Never mind their standards now. There's the vampire's hair and teeth to think about. His watch, his ring, his wallet... and God, his briefcase and his shoes! They must still be out there!
Don't you dare complain, he tells himself . Not when ninety-five per cent of him is gone, just conveniently disappeared like the monster in the last reel of a horror movie. God's been with you so far - I think it's God - so don't you dare complain.
Nor does he. He gathers up the hair, the teeth, the briefcase, and takes them to the end of the alley, splashing through puddles, and tosses them over the fence. After a moment's consideration he throws the watch, wallet, and ring over, too. The ring sticks on his finger for a moment and he almost panics, but at last it comes off and over it goes - plink. Someone will take care of this stuff for him. This is New York, after all. He goes back to Lupe and sees the shoes. They are too good to throw away, he thinks; there are years of wear left in those babies. He picks them up and walks back into the kitchen with them dangling from the first two fingers of his right hand. He's standing there with them by the stove when Lupe comes walking into the kitchen from the alley .
"Don?" he asks. His voice is a little furry, the voice of someone who has just awakened from a sound sleep. It also sounds amused. He points at the shoes hooked over the tips of Callahan's fingers. "Were you going to put those in the stew ?"
"It might improve the flavor, but no, just in storage ," Callahan says. He is astounded by the calmness of his own voice. And his heart! Beating along at a nice regular sixty or seventy beats a minute. "Someone left them out back. What have you been up to ?"
Lupe gives him a smile, and when he smiles, he is more beautiful than ever. "Just out there, having a smoke," he says. "It was too nice to come in. Didn't you see me?"
"As a matter of fact, I did ," Callahan said. "You looked lost in your own little world, and I didn't want to interrupt you. Open the storage-room door for me, would you ?"
Lupe opens the door. "That looks like a really nice pair," he says. "Bally. What's someone doing, leaving Bally shoes for the drunks'?"
"Someone must have changed his mind about them," Callahan says. He hears the bells, that poison sweetness, and grits his teeth against the sound. The world seems to shimmer for a moment . Not now, he thinks . Ah, not now, please.
It's not a prayer, he prays little these days, but maybe something hears, because the sound of the chimes fades. The world steadies. From the other room someone is bawling for supper. Someone else is cursing. Same old same old. And he wants a drink. That's the same, too, only the craving is fiercer than it's ever been. He keeps thinking about how the rubber grip felt in his hand. The weight of the cleaver. The sound it made. And the taste is back in his mouth. The dead taste of Barlow's blood. That, too. What did the vampire say in the Petries' kitchen, after it had broken the crucifix his mother had given him ? That it was sad to see a man's faith fail.
I'll sit in on the AA meeting tonight, he thinks, putting a rubber band around the Bally loafers and tossing them in with the rest of the footwear. Sometimes the meetings help. He never says, "I'm Don and I'm an alcoholic," but sometimes they help .
Lupe is so close behind him when he turns around that he gasps a little.
"Easy, boy," Lupe says, laughing. He scratches his throat casually. The marks are still there, but they'll be gone in the morning. Still, Callahan knows the vampires see something. Or smell it. Or some damn thing.
"Listen," he says to Lupe, "I've been thinking about getting out of the city for a week or two. A little R and R. Why don't we go together? We could go upstate. Do some fishing."
"Can't," Lupe says. "I don't have any vacation time coming at the hotel until June, and besides, we're shorthanded here. But if you want to go, I'll square it with Rowan. No problem." Lupe looks at him closely. "You could use some time off, looks like. You look tired. And you're jumpy."
"Nah, it was just an idea," Callahan says. He's not going anywhere. If he stays, maybe he can watch out for Lupe. And he knows something now. Killing them is no harder than swatting bugs on a wall. And they don't leave much behind. E-ZKleen-Up, as they say in the TV ads. Lupe will be all right. The Type Threes like Mr. Mark Cross Briefcase don't seem to kill their prey, or even change them. At least not that he can see, not over the short term. But he will watch, he can do that much. He will mount a guard. It will be one small act of atonement for Jerusalem's Lot. And Lupe will be all right.
ELEVEN
"Except he wasn't," Roland said. He was carefully rolling a cigarette from the crumbs at the bottom of his poke. The paper was brittle, the tobacco really not much more than dust.