Читать книгу A Velvet of Vampyres - Don Webb - Страница 7

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL MAN IN THE WORLD

Her favorite hunting ground was the Café du Monde. She wasn’t the only one who preyed there, of course, there are great advantages to tourists as prey. It was an open-air cafeteria for vampires: as they wiped their powdered sugar from their chins and talked about how you couldn’t get coffee like this back home, you could size them up. Ever since the place opened in 1862 it had served the needs of the city’s undead.

There was a fellow there right now. He had had a hard night, maybe an argument with some friends, maybe a fight with his wife and so he had come down to Decatur Street to stare gloomily into his steaming coffee. He didn’t even notice the fat pigeons that landed by the tables, keeping like the café itself a twenty-four-hour schedule.

She would wait till he decided to walk back to his hotel. He didn’t look like someone that was staying in the Quarter, probably he had a room in one of the big hotels near the stadium. Sizing up prey was her second favorite part about being a vampire. She fantasized sometime about being a criminal profiler. Mrs. Sherman was very into criminal profilers. Not a lot of work opportunities for anyone who puts 240 down for age. Unlike some of her kind, she prided herself on keeping some tabs on the human world. It made the stalking better, it made the world more sensible, it made the feeding much, much better.

She was sitting in the shadows in the Square. Nine out of ten people couldn’t see her, some people regarded this as a feat of invisibility. She had thought so for years, until she had caught Norbert, that physics students from Tulane. He had known so much! He was the only victim that she had kept alive for a long time. They had had nearly eighteen months together. When she killed him, she had hoped that he would cross over. He was going to write a dissertation on the temporal bio-physics of vampires. Of course, she had to kill him before he had submitted anything to his doctoral committee, such information might be useful to the crowd of want-to-be Van Helsings that hovered around the vampire community like avenging angels. But it had made things ­so clear when he had told her…

Wait. He’s leaving the café now. Let him pass. Walk up from behind.

“Excuse me sir? Are you on the way to the hotel?” she asked.

He turned and took in her auburn hair, her warm brown eyes, her diaphanous dress; and she had seduced him with a glance. It was too easy sometimes.

“Yes, Ma’am. Can I help you?” he said.

“I am worried to be out so late. I had seen you at the hotel earlier, and I was hoping you could walk me back. I would feel much safer,” she said, already putting out her arm for him to take, which he did lightly, and with a smile thinking that he was the hunter not the prey.

“Of course I’ll walk you back, Ms—?”

“Burgess,” she said, “Sheila Burgess.”

They walked and he began small talk. Had she been in the city before? Did she like Bourbon Street? Had she visited the Voodoo Museum? What about the cemetery?

He was boring, so she decided not to spend too long with him. She talked about her knowledge of architecture, about the wrought iron and balconies and the numerous hidden gardens and tiny retreats.

“In fact,” she said, “there’s a famous courtyard just up that alley. We could look over the fence at it.”

They entered the alley.

He said, “I don’t see any courtyard, I don’t see any fences for that matter.”

“Silly I just wanted you off the street for a minute, so I could have you for myself.”

She put her arms up as if to draw him close for a kiss, and he bent down. When he passed close enough, she felt her will pouring into his body, holding him still for the feeding. The victim has to give himself willing, but once the gift is made, he is hers.

Her fangs pierced the throbbing artery, and hot life poured into ­her in great spurts, filling her with what she Needed.

Along with the blood came images, a dream-like stream of the victim’s last thoughts and deeds and dreams. Nothing special here—he was a shoe salesman here for a business meeting, he­ couldn’t sleep, he had a loveless marriage. His image of his wife was so weak that she couldn’t see her at all.

The image stream was very unsatisfying, but it was the icing, and she fed for the cake. His blood was healthy, vital and tasty.

He lost consciousness, and fell out of her arms.

She took his wallet. She seldom needed or used cash, but she­ felt it lessened the chance of him reporting a vampire to the police. He wouldn’t remember much, and the missing wallet would answer such questions as he might have or generate.

She stepped back.

There was time for another victim, she had fed, it would have to be someone really special. There was a little all-night café in the garden district. She only went rarely, but she wanted something more exciting than the half-formed dreams of a ­shoe-salesman chasing around her head as she lay hidden away­ during the day.

She was about to fly, when she saw him—the most beautiful man in the world.

He had been watching her, standing less than five feet away. He looked full of admiration and maybe a little lust or love or some emotion that she knew from long ago but didn’t have a name for now. He had long black hair, and eyes of cobalt blue. He had a slight tan, making him into some sort of pale-dark demigod.

“Hello, beautiful,” he said. If anyone anywhere else had ever said that, she would have laughed, but she felt he meant it, and that she deserved it.

Her first thought was that he was also a vampire. From time to time the undead do seek each other’s company, but such relationships are doomed because of the predator’s need for resources. Always the hunger gets in the way, always eats love, friendship, art—whatever.

“Hello,” she said.

The victim at her feet moaned. She looked down, then back to the beautiful man, but he was walking away.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“I am the shape of your dreams,” he said.

She decided not to follow, she had to think. Vampires are a vulnerable lot because of the daily sleep, and the hatred of mankind for their captors.

She decided to call it a night, and flew home.

Home was a tiny boarding house in the garden district. The landlady knew what she was, and thought it was great. The­ landlady had hopes of being a great horror novelist, and felt the experience of having a vampire tenant would be good on her literary resume.

The landlady was an idiot and Sheila knew she would have to kill­her someday.

Inside the room with its heavy drapes and dust-covered blinds laythe coffin.

* * * *

From The Temporal Biophysics of Hemoglobin-Consuming Undead by­ Norbert Neilly (unpublished thesis), p. 14:

The attraction that human beings have toward vampires is not a ­simple sexual or aesthetic attraction; although such elements may­ certainly exist. I will show in this paper that the attraction is based on the normal movement of complex systems in time. In short humans are drawn to vampires because the vampire is more closely associated with the field-state called the future, than the present. There is a capacity discharge between the human and vampire that allows the human to have the same sort of­ experiences that they would normally associate with the future—that is to say, intense fantasy activity, or, if you will, daydreaming raised a quantum level. The vampire on the other ­hand has a discharge of the human’s past in the form of memories­ and reveries. This relationship draws the human toward the­ vampire, by a simple intensification of the force that draws all­ of us toward the future every day. The vampire is drawn to the­ human, much as the mind is drawn to past events. This has­ profound effects on the psychology of both species, often times ­in ways concealed by themselves. The first study of the­ micro-tubules which appear to be responsible was by Penrose­(1994) and.…

* * * *

All day long were half-formed phantoms for shoe salesman life, ­when dusk came she wanted to wash out her brain. She would go­ clubbing and find someone interesting, someone that she could sink her teeth into, as it were.

She choose a skimpy little outfit of green satin that showed all kinds of things when she wanted it to.

She stopped by her landlady’s.

“You’re going out tonight, aren’t you?” her landlady asked with that flair for the obvious that seemed to be her most developed trait.

“Yes, Mrs. Sherman,” Sheila said.

“How do you pick out you clothes for hunting?”

Sheila gave a brief description of the idea of looking sexy, when you want to attract men. This seemed novel to Mrs. Sherman, and Sheila wondered for the thousandth time how she had ever managed to find a Mr. Sherman in the first place. Of course Mr. Sherman was long gone by the time Mrs. Sherman had moved to New Orleans from Boston. Sheila often thought that everyone in the city except her was a transplant. Of course she was one of the ver­ few that still regretted the Louisiana Purchase.

She had taken the name “Sheila Burgess” because she saw it on an envelope she found in Canal Street. Two men, Dick Clark and Ed Something-or-other, had been promising great wealth to Ms. Burgess. She had found Mrs. Sherman a short time afterward. It had been time to move the coffin again. Sheila moved every nine years, it relieved boredom, and perhaps stopped the stake happy. Vampire hunters had never been a problem until about a century ago when Bram Stoker’s novel had come out. That dreadful Rice woman, whom she had met at a party once, had made everything much worse by connecting New Orleans with vampire lore. Since her books the sale of cigarette cases with hidden mirrors had­ increased disgustingly.

There were great side effects though, there were all these young people called Goths and Emos who wandered around the city hoping to be victims, and there were scads of would-be writers hoping to somehow tap into the success as though success were a vein. She wondered if she was the only vampire that had a literary landlord, ah well being a muse isn’t so bad.

She told Mrs. Sherman that it was time to fly, and the middle-aged matron giggled with delight.

The club was for the Goth crowd. Normally they were pretty dull. The images and dreams that came along with their blood were full o­f black clothes, black walls, and the disgusting use of black makeup. This monochrome approach to life once again convinced Sheila that she was glad she was dead. However, such clubs did­ collect a truly delectable food, the young would-be artist, whose blood was seasoned with the holy fire. She loved the blood of poets. One intense young man that she had lost control with and drained last year, had the most searing dreams and images in his blood—so much so that she tracked down his works and read­ them. She was terribly disappointed, it seemed that his hunger for art was high, but that he regrettably knew nothing of the hard work—the precision that must match the passion.

She saw a likely fellow almost as soon as she passed in the Black Orchid’s portals.

He was even handing a little book to a girl he was trying to impress, who was in turn doing her best unimpressed face.

She walked over.

“Are you the poet?” she said, her eyes big on the chapbook. Bat Wings and Rose Petals by Robert Severson. He drew himself up, quite nice looking in his black velveteen suit. “I am the poet,” he said. Then the veneer of arrogance broke with a smile, “It’s my first book, would you like a copy?”

“Yes,” she smiled.

Then they were talking and he was drinking coffee, and she wasn’t drinking anything, but that wasn’t too odd—half the patrons were trying to give out that they were vampires.

Then she glanced across the room and saw him.

He was in a blue shirt that matched his eyes, and wore a turquoise and silver pendant. He looked fierce and beautiful.

The poet had been speaking, and then noticed her distraction, and­ started to get up and leave.

“No,” she said, “I thought I saw an old friend. I’m new to the city and had been hoping to run into Rebecca.” A name picked quickly from the mental hat.

“Oh,” the poet kept talking, and she decided to seduce him first, feed and then track down the mystery man.

The poet was soon persuaded to taste the night air, and she soon­ tasted his rich redness. He was wonderfully full of dreams of pearls given to sweethearts, moonlit nights and white rose petals ­shaken onto black sheets, and storms in the ocean and Paris in the springtime. She had been to Paris as a little girl. It was different then, she had dreamt of going to see the Eiffel Tower.

He fell gently onto the street. She might drain him all the way­ to see if he had the strength to pass over. What was it Norbert ­said about that phase-transition?

He was watching. He had pressed himself against the wall of a building, being at one with its shadows.

When he saw that she saw him, he stepped forward smiling and open.

“Who are you?” she said.

“John Seymour.”

“That’s very helpful. What are you?”

“A connoisseur of vampirism.”

“What if I don’t like to be watched?”

“You like to be watched, you dream about it, you fantasize about how good you are, and I must say you are unlike many of the clumsy excuses for vampires I’ve see, are quite good, and quite beautiful.”

“You’re very gallant to have such a morbid hobby.”

“It isn’t a hobby. Here have a picture of me.” He reached in his pants pocket and took out a snapshot. It was him standing on Commerce Street in full daylight reading a paper.

She looked up at him to ask another question, but found herself paralyzed for a moment. When it passed he was gone.

* * * *

The next night, the mystery man was all she could think of. She stood at the street corner in the photo. Sometimes she would fly high above it and watch the streets and alleys. But he didn’t come.

The night after that she tried hanging out at the Black Orchid.

The third night she was really hungry, but she made herself feed only in tiny amounts all over the city in the hopes she would find him looking at her.

She wanted him.

Not in the way she wanted a victim; although there was some of that.

She wanted him in the way she used to want a man, if after two hundred years of no human desires her memory was accurate.

It wasn’t just sex, it was—well something more.

On the fifth night he found her. She had been heading to the Café Du Monde. He was behind her on Decatur St.

“Ms. Burgess?” he asked.

His voice was warm like the gulf sea she had played in so very long ago.

“Yes,” she said.

“Ms. Burgess, I thought about dropping by your home on Chambers St. today, but when I realized that you wouldn’t be up.”

Fear filled her, she should run, he knew where her coffin was. But his eyes were the eyes of starlight, and she could fear nothing.

“Ms. Burgess, or may I call you Sheila?”

“You may call me Violeta. I was born Violeta Zivie.”

“What a beautiful name, the ‘veiled one’, how fine for someone in ­whose aspect and her eyes the best of both bright do meet.” He said.

“What do you want from me?”

“Everything, really. All the world and time. But I will start ­with a question: do you miss the day?”

Sheila thought of the warm sun—that great yellow that she had­ not seen since the early settlement here.

“Of course I miss the day.”

“I can give you the day. Well maybe I can give you the day.”

“How?”

“I am your future, much as you are the future of men. I feed upon vampires, drawing their rich accumulation of the past. I don’t have to feed often, once a decade perhaps. So I spend a long time looking for my prey. I’ve been watching you for three years, ever since you killed a student of mine at Tulane.”

“Norbert. But I—”

“You needn’t say anything. He died happy, which is a rare thing ­in the world of men.”

“I had hoped he would pass over.”

“I had hoped so too, I would have spent many long nights with him as we would bring science to bear on ancient magics. Oh don’t look at me that way, I am not interested in putting blood in vials and testing my theories on dogs and mice. There is a way to approach magic with science, already half in magic and wholly informed by wonder.”

“Did you become what you are through your science?”

“No I was you. I was brought to an even higher realm by a poor mad woman. She never knew what had happened to her, how she reclaimed the day by feeding on her own kind. Trying for self knowledge began my sciences”.

“If you drain me, I will be as you?”

“You might. Or you might be a husk that I leave on the street to ­wait the long centuries looking for one as beautiful as you.”

“That doesn’t offer me much hope.”

“We have never been in the job of offering hope. Only possibility,” he said.

“Norbert said that, he said that vampires offer dreams,” she said. “What do you get if I die?”

“Nutrition and two hundred years of memories, not just yours, but of all those you have feasted upon.”

“And I would get such dreams as you represent.”

She thought about it only a moment, and then looking deeply into the cobalt of his eyes, decided they were so deep that the future must live there.

She stepped forward and put her arms around him. She kissed him­ once, then offered her neck.

“To the future” she whispered.