Out of Time (22 page)

“Yes,” Simon said. “But the draining of the blood seems almost ritualistic.”

“I’m afraid the newspaper man overstated that.”

“But the photographs…”

“To sell papers. I’m afraid they paint a more gruesome picture for effect.”

“Really?” Simon said.

If Father Cavanaugh noticed the skepticism in Simon’s voice he chose to ignore it. “We live in different times. Newspapers aren’t what they once were. Hearst and Pulitzer have seen to that,” he said, then offered them an embarrassed smile. “That was bitter, wasn’t it? Before the seminary I tried my hand at reporting. Fresh to America from Ireland and my first assignment was the Spanish-American war. Somewhat of a birth by fire.”

“You were a reporter?” Elizabeth asked, trying to get her mind around a young Father Cavanaugh.

“Ancient history.”

“That is fascinating,” Simon said dryly, obviously recognizing a diversionary tactic when he saw one.

Father Cavanaugh smiled genially again and checked his pocket watch. “Well, I’ve talked your ear off, haven’t I? I really should be going. I’m sorry I couldn’t be more help, but it’s probably best to leave the evils of our society to the professionals, eh?”

“Thank you, Father,” Elizabeth said with a quick glance at Simon, hoping he wouldn’t press the issue.

“Good night to you,” the priest said with a nod, and hurriedly disappeared into the crowd.

“Well,” Simon said, his eyes narrowing and following the priest as he disappeared behind the heavy wooden doors to the church. “That was… interesting.”

“Yeah.” Interesting was one way to put it. Terribly unnerving was another.

“He obviously knows more than he’s saying,” Simon said.

“Maybe he can’t say more. Father-client privilege, or whatever it’s called.”

“It could point to someone in the parish being involved.”

“But what are we going to do? Pretend we’re census workers? Make sure you check the creature of the night box, should it apply.”

“The library.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Have you forgotten everything I taught you?” he said, and then got that gleam in his eyes. The wheels in his head were spinning in overdrive. “If this is the work of a vampire, it would need to feed. Which means more victims. Just the sort of thing a sensationalistic paper would print, don’t you think?”

They pored over newspapers at the library until it closed. Three similar cases were reported in the last few years. That would have seemed like a decent lead if it weren’t for the fact that there had been six murders with ice picks and four beheadings. Maybe the butcher shop murder was nothing more than a gangland signature killing.

They’d considered talking to the reporter, but aside from the potential headline: Future Couple Seeks Vampires in Gotham, they could be putting themselves and any witnesses in more danger from gangster reprisal.

In the end, their initial foray as vampire hunters had turned up bupkis, except for what the little girl had seen or imagined. Elizabeth wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or frustrated.

As the days passed, and the incident drifted further away, she fell into an easy routine. Simon took a bit longer to let go, but eventually he stopped asking questions. Stopped asking them out loud at any rate.

The limited avenues for research frustrated Simon. At least twice, he’d reached for a phone that wasn’t there to call contacts who weren’t born yet. Even if there were documents that might give him clues to the existence of vampires in the city, he couldn’t afford to find them. Aside from not having the credentials in this time to gain access to them, he couldn’t risk the inevitable questions that would follow. His logical mind told him to give up the ghost, but his instincts wouldn’t be silenced. There was more to the murder than a gangland killing, but without any more paths to follow, he was at a loss. Being so close to what he’d been searching for would have sent him into a tailspin if it hadn’t been for Elizabeth.

She gave him things he hadn’t known he’d needed. Now that he had them, he was sure he couldn’t live without them, without her. The days spent in their small apartment were a revelation to him, discovering her likes and dislikes. Her passion for American football confused him almost as much as her nearly pathological hatred of the innocent lima bean. Each discovery, from the ridiculous to the sublime, left him wanting more. She could make him laugh with a freedom he’d nearly forgotten, and melt his heart with a few gently whispered words.

He could spend a lifetime trying to understand her and never tire of the challenge. Stories of her threadbare childhood left him wanting to give her the world. Not that she complained about it, to the contrary really, she had the gift to see what she had and not focus on the things she didn’t. He could envision her as a small child sitting in some poxy hotel room making jewelry out of gum wrappers. She’d faced the cards life had dealt her with the equanimity only a gambler’s child could. Even so, he could see the hollow spaces inside her, the missing pieces of her life he’d never been aware of before. But, as she said, Swiss cheese wouldn’t be any fun without the holes.

It was overly dramatic to say he’d been reborn, but the truth of it was, that’s exactly how he felt. Like he’d stepped into the sunshine for the first time after a life spent underground.

He found himself speaking freely of things he hadn’t thought of in years. Memories secreted away now spilled out. The summers spent at his grandfather’s knee where he listened to fantastic tales of faraway places. He’d visited them in his imagination, escaping from the cold rigidity of boarding school and the arch pragmatism of his parents. He hadn’t realized it at the time, but he would spend the rest of his life searching for those fantastic places, even if he didn’t quite believe they were real.

He told her how after his grandfather died, the chasm had grown between his parents and him, and again, when he told them he wasn’t going to be a barrister. One black sheep in the family was one too many, and Simon didn’t have the excuse of being a doddering, old fool. They never let him forget their disappointment. His years at Oxford were empty and lonely. It all sounded so clichéd. Poor little rich boy. But Elizabeth listened intently, without judgment. All these were things he’d never shared, and now, not only was it painless to do so, it was oddly comforting. He wasn’t sure what was more surprising, the ease with which he revealed himself or how much it pleased him that she wanted him to.

Loving someone and being loved in return was a shock to his system. Like any muscle that hadn’t been used, his heart didn’t always run smoothly. In the quiet of their room, life was bliss, but add in a few outside factors and the mixture became volatile. Fleeting moments of insecurity passed quickly enough, but that Saturday night at the club, something else came to the fore. Unprovoked jealousy spiked to the surface.

King Kashian was back.

Simon did his best not to watch the man watch Elizabeth, but it was a losing battle. He tried busying himself with some new sheet music Charlie had bought, when a little man sidled up to the piano.

He looked to be in his late fifties, but the years hadn’t been kind to him. His legs were bowed and spindly; it looked as if it took a great effort just to cross the room. But it was his face that most struck Simon, etched with deep lines only grief can carve.

“You’re British, right?” the man slurred.

Why was it Americans felt the need to ask him what was obviously apparent? “Yes,” Simon said.

“Good,” the man said with a lop-sided smile. He reached into the breast pocket of his wrinkled coat and took out several pieces of folded paper. “That’s real good. Right and proper.”

He leaned heavily on the piano and unfolded a few pages of sheet music, methodically smoothing the creases.

Charlie came up behind him and laid a hand on the small man’s shoulder. “That time again already, Frank?”

Frank nodded and continued to lovingly smooth out the papers. “Woulda been thirty today.”

Charlie gave his shoulder a comforting squeeze and looked down at Simon. “Frank’s son was killed in the war. Comes in every year on his birthday, and the player sings this song.”

Simon felt distinctly uncomfortable. The last time he’d sung, well, to be honest, he couldn’t remember. “I’m afraid I’m not much of a singer.”

“You in the war?” Frank asked suddenly, his hand jerking with a phantom spasm.

Simon wracked his brain. This was 1929; he would have been in his late twenties during the war years. As an able bodied Englishman, he would surely have served. “Yes, I was.”

Frank’s eyes brightened with something more than the bourbon. “Maybe you knew my son? Where’d you see action?”

He should have seen that question coming. He blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “The battle of the Marne.”

The cyclorama at Coney Island had given him a superficial understanding of the battle at best, but it was, he thought sadly, the only specific battle of World War One he could remember. Shameful.

“Marne,” Frank said softly. The name a curse and prayer at the same time. “First or second?”

“Second.”

Frank’s smile faltered as he rubbed the faded sheet music. “Jimmy was there.” He looked at Simon, a glimmer of life, of hope, in his eyes. “Don’t suppose you ever met? Thin as a reed, all arms and legs and hair like wheat?”

Simon shook his head and felt sick at his deception, but there was no turning back from it now. “I’m sorry.”

Frank clapped Simon on the shoulder. “S’ok.” He turned unsteadily to Charlie and said, “I’d like to buy this man a drink. Served with my son.”

Simon shifted uncomfortably on his bench, but he couldn’t very well admit the truth now, could he?’

“Sure thing, Frank,” Charlie said and held up two fingers to Dix. “But it’s on the house.”

Frank nodded solemnly. “I thank you.” He looked down at the sheet music, his kindly eyes growing moist with unshed tears. “Mother doesn’t come out anymore. But I do. Honor his memory and all. And I’m pleased to share a drink with you.”

“Thank you,” Simon said as he took the glass from Dix.

“But first we sing!” Frank said too loudly. He poked at the sheet music with a gnarled finger and slid it across the top of the piano to Simon.

Simon wanted to protest, but how in good conscience could he possibly disappoint this man? He looked at the music and realized he was actually familiar with it. “Keep the Home-Fires Burning” was a stirring ballad from early in the war. Vague memories of his grandmother’s voice came back to him. She’d died when he was very small, and he’d all but forgotten her. As he read the words on the page, a latent feeling of loss welled inside him. Like the light of a dying star, the grief reached him years after the fact.

Simon cleared his throat and set the papers on the music stand. As he played the first few bars, a reverent silence fell over the room.

He sang the first lines, unsure and nervous, but his voice steadied by the second verse. The poetic recounting of a time when sacrifice was the norm, when men left their lives when called, brought a hush to the crowd. Until the chorus came, when an amazing thing happened. Each man, each woman, joined their voices in the song.

What had been only a page in a history book was suddenly brought to life. Even ten years removed from the horrors of the war, the scars were still fresh.

The wave of emotion was palpable as they came to the last chorus.

Simon played the final note, and the room was completely silent. All around them men and women raised their glasses. Frank wiped a tear from his eye and lifted his. “Thank you.”

Charlie put an arm around the little man and took the sheet music from the piano. He led him to an empty chair and smiled his thanks to Simon.

The conversation in the bar slowly started to pick up again, but the feeling of loss still hovered in the room. Never trusting anyone enough not to use a moment of weakness against him, he’d never been one to seek comfort. Now, he unerringly searched out Elizabeth and found her at the bar placing an order. He caught her eye, and she seemed to know exactly what he was feeling.

Intent on ignoring King Kashian, Simon met up with Elizabeth at the storeroom door and then followed her inside.

Wooden crates lined the walls, leaving a gap only for the door to the alley. Simon leaned back against a shabby old desk cluttered with papers and sighed. Without needing to ask, Elizabeth moved into his embrace. He wound his arms around her and held her to his chest. The feel of her was all the palliative he needed.

He dropped a kiss on the top of her head, and she leaned back and looked up at him.

“You play the piano, you sing, any other tricks?” Her eyes twinkled with mischief.

“Man of mystery,” he reminded her and then he smiled down at her, unsure of how to express how grateful he was to have her in his life. “Thank you.”

Her teasing expression faded to a gentle smile and she touched his cheek with her small hand. “What for?”

He paused for a moment and then shook his head. “Everything.”

Elizabeth’s smile lifted his mood, as it always did.

She sighed dramatically. “Is it time to go home yet?”

“Another hour I’m afraid,” Simon said, as he pulled her closer for a kiss.

They shared a few more longing kisses before it was time to get back to work.

The hour seemed to pass quickly enough and before he knew it, Charlie made last call. Slowly, the bar emptied. The poor man who’d asked Simon to play for his son had long ago passed out at his table.

Charlie gently shook his shoulder to wake him. “Come on, Frank. Time to go home.”

The man mumbled something incoherent and ran a hand roughly over his stubbled chin.

Charlie patted him on the shoulder and looked over to Simon. “Professor! Gimme a hand, will ya?”

Simon helped the older man to his feet, but he swayed precariously and leaned against the wall.

“Ah, a real snootful tonight. Do me a favor, Professor?” Charlie said. “Take old Frank home for me? I let Lester go early. Wife’s ailin’ and I can’t leave the club.”

Simon frowned. He did feel an odd responsibility for the old man’s well-being. It was a strange sensation—concern for a stranger’s welfare. Before, he wouldn’t have given the man a second thought, but now, it was simply the right thing to do. However, he didn’t want to leave Elizabeth alone with King, and his eyes quickly sought her out.