Marquis d'Ufré, a young French diplomat, finds himself in a small Serbian village, in the house of an old peasant named Gorcha. The host is absent: he left the house ten days ago along with some other men to hunt for a Turk outlaw Alibek. Upon leaving he told his sons, Georges and Pierre, that they should wait for him for ten days sharp and, should he come a minute later, kill him by driving a stake through his heart for then he’d be not a man but a vourdalak (vampire). The novella became the basis for "I Wurdulak", one of the three parts of Mario Bava's 1963 film I Tre volti della paura (also known as Black Sabbath), featuring Boris Karloff.