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Catharina Kovac had worked in service since she was fourteen, and her natural way with children led her into the nursery. She had worked as a servant and assistant to the family’s nanny in two households before, only recently taking up her post as Elizabeth Robertson’s nanny. A position made more attractive by the family’s imminent immigration to America and the fact Miss Robertson was an only child; although, she thought that likely to change once Mr. and Mrs. Robertson were reunited. However, despite these two advantages, the position held one very obvious drawback, that of Elizabeth herself. Of all the children she had cared for, this precocious little bitch was by far the worst. Elizabeth acted like she was the lady of the manor, often ordering Catharina around like a servant. When Catharina didn’t comply, Elizabeth would throw a sulk, refusing to cooperate until, eventually, Mrs. Robertson would acquiesce to her demand, ordering Catharina to do the child’s bidding. This vastly undermined Catharina’s position in the house, making her duties almost impossible to carry out.
Catharina didn’t care about the awkwardness of her position at that moment. She had arranged to take a well-earned bath, a luxury she secured soon after boarding because of the limited number of baths available to third class passengers. So, having dropped her unruly charge in the care of another nanny at a nearby cabin, she entered one of the two public bathrooms with her rolled up towel clutched under one arm.
The bathroom was ostentatiously large but sparsely decorated with an oversized enamel bath set in its centre. Catharina locked the door behind her and approached the bath, dropping her towel on the solitary chair as she passed. She opened the hot tap, letting the water run across her fingers until it began to warm, before pushing the plug home and returning to the chair where she began to undress. She removed each article of clothing, carefully folding it before placing it on the chair, forming a small neat pile, her cotton and lace undergarments on the top. Naked, she stretched, arching her back until her shoulder muscles ached in a delightfully refreshing way, and then gently removed the pins holding her dark curls in place, allowing her hair to tumble loosely onto her shoulders. She shook it free as she padded across the tiled floor to check on the temperature of her bath water.
This was her first free time since boarding, and she was determined to make the most of it. A warm bath followed by a spot of reading, but not Brontë’s romanticism; she liked a darker streak to inhibit her dreams. She had recently read Dracula and become obsessed with the notion of vampirism, and to this end had engrossed herself in Carmilla, seeing herself as the powerful and enigmatic stranger. She trailed her hand absentmindedly through the bathwater then, remembering the task at hand, turned off the hot tap before continuing to fill the bath with water from the cold tap.
She waited for a few moments, allowing the cold water to mingle with the hot, her skin coming up in tiny goose bumps as the bathroom’s cold air tingled her naked flesh. Her nipples hardened as she imagined the cause of the breeze being Stoker’s handsome Count entering the room. Subconsciously, she tilted her head to the side, her eyes closed, her hair falling away to expose her delicate neck to her handsome visitor. Catharina felt his hands, strong yet gentle, momentarily caress her upper arms then one cupped her breast.
A soft, frustrated sigh escaped her lips as she banished her darkly delicious thoughts of giving herself to a vampire. She lifted her leg ready to climb into her waiting bath.
But the hand remained. The cold hand clamped to her breast, the strong fingers gouging into her sensitive skin and twisting the hard nub of her nipple causing her to catch her breath. Catharina’s eyes snapped open, her watery stare focused on her own exposed chest. This was no imagined interloper. A man’s hand, large and rough, the veins dark and bulging, twisted the pale mound of her right breast.
Terrified, Catharina drew breath to scream. Ready to beg for her virtue and scream for help, but a second hand quickly clamped across her gaping mouth, stifling any sound, before wrenching her neck violently to the left.
Catharina felt the fragile bones in her neck break with a soft crack, followed by the briefest moment of euphoric relief before death took her soul. Her lifeless body toppled into the bath’s warm water, her neck so hideously twisted her face stared back over her left shoulder, a thin trail of bubbles breaking the water’s surface as her final breath escaped her body.
