Chapter II
Alexander laid down the precious charge on the bed, and resolutely closed the door on Renfield's very perplexed face. Once alone with the love of his life, he stoked the fire and closed tightly the curtains. The glooming light of the flames enhanced the flawless features of the reposing woman. She was as beautiful as he remembered her, Grayson thought with rapture.
He reverently drew closer, and caressed a rosy cheek with his coarse hand. He disrobed quickly and lay on the bed beside her. Her scent was intoxicating. He pulled at her clothes until he could unfasten the bodice, and then his wandering hand delved below, to remove the corset and lift her skirts to his pleasing.
With these last ministrations, the woman stirred and opened suddenly her eyes, a distinct expression of terror printed on the whole of her expression. "What are you doing?" she hazarded to say in a very small voice. "Please, don't touch me! Let me go... Let me go now!" she added in a frantic tone. Her chest was heaving wildly, and speaking was becoming more difficult by the minute.
The solid weight of Alexander's hands and chest was keeping her immobilized, while the vampire held close to her, caressing voluptuously one of her bare thighs, and whispered in her ear, "Don't resist me, Ilona, you know that you are mine." With these last words, he violently pushed into her and started moving frantically over the terrified body beneath. "You're my love, and you have come back to me, do you know that?" he enticed the agonizing woman with such soft, and out of place, words, while possessively holding onto her hair with a most ecstatic expression.
Silent tears were the only response the quiet room bore witness to.
He kept moving over her for what it seemed to the woman an endless amount of time, all the while whispering sweet words and interspersing his monologue with ardent kisses. At last it was over. He remained for a few moments sprawled over the tense body, breathing heavily into her ear. With a grunt, he stood up abruptly and redressed, while the woman still kept her yes tightly closed, her body now shaking with the aftermath of the violation.
"Ilona, this is our secret, do you understand that?" he whispered to the frightened creature, getting closer again and placing a reverent kiss on the rigid lips. "It's most important, for your own protection, that you don't speak of what happened here today to anybody. Do you understand? I will take care of you, but I'm worried for your own safety." He sighed in affliction. "Unfortunately, I have powerful enemies, and you cannot be associated with me in any way, until the time I get rid of the whole lot of them," he explained, shaking forlornly his head.
The woman turned on her side and burrowed her face in the pillows, her body wrecked by quiet sobs.
"Ilona, are you listening?" Alexander asked soothingly, while extending a hand to caress her curly mane. "We will be together soon, don't worry, but for now we need to act in the most cautious of ways. They will want to steal you again from me, and I will not let them again!" he added with a dreadful tone, a distressed expression now painted on his face, at the thought of such worrying eventuality.
Finally, without looking up, the woman sat on the bed and moved silently her head, as to convey acceptance, and Grayson, now satisfied with this night's outcome, smiled at her with emotion and left the chamber, after placing a delicate kiss on her trembling hand.
Four hours later, the crisp morning received Alexander impeccably dressed in a pristine white shirt and a graciously arranged black neckerchief. He paced impatiently in the drawing room, waiting for Dr. Van Helsing's arrival. At last, a distinctive ring was heard.
In big steps, Alexander was at the door, receiving the expected guest. "Ah, doctor, good that you are here. Please, come with me. We have a patient who is in need of your assistance," he added earnestly, frothing his hands with a purposeful grin.
The doctor eyed with mild suspicion the unexpectedly solicitous reception, but nonetheless, followed his host upstairs, a bemused look on his face.
Reaching the second floor, Alexander grabbed the doctor's arm, as if he were to announce a secret the deserted corridor was not allowed to hear. "I want you to treat her with the utmost of cares. She's very precious to me," he whispered with a wistful expression, pointing at a door on the far left wing.
"Who's in there?" the doctor retaliated with a mistrustful glance at the vampire's face. "What have you done now? Is she another one of your meals? What, did you have second thoughts and she's still alive? Are you saving her for your next banquet?" he added with a tinge of scorn.
Grayson sighed patiently and crossed his arms, leaning listlessly against the opposite wall. Today he was in such a good mood, that he wouldn't be riled up even by the annoying countenance of the judgmental doctor. He caressed languidly his moustache and eyed with mild amusement the increasingly agitated semblant of his counterpart.
"Van Helsing, the way in which she arrived at this house is none of your business," he stated patronizingly. "This is my personal matter. You just go inside and verify that she is well: you just tell her that Renfield rescued her from some thugs last night, and brought her here," he ordered at last , with a tone that didn't admit rebuttal.
"Why, is that what really happened?" the doctor enquired in a challenging voice. "Would she by any chance confirm this latest concoction of yours?"
"She might." Alexander smirked and held his counterpart's contemptuous stare with ease.
Nodding skeptically at Grayson's general direction, the doctor took a few steps and proceeded to knock lightly on the door; when he received no answer, he quietly slid in and gaped in astonishment at the sleeping form on the bed. He closed again the door, careful not to make any noise, and eyed Grayson with a distinct look of fury depicted on his face. "By Jove, the woman you have abducted and are keeping prisoner in your house is Mina Murray!"
"Mina Murray…That's how she goes by in this century…," repeated Alexander with a dreamy expression on his face. "That's such a beautiful name", he added with outpouring love. He stroked again his moustache with an indolent motion.
"Alexander, that's not the time for your cursed daydreaming. You always do such sort of nonsense! You cannot have her here. How did she arrive? Did you snatch her on the streets?" Van Helsing was becoming more and more infuriated by the second.
"I most certainly did not do anything of the sort!" Grayson corrected in an offended tone.
"So, am I to understand that she is half-naked and in your chambers willingly?" The doctor's voice dripped sarcasm.
It had come the time for Grayson to admit partially the truth. Diverting his stare to a far off point at the end of the corridor, he finally stated, "Not exactly. Cervenka brought her here. She was meant as a 'present' for me," Alexander clarified in a disgusted tone. "But now she is mine. You see, she's Ilona. The resemblance is uncanny. I cannot be mistaken. We have been reunited at last," he announced triumphantly, with a preoccupying grin illuminating his features. He grabbed again the doctor's arm in earnest. "Ilona is here," he stated with a ferocious and most determined grimace.
Van Helsing just shook his head in bewilderment. "Be reasonable, for heaven's sake! She's one of my colleagues' daughter. Dr. William Murray is director of Bethlehem Memorial Hospital…and a most influential person in the best circles of London. Beside, she's also my student. We cannot have her in this house one minute more. She will jeopardize everything we have worked for up until now!" He added the last words with a progressively thunderous tone, in the futile hope his associate would come back to his senses.
"Doctor, be very careful with your next words…" Alexander hissed dangerously, tightening the grip he was holding on the doctor's arm.
"We must kill her at once."
"I forbid you to lay a hand on her!"
"What do you propose, then? To have her here forever? Don't you think the secrecy will be quite impossible to maintain for long? You do have people coming and going in this palace of yours, and the service staff will certain be puzzled to have a fair lady prisoner in one of your chambers, unless you plan to chain her in the basement, together with our study subjects…"
"You misunderstand me, Van Helsing," Grayson corrected gracefully, a crafty grin on his face. "I will not retain her here one minute more than necessary. As soon as you've made sure of her wellbeing, we will have a carriage taking her home," Alexander offered with a sort of diabolical smirk.
At the unexpected words, the doctor couldn't but gape at the vampire, mystified and incredulous. "What do you mean?" he enquired in a more reasonable tone. "You cannot have her gallivanting around, after you kidnapped her! Does she know what you are?" He chuckled scornfully at the vampire, shaking wildly his head. "Alexander, please try to understand," the doctor at last thundered. "Your life will be in her hands. And so the success of our enterprise. I will not have that!"
"You forget that the decision is mine. And you're mistaken, doctor. Her life will be in my hands. I've made sure of that."
Van Helsing had the sudden urge to stab the vampire through the heart with a crucifix. It was like talking to a madman, and a very dangerous one at that. At last, he drew a heavy breath and passed a hand through his hair. "Very well, then. I will enter now and we will see how well your plan works," he added defiantly. "But at the first indication that she's uncomfortable with anything pertaining to this infernal house, or with you in particular, I 'll find a way to dispose of her, for good."
"Be my guest, I'm sure you'll find her most compliant."
The doctor threw a hard look at the stubborn vampire, understanding slowly dawning on him. By the second, the true meaning of Grayson's words was becoming clearer: the whole idea revolted the deepest fibers of his being, but his practical part recognized quickly how the solution was most advantageous, if not the best he himself could have come up with, if he had been at liberty of finishing off the woman. And it was not that he didn't care for her: Miss Mina Murray had been one of his best students and a delectable person to be around. He had her and her family in the highest esteem, but not to the point of jeopardizing the last fifteen years of his work, and the enterprise of destroying the Ordo Draconis, that had taken over the totality of his life.
He knocked on the door now with more decision, and swiftly entered, to find the woman stirring on the bed. She drew up the covers in an instinctive motion of modesty.
"Miss Murray, how are you doing? What a pleasure to see you today," the doctor greeted cheerfully, as if finding her in bed, her clothes disheveled, in a stranger's house, was the most natural occurrence in the world. "Mr. Grayson told me our friend Renfield rescued you from a couple of assailants last night, and had the good judgment to bring you here at the mansion. Our gracious host is the distinguished Mr. Alexander Grayson, who I'm sure you have already had the pleasure to meet." The whole sentence was delivered with perfect aplomb, as if Van Helsing had really believed each and every one of the words just proffered.
Mina merely moved her head slowly in the affirmative, a look of quiet despair and mild confusion on her face.
That was the cue for the doctor to continue with his charade. "I'll check upon you shortly, especially the bump you must have suffered to the head, but by the look of it, it seems you are in condition to return home safely. Your father must be worried to death by now, but he will be certainly pleased to know that nothing bad happened to you." He smiled at her encouragingly, hoping he wouldn't be contradicted by the woman's next words and overall attitude. He remained in silence, looking fixedly at the mystified face in front of him, as if to will her to comply with his wishes, by the mere power of his hard stare.
Mina's face paled sensibly at the recollection of the last hours in that wretched house. She was having again trouble breathing, and was slightly trembling. The good doctor remained encouragingly calm, determined to display a general air of complete obliviousness.
"Yes, yes, that's what happened," at last she lied, her voice subdued and her stare shifting uncomfortably from one place to another, but pointedly avoiding the doctor's face. "I was getting home from the University, and Jonathan sent word he was impeded from accompanying me home… So I went by myself…" Her voice faltered a little at remembering poor, nice Jonathan, her so beloved fiancé.
Jonathan Harker loved her with all his heart, she was convinced of it, and he could never know what had happened to her in that house. It was all just too shameful. Her face blanched further at the thought of her solicitous lover and of her father ever discovering what she had just become. She had been soiled and was now unworthy of anybody's love. Poor father would die if he ever knew. Or he would be killed by that beast who had just defiled her, she thought with an audible sigh. The truth would put everybody in mortal danger.
She didn't know the extent of what Jonathan would do, but most surely, he would break off the engagement, and then she was sure she wouldn't be able to bear the scandal and all the wretchedness that would accompany such disgraceful condition. No, she thought in earnest, nobody should ever learn what had passed within those cursed walls in the last lurid hours.
Van Helsing approached her, medical instruments at hand. "Miss Murray, you are not yet well: it must be that stroke you received on the head. Let me have a look, would you?" he enquired solicitously. Mina docilely let herself be examined by the good doctor, a forced and acquiescing smile now on her face.
The next hours passed in a blur. She was soon declared fit for travel by the doctor; a chambermaid had come in with a breakfast tray, and after what must have been an interminable time, another maid had helped her getting her soiled clothes in acceptable order. Somebody had assisted her to comb her hair in a presentable fashion. She hadn't been aware of descending the stairs or climbing onto the carriage that was going to bring her safely at home again.
A large, black man – the same as yesterday's nightmare, she did remember – sat beside her and accompanied her to the house. The journey was quiet, or so it appeared to her, since she wasn't able to hear anything that might have been said in the deafening agony of her frantic heart. But she distinctly felt the warm rays of the autumn sun glaring at her through the carriage's window. They seemed to have a reproving quality to them, as if they wanted to shame her further and display all her faults.
At the sight of her precious daughter, who had been inexplicably gone missing for the better part of a day, her father was frantically delighted. The Police had obviously been alerted since several hours, but to no avail, to the man's utmost consternation. Yet, the sight of his beloved only daughter, fretfully entering the hall after so many hours of anguished search, had been the most wonderful spectacle of all, to Dr. Murray's fragile heart. Hugs and kisses, and inquiries for an explanation, followed soon after. Fortunately, she didn't have to say much: the helpful giant took care of giving a believable justification for his daughter's absence, to the grateful elder man.
She heard the two men still talking, while she fled upstairs and closed ruefully her room's door behind her. She stumbled with a relieved sigh on the floor at the foot of the bed, and finally wept freely. Decidedly, nothing was not going to be ever the same. She just lowered her head, and stared absently at her old life rushing before her eyes, now forever gone.