Jane Vows Vengeance

Jane looked at Bergen. She remembered what Walter had said about the odd man reminding him of Renfield, Dracula’s bug-eating assistant.

“Whose familiar is he?”

Miriam sat on the end of the bed and sighed. “That’s what I was trying to find out,” she said, “before you barged in here. What are you doing here, anyway?”

Jane, remembering why she’d come, stood up. “That’s right,” she said. “Before we talk about what to do with Mr. Faust here, you’ve got some explaining to do.”

The sound of wild scratching distracted her. It was coming from the bathroom. “Oh, right,” Jane said. “But first you should probably let Lilith out.”

Chapter 21

Tuesday: Venice

Libiam libiamo, ne’ lieti calici,

che la bellezza infiora;

e la fuggevol fuggevol’ora

s’inebrii a volutta.

Libiam ne’ dolci fremiti

che suscita l’amore,

poiche quell’occhio al core

onnipotente va.

Libiamo, amore; amor fra i calici

piu caldi baci avra.

Alfredo lifted his glass as his voice filled the Portego Of the Palazzo Barbarigo Minotto with the opening lines of his famous drinking song. The small group of listeners, now understanding their role in the night’s performance, lifted their own glasses in return.

“Very clever,” Jane whispered to Walter, who stood beside her. “We’re not only the audience, we’re the guests at Violetta’s party.”

Walter sipped his glass of champagne. “It’s too bad my mother has a stomachache,” he said. “She would love this.”

Jane said nothing. She felt terrible about the lie she’d told Walter. But Miriam had insisted on interrogating Bergen herself. She’d ordered Jane to go to the opera and make an excuse for her absence. A stomachache had seemed the easiest explanation, and so Jane had invented a bad oyster and the resulting digestive distress to explain her mother-in-law’s failure to appear.

She was still unclear on several points regarding the night’s events, and as the performers continued to toast the joys of friendship and love, Jane went over again what she knew and did not know. She had gone to Miriam’s room assuming that Miriam was the one who had stolen the Pierrot from her room in Paris. Miriam, however, had not taken it. She had found it, she said, sitting on the floor of the elevator at the hotel just moments before Sam had gotten on and seen her holding it. Assuming this was true—and Jane had no reason to think that it wasn’t—the identity of the real thief remained a mystery.

Then there was the matter of Bergen. Miriam continued to insist that she had lured Bergen to her room with the promise of a tryst. The very notion filled Jane with a horror beyond imagining. She tried very hard not to remember seeing Bergen kissing Miriam’s neck, but of course, having thought about it, it was all she could think about. She shuddered and drank some more champagne, hoping its intoxicating effects would dim the disturbing image.

What she didn’t fully understand was why Miriam had suspected Bergen of having nefarious intentions in the first place. That he was a vampire’s familiar was, frankly, not surprising. From a casting point of view he was perfect for the role in every possible way. Which was probably why it had never occurred to Jane to seriously entertain the thought that that’s exactly what he was.

Miriam, though, had suspected something. Of course, she suspects everyone of something, Jane reminded herself. Still, she couldn’t help but be reluctantly impressed. It had been a brave move to invite Bergen to her room, and it could have ended very badly for her. Jane hated to think, for several reasons, what might have transpired had she not arrived when she did. Miriam had promised to explain her suspicions later, and Jane was looking forward to that conversation.

The primary question, though, was who Bergen’s master or mistress was. Naturally, being a vampire’s familiar required having a vampire, otherwise the role was nothing more than a pretentious affectation. And where Bergen was concerned there were a number of possibilities. Jane’s immediate assumption was that he was working with Joshua. That made the most sense, as it allowed him to gather information without having to expose himself to possible discovery. But the more she thought about it the more she realized that she couldn’t rule out the Tedious Three, Charlotte, or really any other vampire in existence. If Gosebourne knew about the Needle, there was every reason to suspect that a lot of other vampires did as well, and while many of them would write it off as a legend, many would not. And the easiest way to get it would be to keep an eye on Jane, wait for her to find Crispin’s Needle, and then take it.

Returning to the matter of the stolen doll, she again considered various explanations. Certainly Bergen could have broken into her room and taken the clown. Really, that made the most sense. But Jane was troubled by the fact that Walter had clearly been glamored. Her assumption was that he had interrupted the thief in the act and had been glamored to make him forget what he’d seen. But Bergen was human and would have no glamoring ability. A vampire had to be involved. And that meant that whoever Bergen was working for, she or he was nearby, or at least had been as recently as their time in Paris.

She hoped that Miriam was getting to the bottom of these matters at that very moment and that there would be news when they returned. In the meantime, she tried to enjoy the opera. When the first act ended the entire party moved into the Sala Tiepolo, so named because it featured glorious frescoes done by the artist of that name. It was the perfect setting for Violetta to be miserable in, and the soprano worked both her voice and the gilded furnishings with great success. By the time it came to move into the camera da letto for Act Three and Violetta’s inevitable tragic end, Jane had almost forgotten about Bergen and Miriam. Despite being very familiar with the libretto, she found herself hoping that this time Violetta would rally, marry Alfredo, and live happily for the rest of her life.

But of course she didn’t. People in operas seldom do. And so they watched, tears in their eyes, as Violetta rose from her bed for one last duet with Alfredo and then expired. To preserve the mood of the evening, the audience was escorted out while Alfredo remained weeping over the corpse of his beloved. It was all very tragic and wonderful, and Jane exited into the Venetian night with a strong impulse to throw herself off a tower, or perhaps drink some poison.

The rest of the party, however, was more inclined to drink espresso, and so off they went to a coffee bar. Not wanting to call undue attention to herself by once more claiming heartburn or fatigue, Jane went along. Miriam would be fine for another hour or so, she figured, and as it was their last night in Venice, she wanted to enjoy it as much as possible.

Seated next to Lucy at the table, she told her friend as much as she could about the night’s events. Lucy listened, her eyes getting wider with every new detail. Thankfully, Walter and Ben were engaged in a conversation with Brodie about the architectural details of the Palazzo Barbarigo Minotto, and Brodie’s booming voice drowned out the sounds of Jane and Lucy’s conversation.

“So you don’t think Our Gloomy Friend is behind it?” Lucy said.

“I really don’t,” said Jane. “For one thing, I think she likes being undead. I don’t know why she would want the Needle.”

Lucy thought for a moment. “Maybe she doesn’t,” she said. “Maybe the Needle has nothing to do with it.”