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Lightning flashed. We ducked inside his cabin and I wrestled the door shut against the howling wind.

 

Warm yellow light blossomed from an oil lamp. He lit the fire, then hung up his jacket and sat. I kept my coat.

 

A blast of hard rain hit. We listened to it roar against the old shingles.

 

"Well. You got me here, Mr. Casey. Suppose you tell me what this is all about."

 

Casey twisted in his chair, embarrassed. "You've got a reputation of being able to handle the, uh, the peculiar."

 

"I've seen my share." After a bit, I prompted him again: "What's your peculiar problem, Casey?"

 

He didn't want to talk. I stood and made for the door.

 

"I'll refund you, after time and expenses."

 

He sputtered some. I let him. When he ran down, I said, "I can't help you if you don't talk."

 

"Siddown already and I'll tell you! Jeezum crow, Mister, you are prickly."

 

I came back and sat. "Just a professional. You were saying."

 

"It's... my wife."

 

I looked pointedly around the cabin: one room, small. Just the two of us.

 

"She's not here. She's... she's dead. Except..."

 

"...Except?"

 

"Except she ain't."

 

* * *

 

Now he was going, Casey was happy to talk. The trouble was steering him.

 

"So lovely, my Leah Nan Bobbin. That was her maiden—"

 

"How did she die?"

 

"Mugging, thirty-one years ago tonight. We lived in the city—"

 

"The mugging?"

 

"They... they cut her throat, for her purse."

 

"She's buried down there?"

 

"Green-Wood Cemetery. Family crypt."

 

I nodded. He went on. "After, I came back home and lost myself in the business of living. Eventually I started to feel almost human, until..." He heaved a great sigh.

 

"One year later, she appeared. I woke up to her reaching out. She was cold, quiet, but she was here. I felt a sharp pain. I remember that, nothing else."

 

"I woke up feverish. It was bad, lasted weeks. I was left weak as a kitten."

 

"I convinced myself it'd been my imagination, but a year later she came again. I would've died except Jim Thompson stopped by and found me, drove me to the hospital. Next year, he insisted on staying with me on the anniversary night."

 

"He was stone dead come morning."

 

* * *

 

The next victim had been a local priest, then another neighbor.

 

"One year nobody would help. Again I almost died. That's when I got the idea of calling an expert in the occult."

 

"Not me," I observed.

 

"Twenty-four experts, all told. A few survived, but none came twice, no matter how much I promised. You're twenty-five."

 

"That's a lot of dead bodies, Mr. Casey, some of them good men. I knew a couple. Why should they die instead of you?"

 

"Every one of them knew the danger. They all stayed."

 

I looked him in the eye. "I would have put you in a church, surrounded by true men of faith. If consecrated ground didn't protect you, one of them would — if not a priest, a Khalsa sword-saint."

 

"Would have?"

 

I nodded. "Trouble is, you're not telling me everything."

 

Casey grinned. "Mister Valentine, that would take all night and next week besides."

 

"Do you know what a fetch is, Casey? A Renfield? Ever hear those words?" He stayed silent, so I continued. "I think you're helping her hunt and kill. Have been for years."

 

Casey's eyes narrowed. "And you came anyway?"

 

Just then the door slammed open with a bang. The firelight dimmed, and the lamp burned blue.

 

She was here.

 

* * *

 

In two steps I had my back to a corner. I'd drawn a sawed-off from under my coat and was pointing it one-handed at Casey.

 

"Don't move, old man."

 

He sat, teeth bared, eyes flickering between me and the doorway.

 

I raised my voice. "Door's open, Leah. Join us."

 

Her dress may have been quite fetching once, but it hadn't stood up well. She looked lovely, fresh, and young, with pale full lips that begged to be kissed. Her eyes were entirely black, and she was staring at me. She floated forward across the floor.

 

"That's close enough," I said, reaching under my shirt. I'd hung a horseshoe and a silver cross together on a chain. I pulled them out and she hissed, revealing a mouthful of needle-like teeth. Not for kissing after all.

 

"Vampire, leannan sidhe, baoban sith," I snarled. "Perhaps more than one, I don't know. You've killed a lot of good men, and it's time to end it."

 

Casey chose that moment to leap toward me. I'd expected it and fired, knocking him back on the floor. Buckshot, silver pellets mixed with cold iron.

 

Leah charged me in a cold fury, and I blasted her. It did her dress no favors, but it didn't stop her and neither did my two amulets. Both silver and cold iron had failed. It was a small cabin and she was on me in moments.

 

But I'd come prepared. I squeezed my eyes shut and activated a small device in my left hand. Instantly, it went scorching hot and light blasted out.

 

She screamed. I kept the button pressed despite my burning fingers and prayed.

 

* * *

 

"What... what was that?" Casey asked weakly from the floor.

 

"Sunlight." I was still blinking the spots away. "Friend made it special. Growers use them for indoor pot plants, only a lot less powerful."

 

"It worked?"

 

I looked down at the tattered dress full of dust. "It did."

 

He coughed, spat blood. "You've 'bout killed me," he said matter-of-factly, not complaining.

 

"You didn't give me any choice."

 

"I know. Probably oughtta... thank you. Can't... quite..."

 

"I understand."

 

I didn't really. How could I? But it was all the comfort I had to give.

 

A few minutes later I went out into the night, leaving the door open. I didn't look back, just started my long trudge toward town. The light from the blazing cabin at my back cast a long flickery shadow on the road ahead.

Copyright 2024 - SFS Publishing LLC

The Fetching Caper

P.I. Jack Valentine meets a legend

J. Millard Simpson

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