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“A little late for that. Well, see you guys. I’ll keep you posted. ” Gus gave them a cheery wave and headed off.
“Jackass,” Weinstock muttered under his breath. He and Crow headed down the hall to the solarium and bought Cokes from the machine. The room was empty, and Weinstock closed the door.
“Before you even ask,” he began, “I examined Mark and Connie as completely as I could—ostensibly to check for damage as a result of the prank—and as far as I can tell they’re actually dead. ”
Crow looked skeptical. “You’re telling me you know how to check to see if someone’s a vampire?”
Weinstock sipped his soda. “Not as such, no. It’s just that they are both in phases of the rigor process consistent with normal corpses who’ve been dead as long as each of them has been. ”
“Which tells us what?”
“Hell if I know. It might surprise you to know that they don’t cover vampirism in medical school, not even in Pine Deep. But…I thought you’re the expert, you’re Mr. Halloween. You tell me how I’m supposed to tell. ”
“I’ve been thinking about that all night, but the folklore and the fiction just contradict each other. I don’t know what to believe. ”
“Give me something I can try, damn it. ”
“Well…vampires aren’t supposed to have reflections, so we could try a mirror. ”
“Good…that’s easy enough. ”
“After that, most of the rest of the stuff are things we can try if we’re face-to-face with one. I mean, crosses, garlic, holy water…that sort of stuff. ”
That didn’t sit well with Weinstock. “If it gets to the point where we are actually face-to-face with a vampire who is awake and smiling all toothy at us, I think I might want something a little more substantial than a piece of garlic. And, news flash, Einstein, I’m Jewish. We’re notoriously short on crosses and holy water. ”
“There’s that. ” Crow thought about it. “There’s always, um, the whole ‘stake’ thing. ”
“I was waiting for you to get to that, and I would love to hear how you’re going to explain to Val that you want to drive a stake through her dead brother’s heart. ”
“She knows what’s going on. ”
“Go on, tell her you want to stake Mark. I’ll watch. ”
“Isn’t there something you can do during the autopsies to kind of ensure that they’re dead?”
“Considering the fact that I autopsied both Cowan and Castle and determined with all medical certainty that they were dead, and then caught them on morgue video walking around, I’d say no. ”
“Val’s going to want to cremate him anyway. Connie, too, since Val was her only family. Maybe we should just convince her to expedite that process. She might go for that a lot more than…other methods. ” Crow rubbed his eyes. “Or is any of this necessary?”
“Meaning?”
“Like I said earlier…is this over? Did the problem start with Ruger and Boyd? If so, now that they’re dead is the situation over?”
“Maybe they started it, I don’t know. With Cowan and Castle we know that there were at least two more of them. That’s why I’m so concerned about Mark…he was killed by Boyd, who also killed those two cops. ”
“Yeah, on that subject—Cowan and Castle were buried. Have you checked their graves?”
“Have I dug them up? No. Have I checked to see if their graves look like someone crawled out…then, yes, actually,” Weinstock said, surprising him. “Every morning I check Castle’s grave in Crestville, every afternoon I swing by Rosewood Memorial here in town to look at Cowan’s. The graves look undisturbed, but we’re talking recent burials—bare earth, nothing growing there yet—so they could have been dug up and reburied, and as long as the job was done neatly, then who would know?”
“Damn. ”
“Which means that we’re going to have to check. ”
“Check how? Dig them up?”
Weinstock gave him a silent, steady look.
“Oh, crap,” Crow said.
