Down in a cold, dark and dank cave
Vernon’s enemies are prepared for their grave.
Igon, Wilf, Victor and Valeeta all received their letters round about the same time. Each letter was the same, clear and to the point:
Dear …
We have discovered a body, which we believe to be that of Vernon the Vampire. It is a dead body with a stake through the heart. We are holding the said body in the vaults of Bloodstock Castle and would like you to come there at two minutes before midnight tonight to help us in the identification of the said body.
The main castle gates will be open. This letter must be kept secret.
The letter was signed by Chief Inspector Speekup. They had all read their letters and each of them had kept it a secret from the others. Victor and Valeeta were the most upset and Valeeta was not looking forward to identifying the body of her son.
The ex-King and Queen were the first to arrive. As the letter had said, the main gates were open and both Victor and Valeeta knew their way about the castle better than anyone. After all, they had lived and ruled from there for over a hundred years. Once inside the castle, they both stood inside the great hall which was dimly lit by rush torches placed in brackets on the wall. The torches threw out a flickering light which consistently shadowed then cleared. They gazed around the hall; it looked and felt huge.
‘I never realized how cold it was when we used to live here,’ the ex-Queen said.
‘Ya,’ was Victor’s reply.
They walked proudly towards the door, well over fifty feet away, which would lead them down into the vault, over three hundred feet below the castle. The echo of their footsteps bounced off the five-foot-thick walls, the click of Valeeta’s sharp heels mixing with the slap of Victor’s boots. Valeeta, apart from being depressed at having to identify her son’s body, was also feeling the cold. She sneezed. Just a gentle, feminine sneeze. But the hall was so large and so high that it took two minutes before the echo of that sneeze died away.
When they had almost reached the vault door the ex-Queen said, ‘You would think that someone would look after this place, at least have it dusted now and again. It was never like this when we lived here. Everything shone when we lived here. Why, when we lived …’
‘Shut up, mine dear,’ Victor said, with enough command in his voice to make her do so. He blew the dust away from the sign hanging on the door. It seemed that only the dust had kept the sign in place. For, as the dust moved, the sign fell to the floor. The crash echoed round the hall just as the echoes of Valeeta’s sneeze were fading away.
Victor ignored the sign on the floor and carefully opened the creaking door. He knew it was the right one. He led the way down the winding steps to the vault below. He held Valeeta’s hand as they made their way into the damp darkness, guided only by a distant light. The door closed of its own accord.
* * *
Igon read and re-read the letter which he had found on the floor behind his door. He tore at the seal without looking at it. He called for his horse and made his way to the castle, wondering why the Inspector had asked him to identify the body of Vernon. He wondered, but never questioned.
He tied the horse to a hitching rail and looked around him. He seemed to be the only one there, although he had thought that someone else might have been asked to identify the body as well as himself. He made his way to the old iron gates that were to be open. He didn’t know whether he was relieved or not when he found them so. This was not going to bring back pleasant memories for him, as he had lived in the castle for nearly all his life as one of the ugliest men who had ever been seen, not only in the castle, but anywhere.
He went through the open gates and into the courtyard, hoping that it was Vernon who had been found. If it was, it would mean that many people would be able to live their lives without the constant fear that Vernon would eventually find them and kill them.
As he entered the great hall, a flood of unhappy memories seemed to take over. Ugly memories, sad memories. He tried to think of one happy moment he had spent as a child in this forsaken castle, but sadly he couldn’t. The only person who had treated him with any kindness whatsoever had been Valentine. Never once had he been unkind to him. But in those days he had only ever seen Valentine once every three or four weeks.
Igon made his way to the door that led to the vaults below, the vaults he knew so well from the old days. But now he walked to the door majestically – one of the most handsome men in the world, slim and erect in a white uniform that looked as if it had been painted on him, it fitted so well. The echo of his steps followed him in perfect rhythm.
He reached the door and picked up the dusty sign from the floor, thinking, ‘In the old days I was hit on the head a few times with this.’ He pulled the door open and heard the familiar creak as he made his way down the stairs.
* * *
Valentine looked at the letter he had just been handed. He thanked the servant with a nod. The servant bowed and left the room. Valentine read the letter with great relief. Vernon was dead and also, according to the letter, he was skewed. That meant he was dead forever. That meant he couldn’t harm anyone again.
Valentine thought, ‘That Inspector Speekup must be much cleverer than I thought. Although I’m not looking forward to this, I must go. Then, when I’ve seen Vernon, I can tell the people that they can once more live happily and in peace, live without fear or terror. I must think of the people, the people who have given me a great responsibility, although it’s hard not to think of Victor and Valeeta at a time like this. However, I’ll not tell them until I’m sure it’s Vernon.’
The hardest part of the whole journey for Valentine would be to get past his own guards without their knowing that he was going out to the castle. He knew that there would be at least three armed guards outside the very room he was now in and three more guards on each floor.
He picked up his top hat and went to the door. He opened the door and walked out slowly backwards, with the top hat held almost over his face, while at the same time bowing as he moved backwards saying, ‘Thank you, Mr President. You’re very kind, Mr President. Yes, Mr President. And please, Sir, give your lovely wife my very best regards …’
The three guards ignored the man leaving the President’s office. They would have been more interested in someone who was going in, rather than coming out.
Once outside, he kept as close as he could to the shadows. He went to the stables, harnessed one of the horses to a small buggy and drove elegantly out of the presidential grounds without once being stopped.
He arrived at the castle gates, which the note had said would be open. He stopped the horse and buggy outside the gates and walked through, leaving the horse tied, but free to reach the grass on the edge of the patch leading to the big castle doors. He crunched his way to the massive doors and found them open.
Inside the great hall of the castle he felt strange, as if he had never left the place and, at the same time, as if he had never been there before. It was very strange and quite unnerving. The light from the torches hanging from the walls was now low, making the shadows deeper.
He walked along the chess-patterned floor to the door leading down to the vaults. It all felt different from when he was a child and used to run wild in the great hall. He had never seemed to hear the echo of his footsteps then.
As he reached the door he thought once more, ‘I do hope it is Vernon.’ He opened the door and, at the same time, kicked away the sign with his foot, allowing the door to open freely.
* * *
Wilf actually saw his letter come under the door of his hotel room. He looked at it and, at first, wondered what it was. The thought of opening the door to see who had delivered it never even entered his head. He picked up the sealed letter and turned it over, first looking at the seal. It was then that he thought of opening the door, but the corridor was completely empty. He walked back into his room, snapped the sealing wax and read the letter. Afterwards, a large grin covered his face.
‘Great news,’ he said aloud.
‘What?’ Mr C Menott said from an open drawer.
‘Vernon’s dead. At least, that’s what the Inspector thinks and they want me to go and identify the body.’
‘And will you?’
‘It will be a pleasure.’
‘He’s not very popular then?’
‘Poison’s more popular.’ Wilf made his way to the door. As he reached it, he turned and said to the room in general, ‘I’ll see you later then. OK?’
‘Fine,’ said the voice next to him. Wilf didn’t see the smile on Mr C Menott’s face.
As Wilf walked across the foyer of the hotel to the main exit door, a porter asked him if he was going to beat the Gerts that year.
‘If everything goes to plan, yes.’ He smiled at the porter just before he tripped up over nothing.
The porter rushed to help Wilf to his feet.
‘Are you all right, Sir?’
‘Yes, I’m fine, thank you. I wonder what I tripped over?’ Wilf looked down and saw nothing on the ground.
‘Can I call you a hansom cab?’ the porter asked.
‘Just call me a cab, I already know I’m handsome.’
The porter laughed and went outside to whistle a cab.
Wilf gave the address to the driver: ‘Bloodstock Castle.’ The driver’s eyes widened as he flicked his whip in the direction of the horse’s rump.
Alone in the cab, Wilf read the letter again in the reflection of the cab light until he arrived at the castle.
After he had paid the driver Wilf saw a horse with a buggy attached to it and thought, ‘That will be Inspector Speekup’s carriage. Good, he’ll be able to give me a lift home.’
Once inside the castle, he looked up at the roof of the hall. It was almost as big as a cathedral. He stopped for a moment and listened to the spluttering torches. One or two of them had already gone out. Wilf hoped they would be replaced by the time he and the Inspector left. He looked around the great hall and, out of devilment, clapped his hands together once. Seven perfect echoes came back, followed by seven less perfect echoes, then seven more, until silence once more took over.
He walked as silently as possible to the door leading to the vaults. As he reached the door, he picked up a sign lying on the floor and shouted, ‘Shall I throw it?’ The words came back: THROW IT, THROW IT … THROW IT, THROW it, throwit throwit … throwit, rowit, witwitittt … Wilf looked up, shook his head and put the sign silently back on the floor.
He opened the vault door and stood on the threshold. As he looked round again, he clapped his hands very loudly several times. He then went behind the vault door and kept coming back into the great hall saying, ‘Thank you, thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen, you’re so kind,’ to an unseen clapping audience. As he closed the door for the last time he heard: ‘So kind, so kind, so kind, so kind … ind … ind … ind …’
* * *
The streets of Katchem were empty of any form of movement, human or otherwise. The whole village was dead and covered in thick darkness.
The Inspector replaced his office curtain. He had no idea of how to capture Vernon. His only hope was that Vernon would turn into a nice man and go away. But he knew that would never happen.
He sat once more behind his desk. He lifted his papers and straightened them, putting them back into the exact position they were in before he had picked them up. Nervously, he walked over to the curtains and peered out into darkness as black as the inside of a tomb. He dropped the curtains and almost ran back to sit at his desk. He looked at his fingernails. They had almost disappeared.
He quickly opened the small drawer of his desk and took out a flat bottle. Without bothering to use a glass, he drank from the bottle itself – half of it in one go. He put the cork back and held it close to his trembling body with shaking hands. He was bravely trying not to drink any more but he couldn’t stop himself. He pulled the cork from the bottle with his teeth, spat it across the room and finished off the rest of the bottle in one greedy gulp.
He dropped the empty bottle into the wastepaper basket by his desk. It was the third bottle of Doctor Strong’s Nerve Tonic that he had put away that evening. He knew he was hooked and that the continual drinking was doing him no good.
Sergeant Salt sat at his desk, drinking a cup of hot sweet tea from an old tin cup. The swing door of the police station burst open, nearly making him spill the tea all over his uniform. As he controlled the cup, and himself, he looked at the still–swinging door. A very vicious-looking dog, with the hairs on its back raised, and near-red eyes, slunk towards the Sergeant’s desk. In its mouth the dog held a letter, a sealed one. It watched the Sergeant, letting the letter drop to the floor.
‘Hello boy,’ the Sergeant whispered nervously.
In reply the dog showed its long, yellow teeth, snarling softly as saliva continuously dropped from its wolf-shaped mouth. It looked completely wild.
It backed towards the swing door, never taking its eyes away from Sergeant Salt. He, by now, had one hand under his desk, wrapped round a piece of lead piping that was always hanging there for emergencies such as this, while the other hand took a lump of meat out of his half-eaten sandwich and, as casually as possible, tried to throw it to the dog.
It was a good throw and the meat landed within a good sniff of the dog’s wet nose. Its bright burning eyes never left the Sergeant, and never once looked at the meat, as it backed out of the police station. The Sergeant waited a full minute before letting his grip on the lead pipe relax.
He realised that the dog was somehow controlled to deliver that letter. Carefully he came round from his desk, never once taking his unblinking eyes off the swing door. He slowly bent down over the letter and, with one hand, felt for it on the floor. He rose and wiped the wet parchment on his thick, blue uniform pants. He took it to the nearest candle, holding it up to the light to read. It was addressed to the Chief Inspector. He looked at the office door where he knew that the said Inspector was inside, drinking bottle after bottle of Doctor Strong’s Nerve Tonic.
He thought, ‘That nerve tonic must be working. After every bottle he gets more nervous.’
He walked into the Inspector’s office without knocking. He knew that he didn’t have time to waste, waiting for the Inspector to hear him knock and shout, ‘Come in.’ Without words, he gave the Inspector the letter.
The Great Detective or, as he was known by his men, the Defective Detective, held the letter in a shaking hand. He tore it open. He couldn’t read it as his hands were shaking so much. Sergeant Salt moved round to the side of the desk where the Inspector was sitting, accidentally knocking over the wastepaper basket and seeing three empty bottles of Doctor Strong’s Nerve Tonic rattle to the floor.
The Sergeant, being a tolerant man, ignored the bottles and gently but firmly held the shaking hand as the Inspector read out the contents of the letter:
My Dear Inspector,
You win. I am afraid that I cannot compete with such an agile brain as yours. The way you have distributed your meagre forces is brilliant, quite brilliant. A man of such immense skill can only be admired and so, Sir, I would like to do the honourable thing and give myself up to you personally, and to you alone, in the castle vaults tomorrow at dusk. No-one else must be with you. The shame of giving in while some other person is present would be too much for me to take. I hope you understand as I’m sure you will, being the brilliant adversary you are, and a gentleman.
Yours, with great admiration,
Vernon.
The Inspector had stopped shaking about halfway through the letter. At that moment he was allowing a smile to turn into a grin and a grin to explode into a laugh. He looked at the nonplussed Sergeant who was now reading the letter himself.
‘Well, Salt, he has met his match and knows it, eh, what?’ the great detective crowed.
‘I don’t trust him, Sir,’ the Sergeant shouted at the top of his voice.
‘About one o’clock,’ the Inspector answered back.
The Sergeant knew that there was no way he would be able to get through to his superior, although he smelt some sort of trap. To tell the Inspector that a mad dog had brought the letter would have only evoked the answer, ‘Two lumps in mine’, so he decided not to tell him about the dog, or that he thought the letter was part of a trap.
The Inspector dismissed the Sergeant with a curt wave of his now-steady hand. He felt on top of the world as he re-read the letter, especially the sections ‘cannot compete with such an agile brain’ and ‘a man of such skill’. He folded the letter up, put it in his pocket, then leaned back on his chair, put his feet on top of his desk and gently rocked back and forth, rehearsing the words: ‘You are under arrest.’
Vernon would have been thrilled to have seen the reaction the letter had received, as he knew it would do. A vain man, like the Inspector, would believe all the flattery you could pour on him and he would be there alone to make the arrest. But Vernon would not be there. Vernon knew he would be many miles away as the Inspector walked into the laboratory and found Igon, Valentine, Victor, Valeeta and Wilf the Werewolf all dead …