Caxton’s blood froze. She dropped to a firing crouch and held out an arm to keep Glauer back. She waited for the doors to crash open, for dozens of vampires to come bursting out, but nothing of the sort happened.
The doors just stood there, slightly open. It could have been nothing. The building’s furnace might have switched on and a sudden puff of hot air could have pushed the doors open.
Not likely, she thought.
“Cover me,” Glauer said, moving in. She stayed in her crouch, her weapon ready. He pushed his back up against the wall just to one side of the slightly open doors and peered through the crack. “I don’t see anything,” he told her. He held out his rifle and used it like a stick to push one door open all the way.
Caxton could see something of the room beyond—a big open space lined with rows of seats. The doors opened on the top level of a square amphitheater. Anything at all could be waiting below, hidden from view.
Duck-walking forward, she moved closer to the doors. Glauer stepped through them, his rifle moving from left to right as he covered the room. “Clear,” he said, and she got up to her full height again and moved in, her own rifle still at the ready in case he’d missed something.
She scanned the blue seats and the flights of steps that ran between them, made a note of all the fire exits from the room, then looked down. The electric map lay at the bottom of the amphitheater, an enormous topographically correct rendering of the town of Gettysburg and the battlefield to the south. An operator could switch on and off a series of lights to indicate where various regiments and battalions had stood on each day of the battle. It was hard for Caxton to see much of the map, however, because it was obscured by coffins.
Lots of coffins. Some were broken open but most remained intact. They lay without any real organization on top of the map or on the floor around it. A lot of them had been laid across rows of seats or stood propped up against the steps. She didn’t need to count them to know there must be ninety-nine in total.
She had finally found the coffins. Too late to do any good.
84.
While I was off to war, much transpired behind me, at my previous lodgings. I was only to learn much later of how sorely I’d underestimated my new friend. I was able to reconstruct most of what happened. The following I took from the official record of the special court martial of Private Jack Beecham, transcribed from his own words:
“It was right after midnight, right after her night’s feeding, that it happened.
“I really have no explanation for it, sir, other than it seemed right. The man who came had a bad wound on his face and he looked sickly, but we just thought he was some poor casualty bastard put to use by the quartermaster ’cause he wasn’t fit to fight anymore. Some of the men working as cooks here have worse injuries and ailments, as I’m sure you know. This fellow said his name was Bill something. He was a yank soldier and he used Colonel Pittenger’s name, said he had orders to pick up a coffin and take it away for burial, that’s all I know. No, sir, he hadn’t any papers, but that’s not so rare in wartime, when things aren’t often done to a nicety. He had a wagon with black bunting, you know, a funeral hearse, and a team. Oh, how those horses got themselves up when we brought out the coffin, as if they’d been at by a whole nest of hornets. We was all glad to see him go, as you might imagine, for it meant getting rid of those maddened beasts.
“It seemed alright, honest. I didn’t know Miss Malvern was inside that coffin, or I’d have put up a real fight. He said he was going to take her home and bury her proper, but where he actually got to, I have no notion.
“I’ll take my punishment now, if that’s alright.”
Private Beecham was made to ride a donkey backward around the whole of the camp at morning rolls, with a dunce cap over his eyes. Then he was flogged, given six stripes, and had his week’s pay taken away. It was lucky for him I was so far away; my punishment would have been far graver. Perhaps I’d have introduced him to my new acquaintances.
—THE PAPERS OFWILLIAMPITTENGER
85.
Glauer headed down the steps toward the map. She circled around the top of the amphitheater, scanning the exit doors. She tried one, found it locked. Moved to the next one. That was a dangerous game, she knew. To try the doors she had to lower her weapon, leaving her vulnerable. She needed to do this the way she’d been trained—which meant she needed help. She needed Glauer to cover her while she opened each door.
“Glauer, let’s keep together, okay?” she called out. The big cop had made his way down to the level of the map to stand in the middle of a group of coffins. Though she was sure they were empty, she didn’t want him down there. “Glauer?”
He didn’t even seem to hear her. His rifle was pointed down at the floor, but his face was turned upward, his eyes focused on a glassed-in booth above her head, where the map’s operator would have sat.
His jaw slid open as if it had come unhinged. His massive arms fell lifeless at his sides.
“Glauer!” she shouted, but he didn’t even flinch.
Oh shit, she thought, even as his rifle lifted, even as he brought up the hand of his bad arm to grip the heat shield. She recognized the look on his face just fine—she’d worn the same expression often enough herself. There had to be a vampire up there in the booth. Glauer had made eye contact and now the vampire had him hypnotized. She rushed down toward him, thinking she could snap him out of it.
Then she noticed that his rifle was pointing right at her. Still he looked upward as if transfixed by some religious vision. He wasn’t aiming at her. He probably didn’t even know what his hands were doing. She saw his finger slip through the trigger guard and just had time to drop to the floor as his rifle spat bullets across the wall behind her.
“Trooper?” she heard him call, his voice watery and indistinct. “Where are you? I can’t…I can’t see you.”
Caxton crawled forward on her elbows and knees, protected only by the row of seats between Glauer and herself. He fired another burst that tore at the upholstery of the seats, sending yellow fluff into the air.
She had no idea what she was going to do next. He had her pinned down—if she stood up he would blow her away. If she moved forward or backward too far she would come to one of the sets of steps that ran down to the map. To the side there were two doors, the locked fire exit she’d just tried and the door she’d intended to investigate next, a total unknown. It might be open. There might be fifty vampires waiting behind it. It didn’t matter much, since to get to it she would have to dodge bullets.
“Trooper…did you say…something?” Glauer asked. His voice sounded different, and she realized he was moving. Coming toward her, climbing the steps.
She couldn’t move—but if she didn’t move he would just come to her and kill her where she lay. Her only choice was to try the mystery door. He would have plenty of time to shoot her while she reached for its handle, but she was out of options.
No—she had one option. She could shoot him first. Arkeley would probably have done just that, but she didn’t know if she had the nerve.
So instead she waited for his next burst—just two bullets this time, one of which knocked chips of plaster out of the wall right over her head—and then jumped up and ran as fast as she could for the door.