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"Could he have beaten us here?" Asher kicked the Indian&039;s engine out of gear as they came around the side of the hill into full view of the Peaks&039; wall and lodge gate; as onThe moon had set; it was hard to keep the tires out of ruts only dimly seen He didn&039;t bother to whisper If Dennis was there already, he&039;d have picked up the sound of the engine miles away

"I&039;m not sure" Ysidro&039;s arms were like whalebone and thin cable around Asher&039;s waist, his body a skeletal lightness against the leather of the jacket Asher wasn&039;t sure whether a living man could have kept his seat on the narrow carrier as they&039;d coer-quoted by the invaluable Mr Stoker- has observed, &039;Die Todten reiten schnell&039;- the dead travel fast"

Asher braked gently, easing the ates

Through the pseudo-Gothic monstrosity of native brick and hewn stone appropriated froainst the dim shapes of the naked beeches of the park and the vast swell of the down behind The unkempt laas thick eeds, and the woods that lay to the south and east of the house were already e and elder saplings The place had probably housed no more than a caretaker since Blaydon had closed it up after his wife&039;s death three years ago, and it was obvious that not even a caretaker dwelt here now

He&039;d probably been turned off when Dennis first began to change, Asher thought, and anger stirred hiain at Blaydon&039;s stupid irre-sponsibility Had anything gone aas leak to an omnibus accident in London, Lydia would have been conde the wiser

Except Dennis, of course

"So in other words, he could be waiting for us in the house?" He dis, wind-frayed curtain of hair, the va, and Asher had the ireatly to his taste

"Or hard upon our heels" Ysidro stooped, bracing his bandaged hands on bent knees Asher pushed up his goggles, leaned the bike against the wall, unlashed the silvered steel bar fro Ysidro&039;s back as a step, he could reach the top corners of the rustic stone gateway, to scras He had scarcely dropped to the drive on the other side when Ysidro appeared, palely silhouetted against the uneasy darkness, and sprang doithout a sound to his side At his lodgings, Asher had paused only long enough to don his boots, goggles, and leather jacket, for the night was freezing cold; Ysidro in his open shirt seeest we divide to search"

"Can you hear anything fro intently to the half-heardof the wind in the autumn woods "Not clearly," he murmured at last "Yet the house is not e the bar fro to cover the sky Through it, the house was a barely seen shape of gray, dotted with the black of win-dows, disturbingly like some monster&039;s misshapen skull "If he&039;s behind us, he may arrive on top of us before we&039;d finished reconnoitering," he said grihostly stripe of the drive "And if he&039;s there already-would you or I be able to see or hear hih he&039;d never been more than a casual acquaintance of Blaydon&039;s But most of the dons had received invitations at one tient&039;s s Every ato the dark trap of those encircling walls without the usual pre-liminary checks But there was no time, and they would, in any case, be useless

They skirted the lawn and garden to the kitchen yard, Ysidro leading the way across the leaf-strewn pavement At this point, conceal; they were either perfectly safe or beyond help And if Dennis had not arrived before them-if they were, for the moment, safe-outdoors there was a remote chance that Ysidro&039;s va

In any case, the cellars were reached fro faintly over the tops of the downs and stirring the dark hem of the woods a hundred feet from the house in a way Asher did not like The stables stretched along one side of the yard, every door shut and bolted; the kitchen door was locked as well, but Asher drove his elbow through thepane next to it and reached through to wrench over the latch Beside hi his head this way and that, the stray gusts flicking at his long hair, trying by some leap of the senses to detect the undetectable and to hear as noof dust

The darkness of the kitchen stank oftable scraps As Ysidro found and lit a la rustle of tiny feet, and the priht the tails of ain, softly Open tins and dirty dishes lined the old-fashioned soapstone counters, like sleeping traht Blaydon, of course -in too great a hurry to pump and heat water to clean up The valow, Asher could see his fastidious nostrils flare

"Heour one There is a sers in still air"

"We&039;ll check the cellars first," Asher said, crossing the worn stone floor to the narrow door beside the stove "Upstairs we can always bolt through a " He pushed the door open The smell of dust, coals, and mice almost choked him "You lead If he&039;s here, he&039;s likelier to be behind than before"

He kept his back flattened to the worn, slatted wainscot of the stair-case, his left hand with the silver bar on the upstairs side, while Ysidro edged swiftly down the steps before hi but the racks, and a coal hole, half-filled with coals and dirt

"There&039;s another cellar off the butler&039;s pantry," Asher said as they swiftly ascended the stairs back to the kitchen, their shadows reeling drunkenly in the laht "You&039;d never know the door wasn&039;t just a cupboard I&039;ve never been down there-it h to keep someone in"

The butler&039;s pantry was more like a closet than a room, filled with shelves and family silver The door, tucked away behind a cupboard, was bolted from the outside "She&039;s down there," Simon murmured, even as Asher slipped the bolts "At least so sounds like hers"

"Lydia?" Asher called softly down the dark twist of the stairs, but kept his post at the top until Ysidro had edged his way down them There was a door at the bottom, too; between them, the brick-walled slot of the staircase smelled like a death trap The door at the bottom was bolted, as well "Lydia, it&039;s James! Don&039;t be afraid"

The door burst open as Ysidro slid the bolts, the violence of it taking hiht showed Asher the whiteness of Lydia&039;s face, under a carnelian ind of unbound hair, Her spectacles flashed in the light, and there was the thin slip of so silver in one of her hands as she stabbed at Ysidro&039;s eyes The vampire was out of her way before Asher could see where he moved; Lydia whirled, confused, and Asher called out, "Lydia, it&039;s Jaun to pelt up the stairs and now stopped short at the sight of the dark for at their top; Ysidro, with considerable presence of mind, raised the lamp to shed its rays as far as the top of the stairs "Ja at the vampire who stood, lamp aloft like Liberty&039;s torch, just beside the door

"Oh" She looked momentarily nonplussed, the silver hatpin hich she had attacked hi sharp and vicious in her hand, "Iam sorry You must be Don Simon Ysidro" She held out her other hand to hirace "It was hed shakily at this patently mendacious platitude as they hastened up the stairs "I aht Asher violently around the waist, burying her face in his leather-clad shoulder and hugging hih the ferocity of the e with cold and shock and reaction to her attack on what she had thought were her captors He wrapped his good arht around her shoulders, silver bar and all

Typically, she broke from him almost at once, so as not to tie up a hand with a weapon in it Ysidro had soiven the narrowness of the door-and was leading the iftly through the close confines of the pantry; Asher are of the clinical avidness hich Lydia watched his slender back

"Are you all right?"

She nodded, pulling tighter around her the snagged gray cardigan she wore over shirtwaist and skirt-Blaydon&039;s, he noted, and far too big for her "That was the butler&039;s apartments Have we time to pump some water? I didn&039;t drink the last pitcher Professor Blaydon brought s in it"

"No," Ysidro said briefly "I don&039;t like the sht-I don&039;t like the feel There&039;s so about"

Asher started to protest, but Lydia said, "No, it&039;s all right, the pump here always took forever What happened to your arm?"

"Dennis"

They halted just within the kitchen door In the uncertain starlight the yard and the woods beyond seemed alive with the sinister move-ment of the wind Asher hated the look of them and hated stillaround them like a fist

"Stay close to the house wall," he breathed "We won&039;t be able to see him in the open At least, near a wall, he&039;ll have to co a deep breath, he stepped outside Lydia followed, holding the laether for the first time, Asher realized with a start that the vampire stood no taller than she

Softly, she whispered, "Have you-seen hiles still pushed up on his forehead-he nearly started out of his skin "Did you?"

She shook her head "But I assuh the shut door" She glanced back at Ysidro and wet her lips "His father&039;s seru other than make him like you"

"Indeed," the va his eyes from the lawn and shrubbery around them "Dennis is not like me"

They reached the front of the house Seventy-plus feet of rutted gravel drive stretched before theates The wind drove a swirl of dead beech leaves over it, like the whirling souls of Dante&039;s da The ate, and Asher&039;s whole soul revolted at that nebulous vista of dark He glanced quickly back at Ysidro, as turning his head, listening with fear in his eyes to the night

"Can you make it back to London afoot?"

"Not before dawn But I have boltholes nearer than that-property purchased too recently to show up on your precious lists, my dear Mistress Asher Go back to London Stay awake and stay always around people in some public place He cannot take you there; he dare not let his existence be suspected I will coether, the three of the shadows of the house The wind swirled Lydia&039;s dark skirts and the tangle of her hair and ht in the platter-sized blob of the jiggling laloom stretched in all directions; Asher felt naked before it Lydia whispered, "Shall we run?"

"It wouldn&039;t , we&039;d be less likely to see a threat"

It would, however, have made hih what felt like the Great A darkness The wall looe, and weeds shivering thick around the open iron-work of the gate

Ysidro&039;s hand touched his ar hiray flutter of ate

Asher saw Dennis coh his mind stalled on the detail, with a sense ofjaotten the significance of that bulking forate pillar, eyes glinting in the reflected light of the lah later Asher had clearit rush at them with horrible speed Ysidro ht hirip

Asher brought the silver bar doith all his strength on Dennis&039; wrist, even as theripped at Ysidro&039;s throat Frolitter of blood It strealottal roar of pain, and Asher backhanded hi the facial bones crunch Dennis screaouts of hot syrup Then the va fro, across the open laard the woods Behind the erratically in a pool of kerosene-

"Chapel ruins!" Lydia gasped "Shelter without being closed in!" Blood was splattered liberally over one side of her white shirtwaist and the sweater, droplets of it beading even on her spectacle lenses; it cov-ered the first four inches of the silver hatpin still in her hand She must have stabbed Dennis from the other side Ysidro&039;s shoulder had been opened to halfway down his back, a dark stain spreading with terrible speed over the torn rags of his shirt

Long weeds tangled at their knees as they cut through the overgrown garden Their feet skidded on mud and wet leaves Behind the in pain, as if the iht, Ysidro&039;s bony grip on his swollen ar, but he hardly cared They had to reach shelter of some kind, a wall or enclosure at their backs, or they were dead

The chapel ruin stood in a little dell perhaps a hundred yards from the house, its ivy-draped walls sheltered by a sizable copse of beeches It offered, as Lydia had said, ideal shelter without the potential i cover onthe potential field of attack

"What about the crypt?" Ysidro leaned against the stump of a broken pillar, half doubled-over with pain and dizziness, as Lydia worked a birch sapling loose frohtened and cast a quick glance to the moss-covered altar behind them "If there&039;s another way in, he can"

"There isn&039;t a crypt" Lydia hauled her skirt to untie one of her several petticoats The lowest flounce was saturated froers Ysidro ripped it free and bound it around the wood as a h expanse of hillside that lay between chapel and lawn, Asher tossed them the box of lucifer matches he always kept in his jacket pocket; there was the sharp hiss of sulphur, and the fabric licked into flarandfather had the whole ruin put up at the sahaht This wall, those arches over there, and the tombstones on the hillside are all of it there is"