99 Coffins: A Historical Vampire Tale

the college and rattled down the deserted street, which had been mobbed with tourists just a few hours before. She could see no one nearby. If the local police were on their way, she couldn’t hear their sirens.

She moved closer, sticking to the shadows of the sidewalk. She couldn’t hear anything except the alarm, which was loud enough to give her a headache. She was close enough to see the building’s two wide plate-glass windows, obscured by heavy venetian blinds. A black awning over the doorway read MONTAGUE FUNERAL HOME. A placard above the doorknob readCLOSED .

The door stood slightly ajar. The doorknob had been wrenched sideways in its socket, and it looked like the lock had been forced.

Okay. That was all she needed to know. She dashed across the street to the cover of some trees and took out her cell phone. She called the Harrisburg office of the Pennsylvania State Police and asked the police communications operator on duty to patch her through to the Gettysburg police department. A woman’s voice answered, “Police Department Dispatch. How may I direct your call?”

Caxton glanced at the building across the way. There was no sign of movement within. “This is Laura Caxton with the state police, Troop H. I’m at one-fifty-five Carlisle Street and I’ve got an activated burglar alarm.”

“I’ve already registered that alarm and dispatched a patrol unit,” the dispatcher told her. “But thanks.

Are you available to assist if the chief requests it?”

Caxton frowned. “I’m off duty but, yeah. If you need help I’m here. What’s the ETA on your unit?”

“Upward of five minutes. Have you spotted any subjects?”

“No. There’s sign of forced entry, though. It’s the mortuary down here. I don’t see anyone outside or any suspicious vehicles, so—”

The alarm clanged wildly and then stopped. Caxton peered through the lamp-lit gloom but couldn’t see any change in the building.

“There’s definitely someone inside. They just disabled the alarm and—”

One of the plate glass windows exploded outward, sending jagged shards of glass skating across the street. The blinds fluttered and broke apart, and then a square wooden object protruded from the shattered window. It lurched out to drop with a heavy thud on the sidewalk.

No, no no, Caxton thought.

It was a casket, a big mahogany casket. A much more ornate version of the hundred coffins she’d seen that afternoon. Caxton knew better than to think some junkies had broken into the funeral home to steal something that would be so hard to sell on the street. She had a much better idea who was behind the break-in. Somebody who needed a coffin because his old one had gotten smashed.

“Trooper?” her phone chirped. “Trooper, are you there?”

She bit her lip and tried to think, but there was no time. “Cancel that patrol car, dispatch. No, don’t cancel it—get as many people down here as you can, get them to clear out the vicinity. Get all the civilians off the street!”

“Trooper? I don’t copy—what’s going on?”

“Get everyone away from here!” Caxton shouted.

The vampire jumped up onto the jagged lower edge of the broken window and then leaped down into the street. His skin was the color of cold milk, his eyes red and dully glowing. He had no hair anywhere on his body, and his ears stood up in points. His mouth was full of row after row of sharp teeth.

He looked as if he hadn’t fed in a century. His body was emaciated, pared down by hunger until he was thinner than any human being she’d ever seen. His skin stretched tight over prominent bones, and the muscles on his arms and legs were wasted away to thin cords. His ribs stuck out dramatically, and his cheeks were hollow with starvation. His skin was dotted with dark patches of decay and in some places had cracked open in weeping sores. He wore nothing but a pair of ragged gray pants that were falling apart at the seams.

He looked up the street, then back down as if he expected somebody to be there. Then he looked right across at Caxton and she knew he could see her blood, could see her veins and arteries lit up in the dark, her heart pounding in her chest.

Caxton’s free hand went to her hip to draw her weapon. It didn’t look like he’d fed that night. If she was fast enough maybe she could keep him from ripping her to pieces. Her hand touched her belt and found nothing, and she wasted a vital second looking down, only to realize her Beretta wasn’t there. It was still in her car.

“Dispatch, I have a vampire over here—do you copy? I have a vampire!” she screamed into the phone.

“Request immediate assistance!”

16.

After long searching I found my quarry & almost at once I regretted it. Bill lay curled on a tussock of grass & mud, his body twisted up & broken. His pack & musket were missing & nowhere to be found & his blue jacket had been torn open in the front, the buttons cast about him as if he’d torn them off in a frenzy. His neck & his hands were as pale as the belly of a fish, but that was not the worst of it. His face hung in ragged strips as if he’d been mauled by a bear. Flaps of skin hung loose on his cheeks & his nose was laid open, as completely as if it had been flayed in an anatomist’s classroom.

I found his forage cap near his hand. I picked it up, & wrapped it around & around my own hands, & wept for him, for my Bill was dead.

Eben Nudd placed one hand upon my shoulder, which I was most grateful for. German Pete sat down on his pack & drank deep from his canteen.

I knelt down to kiss my friend’s brow one last time, & it was then I had the worst shock of my life. For though I could feel no heat in him, nor did he breathe or show other sign of life; yet Bill moved. He winced away from my touch.

“Alva,” he said. He stirred, too weak it seemed to sit up, yet desperate to get away. “Alva, he’s calling me.”

“Who is, Bill? Who calls you? Come, let’s get you up & back to camp. The surgeons will do something for you.” They could hardly repair his torn face, I thought, but plenty of men in this war have been disfigured, & yet lived to fight again. “Come.”

“No!” he screamed, his voice as high & thin as a whistle. He struck me on the shoulder & knocked me backward onto my fundament. “No, none of you get closer! Leave me! He’s calling, O, can you not hear him? He calls even now!”

With that he leapt up, & ran off, calling over his shoulder that I should not follow. That I should give him up for dead.

—THE STATEMENT OFALVAGRIEST

17.

The vampire saw her. His red eyes bored right into her. She tried to look away, but she couldn’t.

In an offhand, very casual way, she knew exactly what was happening. He was mesmerizing her. It had happened before. Had she been capable of it she would have screamed, run away, at least tried to move her eyes. But she couldn’t. The vampire had the power to compel her. The amulet at her throat grew warm as it fought that influence, but it had little power of its own. Its purpose was to focus her own mental energies, to give her the clarity to fight the vampire’s psychic attack. Unless she could reach up and grab it, turn her thoughts toward it, it was useless. And until the vampire looked away from her she could do nothing but stare at him, her rational mind disconnected from her body.

The cell phone in her hand made loud buzzing noises. Most likely it was the dispatcher on the other end asking her frantic questions. She opened her fingers and the phone slid to the ground. It bounced off the sidewalk, but she couldn’t look down to see where it had gone. She couldn’t look anywhere except into the vampire’s eyes.

And those eyes—they were cold, even though they were the color of fiery embers. They were vacant of any emotion. They were locked on hers with an unmatchable strength. He could hold her there forever if he wanted to. He could come over and tear her throat out with his hands and she would not be able to turn away or move an inch.