Comeaux leaned against a locker and laughed. The laughter felt good. Almost as good as had whipping Ted Wilson's a.s.s. Comeaux wiped his eyes and looked at Tess.

"I'm not staying here if you're leaving, Matt."

"For a fact, Tess, I'm leaving. But don't do anything you'll regret later."

"School will be out in a few weeks anyway. h.e.l.l with it."

"Anything you want to get?"

"I must have been thinking about doing this for some time, Matt. I took all my personal stuff home several weeks ago."

"Fine. Come on over to the house and have coffee with Martha and me. She needs someone to talk with, I think. She's been ... well, behaving rather oddly the last several weeks."

Tess watched Matt's nose wrinkle as he opened the front door and stepped into the house. The smell was terrible. Tess thought she might be sick. She fought back the nausea and stepped inside.

Matt kicked a cat aside and took a swipe at another cat with his briefcase. He missed the fleet-footed feline. "Dammit," he cursed softly.

"I didn't know you had pets, Matt."

"We didn't until about three weeks ago. Then Martha started dragging in every cat she could find. At last count we had ten. Martha!" he called. "Martha!"

Only hot silence greeted his words.

"Tess, I'm sorry about this odor. Martha ran off our maid and she just refuses to do much cleaning. The woman needs help mentally, but I can't get her in to see the doctor.

Tess's eyes took in the mess in the den. The place was positively filthy. Matt had gone off walking through the house, looking for his wife. Tess stepped over the cats who were winding around her ankles. The sensation was annoying.

She stepped into what she knew was Martha's bathroom, clicked on the lights, and recoiled in revulsion.

The bathroom was just plain nasty. Worse than filthy. She stepped to the mirror and looked at her reflection. But it was not her reflection. The thing staring back at her was hideous-appearing, with matted hair and rotting and mottled flesh. Male or female; Tess couldn't tell.

Tess started screaming.

Noreen leaned back in her chair in the lounge. "Tony, that's the wildest tale I've ever heard."

"I warned you."

"And you think ... what?"

"Noreen, I don't know what to think. But somebody's going to have to come up with some hard evidence before I accept this devil worship stuff."

"Well, whatever is happening might work out best for us at the clinic."

"What do you mean?"

"None of the nurses' aides showed up. Only one orderly, and the kitchen is closed."

"I thought the place was rather quiet."

Noreen glanced at her watch. "Tess should be coming along shortly. Want me to send her right to your office?"

"You? Where is the receptionist?"

"She didn't show up."

A foul, sickening odor was drifting out of the mirror; the image in the mirror had opened its mouth, exposing needle-pointed teeth, the tongue blood-red.

"Jesus Christ!" Matt said, jerking Tess out of the bathroom. He slammed the door.

"Wha ... what? ..." Tess managed to stammer. Her heart was hammering.

"I don't know, Tess. I don't know. And I don't know where Martha is. She's never been one for practical jokes."

"That was no joke, Matt. Matt? Drive me to the hospital, will you? I've got an appointment to see Dr. Livaudais."

"Sure. Come on. I can't take the smell in this house any longer."

They drove straight to the hospital, meeting Sonny Pa.s.son in the lobby. One look at the chiefs face and they knew the man was very angry.

"You heard about Andrea Golden?" Sonny asked.

"No," Tess and Matt replied.

"I just got fired and Tess just quit," Matt told Sonny.

Sonny digested that for a few seconds. "G.o.dd.a.m.n town has gone nuts," he said. "Where was I? Andrea was raped this morning. Her parents are refusing to press charges. I can't get in touch with Juvenile. People are fighting and shacking up and getting drunk and ... and ..." He waved his hand in disgust. "s.h.i.t!" he said, then walked out the front door.

"He's got a point," Matt said so only Tess could hear.

"What, Matt?"

"Whole town going nuts."

Tony Livaudais walked up to the couple. "Please tell me you don't have some supernatural experience you want to relate, Tess?" But he said it with a smile.

The smile soon vanished as Tess began talking. She didn't wait for Tony to show her to his office, just began talking, standing there in the lobby of the small clinic. She spoke in a gush of released emotions. As Tess talked, the third doctor at the clinic, Oscar Martin, and the other nurses gathered, standing quietly, listening, most with disbelief clearly visible in their eyes.

Matt saw the disbelief in their eyes. He said, "Don't smile too much, people. I saw that thing in the mirror, too. And it was real."

One of the younger nurses shuddered at his words.

When Tess finished speaking, no one among the hospital staff said a word. Before anyone could manage to speak, a loud crash came from down the hall. A gurgling scream ended in a wet bubbling sound. Doctors, nurses, and former schoolteachers ran toward the sound.

Tony threw out his hand, halting those behind him. The one orderly who had shown up for work that day lay in a spreading pool of blood. His eyes had been ripped from his head and his throat had a great gaping hole in it. Blood was squirting from the wound with each beat of the young man's heart. The orderly began jerking as death drew nearer with each labored beat of his heart.

Looking around, Tony could not find the man's missing eyes.

"Walt Davis is gone," Noreen said, looking into the room where Walt had been housed.

"Where did those come from?" Matt asked, pointing to the tracks in the blood; tracks that led toward a door at the end of the hall. They were not human footprints.

"What made them?" a nurse asked, as the orderly's heart stopped beating and death took him winging.

"Cats," Dr. Martin said. "But how the h.e.l.l did cats get into the clinic?"

"And how did a cat open that door?" Noreen asked.

No one ventured an opinion.

The corridor was suddenly filled with a strange sound. The men and women listened for a moment. Finally, Tony said, "What the h.e.l.l is that sound?"

"Purring," Noreen said. "Purring."

BOOK TWO.

But first on earth, as vampires sent, But first on earth, as vampires sent, Thy corpse shall from the tomb be rent, Then ghastly haunt thy native place, And suck the blood of all thy race. -Byron -Byron

THE FIRST NIGHT OF THREE.

1.

A violent thunderstorm shook the land, nature's way of relieving the fierce heat that had been baking Becancour and the immediate area around the small town.

And as suddenly as the storm appeared, the people of Becancour took to their homes and stayed there.

Well ... almost almost everybody. everybody.

Walt Davis crouched naked under a house near the old Dorgenois mansion. He was quite comfortable despite his nakedness.

He was surrounded by cats. The silent felines kept him quite warm and dry.

Jackson Dorgenois and Mary Claviere left the house when full night touched the land, coming a bit earlier because of the darkened storm clouds. They left the stolen car and walked toward Becancour after Mary changed out of her nurse's uniform and into some jeans and shirt she'd found in the house. Both were barefooted. The stones and twigs and sticks under their feet did not seem to bother them as they walked through the woods and fields toward Becancour.

Bonnie Rogers stepped out of her house to sit on the porch. She enjoyed the storm; it was like an immensely satisfying s.e.xual experience. As the lightning seared closer to earth and the thunder pounded, Bonnie shook with one climax after the other, for she knew who was sending the storm, and she loved the Master for it.

"The first night," she whispered, her voice not audible above the raging thunder and lightning storm. "Now they will begin to stir and move and seek escape from their rotting homes."

Bonnie threw back her head and howled with laughter as the storm raged.

Dave Porter lay on the bed in the motel room and thought savage thoughts of his wife and her friend, Susan. He had plans for both of them ... plans that would soon become reality ... just as soon as the Master signaled.

Jimmy Perkins silently prowled the stormy nigh oblivious to the storm around him. The rain did not bother him, for it was not sent by G.o.d. But by his G.o.d. Jimmy laughed silently, the lightning flashes glistening off a blood-red tongue and teeth that were as pointed as daggers. He lightly ran his tongue over his teeth. For the first time in a long time he was hungry for the taste of warm living human blood.

"The first night," Jimmy muttered. "The first night."

He laughed as he hunted.

And young Bob Savoie, who would never grow older, heard the silent call of his Master.

"Vous arrivez juste a temps." Bob spoke for the first time in decades. His voice was raspy and deep. The word echoed about his dank and satin-lined home. Bob spoke for the first time in decades. His voice was raspy and deep. The word echoed about his dank and satin-lined home.

And the Master spoke to him. Bob listened intently.

"Oui," Bob said. "Now?" Bob said. "Now?"

Soon, the silent message reached him through the grave.

Bob opened his dead eyes. He flexed stiff fingers. He grew impatient.

Soon, the message came to him, calming him. Bob relaxed.

Soon. Very soon.

Bob closed his eyes and waited.

There were no patients in the clinic. For the first time in memory, Tony Livaudais's clinic was empty. He sent those who had shown up for work back home.

"Don't make me go home, Dr. Livaudais," Andrea begged him. "Please don't."

"I won't, Andrea," he a.s.sured her. He called Don at the substation.

"I'm going to take Andrea home with me," he told the deputy. "Lena won't have it any other way. I just can't send her back to her parents. And I don't give a good G.o.dd.a.m.n what Juvenile thinks about it."

"They'll never know about it, Tony. I d.a.m.n sure won't tell them."

Tony shut down the clinic, and with Andrea's hand in his, they stepped out into the thunder, lightning, and rain-lashed night. They stopped under the canopy protecting the ambulance. The storm was so intense it made normal conversation impossible. Tony could feel the girl's fright as she stood close to him.

And Tony wasn't all that inwardly calm himself. He kept an outwardly calm facade for the girl's sake, but he was jumpy.

The orderly's body had been taken to the funeral home after Sonny and Don had made their reports and taken the stories of those present. Neither man had shown any signs of surprise at the cat tracks or the stories of hearing that ... that purring purring sound. sound.

To Tony's mind, that meant the cops had accepted the idea that the devil was at work in Becancour.

Nonsense!