LITMIR.BIZ

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the open window, stood on the edge and looked down at the village four hundred feet below. Flicking the ex-Mayor awake with his fingers he looked once more at his son, and said to Igon:

      ‘If mine vife should come lookink for me, tell her I’ve gone to the blood bank in the village to make a withdrawal, ya?’ and with that he jumped.

      Igon ran to the window and waved into the darkness. He closed the window with difficulty, thinking ‘It’s all very well for these people to leave by windows, but I wish they’d close them.’ He looked back into the room.

      The Doctor and the servant were starting to stir. Both of them stood up rather shakily at first, trying to work out what had happened.

      When the Doctor at last fully realised the terrible situation he was in, he burst into tears and lay down on the floor, kicking his legs in the air like a badly brought-up child who has been given too much of its own way.

      ‘Help me. Please help me!’ he shouted. ‘I don’t want to leave here in a bucket. Igon, you are my friend. ‘Can’t you think of anything to save me?’

      ‘Why should I? Earlier you called me a curled up lout.’

      ‘You’re not. I’ll give you money. I’m not a rich man but I’ll give you all the money I have if you will only help me. Please, Igon. Please help me, my friend.’

      ‘How much is all your money?’ Igon asked.

      ‘I’ll give you fifty krooms,’ sobbed the Doctor.

      ‘Sixty.’

      ‘But I haven’t got sixty. I’ve only got fifty.’

      ‘It’s not enough,’ Igon said stubbornly.

      ‘But can’t you get it through that thick skull of yours, you bent idiot, it’s all I’ve got.’

      ‘Now it’s gone up to sixty-five krooms for calling me a bent idiot. I’ll let you off for saying I have a thick skull.’

      ‘All right, all right,’ the Doctor said, knowing he wasn’t going to get much change out of Igon. ‘Sixty-five krooms.’

      ‘O.K. Shake.’

      ‘I am shaking.’

      ‘No, I mean shake hands.’

      They shook hands.

      ‘You heard that, didn’t you?’ Igon said to the servant. ‘You heard him say he’d give me sixty-five krooms.’

      The servant who was still in a state of shock nodded vaguely.

      Igon shouted to the Doctor, ‘He heard you. He heard you. The servant heard you.’

      ‘Yes, yes,’ shouted the agitated Doctor, ‘but how can you help me?’

      ‘Easy,’ answered Igon.

      For the first time that evening the Doctor smiled a real, genuine smile. Igon carried on.

      ‘Now, it’s obvious that you do not want to leave this place in a small bucket, right?’

      ‘Right,’ said the smiling Doctor, eagerly.

      ‘Right,’ repeated Igon, ‘So – and this is the clever part – I’ll hide the bucket.’ He flashed his gums and continued. ‘Now give me sixty-five krooms.’

      The Doctor looked at him with a frozen smile on his face for at least a minute, a thousand things chasing through his head. But one thought kept leaping up in front of the others. It kept asking, ‘Is he joking or does he mean that last stupid remark?’

      Within the next few seconds the Doctor realised that Igon meant it. He could tell by the vacant look in his eye. Their three eyes held each other till the spell was broken by the Doctor who whispered in a soft voice, convulsed with fear;

      ‘You stupid, twisted fool. Hiding the bucket is no good.’ His voice became louder. ‘You can’t just hide the bucket, you … you …’ He was at a loss for words.

      ‘You owe me sixty-five krooms,’ Igon said defiantly.

      ‘Shut up you stupid, knotted nit,’ the Doctor shouted back at him, going quite red in his face.

      ‘I’m not a knotted nit,’ said Igon sadly.

      The servant by now was leaning over the coffin, busily sucking a piece of ice.

      ‘Valentine’s moving,’ he said, wiping his chin. The Doctor and Igon raced to the coffin. The now near-hysterical Doctor grabbed the lapels of Valentine’s evening dress suit and started to shake him.

      ‘Wake up, sir. Please wake up, sir,’ the Doctor begged.

      Valentine opened his eyes.

      ‘Hello,’ he said quietly, his head resting in the crook of the Doctor’s arm.

      They all looked down at him. He was a most handsome young man, not a bit like a Vampire; more like a normal person.

      ‘I’m very hungry,’ he said.

      ‘Me too. Me too.’

      Igon received a blow on the head that was so quick he didn’t know whether the Doctor or the servant had done it.

      ‘I really am hungry.’ Valentine slowly sat up.

      The Doctor grabbed Igon by the hair and pulled a few rags from his throat and offered the exposed throat to Valentine, saying, ‘Here, Sir, try this until we can get you something better.’

      ‘No thank you,’ said Valentine nicely, much to the relief of Igon.

      ‘I’ll shake Igon for you, Sir. You’re not supposed to take medicine without it being shaken.’

      The Doctor shook Igon so vigorously that a cloud of dust came from his old clothes. He once again exposed Igon’s neck towards Valentine.

      ‘No thank you. I don’t like blood.’

      For a few seconds everyone was still.

      ‘Pardon?’

      ‘I don’t like blood, so would you mind putting Igon away please.’ Valentine asked. The Doctor dropped Igon hard on the floor.

      ‘You don’t drink blood?’ he said incredulously.

      ‘No. To be quite honest with you, it makes me feel a bit queasy.’

      ‘How long, Sir, may I ask, have you not been drinking blood?’

      ‘You may not believe this, but all my life. As a matter of fact, I don’t like any of the food we Vampires are supposed to eat or drink. I like chips and I like a small glass of red wine.

      For years I’ve been kidding everybody I’ve been drinking blood, but I change it for red wine. Father doesn’t know or Vernon either. I have a feeling that Mother knows, but I’m not positive. I don’t know why I’m telling you all this. I don’t even know who you are, or worse, if I can trust you. Of course, I know I can trust Igon because I look upon him as a friend.’

      The servant and the Doctor looked at Igon who was now smiling gummily at everyone. The Doctor was the first to speak.

      ‘Of course he’s your friend, sir. He’s our friend too,’ he said, patting Igon on his head. ‘Maybe we should introduce ourselves. I’m Doctor Plump.’

      Valentine’s hand came out of the coffin to be shaken by the Doctor. The servant walked slowly over to the coffin and said:

      ‘My name is Sed.’

      ‘Is that your first name?’ asked Valentine.

      ‘No Sir. Sed’s my last name.’

      ‘Well, tell his Vampship your first name then,’ Doctor Plump snarled.

      ‘My

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