“You may have to. Otherwise we’ll have a lot more death on our hands.”
Coop sighed. Washington was right.
An hour later, just before midnight, they parted with a long, slow kiss. “I’ll miss you tonight,” Washington said.
“I’ll miss you too.”
They hugged.
“Be careful,” Washington said.
“Me?”
Washington nodded. “I don’t want to lose you.”
***
Frederick Barnes strolled down the middle of Main Street in the moonlight, happily twirling his cane and whistling a tune from his youth, a tune from long before the Roman legionnaires invaded Saxony. The cold desert wind wailed through the town ahead of him, almost as if heralding his arrival. Candles glowed in windows, and the occasional shadow appeared on lace curtains, but, out here, in the night, Barnes was alone.
But not for long.
Since coming to Alura, Barnes had glutted himself, draining John Murphy entirely, and taking blood from nearly a dozen others. Instead of being sated, his thirst only grew. Even now, after feeding on the banker and the owner of the dry goods store, he felt cold, empty, hollow.
But that was okay. He was among people now. Many people.
In the forests of Germany, high in the ruins of his castle, Barnes supped only thrice a month, spending the rest of his time asleep in his crypt, dreaming red dreams. In 1512, he walked among men in Berlin, but was chased away by fear and plague; his thirst had become uncontrollable, and he drank the blood of dozens a night, leaving them dazed and dying the next day. In 1692, he returned, and it happened again. In 1744. In 1858, he visited Berman, where the plague carried many beyond the grave and back again.
But now, here, he was free to walk boldly and drink much. The villages in the Mojave were small and isolated. And the coast, boasting its fine cities, wasn’t far beyond. He could drink and drink and drink.
This....this was his promised land.
-3-
Sheriff Justus Cooper was roused early on the morning of July 3, 1876 by a knock at the door. His landlady stood sheepishly in the hall, clutching a pink wool shawl closed at her throat with one hand and holding an oil lamp with the other.
"Sorry to wake you, Sheriff," she said, "but Millard Foreman’s downstairs and he says it's urgent."
Millard Foreman? The undertaker?
“Alright. Tell him I’ll be right down.”
Alone, Coop hurriedly dressed and threw on his gun belt. For a moment, he delayed. Honestly, he was afraid of what he’d fine.
Downstairs, Millard Foreman was sitting in the parlor, his legs crossed and his arms folded. When Coop entered the room, the old undertaker jumped to his feet.
"What's happened?" Coop blurted.
“Someone took Mr. and Mrs. Dixon.”
The words sailed directly over Coop’s head. “What was that?”
“Mr. and Mrs. Dixon. Someone stole their bodies.”
***
Josiah Washington had trouble sleeping, and spent most of the night scouring his books in the hope of finding something that would explain what was happening.
He didn’t.
His first patient arrived at six ‘o’clock sharp, complaining of acute lethargy. Several more came in after him, and by seven-thirty his parlor was packed.
News about the epidemic had gotten out, and some of the people Washington saw exhibited signs of mere colds, overwork, and undersleep.
Better to be safe than to be sorry, he supposed.
By nine, the parlor was empty, and Washington was left to his own thoughts.
***
Across town, Justus Cooper stood Millard Foreman’s front parlor with his hands on his hips, surveying the room.
Though some people uneasily shunned mortuaries, Foreman’s parlor was as normal (and pleasant) as anyone's, save for the two coffins propped in the corners and another two lying haphazardly on the floor.
The standing coffins were occupied, one by John Murphy (who was to be buried later in the day) and the other by a man Coop didn't recognize. The ones on the floor were empty.
"I was asleep," Foreman said morosely. He was looking down at the coffins as if he'd never seen them before.
"And?"
"Something woke me up. A crash."
Thinking one of the coffins had simply fallen over, as they sometimes did, Foreman didn't get out of bed to investigate; instead, he went back to sleep.
“Then I heard another crash.”
This time, Foreman rallied and went downstairs.
"When I came in here, I saw the coffins laying down. Mr. and Mrs. Dixon were gone."
Coop looked from the melancholy undertaker to the coffins, and then back again.
"Why would someone steal a dead body?"
"I don't know," Foreman said.
Neither did Coop. To be honest, he was baffled, completely baffled.
***
John Murphy was buried at noon in Alura’s sole cemetery, a small, compact nest of wooden crosses beyond the railroad tracks. Less than twenty people turned out for the graveside service.
Josiah Washington and Justus Cooper sat side-by-side as Pastor Hanskill strained to keep from launching into a sermon about fire and brimstone. Coop, for his part, was worried. Something strange was happening. Something aside from the outbreak.
Next to him, Washington was downright scared. Though the day had been relatively quiet, aside from the early rush of patients, he knew that even know the plague was out there, incubating in the town.
The ceremony ended at two ‘o’clock in the afternoon.. Many of the faithful stopped to shake Pastor Hanskill’s hand, but Coop made a show of avoiding the clergyman.
As they walked back into town, Coop and Washington talked.
“Something isn’t right,” Washington said, echoing Coop’s previous thought.
“No, it isn’t.”
“I wonder if it has anything to do with the German.”
Coop looked at him. “The German?”
“None of this started happening until he showed up.”
“Oh, come on. I don’t like thinking like that.”
“It’s true,” Washington said. “I’m not saying he stole the bodies, but what if he brought something with him? A tropical affliction? Something unknown to western medicine?”
“I could always go see him,” Coop offered. “Make sure he isn’t sick too.”
“You could,” Washington said thoughtfully.
“I will.”
***
The Carter property could be reached directly from town only by following Main Street, and then taking a narrow track over the hill face, through the scrub and grass. An hour after the funeral, Coop saddled his horse, Daisy, and rode up.
Before the track reaches the homestead, it winds one last time back on itself, and, from there, you could see only the pointed roof rising up like the prow of a ship. The place looked haunted, to be honest, and even though Coop didn’t believe in spirits, he shuddered.
The land the house sits on is tabletop flat and covered in threadbare brown grass. There were a few dead trees, a well, and a shed, but not much else.
Coop hitched Daisy to one of the trees, and stroked her flank. She quivered under his hand.
“What’s wrong, girl?” Coop asked softly.
The horse neighed.
Coop looked at the house.
“It’s okay, girl,” he said more to himself than the horse.
At the door, Coop knocked, and wasn’t entirely surprised when the door was opened at once.
“Yes?”
The man before him was a veritable giant, standing at least as high as Lincoln if not taller. He was broad, thick-necked, and wore a tiny mustache on his thin upper lip. His hair was gray and his eyes were so brown they appeared black.
Coop sensed something.
Something...bad.
“Hi, there,” Coop said affably, “my name’s Justus Cooper and I’m the sheri
ff of
Alura. I just thought I’d come out and meet you. Mr. Barnes?”
The man sized Coop up. “No,” he said coldly. “I’m Blutsauger. Mr. Barnes is in San Francisco on business.”
“Oh,” Coop said, “that’s too bad. I was lookin forward to meeting him.”
“He won’t be back for quite some time.”
“Gee. Well, I guess I’ll have to come back some other time. How you settling in?”
“Fine.”
“You feeling sick? I hear...”
“Goodbye, Sheriff.”
With that, Blutsauger shut the door in Coop’s face.
***
Josiah Washington saw three more people that day who complained of weakness. Two of them seemed fairly healthy to him, but the third, a young girl, definitely had...whatever it was.
Washington was called to her home by her mother at three in the afternoon. When Washington found her, she was little more than a sack of bones wrapped in gray flesh, her eyes protruding and her gums sunken back from her teeth.
“Can you help her?” her mother asked, frantic.
“I don’t know,” Washington said.
-4-
Joshua Greene closed up shop at half past midnight on July 3, and walked the three blocks home as though he were walking on air. John Murphy was dead.
Greene knew he was a horrible person for celebrating a man’s death, but John Murphy had done him so much wrong over the years that he really didn’t care. In his forty-five years, he’d come to the conclusion that some people deserved to die. After all, if they were gonna go through life hurting people and causing problems, what good were they?
Home, Greene unlocked the door and went inside.
He was greeted by a lit lamp on the end table. That was strange. He hadn’t been home all day.
“Hello?”
No reply.
Maybe he was robbed. Maybe someone came in and took everything of value.
The cash under his mattress.
Greene’s heart froze. That was his entire life savings.
Taking the lamp, Greene went up the stairs, the dim light casting the shadows into the corners. At the top of the stairs, he froze as, ahead of him, his bedroom door clicked softly shut.
Someone was still here.
In his bedroom.
Greene pulled the Darringer from his trouser pocket and pulled the hammer back. Slowly, wincing as the floorboards creaked under him, he moved to the door.
Listened.
Nothing.
He slowly turned the knob.
Opened the door.
For a moment, he saw nothing out of the ordinary. His bed. His chair. The window. Then he noticed the wardrobe’s doors moving, seeming to tremble, as if someone was holding them closed and panting (or sobbing or laughing).
“Come out of there!” Greene said, trying to make his voice firm.
The doors opened.
John Murphy, his face black and blue, his eyes yellow and shining, stepped out.
Greene dropped the lamp.
“Joshua...” Murphy hissed.
***
Frederick Barnes rose at dusk, his throat so parched he could barely speak. The hunger had grown in the past day, so that it now it gnawed him to the point of agony. His dreams during the day had been soaked in blood. Hot, rich, filling blood. Now, sitting up in his crate, Barnes nearly screamed out. He needed blood. Needed it.
With one long, jagged yellow fingernail, Barnes slashed his own wrist and pressed it greedily against his lips. The blood was cold and stale, but it sustained him long enough to get out and get on with his night.
Briefly he wondered if he hadn’t made a mistake. High in his castle he could manage his thirst, but here, among men, it ran wild, and he became, in essence, a victim of it. They say that once a dog gets a taste of human blood, you have to kill it because it’ll turn rabid. That was him.
I’ll control it.
He would cut back. He would have two, maybe three blood meals tonight. That was it.
-5-
Sunday, July 4, 1876, started, as it always did, with a nearly two hour long church sermon by Pastor Hanskill. This week’s topic was SIN AND PESTILENCE. For almost ninety minutes, as his congregation sweltered in the pews, Hanskill claimed the recent outbreak of consumption was God’s punishment. “Sinners and harlots live and work openly here in Alura. Unless they repent and bow to the Lord, we will be abolished!”
After the service, Coop went back to the office and sat in silence for the rest of the day. Later on, he went to Washington’s.
“Let’s spend the night together,” Coop said.
“I don’t want to be alone,” Washington agreed.
***
At ten that evening, Joshua Greene appeared to Horace White, the editor of the Alura Daily in a dream. Greene was cold, gaunt, and thirsty. He drained every last drop of blood Horace had to offer.
Blake Bugolosi, the owner of the dry goods store, woke from a fevered sleep to find his skin like ice. His throat was parched. He called his daughter, Ruth, into the room, and bit her neck.
Benjamin Hassel, the banker, died in his sleep at ten-fifteen, only to wake back up. His grieving widow, elated at her husband’s revival, embraced him. He bit her neck.
At ten-thirty, John Murphy accosted three men on the street, one of them a well-known outlaw on his way to San Francisco. None survived.
And the horrors continued.
At eleven, Horace White, now up and about, came into his son’s bedroom and sat next to him.
“Papa, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” White said.
“But you’re cold.”
White bit his neck.
All through the night, the legions of the living dead grew, the sickness passed from one to another like tainted currency. Mad with thirst, Frederick Barnes attacked two of his own, drinking the filtered blood with the greedy abandoned of a gluttonous infant.
Later, the undead went into the streets, peeking in windows and knocking on doors, taking babes from their mothers’ arms and accosting men in their beds. Barnes, doubled-over in pain, remained in the street.
His thirst had conquered him.
***
Things were quiet away from the main thoroughfare. If Justus Cooper or Josiah Washington, after making love, heard anything, they assumed they were Independence Day revelers. It was the Centennial after all.
***
Pastor Raymond Hanskill sat by the window of his modest home on Oak Street and watched the shadowy facade of Mimi Baker's tall Victorian. It was late at night, and yet people were still going in and out, in and out, engaging in the sins of the flesh, smoking opium, and probably praying to Lucifer.
This is where the consumption was coming from!
If the sheriff wouldn't do something, he would.
Hanskill left his chair. When he returned, he was holding a gun.
***
A knock at the door woke Sheriff Cooper at almost six in the morning.
While Washington went to answer it, Coop hurried dressed and prepared to hide.
After a few minutes, Washington came back. He looked frightened. “It’s Barney Parker. He says there’s a riot on Main Street.”
Now that Coop listened, he could hear the sounds of screaming.
“Did he know I was here?”
“He figured I could do something. I told him we were discussing the outbreak.”
Coop nodded. “Okay. I’ll be back.”
He kissed Washington on the lips and went downstairs, where he found Barney Parker trembling. “Damndest thing I ever saw!” he blurted as soon as he saw the sheriff. “People are biting each other and everything!”
“Come on.”
Barney led Coop back to Main Street, where dawn was just beginning to crest in the east. A few people wandered the streets, men in nightshirts and women in long, flowing dresses.
“Hey!’ Coop called out to one of them.
The
man turned, saw them, and started in their direction, staggering as if on broken feet. As he got closer, Coop noticed he didn’t look right. His face was pale and jagged, almost like it had lost all of its meat and was nothing but a skull with skin stretched tight on it.
He had blood on his mouth.
“Hey, are you okay?”
The man continued his advance, grinning evilly.
“I don’t think he’s a good guy,” Barney said.
“Why don’t you just stop right there?” Coop said.
The man came on.
“Stop!”
Came on.
Coop pulled out his six-gun. “I’ll shoot you if I have to.”
The man was less than ten feet away. His eyes were black and shinning.
Coop fired.
The bullet hit the man in the chest, driving him back. Blood gushed out of the wound, as if the man were a balloon filled with the stuff.
He didn’t stop.
He advanced.
Coop fired again.
Just as the man reached out to touch him, the sun rose over the rooftops; the light falling on the man flared, and, as Coop watched in stunned disbelief, the man erupted into flames.
“Jesus jumpin Christ!” Barney yelled.
The man, now a ball of flames, let out an odd, demonic scream, and stumbled back, whirling and trying to flee, but the sun rose higher, and the light was inescapable.
He exploded.
For a long moment, Barney and Coop stood in place, watching the pyre as it slowly burned itself out.
“What the hell was that, Coop?”
“I don’t know,” Coop said, “I don’t know.”
***
After slaying the harlot and her demons, Pastor Raymond Haskill returned home and sat back down in his chair.
“They’re sodomites, you know,” a voice said from the darkness behind him.
It was God.
“The sheriff and the nigger. The doctor.”
9 Tales Told in the Dark 11 Page 5
