“Train set,” Jules said.

His flesh was clay, and Jules was Michelangelo. In less than a second, he had his thirty-inch waist. His well-muscled chest descended in a sharp V to his trim midsection. His legs were slender and sinewy. He slipped the shirt over his head, then slid into the size thirty pants. When he buttoned them, he still had half an inch to spare-he actually needed the belt that was hanging on the rack.

The film had stopped while he was getting dressed. Now it started up again. Doodlebug descended the stairs from the balcony, a fifteen-foot gauze cape trailing behind him. He gestured toward the large barrel-fan sitting in the wings of the floor area. Jules walked over and turned it on. The powerful wind ruffled his hair just as the opening bars of “Broadway Ballet” sounded from the speakers on either side of the screen.

Doodlebug joined Jules on the floor. The wind from the fan made his feathery cape soar into the air, reaching almost to the height of the balcony. They waited for the on-screen ballet to reach the fantasy sequence between Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse.

Then they danced.

Or, rather, Doodlebug did all the dancing, and Jules looked handsome and upright and a little awestruck.

As soon as the fantasy sequence was over, Jules attempted to extricate himself from the yards of white gauze his partner had wrapped around him. Doodlebug took advantage of Jules’s temporary captivity to rush over and hug him. The unexpected embrace completely shattered Jules’s concentration, and he burst out of his dancer’s clothing, swelling like a balloon attached to a fire hose. But it didn’t matter. He’d always remember that he’d been able to fit in a pair of size thirty pants. And he’d remember that his dreams, if given half a chance, could be stronger than his doubts.

When Doodlebug released him and stepped back, the younger vampire had tears in his eyes. “Oh, Jules, congratulations. You’vegraduated — you’ve achieved the rank of summa cum laude from Vampire U. My work here is finished.”

“What do you mean, ‘finished’?” Jules grabbed his cloak and wrapped it around his suddenly exposed flesh. “You still gotta teach me all that fancy kung-fu stuff you know. Finished? We’ve barely started. Besides, you’re my partner. We’ve gotta see this thing throughtogether.”

“Really, there’s nothing more you need to learn from me,” Doodlebug said, a hint of wistfulness in his voice. “Come on.” He gave Jules a comradely pat on the back, then unsnapped the beautiful but utterly impractical cape from the neck of his dress. “Let’s go back to the B-and-B and get some sleep.”

The next evening Jules awoke feeling completely refreshed. He checked his watch before opening the lid of his coffin. Eleven forty-twoP.M.? No wonder he felt refreshed-he’d overslept by a good three and a half hours. Why hadn’t his friend woken him up? No matter, though. He and Doodlebug could make this a strategy night. He’d perk up a big pot of coffee, and they could spend a relaxing evening brainstorming. It’d be fun.

He opened the lid of his coffin and sprang up like a robin eager for the first worm of the morning. The room was dark. In fact, the entire cottage was dark. “D.B.? You up yet?”

He climbed out of his coffin and flicked on the light switch. “Doodlebug?”

No answer. He stuck his head into the dark bedroom. “Hey, pal? Rise and shine, buddy!” He turned on the light. Doodlebug’s coffin wasn’t sitting on the four-poster bed. It wasn’t anywhere in the bedroom.

“What thehell-?”

He went into the kitchen. There was a handwritten note sitting on the table. He picked it up and read it.

Dear Jules,

By the time you read this, I’ll be on my way back to California. I know this is a strange way for us to part, but I felt it would be for the best. This is your time to shine, Jules. I feared that if I stayed any longer, I would get in the way of your full maturation. I have taught you everything that you need to know, and I trust completely in your ability to do what needs to be done. Even though I am not there with you, my thoughts and best wishes will be with you always. Just remember that you can have the things you’ve always wanted, but in order to acquire them, you might have to look at them in a new way.

I’ve left you an open line of credit so you can continue to stay in the cottage as long as you need to. Please don’t hesitate to call on me again if there is ever any other way I can be of some help, or if you just want some company. Consider coming out my way one of these Halloweens-my town’s Halloween parade is even wilder than the French Quarter’s. Great seeing you!

Love,

Rory

He read the note a second time, just to make sure he hadn’t misread. Nothing changed. It wasn’t a gag.

Jules turned a paler shade of white.

Like a dormant virus reactivated by a cold wind, the fear was back in the pit of his belly. All too suddenly, he was on his own again.

Erato.

Jules thought the name over and over as he drove toward the Trolley Stop Cafй. Erato was the last friend left whom Jules trusted. Erato could advise him, guide him through shark-strewn waters. He had a solid head on his shoulders-not much in the way of book learning, maybe, but reams of diplomas from the school of the streets. On top of that, Erato was a black man; he’dhave to have insights into Jules’s predicament that were beyond Jules’s reach. Jules had no choice but to finally play it straight with him-he’d have to take the risk of revealing to his friend the vampiric side of his nature that he’d kept secret for years.Erato can handle it, Jules told himself. He’d have to.

The notion of turning to Erato had come to him the previous night, after reading Doodlebug’s note had driven Jules into an almost mindless panic. He’d called Erato’s cell phone incessantly for three hours. But the frantic vampire had been continuously stymied by busy signals. Finally, exhausted by fear and frustration, he’d crawled back into his coffin and fallen into a sleep haunted by nightmares. Most of his evil dreams had Jules trapped on a sinking barge in the middle of the Mississippi, chained to the deck as hundreds of rats scurried across him to flee the sinking vessel.

Tonight Jules wouldn’t bother monkeying around with the telephone. He’d see Erato face-to-face. Jules turned onto the vestigial rump of Basin Street, a thoroughfare made famous by early jazz tunes, but nearly erased from existence by the creation of Armstrong Park thirty years ago. He passed the ugly concrete pile of Municipal Auditorium, site of wrestling matches, Mardi Gras balls, and Disney on Ice; recently it had been home to a minor-league hockey team and a failed casino. Just past the auditorium, a roadblock outside the First District police station blocked his progress.

Jules braked to a halt in front of a pair of police cruisers and stuck his head out his window. “What’s goin‘ on, Officers?”

A weary-looking cop motioned for him to turn around at the intersection. “Basin’s blocked off from here to Iberville. No through traffic allowed. Some kinda Night Out Against Crime demonstration. Cut over to Rampart Street if you’ve gotta make Canal.”

“Thanks, Officer.”

Jules started to make a left turn across Basin when he spotted what looked like Erato’s cab, parked in a closed gas station. He pulled into the lot, which was crowded with other parked cars. Sure enough, itwas Erato’s cab-there was that dumb-looking pair of sun-faded, pink fuzzy dice hanging from his rearview mirror.

Jules backed out of the jam-packed parking lot and rounded the corner onto Rampart. He found an open space beneath a live oak next to Armstrong Park; not the safest stretch of asphalt in New Orleans by any means, but considering the terrors he’d recently lived through, Jules didn’t give the neighborhood’s dicey reputation a second thought.