Anno Dracula Dracula Cha Cha Cha (3 page)

‘That’s very kind, Count…’

‘I insist. You have hotel?’

‘A
pensione,
Count. In Trastevere. Piazza Maria, 24.’

‘You will be delivered safely, Miss Reed. I give you the word of a Kernassy.’

The elder probably thought nothing of slaughtering peasant babies to slake his red thirst, but wouldn’t leave an unaccompanied woman adrift in a foreign city. It was easier to go along with him than make an argument.

Malenka continued her performance. Behind still-popping bulbs, a troupe of photographers and reporters tumbled like acrobats. Kate had learned to look away from the flashes. There were newsreel cameramen and roving wireless reporters. Had she skipped a few too many pages in
Picturegoer
? Either Malenka was the new Marilyn Monroe or anybody who decorated an orgy scene rated this treatment in Rome.

‘Tangenti
have been paid so passports will be processed swiftly at customs,’ said Count Kernassy, steering Kate past Malenka’s act and toward a thinner crowd. ‘Stay close, and you will go through under my cloak.’

For a moment, she thought he meant it literally.

Among the waiting people was a tall, slim vampire woman in a smart violet jacket and skirt, raising a hand in a matching glove. She wore black, horn-rim sunglasses and a Chinese-pattern headscarf, like someone in disguise. A double rope of pearls wound around her slender neck.

‘This will be our
galoppina
,’ Kernassy said. ‘As you say, our fixer.’

The woman took off her dark glasses. Her tiny mouth opened in astonishment, showing piranha teeth.

‘Katie Reed
,’ she exclaimed. ‘Good grief!’

Kate supposed she knew Penelope was part of
il principe’s
household and was therefore in Rome. But, trying to give Penny as little thought as possible, she’d never considered she might be the first person she ran into in the city.

‘Penny,’ she said, lamely. ‘Hello.’

‘You are old friends, I see,’ Kernassy deduced, not entirely accurately

‘Count Kernassy, this is Penelope Churchward. We knew each other, a long time ago.’

‘A long time ago means nought to such as we,’ he said, gallantly taking Penelope’s hand.

The Englishwoman put on a smile that was significantly more convincing than Malenka’s efforts. One had to know her well to distinguish its flaws.

‘How you do turn up, Katie,’ she said. ‘You’re here to see Charles, of course.’

At the time of her death, Penelope had been engaged to Charles. Her turning vampire ended the arrangement. Geneviève had something to do with it too, though not poor four-eyed Katie Reed. She wondered if Penny wasn’t in Rome at least partly because of Charles. He certainly had a knack of keeping vampire ladies about him. Much like
il principe
.

‘Have you seen him?’ Kate asked, hating to.

‘Not recently. He is an invalid. He must turn soon or be lost to us.’

Kate was hoping to persuade him of something similar. That Penelope should mention such a treatment wasn’t encouraging. If it was Penny’s idea, he’d probably be dead set against it. Surely he’d see sense as the last clouds gathered and the reaper sharpened his scythe?

Malenka swanned over, all teeth and teats. Paparazzi kept up with her. Discarded flashbulbs shattered like glass confetti. Penelope put her sunglasses back on and was introduced.

As the Count had promised, an official escorted them past the scrum for passport control. Half of the passengers on the flight were British and formed the beginnings of an orderly queue. Italians wedged themselves at the front, genially tutting at the eccentricity of a race that believed in waiting for turns rather than scrambling for position.

Kate was still too surprised by Penelope’s presence to feel guilty about the slight corruption gaining her preference. She knew
tangenti
— bribes — from the War, when the black market and the open palm were the only way to get anything done. Peace hadn’t changed Italy much.

The Count escorted Malenka. A large warm man in chauffeur’s livery — Penelope addressed him as Klove — carried their many bags. Malenka’s matching luggage was by Vuitton, Kate noticed. She and Penny walked together, wondering what to say to each other.

It had been
decades.

‘Thank you for the condolence card, Katie. It was a kindly gesture. You were always thoughtful.’

‘I was fond of your mother.’

Mrs Churchward had died in
1937.

‘Mama always liked you,’ Penelope admitted. ‘You were the sensible one.’

‘I’m not sure of that.’

‘Do you have get?’ Penelope asked, smiling sharply.

Kate shook her head. She had chosen not to pass on the Dark Kiss, to extend her bloodline. Only someone special, she had vowed. And someone special had never come along.

‘I made a brood of sons and granddaughters in darkness. It’s a fearful responsibility, my dear. I’m obliged to further the Godalming bloodline. In poor Art’s memory.’

Arthur Holmwood, Lord Godalming, was Penelope’s father-in-darkness, the vampire who had turned her. Like Kate and Penny, he was one of the new-borns of the ’80s. Like many of their peers, he hadn’t outlasted his natural lifespan. Kate should be closer to Penelope. They were almost sole survivors of their world.

‘I would found my own house,’ Penelope continued, ‘but I have duties. Whatever you think of him, we owe
il principe
a great debt, Katie. I know you were one of the firebrands who got him kicked out of England. But, like it or not, he’s our leader.’

Neither Kate nor Penny were directly of the Dracula bloodline. They were free from some of the taints that had poisoned most of their generation.

‘You must call at the Palazzo Otranto,’ said Penelope, making Kate shiver. ‘Things are hectic just now, what with wedding arrangements and ambassadorial conspirators.
He
would receive you, I’m sure. Charles is even invited, and that woman. If Dracula can forgive
them,
he’ll
overlook your
little revolutionist enthusiasms.’

During the struggle to oust Dracula from the throne of Great Britain, Kate had spent seven years as an outlaw. Hiding from Carpathians who wanted to impale her, she’d edited an underground newssheet. Later, in the First World War, she’d been buried under one of
il principe
’s marvellous toys, the first breed of tank. She wasn’t sure she could be as forgiving of him as the monster could afford to be of her. She also resented Penny’s implied suggestion that political agitation was a passing hobby, something to fill out boring years of an eternity not spent furthering her bloodline.

She caught herself. Penelope was working her strings, as ever. Kate was not going to be that goggle-eyed wallflower again, scandalised by her prettier friend but hanging on every barbed word. When they were alive and Kate was often her chaperone, Penny was already a manipulative child. Now she had a great many more years of practice in the art of getting to people.

‘Here are the cars,’ Penelope announced.

They had hustled through the airport and out onto the road. Parked at the verge were a red two-seater Ferrari and a hearse-like black Fiat. The Ferrari was a setting for Malenka.

More bulbs popped as Malenka was assisted into the tiny sports car. She stood tall and blew more kisses at the gathered crowd.

Penelope laughed quietly and shook her head, which made Kate think better of her.

‘I’m reminded of twin torpedoes, Katie,
thrusting.’

They
had
been friends, once.

‘The rest of us shall ride out of the wind,’ Penelope said. ‘The bus is a lot roomier than the milk-float.’

A warm man loitered by the cars.

‘Katie, this is Tom,’ introduced Penelope, trailing fingers across his lapel to display ownership. ‘He is a lost American in Europe.’

The young man was attached to the party in a subservient, unofficial fashion. His handshake didn’t give anything away. Kate guessed he was a satellite, and noticed red scratches on his neck. She saw him thinking as he looked her over, and intuited he was totting up the cost of her clothes. His current job was to drive the Ferrari and duck low to stay out of the pictures.

Klove held open the rear door of the Fiat and Kate got in, daintily followed by Penelope. They sank together into a deep leather seat. Someone already sat opposite, smoking a cigarette. Count Kernassy gathered his cape and slipped in to join them. The chauffeur silently shut the door and went up front.

The Count embraced the smoker, kissing him on both cheeks without disturbing his cigarette.

‘This is Signorina Reed, a discovery of our flight,’ the Count explained. ‘She is in your profession, Marcello. A reporter. From Ireland.’

The reporter leaned forward into the light. He was strikingly handsome in a bored, tired sort of way. His dark, wavy hair had a trace of unearned grey at the temples. Like Penny, he wore big black sunglasses. He was a living man, so Kate assumed the shades were an affectation.

Marcello extended a hand and took hers.

Electricity leaped between them.

She must watch herself with this Roman reporter. His casual, fag-dripping smile was insinuating. He was trim and smooth, but with an incipient plumpness that might be quite delicious. Under cologne and the tobacco was a scent of sweet blood. His neck was clean of bites.

He held her hand a few seconds longer than necessary, then turned to the Count and gabbled with him in Italian, ignoring her a trifle too deliberately.

Her heart beat faster. She knew Penelope quietly noticed her new interest. That would come back to haunt her. Penny was always good at storing ammunition for a rainy day.

Still, Kate was in Rome. And opposite was a beautiful man.

The sun was down by the time they were in the city proper. Kate realised the Count would be staying in the centre of Rome. Her
pensione
was in Trastevere, through which they were driving. She tried to persuade the elder to let her out, but he waved the request aside.

‘Absolutely not,
mia cara
Signorina Reed. We have not done with you yet. I insist you join our party this evening. You and Signorina Churchward have much to talk of. And you must experience Via Veneto by night. It is the most exciting street in the world.’

Kate’s rented flat was in the Holloway Road. Not even the most exciting street in North London. She allowed Count Kernassy to overwhelm her.

‘You will escort Signorina Reed, Marcello,’ Kernassy said, suavely commanding.

‘But of course,’ Marcello said, his first words of English.

‘I’m rather afraid Marcello despises us,’ Penelope said, politely. ‘He’s gathering material for a novel which will put us all in our places. His subject is the empty night-lives of the eternal rich.’

From the set of his mouth, Kate knew Marcello understood what Penelope had said. He had some fluency in English, which was a hopeful sign.

‘Do you still write for the papers, Katie?’

‘Yes.’

‘I thought so.’

Penelope sat back. Kate feared she was reddening.

‘Will you write about Malenka?’ she asked Marcello.

Kate wondered why her stomach was tight. And whether she could have come up with a more inane question.

Marcello shrugged and expressively tilted his head.

‘She is like a big doll,’ he said, trying to sneer.

Kate knew at once the reporter was smitten with the starlet and felt unaccountably betrayed. The city was doing something to her. It was a hypnotic spell in ‘Arrivederci, Roma’. She was turning into an idiot.

Her throat prickled with red thirst.

‘But of course he will write of
mia cara,’
the Count said, arm snaking around the Italian. ‘There must be tiny little words to put under the great big photographs. It is a legal requirement.’

Kate wondered if Marcello disliked the Count’s patronising purr. There was steel in Kernassy’s velvet, as if he had a hold over the reporter. Perhaps it was as easy to buy an Italian newspaperman as a passport official.

The Fiat crossed the Tiber at the Ponte Sisto and followed the Ferrari through the crowded streets of Campo de’ Fiori and Piazza della Rotunda. Traffic horns honked a Spike Jones symphony, punctuated by rude shouts and appreciative cries. Couples on motor scooters zipped in between crawling cars, scarf-wearing girls grinned sweetly at stalled motorists. Pedestrians ambled along in the road rather than the pavement, squeezing between vehicles, talking blithely among themselves. There were even herds of sheep, blinking under the streetlights, driven by sharp-eyed children.

‘Italian cars are for speed,’ said Marcello, ‘but Italian cities are not for cars. One can only drive through them at the pace of a walk.’

In the Largo di Torre Argentina, a football game was in process. Three-dozen youths booted a ball about among strolling crowds. When the Ferrari drove into the square, the match was abandoned and the players clamoured around. Kate wondered which chassis they worshipped most, that of the car or that of
la Malenka
.

There was a great deal of whistling and stamping. Malenka stood up in the car and waved.

Everyone wanted red kisses. Malenka bestowed a few on favoured lads, nipping slightly. She licked blood off her lips, and made a gesture which parted the sea of people. They were able to drive on.

Hoots followed them.

Kate’s teeth were sharp and her mouth watery. Inconvenient need nagged. Being a vampire meant living with something like an addiction. To blood, and all that came with its letting. The warm were addicted to food and drink, of course, and to air? But the vampire’s need was stronger, crueller, more insistent.

‘For whom do you write?’ she asked Marcello.

He rattled off names of publications she vaguely knew.
Lo specchio
,
Oggi
,
Europeo
.

‘Marcello once sold the exact same story to
Paese sera
and
Osservatore Romano
,’ Kernassy said, laughing.