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I looked up at the board, confused. "Looks like Greek to me," I said.
"Latin proverbs, actually," whispered Mr Seth. "Didn't want to alarm the gentlewomen unduly," he said motioning towards Mrs Carruthers. "And you never know who'll turn up. We are in a public place, after all, at your specific request. Come closer."
As I approached the board, the lines of foreign quotations shimmered and faded, replaced by a table filled with tight, slanted script. The words were half-obscured by geometric symbols that seemed to defy close inspection.
"Paddy: Your father told me you're an aficionado of horror tales."
"A what?" I asked, placing the calculator down on the table and pulling my orange exercise book and a stumpy pencil from my bag.
"A fanatical. A fan, of horror stories."
"Oh. How - when did Dad tell you about m-"
"All in good time," interrupted the old man. "First, the basics." Mr Seth pointed to the table. "Tell me, has that school taught you how to read between heritage days and trips to the zoo?"
I squinted up at the blackboard and read the column headings: "Um. Blessed. Imperilled. Damned. Devout."
"Right. Now, horror movie expert, tell me this: what are the most popular monsters in history."
"Ahm. Dracula, Frankenstein, I mean, Frankenstein's monster, the Crypt Keeper, the Headless Horseman, Lord Loss, the Nazgul, Darleks, Godzilla, -".
"No," interrupted Mr Seth, glaring at me. "Not their names. Their species?"
"Vampires," I ventured.
"Good, go on."
"Ghosts, and werewolves."
"Yes, yes. And others?"
"Mutants, sorcerers, zombies, blobs -"
"Excellent," said Mr Seth. "And what do they all have in common?"
"They're evil," I said.
"True. Embarrassingly obvious, but true. What else?"
"Um. They attack people. They kill. Or turn people into monsters, like them."
"Yes. And why is that?"
I scratched my head. This was one weird conversation. "Because they're evil?"
"You've already said that," snapped Mr Seth. "Think harder. Use your imagination."
"Because the goodies have to have someone strong enough to put up a fight to make the story interesting?"
Mr Seth laughed, his voice warm, and, for the first time that day, reassuring. "Creative answer, lad. Very post-modern. But there's something else they have in common."
I looked down at the ground, my mind full of mud.
"Souls," said Mr Seth, and I nodded as if even a fool would have known that. "Or, more precisely, an absence of souls. A lacking."
I arched my eyebrow and crossed my arms. Mr Seth was preaching. My family aren't religious, but I'd gone to Mass with Nicky once to get in her good books, and was amazed at how the priest could make even the most terrifying subject - hell, eternal suffering, the devil - as boring as cleaning Katy's cage.
"Pay. Attention!" hissed Mr Seth, and I jumped. Mr Seth was no minister. "Souls make us human," he growled. "Without one, you're a monster."
"The Damned," I said, re-reading the board.
"Yes," said Mr Seth. "Lost forever. Now what if I told you some things from horror stories are more than make believe?"
"I would say," I said bravely, "that you were crackers."
"Ha!" laughed Mr Seth, sounding genuinely pleased with me. "A sensible response in ordinary times, lad, though I suspect you know better than that from the events of the last few days."
"What's a Blallgam"? I asked, reading the first row under the 'Damned' column. "Is it a zombie, a vampire, what?"
"A Blackgum," said the old man, over-enunciating the word to correct me, "is all of those things."
I must have looked as stumped as I felt.
"What's the first thing you notice when you see a police constable at the end of the street?"
"A gun?" I hazarded, unsure where this was going.
"Not from that distance."
"His uniform?" I guessed.
"Or hers," said Mr Seth. "I never specified whether the officer was a man. But you're essentially right. His - or her - uniform would mark him - or her - out as a police officer."
I looked at Mr Seth blankly.
"Another example, perhaps," he said. "Why do all the senior high school kids in this town walk around in clumps, wearing black, with multi-coloured dyed hair, pierced ears and noses?"
"Because Quakehaven's full of losers?"
Mr Seth ignored my joke. "Why do the older kids all listen to the same songs with their white wirelesses turned up far too loud?"
"You mean their iPods?" I laughed. "Because they're cool?"
"Don't be silly, Paddy. You're smarter than this; at least I hope you are."
My cheeks burned. I was being tested and wasn't doing well. "Um. I guess they dress the same way and do a lot of the same stuff to fit in. Actually, more so they don't stand out."
"Bullseye!" said Mr Seth, jubilantly, clapping his hands. "And what if I told you that, in the real world, most of these monsters - the Blackgum - were once human? That, even after they lose their souls, they retain human habits, at least for the first few years?"
"Well," I said, thinking hard about the teenager-goths. "They'd probably want to hang out together."
"Splendid. And that's just what they do. After a few days wandering around in their rotting human skin, a Blackgum finds a gang dressed up in superior clothes: a fancy suit, like a werewolf's fur and claws, or a vampire's cloak and fangs, or whatever. The new Blackgum copies the local gang to avoid sticking out like a black swan in a nest of whites. Funny thing fashion, of course," he said wistfully. "Human skin is the latest fad. Who'd have thought?"
"What's to stop them changing over and over again? Zombie-suit for Winter, and a wraith-look for Summer, and so on?"
"Have you ever heard the saying, the leopard can't change its spots?"
I nodded.
"Once a Blackgum locks into its first look, it's painful for it to change form. Think of a newly-minted Blackgum as a lump of wet plaster. Once it's squeezed into its first cast, it sets and gets stuck in the mold. There's still the odd shapeshifter about that can morph between forms, true. But they're not common these days."
"Why haven't I ever seen a Blackgum in real life?” I asked sceptically.
"The 21st century," sighed Mr Seth. "Have you ever goggled 'monsters' on the Interweb?"
I laughed. "Googled, you mean? On the Internet?" I shook my head. Our school strictly supervised our use of the Internet. Mrs Dixon would never let me search for monsters.
"Well plenty of people do. Newspapers and web catalogues -"
"Blogs," I grinned.
"Such liberties with language," scoffed Mr Seth. "Yes, the press would pay top dollar for a confirmed monster picture. The Blackgum were forced into hiding - either to some remote Siberian outpost, like abominable snowmen - or by disguising themselves as people to avoid being caught on geeks' phones or the security cameras on every street corner."
"So Blackgum are harmless now?"
"Far from it, Paddy," said Mr Seth, resting his hands on my shoulders. "Times are harder for them now, but they're just as hungry, and probably more desperate than ever."
"What do they eat?" I asked, not sure I wanted to know.
"The same thing they eat in the stories, Paddy."
I gulped. "People."
"Only a few are partial to human flesh, and then only on special occasions. Most prefer pizza. Who can blame them?"
I sighed, ignoring Mr Seth's lame jibe. "They eat souls don't they?"
"Bingo."