Caput Mortuum

She walked into the pub wearing black and high heels and a condescending air. There were not many people there as it was a Wednesday evening. She sat at a table and glanced around; I suppose the lack of waiters bothered her. She looked like a woman who was used to getting her way, hard eyes and too much makeup, people fall over themselves for a woman like that.  

Frank was behind the bar, he gave her a few moments to settle in before he went to her table. He didn’t have a menu; everyone who came here knew what they wanted. I watched her eye him, up and down, looking at the brawny arms covered in hair, the face that looked like beaten leather. She smiled with as much warmth as she could muster.

“Good evening, Ma’am,” he said. “My name is Frank. What can I get you?”

She thought for a moment, eyes wandering up to the ceiling, “I think I would like a Caput Mortuum and beef tartar.”

She was tapping one finger gently on the table cloth, looking Frank in the eyes. That was never a wise decision. I watched the tension gather between Frank’s shoulder blades and counted the seconds, one, two, three… his nostrils flared but he looked away.

“We don’t do raw meat here,” he said, his voice gruffer than it was before, “and I don’t know what’s in a Caput Mortuum.” The way he said it, it came out kay-put mort-ee-um, Latin was not something he knew well.

The woman sucked in a breath and adjusted her posture, a little bit straighter, “Fine then, I’ll have whatever the chef recommends. As for my drink, it is two parts vodka, one part dark rum, one part human blood, and a slice of lime.”

“Is that all?” Frank asked, too calmly.

“Yes, I do think that will be all.” The woman gave a short nod, and sat back, watching as Frank left her table and went to the back. I wondered what he would do, I knew for a fact there was no human blood on the premises. There was very little blood of any kind, for safety reasons.

When he was gone, she glanced around the room, eyeing the other patrons as if she was looking for something. When she got to me her eyes stopped. I think it took her a minute to come to terms with the fact that she and I might exist in the same place. I worked my big toe through the hole in my sneakers, and gave her a nod.

She nodded back, hesitantly, her expression souring. If I had money to bet, I would have bet she’d ask Frank as soon as he came back to kick me out of the pub. It was a common enough request among people who weren’t regulars. I considered, briefly, lighting up a smoke, but decided against it. It wouldn’t be worth the trouble Frank would get in.

We kept our eyes locked, and I watched her face twitch as she tried to keep the smug look on her face from slipping off. I counted the seconds, one, two, three…

Frank came out from the back with a glass in his hand and walked between us. I readjusted my posture, and watched them out of the corner of my eye. The glass he put down before her stood on a delicate stem, and looked for all the world like a slightly pudgy girl with an hour glass figure perched on a flagpole. The liquid inside was a strange shade of dark red.

“Your butter chicken will be out shortly,” he told her.

“Butter chicken doesn’t seem like pub food,” she said.

“It’s a classic,” Frank said stoically.

She nodded slightly and took a sip of her drink. Then she paused, and took another sip. “This,” she said frostily, “is not what I asked for.”

“No,” said Frank, “but cranberry juice and grenadine is the closest thing you’re going to get to it.”

“I thought this pub was supposed to cater to my sort of people,” she said.

Frank widened his stance a little bit, and his shoulders tensed again. It was only a few days until the full moon, it was a wonder he hadn’t ripped her head off her shoulders yet. No one here would tell. “What is your sort of people, Ma’am?” he asked.

“Creatures of the night, demons, vampyres.” The way she said it, you could hear the y, she leaned into it as if it set them apart from the ordinary vampires. “Was I given faulty information?”

She smiled at Frank, daring him to disagree. I could see her canine teeth had been sharpened, inexpertly. Frank smiled back, baring his square white teeth. They stared at each other, as the second ticked by, one, two, three… Frank did not look away.

“And which are you?” he asked.

“I am a Vampyre,” she replied loftily.

“I can hear your pulse,” Frank told her. He placed a large hand on her table and leaned down, “I can smell the life of you.”

“Excuse me?” her face didn’t change, but there was a crack in her voice.

Frank smiled a little wider, “And now I can smell your fear. Let me tell you something Ma’am. You were given the right information, but I’m not sure you understand what that means. Now, tell me, if you ran an establishment that was frequented by blood thirsty creatures of the night, as you so eloquently put it, would you keep human blood on the premises, or does that seem just a little bit stupid?”

“Well, I,” she floundered, stumbling over her words.

“Get out,” growled Frank, “and if you’re lucky, nothing will follow you home.”

She looked down and pushed her chair back, fumbling for her coat. Then without shame, she fled, the door banging behind her. Frank straightened up and cracked his neck.

“Delphi,” he said, without looking over, “how would you like some butter chicken, on the house?”

“That would be lovely,” I said.

And it was.