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Hunger Pangs
A coin stood on its end, balanced under John Abbott's fingertip.
The shine had worn off after countless trips from trouser pockets to soiled fingers to cash drawers and back. Money was the dirtiest thing going. He crouched close to the bar and studied the grime caked on its lusterless face, imagining where rotation had taken the bit of currency. What societal ills had it touched? This occupied his mind for five or six minutes. Beyond the coin, the man tending bar was a blur. "I'll have another round," John mumbled, but he gathered that it went unheard when the man kept wiping the countertop. With sleepy eyes, the vampire straightened and tried again, wobbling on his stool. "I'll have another round, I said."
John was in a state. It looked as if he hadn't slept or fed in days, and he hadn't, thanks to all those dreams of young miss Brahms. His star pupil had been married off to a widower, a policeman whose previous wife was offed by a runaway horse carriage. Its driver, three sheets to the wind, had simply let go of the reigns and let it plow through London. So Angela was rescued from a life of spinsterhood, but not before she allowed her tutor a few gropes between lessons. John's memory was a frightful thing. He could still feel the warmth of her soft thigh on his knuckles. But gone she was, before he'd found out all her secrets, and so Angela would long weigh on his mind.
The vampire rubbed his eyes and blinked. A messy thatch of black curls obscured his forehead.
( Simon, An Unsociable Creature in Search of Company? )
( Puzzles )
The shine had worn off after countless trips from trouser pockets to soiled fingers to cash drawers and back. Money was the dirtiest thing going. He crouched close to the bar and studied the grime caked on its lusterless face, imagining where rotation had taken the bit of currency. What societal ills had it touched? This occupied his mind for five or six minutes. Beyond the coin, the man tending bar was a blur. "I'll have another round," John mumbled, but he gathered that it went unheard when the man kept wiping the countertop. With sleepy eyes, the vampire straightened and tried again, wobbling on his stool. "I'll have another round, I said."
John was in a state. It looked as if he hadn't slept or fed in days, and he hadn't, thanks to all those dreams of young miss Brahms. His star pupil had been married off to a widower, a policeman whose previous wife was offed by a runaway horse carriage. Its driver, three sheets to the wind, had simply let go of the reigns and let it plow through London. So Angela was rescued from a life of spinsterhood, but not before she allowed her tutor a few gropes between lessons. John's memory was a frightful thing. He could still feel the warmth of her soft thigh on his knuckles. But gone she was, before he'd found out all her secrets, and so Angela would long weigh on his mind.
The vampire rubbed his eyes and blinked. A messy thatch of black curls obscured his forehead.
( Simon, An Unsociable Creature in Search of Company? )
( Puzzles )