“He’s giving us all double wages,” said Zora with satisfaction. “But thank you all the same, Mina. Not everyone would want a bunch of poisonous snakes in their house. I didn’t know what to do after one of them got loose and the hotel kicked me out. And it wasn’t even one of the poisonous ones, just Buttercup! She looks impressive—most people have never seen an albino python—but she wouldn’t hurt anyone, not really. I mean, unless they scared her.” Although on stage Zora spoke with the accent of the Mysterious East, this morning it was evident that the east she came from was Hackney in the East End of London. She ate the final bite of her omelet appreciatively.
Just then Kati, the parlor maid, came in carrying a silver tray. She said something to Mina in Hungarian—Catherine still could not make heads or tails of that language! Mina picked a piece of paper off the tray and looked at it intently. Even from the back, it had the distinctive appearance of a telegram.
“This is from Irene Norton,” said Mina, putting it down on the table. “She says she’s found the warehouse in Vienna where Van Helsing was creating and mesmerizing vampires, and where they still maintain a sort of nest. She asks if we’d like to join her for a vampire hunt. You and Beatrice need to get back to London, don’t you? But I could go. After all, I have developed a sort of expertise in vampires!”
“I pity Van Helsing’s vampires, with two such formidable opponents to deal with!” It was Count Dracula, who had entered as silently as he always did. Catherine looked him over with satisfaction. He was such a perfect romantic hero! Not, perhaps, particularly tall, but with the easy, upright carriage of an aristocrat and military man. High cheekbones, an aquiline nose, a forehead that indicated intellect, interesting pallor, and the sort of dark, floppy hair that would have delighted Mrs. Radcliffe. And he usually dressed in black. Yes, she would have to see if she could fit him into one of her books, somehow!
Mina turned to him with a frown, not of anger but as though she were thinking hard. “I should go, shouldn’t I? Irene has more resources than I do, but she has very little experience fighting vampires, whereas I—well, I’ve learned a great deal about them in the years since poor Lucy was transformed into one. You can’t come, I suppose, Vlad? Not with the Emperor himself arriving for a state visit this week?”
The Count shook his head. “Much as I would like to see a Hungary free of Austrian influence—I was proud to stand with Kossuth, and would again, despite the failure of our cause—I have official duties to perform. I must stay and represent my country. But you might ask Carmilla. It would take her no more than a day to drive from the schloss to Vienna, and she has always enjoyed hunting—even our kind, when they prove dangerous.”
Mina nodded. “I’ll send her a telegram today. I’m sure Irene could use all the help she can get.” She turned to Catherine and Zora. “Will you girls and Beatrice be all right here without me? You’re too old to need chaperones, I think.”
Catherine laughed. “I should think so! Anyway, Bea and I are leaving on Friday morning. We want to get back to London as soon as we can.”
“And Lorenzo’s circus is leaving too,” said Zora. “We’re booked all the way to Constantinople!”
Catherine could not help feeling envious. She would have liked to stay with the circus, playing her part as La Femme Panthère, the Panther Woman of the Andes, all the way to that fabled city. But the Athena Club needed her. How would they rescue Alice without her help?
DIANA: You’re not indispensable, you know!
JUSTINE: She certainly is! You are, Catherine. We could not do without you.
DIANA: You’re not going to edit that out, are you? You never edit out anything that makes you sound important.
But what were the Count and his parlor maid talking about? Kati was speaking to him in rapid Hungarian. He seemed to be arguing with her—he raised his hands and swept them through his hair in exasperation, creating even more perfect waves. She curtseyed and walked out of the room, holding the silver tray. “Kati!” he called after her; then to Catherine’s surprise he followed her out of the room, still expostulating.
“What in the world was that about?” asked Zora.
Mina looked both incredulous and amused. “Evidently, young Kati has decided to go work for Ayesha! Do you remember Ayesha’s assistant—Ibolya, I think her name was? Well, she and Kati were at school together, and Ibolya’s going off to Zurich to study medicine, so the President of the Alchemical Society needs a new assistant—and Kati has taken the job! She just gave her two weeks’ notice. You know how Vlad feels about that Ayesha—although to be honest, I think he was in love with her once, before she expelled him from the Alchemical Society. Not that I’m blaming her, considering the underhanded tactics he used in that election! I care for Vlad very much, but medieval Hungarian aristocrats don’t fight according to Hoyle.” She put her hand on the telegram and regarded it thoughtfully for a moment. “Sometimes I think he’s still a little in love with her, despite everything. Of course she offered this position to Kati to spite him—she’s still angry, and now he’s going to be angry as well. Over a parlor maid! Although I admit that Kati is an exceptionally good one. Anyway, he’s going to be impossible for the rest of the day. All right, I’m done with lunch. I need to telegraph Irene and Carmilla, then purchase a train ticket to Vienna. The two of you have tonight’s performance to prepare for. I wonder where Beatrice has gone off to. The cook prepared some lovely goop for her, and now it will go to waste.”
“She’s probably with Clarence somewhere,” said Catherine. “She seems to spend every waking moment with him nowadays.”
BEATRICE: That is not fair, Cat! Particularly when I was trying so hard not to spend time with him. I wanted him to forget me, to find—well, not someone else exactly, but perhaps something to do other than converse with a poisonous woman.
Beatrice was, in fact, with Clarence Jefferson at that moment, as Catherine had suspected. She looked around at the dark, paneled walls of the Centrál Kávéház. She and Clarence had gotten into the habit of coming here after rehearsals. She would sip an elderflower tisane and he would drink a dark, aromatic espresso. But this morning she had gone to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences for the first meeting of the Committee on Ethics in Alchemical Experimentation, so she and Clarence had decided to meet here for lunch and go on to rehearsals together. She was wearing the green dress she had been given by Mr. Worth himself in Paris, for no special reason—she had simply felt like wearing it this morning. Certainly she had not dressed up particularly for Clarence! Not that he ever seemed to notice what she was wearing, anyway. His attention always seemed to be entirely on her—although at the moment, some of it was focused on stirring his coffee.
He, too, seemed to have dressed with care, but then he always did, unless he was helping Atlas and the acrobatic Kaminski Brothers put up or take down sets. She could see in him the lawyer he had once been, before he had been tried and acquitted for murder—miraculously, for a black man in America who had shot and killed a white police officer, even before a crowd of witnesses who could swear it was in self-defense. That evening, he would be dressed as the Zulu Prince, who danced his native dances for an appreciative audience—one more attraction in Lorenzo’s Circus of Marvels and Delights.