me with the other crossbow. Then it'll be me and then Felix on my left. Cat, you tell us when they're coming. Felix'll hold 'em off until I can shoot one, with Adam backing me up. Then we go straight out the door, with Felix holding the rest of 'em off until we can get to the sunlight. Nobody else shoots unless Felix or I tells them to."
He looked at the gunman, still sitting on the curb staring between his boots.
"That okay with you, Felix?"
Felix looked at him, nodded dully. "I'd like some more light," he said calmly.
"We got more light, Carl?"
"I think there's one or two in the motorhome. I'll have to look."
Jack shook his head. "We'll look. C'mon, Felix, let's... Hey! Hit the winch."
All turned and followed Jack's gaze to the cable running from the winch to the warehouse door.
"It's stopped moving!" noticed Carl.
Jack tossed his cigarette angrily to the street. "Hell, yes, it's stopped moving. Did you expect the damn thing to stay caught forever while we stood around yappin'?"
But it hadn't gotten loose. Carl's winch dragged out the crossbow bolt still tangled in the monster's clothing. But the monster was dust.
"We killed it!" cried Cat, amazed. "Indoors! Without sunlight!"
"Yeah," muttered Jack.
"I don't understand," said the deputy. "You've never done this before? In the movies, they always..."
"Forget the movies," growled Jack. "They don't change into bats or wolves, either."
"But stakes do kill them," offered Adam.
"Yeah," replied Jack, lighting another cigarette. He walked over and shifted the dusty clothes with a chain-mailed boot. "You know, we knew the stakes hurt 'em. I guess we just never managed to keep one on one long enough. Before, they always tore loose if we didn't get 'em out and burning pretty quick."
"That," suggested Cat with a smile toward Felix, "was before the Lone Ranger, here."
Felix eyed him blankly. "Could be," he said at last.
Jack laughed. "Damn well 'could be,' gunman. Those bullets keep 'em too miserable to get loose until it's too late." He walked a fast circle around the dusty clothes, surveying them from all sides. Then he stopped and stared at the locals, still too scared to approach.
"Ha!" he said at last, clapping his hands together and smiling. "C'mon, Felix! Let's see about your light."
"Hey, Cat," snarled Carl suddenly, reaching down for the first-aid kit at his feet, "did you know you and the padre are bleeding?"
Cat grinned. "We assumed so. We were so popular."
"All right, dammit!" snarled Carl after he had tended their minor wounds, "what the hell happened in there?"
Cat and Adam exchanged a look. "Well," began Cat, "first Felix froze."
And then they told Carl about Cat fixing the light and about the little fiend wrapping him up and about Adam getting whipped by the cable and then about Jack getting Cat loose just in time for the wave of ghouls and then Kirk came in and...
"And then Felix saved us," he added with a smile. "And here we are."
Carl snarled. "I thought you said Felix froze."
Cat shrugged. "He unfroze."
"And that's all it took?"
"You should have seen him."
"Pretty good?"
Cat looked at him. "More than 'pretty good.' You ever see a spaghetti western?"
"That good?"
Cat and Adam exchanged another look. "Better," they replied in unison.
Carl lit a cigarette and looked at them thoughtfully. "Fast draw?"
Adam shook his head. "More like a fast shot."
Cat nodded. "Like a goddamn machine gun."
"Hmm," muttered Carl to himself. "Did he aim?"
Cat stared at him. "Did he what?"
Adam spoke up. "I know what Carl means. No. He didn't. He just sort of... pointed?"
Carl grinned and nodded. "I knew it! Only uses one hand, too, right?"
Adam nodded.
Carl laughed. "I knew it," be repeated. "It's why he uses that tiny gun. It's the heaviest thing he can use with one hand." He stood and carried the first-aid kit back to his chair by the winch controls. "We got ourselves a gunman."
Jack Crow hadn't given a damn about the light. He had just wanted to get Felix alone. Oh, he went through the motions, finding two lanterns in their storage chest in the motorhome's bedroom. And he made sure they both worked, replacing the battery in one.
And then he got ready to talk.
Only, sitting there at the table with Felix blankly across from him, he didn't really know what to say. Or ask.
Finally, "You all right?" he blurted, too loudly.
Felix didn't startle. He just raised his eyes and looked at him.
"I mean," Jack amended, "are you ready to go back in?"