F Wilson - Midnight Mass

Looking down at that still form under the quilt she had helped Bernadette make, Carole sagged against the couch and began to cry. She tried to say a requiem prayer but her grief-racked mind had lost the words. So she sobbed aloud and asked God why? How could He let this happen to a dear, sweet innocent who had wished only to spend her life serving Him? WHY?

But no answer came.

When Carole finally controlled her tears, she forced herself to her weary feet and made her way back to the main floor. When she saw the light on in the front foyer, she knew she should turn it off. She stepped over the still form of Rosita under the blood-soaked blanket. Two violent deaths here on the church grounds, a place devoted to God. How many more beyond these grounds?

She knew she should carry Rosita to the basement as well, but lacked the strength—of either will or body.

Tomorrow . .. first thing tomorrow morning, Rosita. I promise.

She turned off the light and raced through the dark back up to her own room where she huddled shivering in her bed.

CAROLE . . .

Carole awoke in a cold sweat. Good Friday again. How many times must she relive that night?

She pushed herself up from the mattress and stumbled to the bathroom. She poured an inch of water from the tap into a glass and drank it down. Didn: t want to risk drinking too much without boiling it first.

At least the water was still running. Was that the vampires' doing? Carole wouldn't be surprised. Water was one of the necessities of life. It seemed to her the vampires wanted a certain number of the living to survive, but not to communicate. Which would explain why the electricity and the telephones went out that first weekend. Keep people isolated and insulated from any message of hope.

She found her way back to the bed and buried her head under the pillow. She needed sleep—dreamless sleep that would allow her to wake up refreshed instead of exhausted. She didn't want to dream of Good Friday again, or worse, the following day . . . the worst day of her life.

HOLY SATURDAY . . .

Carole awoke to the wail of sirens. She sat up in bed, blinking in the morning light.

A dream . . . please, God, show me that last night was all a dream.

But her throat tightened at the sight of Bernadette's empty mattress on the floor beside her bed. No ... not a dream. A living nightmare.

She'd stayed up till dawn, then she'd pulled the bedspread from the window and fallen into exhausted sleep.

The sirens. . . closer now. She crept to the window and peeked at the street below. Two police cars, red and blue lights flashing, roared past the front of the convent and made squealing turns into the church parking lot.

The police! They've come!

Carole rose and hurried across the hall to Bern's room in time to see them slow to a stop before the church.

Thank you, God, she thought. All is not lost. The police are still on the job.

Before pushing away from the window she searched the lawn to the left of the church for the remains of the vampire she'd killed last night. A bright, clear, unconscionably beautiful morning, with a high trail of brown smoke drifting from the east. She couldn't find the vampire, but she spotted Bernadette's wooden cross lying in a man-shaped puddle of brown ooze on the grass. Could that be all that remained of—?

Can't worry about that now, she thought as she dashed back into the hall and down the rear stairs. She had to get to the police, tell them about Bernadette. They'd take her to a morgue or a funeral home where Carole could arrange for a proper burial.

She reached the rear door and had just turned back the deadbolt when she glanced through the glass. The sight of a lean, wolfish man, all in denim, uncoiling from the front passenger seat of the first car froze her heart. He settled a cowboy hat over his long brown hair and looked around, smirking as if he owned the world. A tattooed blond woman in a leather vest got out of the driver seat while two more men in rough clothes slithered from the second car. The first wore his long black hair in a single braid down the middle of his back; the second was sandy haired and balding, wearing a scraggly beard to compensate for what he'd lost on his scalp. All four wore wraparound sunglasses and had silvery earrings dangling from their right lobes.

Carole ducked away from the door and jammed her hands against her mouth. She'd seen these people before, last night, leading the caravan of trucks carrying the undead into town. It seemed so long ago, a lifetime. But this could only mean that the police had lost. The undead and their caretakers were in control now.

But what were they doing here at St. Anthony's?

She crept away from the door and down the hall toward the kitchen. The windows over the sink looked out toward the church. She could watch from there and see without being seen. She needed to know what they were up to. She leaned over the big double sink and cranked the window open an inch or two, just enough to hear what they were saying.

She sniffed the air that wafted through the opening. Something burning somewhere. .. smelled like some sort of meat. She glanced at the brown smoke trailing across the sky. Could that be—?

A car door slammed. She watched the one in the cowboy hat heft a crowbar as he walked from his police car to the side door of the church. Swinging it like a baseball bat he started bashing the hooked end against the doorknob. The clang of metal on metal echoed like a church bell through the eerie silence of the morning. Then he reversed his grip and rammed the tip of the long end between the door and the frame. A few hard yanks and the door popped open.

The woman and the two other men ran inside while the cowboy returned to the police car. He leaned against the fender and lit a cigarette; he carelessly bounced the crowbar against the hood, denting it with every bounce.

A few minutes later the two other men emerged, dragging Father Palmeri between them. The priest had a bloody nose and was blubbering in fear, begging them to let him go.

The sandy-haired man laughed. "Found him hiding in the basement! Lookit him! Peed his pants!"

Carole shook her head in dismay when she saw the darker stain on Father

Palmeri's black cassock. God forgive her, she'd never liked the man, and after last night when he could have saved Bernadette simply by letting her into the church, well, she liked him even less. He was a man of God. He was supposed to set an example.

Then the woman appeared. She'd draped herself in Father Palmeri's long white chasuble and came out dancing and skipping behind the whimpering priest.

Carole felt her anger begin to boil. How dare this . . . this tramp sully holy vestments like that. It was sacrilege.

"You like basements, priest?" the cowboy said, grinning. "Good. 'Cause you're gonna be seeing a lot of them from now on."

Carole's stomach dropped. What did that mean? Were they going to turn him into a vampire? Oh, no. They couldn't do that. Not to a priest.

She had to help him, but what could she do? She was one woman and there were four of them. She watched as they locked Father Palmeri in the caged rear compartment of one of the cars. Then they started toward the convent, the cowboy in the lead, the crowbar on his shoulder.

No! Not here! Not now! And she'd unlocked the door.

Hide! The basement? No. She had to pass the rear door to reach it. They'd see her for sure. She could make it to the second floor but couldn't think of anyplace to hide up there.

She did a quick turn and her gaze came to rest on the big institutional-size oven to her left. She yanked down the door and looked inside. Could she fit? Maybe, maybe not. But even if she did fit, the plate glass window in the door would give her away. But no. A closer look showed that it was fogged with baked-on grease. Bless old Sister Mary Margaret's bad eyes. Last week was her turn to clean the oven. She never did a good job, for which Carole was now grateful.