That wasn't exactly reassuring, but they submitted with good grace, and all took their medicine like good boys and girls. It was thick and syrupy, and tasted like pomegranates. "Now just relax," the hostess soothed, but the drug flowed through their veins so fast that they were very relaxed indeed, before she finished the sentence. Delicious languor enveloped them, and they drifted off into a sleep that was so welcome, it was positively sybaritic.
The young woman glanced about to make sure no one was watching, then quickly stepped into the shadow of a huge old tree and fumbled with something behind her back. "There! Darn bosom-binder keeps coming unfastened!" She stepped back out, with her mammary measurements drastically dwindled. "Golly whillikers, Deviz, it's really unfair to have to put up with so much out in front, when some lucky girls scarcely have any!"
Her Scots terrier looked up at her and yapped in agreement.
The young woman glanced about nervously. "Golly whillikers, Deviz, maybe we shoulda stayed on the street where we live! I don't think I like this gloomy old neighborhood!" She swallowed heavily. "Maybe I wouldn't be so scared if I weren't still a virgin. But all those spooky old houses set back so far from the sidewalk… And all those bony old trees, with the brown and sere leaves dropping off and drifting to the ground like the ghosts of sorrows worn out with grieving." She frowned, jogging the side of her head with the heel of her hand. "What's the matter with me? I don't speak like that!"
There was a sudden flurry of yaps, and her head snapped up, just in time to see Deviz go bounding away after a dim and spectral squirrel. "Deviz!" she yelped, and leaped to follow him, the skirts of her jumper billowing in the breeze. "No, Deviz! Not in there!"
But the dog dashed right after the bounding rodent as it leaped through the rusty grillwork of the ancient fence and sprinted up the rotting flagstones of the curving path, all the way up the hill to the gaunt old house that brooded over the scene.
"No, Deviz!" The girl struggled with the rusty gate, then climbed over the fence. Her skirt caught on one of the iron points, but she yanked it loose and leaped down to follow her dog.
She almost caught up with him on the porch, but the door suddenly opened, and the squirrel shot through with Deviz hot on its heels. The girl bolted after them, but skidded to a halt as she saw the lady who stood in the doorway.
"Good afternoon, my dear." She was tall, slender, and pale, with just a touch too much rouge, and glossy black hair that swept down to her shoulders in a straight fall, turned up just a little on the ends. The girl stared, then squeezed her eyes shut, opened them, and looked again. She couldn't be sure, but she thought the woman's eyeteeth were much longer than usual. And very sharply pointed.
"Do come in," the lady purred, stepping back from the doorway.
Dread rose up in the young girl, but her beloved dog was in that house, so she hadn't much choice. With reluctance weighing down her dainty feet, she stepped across the threshold.
Her hostess closed the door with unseemly speed. "My name is L'Age D'or. What is yours?"
"Petty," the girl stammered, "Petty Pure." She stared around her. "Golly! You've got an awful lot of real old things… YIKE! One of them moved!"
"Why, yes, that's my uncle." L'Age took the arm of the old gnarled man with the yellowed straggling hair and the shiny black suit. "Petty Pure, allow me to introduce Sucar Blutstein."
The old man stared at Petty, his eyes wide and round, his mouth stretched wide in a grin. A drop of moisture dripped from one pointed fang. Petty shuddered.
"Ah, I see you've noticed his dentition." L'Age smiled, revealing her own fangs. "It runs in the family."
"Puh… pleased to meet you, I'm sure," Petty stammered.
"And I," Sucar Blutstein chuckled, "and I."
"Keep a lid on it, you old fool," L'Age muttered to him, "or you'll scare her off." Aloud, she said to Petty, "Won't you sit down and make yourself comfortable? I'll ring for tea." She stepped over to the corner to pull on a bell-rope. A moment later, the butler shambled in, and Petty gasped in horror. He was a giant, seven feet at least, and all his clothes were way too small for him. His feet were too large, and his face was seamed with scars and was squarish, with a ragged hairline. His eyelids drooped, and an electrical contact protruded from each side of his neck. He hooted sullenly.
"Tea," L'Age snapped, then beamed at Petty. "Cream or lemon, my dear?"
"Uh… cream, if you please. And sugar." Petty scrunched back against the high back of her wing-chair in terror.
"And, um, tomato juice for me," L'Age finished. "And some teacakes, of course. Yes, that will be all, Frank."
The butler growled and shambled from the room.
Petty slowly uncurled. "What… what is he?"
"Oh, just some tinkering I did in an idle moment." L'Age waved the issue away. "Now, my dear, tell me about yourself. Have you any family?"
The butler shambled into the kitchen, grunting. Auntie Diluvian, a fat, sweaty old woman in a floor-length gaudy dress, looked up from the pot she was stirring. "She wants what?… Tea? Whatever for?… Company? A virgin? Oh, yes, I'm sure they welcomed her with open arms—first real food they've seen in years. Been living on that son of hers, she has—and what he's been living on, I hate to think… Roderick!"
Uncle Roderick, an aging hunchback, looked up from the tomatoes he was squeezing. "Eh?"
"Run upstairs and drain me two ounces," Auntie Dil called.
"But he already gave today," Uncle Roderick protested.
"It's a special occasion," Auntie Dil snapped. "He'll just have to pump up some more."
"Bleed him white, that's what she'll do," Roderick grumbled, but he picked up a small beaker and trudged up the back stairs.
On the first floor landing, he limped past the sumptuous mistress bedroom and turned into the adjoining chamber. It was spare and Spartan—only a bare wooden floor, blank beige walls, and, in a corner, an old, forgotten, dried-up Christmas tree, its balls cracked and broken, its tinsel sadly tarnished.
In the center of the room stood a dusty old canopied bed, and on it lay a bronzed body, eyelids closed, chest rising and falling gently.
"The poor lad," Uncle Roderick sighed as he hobbled over and sat in the straight chair beside the bed. "The poor lad." He took the young man's unresisting hand, propped it over the edge of the bed, held the beaker under the wrist, and turned the little spigot set into the vein. Dark ruby fluid welled out and into the beaker. When it had risen to the "2 oz." line etched in the glass, Uncle Roderick turned off the little faucet, wiped it with a hanky, and laid the hand gently back on the bed. "There, there," he soothed, even though he knew McChurch couldn't hear him. "There, there."
He stood up with a creak of old bones and a sigh, and turned away to leave, but stopped in the doorway to look back at the incredibly handsome young man, his muscular shoulders and chest bulging up from under the sheets, his eyes closed. Uncle Roderick sighed and shook his head, and shut the door behind him.
As he reached the bottom of the stairs, Sucar Blutstein fairly pounced on him, eyes glittering. "Did you get it? Do you have it?"
"Oh, yes, Master Blutstein," Roderick sighed.
"Oh, bliss! Oh, rapture!" Sucar Blutstein poised clawed fingers, drooling only a little. "Let me see it! Let me taste…" He broke off as Roderick held up the beaker, showing the two inches of dark red fluid. Blutstein stared at it, lips writhing back in terror. "Aieeeee!" He squeezed his eyes shut, raising his hands to block out the sight. "Take it away! Take it away!" He staggered off toward the drawing room, shuddering.