Dear Followers,

Yeah...it's just me, arrivin' at Kildare's, langered again on Gin! (turn your speakers on pigeon!). I was over at his gaff hopin' to hit him up for a Feckin' New Typewriter! You'd think by now The Vampires would get their fat arses off those satin-clad thrones an' go out somewhere to purchase me a decent type writer! This clunker is more suited to being utilised for murderin' some poor deservin' bastard! Smack! Right down like a tonne of parts on the head! Smack! Anyway thankfully I'm not the murderous type. No. I'm more of a sneak, the type that might poison you with a nice fresh cuppa tea. "Here pigeon...have a nice pick-me-up!" 

Blind as a wanking bat, but sharp as a horse whip, I am The Hoar of Ages. I shall indulge you herein with no pleasantries, no quips, no soft-hearted words, no comforting expressions. I am as hard and bitter as the bite that renders the sharp announcement of venom to veins. My apparent and shocking beauty belies a more sinister soul, one which has witnessed at first hand the dredge and filth of this pathetic planet and its dim-witted population. So spare me your tears and woes. You shall not find a freshly baked angel cake in this granny's cupboard! Besides, were you ever to sit with 'me' for tea and cake, 'twould be a 'lasting' refreshment you'd be sippin', and a cloggin' chunk of yeast you'd be attempting to lift from the roof of your lacklustre mouth! Ever try passing a DearVampire Cake? Trust me...one needs well-worked thighs to down the feckin' thing once lodged in the gob! I am however working on a more 'palate-pleasing' recipe in my kitchen. I shall tell you all about it...sometime. I may even make it available to you!

I live alone at an undisclosed location in Ireland, where I receive many man-friends. They keep me for sordid services rendered, I keep them for the lager-loot in their taundry pockets. They come and go like days and nights, but thankfully their numbers are plentiful. You'd be surprised who I've had draped across the Frenchman's Chest in my parlour! Perhaps I shall one day publish their names...a vibrant List of Shame 'twould make indeed! "A good walk from the Four Courts, but a quick ramble from Smithfield..." is how I describe the route to my compact little two-up two-down residence in Dublin. Of course anyone in the know would consider these directions a riddle, and feck 'em! I've always been a firm believer in me privacy, and so to twist their minds as they look for me place, I give 'em the worst directions imaginable! "Eh, yeah Pigeon, ya take a left at Arran Quay, then its a right...right?
 

And down the alley to yer left...right? And up the flight of steps, behind The Church of the Barren and Beligerant, through the beech tree gardens, another left, across the road, through the woolen mills and your nearly there! One more right at the lights, another left at the postbox, and down the lane beside the butcher. You'll be lookin' for the door with two lions...just knock." By the time me visitors get to me, they're feckin' exhausted, and it makes me 'job' the easier. Plant 'em in a soft chair, do the biz, and empty their pockets having locked 'em on cheap gin...works a treat every time. Sure they even come back for the abuse!

Why be I here? Well...The Vampires have allotted me this feckin' page, so that I can address irritants and imbeciles who write to them, for I am not only The Hoar of Ages, I am also Secretary to The Vampire Kildare. I was hired by Kildare quite a number of years ago, too many I'd say. My position sees me  tending to incoming post, replying to letters which are received, answering The Heavy Black Phone which sits on my desk, and travellin' back and forth like a bleedin' human-yoyo between Freake's gaff in New York and Kildare's little hovel in Christchurch, Dublin.

I have me own plane...The Vampires bought the damn thing. Runs well enough, but the inflight food sucks a wonder. There's always a tin box waitin' for me, with cheeses and breads and fish and fruit in it for me. Sometimes the fish stinks, but if I don't eat it, I keep it for the cats at JFK. The pilot thinks I'm some feckin' rich aristocrat with a ready stash of bygone-day money stashed in a swiss bank account. That's the cover story anyway, as far as he's concerned. He says little, thankfully, and spends most of his feckin' time pickin' a herpes scab that seems to have a life of its own as it comes and goes on his upper lip. I swear...that festering scab will bring our bleedin' plane down one of these nights...he picks at it so bloody much! Anyway, travel is a bore...so I bring lots of me own personal bits 'n bobs to keep me mind occupied. Me bags are always with me...always jammed with piles of papers and trinkets on me way out to New York, and likewsie coming back to Dublin. It works vice versa...Kildare is always sendin' all sorts of crap out to Freake, and Freake will always have a shiteload of garbage ready for me to bring back to Kildare in Dublin, so I bring an empty case or two, just in 'case'!.

When I get to New York, there's always a car waitin'. Driver says nothin' and heads of to Freake's building. Once there, I get ta business, updating Freake on letters he has received, taking notes and instructions and all that shite. He's a good Gov, really...even though I have me doubts 'bout his sanity. Ya never know, with vampires...I swear one of these days he's gonna lunge at me and finish me off right there and then! So, I always work 'fast' and 'furious'...do the biz, and make like a feckin' steam train outta there, when we're done. Just as I'm leavin', he awlays goes into his back rooms and comes out again with something for me. "A parting gift...my Dear Hoar", he says, and hands me somethin' expensive, like jewelry or perfume. But sure I deserve it, don't I! Anyway, point is...he's thoughtful in that way...Freake. So long as you don't find him in a bitch-arsed mood, and hungry. 

Then it's back ta Dublin, over to Kildare's place, same shite...dialogue, takin' notes and giving him his crap outta me cases from Freake. That bastard wouldn't give ya daylight! But I'm mad about him all the same! "How's it goin' Mordi?" I always say. "Tis going....me deary...'tis going, at least" , he says. And when I've exhausted him with news from Freake in New York, he pays me the wages. It's a long haul, this travellin' thing. But thats the feckin' way it is honey...that's the feckin' way it is. Besides, if nothin' else, I get ta see The World from the window of that plane...over and over and over again. And with so much filth, misery and drudgery on the ground...it's a fuckin' marvel to be on top of it all, lookin' down! I am also engaged in establishing SLEEPWALK.TV at the mo, so ya could say me feckin' knickers are gettin' in a twister. But hey, what's in a days work anyway if you exclude all the crap we all unload on eachother. That's about the bulls balls of it. I occasionally answer the door, but never forget to fully equip myself with a jackhammer when doing so. A girl must protect herself, at any 'cost'! Believe me, I've spent a fortune on detergent in my attempts to uncrust my frocks after a beating. But those are other stories.
 

I tend The Office in Ireland from 9.00am to 5.00pm sharp Monday to Friday, and to not one moment beyond these times. If you wish to leave a personal phone message for The Vampires, you may dial 1-360-3586032 within the United States and 001-360-3586032 from outside the United States. I trust you shall continue to write your letters to The Vampires. When they find it utterly impossible to respond, I shall be doing so in lieu. I do so much enjoy scribbling the odd letter meself, and so if one wishes to write to me personally, one may do so. I won't thank you for dropping by. You'll be back besides. And why the hell should I thank a feckin' stranger? The last time I thanked a stranger...he refused to pay up. I wonder how his wife ever survived, after his demise? Strange-like...life. Strange-like!

Well, well, well. As it happens, pigeons, part of my job as secretary to The Vampires is to flit about the planet to Kildare and Freake's various residences and try to put some kind of order and sense into all the rubbish in these places. And I'm talking about attics, cellars, closets, false closets, trap doors, back houses, turrets, towers, and carriage houses from here to Calcutta, stuffed to the feckin' brim with more Egyptological relicry and recondite piles of old papers and books, stuffed baboons, old hats, canes, skulls, petrified motor cars and plain old Victorian rubbish than you can shake a broom at. It's a monstrous task.

Right then...I won't thank you for dropping by. You'll be back besides. And why the hell should I thank a feckin' stranger? The last time I thanked a stranger...he refused to pay up. I wonder how his wife ever survived, after his demise? Shite sometimes...life. In the meantime, you may catch up with me by reading my new 'Monthly Mumble'. I'm rarin' to rip some feckin' 'soars' open...and I'll be doing just that, each and every feckin' month!

The Hoar Of Ages

ps.

Well, it was at the Freake "family seat" in Salem, Massachusetts, USA, that I happened to come across some old drawings by "Caspar." (Yes, seems he spelled his Christian name with two A's in the old days.) Here is one sketch, and there's more where that came from. The inscription at the bottom reads "de Vampyrium Nosferatum" and it's signed "CF 1804." On the back of the drawing he's written "The Vampyrium as I swear I saw it. Lake of Grodny, Yugra Frontier, Russia."