His voice was flat in my clean, well-lighted...
His
voice was flat in my clean, well-lighted studio
He put his hands to his head and raked his fingers
slowly through his hair, making it wilder than
ever"But I'll tell you something, you guys: - if
that's what's coming for me in the end, I sort of
wish I'd never been born in the first place
x
I set the thick stack of drawings and watercolors
aside on the carpet, delighted to get the last two
out of my sightThen I looked at what had been
under her pictures, weighing the picnic basket
down
It was ammo for the spear-pistolI lifted one of
the stubby harpoons outIt was about fifteen
805
inches long, and quite heavyThe shaft was steel,
not aluminum - I wasn't sure aluminum had even
been used in the nineteen-twentiesThe businessend
was triple-bladed, and although the blades
were tarnished, they looked sharpI touched the
ball of my finger to one, and a tiny bead of blood
appeared on the skin instantly
"You ought to disinfect that," Jack said
"Yes indeed," I saidI turned the thing over in
the afternoon vintage fendi bag sun, sending reflections bounding
around the wallsThe short harpoon had its own
ugly beauty, a paradox perhaps reserved
exclusively for certain weapons of efficiency
"This wouldn't go very far in water," I said"Not
as heavy as it is
"You'd be surprised," Wireman said"The gun fires
off a spring and a CO2 cartridgeShe bangs pretty
goodAnd back in those days, short range was
enoughThe Gulf teemed with fish, even close in
If Eastlake wanted to shoot something, he could
usually do it at point blank range
"I don't understand these tips," I said
806
Wireman said, "Nor do IShe had at least a dozen
harpoons, including four mounted on the wall in
the library, and none of them are like these
Jack had gone into the bathroom and come back with
a bottle of hydrogen peroxideNow he took the
harpoon I was holding and examined the triplebladed
tip"What is it? Silver?"
Wireman made his thumb and forefinger into a gun
and pointed it at him"Hold your cards, but
Wireman thinks you have scored a Bingo
"And you don't mulberry bags get that?" Jack asked
Wireman and I looked at each other, then at Jack
again
"You haven't been watching the right movies," he
said"Silver bullets are what you use to kill
werewolvesI don't know if silver works on
vampires or not, but obviously somebody thought it
did
"If you're suggesting Tessie and Laura Eastlake
are vampires," Wireman said, "they must have built
up a hell of a thirst since 1927 He looked at me,
expecting corroboration
"I think Jack's onto something," I saidI took
the bottle of peroxide, dipped the finger I'd
807
pricked into it, and splashed the bottle up and
down a couple of times
"Man-law," Jack said, grimacing
"Not unless you were planning to drink it," I said,
and after a moment's consideration Jack and I both
burst out laughing
"Huh?" Wireman asked
"Never mind," Jack said, still grinningThen he
grew serious again"But there are no such things
as vampires, EdgarThere could be ghosts, I'll
give you that much - I think almost everyone
believes there could be ghosts - but replica prada handbags there's no
such thing as vampires He brightened as an idea
struck him"Besides, it takes a vampire to make a
vampireThe Eastlake twins drowned
I picked up the short harpoon again, turning it
from side to side, making the reflection from the
tarnished tip tumble along the wall"Still, this
is suggestive
"Really," Jack agreed
"So's the unlocked door you found when you brought
the picnic basket," I saidThe
canvas that was lifted out of the rack and put
onto the easel
808
"You saying it was the crazy librarian after all,
amigo?"
"No My voice cracked, brokeI had
to take another sip of water before I could say
what needed saying"Just that maybe vampires
aren't the only things that come back from the
dead
"What are you talking about?" Jack asked
"Zombies?"
I thought of the Perse with her rotting sails
"Let's say deserters
xi
"Are you sure you want to be here alone tonight,
Edgar?" Wireman asked"Because I'm not sure it's
such a great ideaEspecially with that stack of
old pictures for company"You rolex watches knock offs have
succeeded in giving Wireman a first-class case of
the willies
We were sitting out in the Florida room, watching
the sun start its long, slow decline toward the
horizonI had produced cheese and crackers
809
"I'm not sure this will work otherwise," I said
"Think of me as a gunslinger of the art worldI
paint alone, podner
Jack looked at me over a fresh glass of iced tea
"You're planning to paint?"
"Well - sketchIt's what I know how to do And
when I thought back to a certain pair of gardening
gloves - HANDS printed on the back of one, OFF on
the back of the other - I thought sketching would
be enough, especially if I did it with little
Elizabeth Eastlake's colored pencils
I swung around to Wireman"You have the funeral
parlor tonight, correct?"
Wireman glanced at his watch and heaved a sighThere's another
visitation tomorrow from noon until twoRelatives
from afar will come to bare their teeth at the
usurping interloperThen the
final act, day after tomorrowFuneral at the
Unitarian Universalist Church in chanel replica handbags cheap Os