by J Dune
Lieutenant Columbo struggled to breathe. The crude spin of the burlap sack was doing its job.
The van shook like a nervous hand— and the Lieutenant counted each kicked-up rock that pinged its side. Last time, it took him sixty four ricocheted pebbles before they had reached their destination. Now, he had already counted one hundred and two.
“Gentlemen, could I—“ Another shudder. One hundred three, one hundred four.
“Uh, could I lift this just a tiny bit? I’d like to smoke, sirs,” he finished, slowly raising his hands.
Before they had gotten past his stomach, there was an unmistakable click of a firearm being pointed in his direction. The Lieutenant’s hands became inert again.
Fifteen rock-dings later, the vehicle came to a stop. When it started again, the road had become smooth. Inside the van, things were so quiet that the Lieutenant preemptively softened his breath in order to mitigate the chances of another barrel being pointed at his face.
They sat in silence until they stopped again, and Lieutenant Columbo was hastily forced out of the car, gunmetal occasionally poking into his back and sides. He was inched forward— carefully and forcibly navigating unknown terrain as if he were walking a tightrope. It was cool, but without wind. The ground was clearly concrete, and coupling that with the faint buzz of high-intensity lighting, the detective ascertained that they were likely in a tunnel.
“Stop,” one of the men said, and the Lieutenant stopped. There were sounds of finger-punching, and after a moment, the industrial groan of a moving piece of metal. The barrel of the gun moved the Lieutenant again, this time away from the cold, tunnel air, and into a more controlled environment.
The man removed the sack from Columbo’s head. A clash of whites and blues blinded the detective, who shielded his eyes temporarily. When he came to, he took in the features of what was apparently a waiting room— as sterile as a hospital’s— and decoratively empty save for a row of metal chairs lined against the wall. The lieutenant seated himself as he watched his captor speak into a wired receiver attached to an intercom. The man was dressed inconspicuously conspicuous; jeans, a checkered shirt, and a pair of Aviators— a deceptively ordinary outfit. The man ended the transmission and stood, hands folded. Columbo pointed towards his mouth, gesturing for a cigar. Still nothing.
The room jumped, and so did the Lieutenant. He felt the ground below shake and give way, the entire room slowly dropping like an elevator car. The corner-man did not react, but the Lieutenant preemptively placed his head in his hand, stealing his stomach.
Eventually, the room grounded itself again with a final shake, and the detective finally had the courage to look again. The eastern wall hissed as it split in two, revealing a larger extension of the waiting room just passed the steel innards of the elevator system. A familiar face walked into view, and the detective shot up instantly.
“Officer Nielsen!” Columbo shouted, and moved in to extend his hand. The man was clad in uniform— a dark blue suit coat lined with multitudes of insignia over his chest. The largest sat upon his shoulder, an emblem bearing the three-fold arrow of the organization the Lieutenant had come to know as the Foundation. The detective took notice of a heap of manila folders pressed at the man’s side.
The Englishman clasped the detective’s hand and laughed. “Director now, Lieutenant— of the entire Anomalous Crimes Department. I do hope my men weren’t too rough on the way down. I know pigs tend to squeal when corralled,” he said with a grin.
“Oh, no, sir. I completely understand the need for secrecy. This whole operation you’re running? Only makes sense.” Columbo gestured to the corner-guard again, and then back at the Director. “Oh, uh— can I smoke now? Just a cigar, sir.”
“Whatever makes you comfortable Lieutenant.”
The detective groaned in relief as the tobacco paper filled his mouth.
“Come now, man. We need your talents.”
The group led Columbo down the hall, and deeper into the facility. On occasion, the detective attempted to sneak glances into the passing rooms, and found only black-tinted glass to meet his gaze.
“This is incredible, Director. Incredible. Boy, this ought to be a government facility with the elevators, and all these rooms, I mean— where on earth do you get the funding for this stuff?”
“Money flows, Lieutenant, and we follow. An upgrade from our previous facility, wouldn’t you say?”
Columbo shook his head in disbelief, both in dissatisfaction at the Director’s explanation and in agreement at his question. “That old office building? Oh, yeah. Certainly.”
Nielsen stopped the group at a room whose placard labeled it LA-91, and placed his finger on a small pad. The lock hissed open, and the Director opened the door for the rest of the group. Columbo looked at the grey pad in awe.
“Biometrics. State of the art.”
“But how—“
“It ensures that I will never lose my key card, detective. Its been placed beneath the skin.”
Columbo nodded, still examining the device. “Better hold onto that finger then, sir.”
The Director laughed. “Indeed. In here, gentlemen.”
After they had settled into the conference room— which was as minimal and stark as the rest of the base— the Director took a seat opposite of the detective.
“A test of your deduction. Why are you here?” the Director asked.
Columbo took a puff. “Well, if I had to guess…” a smile crept onto his face, “it would be the Beau Wolf case, sir.”
The Director shook his head. “You are magnificent. You really are. How did you know?”
“Ah, it’s just that— well, the past four times you contacted me, it always had to do with the most recent case. That happens to be Mr. Wolf at the moment.”
The Director clicked his tongue. “And here I thought you caught on to some evidently arcane detail that had plucked the case from the realm of the ordinary.”
“Apologies, sir. Just noticed the pattern.”
The director handed off a folder to his guard, who placed it in front of the detective. Columbo hesitated before opening it. “Now, you’ve got me worried, was I supposed to notice something unnatural about Mr. Wolf?”
“To be honest, Detective. We’re not sure there’s anything to it ourselves.”
Columbo studied the photographs inside. They were xeroxed copies of the same pictures that Officer Harrison took at the scene, only they hadn’t lost a touch of quality in the process. In some ways, they looked even cleaner than the originals. “Is, uh, Officer Harrison an asset too? They’re his photographs.”
“Many tentacles, Lieutenant. Many tentacles,” the Director replied.
“Well, it doesn’t matter. Can’t say I see anything out of the ordinary, sir.”
“Would you say Mr. Wolf was not a typical victim?”
“Oh, no, sir. Not at all. He was affluent, connected, had his hands in a lot of cookie jars if you understand what I’m saying. He was a very typical victim, sir,” Columbo replied. “Very typical.”
“What of suspects, Lieutenant?”
“Well, cases like this are one of two types— and this is just my opinion, of course. Either everyone wants a piece, and I have my work cut out for me over the next few months,” Columbo said, puffing away, “or someone goes above and beyond to unwittingly incriminate themselves from the moment they step back onto the scene.”
“And which type of case is this?”
“I’m hoping Mr. Munteanu can clear that up for me tomorrow. Given that it was his campaign Mr. Wolf was managing.”
“You haven’t met with Munteanu yet?”
“No, sir. That’s tomorrow’s agenda. My wife, uh, you know that thing she has— with her nerves. I think I told you about it last time we talked. They act up, and when they act up— sometimes it gets real bad. I mean, ‘she could be paralyzed if we don’t do something about it’ kind of bad.”
“Yes, I do remember you mentioning. I’m sorry to hear tha—“
“Well, she had an emergency while I was out on the job, I had to leave, we weren’t able to bring Munteanu in, you can understand. She’s alright now, but we figured it would be best to pencil it in for the next day.”
“In that case, I’m glad we’re able to fill you in prior to your first meeting,” the Director said as he slid another folder across the table. This one was large, and stuffed with documents. “A brief dossier should get you up to speed.”
“On Mr. Munteanu?” Columbo asked, opening the folder. He found himself greeted by a large sketch of a caped man, fanged and red-eyed.
“On Count Dracula, Lieutenant.”
The Grand Molina was lined from top to bottom with an open-eared audience.
Lieutenant Columbo failed to find a row among them without someone sporting a Munteanu shirt, sign, or pendant. The man had honed in on a type of fanaticism reserved for presidential elections on a local level. While the detective understood that Munteanu was a popular candidate as much as anyone in L.A did, the intensity of it all had escaped him until now. Cases were piling up seemingly faster than ever, and a once-proud follower of local politics found himself shamefully out of the loop when it came to Los Angeles’ current political darling. But after the revelations that Director Neilsen revealed earlier that morning, maybe it was a positive to go into Munteanu’s case blind, Columbo thought.
Dracula. He had turned the idea over in his head all morning. Dracula— the same vampire that Stroker had turned into a household name, and Hollywood into a cultural icon— was not only both extant and alive, but running for the mayor’s seat as well. It was unbelievable, but so were the past cases the Foundation had involved the Lieutenant in.
Every outing with the organization had illuminated a previously unknown facet of reality for the detective, and the only way he managed to rationalize it all was by reminding himself that there were already thousands upon thousands of individuals working in the shadows to keep the supernatural hidden away. He wasn’t supposed to know about it, and now that he was let in on it, the only response was to adapt and move on— like a fresh piece of evidence that invalidated a prior suspicion. Adaptability was the mettle that separated those who cleared cases, and those who didn’t.
Columbo watched Munteanu from the field, watching the stage and taking in the way he interacted with his staff. Cordial, convivial— a natural politician, complete with handshakes and smiles. He noted the almost-golden tint that hung on the man’s skin— both illuminating and sickly at once. The Director had pointed out that it was a natural side-effect of sun sickness immunization therapy— one of the vampiric sciences. The media had spun it as an affable quirk.
The speech hit all of the right notes. ‘This great city’, ‘each and every one of you’, ‘scratched and clawed’, and so on. The lieutenant was impressed, admittedly— it took genuine charisma to make material so tired seem palatable. The slight hint of a foreign accent pointed towards working class roots, possibly as a second-generation immigrant, but the Count had clearly stamped enough of it down to still appeal to an American audience. A partisan candidate through and through, never leaning too deep into a particular slant on one issue, and outright avoiding those that would required him to do so. The Foundation suspected ulterior motives, but Columbo didn’t. This wasn’t the disposition of a man with an agenda— but someone looking to permanently ascend to a more comfortable life.
When the rally had ended, the Lieutenant began to prowl, moving through the crowd towards the main stage. Munteanu was already engaged in lobbying, shaking hands with a suited man near the guard-rail. Security blocked the Lieutenant’s path, refusing to budge even when presented with a police badge. The men only eased off when Munteanu waved them away, motioning for Columbo to join his conversation.
“Lieutenant Columbo!” the politician shouted. The detective was bewildered, not having previously introduced himself.
“Don’t be shy, Lieutenant,” Munteanu continued. “I was just speaking to Mr. Patterson here, from the House. Your department might be getting that increased funding I know you’ve all been waiting for.”
The detective smiled, shaking both of their hands. “Oh, we get by. But thank you, sir, it’d be a tremendous help.”
“Enjoy the speech, Lieutenant?” Patterson asked. “You seem like a Munteanu man just looking at you.”
”Well, I’m a little ashamed to admit that it was my first time hearing him speak. We vote in our house, sir, but this past election cycle, you know, you just can’t find the time.”
“So, officially a new convert, Lieutenant?” Munteanu said, grinning. The detective took note of the man’s false teeth.
“I can’t say just yet, sir. But I’m intrigued. I am intrigued.”
Patterson took a telegraphed glance at his watch. “Vinny, I have to go, but let me know when you’re free for lunch. We’ll do Genevieve’s.” Munteanu gave another patented smile and let him go.
Columbo shook his head, taking a long puff of his cigar. “Have, uh, we met before, sir?”
“Of course not, Lieutenant. You showed that badge to my security, and I just figured it had to be you. We still have our meeting in a half hour, after all.”
“Right, sir. That would explain it,” Columbo said, slightly upset that he hadn’t intuited that himself. “I thought I would stop by, hear what you had to say. Very impressive speech, sir. The way you hold the crowd in the palm of your hand is just beautiful. Beautiful, sir.”
“They’re the ones willing to listen. This campaign has been a gift— being able to resonate with so many people,” Munteanu said, motioning the detective to walk alongside him. Columbo pushed through oncoming foot-traffic as the two strolled, the metal guard-railing between them.
“I’d say. I was, uh, also wondering if you’d mention anything about Mr. Wolfe’s passing,” said the Lieutenant, still puffing. “It’s in the papers already. All this momentum you have, I figured it might come up.”
“Oh no, Lieutenant. Nothing on that until we talk about it first. I was turning away reporters in my sleep last night.”
“Well, that would be fault, sir. Our schedules and all, postponing the interview, I do apologize that we couldn’t do this earlier,” said Columbo, pushing past a distributor handing out Munteanu buttons to an eager crowd.
“Nonsense, the chief told me it was a familial emergency. Your wife is doing better, yes?”
“Uh, yeah, she is, thank you for asking.”
Munteanu put his hand up, almost motioning for silence. Something had apparently caught his eye in the distance— a group of suited men standing by a tree, flagging him down. The candidate forced out a sigh. “Ah, the bankers. Lieutenant, we did schedule our get-together a half hour from now. There’s so many people who want your time at these rallies, really, if I could ju—”
Columbo threw his hands up. “Absolutely not a problem, sir. Meet you at the house, then.”
”Wonderful. Wonderful, I’ll let the guards know!” Munteanu said with a quick handshake, practically running off to the banking group.
“Ah, Mr. Munteanu!” Columbo called out, leaning over the railing. The man turned back, puzzled. “Just one more thing, sir.”
”Yes, Lieutenant Columbo?”
”I’m working in equal capacity alongside the SCP Foundation. Letting you know for transparency’s sake and all.”
In less than a second, that golden hue had disappeared from the politician’s face, his trademark smile flatlining. He nodded, uneasily and repeatedly. “Yes, yes, of course,” he said, resurrecting the smile with difficulty. Munteanu turned, and walked away again.
“See you soon, sir!” Lieutenant Columbo yelled.
Munteanu Manor was hit by a storm as its proprietary owner charged into the front door. A maid stood back, clearly disturbed.
“Carm!” he shouted, tossing his coat aside and missing the rack. He called for her again to no avail. Munteanu grabbed at his forehead.
“Outside, Mr. Munteanu,” said Mrs. Gallows, the maid, regaining her courage. “The closed garden.”
“Thank you,” he said, rushing past the foyer and towards the sliding glass doors of the sun room.
Outside, Munteanu heard distant chatter. He wasn’t expecting guests. And then it dawned on him: he was. He navigated past the trimmed hedges and carefully kept flower beds, and into a bush-walled clearing that surrounded a tree— a reflective place.
Carmilla was being entertained.
“Oh, speak of the devil!” the Lieutenant said, somehow watching the tree and the hedges at the same time.
“Hello, Lieutenant. I— I hadn’t realized you would be here so early.”
“11:00, sir. Got to be punctual these days, you know how it is with traffic on a Thursday,” Columbo said. Munteanu was quickly beginning to realize just how much of what came out of this man’s mouth was absolute nonsense.
“The Lieutenant was just filling me in,” Carmilla said. “I should have figured the Foundation would take interest.”
He told her, Munteanu thought. If their game was pinning a murder on him, the Foundation was either playing with an open hand, or the Lieutenant was just as dimwitted as his attitude suggested.
“Yes, well, how about we start from square one, hm?” Munteanu said. “You sprung quite a shocker on me at the rally, Lieutenant.”
“I guess I did,” Columbo said, scratching his chin. “I’m sorry, sir. I just wanted to be transparent.” The Lieutenant plopped himself down underneath the tree, and spent a brief moment taking in the air. “You know, this is great, it really is. It’s a wonderful garden, sir. Boy, I would spend hours out here if I—“
“The Foundation, Lieutenant,” Munteanu pushed.
“Right, well, as you know, I’m LAPD, we’re following standard procedure on that front. But uh, I was informed about your identities, the whole vampire business. That came from the Foundation. In the unlikely event of Mr. Wolfe’s death having some sort, um, supernatural connection, the Foundation’s orders would take precedence. I’m sure you can understand, sir.”
Munteanu nodded. They obviously suspected him. Even without the vampiric connection, Wolfe was too close to Munteanu for him to escape scrutiny. In any situation, all there was to do was weather the storm as best he could. “You don’t intend to expose our identities, do you, Lieutenant? The Foundation has had a non-aggression pact with my family for nearly a century.”
“They would never, Vlad,” Carmilla said, speaking for the Lieutenant.
“Oh no, sir. I want to make that very clear,” said the detective. “To be honest, I don’t think it’d hurt your numbers one bit. Imagine the papers. ‘DRACULA’S SENSIBLE TAX POLICIES’, they’d love it.”
Carmilla laughed, and Vincent shot her a side-eye. When was the last time she laughed at one of his remarks?
“Can we get on to the investigation, Columbo?” Vincent diverted. “Given its secrecy, I do not find jabs at my identity humorous.”
“Oh, lighten up,” Carmilla said. “The Lieutenant’s joking.”
Whatever game she was playing was eluding him. “My dear, would you make us some tea? I’m sure the Lieutenant is famished from all the walking” he said, hoping that sending her away would be an optimal move. “Be quick, my love.”
Carmilla smiled, flashing her fangs. “Of course, my Count. Of course.” She walked through the bushes, and Vincent felt relief.
“Now, uh, Mr. Wolfe,” Columbo continued, almost seamlessly. “Mrs. Munteanu had told me that you two have known each other for about 3 years, always got along, never had any troubles— how would you put it?”
“Just the same, Lieutenant. Mr. Wolfe was an excellent campaign manager.”
“Was he aware of your identity?”
“Don’t talk nonsense, Columbo. If they’re not a documented vampire in that dossier you were certainly given, they would not know. They cannot know.”
“Uh-huh. Any enemies?”
“None that I knew of. He was a quiet sort.”
“Right. Would you say he struggled with any sort of, uh, personal vices?”
“Well, there was— it was quite embarrassing,” Munteanu said, feigning concern. “He was a drinker, a very heavy one. Whenever we would have a party, no matter the occasion, Beau would practically drain our wine reserves. The night of his death, in fact, was possibly the worst I had ever seen him.”
Columbo was jotting down notes at lightning speed, mumbling and nodding along.
“Do you think that it was alcohol poisoning, Lieutenant?” Munteanu said, seeding a basic diversion to feel out the Lieutenant’s deductive skills.
“Couldn’t have been,” Columbo replied. “The boys in the lab got back to me earlier. There was poison in the body, but it certainly wasn’t alcohol.”
“Poison?” Munteanu composed himself. There was nothing that could have linked himself to the murder. Getting out of this would be as simple as not telling on himself. “That sounds ridiculous, Lieutenant. Who on earth would poison a campaign manager?”
“Well, we’re trying to figure that out, sir,” said the Lieutenant. “Believe me, I’m with you. It’s strange. If someone had it out for Mr. Wolfe, you would think they’d choose a method of execution that didn’t put him so close to that party.”
“What do you mean?”
“We haven’t figured out the type of poison just yet, but it was a fast killer, sir. He was filled with it, and whatever it was, it must have been administered by someone at your party. It was too concentrated to be a slow poison, no, this was immediate.”
“At my party? Do you realize what you’re saying, Columbo? Could one of my staff have plotted to kill him?”
“I apologize, sir. I don’t mean to insinuate anything. I spoke to Gallows earlier, lovely lady. No, I don’t think that at all,” Columbo said, chewing his cigar. “There wouldn’t be a motive.”
“Attitudes toward Mr. Wolfe were ambivalent at their strongest. I’m struggling to find any reason why someone would want to kill him,” Munteanu said.
“I don’t disagree, sir. That’s a very good point. Usually in these cases it’s for money, an inheritance, insurance. But Mr. Wolfe, he was a solitary guy. Didn’t have much of that, and no family to speak of. Even the gate guard I spoke to at his estate didn’t know much about him. Do you find that funny, sir?”
“I find none of this funny, Lieutenant.”
“That no one knew anything about his personal life. Other campaigns he managed, political resume, where he got his fortune. That bothers me.”
“He was a gold hoarder, Lieutenant. You see it all the time among the wealthy. Affluence can breed antisocial behavior. Evidently, he had a reason to distance himself from society, especially if someone were willing to poison him.”
“Maybe, that’s a good point,” Columbo said, contemplating. “A good point.”
The Lieutenant jumped to his feet, and clapped his hands together. “Well, there are going to be a few things I’ll need from you.”
“Like what, Lieutenant?”
“A list of every guest in attendance at your party, as well as molds of your fangs. Oh, and Mrs. Munteanu’s fangs as well, right.”
“Are you— this is absurd— are you asking me to divulge the identities of other vampires?”
“Oh no, sir. The Foundation already knows their identities. We’d just like to know who was in attendance so we can—“
“Casting molds, Lieutenant? Are you pinning this whole thing on vampires just because you’ve learned about them yesterday? What reason do you have to suspect a vampire over any other guest at that party, of which there were hundreds, I might add.”
“We’ve found bite-marks on the neck. Police didn’t think anything of it, but the Foundation understood. Possibly how the poison was administered. Foundation already made casts of the fang marks. We just need to match them, sir.”
Munteanu was stunned. He rolled his tongue over his false teeth. Perhaps diverting the Lieutenant would be easier than he anticipated.
“Yes— yes, of course. I understand. That detail would narrow it down to a vampire. My concern is— well, the last person that had been seen with Mr. Wolfe was my wife. Carmilla took him home. You don’t think that she had anything to do with it, do you, Lieutenant?”
“It’s not fair to speculate, Mr. Munteanu,” Columbo said, moving out of the clearing. “Not until we get those teeth marks.”
“Yes, would sometime next week work for you?”
“Next week?” Columbo said, pulling the cigar from his mouth. “There’s two Foundation techs waiting at the gate. They want to get it done as soon as possible, sir. I’m sure you understand.”
The Count imagined killing him— lunging forward and tearing through that fat neck of his. Lieutenant Columbo’s arteries would certainly produce the most salivating drink. He could tell just from the way his veins bulged on his hands, and the curve of his neck. All of it could be done in an instant, and in another time, it would have been.
But Munteanu swallowed his retaliation, and forced out another one of his smiles. “The sooner, the better, Lieutenant.”
The Count was compliant, and not overly so. A stray comment directed at the Foundation techs here and there, but nothing significant other than the vampire’s deep-rooted disdain for the organization.
The transformations were unlike anything the detective had ever witnessed, even on his previous outings with the Foundation. In an instant, Vincent Munteanu had become an animal, faster than Columbo’s eyes could keep track of the changing shape. The detective ruminated on the encounter, sifting for details that he may have missed as he traced his fingers inside the soft, plaster contours of Dracula’s fangs.
”It’s not an illusion, Lieutenant,” the blond-haired tech had explained. “It’s condensing heat and mass into a new form, and altering the particles to suit a favored appearance.”
The Lieutenant struggled to understand, but the tech assured him that the exact science was equally difficult for the Foundation to quantify.
“My, uh, primary concern is that if a vampire is altering their appearance, wouldn’t it also be possible for them to alter the size and shape of their fangs?” Columbo said to the man in private, as soon as Munteanu was out of earshot. “You take fingerprints the right way, they’re accurate. No magic to worry about. These— how do we know he hasn’t changed his teeth?”
“It wouldn’t be possible,” the tech assured him. “A vampire who can change their shape has devoted years of their life to doing so. They study the form inside and out until they practically sear it onto their brain, constructing the exact image through focus. It’s easier if you build on a template that others have been using and focusing on for years— like tracing a picture as opposed to drawing one. There’s little difference, but you wouldn’t draw outside of the lines. And once the picture is finished, you wouldn’t want to waste time redrawing it again.”
Columbo nodded, his main takeaway from the researcher’s explanation being that if Dracula did murder Mr. Wolfe, he wouldn’t have had enough time over the past two days to alter the shape of his teeth in anticipation. But if Carmilla’s casts didn’t fit the bite marks, narrowing down the exact vampire would prove that much more difficult. Somewhere across town, other Foundation operatives were taking fang casts of local vampires that had attended the party. Word traveled, and if it got back to the murderer before the Foundation could take their cast, they could just as easily flee and escape the Foundation’s oversight like many vampires had before, as Director Neilsen explained.
The Foundation knocking down every vampire’s door certainly wasn’t going to help the investigation, Columbo thought.
There was an inherent distrust of the organization among most vampires, and if the Foundation were anything like the litter of LAPD incompetents that happened to share rank with the detective, noncompliance would be taken as an admission of guilt. Columbo had to play his cards right, and he had to put them on the table as fast as he could. Right now, the biggest stake was Dracula. That, he was sure of. Coming to a conclusion on the Count was paramount to the case’s success, regardless of his involvement in it. Neilsen had warned that investigating any large vampire clan could provoke tension between them and the Foundation, and Dracula’s was possibly the most high-profile of them all.
Columbo laid out the observations that he was absolutely sure of in his mind. One, Mr. Wolfe, had been poisoned. Two, Mr. Wolfe had been bitten by a vampire, possibly to administer the poison. Three, Mr. Wolfe had spent a night in the presence of over a dozen vampires. Four, Wolfe’s estate showed no signs of forced entry, which the gate-guard was certain was out of the question. Five, the last person to have been spotted with Mr. Wolfe was Carmilla, a vampire countess who, according to the Foundation, is more than capable of transfiguring her appearance. And six, the size of the fang marks taken from the cadaver were small, and more equivalent to those of a bat than a man, meaning that breaking and entering without alerting security was something that could have been done with ease. At the same time, Wolfe had been in such a drunken haze that the bite could just have easily been performed at the party itself.
“Don’t think too hard, Lieutenant,” Carmilla said, standing at the door to the Solarium in her ornate, silk dress. The mid-day sun had given her outline an illuminating glow. Somehow, the immunization therapy had given her skin a pale tint as opposed to a golden one.
Unlike her husband, the Lieutenant hadn’t been able to pry any underlying ugliness from beneath her well-groomed exterior. The way she interacted with him was certainly on the colder side, but without the passive aggressive snide of a wealthy couple’s failing marriage that the Lieutenant had become as proficient as a bloodhound in sniffing out. There may not have been love between them, but there was mutual understanding. A marriage of necessity between two creatures of the night— each benefiting from the other’s companionship as they raised their status together.
“I can’t help myself, Mrs. Munteanu,” Columbo said, bringing his eyes back to the casts.
“Carmilla— please,” she insisted. “They just took my teeth. I’m all clear.”
”Not that I don’t believe you, ma’am, but I’d have to hear it from them first.” Columbo continued to stare at the plaster with such intensity that he nearly bit through his cigar.
“Well, here’s something from me, and you can write this down in your reports,” Carmilla said. “I couldn’t bite through flesh even if I wanted to. And I do want to.”
The Lieutenant looked up, intrigued. “Yeah? Why not?”
“It’s my defanging cycle, Lieutenant,” she said, flashing a clearly-fanged smile. “Did the Foundation not explain basic biology to you?”
“I’m afraid I, uh, didn’t have time to read everything they gave me,” Columbo said. “Defanging cycle?”
”3 months on, 3 months off. It happens to all of us— our fangs grow dull, our fangs fall out, and sharp, new ones grow in. An element of bat biology found in the wild.”
”Just like bats, yeah. Yeah, I’ve heard of that, I saw it in one of those animal shows my wife likes,” the Lieutenant said, beginning to trail off before pulling himself back on course. “But you’ve got fangs. I can see them.”
“An evolutionary compensation. They’re false teeth, with no bite to them until fresh sharps push them out. And then the cycle repeats.”
“But, uh, how do you feed when you can’t use your fangs? I know feeding is a necessity— they did explain that to me.”
“The body stores proteins found in blood during feeding periods. It’s like hibernation, or storing food for the winter.”
The Lieutenant was intrigued, and passed her the casts of her husband’s teeth.
“Would you be able to tell if a pair of fangs is capable of feeding or not?”
Carmilla examined them, tracing her finger along the insides of the shape. She shook her head. “These are false, all three of them.”
Columbo lit his cigar again. Finally, a piece of information that Munteanu willfully omitted, despite being the detail that could have secured his innocence. It didn’t make sense. Why would the Count not mention that his fangs were unable to feed?
“So your husband, he couldn’t feed with these teeth?” Columbo asked, still kneading the details over in his mind.
Carmilla glanced at the cadaver’s cast. “Definitely not. They’re too dull to penetrate skin.”
“Why would he… not mention that to us? This whole fang cycle business.”
Carmilla laughed, as if he had told a joke. “It’s just natural to a vampire, Lieutenant. It’s easy to lose track of the things you Foundation types do and do not know about.”
“And, uh, forgive me for asking if this is personal— but, when you do feed, where do you get the blood?”
“From a vampire-owned blood bank, Lieutenant. We’re not the kind of animals who sneak off in the night to feed on unsuspecting prey anymore. Well, our brood, at least.”
“A blood bank? Like, from a donation center?”
”There’s always a demand for blood, Lieutenant, and not enough of it to go around. If you’ve donated, there’s a chance it went to a vampire. How does that make you feel, Mr. Columbo?”
“Happy to help,” the detective said, grinning. “Blood banks, ain’t that something…”
Columbo scribbled some more notes onto his pad, and gestured in a way that said that he conceded to her arguments. “Well, that explains that. Boy, I’m glad we were able to clear all of this up. Having Dracula as one of your suspects, jeez, you could imagine how scared I was, ma’am. I’ll never be able to watch those movies again, I’ll tell you that much.”
Carmilla laughed again, and this time she sounded genuine. “We’re not bad people, Lieutenant, despite what your Foundation must have told you. Vincent is a brown-noser, and a painfully obvious one at that, but killing is… behind him. He’s making an effort to change, even if the Foundation doesn’t believe that.”
”That’s another thing I just can’t wrap my head around. Why politics?”
”He says he sees it as an effort to rehabilitate his image, some sort of moral reconciliation with himself.”
“Wow, that’s admirable. That is very admirable,” said Columbo. He was beginning to understand the dynamic between the two vampires the more he spoke with Carmilla. A little more prodding, and some sort of relevant detail was bound to emerge.
“I think he’s full of shit,” she added.
There it was. “Excuse me?”
“This political game, there’s no penance about it. Vladimir ran out of money! This is just the easiest way to finance the lifestyle he got used to without having the Foundation shoving a stake up his cloak.”
“And, uh, that’s the only ulterior motive for moving into politics that you suspect? Financial troubles?”
“Easily. I listen to those speeches and cringe myself into the grave. The desperation…”
“Did Mr. Wolfe have some sort of financial arrangement with your husband?”
“You should ask him, Lieutenant. I have nothing to do with the finances. I sit, and listen, and appear at events, and shake hands with pigs in human skin after dinner. I don’t come closer to the campaign than I absolutely have to. We stick together to mutually assure our own security. And yes, Lieutenant, I still do love him— before you get any wild ideas,” Carmilla said. “It’s hard not to love a man who provides you with as many women as you desire.”
This was too much information to process at once. Columbo glanced at his notepad and simply wrote down ‘BOTH WAYS’.
“Well, um, I’ll get out of your hair, ma’am,” Columbo said, picking up the casts and moving towards the door. “Thank you for your help, miss. I think I have a very good idea where to take this next. And again, I’m so sorry for the trouble I caused. I’ll follow up with the bank statements when I get a chance, maybe there’s something there you two can help me with.”
“Anything at all, Lieutenant. You weren’t a bother in the slightest.”
Columbo took his leave, closing the door on his way out, and then immediately opened it again. “Oh! Ma’am, there’s just one more thing I forgot to ask.”
“Oh— uh, of course,” Carmilla said, perplexed.
“Has your husband been to one of those blood banks recently?”
A hint of uncertainty flashed in Carmilla’s eyes. “I don’t see why he would need to. He’s in an off-cycle, his body compensates in place of feeding.”
Columbo shot her another smile. “Right, of course. Just tying up some loose ends, that’s all.”
The detective made his exit, and Carmilla sat in stunned silence. She just couldn’t wrap her head around it. Vladimir had gone to the bank every Wednesday for the past month.
The sight of ketchup made the Lieutenant wretch.
He shoved the eggs off to the side. He’d do pancakes instead— besides, the Director was paying. At least he would be if he ever decided to show up.
It was four in the morning, and the diner was nearly empty, save for a trucker at the counter seating, and a loud group of teenagers in the back, who had more of an interest in show tunes than their food.
The detective had told his wife he wouldn’t be home until later in the night, but he didn’t expect that he’d be taking naps at the Black Cow like a drunk taking a detour while stumbling his way home. He poked his fork at the eggs again. Still couldn’t do it.
He was nearly about to fall face-first into his coffee again when a certain pair of Aviators walked in, contrasting his civilian outfit with the ordinary stiffness and poise of a trained soldier. Columbo almost felt offended he was being sent the errand boy and not the man himself. Sunglasses sat at the table, and helped himself to a slice of bacon.
“Director couldn’t make it,” he said, voice raspy and hushed. “Busy man.”
Columbo gestured in a way that asked ‘what are you going to do’, and slid the plate of bacon across the table. “Anything new coming up?”
“No.”
The pair sat in silence. Columbo dug his hands into his forehead. What a perfectly uneventful end to an overlong day.
“I was hoping you wouldn’t say that,” the Lieutenant said. “Well, can I read some witness statements? From the other vampires.”
“If the Director deems it necessary.”
Columbo rapped his fingers on the table. A case where he couldn’t read statements, but was expected to solve everything all the same.
“Apologies,” Sunglasses added, past the point of tact.
“I passed off that report from the manor, I don’t know if you got a chance to read it yet but there’s still some thread to pull with the politician’s. Looking into some financial statements later.”
Sunglasses nodded. “Could be something. Might find some paper statements at the estate, if you go looking.”
Columbo stood up, and tossed a five onto the table as a tip. “I’ve got to go, say hi to the Director,” he said, leaving sunglasses with his bill. It wasn’t usually the Lieutenant’s style, but he found himself frustrated with the situation.
He watched himself light up another cigar in the rear view. Maybe he was expecting things to move along faster than he should have; the tension of having Count Dracula standing in your mental lineup certainly didn’t help matters either. It had been just over a day, Colombo thought. This kind of impatience was uncharacteristic of him— and after 22 hours straight on the case, what he really needed was sleep.
He started up his Peugeot, and drove directly to Beau Wolfe’s estate.
The sun began to rise, and the Lieutenant took in the view from the central seat in Mr. Wolfe’s study. For the past two hours, the detective had scoured the premises for anything that could even remotely be construed as a financial statement. And like a mundane Holmes, Columbo sat curled up in a chair, sifting through another man’s taxes with as much intensity as the task ever demanded.
There were bits— but bits weren’t leads, and if you got lost in them, you’d never recognize something interesting when it actually hit. Wolfe ran a tight ship when it came to the campaign, it seemed. Completely and utterly ordinary, even if Columbo had now recognized some of the donors involved as vampires. Donations, tax write-offs, hardly anything that wasn’t related to the past three years.
“Mr. Wolfe kept everything,” the gate guard told him on his way into the estate. “You’ll just have to bother finding it. Offices should have everything from the campaign, but further than that… it’s around, I’d say. It’s around.”
Columbo clutched the tax statements close to his chest, ready to fall asleep. He’d find some way to explain this to his wife in the afternoon, but she always understood. But before sleep could claim him, a flash of intrigue hit at once. He found himself staring at a statement made out to a private contractor for building supplies delivered to the estate itself. And quite an expensive lot of them, too. An ordinary purchase, but with the lack of renovations on the inside, Columbo had to question where the material had gone.
He had mapped out every room in the mansion, and none of them looked like they had been touched in the past decade, much less updated. And the receipt was from the past year. Columbo thumbed through the remaining stacks of material he hadn’t looked at yet, hoping to find any other statement made out to other contracting companies. One in 1975, three in 1973, another in ‘75. Where was it all going?
Columbo grabbed the papers, and began wandering around the estate. Continually updated, continually built upon, large enough to justify years of continuous purchases. Columbo ran from the study to the exterior, nearly tripping over his own feet as he raced down the hill, arms flagging down the gate guard.
The fat man poked his head out of his box’s window. “Detective?”
“Mr. White! Mr. White!” Columbo shouted. He came to a stop, gasping for air. “When you wanted to talk to Mr. Wolfe, you called him, right?”
White nodded. “Got a telephone right here.”
“How many connections on your landline? Where did he usually pick up from?”
“Uh, I’d say… one in the office, one in the study, bedroom, kitchen, guest room… basement,” White said. “He was usually in the office.”
“Have you seen the cellar?”
”No sir, I hardly went in. Never had much of a reason to outside of dinner. But I’m sure it’s nice, all those renovations and that.”
“Mr. Wolfe mentioned the renovations?”
”A few times, he worked on them on and off over the past few years.”
“Do you know why that’s funny, Mr. White?” Columbo asked. The guard shook his head. “Come take a look at the cellar with me.”
White reluctantly followed, and within ten minutes, they found themselves standing in what was possibly the most disused portion of the house. The entirety of the estate’s cellar was the size of a spare bedroom, and didn’t seem to serve any particular purpose. Cement walls, a barren floor, and completely unfurnished, save for spare filing cabinets and some disused household tools laying here and there. White was stunned.
“Yeah,” Columbo said. “Doesn’t make any sense, really. Where are the renovations?”
”You think he was covering something up?”
“No, no I don’t,” Columbo added, taking a puff. “He said he was renovating the basement to someone who would have no reason to verify his statements. I think he was telling the truth, sir.”
”Okay, then where are the renovations?”
Columbo examined the bare walls, and pointed. “Wherever that basement landline you mentioned is.”
“I’ll call Cali-Line, let’s find out,” White said, making his way up the stairs.
Columbo stood, staring at his surroundings. He was going on hour twenty-seven now, but felt like he had just woken up. He walked towards a large, black filing cabinet pushed against the wall. It nearly doubled him in size. There was a trail of black-scrape marks on the cement floor. Columbo breathed in, and dug his hands behind the gap at the back of the cabinet. The Lieutenant pushed it along the direction that it had clearly been pushed before, and was relieved to see that his effort had paid off.
An ordinary door sat behind the cabinet, lacking a knob. Columbo opened it, and trailed down the small flight of stairs that led into the darkness.
When he reached the bottom, he fiddled for a light switch. And when he found one, the room came alive at once, blinding the Lieutenant with a wave of fluorescence.
When his eyes had adjusted, Lieutenant Columbo found himself face to face with the horrifying visage of a vampire, bloodshot eyes fixated on him while a lengthy tongue hung out of its mouth. The detective jumped, and quickly realized that the figure was behind glass— like a taxidermist’s showcase.
All around him were display cases. Longways, upright, tables, even. All of them were filled to the brim with objects— so many that the detective could barely take them in at once. There was a case of weapons— shields, swords, and armor; in the center, an open-glass table that displayed some sort of ornate sarcophagus; rows of vertical showcases that contained preserved cadavers of beast-like men— walking lions and reptilian soldiers. It was a trophy room, that much was obvious, but for the type of game that seemed more at home in a Foundation facility than a hunter’s lodge.
Columbo looked at the central vampire display again, and read the placard below.
'MARCH 3RD, 1634 - LONDON. UNKNOWN BROOD.’
For a case with so many details that bothered the Lieutenant, it felt good to have one of them finally fall into place. He couldn’t force down his smile.
Whether he knew it or not, Count Dracula had been fraternizing with a vampire slayer.
