The Avenger 33 - The Blood Countess (3 page)

As the figure stepped into the wall, a thin beam of moonlight struck the cloak, for a few seconds illuminating a red circle on the front of the garment. A spot of fresh blood.

“Vampires,” said the wrinkled little man with the wispy white beard. “Vampires are a passion with me,
senhor.”

“I see,” said Dick Benson.

The train, one of the finest in the Panazuela National Railway System (which wasn’t saying much), was huffing and rattling up through the foliage-spattered mountains. It was mid-afternoon and the Avenger was two hours from his destination.

“Which explains,” said the old man, “why I am making this uncomfortable journey to Mostarda.”

They were sitting in the crowded club car. Benson held a cup of Panazuelan coffee in his hand. The old man was sipping a cocktail through a straw.

“You expect to find vampires there?”

“Ah, yes.” He wiped at his white mustache with the tips of his gnarled fingers. “Excuse me,
senhor,
but I realize I have not introduced myself. I am Dr. Antonio Bouchey of the University of Barafunda. There my specialty is Panazuelan literature.”

“My name is Richard Benson,” said Benson. “I’m with American Produce.”

“Ah, yes, the exploiters of our country,” said the professor. “But we must all do what we are bidden. You, by American Produce; me, by the university.”

“You were telling me,” reminded Benson, “about the vampires.”

“Yes, let us return to a more pleasant subject.” He set his drink on the narrow table next to his chair. “Perhaps you have not heard,
senhor
Benson, that there have been several very strange killings in Mostarda lately.”

“No. I haven’t.”

The old man stroked his fragile beard. “Each of the dead ones had very little blood left in him,
senhor,
very little. On each body were found very peculiar marks, and some mutilation.”

“When you speak of vampires, doctor, do you mean vampire bats or are you—”

“No, no, my friend, not bats . . . although in the jungles to the south such creatures exist. No, I speak of human beings, or nearly human. Beings to whom the blood is the life, as we say. They kill because they must, because the only way to prolong their evil lives is with fresh blood. Blood drawn from a still warm body.”

“I’ve heard folk tales of such things, but I don’t think—”

“All folk tales, my friend, are based on fact,” said Dr. Bouchey. “Sometimes, it is true, a folk story will exaggerate.”

“You really believe in human vampires, then?”

“Ah, yes, I sincerely do.” He leaned closer to Benson. “I have seen their victims,
senhor.
Over the years I have seen several bloodless corpses.”

As the train swayed around a mountain curve, all the glasses and bottles in the club car rattled. From his window the Avenger could see the ancient engine exhaling black smoke, and far ahead a wooden trestle bridge they’d be crossing in a few more miles.

“You are probably more familiar with the European vampire legends,” continued the little professor. “I have studied all those, of course. Here in Latin America we have our own legends, even stories which were told before the Portuguese and the Spaniards came. In fact, near to Mostarda lie the ruins of a very old temple,
senhor.
Once, hundreds of years ago, a very unusual cult thrived in the region, and in that very temple they sacrificed many a victim and drank his blood. Here, too, as in the Old World, it is believed that blood will give eternal life.”

The Avenger drank some of his coffee before asking, “You say you have seen victims, doctor, but have you ever met a vampire?”

Dr. Bouchey slowly nodded his head. “Yes,
senhor,
I have,” he replied. “It was many years ago, in Guarda Chuva, while I was studying at the university there.” Pausing, he rubbed at his wrinkled forehead. “Many people have expressed similar thoughts,
senhor
Benson, but let me say that while it is horrible and terrifying to see the devil at midnight in a lonely churchyard, it is even more awful to encounter him at noon on a crowded street. I had only a glimpse of this man, and that was more than forty years ago, yet I see him very clearly in my mind still.”

“What made you believe the man was a vampire?”

“There had been, in the poorer section of the city, a series of murders,” the professor said. “In some ways similar to the crimes of Jack the Ripper in England, but these were definitely the work of a vampire. When I saw this man . . . I simply
knew.
There was about him something, an aura . . . Yes, I can see you are amused. Imagination, you think, or simply one more old man who is losing his grip on reality. Such is not the case, I assure you. No, when you see such a one . . . you know.”

“Perhaps,” said Benson, “you’ll see such a one in Mostarda.”

“That is my hope, although it has been—”

Everyone, everything, in the train car was thrown violently forward. Chairs crashed over, glasses broke. A girl screamed; men cursed in several languages.

Benson got quickly to his feet and helped the old professor up.

“What can have happened?” asked the old man.

Before the Avenger could reply, they heard machine-gun fire from up ahead.

The strong, supple fingers rubbed the spot of dried blood off the cloak.

“What are you doing, Erika?” asked a voice from the far doorway.

The blond girl, stuffing the damp chamois into the pocket of her tweed skirt, backed out of the large wardrobe closet. She was a tall girl, big-boned, good-looking. “Nothing, Liz,” she said.

“You look too guilty to have been up to nothing,” said Elizabeth Bentin. A slender girl, she had intensely black hair and pale skin. “Please tell me.”

“Just cleaning up something I spilled.” Erika tried a smile. “I have my clumsy moments.”

Elizabeth came across her bedroom. Brushing by her companion, she looked inside her closet. “I haven’t worn any of these things since . . . There’s a damp spot on this cloak.”

“Yes, I spilled some nail polish on it and—”

“Please, Erika, don’t lie to me.” She touched the blond girl’s arm. “What did you wipe off my cloak?”

“Nothing to worry about, Liz, it was only—”

“Was it blood?”

Erika turned her head away, looking through the leaded windows at the bright green forest that surrounded the castle. “There’s really nothing to worry about.”

“It was blood.” Elizabeth’s fingers tightened on the other girl’s arm. “Wasn’t it?”

Erika said finally, “Yes, but—”

“My God.” Elizabeth sat on the edge of her four-poster bed. “Has there been another . . . death?”

Erika put her hand on the pale girl’s shoulder. “These incidents have absolutely nothing to do with you, Liz.”

“Who was it?”

“There’s really no need to—”

“Who?”

“Well, Leonard Rodney was found dead in the—”

“Rodney?”
Elizabeth brought her hand up to her mouth. “But he was supposed to be protecting me, and now I’ve—”

“You had nothing to do with what happened to him, absolutely nothing.”

“Didn’t I?” She shook her head. “Erika, I really don’t know. Last night . . . last night it happened again. I . . . blacked out. I mean, I was sitting here just as I am now. You’d brought me my cup of cocoa and left. I . . . it was as though I’d simply leaped through time. The next thing I remember is glancing toward that window and seeing the dawn light. You see, Erika, I lost time again. Lost hours. And I don’t remember what I did all that time.”

“You probably slept, Liz.”

“No, it’s not that simple. I think I went out.”

“I’m right in the next bedroom,” said Erika. “I’m sure I would have awakened if I’d heard any—”

“I must have put on that cloak.” Elizabeth rose and pointed toward the closet. “I . . . I don’t remember.”

“There are a dozen ways a spot could have gotten on that cloak. One of the maids may have cut her finger while tidying up, or Mrs. Andrade herself could have—”

“And look down there.” Elizabeth pulled free of Erika, ran to the wardrobe, and knelt. She pulled a pair of walking shoes off the shoe rack. “See, Erika? There’s fresh earth smeared on these. It means I was out.”

“It doesn’t mean anything. I’m telling you, and you must believe me, Liz, that I’m absolutely certain you have nothing to do with any of these killings.”

Elizabeth let the muddy shoes drop to the floor. “I was hoping Dick Benson could help me,” she said. “But now . . . I don’t think anyone can help me.”

Anson McClurg wiped a limp handkerchief across his high furrowed forehead. “Lord, it’s hotter here than in Ereguay,” he said. He sighed, smoothed some of the travel wrinkles out of his lightweight suit and climbed the red tile porch of the American consul’s house, in Mostarda.

The front door was half open. Inside, a man in white trousers and shirt was polishing the hardwood floor of the hallway with a large candy-striped rag.

“I’m McClurg,” announced McClurg through the opening.

“Ah,
senhor
McClurg.” The man—he was plump, in his late forties—got off his knees. “We have been expecting you. It is sad, is it not, about
senhor
Rodney?”

McClurg had never liked Leonard Rodney, and having to take over the running of this office of his, even temporarily, was not McClurg’s idea of a pleasant job. Not that Ereguay was a paradise on earth.

“Yes, very sad,” he said in his adequate Portuguese.

“I am João Escabar,” said the plump man. “I have been acting as houseboy, valet, butler, and man of all work. It would please me to continue in such capacities for you,
senhor.”

“Don’t see any reason why not.” McClurg crossed the threshold. It was cool inside the big stone house. “How’s the plumbing?”

“Excellent,
senhor.”

“I’d like a shower. You might park my car—it’s out front—and then bring in my bags.”

“Sim,
at once,
senhor
McClurg,” said Escabar. “And when do you wish to view the body of poor
senhor
Rodney?”

“Good lord.” McClurg blinked. “Don’t tell me you’ve got the thing here?”

“Ah, no, poor
senhor
Rodney is at the Lemos Brothers Mortuary,” explained Escabar. “Or I should say he will be there once the autopsy has been completed by the police surgeon. There is to be a rosary for the repose of his soul at the Lemos Brothers’ establishment this evening at eight. That is, if they’ve finished cutting him up by—”

“Yes, well, we’ll have to see about sending some flowers.” McClurg didn’t think he was up to praying for his late colleague. “There are a lot of odd rumors floating around as to exactly how Rodney met his death, João. Do you know what really happened?”

“It is very simple,
senhor.”

“Yes?”

“He was killed by a vampire.”

The engineer got almost all the way across the trestle bridge before they gunned him down. He went flying over the edge of the structure, arms outstretched, then plummeted three hundred feet to the dry riverbed below.

The four armed men paid no attention to his plunge. He was dead, out of the way, as soon as two of the machine guns had caught him.

“You, my friend,” said the large bearded man who led the four gunners, “come down here like a good fellow.”

The conductor was in the engine cab, holding onto a metal railing. He’d run up here to find out why the train had stopped. “The height,” he said, his face flushed and perspiring. “I . . . can’t look down.”

The train had been halted in the middle of the wooden bridge. A barricade of fresh-cut logs was blocking the way.

“Come out now, or I’ll cut you in half!”

“Yes, very well. Give me but a moment to compose my—”

With a snarl the bearded man leaped into the cab, grabbed the sweating conductor, and tossed him out.

“I’ll fall . . . Help me, please, I don’t want to—”

Laughing, one of the other men caught him by the collar. “It’s not so far down, friend.” He dragged the frightened conductor to the bridge edge and jerked his head out over the long drop. “See, a few hundred feet is all.”

“Please, I—”

“That’s enough, Man’el,” ordered the leader. “Bring him to me.”

Along the train a few passengers were attempting to climb out of their cars.

One of the men sent a burst of machine-gun fire at the train. “Back inside, you cattle!”

“You have an American traveling with you,” said the bearded leader.

“Per . . . perhaps. These days we get many diff—” A slap across the face made his head roll from side to side. “Yes, I noticed at least one such.”

“A young man, dark-haired, medium height. Which car is he traveling in?”

The conductor attempted to reach for his notebook and papers inside his coat.

The leader slapped him once more. “Tell me quickly.”

“He was . . . in the club car the last time I passed through.”

“Which car is that?”

“There. Number 8072.”

“Very well.” The leader let go and the conductor fell to his knees on the cross ties. “You two stay here. Man’el, come with me.”