He squinted, then straightened quickly as recognition dawned on him. “Doc?”

My heart in my throat, I watched the old man scurry across the grass. The last thing I wanted was for him to break his hip. “Be careful!”

“Be careful,” he mocked. “You’re a damn fool, coming back here. They told me you were dead!”

From the pocket of his neatly pressed trousers, he produced a key ring covered with antique keys. After much muttering, he selected one and slipped it into the gate’s lock. Instead of crumbling to dust, it actually swung inward with a minimum of screeching. A few leaves from the clinging ivy pulled off, but no one would notice the gate had moved in a hundred years.

“Get your ass in here,” he scolded, glancing nervously up at the house. “Now, you got some explaining to do. Did you eat that boy?”

“What? No!” I said, a little too loudly.

Clarence shushed me. “Keep your voice down. The master’s home, and he’s been in a real bad mood since his daddy left.”

“I thought the Soul Eater couldn’t survive without his annual feeding?”

“Ain’t nothing going to kill that bastard. Believe me, this isn’t the first time somebody tried.” Clarence shook his head. “What happened to the boy?”

“Cyrus killed him.” I thought of the barrels in the basement and what Clarence had told me. “What did you do with him?”

“I didn’t do anything with him. I had the night off. They probably burned him with the rest of them.”

At least he wasn’t crammed in some barrel. I pointed to the house. “Where’s Cyrus?”

“In the study. He’s been there since the night of the party, trying to avoid her.” His last statement was delivered in an accusing tone.

“Her? Dahlia survived?”

Clarence’s face scrunched in an almost comical expression of disapproval. “Seems somebody told her she should find herself a vampire to turn her at the party.”

I ground my teeth. It would be one thing to fight Cyrus, but Dahlia was way out of my league. “What about the guards?”

“They’re trying to steer clear of Dahlia and the Master, but they’ll find you if you go in there.” He squinted at me. “You got backup coming, right?”

“No. I might as well stake myself right here on the lawn,” I muttered, looking up at the looming facade of the house.

“I got one in my back pocket,” Clarence offered. “This is gonna be ugly, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “You might want to get out of here.”

“No, when he’s gone, someone’s got to tidy things up around here,” he said with a sad smile.

“You don’t have to stay. I’ve got friends, we could help you get a condo in Florida or something. Anywhere you want.”

“I ain’t going nowhere.” He made a halfhearted shooing motion with his hands. “I told you before. I come with the house. You give him hell, Doc.”

I wanted to hug him, but I wouldn’t ask him to lower himself to hug a vampire. I couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t jump at the chance for freedom. I also couldn’t understand the strange compulsion people had to stay in their homes to face hurricanes and floods rather than evacuate. Fear of change, maybe. Or denial of their mortality. Whatever the reason, Clarence seemed to share their stay-put mentality, and I knew I wouldn’t change his mind. I made him promise to stay near the guardhouse and not show his face until morning. I watched until he disappeared into the maze. Then I headed up to the house.