Reaper Man

‘I hate lawyers,’ said the voice from under the chair. It had a sad, hollow sound. Windle tried to move his legs a little closer to his own chair.

‘It voss quite a good castle,’ said Doreen.

‘A bloody heap of mouldering stone is what it was,’ said Arthur.

‘It had nice views.’

‘Yeah, through every wall,’ said Arthur, dropping a portcullis into that avenue of conservation. ‘I should have known even before we went to look at it. So I turned the carriage around, right? I thought, well that’s four days wasted, right in the middle of our busy season. I don’t think any more about it. Next thing, I wake up in the dark, I’m in a box, I finally find these matches, I light one, there’s this card six inches from my nose. It said—’

‘“You Don’t Have to Take this Lying Down”,’ said Mr Shoe proudly. ‘That was one of my first ones.’

‘It vasn’t my fault,’ said Doreen, stiffly. ‘You had been lyink rigid for tree dace.’

‘It gave the priest a shock, I can tell you,’ said Arthur.

‘Huh! Priests!’ said Mr Shoe. ‘They’re all the same. Always telling you that you’re going to live again after you’re dead, but you just try it and see the look on their faces!’

‘Don’t like priests, either,’ said the voice from under the chair. Windle wondered if anyone else was hearing it.

‘I won’t forget the look on the Reverend Welegare’s face in a hurry,’ said Arthur gloomily. ‘I’ve been going to that temple for thirty years. I was respected in the community. Now if I even think of setting foot in a religious establishment I get a pain all down my leg.’

‘Yes, but there was no need for him to say what he said when you pushed the lid off,’ said Doreen. ‘And him a priest, too. They shouldn’t know those kind of words.’

‘I enjoyed that temple,’ said Arthur, wistfully. ‘It was something to do on a Wednesday.’

It dawned on Windle Poons that Doreen had miraculously acquired the ability to use her double-yous.

‘And you’re a vampire too, Mrs Win … I do beg your pardon … Countess Notfaroutoe?’ he enquired politely.

The Countess smiled. ‘My vord, yes,’ she said.

‘By marriage,’ said Arthur.

‘Can you do that? I thought you had to be bitten,’ said Windle.

The voice under the chair sniggered.

‘I don’t see why I should have to go around biting my wife after thirty years of marriage, and that’s flat,’ said the Count.

‘Every voman should share her husband’s hobbies,’ said Doreen. ‘It iss vot keeps a marriage intervesting.’

‘Who wants an interesting marriage? I never said I wanted an interesting marriage. That’s what’s wrong with people today, expecting things like marriage to be interesting. And it’s not a hobby, anyway,’ moaned Arthur. ‘This vampiring’s not all it’s cracked up to be, you know. Can’t go out in daylight, can’t eat garlic, can’t have a decent shave—’

‘Why can’t you have a—’ Windle began.

‘Can’t use a mirror,’ said Arthur. ‘I thought the turning-into-a-bat bit would be interesting, but the owls round here are murder. And as for the … you know … with the blood … well …’ His voice trailed off.

‘Artore’s never been very good at meetink people,’ said Doreen.

‘And the worst part is having to wear evening dress the whole time,’ said Arthur. He gave Doreen a sideways glance. ‘I’m sure it’s not really compulsory.’

‘It iss very important to maintain standerts,’ said Doreen. Doreen, in addition to her here-one-minute-and-gone-the-next vampire accent, had decided to complement Arthur’s evening dress with what she considered appropriate for a female vampire: figure-hugging black dress, long dark hair cut into a widow’s peak, and very pallid makeup. Nature had designed her to be small and plump with frizzy hair and a hearty complexion. There were definite signs of conflict.

‘I should have stayed in that coffin,’ said Arthur.

‘Oh, no,’ said Mr Shoe. ‘That’s taking the easy way out. The movement needs people like you, Arthur. We had to set an example. Remember our motto.’

‘Which motto is that, Reg?’ said Lupine wearily. ‘We have so many.’

‘“Undead yes — unperson no!”’ Reg said.

‘You see, he means well,’ said Lupine, after the meeting had broken up.

He and Windle were walking back through the grey dawn. The Notfaroutoes had left earlier to be back home before daylight heaped even more troubles on Arthur, and Mr Shoe had gone off, he said, to address a meeting.

‘He goes down to the cemetery behind the Temple of Small Gods and shouts,’ Lupine explained. ‘He calls it consciousness raising but I don’t reckon he’s on to much of a certainty.’

‘Who was it under the chair?’ said Windle.

‘That was Schleppel,’ said Lupine. ‘We think he’s a bogeyman.’

‘Are bogeymen undead?’

‘He won’t say.’

‘You’ve never seen him? I thought bogeymen hid under things and, er, behind things and sort of leapt out at people.’

‘He’s all right on the hiding. I don’t think he likes the leaping out,’ said Lupine.

Windle thought about this. An agoraphobic bogeyman seemed to complete the full set.

‘Fancy that,’ he said, vaguely.