Todd's uncle Johnson always kept lots of garlic at home and there was a cross in every corner of his house, even his fence was made up of crosses and there was a big cross on top of his roof, just like a church. Just across the road from his home was an ancient house. Its windows and doors were boarded up for centuries and no one rented or sold it. Local people used to say that one can hear screeching1 of a bat from inside the home and many people also reported seeing shadow of a tall and lanky2（瘦长的） man in the window, on the upper floor, which was the only one not covered with boards.
Despite the long time for which the house had not been used, it always used to look clean. There was not even a single leaf in the backyard. The bats seemed to love the place and at night, a number of bats used to appear there, as if from nowhere. According to the folklore3（民俗学）, the house was lived-in by a real vampire4. Many people were reported to have died inexplicably5 in front of the house. Their eyes used to be wide open, as if they had seen something horrible when they died. It was also a site where accidents used to occur quite frequently.
It was said that the vampire of the house opposite that of Uncle Johnson s, used to reveal6 his face to his victims only. People also said that he was so ugly that people had a heart attack at the very instant they saw him and this is why they died. Then, when they were buried, the vampire used to dig up their graves7 and sucked their blood to feed himself. The legend also went that anyone who passed a dare in the name of the vampire would get to see how he looks and will die a painful death at the hands of the vampire. Would you like to give it a try?
