A couple of ogres in a downtown bar got into a fight over a female of the species. No humans were hurt but the property damage was substantial. Ogres are hard to subdue, so one of the responding cops called in the Sacred Weapons and Tactics unit. But by the time SWAT got there, the female had left in disgust, and the two male ogres, realizing there wasn’t anything to fight about, were sitting at what was left of the bar, having a beer. I hear they went to County Jail quietly, although neither of them made bail.
There was an ugly situation involving a golem on Monday night. A member of Temple Beth Israel’s congregation got the idea that Rabbi Jacobson was messing around with his wife. That turned out to be bullshit, but it didn’t stop the guy from hiring a Kabbalistic wizard to get even in the traditional fashion. The golem had chased Rabbi Jacobson all over the inside of the temple and almost had him cornered when Karl and I showed up – SWAT was busy across town, where a bunch of Slide-addicted dwarves had tried to take down the all-night branch of Citizens Savings, but a teller had tripped the silent alarm before the little bastards had a chance to get clear.
The golem was at least eight feet tall, and single-minded in its purpose of pounding the rabbi into porridge. Nothing you can shoot a golem with makes a damn bit of difference, but I’d encountered one before and knew what to do. The thing is animated by a piece of paper in its mouth on which the wizard has written a shem – any one of the several Hebrew names for God. Remove the paper, you deactivate the golem. Of course, the thing is programmed to resist any attempts to grab the paper, and I’d have been crushed by its giant arms if I’d gotten close enough to try. Fortunately, my partner has vampire speed. Once I’d explained what needed to be done, Karl had the shem out if its mouth so fast, the golem didn’t even have time to react before it crumbled into the big pile of mud that had been its original form. Rabbi Jacobson thanked us warmly for the great mitzvah we’d done him, but Karl and I said we’d just been doing our jobs. When we left, he was looking through the phone book for carpet cleaners who were open late.
When we got back to our car, there was a number ten envelope stuck under one of the wiper blades. I opened it and saw that Louis Loquasto had come through for us after all.
The message had been printed by a computer. It didn’t waste words on social niceties, which was OK with me.
Resident of former Callaway home on Lake Scranton appears to be PW. Unable to determine with certainty, as grounds and house well-guarded, but this itself lends credibility. Other matters are well in hand, with positive results expected shortly.
It was signed – if that’s the right word – with a simple “L”.
“Huh,” Karl said when he’d read it. “I guess ‘other matters’ means those two guys he’s gonna hit, old man Delatasso and Dimitri what’s-his-name.”
“Kaspar.”
“Yeah, him.”
“Kaspar’s a vampire, Karl.”
“Yeah, you already told me. So?”
“So, I was wondering if you’ve got any kind of problem with him being taken off the board,” I said.
Karl gave me a half-smile. “‘Taken off the board.’ Jeez, Stan, you’re starting to talk like a Mafia boss yourself.”
“You know what I mean, and don’t change the subject,” I said. “Kaspar’s a vampire, and I asked Loquasto to have him killed. You’re a vampire, so I was wondering if it bothers you.”
“I’m a cop, too,” he said. “And I was a cop before I became a vamp.”
“I know that,” I said. Who would know better? Christine had brought Karl over because I’d asked her to. It was either that or watch Karl die from injuries he’d received while helping me catch a killer.
“You were with Homicide before Occult Crimes,” Karl said. “And a street cop before that. Right?”
“Yeah. Six years in uniform before I got my gold shield. So?”
“You ever kill any humans in the line of duty?”
“I think I see where you’re going with this,” I said.
“Well, did you?”
“Yeah – two as a street cop, and one while I was a Homicide dick.”
Karl nodded. “Did it bother you?”
“Yeah. Some.”
“Because you killed them – or because they were human?”
A few seconds went by. “I guess I’d probably say that you proved your point.”
“Then how about you not ask me any more stupid-ass questions. Deal?”
“Deal. What do you say we go back to the station and see what we can find out about this Callaway place?”
“That’s the second-best idea you’ve had tonight,” Karl said.
“What was number one?”
“Letting me handle the fucking golem. Now I don’t have to explain to Christine how you got yourself killed by an eight-foot pile of mud.”
Lake Scranton. The house just had to be on Lake Scranton. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise, really – there are lots of ritzy homes out that way, and I wouldn’t expect Patton Wilson to hole up in a shack.
But some very bad shit had gone down a couple of years ago, in the pump house that controls the lake level – despite its name, Lake Scranton is a reservoir, not something made by nature. A number of people had died in the pump house that night, none of them pleasantly. Several others had come damn close to dying – including Christine, Karl, and me.
But the Callaway estate was almost a mile from the pump house, and I decided that I’d better stop thinking about old tragedies and start focusing on how to avoid a new one.
There was a lot of information about the place available online, including six photos showing the house, inside and out. The realty company had left the listing up, even though the word “SOLD” in red letters was prominently displayed on the page. I wondered why they’d even bothered.
The house was something called a Heritage Log Home, but it wasn’t anything Daniel Boone would recognize. Instead, it looked like the kind of lodge you’d find at a ritzy ski resort. According to the Realtor, the house sat in the middle of a two-acre lot, about a quarter mile from the intersection of Lake Scranton Road and Watres Drive. Four beds, three baths, four-car garage around back, surrounded by woods on three sides. The Callaway family had sold it last year for $460,000 to something called “V. H. Property Development.” Four hundred sixty grand may not buy you much house, say, on Long Island. But in Scranton, it’ll get you a mini-mansion, like the one Karl and I were looking at.
I googled “V. H. Property Development” and found exactly zip. Whatever properties they were developing apparently weren’t available on the public market. Then something occurred to me.
“I bet I know what the ‘V. H.’ stands for,” I said to Karl.
“What?”
“Van Helsing.”
Karl snorted. “You’re probably right. That sounds like something that would appeal to our buddy Patton.”
We studied the property photos. “Check this out,” Karl said. He picked up a pencil and pointed at the monitor. “A two-level veranda that goes all around the house. Three-hundred-sixty-degree view. Put people on each of the four sides, and it’s gonna be pretty hard to sneak up on that place.”
“Except at night, maybe.”
“Sure,” Karl said. “Unless the guys on the deck have night-vision equipment. Or they’ve got motion sensors on the grounds, or maybe body heat detectors. Motherfucker bought the place eleven months ago – think he might’ve installed stuff like that?”
“Who – paranoid millionaire Patton Wilson, who’s got more arrest warrants out on him than John Dillinger ever had?”
“That’s the guy.”
“In a fucking heartbeat,” I said. Staring at the photos on the screen, I said, “Still, some reconnaissance might not be a bad idea. Get an idea of what we’re up against – if we can do it without getting caught.”