“Yeah; yeah, that’s exactly what we wanted to report,” Neil said. “Exactly.”
“Vandalism?” I said when we were back in the car.
“I don’t want to talk right now.”
“Well, maybe I want to talk.”
“I just couldn’t do it.”
“No kidding.”
He looked over at me. “You could’ve told him the truth. Nobody was stopping you.”
I looked out the window. “Yeah, I guess I could’ve.”
“We’re going over there tonight. To the vampire’s place.”
“And do what?”
“Ask him how much he wants.”
“How much he wants for what?” I said.
“How much he wants to forget everything. He goes on with his life, we go on with ours.”
I had to admit, I’d had a similar thought myself. Neil and I didn’t know how to do any of this. But the vampire did. He was good at stalking, good at harassing, good at violence.
“We don’t have a lot of money to throw around.”
“Maybe he won’t
“They’re sophisticated enough to make two murders look like accidents.”
“I guess that’s a point.”
“I’m just not sure we should pay him anything, Neil.”
“You got any better ideas?”
I didn’t, actually. I didn’t have any better ideas at all.
6
I spent an hour on the phone with Jan that afternoon. The last few days I’d been pretty anxious, and she’d sensed it, and now she was making sure that everything was all right with me. In addition to being wife and lover, Jan’s also my best friend. I can’t kid her. She always knows when something’s wrong. I’d put off telling her about Bob and Mike dying. I’d been afraid that I might accidentally say more than I should and make her suspicious. But now I had to tell her about their deaths. It was the only way I could explain my tense mood.
“That’s awful,” she said. “Their poor families.”
“They’re handling it better than you might think.”
“Maybe I should bring the kids home early.”
“No reason to, hon. I mean, realistically there isn’t anything any of us can do.”
“Two accidents in that short a time. It’s pretty strange.”
“Yeah, I guess it is. But that’s how it happens sometimes.”
“Are you going to be all right?”
“Just need to adjust is all.” I sighed. “I guess we won’t be having our poker games anymore.”
Then I did something I hadn’t intended. I started crying, and the tears caught in my throat.
“Oh, honey,” Jan said. “I wish I was there so I could give you a big hug.”
“I’ll be OK.”
“Two of your best friends.”
“Yeah.” The tears were starting to dry up now.
“Oh, did I tell you about Tommy?” Tommy was our six-year-old.
“No, what?”
“Remember how he used to be so afraid of horses?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, we took him out to this horse ranch where you can rent horses?”
“Uh-huh.”
“And they found him a little Shetland pony and let him ride it, and he loved it. He wasn’t afraid at all.” She laughed. “In fact, we could barely drag him home.” She paused. “You’re probably not in the mood for this, are you? I’m sorry, hon. Maybe you should do something to take your mind off things. Is there a good movie on?”
“I guess I could check.”
“Something light, that’s what you need.”
“Sounds good,” I said. “I’ll go get the newspaper and see what’s on.”
“Love you.”
“Love you, too, sweetheart,” I said.
I spent the rest of the afternoon going through my various savings accounts and investments. I had no idea what the creep would want to leave us alone. We could always threaten him with going to the police, though he might rightly point out that if we really wanted to do that, we would already have done it.
I settled in the five-thousand-dollar range. That was the maximum cash I had to play with. And even then I’d have to borrow a little from one of the mutual funds we had earmarked for the kids and college.
Five thousand dollars. To me, it sounded like an enormous amount of money, probably because I knew how hard I’d had to work to get it.
But would it be enough for our friend the vampire?
Neil was there just at dark. He parked in the drive and came in. Meaning he wanted to talk.
We went in the kitchen. I made us a couple of highballs, and we sat there and discussed finances.
“I came up with six thousand,” he said.
“I’ve got five.”
“That’s eleven grand,” he said. “It’s got to be more cash than this creep has ever seen.”
“What if he takes it and comes back for more?”
“We make it absolutely clear,” Neil said, “that there is no more. That this is it. Period.”
“And if not?”
Neil nodded. “I’ve thought this through. You know the kind of lowlife were dealing with? A, he’s a burglar, which means, these days, that he’s a junkie. B, if he’s a junkie, then that means he’s very susceptible to AIDS. So between being a burglar and shooting up, this guy is probably going to have a very short lifespan.”
“I guess I’d agree.”
“Even if he wants to make our life miserable, he probably won’t live long enough to do it. So I think we’ll be making just the one payment. We’ll buy enough time to let nature take its course — his nature.”
“What if he wants more than the eleven grand?”
“He won’t. His eyes’ll pop out when he sees this.”
I looked at the kitchen clock. It was going on nine now.
“I guess we could drive over there.”
“It may be a long night,” Neil said.
“I know.”
“But I guess we don’t have a hell of a lot of choice, do we?”
As we’d done the last time we’d been here, we split up the duties. I took the backyard, Neil the apartment door. We’d waited until midnight. The rap music had died by now. Babies cried and mothers screamed; couples fought. TV screens flickered in dark windows.
I went up the fire escape slowly and carefully We’d talked about bringing guns, then decided against it. We weren’t exactly marksmen, and if a cop stopped us for some reason, we could be arrested for carrying unlicensed firearms. All I carried was a flashlight in my back pocket.
As I grabbed the rungs of the ladder, powdery rust dusted my hands. I was chilly with sweat. My bowels felt
