Countess Dracula (7 page)

‘What do you mean?’ asked Georgina, as if the concept was still beyond her grasp.

‘I mean we need to bathe, do our hair and makeup and douse ourselves in scent that the men will find irresistible!’

‘Oh.’ Georgina looked down at her dress. ‘So I have to take this off again?’

‘Only for now, darling, only for now.’

Elizabeth’s main bathroom lay directly off the dressing room. If there was one thing she didn’t believe in it was skimping on the space available for pampering. She slid back a large mirrored panel to reveal a spacious tub and shower.

‘My word!’ said Georgina. ‘It’s lovely, and so big.’

‘Indeed it is,’ Elizabeth agreed. She had tested its capacity with visiting guests on many occasions – in fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she had bathed in it alone. Nor would she tonight.

‘Never cut back on the important things in life,’ she said with a smile, heading over to the tub and putting the plug in place. Her hand automatically reached for the tap but she stopped herself. She didn’t want to run the water, not yet.

Georgina was clearly feeling uncomfortable, standing in the bathroom in nothing but her cheap underwear. ‘I think I’d lose myself in it,’ she said.

Maybe you will
, Elizabeth thought.

For a moment she thought about what she was planning. Was she really intending to go through with this? Her concerns were not about morality, a diluted concept after years of living her lifestyle. It was a word to be found in dictionaries, something that existed elsewhere, like the poverty and hunger that she had risen above.

The only question in her mind was:
Can I get away with this? Can I get what I want and then walk away scot-free?
It said more about her arrogance than her planning skills that she decided the answer was yes. She could do what she wanted: she was Elizabeth Sasdy, Queen of Hollywood.

She stepped behind Georgina so that she was between the girl and the door. ‘No need to be shy,’ she said. ‘I’ll leave you to it once I’ve shown you where everything is.’

Pleased to see that this made the girl relax a little, Elizabeth moved over to the bathroom cabinets. She opened the heavy pearlescent doors to reveal stacks of white towels. Then the next cabinet was opened to show an array of soaps, powders and shampoos. Elizabeth reached in and pulled out a selection of bottles, throwing them one at a time to Georgina.

‘This is wonderful – California citrus, smells like you’re bathing in a lemon tree. This one is supposed to be good for your skin. This is for your hair. This is a scented conditioner.’

Georgina, struggling to hold all the bottles, terrified of dropping one, looked at the object that Elizabeth still had in her hand. ‘And what’s that for?’

‘This, dear?’ asked Elizabeth, opening the cutthroat razor. ‘This is for making me look young again.’

She moved behind the girl, slapping a hand firmly across her mouth to stop the inevitable scream.

Georgina kept hold of the bottles even as she realised what was about to happen, her instinct not to damage things that weren’t hers bred into her so deeply that it helped cost her her life. Not that she would have had time to do much, anyway – Elizabeth was quick, drawing the blade across her throat as her father had done with the pigs back in Hungary: one sure cut. Then she pushed the girl forward so that she fell into the bath, the bottles clattering around her feet.

Georgina hit the enamelled surface with a dull thud, her hands slapping at the bath as she tried to push herself up. Her palms splayed in the blood that was gushing from her. However hard she fought for a breath so that she could scream, the wound in her throat wouldn’t let her.

Elizabeth closed and locked the bathroom door only moments before Nayland appeared on its other side.

‘Elizabeth?’ he shouted. ‘Are you all right? It sounded like something fell over.’

Georgina was still now, the only sound that of the pumping spray of blood against the inside of the bath. A repetitive soft slap against the enamel.

‘I’m fine,’ Elizabeth said. ‘Like you care.’

She undid her dressing gown, not wanting to get blood on it, then stepped forward, straddling Georgina so she could lift her up and squeeze more blood from the gash in her throat.

‘About earlier,’ said Nayland, ‘what I said … I’m sorry, I just get …’

‘I know what you get,’ she replied. Christ, did he have to try and have a heart-to-heart now? This was hardly a convenient time. ‘Look.’ She set Georgina back down as the flow of blood slowed to a trickle. ‘We’ll talk later, all right?’

A pause. ‘OK.’ A longer pause. ‘Is the maid with you?’

Patience had been talking, Elizabeth realised. ‘Of course she isn’t – I’m taking a bath. I gave her fifty dollars and told her to take the night off.’

‘Patience seemed to think you were going to take her out … dancing.’

Elizabeth laughed. ‘Does that sound like me?’

‘No,’ Nayland had to admit. ‘I was surprised.’

‘I told you, I gave her some money and packed her off. Now go away – we’ll talk later.’

‘Fine.’ There was a shuffling on the other side of the door while Nayland decided if there was anything else he could say. He realised there wasn’t and she listened to him walk away slowly, closing the dressing-room door behind him. Finally, peace.

She went back to Georgina and lifted her up by the ankles. Elizabeth was a strong woman and certainly not averse to flexing her muscles. Still, she was glad the girl had been so slight. She squeezed the maid’s body, trying to work as much of the blood as possible out of it. There was always going to be wastage, she decided, maybe a couple of pints retained by the body despite her best efforts. Looking down into the bath she decided there was more than enough. If one small splash had had such a pronounced effect how could all this not revitalise her completely?

But what if its potency faded after death?

Elizabeth grabbed a large sponge, climbed into the tub, squatted down and got to work.

The blood was cooling quickly. She dragged the loaded sponge up her legs, the skin glowing with warmth to begin with before quickly chilling off. Then she rubbed it across her shoulders and chest, letting the liquid run down. She dropped back so that she was sitting in the thick puddle, working fast to paint every inch of herself, forcing the sponge into every hated fold and crease. The blood thickened on her as it began to clot and dry, her limbs sticking to her torso as she tried to shift in the bath and become more comfortable.

She soaked up more on the sponge and squeezed it out over her head, massaging it into her hair and scalp and finally her face. She closed her eyes as lightly as she could and doused herself, letting the fluid run from her forehead in a dripping curtain. She used her fingers to rub the blood in, massaging her cheeks, pushing her fingers along the side of her nose, working the skin hard. She nearly choked as she accidentally snorted in a little, feeling it run down the back of her throat like salty syrup.

Her neck, too: no more sagging jowls or puckered throat. She rubbed and rubbed, dipping her hands into the blood beneath her and smearing herself all over, obsessively returning to every part of her that she had grown to hate, pinching and twisting the skin, letting her nails scrape at it, punishing it for being so weak, so pathetic and old.

Eventually, muscles aching and her whole body sticking to the bath beneath her, Elizabeth lay back and relaxed.

The smell was pungent but not unpleasant – she wanted to be reminded of the potency of what she was lying in, the animal richness of it.

How long did it take to work? Perhaps the longer she had it on her body the greater the effect? Though surely there was a limit? She could hardly shrink away back to childhood here in her slick second womb. Her skin tingled, though whether that was from the rough attention she’d paid it or whether it was proof that the blood was taking effect she couldn’t say.

She realised she’d been holding her breath and she let out a sigh that bubbled through wet lips.

She should be horrified. She should be disgusted. She didn’t want to open her eyes – not because she was scared to look upon the literal bloodbath she had created but because she wanted her eyelids to receive the full benefit. She reached out a hand and rested it on the cool flank of the dead maid, the woman she had killed. She realised she felt nothing. No, not nothing, worse than that: she felt thrilled. She felt powerful. She felt back in a place of dominance, feeding off the little people, thriving off their devotion. She felt
herself
.

She waited for about twenty minutes, then decided that the blood must have done its work. She was too impatient to wait any longer.

Elizabeth sat up and reached out for the taps. In her head she briefly heard her father’s voice. ‘
Cold water for blood
,’ he said and she could picture him hurling bucket after bucket of icy water on the bloodstained floor of the barn after he had slaughtered one of the pigs. ‘
It chills it off the stones
.’

She had no idea whether there was any truth to that but decided there was little point in arguing.

She turned on the cold-water tap and let the liquid rush out. She gave an involuntary shriek as it splashed on her, cupping it with both hands nonetheless and pouring it over her head, letting it rush over her shoulders. A cloud of pink blossomed around her as the blood began to be washed off. She removed the plug and swirled the blood residue away, forcing it down the outlet.

Leaning over the side of the bath she nudged Georgina’s legs aside so that she could reach for one of the bottles she had handed her, the shampoo. Elizabeth poured a good handful into her hair and massaged it, constantly cupping more cold water and dousing herself with it.

It took a long time but eventually she was clean.

She stood up and, on impulse, turned her gaze away from the bathroom mirror. She didn’t want this piecemeal, she wanted to appreciate the full effect.

She stepped out into her dressing room and stared at herself in the mirrors that surrounded her.

She was beautiful. Perfect. A woman who had lost twenty years … more, even. She couldn’t take her stare off herself. Her hands constantly stroked her body, feeling every inch of its rejuvenation.

A miracle. And one that was certainly worth the life of a stupid maid, a girl whom nobody in their right mind would miss.

Which was when she noticed the girl’s uniform, still discarded on the floor. Had Nayland seen it? No matter if he had: he would keep her secret. She would make quite sure of that.

Nayland
had
noticed the uniform – had been staring at it, in fact, when he had asked Elizabeth about the girl’s whereabouts.

‘I gave her fifty dollars,’ his wife had said, ‘and told her to take the night off.’

A lie, surely. But hiding what truth?

He had retired to his own room. Once again lost inside his own house, feeling out of control and powerless beneath a roof that increasingly felt like that of a prison rather than a home.

He poured himself a large Scotch and sat in the window, watching an unhealthy sun sink behind the mountains. Part of him wished it would have the decency to just stay there.

The maid. What had Elizabeth done to the maid?

And, more to the point, what was he going to do about it?

Nayland lost himself in the shadows, the faint light from a bedside lamp too thin to permeate further than the safety of his white-sheeted bed.

Elizabeth came to him a few hours later. A silhouette in his doorway, a ghost bathed in expensive scent.

‘Look at you,’ she said, ‘sat staring out into the dark.’

‘Story of my life.’

‘It doesn’t have to be.’ She stepped inside the room and closed the door behind her. ‘Turn off that light.’

He didn’t question her – did he ever? – just got to his feet, walked over and let the darkness possess those last few steps.

‘Take off your clothes.’

This did give him pause. Unsure for a moment whether it would be the prelude to humiliation. What the hell, it wasn’t as if he had any pride left.

He dropped his garments to the floor, casting them into the darkness where they were lost.

He stood there in what little moonlight managed to filter in through the window, broken up and carved by the blades of the palm trees outside. He looked down at his body, a scratchy projection of his past self, a grainy monochrome print of a man.

‘Close your eyes,’ Elizabeth said.

‘I can’t see a thing anyway.’

‘Close them.’

Nayland did so, forcing himself to relax, spreading out his hands and letting himself float in the darkness. Giving in to her as he always did. He heard her move closer, the soft breath of air as she came to him, the awareness of something else out there in this ocean of darkness, a big predator certainly, one that he had long ago accepted would one day eat him whole.

Elizabeth whispered in his ear. ‘I’m going to do what I want.’

‘When have you not?’ he replied.

Her fingers brushed his chest, his cheeks, ran their nails down his arms, so lightly that it was like being touched by a spirit, something without flesh. The illusion would not be maintained for long. After a moment of absence, left to float once more, he felt her take hold of his penis, her thumbnail dragging its way along it, promising pain as well as pleasure.

‘I’ve missed this,’ Elizabeth told him. He didn’t believe her, of course, but it was nice to hear. His body had no issue with her lies, and he stiffened between her fingers.

Nayland pictured her as he had seen her on the screen, imagined her hands reaching out from the projector’s beam and pulling him in. She tugged him towards the bed, leading him like the obedient old hound that he was.

‘Lie back,’ she said, feet still planted on the floor, toes curling against the marble tiles.

The spirit of Elizabeth vanished to be replaced with the animal that lived at the heart of her. She climbed on top of Nayland, hands forcing him down against the sprung mattress as she rode him as though he was an inanimate object. As always, the goal was her pleasure but that didn’t lessen his own. He gripped the sheets on either side of him and pressed his head back into the bed, stiffening at the scratching of her nails, the bite of her teeth, the hungry grind of her as she pounded against him. It was an act of vandalism and he loved her all the more for it.