I shoved my gun back into its holster and took out my silver-wire whip. I made Jill take a step backward, toward the door, and then I lashed it sideways so that it wound itself around the young man’s chest, pinning its arms. I gave the whip a sharp yank, and the young man fell onto the worn-out carpet, struggling and swearing.
“What you done to me, you bastard? What you done?”
You never forget how to restrain a Screecher. After you’ve done it often enough, you could almost do it in your sleep. Kneel on its chest, fasten its thumbs together with the silver thumbscrews, then drag off its rancid shoes and fasten its big toes together, until you hear the screws crunch into the bones. The gingery-headed girl kicked and wrestled me, too, but for a Screecher it was very weak. I must have hurt it badly when I shot it, and Jill helped me by holding the Bible right in front of its turquoise-mottled face so that it was completely dazzled.
When I had tightened up their thumbscrews and toescrews, I pulled the young man so that it was sitting upright, and unwound the whip. Then I dragged the girl off the couch so that it was sitting upright, too, back-to-back, and I wound the whip around both of them, so hard that it was cutting into their arms.
Jill looked at me, and I could see that she was disturbed.
“You’re going to regret this, you bastard,” the young man told me.
“Not half as much as you are, sunshine.” You see how British I was becoming, and I’d only been there a couple of days. “Especially if you don’t tell me what I need to know.”
“I’m not telling you nothing. You can effing eff off.”
“I want to know where Duca is, that’s all.”
“Micky’ll split you wide open and I’ll drink you dry,” the girl spat at me.
“Um, I don’t think so. You seem to be laboring under the misapprehension that I can’t kill you. The truth is, I can, and I’m going to.”
Jill was still holding up the Bible. I said, “It’s OK, Jill, you can put that down now. The only way these characters are getting out of here is in a sack.”
She slowly closed the Bible and put it back into my Kit. “You’re not really going to.?”
“Kill them? Of course. They’re half-dead already. But I need some information first.”
“Why should we tell you anything?” said the young man. “If you’re going to kill us anyway, what’s the effing difference?”
“The difference is that if you don’t tell me what I want to know, I’m going to hurt you both very badly.”
Jill said, “Jim — can I talk to you? Outside, if that’s all right.”
“Sure. These two aren’t going anyplace.”
She went out into the front garden. I could see that she was very agitated. Bullet stayed close to her and kept looking up at her anxiously.
“Jim, they told me that you were going to kill the Screechers, when you found them, but I never realized that it was going to be like this.”
I didn’t know what to say. She was a lovely and sensitive young woman and I really didn’t want to distress her, but she had to realize that we were hunting some of the most disgusting parasites on the face of the earth and there was no easy or humane way of exterminating them.
“Listen,” I said, “why don’t you go back to that laundry and call Terence for me again? Tell him where we are and tell him that we’re going to need an unmarked van. He’ll know what you mean.”
“I don’t know how you can do this,” she said.
“If it’s any consolation, neither do I.”
“How long do you need?”
“Give me ten minutes, OK? If they’re going to talk, that should be long enough.”
“And if they don’t?”
The Curse of Duca
The two Screechers looked up at me as I came back into the house and I don’t think that I have ever seen such hatred on any creature’s face, human or not.
“You still don’t want to answer my questions?” I asked them. “All I need to know is where Duca is hiding himself, and how many people he’s infected.”
“You can kill us but we won’t die,” said the young man, contemptuously. “You can even cut our heads off and we won’t die.”
“Oh, yes, I know that. But that can only happen if your body is able to escape from the place where I put it, and your head is still reasonably intact. Since I’m going to bury your bodies in consecrated ground, and I’m going to boil your heads until there’s nothing left of your brains but soup, which I’m going to pour down the drain, there isn’t much chance of that happening.”
“Duca will find you, and Duca will make sure that you suffer.”
“Duca doesn’t have to worry about finding me. I’m going to find it first. I have a score to settle with Duca.”
“Well, we’re not going to help you find him,” said the gingery-haired girl.
“You want to bet?” I asked it. I went to the windows which overlooked the backyard, and pulled down the grubby net curtains. Then I came back and wrapped the curtains around the Screecher’s heads.
“What are you doing, you tosser?” the young man said, spitting to get the net curtain out of its mouth.
“Guy Fawkes’ Night just came early,” I told it.
“What?”
I took the holy oil out of my Kit, unstoppered it and poured it over their wrapped-up heads.
“Bloody hell, that burns!” the young man shouted, tossing its head violently from side to side. The girl didn’t say anything, but sucked in its breath because the oil hurt so much.
I took a box of Swan Vestas and struck one, holding it up in front of them so that they could see the flame.
“Now do you want to tell me where Duca is hiding?”
“You’re mad, you are!” the young man screamed. “I’m not going to tell you nothing!”
“The choice is yours, buddy. How about you, sweetheart, are you going to tell me where Duca is?”
“Go to hell,” the girl retorted, its voice muffled under the nets.
“In that case, you don’t leave me any alternative.” The match had burned right down to my fingers and I had to blow it out and take out another one.
At that moment, though, Jill came back into the living room. She looked wide-eyed at the two Screechers with the net curtains wrapped around their heads, but she didn’t ask me what I was doing. Instead, she said, “I’ve just spoken to Terence. He’s identified the car.”
“Well, that’s good news for these two. Comparatively speaking.”
Jill had written the car-owner’s address on the back of a laundry bill. “It belongs to Dr. Norman Watkins, the Laurels, Pampisford Road, South Croydon. He’s in general practice, but most of his patients are private.”
“So. I wonder what a strigoi mort is doing, driving his car around?”
“Terence is leaving now. He’s going to collect his car from Beddington Park, and then he’s coming over here with a van. He says that he shouldn’t be more than an hour.”
“That’s plenty of time. Do you want to take Bullet for a walk while I do the necessary?”
Jill said, “All right. Come on, Bullet.” But when she reached the door she hesitated. “Do you have to do this? I mean, is there really no other way?”
“Come on, Jill — you saw for yourself what these two jokers are capable of. And once they become strigoi mortii they’ll spread their infection like wildfire.”
“Can’t they be given a proper trial?”
“Jill — justice is a human right. These goddamn things are halfway to losing their humanity already.”
“Duca will drain your blood, even if we can’t,” said the gingery-haired girl. “I promise you that, you piece of shit. I promise both of you.”