... Do such undead fiends truly walk the Earth?
Demetrious Myicura thought so. The fear of vampires dominated his life so much that his existence revolved around keeping the monsters at bay. He believed in them implicitly...and that belief led to a horrible, lonely death for the elderly Polish immigrant.
It was 1973 when Myicura's emaciated, grotesquely contorted body was found in his dreary home in the village of Stoke-on-Trent in England. The elderly man had worked quietly in the village since the late 1940's, keeping to himself and making few friends and acquaintances. It was only after he had missed work for several days that the police were called to investigate. ...
Myicura was found dead on his bed in his cold and meanly furnished abode. He had taken all electric light bulbs out of their sockets and lived in candlelit silence. His body was found on his bed fully clothed, with his knees bent upward and his right elbow bent behind his head. A huge mound of clothes lay at the foot of the bed. Myicura's body was rigid with rigor mortis and his mouth gaped open as if frozen in a scream of terror.
There was more strangeness in the room. Salt was sprinkled everywhere, including the bed itself. Newspapers were spread around the bed... as if to warn Myicura if anybody approached him while sleeping. Anyone stepping on the newspapers would make a loud crackling sound. Several containers were strategically placed throughout the room. Many were filled with combination of urine and salt. On the window a bowl held a mixture of human waste and garlic.
The police were mystified by these strange details. An autopsy showed that Myicura actually died of suffocation...the old man had choked to death on a piece of pickled garlic. The cause of death seemed natural yet the circumstances were decidedly UNNATURAL. Further investigation discovered that all of the weird items surrounding Myicura's death were designed to ward off vampires...the salt, the containers mixing waste and garlic and salt, the newspapers, the piece of pickled garlic It was theorized that this was the way that the old man lived, each night consumed by fear of the living dead. Instead of swallowing or chewing the garlic piece, Myicura had choked on it. All of the strangeness was part of old Polish folk remedies for vampirism.
