“I am right,” said Louis. “But if you want Gremt to do this, then ask Gremt. I’ll sit with Gremt for the duration. Doesn’t matter to me. The question is, do you have a simple way to stop and restart Lestat’s heart?”

“Yes,” said Fareed. “But think what might happen to all the vampires everywhere when this little experiment is carried out! There’s no way in the world to warn everyone.”

“What do you want us to do?” I said. “Send out an alert? We don’t even know how to reach all the blood drinkers of the world.”

“Yes, we do,” said Louis. “Use Benji’s broadcast. Set a time for this tomorrow night, and tonight have Benji broadcast the alert, that at a certain hour Greenwich mean time all blood drinkers must be in a safe and secure place for the space of sixty minutes. And have Benji loop the broadcast all day tomorrow and up to the time of the experiment. That’s the best you can do, really. And have all the old ones send out the word telepathically. We come here at sunset and Fareed stops your heart. If it’s started a half hour or forty-five minutes later by Gremt…”

“We could lose some of the young ones doing this,” said Seth. “Louis did not die when things appeared hopeless. But we are talking about Lestat. And suppose the minute the invisible connection is severed, death follows for all who are disconnected.”

“But death didn’t follow for me,” said Louis again. “Look, you’re not thinking of all aspects at the same time.”

“We’re about to face pure annihilation!” I said. “I say do it. Do it now! The Hell with sending out a message. Where is Gremt? Gremt is at the Château or he’s at his home in the country. That’s not three minutes from here for one of us.”

At that moment, the door to the back stairway opened and Teskhamen and Gremt appeared. They wore long heavy coats, with cravats. And I could see at once that Teskhamen had brought Gremt here via the wind and they were both dusty and ruddy from the cold.

Gremt approached slowly as if he might be intruding and then he said in a soft voice to Fareed, “What is it I have to do? Can you give me precise instructions?”

We all went back to arguing, until quite suddenly Cyril stepped out of the shadows and cried, “Enough!”

Of course this commanded everyone’s attention as the great hulking Egyptian stood there with an expression of pure exasperation on his face.

“You can’t stop me!” I said.