Alabama Vampire

By Michael Stephens

In Aaron Burr County, Alabama, a primitive land still barely recovered from the long-ago Civil War, Hank Grissel makes his living at a most unenviable task: supplying victims for his master, a planter with an insatiable thirst for human blood. By turns fawning and ferocious, cowardly and desperate, Grissel combines incredible crudity with homespun Southern philosophy as he butchers his way across Alabama. With a journalist following the trail of bodies, can this lewd tomcat of a man escape justice?

Replete with warring rival Klans, backwoods prophecy, and neo-segregationist politicians, all exploited by the enterprising Grissel, Alabama Vampire is a dark and comic novel of the freakish South, with laughter and horror on every page.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483625867

Michael Stephens

Michael Stephens is a native Southerner who has traveled through Alabama many times, never staying long. Perhaps because of his early education at the hands of Northern immigrants, he is commonly mistaken for a Yankee, and occasionally for some other species of foreigner. This has led to many ugly incidents between Stephens and more authentic Southerners. Nevertheless, he continues to write about the South, which he describes as “a land of heroic weirdness.” Stephens lives in Florida, where he can blend in among other quasi-Southerners. He is the author (as Edward Radclyffe) of another novel, Madness is Catching.

Book preview

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Some evil men would be far less dangerous if they had not a few virtues as well.

La Rochefoucauld

CHAPTER 1

The Starlight Package Store and Lounge stood on the old U.S. highway where it crossed the county line. The Starlight was obsolescent like the road, a relic of dry counties and easy travel. Both had betrayed it, but the neon sign that jutted up lean like a dagger still flickered at night, and by day the locals had no need of a sign. The Starlight was ever there, at the lonely junction of road and border, a familiar Pharos for an inward-looking world.

On a blinding summer afternoon, a sedan turned off the road into the Starlight’s crumbled asphalt lot. It was no redneck car. Long and high and lean, the old Mark IX Jaguar wallowed over potholes as it rolled behind the building, slowly, as if expecting obeisance from the pickup and the battered Oldsmobile that squatted there with peonish reserve. The Jaguar was from about 1960, half pre-war, half space age in its big, sleek bulk, with lines of chrome following every arc in a jet-black body that lacked one straight line. It had undulant fenders like a woman’s hips, and huge headlights that… well, it was a car whose design owed nothing to wind tunnels or computer modeling. Quieter even than the Rolls it had aped fifty years ago, the great car drifted to a stop in the far end of the little lot, away from careless drivers.

A man stepped out, shutting the door gently. He was a bit younger than the car, but not as well kept. His ragged black hair was greased down in no particular style, just to keep it in place, and pulled carefully behind his ears. It ducktailed in back, adding grease to the already soiled collar of his navy blue blazer—Brooks Brothers, the best tropical wool one could buy off the rack, although this one had been on a few racks since, until snatched up on dollar day. All the brass buttons were gone from one sleeve, and the lining was frayed, but it had an innate class in backwoods Alabama, land of wash-and-wear, or just wear. Not that it necessarily meant respect, but it did set him apart just enough to make him feel truly at home. The same went for the candystriped cotton oxford, the worn khakis in need of an iron, and the old black wingtips, almost through their third soling. He kept these blacked with polish from a bottle. Where his skin was bare—hands and face only, as in the days before sun-worship—it was browned and prematurely lined, a bit spotted and not too healthy. His face, long and lean like his body, went from a high, protruding forehead down to a beetled, hairy ridge of a brow, a large yet undistinguished nose that despite its sharp Roman bridge somehow lacked dignity, and a heavy chin like a fist drawn back. High cheekbones, short on flesh beneath, arched out to bulky, fungous ears held close to his head as if to guard the flanks his eyes could not readily patrol. These eyes crouched beneath the outcrop of his brow, deep and dark but large, and they moved in concert with his mouth whenever he spoke, teaming up with the yellowed teeth and thin, wrinkle-framed lips to double the force of a leer or a fawning remark.

As he stood contemplating the piney woods that encompassed the lot beyond a band of clay, he dragged a pack of off-brand Egyptian cigarettes from his coat, and lit one with an old, silver-cased lighter. He turned to the building. Up front, toward the road, the package store made a fifties attempt at flash, with lots of glass and a steep roof, both succeeding only in making it look like a Stuckey’s evil little twin. Behind this, a flat-roofed attachment sat windowless and drear. It was a block of concrete blocks, slathered in lime-green paint that was starting to peel, revealing powder blue beneath. He sauntered over to the lone door. The steel panel matched the wall down to the green-painted handle, except that lounge was painted across it in loopy pink script. He pulled on the door, and it opened, the gap exhaling stale air like a discovered ancient tomb.

Inside, the man let the door creak closed behind him. The lounge was small and dingy, too small for bands to play, too dingy for any revel. It was a place people went when they were depressed and did not really want cheering, but rather a catalyst to melancholy. The whole lounge had room only for half a dozen tables and a bar, all done in a 1970s style that was the Starlight’s last attempt at modernizing. Since then, just being there had been enough to stay in business. The captain’s chairs and bar stools, all rich in vinyl and dark varnish, waited empty every day and most evenings. They were empty now, but for a woman at the bar, hunched on her elbows over a tumbler. The bartender, a disappointed son of Bes who had worked somewhere better—that is, somewhere else—stood polishing a glass. He was pudgy and bald and sixty, and here he had plenty of time to think about it. When he saw the man come in, though, he almost smiled in his own tired way.

Hey, Hank, he said, shelving the glass. The woman glanced toward the door, then away. She was young.

The man flashed a sudden grin of yellow teeth. Looks like ya got as much business today as a Klan recruiter in Harlem, Joe, he said in an oily central-Alabama twang, letting his words slide out at their leisure. He went to the bar, and slid over a stool next to the woman. I hope this seat ain’t taken, he grinned, eyeing her.

No, she said with a petulant weariness. He looked her over, heedless of what she might think. She appeared barely drink-legal, in a shapely prime that seldom lasts long in the woods, her hair bleached and falling over her tanned back. Her tank top strained and bulged, full of good things like a Christmas stocking. Elbows on the bar and eyes on her glass, she looked distinctly unhappy, but he was more concerned with peeling her jeans.

Lemme have a beer, Drinks, he said, barely taking his eyes off the woman. Joe pushed a longneck across the bar. The man took a quick swig, and returned to the woman.

My name’s Grissel. Hank Williams George Wallace Jefferson Davis Grissel, all told, he said, extending a hand that was glanced at and ignored. You can call me Hank if ya like, or pick somethin else off that list. Or you can call me honey or baby, too. I know a bunch o waitresses an such that call everybody that. It don’t mean nothin to em. That don’t mean none o the boys they call it don’t get nothin out of it. The woman can please em without meanin anything by it.

The woman cast another tired glance at Grissel. He was grinning wide, pushing skin up in folds around his mouth. Her gaze persisted this time.

Well, what’s your name, then? Grissel asked. He took a drink, lifting the bottle between eyes that never left the woman. She was silent. Betchoo got a real Southern name. Lessee… um… Lawanda? Leeann? Luann? Charlene? Darlene? Belinda?

All through this, the woman watched Grissel as if he were a circus freak of limited talent. You sure try hard, she said at last, looking away.

Grissel was unperturbed. Hmm… Shirlene? Labrenda? Lurlene? Jolinda? Oh, I think I know now. Y’see, there’s a science to it, like fishin, or creationism. I can only judge from what I can see, an you’s nine-tenths covered up right now, but I’m gonna make a educated guess that you’s a Jolene. He took a long swig, as if celebrating his success.

My name’s Casey, she said, and gave a thin, dismissive smirk.

Casey?

Casey.

Grissel looked at Joe with mock puzzlement. I’ll be damned, Drinks. You can tell we’s bein invaded again. The bartender shrugged and began polishing a glass. Grissel turned back to Casey.

Well, I guess that’s a pretty name, ‘Casey,’ least up North. Now, what I wanna know, Stacks, is why ya seem so blue in a cheery place like this. I come in here, it’s like a oasis, but you look like ya might as well be dead. Grissel grinned wider than ever.

Casey drained the tumbler, leaving only shrunken cubes of ice. Grissel motioned to the bartender to pour her another.

I just gotta get outta this state, Casey sighed. I feel like Alabama’s closin in on me. Even Aaron Burr County’s closin in on me. I feel like… like I ain’t got a chance here. Like there’s nothin here for me. I don’t even got any family left here. Don’t know why I should stay. I wanna see places, meet people who ain’t all the same, do stuff. You know what I’d like to do? She smiled for the first time. I’d like to see New York City. Or even New Orleans. Somethin other than rundown farms, an shithole towns where everybody’s old an wears overalls. I ain’t never been outside Alabama, an if I don’t leave soon, I feel like I’ll probably just get knocked up, an live in a trailer, an work in a diner till I’m sixty-five.

They’s plenty o gals gettin knocked up an trailer-trashed in Las Vegas, too, Grissel said, with a smile that could pass for sympathy. An workin in diners, after they ain’t good for strippin, an then turnin sixty-five all fat an nasty just like they would anywhere else.

I just wanna see somethin else, that’s all. I don’t care about Paris or anything, just somethin outside these lousy county roads that seem like they just go around in circles.

Grissel kept smiling. Sounds like ya ain’t really seen Alabama yet. Trust me: I been to New Orleans, an I can say there’s nothin worth seein outside Alabama. Why, you got Mobile—big ships comin in, people talkin French. You got Montgomery, first capital o the Confederate States of America (I seen where Jeff Davis stood an took the oath that made him leader o the free world). You got Birmingham, center o world industry. Got tall buildings there, tall as ya need em. In short, there’s nothin Alabama ain’t got. Mountains, an rivers, an plains—forests, an cotton fields, an on down to the sea. Why, we got beaches, an islands, even. Nah, you don’t need to leave Alabama to see the world. We got a little bit o everything right here. Whatcha wanna do is come visit mah great big plantation house. You too good to be drinkin this swill. Here Grissel winked at the bartender. I got some whiskey there, come all the way from China. Why’n’choo hop in mah big car, Stacks, an we’ll drive back to mah place in the style to which I know ya ain’t accustomed?

Grissel drove down a long, straight trail, the tenuous remnant of an old brick highway, now awash in clay and hedged in by forest. The Jaguar bounced along, quiet but for the gentle bumping of the live rear axle. The sounds from the trunk, however, were far less gentle.

Quiet back there, Stacks, Grissel drawled. You don’t wanna wake the coons an possums, do ya? Them night creatures needs their rest. Doncha worry, it won’t be long fore we get to mah big plantation. Then ya can stretch a mite, an see how Alabamians lived in the good old days. Gonna give ya the guided tour.

This did nothing to stop the thumping in the trunk. Grissel turned on the radio, and tuned it through static and voices until raucous hillbilly music jumped out to do battle with the polished walnut and smooth Connolly leather of the car.

Yessir, he said with a grin, ol Fangs is gonna like you—soft an juicy like a Georgia peach.

Turning onto another trail that had always been dirt, Grissel drove through a dense hammock of Southern magnolias and water oaks, with wild grape vines as thick as an old rattlesnake climbing to the canopy, tendrils grasping at branches to bring new leaves into the sun and air so lacking below. At length there was light ahead, growing steadily closer, until suddenly the car burst into blue skies and white columns, the latter rearing up before Grissel with the defeated glory of the Parthenon, splendid in ruinous repose, defiant to this end of Southern time. Four great columns, as thick and tall as the clear, straight trunks of the trees in the lost primeval Alabama forests, rose from a high stone porch to support a mountainous pediment that rested in an illusion of lightness, the tons aloft as if barely touching the columns below. A marble stairway flowed in a leisurely, organic descent from the porch down to the grass, spreading like a stony ooze. From the crisply scored ashlar of the porch, to the fluted columns, crowned with lavish Ionic-Corinthian capitals, to the floating pyramid of the pediment, all was white, glaring in the sun, thrusting back its light as if for the legion parts to say, We need you not. We are the sun and moon and stars here. We shine of our own doing. And yet from the pediment white lead paint was peeling, and gray cypress showed itself. The capitals, too, each carved from one block of cypress as tall as a man, were dull now except in recesses. From the columns, the white plaster so carefully trowelled into flutes was falling away, leaving forty-foot towers of pale pink brick that, while lovely in themselves, were not the Roman image of power and eternity the templed front had claimed. And even the porch, on which all else weighed down, cracked and shed plaster to reveal a sandy, yellow brick, the cheapest local make. There were deep fissures in the brickwork here, imperiling more than pride, and where exposed the bricks had begun to crumble, and digger wasps were carving wormlike burrows in the soft and fragile mortar.

As grand as this façade was, it was not the only approach to this sprawling, ruined house. To the right and to the left, wings no less massive—two tall stories above a high raised basement, and attic servants’ rooms that were luxury for slaves—marched out to end in porticos as colossal and decayed as the first. Each was different in detail: On the right, the columns were Doric, smoothly round and lacking capitals; on the left, graceful Ionic capitals held up a heavy, flat entablature rather than the triangular pediment of the other fronts. Even the windows differed from wing to wing, and wooden balconies jutted out at random—rotted and falling away now—and in places walls bowed out into curved bays that broke any symmetry of line. It was as if many different great houses had been sewn together in a mad union, a Frankenstein palace of architectural odds and ends, a mockery of Palladio’s villa.

Grissel followed a tire-worn track across the grass. The coarse and weedy lawn was the only sign that the house was not wholly abandoned. It held at bay the forest, waiting a hundred feet off for the time when even the brick citadel could be stormed by root and vine. The track curved around to the Doric portico. Here the high porch was not solid, but housed three archways into a cellar where carriages could be pulled in on rainy nights of old, letting coiffured and smartly dressed guests arrive and depart dry and happy. Now the dark place was a garage for the Jaguar, and for a Cadillac about twenty