The Horror Megapack_ 25 Classic and Modern Horror Stories ( PDFDrive )

Cleaned up, shaved, with hair combed and cut as best I could manage, I
followed the road to the Dresden. I ate frequently, trying to curb my instincts to
hunt and kill, and found raw or very rare meat could sustain me, though it never
truly satisfied my vast appetite. I had by this time learned some German, and
posing as an American tourist, I managed to make my way to West Berlin.
My journey back to America was long and convoluted. By the time I reached
New York City by steamship, nearly five years had passed.
I still hungered, but now I chose my victims carefully. They were criminals
and cutthroats, murderers and racketeers, the scum of society. I stole everything
I wanted from them. When the thirst became too great, I drank their blood—
always careful to make it seem as though they had been murdered by rivals
gangsters. Once, staging the scene of a grisly murder, I paused to wonder how
many other such notorious crimes had actually been arranged by my kind. The
St. Valentine’s Day Massacre? The blood was a giveaway. The Donner Party?
Possibly. The Mary Celeste? Rather likely. Any of a hundred more could have
been—and probably were—the result of vampire attacks.
And vampire I proclaimed myself. There could be no other answer for my
condition. Much as legend, books, and films portrayed us as cold, unfeeling
creatures of the grave, the reverse was true. I felt; I needed and yearned and
dreamed and hoped and prayed. And I craved companionship. The followers and
acolytes I occasionally gathered to myself never proved satisfying. They wanted
to be like me, to become vampires themselves, but I had no idea how I had
become one myself. Biting them didn’t seem to do the trick; they remained the
same frail, weak creatures they’d always been, and eventually I tired of them and
abandoned their kind forever.
In 1960, when I called my parents for the first time since my return from the
war, my mother answered the telephone. I was so nervous my hands shook.
“Hello?” she said when nobody answered. “Hello?”
“Mother,” I said, “this is Tuck.”
There was silence. Then, “If this is your idea of a joke, you’re sick.” And she
hung up.
I called back. The telephone rang, but nobody picked up.
I sat up alone all that night. And the following night I fed on anyone and
anything that moved for the first time since Germany. The police blamed a
satanic cult. I could have laughed.
I never tried to contact my parents again while they were alive, though I
dutifully took out a subscription to the weekly Plainfield Gazette and began