To: Merrick
Now you’re being an ass, and I don’t want to talk to you anymore. And before you text me again demanding that I stop doing what I’m doing, which you know full well annoys and irritates me, just remember that my cousin, if he is Victor, is on a plane heading straight for you.
From: Merrick
We don’t know who he left behind.
To: Merrick
We’ll know soon enough. And you might want to brace yourself for some news about Ellis. He called and in between telling me about this man he met, and a wet T-shirt contest he was going to judge ... well ... never mind. I’ll tell you in person.
Merrick didn’t answer after that, and I spent the next couple of hours alternating between wondering what was happening in Rome, and consideringwhether Ellis was in his right mind.
The town of St. Gennevier was small, barely worth stopping at, or so I thought as I surveyed one main street, and a few scattered houses that seemed to crawl up one side of a mountain. Green terraced fields indicated grapes were a primary form of agriculture, but other than that, and a very ruined castle on the top of a big hill, there wasn’t much to see.
Luckily, I had managed to get the name of the house out of Ellis before he hung up, so I stuffed Kelso and myself into a tiny little taxi, and we headed out to see what was going on.
“This isn’t very much like a villa that has a dungeon, is it?” I asked Kelso when we were deposited at the entrance to what looked like a modest rambler set against a sheer rock face that led upward to several terraced fields. To one side stood a small shed, outside of which were a couple of goats, who stared at me with bored eyes.
The house didn’t even have a fence to keep people out. I glanced around, didn’t see anyone other than the goats, and, with a mental shrug, went up to the door and knocked. “Stay with me, though, just in case something bad is going down that we don’t know about,” I told Kelso. We waited for a couple of minutes, then knocked again. Faintly, a woman’s voice could be heard approaching, and after what seemed like another two or three minutes, the door opened to reveal a short white-haired wizened woman.
“Oui?”she asked in a husky voice, then proceeded to fall into a coughing fit. She wobbled and weaved like she was going to fall down, so I hustled forward and, taking her by the arms, got her onto a wooden bench just inside the door.
“Are you OK? Man, that’s a dickens of a cough. Can I get you something? A glass of water, maybe?”
The woman hacked up a few more times, then waved one gnarled hand at me, and said in heavily accented English, “You are American?”
“Yes, I am.”
“I have met Americans before,” she said, pausing to cough a little more. “The Americans liberated our town. They were very nice, very pleasant.”
“I’m glad to hear that. Are you sure about the water? Is there someone I can call for you?”
“Non,non, I am well. It is my lungs, they do not march, you know?”
“Uh ... sure.” I glanced around the inside of the house, but like the outside, it was perfectly innocuous, with open doors showing what must be a sitting room, where a TV burbled loud commercials, while farther down, the hall opened into a big country kitchen. “How about some water?”
She shook her head, and gave me a curious look. “Guy, my grandson, will be here soon for supper. Who are you?”
“Sorry, we didn’t get to introductions, did we? I’m Tempest, and this is my dog, Kelso. Er ... what’s your name?”
“Belloir.” She got to her feet, her knees popping loudly as she did so. She barely came up to my shoulder, so must have been under five feet tall.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you. You wouldn’t happen to know of another American who is supposed to be here, would you? His name is Ellis.”
“Another American? From the liberation?”
“No, no, one like me, only male. He said he was at Villa Pinoir.”
“This is Villa Pinoir,” she said, nodding, and, grasping my wrist to brace herself, shuffled into the room with the loud TV. “There is no one here but me. Not until Guy comes home.”
“Oh.” My shoulders sagged a little when she released me to plop down in a padded rocking chair. “Either I got the name wrong, or he did—”
“There are the Dark Ones, of course, but they are below,” she said, gesturing with a tissue toward the floor. “In the wine cellar. They were not here during the war.”
I gawked at her for the count of ten before I managed to get my wits gathered up again. “You have vampires in your wine cellar?”
“Oui.Monsieur Carlo, he arranged for them to stay there.” She clutched a remote control, and changed the channel. “Ah, it is time for my shows. Close the door behind you when you leave. Guy tells me never to leave the door open in case the Dark Ones try to escape.”
