Free Consultation with a Vampire - 01 by Patrick E. McLean Page B

both his feet on each step made him feel small and stupid, but he soldiered on.  
    Even worse, when he got to the door, he couldn’t reach the knocker. “Ah, screw it.” He pulled back a leg to kick the living hell out of the door and make a racket loud enough to wake the undead. But before he let fly with the shoe leather, he tried the massive doorknob. It turned easily, and the well-oiled door swung open without a sound.  
    Topper stepped inside and closed the door behind him. The lack of an ominous and melodramatic creak put him more on edge. Unlocked? Jesus, the door was unlocked? Why did he dive out the window?  
    Then he remembered the blood and the screaming. And with it came a sinister thought: “Why would they make it harder for lunch to deliver itself?”
    What was this, the Venus flytrap of vampire condominiums? Again he was overwhelmed by a feeling of stupidity intermingled with dread. But, before him was love. The smell of Madeleine seemed to hang in the air, and he could not resist going inside.  
    “Hello? Honey, I’m hoooome!”  
    His voice echoed in the empty rooms. He was very silent and very still, but he could see and hear nothing. He found an ancient pushbutton switch. When he turned it on, it illuminated a gigantic foyer, empty but for dust.  
    He wandered through the first floor of the decaying building. While the exterior walls looked as if they would withstand a prolonged siege, the inside was shabby beyond belief.
    Elegant turn-of-the-century wallpaper peeled off rotting, water-soaked wallboard. Plaster crumbled onto the floor like an elegant ruin of the ancient world, slowly surrendering to the ravages of time. In fact, the only items on the first floor that suggested habitation were a card table and two folding chairs.  
    On the card table, a half-finished game of solitaire was laid out. “Hunh,” Topper said. “I guess when you live forever, you gotta find something to pass the time.” This gave him hope for his absurd, impossible, and most likely lethal romance with Madeleine. Topper wasn’t long on self-knowledge, but one thing he did know about himself: He sure as hell wasn’t dull.  
    He shuddered as he passed a curved staircase leading up. No, he didn’t want to go up there just yet. Where would she be? In the basement. Had to be. Vampires spend their days underground, right? At least they did in all the movies. And, as far as Topper was concerned, the movies had never lied.
    He found a stairway leading downward. The musty smell of death and old ladies wafted up from the dark. Topper felt around for a light switch. If he hadn’t found one, he might have turned right around and run out then and there. But it’s a funny thing about fate. Sometimes the click of a push-button light switch and the sizzle of cheap aluminum wires are all someone needs for his fate to be sealed.  
    As Topper descended into the darkness, a series of bare bulbs illuminated his journey into the basement or, rather, undercroft. “Undercroft” was the perfect term, as this building had been built so long ago it was constructed on a series of low arches beneath which Topper now walked. The arches stretched the length of the building, and along one side, Topper could see a set of bowling alleys that had fallen into disuse. Members of one of the city’s wealthy families must have come down here to enjoy themselves as World War I raged or the roaring ’20s roared.  
    As Topper walked farther along the underground chamber, he found what he was looking for. Ahead was an area of thick rugs and velvet draperies. Electric candelabras decorated ornate, lacquered tables. In the middle of the velvet oasis were two expensive coffins. Top-of-the-line models. The kinds of coffins that are bought for the deceased only by exceptionally guilty family members. Those who have gotten away with parricide, trophy wives who were bedding a tennis coach when their husbands were struck down, that kind of thing.