A Creepy Case of Vampires
Barnes & The Brains
Kenneth Oppel
Dedication
for Philippa
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1 Spooked
Chapter 2 Wooden Stakes and Silver Bullets
Chapter 3 Night Visitor
Chapter 4 A Critical Stage
Chapter 5 One More Chance
Chapter 6 In the Shop
Chapter 7 Home Sweet Home
Have you read all of the Barnes & the Brains adventures?
Also By Kenneth Oppel
Copyright
About the Publisher
Chapter 1
Spooked
“You lousy geniuses!” shouted Mr Wallace from his doorway, wiping water and soapsuds from his face. “That’s the last time I hire you three! Pests, that’s what you are! Pests!”
Giles Barnes hurried away from the house with Tina and Kevin Quark, clutching their tools, soaked to the skin.
“I think that’s what you’d call an unhappy customer,” Giles said.
“He sure seems upset,” said Kevin.
“And why is that, do you think, Kevin?” Tina demanded angrily. “Do you think it has something to do with what happened in his kitchen just now?”
“It was an accident,” muttered her brother.
“Do you think it has anything to do with the three inches of water on his floor, and the shattered dishes, and the volcano of soapsuds?”
“I told him I was sorry,” Kevin mumbled.
Mr Wallace had hired Tina and Kevin Quark’s genius business to come and fix his dishwasher. It was supposed to be a simple job. But somewhere along the line, a few wires got crossed. Before anyone knew what was happening, the dishwasher had turned itself on and was spewing out water and soapsuds and dishes and glasses—and a few pots and pans, too. It was like a typhoon and volcanic eruption rolled into one. By the time Tina had managed to shut it off, the kitchen was in ruins and Mr Wallace was beside himself.
“You connected the wrong wires, Kevin,” Tina told her brother.
“They all looked the same.”
“There were an awful lot of wires,” Giles pointed out.
“This will not be good for business,” Tina said gloomily. “By the time this gets around, our brand name credibility will be seriously damaged.”
As they trudged home, wet and discouraged, none of them noticed the small, black, pointy shapes that soared overhead in the darkening sky.
“Well, Tina’s banned me from the workshop,” said Kevin the next day.
“Because of the dishwasher thing?” asked Giles.
“Mr Wallace called our parents and now we have to pay him back for all the dishes we broke. Tina got really angry with me and called me a biohazard.”
“Look, I’ll chip in my share for the broken dishes. That’s only fair.”
Giles and Kevin were walking home past the old church at the edge of their neighbourhood. Giles had always liked the church, but not on windy evenings like this, when the trees twitched and the graveyard danced with shadows. The sun was just sinking out of sight, and fog was already rolling in off the river.
“Hey, what’s that on the tower?” Kevin said suddenly.
Giles looked up at the church’s bell tower. It looked like the turret of a castle, with notched crenellations and slit windows all around. Even from quite far away, Giles could see clearly that there was someone up there.
He was a tall, hunched figure, dressed in a billowing black cape. Wisps of fog curled around him, and as he turned toward them, Giles felt his knees go watery. The man’s face was like a furry black mask, with only a flash of pale flesh around eyes which, in the dying light, seemed to glitter dark red.
“You see that, Barnes?” said Kevin in a quavering voice.
“I see it,” whispered Giles.
The figure stretched out a bony arm, as if pointing down at them. All at once, fog boiled up around him, and when it cleared, he had vanished. But swooping around the tower was a large bat, its wings slashing through the twilight.
Without warning, a whole swarm poured from the windows of the bell tower. Dozens of bats—maybe even hundreds—wheeled through the air, flickered over the graveyard, and then swooped straight down towards Giles and Kevin.
“Run!” Giles shouted.
Shoulders scrunched up around their ears and hands clamped over their heads, the two boys charged past the graveyard. They didn’t dare look back. They veered around the next corner, barrelled on down the street, and didn’t stop running till they had reached Kevin’s house.
Chapter 2
Wooden Stakes and Silver Bullets
“A vampire?” Tina said.
“Sure looked like it,” puffed Giles, still breathless. “Tall, black cape, pale skin—the works.”
“A vampire,” she said again, slowly, as if rolling the thought over in her head. She smiled faintly. “How interesting. How quaint.”
“Quaint?” exclaimed Kevin. “You should have seen it!”
Tina sighed and put down the fat science textbook she’d been reading for fun. She didn’t look much like her brother, who was tall and gangly, with curly red hair and freckles. Tina was quite small, with two perfect blond braids and a crease in her forehead—because she was always thinking hard about her next brilliant scientific breakthrough. Giles was certain she was the smallest genius in the world.
“And there were bats everywhere!” added Kevin. “That’s what vampires do, isn’t it? They turn into bats!”
“Kevin,” sighed his sister, “I think your brain is overheated. And Barnes, you aren’t much better.”
“You weren’t there!” Giles objected. “It was terrifying!”
“We’re going to need garlic,” Kevin began, counting off on his fingers. “We’re going to need holy water, we’re going to need wooden stakes and silver bullets, we’re going to need—”
“Vampires don’t exist,” said Tina calmly. “What you saw was just a regular person on the church tower—probably one of the bell ringers.”
“They only come during the day!” said Giles, who could hear the church bells from his house.
“And how do you explain the bats?” Kevin demanded.
“Bats always come out at dusk,” said Tina. “They are nocturnal animals. That means they feed at night.”
“Feed at night,” said Kevin in a strangled voice. “Did you hear that, Barnes? They’re feeding at night. Here. In our neighbourhood!”
Giles swallowed. He didn’t like the sound of that one little bit.
“All right,” sighed Tina. “Tomorrow we’ll go have a look at the church. But this is all very unscientific. I just want you to know that.”
After school the next day, Giles, Kevin, and Tina headed back to the old church. As they neared the graveyard, Kevin stopped and opened his backpack.
“I couldn’t find any garlic,” he said, “but I did make a couple of wooden stakes.”
He handed Giles three short pieces of wood which had been sharpened to a point, and then plunged his hand back into his backpack.
“I also brought a little mirror—that’s how you tell if someone’s a vampire, because you can’t see them in a mirror. And I found an old crucifix in Mom’s jewellery case. That drives off a vampire if you hold it up to his face. I called around to some stores to see if they had any silver bullets, but they said they were sold out. And anyway, they wouldn’t be much use without a gun. But,” he said proudly, “I did manage to get a feather duster.”
He held up a ridiculous, stubby little duster with a purple handle and purple feathers.
> Giles stared at it. “What’s that do?” he said.
“What do you mean?” Kevin said impatiently. “It drives off vampires.”
“I’m not so sure, Kevin. I’ve never heard that.”
“Oh,” said Kevin, his face falling. “I, uh, thought I heard it somewhere.”
Tina sighed impatiently. “Kevin, this is all a waste of time. There’s no such thing as vampires.”
“I guess you don’t want a wooden stake then,” said Giles, offering her one.
“Please, don’t insult my intelligence.”
Giles and Kevin divided up the vampire gear, and Kevin reluctantly put the feather duster back in his backpack.
“I’m sure I heard something about feather dusters and vampires,” he muttered.
They walked through the graveyard, past crooked tombstones worn smooth by time. Giles had to admit that, in broad daylight, the church didn’t look nearly as scary as it had last night. Maybe Tina was right after all. But he was still glad to have a wooden stake and a mirror handy.
“You say you saw someone up there?” said Tina, pointing to the bell tower.
“Yes,” said Giles. There was certainly no one there now.
“Well, let’s have a look inside,” said Tina.
“Inside?” said Kevin. “Maybe that’s not such a good idea.”
“How else can we be sure?” said Tina, striding on ahead, clearly enjoying herself. “Maybe we’ll find Count Dracula’s coffin up there in the tower! Wouldn’t that be a treat! Then you can use your stake on him. What fun!”
“I don’t think she’s taking this seriously,” Kevin whispered to Giles.
“She’s pretty sure of herself, isn’t she?” said Giles. “I bet she’d be scared if she saw a real live vampire.”
“Doubt it,” said Kevin. “The vampire would probably take one look at her and beg for mercy.”
They reached the front of the church. Around the stone archway was a border of chiselled bird heads, their ferociously sharp beaks pointing in toward the large double doors. There was no doorknob, only a huge ring of braided iron.
Tina lifted the ring and tried to turn it, but it wouldn’t budge. Giles and Kevin gave it a try together, without any luck. Then Giles noticed the huge keyhole beneath the ring. He knelt down and peered through it. It was so dark inside the church that he couldn’t see much.
Then it seemed to get even darker—pitch black. All at once, the door jerked away from him and he lurched forward onto the stone floor. At his nose were two big black shoes.
“The vampire!” he heard Kevin shout.
Giles looked up in terror, and saw a man in black towering above him. He scrambled backwards so fast that he knocked Kevin and Tina down onto the grass. Then he noticed the priest’s white collar.
“I’m certainly no vampire,” said the priest with a faint smile. “I’m Father Peter. May I help you?”
“Oh,” said Kevin, quickly stashing his wooden stake in his backpack. Giles slowly stood up and dusted off his jeans. Father Peter was certainly not the man they’d seen last night on the tower. For one thing, the priest wasn’t nearly as tall, and he was heavier, with white hair and a beard.
Tina stepped forward to take charge.
“Father Peter,” she said in her most businesslike voice. “Please excuse the oafish behaviour of my associates. My name’s Tina Quark. This is Kevin Quark, no relation, and Giles Barnes. You may have heard of our local genius business.”
“Well, I can’t say I have,” said Father Peter.
Tina snapped her fingers at her brother. “Kevin, our business card.”
“Oh, right,” said Kevin, fumbling in his pocket. He dragged out a crumpled bit of cardboard, tried unsuccessfully to smooth it, and then offered it apologetically to Father Peter.
“‘Local geniuses,’” he read aloud. “‘Capable of just about everything.’”
“Good thing he hasn’t heard about the Wallaces’ dishwasher,” Kevin whispered to Giles.
“We have a very impressive success rate,” Tina told the priest. “And I should tell you that I’m a genius with eleven years of experience.”
“How old are you?” the priest asked, amazed.
“Eleven,” said Tina.
“I see.”
“Now, Kevin and Barnes here said they saw bats in your bell tower last night.”
“I don’t doubt it,” said Father Peter. “I’ve had a terrible bat problem lately. Just the last few days, really. I don’t know where they’ve all come from. And I certainly don’t know how I’m going to get rid of them!”
“Perhaps we can be of some service, then,” said Tina.
Father Peter looked at her strangely for a moment. “Well, perhaps you can. Please, come inside.”
Giles had never been inside this church before. It was very old, and the stone walls seemed to slope inward slightly from the roof. There was a huge baptismal font in the central aisle, made of ancient, rough stone. Narrow stained glass windows were set into the walls. It was very quiet.
“It’s a real problem,”‘ Father Peter told them. “You’ve heard that old phrase, ‘bats in the belfry’? Now I know what it means! My bell pullers refuse to go up into the tower now. They say they’re getting swooped by bats. And it’s not just the tower. The little fiends have got into the rafters, too.”
Father Peter pointed up toward the darkness of the high-beamed ceiling. Giles shuddered to think of all the bats up there, hanging upside down by their claws, wings folded tight.
“At the evening mass, you can see them fluttering around. I’ve had people run out in terror! And, quite frankly, the droppings are becoming a real problem. All over the pews and the floor!”
“Father Peter,” said Tina, “I think we can solve your bat problem. I should be able to whip something up…quite a simple matter, really…yes…yes…”
And Giles could see that she was momentarily lost in thought, her small head churning with numbers and formulas and mathematical symbols.
“Yes,” she said after a while, “I think I know just the thing.”
“Well, I’d be most grateful,” said Father Peter, surprised.
“Kevin will send you an estimate,” she said.
“Yes, of course,” said the priest. “Running a genius business must be expensive.”
“It’s the cost of the human help,” said Tina seriously, looking at Kevin. “Sometimes they’re more trouble than they’re worth. You’ve got to keep an eye on them.”
They said good-bye to Father Peter and made their way back through the graveyard.
“Well, another job for the genius business,” said Tina happily. “Should be a snap.”
Giles looked back over his shoulder at the bell tower. A few bats flickered out through the slit windows into the dimming sky. He shivered. If everything was so simple, then why had all those bats come here in the first place? And who—or what—was that mysterious figure on the tower last night?
Chapter 3
Night Visitor
Scritch. Scritch, screetch. Scriiiiiiiittttchhhhh.
Giles’s eyes popped open. It was the middle of the night. A strange scratching noise was coming from outside his window. It sounded like an old, brittle twig scraping against the glass. Probably just some of those dead ivy vines his father had forgotten to cut back in the summer. But then, through the curtains, he thought he saw a strange shadow…
Giles slowly slipped out of bed and padded silently across the room. His heart pounded. He reached the window, took a deep breath, and threw back the curtains.
There was a flash of red light from upside-down eyes. A bat hung by its claws from the outer window frame. It had thick black fur and sharply pointed ears, and Giles could see tiny, needle teeth in its open jaws.
He was frozen in terror. With a squeak, the bat quickly dropped from the window, stretched its wings, and swooped down into the fog that blanketed the road. Giles’s teeth chattered furiously. Just as he was about to close the c
urtains and dive back into bed, he heard footsteps on the pavement.
From out of the fog came the man they had seen on the bell tower! He walked straight past the front of Giles’s house, his black cape flowing around him, and then disappeared once more into the night.
“Mom, do we have any garlic?” Giles asked at breakfast.
“Garlic?” said his mother, looking at him strangely. “What for?”
“Oh, just vampires,” said Giles breezily.
Mr Barnes looked up from his bowl of cereal.
“Vampires?” he said.
“Garlic’s supposed to protect you from vampires.”
“Will you be running into many today?” his mother inquired.
“Well, you know all those bats we saw over at the old church? I think there might be a vampire with them.”
“That’s ridiculous,” said Mrs Barnes. She was a professor of mathematics at the university, and she didn’t like anything that couldn’t be explained by long equations. It was almost impossible for her to believe in anything even slightly supernatural—even the one time her own house was filled to bursting with genuine ghost birds.
“Well, Tina agrees with you,” Giles told his mother. “But I’m not so sure. Anyway, we’re trying to help Father Peter get rid of his bats.”
“Hmm. I hope you three aren’t making a nuisance of yourselves,” his mother said, frowning. “I was on the phone to Mr Wallace for almost half an hour, trying to calm him down. I don’t want an angry call from the local priest next.”
Giles nodded and sighed. It seemed that every time something went wrong with the genius business, everyone forgot all the successes they’d had, and only remembered the bad things. It wasn’t much fun being thought of as a pest.
“You’d better give him some garlic,” Mr Barnes said to his wife, winking at Giles.
“Humph,” said Mrs Barnes, but started rooting around in one of the drawers. “I think I’ve got a few cloves around here somewhere…here.”
She put half a bulb of garlic on the kitchen table. Giles looked at it dubiously.