CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Kevin rushed back to the hearth room, and, nearly stuttering, said, “You mean he painted these pictures? Count Volkov himself?

“He certainly did, Kevin,” Aunt Carolyn replied. “There’s no way you could have seen them all yet, but Count Volkov painted a lot of the paintings in the lodge. There are actually several dozen of them, hanging in various places.”

Kevin felt intrigued by this information, that The Count himself had painted the very pictures Kevin had looked at and even touched. But then, Kevin’s thoughts came to a screeching halt.

Why, he wondered, are Count Volkov’s paintings here? In my aunt’s lodge?

It didn’t make sense!

“And let me guess your next question, Kevin,” Aunt Carolyn said, still cloaked by the shadows. “You want to know why The Count’s paintings are here, in my lodge, right?”

“Well, yes,” Kevin admitted. “I was just thinking that, just this second.”

Aunt Carolyn’s voice lowered to a strange whisper. “So I’ll tell you why,” she said. “Because this lodge, this very same building that you’re sitting in right this moment, used to be owned by Count Volkov.”

“No!” Kevin exclaimed.

“Wow!” Jimmy said, his mouth still stuffed with popcorn.

“Kevin’s getting scared,” Becky rudely interrupted.

“I am not!” Kevin retorted.

“Watch out for the big bad vampire… Calve.”

“Shut up! And don’t call me Kevvie!”

“That’s enough of that, kids,” Aunt Carolyn went on. “But what I just told you is true. When The Count arrived in America, it was the beach right off my bluffs where he landed. And since he had the equivalent of many millions of dollars in gold bricks, the first thing he needed was a home. So he paid the local villagers to build the lodge. According to the legend, the lodge was built over a hundred years ago for the price of one single gold brick that weighed over twenty pounds.”

“That’s a lot of gold,” Jimmy said, munching more popcorn.

“It certainly is,” Aunt Carolyn responded. “Today, a standard gold brick is worth almost $200,000. And it was worth a lot more back in those days.”

Kevin’s mind reeled; he was fascinated, but his fascination had nothing to do with the amount of money it cost to build the lodge. What fascinated him was this: This is Count Volkov’s house, he thought. I’m sitting in The Count’s house right this minute!

“About twenty years ago,” Aunt Carolyn went on, “I found out that the lodge was for sale. It had been vacant for years and years, and it was in very bad condition at the time. So I was able to buy it for a small amount of money, then I had it refurbished, and opened it up to campers and fishermen.”

“If it was vacant for all those years,” Jimmy asked, grabbing yet another fistful of popcorn, “how come nobody else bought it?”

“No one wanted it,” Aunt Carolyn told him.

“But it’s a great place,” Kevin said. “How come no one wanted to buy it?”

“Well, because of it’s history. Who would want to buy a lodge that was once owned by a man rumored to be a vampire? The lodge was considered bad luck, like a haunted house, so it sat for all those years without any buyers. Fortunately, I was able to fix it up pretty well, and until very recently, the lodge and the surrounding fishing dells and campgrounds attracted quite a lot of people.”

Kevin’s astonishment held him fast into his seat. There was still one more question burning in his mind…

“What is it, Kevin?” Aunt Carolyn asked. “You look like you have another question. Am I right?”

“Well, uh, yes, Aunt Carolyn,” Kevin admitted. “I do have another question.”

Aunt Carolyn smiled again, as though she already knew what Kevin wanted to ask. “Go ahead.”

“Well, uh, whatever happened to Count Volkov?”

“Nobody knows,” Aunt Carolyn said. “He disappeared, was never seen again. But of course, there are rumors about what actually happened.”

“What are they?” Kevin asked, still brimming with excitement. “What are the rumors?”

Aunt Carolyn relaxed back in her armchair. “The rumors are that the townspeople eventually found out that Count Volkov was a vampire, just like the people back in his kingdom had, and one day, when The Count was asleep in his coffin, they all banded together and overpowered Count Volkov’s servants. Then, still in the safety of daylight, they chained The Count’s coffin up… and buried it.”

“Where?” Kevin asked.

“They buried it somewhere on the grounds, Kevin, but no one knows exactly where. And they never told anyone else where The Count’s grave was, so nobody could dig him up and unleash him again.”

“Wow,” Jimmy said, digging out the last kernels of popcorn out of the bowl. “But what about all that gold?” Jimmy asked. He looked dejectedly down at the empty bowl of popcorn. “What happened to all those millions of dollars?”

“Nobody knows that either, Jimmy,” Aunt Carolyn said. “The way the rumor goes is that The Count had it buried somewhere on his own, and he wrote down the location of where it was buried in his secret diary. But no one ever found out where the diary was because The Count never told anyone. All that money is probably buried somewhere on the property too, just like The Count’s coffin, but with all these hundreds of acres of forest, it’s not likely that it will ever be found.”

Okay, Kevin thought, that crate of gold bricks is buried somewhere around here. This part he easily understood: buried treasure. There were lots of stories about buried treasure. What bothered him, however, was not the part about the buried gold bricks…

The Count’s coffin is buried somewhere around here too… with him still in it!

And since vampires were immortal, that could only mean one thing:

Count Volkov is still alive…

Kevin felt captivated. What a great, scary story! It was the best vampire story he’d ever heard, and much better than the movies he’d seen so many times on tv. And he wanted to know more about The Count, he wanted to hear more of the story, but—

“Well, kids,” Aunt Carolyn said, and stood up from her armchair. “That’s the local vampire legend. And I’m afraid it’s time for you all to get to bed. It’s past eleven now.”

“That was a great story,” Jimmy said. “And thanks for the popcorn.”

“You’re quite welcome, Jimmy,” Aunt Carolyn replied.

“I thought it was silly,” Becky complained and smirked. “You don’t really believe in vampires, do you?”

Aunt Carolyn chuckled. “Of course not. The story of Count Volkov is just old local folklore, just a legend.” She rubbed her hands together. “Okay, off to bed now, all of you. It’s late and you must be very tired.”

Kevin got up from the couch. He felt strange, but he didn’t feel tired. He guessed it was just the creepy story about The Count, but there was no real reason for him to be bothered about that because, just as Aunt Carolyn had said, the story was just folklore, a legend. And vampires weren’t real…

“Goodnight, kids,” Aunt Carolyn said. “See you all in the morning.”

The rest of them said goodnight and headed up the wide, carpeted stairs. But Kevin was last in line, and before he could even make it to the first step, Aunt Carolyn stopped him and said, “Oh, and Kevin?”

Kevin turned at the bottom of the steps. “Yes?”

“It’s true, the story about Count Volkov is only a legend, but there’s one thing you should think about.”

“What’s that, Aunt Carolyn?” Kevin asked.

Aunt Carolyn’s long black dress made her look like a shadow in the foyer. Her white face seemed to grin at him in the dark, and then she said:

“All legends, in some way, are based on truth.”