The Laughing Corpse (Vampire Hunter 2)

It was after five on a Thursday. Most of the bar stools and all the tables were taken. The place was cheek to jowl with business suits, male and female. A spattering of work boots and tans that ended at the elbow, but mostly upwardly mobile types. Dead Dave's had become trendy despite efforts to keep it at bay.

It looked like happy hour was in high gear. Shit. All the yuppies were here to catch a nice safe glimpse of a vampire. They would be slightly sloshed when it happened. Increase the thrill I guess.

Irving was sitting at the rounded corner of the bar. He saw me and waved. I waved back and started pushing my way towards him.

I squeezed between two gentlemen in suits. It took some maneuvering, and a very uncool-looking hop to mount the bar stool.

Irving grinned broadly at me. There was a nearly solid hum of conversation in the air. Words translated into pure noise like the ocean. Irving had to lean into me to be heard over the murmuring sound.

"I hope you appreciate how many dragons I had to slay to save that seat for you," he said. The faint smell of whiskey breathed along my cheek as he spoke.

"Dragons are easy, try vampires sometimes," I said.

His eyes widened. Before his mouth could form the question, I said, "I'm kidding, Irving." Sheesh, some people just don't have a sense of humor. "Besides, dragons were never native to North America," I said.

"I knew that."

"Sure," I said.

He sipped whiskey from a faceted glass. The amber liquid shimmered in the subdued light.

Luther, daytime manager and bartender, was down at the far end of the bar dealing with a group of very happy people. If they had been any happier they'd have been passed out on the floor.

Luther is large, not tall, fat. But it is solid fat, almost a kind of muscle. His skin is so black, it has purple highlights. The cigarette between his lips flared orange as he took a breath. He could talk around a cig better than anyone I'd ever met.

Irving picked up a scuffed leather briefcase from off the floor near his feet. He fished out a file over three inches thick. A large rubber band wrapped it together.

"Jesus, Irving. Can I take it home with me?"

He shook his head. "A sister reporter is doing a feature on local upstanding businessmen who are not what they seem. I had to promise her dibs on my firstborn to borrow it for the night."

I looked at the stack of papers. I sighed. The man on my right nearly rammed an elbow in my face. He turned. "Sorry, little lady, sorry. No harm done." Little came out liddle, and sorry slushed around the edges.

"No harm," I said.

He smiled and turned back to his friend. Another business type who laughed uproariously at something. Get drunk enough and everything is funny.

"I can't possibly read the file here," I said.

He grinned. "I'll follow you anywhere."

Luther stood in front of me. He pulled a cigarette from the pack he always carried with him. He put the tip of his still burning stub against the fresh cigarette. The end flared red like a live coal. Smoke trickled up his nose and out his mouth. Like a dragon.

He crushed the old cig in the clear glass ashtray he carried with him from place to place like a teddy bear. He chain smokes, is grossly overweight, and his grey hair puts him over fifty. He's never sick. He should be the national poster child for the Tobacco Institute.

"A refill?" he asked Irving.

"Yeah, thanks."

Luther took the glass, refilled it from a bottle under the bar, and set it back down on a fresh napkin.

"What can I get for ya, Anita?" he asked.

"The usual, Luther."

He poured me a glass of orange juice. We pretend it is a screwdriver. I'm a teetotaler, but why would I come to a bar if I didn't drink?

He wiped the bar with a spotless white towel. "Gotta message for you from the Master."

"The Master Vampire of the City?" Irving asked. His voice had that excited lilt to it. He smelled news.

"What?" There was no excited lilt to my voice.

"He wants to see you, bad."

I glanced at Irving, then back at Luther. I tried to telepathically send the message, not in front of the reporter. It didn't work.

"The Master's put the word out. Anybody who sees you gives you the message."

Irving was looking back and forth between us like an eager puppy. "What does the Master of the City want with you, Anita?"

"Consider it given," I said.

Luther shook his head. "You ain't going to talk to him, are you?"

"No," I said.

"Why not?" Irving asked.

"None of your business."

"Off the record," he said.

"No."

Luther stared at me. "Listen to me, girl, you talk to the Master. Right now all the vamps and freaks are just supposed to tell you the Master wants a powwow. The next order will be to detain you and take ya to him."

Detain, it was a nice word for kidnap. "I don't have anything to say to the Master."

"Don't let this get outta hand, Anita," Luther said. "Just talk to him, no harm."

That's what he thought. "Maybe I will." Luther was right. It was talk to him now or later. Later would probably be a lot less friendly.

"Why does the Master want to talk to you?" Irving asked. He was like some curious, bright-eyed bird that had spied a worm.

I ignored the question, and thought up a new one. "Did your sister reporter give you any highlights from this file? I don't really have time to read War and Peace before morning."

"Tell me what you know about the Master, and I'll give you the highlights."

"Thanks a lot, Luther."

"I didn't mean to sic him on you," he said. His cig bobbed up and down as he spoke. I never understood how he did that. Lip dexterity. Years of practice.

"Would everybody stop treating me like the bubonic f**king plague," Irving said. "I'm just trying to do my job."

I sipped my orange juice and looked at him. "Irving, you're messing with things you don't understand. I cannot give you info on the Master. I can't."

"Won't," he said.

I shrugged. "Won't, but the reason I won't is because I can't."

"That's a circular argument," he said.

"Sue me." I finished the juice. I didn't want it anyway. "Listen, Irving, we had a deal. The file info for the zombie articles. If you're going to break your word, deal's off. But tell me it's off. I don't have time to sit here and play twenty damn questions."

"I won't go back on the deal. My word is my bond," he said in as stagy a voice as he could manage in the murmurous noise of the bar.

"Then give me the highlights and let me get the hell out of the District before the Master hunts me up."

His face was suddenly solemn. "You're in trouble, aren't you?"

"Maybe. Help me out, Irving. Please."

"Help her out," Luther said.

Maybe it was the please. Maybe it was Luther's looming presence. Whatever, Irving nodded. "According to my sister reporter, he's crippled in a wheelchair."

I nodded. Nondirective, that's me.

"He likes his women crippled."

"What do you mean?" I remembered Cicely of the empty eyes.

"Blind, wheelchair, amputee, whatever, old Harry'll go for it."

"Deaf," I said.

"Up his alley."

"Why?" I asked. Clever questions are us.

Irving shrugged. "Maybe it makes him feel better since he's trapped in a chair himself. My fellow reporter didn't know why he was a deviant, just that he was."

"What else did she tell you?"

"He's never even been charged with a crime, but the rumors are real ugly. Suspected mob connections, but no proof. Just rumors."

"Tell me," I said.

"An old girlfriend tried to sue him for palimony. She disappeared."

"Disappeared as in probably dead," I said.

"Bingo."

I believed it. So he'd used Tommy and Bruno to kill before. Meant it would be easier to give the order a second time. Or maybe Gaynor's given the order lots of times, and just never gotten caught.

"What does he do for the mob that earns him his two bodyguards?"

"Oh, so you've met his security specialist."

I nodded.

"My fellow reporter would love to talk to you."

"You didn't tell her about me, did you?"