"Don't sweat it, Leary," I said. "I don't think you were gonna do much more business tonight, anyway."

  As we walked back to the car, Karl said, "Well, that ended with nobody gettin' hurt – apart from those dummies who tried to fight Igor."

  "Yeah," I said. "Maybe our luck is changing."

  After all these years on the job, I should know better than to tempt fate that way.

Doc Watson had left a message that he'd see us at 4am, and it was twelve after the hour when Karl and I arrived at his reception room. The woman behind the desk looked to be in her mid-fifties. A lot of vamps have night jobs, but I was pretty sure this one was human, more or less.

  "He's expecting us," I told her.

  The look she gave me would've done credit to Sister Yolanda, who'd made my life hell in eighth grade. Despite all the weres, zombies, and vamps I've had to deal with since then, Sister Yolanda was the one I still had nightmares about.

  "The doctor was expecting you at 4 o'clock," she said. I wondered if she had a big wooden ruler somewhere in her desk.

  I was in no mood for this shit, and I guess Karl wasn't either. He put his hands on her desk and leaned forward. The smile he gave her displayed his fangs nicely. "I'll make you a deal," he said pleasantly. "You'll tell the doc that we're here, and I'll try to forget that I haven't fed tonight and I'm real thirsty. Sound like a plan?"

  I heard the castors protest as she quickly pushed her chair back, her eyes huge.

  "Y-yes, of course. I didn't mean to – excuse me, please."

  Then she was heading for the oak door behind her at a pace that was not quite a run. She knocked twice and didn't wait for a reply from inside before entering Doc Watson's inner sanctum.

  "Where were you when I was in eighth grade?" I murmured to Karl. He looked at me, but before I could explain, the receptionist was back.

  To me she said, "Doctor Watson will see you now." She didn't look at Karl at all.

  Terence K Watson was a thin guy who wore his thick black hair brushed straight back. Combine that with the goatee and his fondness for black clothing and you've got a look that Rachel Proctor once described to me as Faustian. What she meant was the doc would have looked good as Mephistopheles in a staging of Marlowe's play. Faust himself was no fashion plate, by most accounts.

  Rachel is one of the smartest people I know, but she's wrong on that one. I've seen the real Mephistopheles, and he looks like nothing human – unless he wants to. Besides, Doc Watson isn't into stealing souls. He's in the business of saving them, or trying to.

  The doc and I go way back, and he's met Karl before, so no introductions were called for. But as we sat down, he looked at Karl and said, "I heard you'd been turned a while back, Karl, and now I see that the stories are true. If you don't mind my asking, how are you doing? It's quite an adjustment you've had to make."

  Karl thought for a few seconds before answering. Maybe he was deciding how much to say. "It's an adjustment, like you said, Doc. But it's not too bad most days – most nights, I mean. And when it is, I just remind myself that being undead beats the alternative."

  "Does it? You're sure?"

  "Yeah, pretty sure."

  Doc nodded. "Good."

  "You must treat a few vampires yourself, Doc," I said. "Since you've started offering night appointments, and all."

  He looked at me and his expression grew, if possible, more serious. "The confidentiality of my relationship with patients is absolute, Stan. It has to be – even to the point of declining to answer that question."

  "I didn't mean anything by it, Doc. Just making conversation."

  He let his long face relax in a sort of smile. "I know, Stan. But it's not the kind of small talk that I can join in."

  "We're here to ask you about somebody who isn't one of your patients," Karl said. "At least, I hope he's not."

  "Even if he is, Karl, you'll never know it." He spread his hands for a second and sat back. "Ask away. I'll tell you what I can."

  Karl and I took turns telling him about the witch burnings. When we were finished, Doc was silent for several seconds.

  "I suppose telling you that the person responsible for these crimes seems to hate witches would be an exercise in the obvious," he said.

  "Yeah, kind of," I told him.

  "Of course, that assumes the victims are chosen randomly, within the witch community," Doc said. "There's always the possibility that his grudge was against these two women in particular."

  "We've got people working that angle," Karl said. "They're looking for a common factor – clients, boyfriends, relatives, all that."

  "If they find something, it'll make my life a lot easier," I said. "But since God seems to be part of an ongoing conspiracy to make my life difficult, let's assume for now that it's a serial killer who's obsessed with witches."

  "All right, then." Doc was sitting in an expensive-looking leather swivel chair. He tilted it back as far as it would go and closed his eyes. He sat like that without speaking for fifteen seconds or so. "He's choosing witches because they symbolize something for him – something that he wants to kill, or wishes he had, but can't. It's possible that an actual witch did him dirty sometime in the past, of course. However, when the victims are female, we tend to believe that they are serving as stand-ins for a woman in the killer's past, often the mother, or a mother-figure." Doc opened his eyes and shrugged. "Trite, but true."

  "So, you figure the guy's mother was a witch?" Karl asked.

  "Maybe," Doc said, "but it's rarely that simple. By the way, I've been using 'he' because it's easier, but I don't mean to prejudice your investigation by implying that the killer is necessarily male. However, the odds favor it, since the vast majority of serial killers who have been identified were male." Doc thought for a moment. "That doesn't apply to supernaturals, of course."

  "How come?" Karl asked.

  "Because the distinctions aren't as clear. For instance, do you consider a vampire who kills people a serial killer, or just hungry?"