bawled at Willie for his stupidity in hiding the stakes there. What had he been thinking? Willie stared at him, then began to argue in self-defense. He hadn't been the one who'd put them there!
Ashamed of himself, Barnabas waved at Willie to stop.
While they'd been tearing around the house, the sun had long risen.
And now there was another problem.
He touched a finger to the pointy tips of the stakes. Not even sharp enough to penetrate a dish of Mrs. Johnson's Indian pudding! And what sort of wood was this? Neither of them could remember the type of tree they'd gotten it from. Elliot had insisted that mountain ash was the best wood to be used in the making of vampire stakes.
Though Barnabas was no longer a vampire, he felt in his heart that he would know a mountain ash simply from having been a vampire. He was willing to bet that such a tree would sound a chime of disquiet in his soul.
Nevertheless, he went to the phone, consulted the small address book that lay beside it, and dialed.
"I need you," he said without preamble. "It's urgent. How soon can you come to me at the Old House?"
With the feeling that the morning sun was racing across the sky, Barnabas rang Collinwood and told Roger what had befallen Elliot. To his surprise, Roger repeated the information to someone in the background, who asked a question. It was a man's voice.
"Devlin is here with me," Roger told Barnabas evenly.
"What?!" Barnabas cried, seizing the curly telephone cord in his fingers. "What do you mean, what happened? Roger, are you all right?"
"Yes, of course. He came to the house before sunrise, wants to help us go after Kim Jansing."
Perplexed, heart pounding, Barnabas leaned on the sturdy table that held the chocolate-brown rotary telephone.
"But how has this come about? Burke isn't, he isn't—"
Faintly on the other end of the line he heard Burke ask Roger, "That Barnabas? Can't we go without Elliot?"
Roger continued, "He brought us crucifixes to wear. He's not the person we're after, can't be." Roger chuckled and said hollowly, "At least, I'm sixty-percent sure."
Barnabas heard, "let me talk to him," and Burke was on the line.
"Stokes down, is he? Then it's the three of us."
"Let's give Elliot a chance," Barnabas said strongly. "It's only nine o'clock. He'll be out of the hospital before very long." As he said the words, he prayed furiously that this was so.
"All right," Burke said tersely. "But what do we do in the meantime? Is there any other prep-work that needs doing?"
Barnabas decided.
"You gentlemen should come over here now; I know it's daylight, but I don't want us split up. One of us has just been struck down, and though it is probably the wildest coincidence Elliot's in hospital, I'm not taking chances. And—bring knives, enough for all of us. What I'm looking for is, oh, something that would carve wood, you know, good sharp tools you'd choose if you had a big hunk of wood to whittle. That's it, I think. We'll see you when you get here."
"We're coming," said Burke, and hung up.
Barnabas put the receiver in its cradle and stroked his chin thoughtfully. How long would Elliot be? He would come in his own car; perhaps they'd need two cars. He thought of the four of them hulked together in one automobile. No, two cars might be best. Hopefully, in a few hours, they would have a body to transport in the trunk of one of them.
The phone rang beneath his hand.
"Devlin disconnected the call before I could tell you about this," Roger said resentfully. "Do you remember Hallie describing a young woman at the back gate a few nights ago? Well, last night she came to Collinwood."
Roger related the incident.
"I got hold of Elliot right away, and he was certain that she's the vampire because she claimed to have seen Angelique wearing a scarf Elliot swears he only just gave to Angelique the other night, perhaps minutes before she was—taken. Also," Roger said, lowering his voice, "remember that Elliot had surmised she might be involved with Devlin, working with him? Well, why could she not instead be linked with Jansing?"
Roger heard himself narrating, but suddenly his mind leapt elsewhere. That angry, beautiful woman with all the long hair.
Jansing, the portrait painter.
He even remembered remarking to Liz that Jansing's model resembled him.
He shouted, "Great astounding God!" into the phone. "Oh, no," he groaned.
"What now?" Barnabas demanded. "What's happened?"
"Barnabas, dear God. That young woman is—I told Elliot I was sure I'd seen her somewhere before. And I had.
"It was when I took Liz to meet Jansing at his studio Tuesday, and he wasn't there, so we looked at three or four of his canvases.
"That woman is the model in Kim Jansing's paintings."
Barnabas was at the door before Panna could knock. Quentin's beautiful girlfriend gave him her sunny smile, and for a moment, his angry heart was comforted.
She was so much like her sister Veronika, yet so different. She laughed more easily, talked more willingly, and it struck him that she would be quicker to accept arcane concepts.
He took her arm, and they strode into the cool, sunny woods together.
"I want you to watch me," he said in a low voice. "I'm going to try to find a mountain ash, and I believe that I can. But I want your confirmation that I'm right."
He hesitated in a copse of trees. His companion did not speak. Barnabas looked around, then continued on with her, gazing about.
"The mountain ash isn't really an ash tree in itself," Panna told him, her bright auburn hair brushing against the shoulder of his jacket. "It is more closely related to the rose tree. That sounds a little disorganized, but fascinating things usually are."
Barnabas halted like a pointer scenting a rabbit. "That one," he said flatly.
He dropped her arm and walked to a tree about 25 feet tall, with gray bark and blue-green leaves. A shudder rippled down his back as he laid his hand on it and looked back at her.
"Yes," she said.
Burke and Roger arrived at the Old House as Willie and Barnabas were setting up a plank table made of rough-hewn oak in the front yard while Panna stood on the front steps, observing them.
"What's this?" Burke asked rapidly, eyeing the table and then looking over at Panna.
"My dear," Roger murmured with pleasure, approaching Panna and taking both her hands in his, "how do you come into this mess?"
"She doesn't really," Barnabas threw over his shoulder. "Panna was good enough to guide me to a mountain ash, which Elliot advises is the best sort of wood for—what we need."
"You are all working together on a project?" Panna asked, glancing from Barnabas to Roger. "It must be important, Roger, to get you out of the cannery on Friday morning! But who wouldn't prefer to be out among the trees instead of choked up in a stifling office?' Her white teeth peeped out in a charming smile.
Burke had now entered their circle, gazing deeply at Panna, meaning full well to be introduced.
"Panna Liska," Roger said, "soon to be my sister-in-law. I should say Doctor Panna Liska, for she is an arborist. Or are you a xylologist? Knows everything about trees. Panna, this is Burke Devlin."
The two shook hands and murmured, Roger casually watching Panna's face. No flicker of recognition or emotion. Then perhaps Veronika had not been telling her sisters all about the swashbuckling Devlin.
This was important to Roger, who was experiencing little ghostings of fear that Veronika would stop loving him, and turn instead to his rival.
"Here's what we're going to do," Barnabas called from behind them. "We are going to get a tree limb from a mountain ash I've marked off not far from here and hack it into equal portions so each man has a chunk. And we are going to make—" he cast speaking eyes at Roger and Burke— "the pieces we will need for our visit to town today."
"Barnabas, I was thinking, wouldn't a lathe be quicker?" Willie offered, out of breath, tugging the big yellow extension ladder with him. A rusted bow saw was looped over one arm.
"Probably. But we won't need one," Barnabas replied.
"You want a lathe? I know where there's one. It's at the … up the street … I can see the place in my mind," Burke said, grimacing in frustration.
"That was probably long ago, Burke," Roger said, not unkindly.
"At the Boy's Club on North Main!" Burke cried. "They've got a lathe, or they did have."
"We're going to do it this way," Barnabas said with determination, turning to them, "or we are going to try our very best." He removed his suit jacket and laid it at the end of the table.
Pulling off his jacket and clucking in protest, Roger said, "We can hardly go to the Boy's Club and have a squad of children watch us turn out a pile of vampire stakes!"
He couldn't bite back the words. The men froze, remembering Panna behind them.
Her face was now solemn. They all looked at one another helplessly.
"I knew something was wrong," she said softly. "Carry on with what you're doing. You'll get no questions from me."
She went to Barnabas. "Do you need me here any longer?"
He took her hand and kissed it, then shook his head at her, smiling.
Roger made Panna wait. Standing before her, he slipped his finger beneath the thin gold chain at her throat.
He pulled the tiny Star of David out of the collar of her sweater.
"You always wear it, I think," Roger commented quietly. "You have, as long as I have known you. Keep it close."
She nodded, glanced silently at the other men, then turned and left them, walking through the sun-dappled clearing to her car.
Willie had felled the bough from the ash tree. Burke had taken one look at it and advised him to get an electric saw right away and extension cords from the house. With Burke holding one end of the limb on the flat table, Willie had used the electric saw to cut the bough in six lengths of about 14" apiece. Now each man was ready to sit down and begin whittling.
Burke had stripped off his jacket and was in rolled-up shirtsleeves, as were Barnabas and Roger. An atmosphere of masculine resolve was growing among them as they settled to their task.
Barnabas drew the two old vampire stakes, the ones that needed sharpening, and placed them between himself and the others.
"Here are our examples," he said. "Willie turned them years ago, and they work, they just need sharpening."
Gripping a big knife in his gardening gloves, Roger began carefully to whittle. "Barnabas, I sense a driving need in you to do all this by hand and avoid the lathe if at all possible. Am I reading you correctly?"
"I sense that as well," Burke agreed, giving Barnabas a piercing glance. "But perhaps we know why."
The trio exchanged a glance without speaking, and then as Barnabas began to tell them, they bent to work.
"You're probably right, gentlemen," he confessed. "Perhaps a scholar would tell you it makes no difference whether the weapon is turned on a lathe or carved by hand, but I disagree. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, love and courage are involved here. We need to do these by hand, not just twirl them off on some machine. We're going to put ourselves into these pieces, our sweat and our resolve. Our blood, if we drop some of it here at the table, will be absorbed into this wood. More than anything else I can think of, these stakes are a labor of love." He felt, but didn't want to say out loud, that producing the implements by hand would possibly infuse the weapons with great power, stemming from the emotions of those producing them. But maybe the other men around the table already realized it.
"Burke," Barnabas said, pausing with his knife over the rough wood, "you're not exactly involved in this. I know you love Liz in your way, and we're honored that you're helping us. But this beast has purposely gone after the women in and associated with Collinwood. What is it that has impelled you to join us today, if you don't mind the question?"
"Don't worry about me," Burke said darkly, casting a furtive glance at them. "I'm where I need to be."
No one asked him what he meant.
Elliot turned up at midday.
The men cleared the yard, gathering the cast-off pieces and fragments of wood into an iron bucket which would be dumped into Barnabas' fireplace. Willie carried the larger pieces of the branch to the back of the house to be cut into firewood later. They were lifting the plank table to carry it away when Elliot joined them.
He looked wan while he chatted easily about his hospital sojourn, and all the while, kept his eyes on Burke Devlin.
When Burke went to the back of the house with Willie and Barnabas, Roger touched Elliot's sleeve.
"He came to Collinwood two or three hours before sunrise with a plethora of crosses and holy medals," Roger explained, "and insisted that I outfit everyone in the house with a crucifix. He's wearing one himself. And you see him here, out in the daylight. He can't be the beast. He insists on helping us."
Elliot accepted the explanation, but his mind raced.
Burke could not be working with the woman as some sort of enslaved consort, could he? If he'd been bitten by her, he would be in the same condition as Angelique and the others, surely. For a moment, overmastering hatred blackened his thoughts at whoever had done this to Angelique, and he had to fight inwardly to steady himself. He'd been watching Burke carefully since he'd come upon the group, and the man had ably assisted in the making of the stakes. Roger had narrated how Devlin had pawed through the collection of crucifixes, insistent upon sharing them.
Perhaps all was well. And yet, Devlin had no emotional investment in the matter. So what was he doing here?
Elliot remembered sitting cramped with David in the back of Julia's car as they had returned to Collinwood the evening they'd met Castlewold at the rink. He had noted the staggering hero worship the boy had for Devlin. Perhaps that explained Devlin's presence here today on the vampire hunt: he loved the boy.
Just for a dazzling split-second, Elliot entertained the idea that Burke Devlin was not Burke Devlin at all; that the real man had perished in the plane crash so long ago, and this man before him was an impostor. He recalled how David had marveled as his father, his aunt, and Maggie had all failed to know him immediately. But David himself was certain; Roger and Elizabeth, Barnabas and Julia had now accepted him. Still, it was an alarming thought.
Then Roger was telling him that he'd remembered the angry young woman of last night as the model in Kim Jansing's portraits, and Elliot's attention shifted abruptly.
"There was a name on the portraits, too," Roger added, his brow creasing. "I thought it odd at the time. Not a painted signature in the corner of the canvas, but in the center, as if it were a title to the piece. It wasn't Jansing's name."
Roger drew a pencil and a small notepad from the breast pocket of his white cotton work-shirt, and briefly printed something on the paper. "It looked like this," he explained, turning the pad towards Elliot.
"Scearlat," Roger said, pronouncing it skeer-latt.
"Scarlet," Elliot muttered. "That is how the word 'scarlet' was written in Old English. The word was spelled variously in Old English and Old French, probably originating from the Persian word, saqirlāt, which, again, might derive from Byzantine Greek, meaning 'bright red.' The vampire's name, perhaps. How fitting.
"Roger, how would you feel about phoning the cannery and dismissing everyone for the day?"
Roger shot him a look that was almost conspiratorial.
"I did that," he assured Elliot. "I phoned a few hours ago and told my foremen to evacuate the plant by noon. Tell everyone there was a plumbing issue or an order from the gas company, but empty the building. They were puzzled, but not enough to argue against an early Friday."
Elliot sighed. "Marvelous. Thank you." He looked up as the other men returned without Willie.
They quickly picked over a light lunch in Barnabas' kitchen.
"Are we ready to set out?" Elliot asked them when they once again stood outside. It was close on one o'clock. They hadn't saved as much time as Barnabas had hoped, but the sun wouldn't set for a good six or seven hours.
The men silently regarded one another, and one by one, nodded.
"Then, Roger," Elliot announced, turning to him, "I ask one thing more. I need you to get everyone out of Collinwood."
"Out—what?" Roger blurted.
"Listen to me," Elliot went on softly, his eyes burning into Roger's. "I want you to empty Collinwood, get every last person, including the servants, out of the house. I feel that this is vital. Barnabas, can they camp out overnight here in the Old House?"
"Why, why, yes," Barnabas stammered, unprepared for the request and unable to see what prompted it. "Yes, of course they can come here. Willie can open up some bedrooms, but why?" Elliot sensed Burke Devlin's eyes on him.
"Because Collinwood is the epicenter of these attacks. Elizabeth was bitten there, probably in her own bedroom. Angelique and Julia were almost certainly assaulted in the house. If we all go out to take down these vampires and leave this estate wide open and unprotected, and the two of them somehow sense that we are coming, might not one of them circle back to attack our unprotected flank? We know that Jansing moves by day. You see what I mean."
Roger's eyes narrowed. Elliot could see the dread scenarios play out behind his eyes.
"If everyone is out here, with Willie guarding them, then I feel we're one up on the vampire," Elliot said firmly. Unexpectedly, he quickly walked over and sat on the front steps of the house.
"I'm fine," he said, as Barnabas came forward, concerned. "Just fatigued. I'll be glad once we've vanquished the devils. Willie, Garvey, and Harry should provide sufficient protection. Although I'd prefer that Roger remained behind."
Roger blinked.
"I? Stay behind?" he choked out indignantly. His face went ashy. Startled, Barnabas braced for him to begin yelling in protest, but he did not.
Elliot spoke gently. "You're the only adult who knows what Kim Jansing looks like. You're the only one who knows just what is going on here. You want to come with us, to strike a blow for Elizabeth. That is right. But you have another claim, too. You can come, or remain here as the rightful protector of the estate. And of your son. Burke can go in your place."
For a moment, Roger fought a towering rage. He looked worriedly through the trees as though he could see Collinwood.
Stay behind?
What would Veronika think if he remained safely at home, as Burke ran to face danger in his place?
But what if Elliot were right, and Jansing came looking for someone on the grounds? The houses were only half a mile apart ...
Roger was no coward. What was more important? A threat to David, or how he himself looked in his fiancée's eyes? Did he really want to leave his son in the protection of Harry, Willie and Garvey, a trio of bumbling stooges?
He felt a surge of blood to his head, but then it eased. In a millisecond, he vanquished his pride.
"I shall stay here," he said soberly. "I want to come with you, damn it. But I'll stay to protect David and the others. There is no question. I shall stay."
The men could see what Roger's acquiescence had cost him. Elliot roughly clapped him on the back.
Had Panna or Veronika been there, they would have marveled that Roger had perhaps never looked so handsome as he did just then.
"Drive to Collinwood, tell everyone to vacate at once. Get them all up here."
"I'll ride back with him," Burke said. "Pick up my car and come back here."
"Why don't we all go together?" Elliot suddenly suggested, the darkness in his eyes belying his easy words. "Take Roger's car and Julia's. Barnabas, if you'll allow Burke to drive Julia's car, I'll ride with him. Roger, can you provide us with flashlights and batteries?"
"Yes," Roger said quietly, pulling on his suit jacket. "Garvey and Mrs. Johnson take care of all that, so we should have plenty. I'll get my car out of the back."
Roger went around the house. Burke walked to the verge of the clearing to fetch his suit jacket, which he had left hanging over the branch of a tree.
When he was out of hearing, Elliot wiped his face. "Well. That went more smoothly than I was prepared for."
Barnabas looked askance at his friend. "I don't understand," he said in a low voice. "Why are we all driving over to Collinwood together? We can leave from here just as well. Listen, why don't you let Roger go with us, and you be the one to stay behind with Willie to guard everyone here?"
"Because," Elliot replied. He smiled up at Barnabas. "Perhaps Roger is needed here, perhaps not. But I can't stay back. I need to keep an eye on Devlin."
Barnabas froze. "What do you mean?" he whispered.
"I don't entirely know," Elliot admitted. He lightly struck his thigh with his fist. "The man's hiding something. Don't you feel it? I am the one who knows him least well; I've met Burke once before today. But seeing him just now, I'm convinced that he has something in mind that he's keeping to himself."
He watched as, some distance away, Burke smoothly donned his jacket, putting it right at the collar, turning to regard them.
"If things go south and he proves untrustworthy," Elliot continued, "I don't even want the two together in a car, out of my sight. I don't want Roger anywhere near him. There are factors at play which make me believe Devlin would probably strike at Roger with intent to kill."
"But how can that be?" Barnabas protested. "They were alone together for at least three hours this morning and Burke didn't kill him then!"
Elliot sighed.
"No, he did not. And now he accompanies us straight into the viper's nest. I pray that I'm wrong, but something's going on here, and I hope it isn't what I think it is."
"Don't worry about it," David said, carelessly slinging a pair of underwear into a paper bag. A guy didn't need much on an overnight. "They're going to squash the vampire today and then Aunt Elizabeth will be back in the morning. I wish I was going with them."
Hallie stood beside him in his bedroom, terrified.
Impulsively, David took her by the shoulders and leaned in and kissed her on the mouth before he knew what he did.
She stared at him in disbelief. He didn't let her go.
"David," Hallie said uncertainly.
He released her. "Get your stuff," he said cheerfully. "You'll be able to sleep better in the Old House, anyway. You've been scared stiff since they told us about the vampires, and they only told us because Burke forced them to."
Hallie hesitantly stepped away from the bed. David tossed a couple of his favorite magazines into the bag.
"I'm finished, want me to come with you?" he asked her.
He was thinking, I kissed her. Oh my God, did she notice? She probably did. He thought the whole house would fall onto his head. God, what would Hallie think of him? His father had better not find out.
She'd looked so frightened, David hadn't been able to help it. He had thought it'd make her feel better. So he'd kissed her. Sort of a stupid thing to do, and now his heart was slamming in his chest, and he kind of felt like he should sit down, or run fifteen miles or something, but big deal! A kiss was just a kiss. And he'd done it really well! His teeth hadn't clunked against hers or anything. Hallie had smelled delicious, that one-of-a-kind smell of the bubblegum that came with baseball trading cards.
"You kids!" cried Mrs. Johnson from downstairs. "Get down here, we're leaving in five minutes!"
Hallie smiled.
"Yes, come with me. I'm not bringing much."
David threw his hair out of his eyes, rolled the top of his paper bag shut, and followed her from the room.