“Well… you think these coffins are a bit hard? I’ve thought of putting cushions on them, but it might look too tacky.”

“How about red velvet?” I suggested.

“Maybe,” Billings sighed, unconvinced, as he looked at the empty cracker dish.

Lugosi was clearly trying to break through the ring of bodies, and I considered the possibility of following the most likely suspect in the group but gave it up. The odds were too slim, the hour too late, and my gas too low. Lugosi made his way through the group and advanced toward me. I stood up and Billings joined me, almost falling back on his coffin.

“Whose idea was it to invite Mr. Lugosi tonight?” I asked Billings loud enough for the others to hear and tried to make it sound like the start of a thank-you-for-the-lovely-evening. Lugosi was at my shoulder listening, the quartet of fluttering capes in pursuit. “I don’t recall,” said Billings, playing with his fangs.

“It was mine,” whispered the dark woman, her voice somewhat foreign, amused, and a little sleepy. She stared immodestly at my much-traveled neck and I pulled up my collar.

“No,” interjected a lean vampire with a jagged nose and a too-small cape that choked his words into a crimson gasp. His accent was definitely more New York Jewish than Transylvanian.

“No, no,” came in the Chinese vampire, billowing his broad cape and elbowing his way to the foreground. The cape was so long that he stepped on it and tripped forward into Lugosi.

The tall dark vampire who had been looking at me earlier was the only one who didn’t try to take any credit.

“Anybody oppose the invitation?” I tried, knowing no one would admit it in Lugosi’s presence but hoping vampire competition would emerge.

“No, why?” asked the Chinese guy.

“Because,” Lugosi said with a broad smile. “I like to be welcome. And I half-enjoyed our visit, but the sands of time fall relentlessly and the dawn approaches.” Lugosi pointed in the general direction of the dawn somewhere above the moldy ceiling. We headed for the stairs, the vampires behind us. I could feel the warm breath of the woman behind me, and I imagined her eyes on my not-too-clean collar.