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CHAPTER 15


  DR. SEWARD'S DIARY-cont.


For a while sheer anger mastered me. It was as if he had during her life
struck Lucy on the face. I smote the table hard and rose up as I said to
him, "Dr. Van Helsing, are you mad?"

He raised his head and looked at me, and somehow the tenderness of his
face calmed me at once. "Would I were!" he said. "Madness were easy to
bear compared with truth like this. Oh, my friend, whey, think you, did
I go so far round, why take so long to tell so simple a thing? Was it
because I hate you and have hated you all my life? Was it because I
wished to give you pain? Was it that I wanted, no so late, revenge for
that time when you saved my life, and from a fearful death? Ah no!"

"Forgive me," said I.

He went on, "My friend, it was because I wished to be gentle in the
breaking to you, for I know you have loved that so sweet lady. But even
yet I do not expect you to believe. It is so hard to accept at once any
abstract truth, that we may doubt such to be possible when we have
always believed the `no' of it. It is more hard still to accept so sad a
concrete truth, and of such a one as Miss Lucy.Tonight I go to prove it.
Dare you come with me?"

This staggered me. A man does not like to prove such a truth, Byron
excepted from the catagory, jealousy.


 "And prove the very truth he most abhorred."


He saw my hesitation, and spoke, "The logic is simple, no madman's logic
this time, jumping from tussock to tussock in a misty bog. If it not be
true, then proof will be relief. At worst it will not harm. If it be
true! Ah, there is the dread. Yet every dread should help my cause, for
in it is some need of belief. Come, I tell you what I propose. First,
that we go off now and see that child in the hospital. Dr. Vincent, of
the North Hospital, where the papers say the child is, is a friend of
mine, and I think of yours since you were in class at Amsterdam. He will
let two scientists see his case, if he will not let two friends. We
shall tell him nothing, but only that we wish to learn. And then . . ."

"And then?"

He took a key from his pocket and held it up. "And then we spend the
night, you and I, in the churchyard where Lucy lies. This is the key
that lock the tomb. I had it from the coffin man to give to Arthur."

My heart sank within me, for I felt that there was some fearful ordeal
before us. I could do nothing, however, so I plucked up what heart I
could and said that we had better hasten, as the afternoon was passing.

We found the child awake. It had had a sleep and taken some food, and
altogether was going on well. Dr, Vincent took the bandage from its
throat, and showed us the punct- ures. There was no mistaking the
similarity to those which had been on Lucy's throat. They were smaller,
and the edges looked fresher, that was all. We asked Vincent to what he
attributed them, and he replied that it must have been a bite of some
animal, perhaps a rat, but for his own part, he was inclined to think it
was one of the bats which are so numerous on the northern heights of
London. "Out of so many harmless ones," he said, "there may be some wild
specimen from the South of a more malignant species. Some sailor may
have brought one home, and it managed to escape,or even from the
Zoological Gardens a young one may have got loose,or one be bred there
from a vampire. These things do occur, you, know. Only ten days ago a
wolf got out, and was, I believe, traced up in this direction. For a
week after, the children were playing nothing but Red Riding Hood on the
Heath and in every alley in the place until this `bloofer lady' scare
came along, since then it has been quite a gala time with them. Even
this poor little mite, when he woke up today, asked the nurse if he
might go away. When she asked him why he wanted to go, he said he wanted
to play with the `bloofer lady'."

"I hope," said Van Helsing, "that when you are sending the child home
you will caution its parents to keep strict watch over it. These fancies
to stray are most dangerous, and if the child were to remain out another
night, it would probably be fatal. But in any case I suppose you will
not let it away for some days?"

"Certainly not, not for a week at least, longer if the wound is not
healed."

Our visit to the hospital took more time than we had reckoned on, and
the sun had dipped before we came out. When Van Helsing saw how dark it
was, he said,

"There is not hurry. It is more late than I thought. Come, let us seek
somewhere that we may eat, and then we shall go on our way."

We dined at `Jack Straw's Castle' along with a little crowd of
bicyclists and others who were genially noisy.About ten o'clock we
started from the inn. It was then very dark, and the scattered lamps
made the darkness greater when we were once outside their individual
radius. The Professor had evidently noted the road we were to go, for he
went on un- hesitatingly, but, as for me, I was in quite a mixup as to
locality. As we went further, we met fewer and fewer people, till at
last we were somewhat surprised when we met even the patrol of horse
police going their usual suburban round. At last we reached the wall of
the churchyard, which we climbed over. With some little difficulty, for
it was very dark, and the whole place seemed so strange to us, we found
the West- enra tomb. The Professor took the key, opened the creaky door,
and standing back, politely, but quite unconsciously, motioned me to
precede him. There was a delicious irony in the offer, in the
courtliness of giving preference on such a ghastly occasion. My
companion followed me quickly, and cautiously drew the door to, after
carefully ascertaining that the lock was a falling, and not a spring
one. In the latter case we should have been in a bad plight. Then he
fumbled in his bag, and taking out a matchbox and a piece of candle,
proceeded to make a light. The tomb in the daytime, and when wreathed
with fresh flowers, had looked grim and gruesome enough, but now, some
days afterwards, when the flowers hung lank and dead, their whites
turning to rust and their greens to browns, when the spider and the
beetle had resumed their accustomed dominance, when the time-discolored
stone, and dust-encrusted mortar, and rusty, dank iron, and tarnished
brass, and clouded silver-plating gave back the feeble glimmer of a
candle, the effect was more miserable and sordid than could have been
imagined. It conveyed irr- esistibly the idea that life, animal life,
was not the only thing which could pass away.

Van Helsing went about his work systematically. Hold- ing his candle so
that he could read the coffin plates, and so holding it that the sperm
dropped in white patches which congealed as they touched the metal, he
made assurance of Lucy's coffin. Another search in his bag, and he took
out a turnscrew.

"What are you going to do?" I asked.

"To open the coffin. You shall yet be convinced."

Straightway he began taking out the screws, and finally lifted off the
lid, showing the casing of lead beneath. The sight was almost too much
for me. It seemed to be as much an affront to the dead as it would have
been to have stripped off her clothing in her sleep whilst living. I
actually took hold of his hand to stop him.

He only said, "You shall see,"and again fumbling in his bag took out a
tiny fret saw. Striking the turnscrew through the lead with a swift
downward stab, which made me wince, he made a small hole, which was,
however, big enough to admit the point of the saw. I had expected a rush
of gas from the week-old corpse. We doctors, who have had to study our
dan- gers, have to become accustomed to such things, and I drew back
towards the door. But the Professor never stopped for a moment. He sawed
down a couple of feet along one side of the lead coffin, and then
across, and down the other side. Taking the edge of the loose flange, he
bent it back towards the foot of the coffin, and holding up the candle
into the aperture, motioned to me to look.

I drew near and looked. The coffin was empty. It was certainly a
surprise to me, and gave me a considerable shock, but Van Helsing was
unmoved. He was now more sure than ever of his ground, and so emboldened
to proceed in his task."Are you satisfied now, friend John?" he asked.

I felt all the dogged argumentativeness of my nature awake within me as
I answered him, "I am satisfied that Lucy's body is not in that coffin,
but that only proves one thing."

"And what is that, friend John?"

"That it is not there."

"That is good logic," he said, "so far as it goes. But how do you, how
can you, account for it not being there?"

"Perhaps a body-snatcher," I suggested. "Some of the undertaker's people
may have stolen it." I felt that I was speaking folly, and yet it was
the only real cause which I could suggest.

The Professor sighed. "Ah well!" he said," we must have more proof. Come
with me."

He put on the coffin lid again, gathered up all his things and placed
them in the bag, blew out the light, and placed the candle also in the
bag. We opened the door, and went out. Behind us he closed the door and
locked it. He handed me the key, saying, "Will you keep it? You had
better be assured."

I laughed, it was not a very cheerful laugh, I am bound to say, as I
motioned him to keep it. "A key is nothing," I said, "thee are many
duplicates, and anyhow it is not diffi- cult to pick a lock of this
kind."

He said nothing, but put the key in his pocket. Then he told me to watch
at one side of the churchyard whilst he would watch at the other.

 I took up my place behind a yew tree, and I saw his dark figure move
until the intervening headstones and trees hid it from my sight.
 It was a lonely vigil. Just after I had taken my place I heard a
distant clock strike twelve,and in time came one and two.I was chilled
and unnerved, and angry with the Professor for taking me on such an
errand and with myself for coming. I was too cold and too sleepy to be
keenly observant,and not sleepy enough to betray my trust, so altogether
I had a dreary, miserable time.

Suddenly, as I turned round, I thought I saw something like a white
streak,moving between two dark yew trees at the side of the churchyard
farthest from the tomb. At the same time a dark mass moved from the
Professor's side of the ground, and hurriedly went towards it. Then I
too moved, but I had to go round headstones and railed-off tombs, and I
stumbled over graves.The sky was overcast, and somewhere far off an
early cock crew. A little ways off, beyond a line of scattered juniper
trees, which marked the pathway to the church, a white dim figure
flitted in the direction of the tomb. The tomb itself was hidden by
trees, and I could not see where the figure had disappeared. I heard the
rustle of actual movement where I had first seen the white figure, and
coming over, found the Professor holding in his arms a tiny child. When
he saw me he held it out to me, and said, "Are you satisfied now?"

"No," I said, in a way that I felt was aggressive.

"Do you not see the child?"

"Yes, it is a child, but who brought it here? And is it wounded?"

"We shall see,"said the Professor, and with one impulse we took our way
out of the churchyard, he carrying the sleep- ing child.

When we had got some little distance away, we went into a clump of
trees, and struck a match, and looked at the child's throat. It was
without a scratch or scar of any kind.

"Was I right?" I asked triumphantly.

"We were just in time," said the Professor thankfully.

We had now to decide what we were to do with the child, and so consulted
about it. If we were to take it to a police station we should have to
give some account of our movements during the night. At least, we should
have had to make some statement as to how we had come to find the
child.So finally we decided that we would take it to the Heath, and when
we heard a policeman coming, would leave it where he could not fail to
find it. We would then seek our way home as quickly as we could. All
fell out well. At the edge of Hampstead Heath we heard a policeman's
heavy tramp, and laying the child on the pathway, we waited and watched
until he saw it as he flashed his lantern to and fro. We heard his
exclam- ation of astonishment, and then we went away silently. By good
chance we got a cab near the `Spainiards,' and drove to town.

I cannot sleep, so I make this entry. But I must try to get a few hours'
sleep, as Van Helsing is to call for me at noon. He insists that I go
with him on another expedition.


27 September.--It was two o'clock before we found a suitable opportunity
for our attempt. The funeral held at noon was all completed, and the
last stragglers of the mour- ners had taken themselves lazily away,
when, looking care- fully from behind a clump of alder trees, we saw the
sexton lock the gate after him. We knew that we were safe till morning
did we desire it, but the Professor told me that we should not want more
than an hour at most. Again I felt that horrid sense of the reality of
things,in which any effort of imagination seemed out of place, and I
realized distinctly the perils of the law which we were incurring in our
unhal- lowed work. Besides, I felt it was all so useless. Outrag- eous
as it was to open a leaden coffin, to see if a woman dead nearly a week
were really dead,it now seemed the height of folly to open the tomb
again, when we knew, from the evi- dence of our own eyesight, that the
coffin was empty. I shrugged my shoulders, however, and rested silent,
for Van Helsing had a way of going on his own road, no matter who
remonstrated. He took the key, opened the vault, and again courteously
motioned me to precede. The place was not so gruesome as last night, but
oh, how unutterably mean looking when the sunshine streamed in. Van
Helsing walked over to Lucy's coffin, and I followed. He bent over and
again forced back the leaden flange, and a shock of surprise and dismay
shot through me.

There lay Lucy, seemingly just as we had seen her the night before her
funeral. She was, if possible, more radi- antly beautiful than ever, and
I could not believe that she was dead. The lips were red, nay redder
than before, and on the cheeks was a delicate bloom.

"Is this a juggle?" I said to him.

"Are you convinced now?" said the Professor,in response, and as he spoke
he put over his hand, and in a way that made me shudder, pulled back the
dead lips and showed the white teeth. "See," he went on,"they are even
sharper than before. With this and this," and he touched one of the
canine teeth and that below it, "the little children can be bitten. Are
you of belief now, friend John?"

Once more argumentative hostility woke within me. I could not accept
such an overwhelming idea as he suggested. So, with an attempt to argue
of which I was even at the mom- ent ashamed, I said, "She may have been
placed here since last night."

"Indeed? That is so, and by whom?"

"I do not know. Someone has done it."

"And yet she has been dead one week. Most peoples in that time would not
look so."

I had no answer for this, so was silent. Van Helsing did not seem to
notice my silence. At any rate, he showed neither chagrin nor triumph.
He was looking intently at the face of the dead woman, raising the
eyelids and looking at the eyes, and once more opening the lips and
examining the teeth. Then he turned to me and said,

"Here, there is one thing which is different from all recorded. Here is
some dual life that is not as the common. She was bitten by the vampire
when she was in a trance, sleep-walking, oh, you start. You do not know
that, friend John, but you shall know it later, and in trance could he
best come to take more blood. In trance she dies, and in trance she is
Un-Dead, too. So it is that she differ from all other. Usually when the
Un-Dead sleep at home," as he spoke he made a comprehensive sweep of his
arm to designate what to a vampire was `home', "their face show what
they are, but this so sweet that was when she not Un-Dead she go back to
the nothings of the common dead. There is no malign there, see, and so
it make hard that I must kill her in her sleep."

This turned my blood cold, and it began to dawn upon me that I was
accepting Van Helsing's theories. But if she were really dead, what was
there of terror in the idea of killing her?

He looked up at me, and evidently saw the change in my face, for he said
almost joyously, "Ah, you believe now?"

I answered, "Do not press me too hard all at once. I am willing to
accept. How will you do this bloody work?"

"I shall cut off her head and fill her mouth with gar- lic, and I shall
drive a stake through her body."

It made me shudder to think of so mutilating the body of the woman whom
I had loved. And yet the feeling was not so strong as I had expected. I
was, in fact, beginning to shudder at the presence of this being, this
Un-Dead, as Van Helsing called it, and to loathe it. Is it possible that
love is all subjective, or all objective?

I waited a considerable time for Van Helsing to begin, but he stood as
if wrapped in thought. Presently he closed the catch of his bag with a
snap, and said,

"I have been thinking, and have made up my mind as to what is best. If I
did simply follow my inclining I would do now, at this moment, what is
to be done. But there are other things to follow, and things that are
thousand times more difficult in that them we do not know. This is
simple. She have yet no life taken, though that is of time, and to act
now would be to take danger from her forever. But then we may have to
want Arthur, and how shall we tell him of this? If you, who saw the
wounds on Lucy's throat, and saw the wounds so similar on the child's at
the hospital, if you, who saw the coffin empty last night and full today
with a woman who have not change only to be more rose and more beau-
tiful in a whole week, after she die,if you know of this and know of the
white figure last night that brought the child to the churchyard, and
yet of your own senses you did not believe, how then, can I expect
Arthur, who know none of those things, to believe?

"He doubted me when I took him from her kiss when she was dying. I know
he has forgiven me because in some mis- taken idea I have done things
that prevent him say goodbye as he ought, and he may think that in some
more mistaken idea this woman was buried alive, and that in most mistake
of all we have killed her. He will then argue back that it is we,
mistaken ones, that have killed her by our ideas, and so he will be much
unhappy always. Yet he never can be sure, and that is the worst of all.
And he will sometimes think that she he loved was buried alive, and that
will paint his dreams with horrors of what she must have suffered,and
again, he will think that we may be right, and that his so beloved was,
after all, an Un-Dead. No! I told him once, and since then I learn much.
Now, since I know it is all true, a hun- dred thousand times more do I
know that he must pass through the bitter waters to reach the sweet. He,
poor fellow, must have one hour that will make the very face of heaven
grow black to him,then we can act for good all round and send him peace.
My mind is made up. Let us go. You return home for tonight to your
asylum, and see that all be well. As for me, I shall spend the night
here in this churchyard in my own way. Tomorrow night you will come to
me to the Berkeley Hotel at ten of the clock. I shall send for Arthur to
come too,and also that so fine young man of America that gave his blood.
Later we shall all have work to do. I come with you so far as Piccadilly
and there dine, for I must be back here before the sun set."

So we locked the tomb and came away, and got over the wall of the
churchyard, which was not much of a task, and drove back to Piccadilly.

NOTE LEFT BY VAN HELSING IN HIS PORTMANTEAU, BERKELEY HOTEL
 DIRECTED TO JOHN SEWARD, M. D. (Not Delivered)


 27 September

"Friend John,

"I write this in case anything should happen.I go alone to watch in that
churchyard. It pleases me that the Un-Dead, Miss Lucy, shall not leave
tonight, that so on the morrow night she may be more eager. Therefore I
shall fix some things she like not, garlic and a crucifix, and so seal
up the door of the tomb. She is young as Un-Dead, and will heed.
Moreover, these are only to prevent her coming out. They may not prevail
on her wanting to get in, for then the Un-Dead is desperate, and must
find the line of least resistance, whatsoever it may be. I shall be at
hand all the night from sunset till after sunrise,and if there be aught
that may be learned I shall learn it. For Miss Lucy or from her, I have
no fear,but that other to whom is there that she is Un-Dead, he have not
the power to seek her tomb and find shelter. He is cunning, as I know
from Mr. Jonathan and from the way that all along he have fooled us when
he played with us for Miss Lucy's life, and we lost, and in many ways
the Un-Dead are strong. He have always the strength in his hand of
twenty men, even we four who gave our strength to Miss Lucy it also is
all to him. Besides, he can summon his wolf and I know not what. So if
it be that he came thither on this night he shall find me. But none
other shall, until it be too late. But it may be that he will not
attempt the place. There is no reason why he should. His hunting ground
is more full of game than the churchyard where the Un-Dead wo- man
sleeps, and the one old man watch.

"Therefore I write this in case . . . Take the papers that are with
this, the diaries of Harker and the rest, and read them, and then find
this great Un-Dead, and cut off his head and burn his heart or drive a
stake through it, so that the world may rest from him.

"If it be so, farewell.

"VAN HELSING."

 DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


28 September.--It is wonderful what a good night's sleep will do for
one. Yesterday I was almost willing to accept Van Helsing's monstrous
ideas, but now they seem to start out lurid before me as outrages on
common sense.I have no doubt that he believes it all. I wonder if his
mind can have become in any way unhinged. Surely there must be some
rational explanation of all these mysterious things. Is it possible that
the Professor can have done it himself? He is so abnormally clever that
if he went off his head he would carry out his intent with regard to
some fixed idea in a won- derful way. I am loathe to think it, and
indeed it would be almost as great a marvel as the other to find that
Van Hel- sing was mad, but anyhow I shall watch him carefully. I may get
some light on the mystery.


29 September.--Last night, at a little before ten o'clock, Arthur and
Quincey came into Van Helsing's room. He told us all what he wanted us
to do, but especially address- ing himself to Arthur, as if all our
wills were centered in his. He began by saying that he hoped we would
all come with him too, "for," he said, "there is a grave duty to be done
there. You were doubtless surprised at my letter?" This query was
directly addressed to Lord Godalming.
 "I was. It rather upset me for a bit. There has been so much trouble
around my house of late that I could do without any more. I have been
curious, too, as to what you mean.

"Quincey and I talked it over, but the more we talked, the more puzzled
we got, till now I can say for myself that I'm about up a tree as to any
meaning about anything."

"Me too," said Quincey Morris laconically.

"Oh," said the Professor, "then you are nearer the be- ginning, both of
you, than friend John here, who has to go a long way back before he can
even get so far as to begin."

It was evident that he recognized my return to my old doubting frame of
mind without my saying a word. Then, turn- ing to the other two, he said
with intense gravity,

"I want your permission to do what I think good this night. It is, I
know, much to ask, and when you know what it is I propose to do you will
know, and only then how much. Therefore may I ask that you promise me in
the dark, so that afterwards, though you may be angry with me for a
time, I must not disguise from myself the possibility that such may be,
you shall not blame yourselves for anything."

"That's frank anyhow," broke in Quincey. "I'll answer for the Professor.
I don't quite see his drift, but I swear he's honest, and that's good
enough for me."

"I thank you, Sir," said Van Helsing proudly. "I have done myself the
honor of counting you one trusting friend, and such endorsement is dear
to me." He held out a hand, which Quincey took.

Then Arthur spoke out, "Dr. Van Helsing, I don't quite like to `buy a
pig in a poke', as they say in Scotland, and if it be anything in which
my honour as a gentleman or my faith as a Christian is concerned, I
cannot make such a pro- mise. If you can assure me that what you intend
does not violate either of these two, then I give my consent at once,
though for the life of me, I cannot understand what you are driving at."

"I accept your limitation," said Van Helsing, "and all I ask of you is
that if you feel it necessary to condemn any act of mine, you will first
consider it well and be satisfied that it does not violate your
reservations."

"Agreed!" said Arthur. "That is only fair. And now that the pourparlers
are over, may I ask what it is we are to do?"

"I want you to come with me, and to come in secret, to the churchyard at
Kingstead."

Arthur's face fell as he said in an amazed sort of way,

"Where poor Lucy is buried?"

The Professor bowed.

Arthur went on, "And when there?"

"To enter the tomb!"

Arthur stood up. "Professor, are you in earnest, or is it some monstrous
joke? Pardon me, I see that you are in earnest." He sat down again, but
I could see that he sat firmly and proudly, as one who is on his
dignity. There was silence until he asked again, "And when in the tomb?"

"To open the coffin."

"This is too much!" he said, angrily rising again. "I am willing to be
patient in all things that are reasonable, but in this,this desecration
of the grave, of one who . . ." He fairly choked with indignation.

The Professor looked pityingly at him."If I could spare you one pang, my
poor friend," he said, "God knows I would. But this night our feet must
tread in thorny paths,or later, and for ever, the feet you love must
walk in paths of flame!"

Arthur looked up with set white face and said, "Take care, sir, take
care!"

"Would it not be well to hear what I have to say?" said Van Helsing.
"And then you will at least know the limit of my purpose. Shall I go
on?"

"That's fair enough," broke in Morris.

After a pause Van Helsing went on, evidently with an effort, "Miss Lucy
is dead, is it not so? Yes! Then there can be no wrong to her. But if
she be not dead. . ."

Arthur jumped to his feet, "Good God!" he cried. "What do you mean? Has
there been any mistake, has she been buried alive?"He groaned in anguish
that not even hope could soften.

"I did not say she was alive, my child. I did not think it. I go no
further than to say that she might be Un-Dead."

"Un-Dead! Not alive! What do you mean? Is this all a nightmare, or what
is it?"

"There are mysteries which men can only guess at, which age by age they
may solve only in part. Believe me, we are now on the verge of one. But
I have not done. May I cut off the head of dead Miss Lucy?"

"Heavens and earth, no!" cried Arthur in a storm of passion. "Not for
the wide world will I consent to any mutilation of her dead body. Dr.
Van Helsing, you try me too far. What have I done to you that you should
torture me so? What did that poor, sweet girl do that you should want to
cast such dishonor on her grave? Are you mad, that you speak of such
things, or am I mad to listen to them? Don't dare think more of such a
desecration. I shall not give my consent to anything you do. I have a
duty to do in protecting her grave from outrage,and by God, I shall do
it!"

Van Helsing rose up from where he had all the time been seated, and
said, gravely and sternly, "My Lord Godalming, I too, have a duty to do,
a duty to others, a duty to you, a duty to the dead, and by God, I shall
do it! All I ask you now is that you come with me, that you look and
listen, and if when later I make the same request you do not be more
eager for its fulfillment even than I am, then,I shall do my duty,
whatever it may seem to me. And then, to follow your Lordship's wishes I
shall hold myself at your disposal to render an account to you,when and
where you will." His voice broke a little, and he went on with a voice
full of pity.

"But I beseech you, do not go forth in anger with me.In a long life of
acts which were often not pleasant to do, and which sometimes did wring
my heart,I have never had so heavy a task as now. Believe me that if the
time comes for you to change your mind towards me,one look from you will
wipe away all this so sad hour, for I would do what a man can to save
you from sorrow. Just think. For why should I give myself so much labor
and so much of sorrow? I have come here from my own land to do what I
can of good, at the first to please my friend John,and then to help a
sweet young lady, whom too, I come to love. For her, I am ashamed to say
so much, but I say it in kindness, I gave what you gave, the blood of my
veins. I gave it, I who was not, like you, her lover, but only her
physician and her friend. I gave her my nights and days, before death,
after death, and if my death can do her good even now, when she is the
dead Un-Dead, she shall have it freely." He said this with a very grave,
sweet pride, and Arthur was much affected by it.

He took the old man's hand and said in a broken voice, "Oh, it is hard
to think of it, and I cannot understand, but at least I shall go with
you and wait."


CHAPTER 16


   DR SEWARD'S DIARY-cont.


It was just a quarter before twelve o'clock when we got into the
churchyard over the low wall. The night was dark with occasional gleams
of moonlight between the dents of the heavy clouds that scudded across
the sky. We all kept some- how close together, with Van Helsing slightly
in front as he led the way.When we had come close to the tomb I looked
well at Arthur, for I feared the proximity to a place laden with so
sorrowful a memory would upset him, but he bore himself well. I took it
that the very mystery of the proceeding was in some way a counteractant
to his grief. The Professor un- locked the door, and seeing a natural
hesitation amongst us for various reasons, solved the difficulty by
entering first himself. The rest of us followed, and he closed the door.
He then lit a dark lantern and pointed to a coffin.Arthur step- ped
forward hesitatingly. Van Helsing said to me, "You were with me here
yesterday. Was the body of Miss Lucy in that coffin?"

"It was."

The Professor turned to the rest saying, "You hear, and yet there is no
one who does not believe with me.'

He took his screwdriver and again took off the lid of the coffin. Arthur
looked on, very pale but silent. When the lid was removed he stepped
forward. He evidently did not know that there was a leaden coffin, or at
any rate, had not thought of it. When he saw the rent in the lead, the
blood rushed to his face for an instant, but as quickly fell away again,
so that he remained of a ghastly whiteness. He was still silent. Van
Helsing forced back the leaden flange, and we all looked in and
recoiled.

The coffin was empty!

For several minutes no one spoke a word. The silence was broken by
Quincey Morris, "Professor, I answered for you. Your word is all I want.
I wouldn't ask such a thing ordin- arily, I wouldn't so dishonor you as
to imply a doubt, but this is a mystery that goes beyond any honor or
dishonor. Is this your doing?"

"I swear to you by all that I hold sacred that I have not removed or
touched her. What happened was this. Two nights ago my friend Seward and
I came here, with good pur- pose, believe me.I opened that coffin, which
was then sealed up, and we found it as now, empty. We then waited, and
saw something white come through the trees. The next day we came here in
daytime and she lay there. Did she not, friend John?

"Yes."

"That night we were just in time. One more so small child was missing,
and we find it,thank God,unharmed amongst the graves.Yesterday I came
here before sundown, for at sun- down the Un-Dead can move. I waited
here all night till the sun rose, but I saw nothing. It was most
probable that it was because I had laid over the clamps of those doors
garlic, which the Un-Dead cannot bear, and other things which they shun.
Last night there was no exodus, so tonight before the sundown I took
away my garlic and other things. And so it is we find this coffin empty.
But bear with me. So far there is much that is strange. Wait you with me
outside, unseen and unheard, and things much stranger are yet to be.So,"
here he shut the dark slide of his lantern,"now to the outside." He
opened the door,and we filed out, he coming last and locking the door
behind him.

Oh! But it seemed fresh and pure in the night air after the terror of
that vault. How sweet it was to see the clouds race by, and the passing
gleams of the moonlight between the scudding clouds crossing and
passing, like the gladness and sorrow of a man's life.How sweet it was
to breathe the fresh air, that had no taint of death and decay. How
humanizing to see the red lighting of the sky beyond the hill, and to
hear far away the muffled roar that marks the life of a great city. Each
in his own way was solemn and overcome. Arthur was silent, and was, I
could see, striving to grasp the pur- pose and the inner meaning of the
mystery. I was myself tol- erably patient, and half inclined again to
throw aside doubt and to accept Van Helsing's conclusions. Quincey
Morris was phlegmatic in the way of a man who accepts all things, and
accepts them in the spirit of cool bravery, with hazard of all he has at
stake. Not being able to smoke, he cut himself a good-sized plug of
tobacco and began to chew. As to Van Helsing, he was employed in a
definite way. First he took from his bag a mass of what looked like
thin, wafer-like biscuit, which was carefully rolled up in a white
napkin. Next he took out a double handful of some whitish stuff,like
dough or putty. He crumbled the wafer up fine and worked it into the
mass between his hands. This he then took, and roll- ing it into thin
strips, began to lay them into the crevices between the door and its
setting in the tomb. I was some- what puzzled at this, and being close,
asked him what it was that he was doing. Arthur and Quincey drew near
also,as they too were curious.

He answered, "I am closing the tomb so that the Un-Dead may not enter."

"And is that stuff you have there going to do it?"

"It Is."

"What is that which you are using?" This time the ques- tion was by
Arthur. Van Helsing reverently lifted his hat as he answered.

"The Host. I brought it from Amsterdam. I have an In- dulgence."

It was an answer that appalled the most sceptical of us, and we felt
individually that in the presence of such earnest purpose as the
Professor's, a purpose which could thus use the to him most sacred of
things, it was impossible to distrust.In respectful silence we took the
places assign- ed to us close round the tomb, but hidden from the sight
of any one approaching. I pitied the others, especially Arthur. I had
myself been apprenticed by my former visits to this watching horror, and
yet I, who had up to an hour ago repud- iated the proofs, felt my heart
sink within me. Never did tombs look so ghastly white. Never did
cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom.
Never did tree or grass wave or rustle so ominously. Never did bough
creak so mysteriously, and never did the far-away howling of dogs send
such a woeful presage through the night.

There was a long spell of silence, big, aching, void, and then from the
Professor a keen "S-s-s-s!" He pointed, and far down the avenue of yews
we saw a white figure ad- vance, a dim white figure, which held
something dark at its breast. The figure stopped, and at the moment a
ray of moon- light fell upon the masses of driving clouds, and showed in
startling prominence a dark-haired woman, dressed in the cerements of
the grave. We could not see the face, for it was bent down over what we
saw to be a fair-haired child. There was a pause and a sharp little cry,
such as a child gives in sleep, or a dog as it lies before the fire and
dreams. We were starting forward, but the Professor's warn- ing hand,
seen by us as he stood behind a yew tree, kept us back. And then as we
looked the white figure moved forwards again. It was now near enough for
us to see clearly, and the moonlight still held. My own heart grew cold
as ice, and I could hear the gasp of Arthur, as we recognized the
features of Lucy Westenra. Lucy Westenra, but yet how changed. The
sweetness was turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty, and the purity to
voluptuous wantonness.

Van Helsing stepped out,and obedient to his gesture, we all advanced
too. The four of us ranged in a line before the door of the tomb. Van
Helsing raised his lantern and drew the slide. By the concentrated light
that fell on Lucy's face we could see that the lips were crimson with
fresh blood, and that the stream had trickled over her chin and stained
the purity of her lawn death robe.

We shuddered with horror. I could see by the tremulous light that even
Van Helsing's iron nerve had failed. Arthur was next to me, and if I had
not seized his arm and held him up, he would have fallen.

When Lucy, I call the thing that was before us Lucy be- cause it bore
her shape, saw us she drew back with an angry snarl,such as a cat gives
when taken unawares, then her eyes ranged over us. Lucy's eyes in form
and color, but Lucy's eyes unclean and full of hell fire, instead of the
pure, gentle orbs we knew. At that moment the remnant of my love passed
into hate and loathing. Had she then to be killed, I could have done it
with savage delight. As she looked, her eyes blazed with unholy light,
and the face became wreathed with a voluptuous smile. Oh, God, how it
made me shudder to see it! With a careless motion, she flung to the
ground, callous as a devil,the child that up to now she had clutched
strenuously to her breast, growling over it as a dog growls over a bone.
The child gave a sharp cry, and lay there moan- ing. There was a
cold-bloodedness in the act which wrung a groan from Arthur.When she
advanced to him with outstretched arms and a wanton smile he fell back
and hid his face in his hands.

She still advanced, however, and with a languorous, vol- uptuous grace,
said, "Come to me, Arthur. Leave these others and come to me. My arms
are hungry for you. Come, and we can rest together. Come, my husband,
come!"

There was something diabolically sweet in her tones, something of the
tinkling of glass when struck, which rang through the brains even of us
who heard the words addressed to another.

As for Arthur,he seemed under a spell, moving his hands from his face,
he opened wide his arms. She was leaping for them, when Van Helsing
sprang forward and held between them his little golden crucifix. She
recoiled from it, and, with a suddenly distorted face, full of rage,
dashed past him as if to enter the tomb.

When within a foot or two of the door,however,she stop- ped, as if
arrested by some irresistible force. Then she turned, and her face was
shown in the clear burst of moon- light and by the lamp, which had now
no quiver from Van Hel- sing's nerves.Never did I see such baffled
malice on a face, and never, I trust, shall such ever be seen again by
mortal eyes. The beautiful color became livid, the eyes seemed to throw
out sparks of hell fire, the brows were wrinkled as though the folds of
flesh were the coils of Medusa's snakes, and the lovely, blood-stained
mouth grew to an open square, as in the passion masks of the Greeks and
Japanese. If ever a face meant death, if looks could kill, we saw it at
that moment.

And so for full half a minute, which seemed an eternity, se remained
between the lifted crucifix and the sacred clos- ing of her means of
entry.

Van Helsing broke the silence by asking Arthur, "Answer me, oh my
friend! Am I to proceed in my work?"

"Do as you will, friend. Do as you will. There can be no horror like
this ever any more." And he groaned in spirit.

Quincey and I simultaneously moved towards him,and took his arms. We
could hear the click of the closing lantern as Van Helsing held it down.
Coming close to the tomb, he began to remove from the chinks some of the
sacred emblem which he had placed there. We all looked on with horrified
amazement as we saw, when he stood back, the woman, with a corporeal
body as real at that moment as our own, pass through the interstice
where scarce a knife blade could have gone.We all felt a glad sense of
relief when we saw the Professor calmly restoring the strings of putty
to the edges of the door.

When this was done, he lifted the child and said, "Come now, my friends.
We can do no more till tomorrow. There is a funeral at noon, so here we
shall all come before long after that. The friends of the dead will all
be gone by two, and when the sexton locks the gate we shall remain. Then
there is more to do, but not like this of tonight. As for this little
one, he is not much harmed, and by tomorrow night he shall be well. We
shall leave him where the police will find him, as on the other night,
and then to home."

Coming close to Arthur, he said, "My friend Arthur, you have had a sore
trial, but after, when you look back, you will see how it was necessary.
You are now in the bitter waters, my child. By this time tomorrow you
will, please God, have passed them, and have drunk of the sweet waters.
So do not mourn over-much. Till then I shall not ask you to forgive me."

Arthur and Quincey came home with me, and we tried to cheer each other
on the way. We had left behind the child in safety, and were tired. So
we all slept with more or less reality of sleep.


29 September, night.--A little before twelve o'clock we three, Arthur,
Quincey Morris, and myself, called for the Professor. It was odd to
notice that by common consent we had all put on black clothes. Of
course, Arthur wore black, for he was in deep mourning, but the rest of
us wore it by instinct. We got to the graveyard by half-past one, and
strolled about, keeping out of official observation, so that when the
gravediggers had completed their task and the sex- ton under the belief
that every one had gone, had locked the gate, we had the place all to
ourselves.Van Helsing, instead of his little black bag,had with him a
long leather one,some- thing like a cricketing bag.It was manifestly of
fair weight.

When we were alone and had heard the last of the foot- steps die out up
the road, we silently, and as if by ordered intention, followed the
Professor to the tomb. He unlocked the door, and we entered, closing it
behind us. Then he took from his bag the lantern, which he lit, and also
two wax candles, which, when lighted, he stuck by melting their own
ends, on other coffins, so that they might give light suff- icient to
work by. When he again lifted the lid off Lucy's coffin we all looked,
Arthur trembling like an aspen,and saw that the corpse lay there in all
its death beauty. But there was no love in my own heart, nothing but
loathing for the foul Thing which had taken Lucy's shape without her
soul. I could see even Arthur's face grow hard as he looked.Present- ly
he said to Van Helsing, "Is this really Lucy's body, or only a demon in
her shape?"

"It is her body, and yet not it. But wait a while, and you shall see her
as she was, and is."

She seemed like a nightmare of Lucy as she lay there, the pointed teeth,
the blood stained, voluptuous mouth, which made one shudder to see,the
whole carnal and unspirit- ed appearance, seeming like a devilish
mockery of Lucy's sweet purity. Van Helsing, with his usual
methodicalness, began taking the various contents from his bag and
placing them ready for use. First he took out a soldering iron and some
plumbing solder,and then small oil lamp, which gave out, when lit in a
corner of the tomb, gas which burned at a fierce heat with a blue flame,
then his operating knives, which he placed to hand, and last a round
wooden stake, some two and a half or three inches thick and about three
feet long. One end of it was hardened by charring in the fire, and was
sharpened to a fine point. With this stake came a heavy hammer, such as
in households is used in the coal cellar for breaking the lumps.To me, a
doctor's preperations for work of any kind are stimulating and bracing,
but the effect of these things on both Arthur and Quincey was to cause
them a sort of consternation. They both, however, kept their courage,
and remained silent and quiet.

When all was ready, Van Helsing said,"Before we do any- thing, let me
tell you this. It is out of the lore and ex- perience of the ancients
and of all those who have studied the powers of the Un-Dead. When they
become such,there comes with the change the curse of immortality. They
cannot die, but must go on age after age adding new victims and multi-
plying the evils of the world. For all that die from the preying of the
Un-dead become themselves Un-dead,and prey on their kind. And so the
circle goes on ever widening, like as the ripples from a stone thrown in
the water. Friend Arthur, if you had met that kiss which you know of
before poor Lucy die, or again,last night when you open your arms to
her, you would in time, when you had died, have become nosferatu, as
they call it in Eastern europe, and would for all time make more of
those Un-Deads that so have filled us with horror. The career of this so
unhappy dear lady is but just begun. Those children whose blood she
sucked are not as yet so much the worse, but if she lives on, Un-Dead,
more and more they lose their blood and by her power over them they come
to her, and so she draw their blood with that so wicked mouth.But if she
die in truth, then all cease. The tiny wounds of the throats disappear,
and they go back to their play unknowing ever of what has been. But of
the most blessed of all, when this now Un-Dead be made to rest as true
dead, then the soul of the poor lady whom we love shall again be
free.Instead of working wickedness by night and growing more debased in
the assimilating of it by day, she shall take her place with the other
Angels. So that, my friend, it will be a blessed hand for her that shall
strike the blow that sets her free. To this I am willing, but is there
none amongst us who has a better right? Will it be no joy to think of
hereafter in the silence of the night when sleep is not, `It was my hand
that sent her to the stars. It was the hand of him that loved her
best,the hand that of all she would herself have chosen, had it been to
her to choose?' Tell me if there be such a one amongst us?"

We all looked at Arthur. He saw too, what we all did, the infinite
kindness which suggested that his should be the hand which would restore
Lucy to us as a holy, and not an unholy, memory. He stepped forward and
said bravely, though his hand trembled,and his face was as pale as snow,
"My true friend, from the bottom of my broken heart I thank you. Tell me
what I am to do, and I shall not falter!"

Van Helsing laid a hand on his shoulder,and said,"Brave lad! A moment's
courage, and it is done. This stake must be driven through her. It well
be a fearful ordeal, be not de- ceived in that, but it will be only a
short time, and you will then rejoice more than your pain was great.
From this grim tomb you will emerge as though you tread on air. But you
must not falter when once you have begun.Only think that we, your true
friends, are round you, and that we pray for you all the time."

"Go on,"said Arthur hoarsely."Tell me what I am to do."

"Take this stake in your left hand, ready to place to the point over the
heart, and the hammer in your right. Then when we begin our prayer for
the dead, I shall read him, I have here the book, and the others shall
follow, strike in God's name, that so all may be well with the dead that
we love and that the Un-Dead pass away."
 Arthur took the stake and the hammer, and when once his mind was set on
action his hands never trembled nor even quivered. Van Helsing opened
his missal and began to read, and Quincey and I followed as well as we
could.

Arthur placed the point over the heart, and as I looked I could see its
dint in the white flesh. Then he struck with all his might.

The thing in the coffin writhed, and a hideous, blood- curdling screech
came from the opened red lips. The body shook and quivered and twisted
in wild contortions. The sharp white champed together till the lips were
cut, and the mouth was smeared with a crimson foam. But Arthur never
fal- tered. He looked like a figure of Thor as his untrembling arm rose
and fell, driving deeper and deeper the mercy- bearing stake, whilst the
blood from the pierced heart well- ed and spurted up around it. His face
was set, and high duty seemed to shine through it. The sight of it gave
us courage so that our voices seemed to ring through the little vault.

And then the writhing and quivering of the body became less, and the
teeth seemed to champ, and the face to quiver. Finally it lay still. The
terrible task was over.

The hammer fell from Arthur's hand. He reeled and would have fallen had
we not caught him. The great drops of sweat sprang from his forehead,and
his breath came in broken gasps. It had indeed been an awful strain on
him, and had he not been forced to his task by more than human
considerations he could never have gone through with it. For a few
minutes we were so taken up with him that we did not look towards the
coffin. When we did, however, a murmur of startled surprise ran from one
to the other of us. We gazed so eagerly that Arthur rose, for he had
been seated on the ground, and came and looked too, and then a glad
strange light broke over his face and dispelled altogether the gloom of
horror that lay upon it.

There, in the coffin lay no longer the foul Thing that we has so dreaded
and grown to hate that the work of her de- struction was yielded as a
privilege to the one best entit- led to it, but Lucy as we had seen her
in life,with her face of unequalled sweetness and purity. True that
there were there, as we had seen them in life, the traces of care and
pain and waste. But these were all dear to us, for they marked her truth
to what we knew. One and all we felt that the holy calm that lay like
sunshine over the wasted face and form was only an earthly token and
symbol of the calm that was to reign for ever.

Van Helsing came and laid his hand on Arthur's shoulder, and said to
him, "And now, Arthur my friend, dear lad, am I not forgiven?"

The reaction of the terrible strain came as he took the old man's hand
in his,and raising it to his lips, pressed it, and said, "Forgiven! God
bless you that you have given my dear one her soul again, and me peace."
He put his hands on the Professor's shoulder, and laying his head on his
breast, cried for a while silently, whilst we stood unmoving.

When he raised his head Van Helsing said to him, "And now, my child, you
may kiss her. Kiss her dead lips if you will, as she would have you to,
if for her to choose. For she is not a grinning devil now, not any more
a foul Thing for all eternity. No longer she is the devil's Un-Dead. She
is God's true dead, whose soul is with Him!"

Arthur bent and kissed her, and then we sent him and Quincey out of the
tomb. The Professor and I sawed the top off the stake, leaving the point
of it in the body. Then we cut off the head and filled the mouth with
garlic. We sold- ered up the leaden coffin, screwed on the coffin lid,
and gathering up our belongings, came away. When the Professor locked
the door he gave the key to Arthur.

Outside the air was sweet, the sun shone, and the birds sang, and it
seemed as if all nature were tuned to a differ- ent pitch.There was
gladness and mirth and peace everywhere, for we were at rest ourselves
on one account, and we were glad, though it was with a tempered joy.

Before we moved away Van Helsing said,"Now, my friends, one step or our
work is done, one the most harrowing to our- selves. But there remains a
greater task, to find out the author of all this or sorrow and to stamp
him out. I have clues which we can follow, but it is a long task,and a
diff- icult one, and there is danger in it, and pain.Shall you not all
help me? We have learned to believe, all of us, is it not so? And since
so, do we not see our duty? Yes! And do we not promise to go on to the
bitter end?"

Each in turn,we took his hand, and the promise was made. Then said the
Professor as we moved off, "Two nights hence you shall meet with me and
dine together at seven of the clock with friend John. I shall entreat
two others, two that you know not as yet, and I shall be ready to all
our work show and our plans unfold. Friend John, you come with me home,
for I have much to consult you about, and you can help me. Tonight I
leave for Amsterdam, but shall return tomorrow night. And then begins
our great quest. But first I shall have much to say, so that you may
know what to do and to dread. Then our promise shall be made to each
other anew.For there is a terrible task before us, and once our feet are
on the ploughshare we must not draw back."


CHAPTER 17


  DR. SEWARD'S DIARY-cont


When we arrived at the Berkely Hotel, Van Helsing found a telegram
waiting for him.

"Am coming up by train. Jonathan at Whitby. Important news. Mina
Harker."


The Professor was delighted. "Ah, that wonderful Madam Mina," he said,
"pearl among women! She arrive, but I can- not stay. She must go to your
house, friend John. You must meet her at the station. Telegraph her en
route so that she may be prepared."

When the wire was dispatched he had a cup of tea. Over it he told me of
a diary kept by Jonathan Harker when abroad, and gave me a typewritten
copy of it,as also of Mrs.Harker's diary at Whitby. "Take these," he
said,"and study them well. When I have returned you will be master of
all the facts, and we can then better enter on our inquisition. Keep
them safe, for there is in them much of treasure. You will need all your
faith, even you who have had such an experience as that of today. What
is here told," he laid his hand heavily and gravely on the packet of
papers as he spoke, "may be the beginning of the end to you and me and
many another, or it may sound the knell of the Un-Dead who walk the
earth. Read all, I pray you, with the open mind, and if you can add in
any way to the story here told do so, for it is all import- ant. You
have kept a diary of all these so strange things, is it not so? Yes!
Then we shall go through all these to- gether when we meet." He then
made ready for his departure and shortly drove off to Liverpool Street.
I took my way to Paddington, where I arrived about fifteen minutes
before the train came in.

The crowd melted away, after the bustling fashion com- mon to arrival
platforms,and I was beginning to feel uneasy, lest I might miss my
guest, when a sweet-faced, dainty look- ing girl stepped up to me, and
after a quick glance said, "Dr. Seward, is it not?"

"And you are Mrs. Harker!" I answered at once, where- upon she held out
her hand.

"I knew you from the description of poor dear Lucy, but. . ." She
stopped suddenly, and a quick blush overspread her face.

The blush that rose to my own cheeks somehow set us both at ease,for it
was a tacit answer to her own. I got her luggage, which included a
typewriter, and we took the Under- ground to Fenchurch Street, after I
had sent a wire to my housekeeper to have a sitting room and a bedroom
prepared at once for Mrs. Harker.

In due time we arrived. She knew, of course, that the place was a
lunatic asylum, but I could see that she was un- able to repress a
shudder when we entered.

She told me that,if she might, she would come presently to my study, as
she had much to say. So here I am finishing my entry in my phonograph
diary whilst I await her. As yet I have not had the chance of looking at
the papers which Van Helsing left with me, though they lie open before
me. I must get her interested in something, so that I may have an opp-
ortunity of reading them. She does not know how precious time is, or
what a task we have in hand. I must be careful not to frighten her. Here
she is!

 MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL

29 September.--After I had tidied myself, I went down to Dr. Seward's
study. At the door I paused a moment, for I thought I heard him talking
with some one. As, however, he had pressed me to be quick, I knocked at
the door,and on his calling out, "Come in," I entered.

To my intense surprise, there was no one with him. He was quite alone,
and on the table opposite him was what I knew at once from the
description to be a phonograph. I had never seen one, and was much
interested.

"I hope I did not keep you waiting," I said, "but I stayed at the door
as I heard you talking, and thought there was someone with you."

"Oh," he replied with a smile, "I was only entering my diary."

"Your diary?" I asked him in surprise.

"Yes," he answered. "I keep it in this." As he spoke he laid his hand on
the phonograph. I felt quite excited over it, and blurted out, "Why,
this beats even shorthand! May I hear it say something?"

"Certainly," he replied with alacrity, and stood up to put it in train
for speaking. Then he paused, and a troubl- ed look overspread his face.

"The fact is," he began awkwardly."I only keep my diary in it, and as it
is entirely, almost entirely,about my cases it may be awkward, that is,
I mean . . ." He stopped, and I tried to help him out of his
embarrassment.

"You helped to attend dear Lucy at the end. Let me hear how she died,
for all that I know of her, I shall be very grateful. She was very, very
dear to me."

To my surprise,he answered, with a horrorstruck look in his face, "Tell
you of her death? Not for the wide world!"

"Why not?" I asked, for some grave, terrible feeling was coming over me.

Again he paused, and I could see that he was trying to invent an excuse.
At length, he stammered out, "You see, I do not know how to pick out any
particular part of the diary."

Even while he was speaking an idea dawned upon him, and he said with
unconscious simplicity, in a different voice, and with the naivete of a
child, "that's quite true, upon my honor. Honest Indian!"

I could not but smile, at which he grimaced."I gave my- self away that
time!" he said. "But do you know that, al- though I have kept the diary
for months past, it never once struck me how I was going to find any
particular part of it in case I wanted to look it up?"

By this time my mind was made up that the diary of a doctor who attended
Lucy might have something to add to the sum of our knowledge of that
terrible Being, and I said boldly, "Then, Dr. Seward, you had better let
me copy it out for you on my typewriter."

He grew to a positively deathly pallor as he said, "No! No! No! For all
the world. I wouldn't let you know that terrible story.!"

Then it was terrible. My intuition was right! For a mo- ment, I thought,
and as my eyes ranged the room,unconscious- ly looking for something or
some opportunity to aid me, they lit on a great batch of typewriting on
the table. His eyes caught the look in mine, and without his thinking,
followed their direction. As they saw the parcel he realized my mean-
ing.

"You do not know me," I said. "When you have read those papers, my own
diary and my husband's also, which I have typed, you will know me
better. I have not faltered in giv- ing every thought of my own heart in
this cause. But, of course, you do not know me, yet, and I must not
expect you to trust me so far."

He is certainly a man of noble nature. Poor dear Lucy was right about
him. He stood up and opened a large drawer, in which were arranged in
order a number of hollow cylinders of metal covered with dark wax, and
said,

"You are quite right. I did not trust you because I did not know you.
But I know you now, and let me say that I should have known you long
ago. I know that Lucy told you of me. She told me of you too. May I make
the only atonement in my power? Take the cylinders and hear them. The
first half-dozen of them are personal to me, and they will not horrify
you. Then you will know me better. Dinner will by then be ready. In the
meantime I shall read over some of these documents, and shall be better
able to understand cer- tain things."

He carried the phonograph himself up to my sitting room and adjusted it
for me.Now I shall learn something pleasant, I am sure. For it will tell
me the other side of a true love episode of which I know one side
already.

 DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


29 September.--I was so absorbed in that wonderful diary of Jonathan
Harker and that other of his wife that I let the time run on without
thinking. Mrs. Harker was not down when the maid came to announce
dinner, so I said, "She is possibly tired. Let dinner wait an hour," and
I went on with my work. I had just finished Mrs. Harker's diary, when
she came in. She looked sweetly pretty, but very sad, and her eyes were
flushed with crying. This somehow moved me much. Of late I have had
cause for tears, God knows! But the relief of them was denied me, and
now the sight of those sweet eyes, brightened by recent tears, went
straight to my heart. So I said as gently as I could, "I greatly fear I
have distressed you."

"Oh, no, not distressed me," she replied. "But I have been more touched
than I can say by your grief. That is a wonderful machine, but it is
cruelly true. It told me, in its very tones, the anguish of your
heart.It was like a soul crying out to Almighty God. No one must hear
them spoken ever again! See, I have tried to be useful. I have copied
out the words on my typewriter, and none other need now hear your heart
beat, as I did."

"No one need ever know, shall ever know," I said in a low voice. She
laid her hand on mine and said very gravely, "Ah, but they must!"

"Must! but why?" I asked.

"Because it is a part of the terrible story, a part of poor Lucy's death
and all that led to it. Because in the struggle which we have before us
to rid the earth of this terrible monster we must have all the knowledge
and all the help which we can get. I think that the cylinders which you
gave me contained more than you intended me to know. But I can see that
there are in your record many lights to this dark mystery. You will let
me help, will you not? I know all up to a certain point, and I see
already, though your diary only took me to 7 September, how poor Lucy
was beset, and how her terrible doom was being wrought out. Jonathan and
I have been working day and night since Professor Van Helsing saw us. He
is gone to Whitby to get more information, and he will be here tomorrow
to help us. We need have no secrets amongst us. Working together and
with absolute trust, we can surely be stronger than if some of us were
in the dark."

She looked at me so appealingly, and at the same time manifested such
courage and resolution in her bearing, that I gave in at once to her
wishes. "You shall," I said, "do as you like in the matter. God forgive
me if I do wrong! There are terrible things yet to learn of. But if you
have so far traveled on the road to poor Lucy's death, you will not be
content, I know, to remain in the dark. Nay, the end, the very end, may
give you a gleam of peace. Come, there is dinner. We must keep one
another strong for what is before us. We have a cruel and dreadful task.
When you have eaten you shall learn the rest, and I shall answer any
questions you ask, if there be anything which you do not understand,
though it was apparent to us who were present."

MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL


29 September.--After dinner I came with Dr. Seward to his study. He
brought back the phonograph from my room, and I took a chair, and
arranged the phonograph so that I could touch it without getting up, and
showed me how to stop it in case I should want to pause. Then he very
thoughtfully took a chair, with his back to me, so that I might be as
free as possible, and began to read. I put the forked metal to my ears
and listened.

When the terrible story of Lucy's death, and all that followed, was
done, I lay back in my chair powerless. Fort- unately I am not of a
fainting disposition. When Dr. Seward saw me he jumped up with a
horrified exclamation, and hurr- iedly taking a case bottle from the
cupboard, gave me some brandy, which in a few minutes somewhat restored
me. My brain was all in a whirl, and only that there came through all
the multitude of horrors, the holy ray of light that my dear Lucy was at
last at peace, I do not think I could have borne it without making a
scene. It is all so wild and mys- terious, and strange that if I had not
known Jonathan's ex- perience in Transylvania I could not have believed.
As it was, I didn't know what to believe, and so got out of my
difficulty by attending to something else. I took the cover off my
typewriter, and said to Dr. Seward,

"Let me write this all out now. We must be ready for Dr. Van Helsing
when he comes. I have sent a telegram to Jonathan to come on here when
he arrives in London from Whitby. In this matter dates are everything,
and I think that if we get all of our material ready,and have every item
put in chronological order, we shall have done much.

"You tell me that Lord Godalming and Mr. Morris are coming too. Let us
be able to tell them when they come."

He accordingly set the phonograph at a slow pace, and I began to
typewrite from the beginning of the seventeenth cy- linder. I used
manifold, and so took three copies of the diary, just as I had done with
the rest. It was late when I got through, but Dr. Seward went about his
work of going his round of the patients. When he had finished he came
back and sat near me, reading, so that I did not feel too lonely whilst
I worked. How good and thoughtful he is. The world seems full of good
men, even if there are monsters in it.

Before I left him I remembered what Jonathan put in his diary of the
Professor's perturbation at reading something in an evening paper at the
station at Exeter, so, seeing that Dr. Seward keeps his newspapers, I
borrowed the files of `The Westminster Gazette' and `The Pall Mall
Gazette' and took them to my room. I remember how much the `Dailygraph'
and `The Whitby Gazette', of which I had made cuttings, had helped us to
understand the terrible events at Whitby when Count Dracula landed, so I
shall look through the evening papers since then, and perhaps I shall
get some new light. I am not sleepy, and the work will help to keep me
quiet.

 DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


30 September.--Mr. Harker arrived at nine o'clock. He got his wife's
wire just before starting. He is uncommonly clever, if one can judge
from his face, and full of energy. If this journal be true, and judging
by one's own wonderful experiences, it must be, he is also a man of
great nerve. That going down to the vault a second time was a remarkable
piece of daring. After reading his account of it I was pre- pared to
meet a good specimen of manhood, but hardly the quiet, business-like
gentleman who came here today.


LATER.--After lunch Harker and his wife went back to their own room,and
as I passed a while ago I heard the click of the typewriter. They are
hard at it. Mrs. Harker says that knitting together in chronological
order every scrap of evidence they have. Harker has got the letters
between the consignee of the boxes at Whitby and the carriers in London
who took charge of them. He is now reading his wife's tran- script of my
diary. I wonder what they make out of it. Here it is . . .


Strange that it never struck me that the very next house might be the
Count's hiding place! Goodness knows that we had enough clues from the
conduct of the patient Renfield! The bundle of letters relating to the
purchase of the house were with the transcript. Oh, if we had only had
them earl- ier we might have saved poor Lucy! Stop! That way madness
lies! Harker has gone back, and is again collecting material. He says
that by dinner time they will be able to show a whole connected
narrative. He thinks that in the meantime I should see Renfield, as
hitherto he has been a sort of index to the coming and going of the
Count. I hardly see this yet, but when I get at the dates I suppose I
shall. What a good thing that Mrs. Harker put my cylinders into type! We
never could have found the dates otherwise.

I found Renfield sitting placidly in his room with his hands folded,
smiling benignly. At the moment he seemed as sane as any one I ever saw.
I sat down and talked with him on a lot of subjects, all of which he
treated naturally. He then, of his own accord, spoke of going home, a
subject he has never mentioned to my knowledge during his sojourn here.
In fact, he spoke quite confidently of getting his discharge at once. I
believe that, had I not had the chat with Harker and read the letters
and the dates of his outbursts,I should have been prepared to sign for
him after a brief time of ob- servation. As it is, I am darkly
suspicious. All those out- breaks were in some way linked with the
proximity of the Count. What then does this absolute content mean? Can
it be that his instinct is satisfied as to the vampire's ultimate
triumph? Stay. He is himself zoophagous, and in his wild ravings outside
the chapel door of the deserted house he al- ways spoke of `master'.
This all seems confirmation of our idea. However, after a while I came
away. My friend is just a little too sane at present to make it safe to
probe him too deep with questions. He might begin to think, and then . .
. So I came away. I mistrust these quiet moods of of his, so I have
given the attendant a hint to look closely after him, and to have a
strait waistcoat ready in case of need.


 JOHNATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL


29 September, in train to London.--When I received Mr. Billington's
courteous message that he would give me any in- formation in his power I
thought it best to go down to Whit- by and make, on the spot, such
inquiries as I wanted. It was now my object to trace that horrid cargo
of the Count's to its place in London. Later, we may be able to deal
with it. Billington junior, a nice lad, met me at the station, and
brought me to his father's house,where they had decided that I must
spend the night. They are hospitable, with true York- shire hospitality,
give a guest everything and leave him to do as he likes. They all knew
that I was busy, and that my stay was short, and Mr.Billington had ready
in his office all the papers concerning the consignment of boxes. It
gave me almost a turn to see again one of the letters which I had seen
on the Count's table before I knew of his diabolical plans. Everything
had been carefully thought out, and done systematically and with
precision. He seemed to have been prepared for every obstacle which
might be placed by acci- dent in the way of his intentions being carried
out. To use and Americanism, he had `taken no chances', and the absolute
accuracy with which his instructions were fulfilled was simply the
logical result of his care. I saw the invoice,and took note of it.`Fifty
cases of common earth, to be used for experimental purposes'. Also the
copy of the letter to Car- ter Paterson, and their reply. Of both these
I got copies. This was all the information Mr.Billington could give me,
so I went down to the port and saw the coastguards, the Customs Officers
and the harbor master, who kindly put me in commun- ication with the men
who had actually received the boxes. Their tally was exact with the
list, and they had nothing to add to the simple description `fifty cases
of common earth', except that the boxes were `main and mortal heavy',
and that shifting them was dry work. One of them added that it was hard
lines that there wasn't any gentleman `such like as like yourself,
squire', to show some sort of appreciation of their efforts in a liquid
form. Another put in a rider that the thirst then generated was such
that even the time which had elapsed had not completely allayed it.
Needless to add, I took care before leaving to lift, forever and
adequately, this source of reproach.

 30 September.--The station master was good enough to give me a line to
his old companion the station master at King's Cross, so that when I
arrived there in the morning I was able to ask him about the arrival of
the boxes. He, too put me at once in communication with the proper
officials, and I saw that their tally was correct with the original in-
voice. The opportunities of acquiring an abnormal thirst had been here
limited. A noble use of them had, however, been made, and again I was
compelled to deal with the result in ex post facto manner.

From thence I went to Carter Paterson's central office, where I met with
the utmost courtesy. They looked up the transaction in their day book
and letter book, and at once telephoned to their King's Cross office for
more details. By good fortune, the men who did the teaming were waiting
for work, and the official at once sent them over, sending also by one
of them the way-bill and all the papers connected with the delivery of
the boxes at Carfax. Here again I found the tally agreeing exactly. The
carriers' men were able to supplement the paucity of the written words
with a few more details. These were, I shortly found, connected almost
sole- ly with the dusty nature of the job, and the consequent thirst
engendered in the operators. On my affording an opp- ortunity, through
the medium of the currency of the realm, of the allaying, at a later
period, this beneficial evil, one of the men remarked,

"That `ere `ouse, guv'nor, is the rummiest I ever was in. Blyme! But it
ain't been touched sence a hundred years. There was dust that thick in
the place that you might have slep' on it without `urtin' of yer bones.
An' the place was that neglected that yer might `ave smelled ole
Jerusalem in it. But the old chapel, that took the cike, that did!Me and
my mate, we thort we wouldn't never git out quick enough. Lor', I
wouldn't take less nor a quid a moment to stay there arter dark."

Having been in the house, I could well believe him, but if he knew what
I know, he would, I think have raised his terms.

Of one thing I am now satisfied. That all those boxes which arrived at
Whitby from Varna in the Demeter were safe- ly deposited in the old
chapel at Carfax. There should be fifty of them there, unless any have
since been removed, as from Dr. Seward's diary I fear.


Later.--Mina and I have worked all day, and we have put all the papers
into order.

 MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL


30 September.--I am so glad that I hardly know how to contain myself. It
is, I suppose, the reaction from the haunting fear which I have had,that
this terrible affair and the reopening of his old wound might act
detrimentally on Jonathan. I saw him leave for Whitby with as brave a
face as could, but I was sick with apprehension. The effort has,
however, done him good. He was never so resolute, never so strong, never
so full of volcanic energy, as at present. It is just as that dear, good
Professor Van Helsing said, he is true grit, and he improves under
strain that would kill a weaker nature. He came back full of life and
hope and deter- mination. We have got everything in order for tonight. I
feel myself quite wild with excitement. I suppose one ought to pity
anything so hunted as the Count. That is just it. This thing is not
human, not even a beast. To read Dr. Sew- ard's account of poor Lucy's
death, and what followed, is enough to dry up the springs of pity in
one's heart.


Later.--Lord Godalming and Mr. Morris arrived earlier than we expected.
Dr. Seward was out on business, and had taken Jonathan with him, so I
had to see them. It was to me a painful meeting, for it brought back all
poor dear Lucy's hopes of only a few months ago. Of course they had
heard Lucy speak of me, and it seemed that Dr. Van Helsing, too, had
been quite `blowing my trumpet', as Mr. Morris expressed it. Poor
fellows, neither of them is aware that I know all about the proposals
they made to Lucy. They did not quite know what to say or do, as they
were ignorant of the amount of my knowledge. So they had to keep on
neutral subjects. However, I thought the matter over, and came to the
conclus- ion that the best thing I could do would be to post them on
affairs right up to date. I knew from Dr. Seward's diary that they had
been at Lucy's death, her real death, and that I need not fear to betray
any secret before the time. So I told them,as well as I could, that I
had read all the papers and diaries, and that my husband and I, having
typewritten them, had just finished putting them in order. I gave them
each a copy to read in the library. When Lord Godalming got his and
turned it over, it does make a pretty good pile, he said, "Did you write
all this, Mrs. Harker?"

I nodded, and he went on.

"I don't quite see the drift of it, but you people are all so good and
kind, and have been working so earnestly and so energetically, that all
I can do is to accept your ideas blindfold and try to help you. I have
had one lesson already in accepting facts that should make a man humble
to the last hour of his life. Besides, I know you loved my Lucy . . ."

Here he turned away and covered his face with his hands. I could hear
the tears in his voice. Mr. Morris, with in- stinctive delicacy, just
laid a hand for a moment on his shoulder, and then walked quietly out of
the room. I suppose there is something in a woman's nature that makes a
man free to break down before her and express his feelings on the tender
or emotional side without feeling it derogatory to his manhood. For when
Lord Godalming found himself alone with me he sat down on the sofa and
gave way utterly and op- enly. I sat down beside him and took his hand.
I hope he didn't think it forward of me, and that if her ever thinks of
it afterwards he never will have such a thought. There I wrong him. I
know he never will. He is too true a gentle- man.I said to him, for I
could see that his heart was break- ing, "I loved dear Lucy, and I know
what she was to you, and what you were to her. She and I were like
sisters, and now she is gone, will you not let me be like a sister to
you in your trouble? I know what sorrows you have had, though I cannot
measure the depth of them. If sympathy and pity can help in your
affliction, won't you let me be of some little service, for Lucy's
sake?"

In an instant the poor dear fellow was overwhelmed with grief. It seemed
to me that all that he had of late been suffering in silence found a
vent at once. He grew quite hy- sterical,and raising his open hands,
beat his palms together in a perfect agony of grief. He stood up and
then sat down again, and the tears rained down his cheeks. I felt an in-
finite pity for him, and opened my arms unthinkingly. With a sob he laid
his head on my shoulder and cried like a wear- ied child, whilst he
shook with emotion.

We women have something of the mother in us that makes us rise above
smaller matters when the mother spirit is in- voked. I felt this big
sorrowing man's head resting on me, as though it were that of a baby
that some day may lie on my bosom, and I stroked his hair as though he
were my own child. I never thought at the time how strange it all was.

After a little bit his sobs ceased, and he raised him- self with an
apology, though he made no disguise of his emo- tion. He told me that
for days and nights past, weary days and sleepless nights, he had been
unable to speak with any one, as a man must speak in his time of sorrow.
There was no woman whose sympathy could be given to him, or with whom,
owing to the terrible circumstance with which his sorrow was surrounded,
he could speak freely.

"I know now how I suffered," he said, as he dried his eyes, "but I do
not know even yet, and none other can ever know, how much your sweet
sympathy has been to me today. I shall know better in time, and believe
me that, though I am not ungrateful now, my gratitude will grow with my
under- standing. You will let me be like a brother, will you not, for
all our lives, for dear Lucy's sake?"

"For dear Lucy's sake," I said as we clasped hands."Ay, and for your own
sake," he added, "for if a man's esteem and gratitude are ever worth the
winning, you have won mine to- day. If ever the future should bring to
you a time when you need a man's help,believe me, you will not call in
vain. God grant that no such time may ever come to you to break the
sunshine of your life, but if it should ever come, promise me that you
will let me know."

He was so earnest, and his sorrow was so fresh, that I felt it would
comfort him, so I said, "I promise."

As I came along the corridor I say Mr. Morris looking out of a window.
He turned as he heard my footsteps. "How is Art?" he said. Then noticing
my red eyes, he went on,"Ah, I see you have been comforting him. Poor
old fellow! He needs it. No one but a woman can help a man when he is in
trouble of the heart, and he had no one to comfort him."

He bore his own trouble so bravely that my heart bled for him. I saw the
manuscript in his hand, and I knew that when he read it he would realize
how much I knew, so I said to him,"I wish I could comfort all who suffer
from the heart. Will you let me be your friend, and will you come to me
for comfort if you need it? You will know later why I speak."

He saw that I was in earnest,and stooping, took my hand, and raising it
to his lips, kissed it. It seemed but poor comfort to so brave and
unselfish a soul, and impulsively I bent over and kissed him. The tears
rose in his eyes, and there was a momentary choking in his throat. He
said quite calmly,"Little girl, you will never forget that true hearted
kindness, so long as ever you live!" Then he went into the study to his
friend.

"Little girl!" The very words he had used to Lucy, and, oh, but he
proved himself a friend.


CHAPTER 18


   DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


30 September.--I got home at five o'clock, and found that Godalming and
Morris had not only arrived, but had already studied the transcript of
the various diaries and letters which Harker had not yet returned from
his visit to the carriers' men, of whom Dr. Hennessey had written to me.
Mrs.Harker gave us a cup of tea,and I can honestly say that, for the
first time since I have lived in it, this old house seemed like home.
When we had finished, Mrs. Harker said,

"Dr.Seward, may I ask a favor? I want to see your pat- ient, Mr.
Renfield. Do let me see him. What you have said of him in your diary
interests me so much!"

She looked so appealing and so pretty that I could not refuse her, and
there was no possible reason why I should,so I took her with me.When I
went into the room, I told the man that a lady would like to see him, to
which he simply answer- ed, "Why?"

"She is going through the house, and wants to see every one in it," I
answered.

"Oh, very well," he said,"let her come in, by all means, but just wait a
minute till I tidy up the place."

His method of tidying was peculiar, he simply swallowed all the flies
and spiders in the boxes before I could stop him. It was quite evident
that he feared, or was jealous of, some interference. When he had got
through his disgusting task, he said cheerfully, "Let the lady come in,"
and sat down on the edge of his bed with his head down, but with his
eyelids raised so that he could see her as she entered. For a moment I
thought that he might have some homicidal intent. I remembered how quiet
he had been just before he attacked me in my own study, and I took care
to stand where I could seize him at once if he attempted to make a
spring at her.

She came into the room with an easy gracefulness which would at once
command the respect of any lunatic, for easi- ness is one of the
qualities mad people most respect. She walked over to him,smiling
pleasantly, and held out her hand.

"Good evening, Mr. Renfield," said she. "You see, I know you, for Dr.
Seward has told me of you." He made no immediate reply, but eyed her all
over intently with a set frown on his face. This look gave way to one of
wonder,which merged in doubt, then to my intense astonishment he said,
"You're not the girl the doctor wanted to marry,are you? You can't be,
you know, for she's dead."

Mrs. Harker smiled sweetly as she replied, "Oh no! I have a husband of
my own,to whom I was married before I ever saw Dr. Seward, or he me. I
am Mrs. Harker."

"Then what are you doing here?"

"My husband and I are staying on a visit with Dr.Seward."

"Then don't stay."

"But why not?"

I thought that this style of conversation might not be pleasant to Mrs.
Harker, any more than it was to me, so I joined in, "How did you know I
wanted to marry anyone?"

His reply was simply contemptuous, given in a pause in which he turned
his eyes from Mrs. Harker to me, instantly turning them back again,
"What an asinine question!"

"I don't see that at all, Mr. Renfield,"said Mrs.Harker, at once
championing me.

He replied to her with as much courtesy and respect as he had shown
contempt to me, "You will, of course, under- stand, Mrs. Harker, that
when a man is so loved and honored as our host is, everything regarding
him is of interest in our little community. Dr. Seward is loved not only
by his household and his friends, but even by his patients, who, be- ing
some of them hardly in mental equilibrium, are apt to distort causes and
effects. Since I myself have been an in- mate of a lunatic asylum, I
cannot but notice that the soph- istic tendencies of some of its inmates
lean towards the errors of non causa and ignoratio elenche."

I positively opened my eyes at this new development. Here was my own pet
lunatic, the most pronounced of his type that I had ever met with,
talking elemental philosophy, and with the manner of a polished
gentleman. I wonder if it was Mrs. Harker's presence which had touched
some chord in his memory. If this new phase was spontaneous, or in any
way due to her unconscious influence, she must have some rare gift or
power.

We continued to talk for some time, and seeing that he was seemingly
quite reasonable, she ventured, looking at me questioningly as she
began,to lead him to his favorite topic. I was again astonished, for he
addressed himself to the ques- tion with the impartiality of the
completest sanity. He even took himself as an example when he mentioned
certain things.

"Why,I myself am an instance of a man who had a strange belief.Indeed,it
was no wonder that my friends were alarmed, and insisted on my being put
under control. I used to fancy that life was a positive and perpetual
entity, and that by consuming a multitude of live things, no matter how
low in the scale of creation, one might indefinitely prolong life. At
times I held the belief so strongly that I actually tried to take human
life. The doctor here will bear me out that on one occasion I tried to
kill him for the purpose of strengthening my vital powers by the
assimilation with my own body of his life through the medium of his
blood,relying of course, upon the Scriptural phrase, `For the blood is
the life.' Though, indeed, the vendor of a certain nostrum has
vulgarized the truism to the very point of contempt. Isn't that true,
doctor?"

I nodded assent, for I was so amazed that I hardly knew what to either
think or say, it was hard to imagine that I had seen him eat up his
spiders and flies not five minutes before. Looking at my watch, I saw
that I should go to the station to meet Van Helsing, so I told Mrs.
Harker that it was time to leave.

She came at once,after saying pleasantly to Mr.Renfield, "Goodbye,and I
hope I may see you often, under auspices plea- santer to yourself."

To which, to my astonishment, he replied, "Goodbye, my dear. I pray God
I may never see your sweet face again. May He bless and keep you!"

When I went to the station to meet Van Helsing I left the boys behind
me.Poor Art seemed more cheerful than he has been since Lucy first took
ill, and Quincey is more like his own bright self than he has been for
many a long day.

Van Helsing stepped from the carriage with the eager nimbleness of a
boy. He saw me at once, and rushed up to me, saying, "Ah, friend John,
how goes all? Well? So! I have been busy,for I come here to stay if need
be.All affairs are settled with me,and I have much to tell. Madam Mina
is with you? Yes. And her so fine husband? And Arthur and my friend
Quincey, they are with you, too? Good!"

As I drove to the house I told him of what had passed, and of how my own
diary had come to be of some use through Mrs. Harker's suggestion,at
which the Professor interrupted me.

"Ah, that wonderful Madam Mina! She has man's brain, a brain that a man
should have were he much gifted, and a wo- man's heart.The good God
fashioned her for a purpose,believe me, when He made that so good
combination.Friend John, up to now fortune has made that woman of help
to us, after tonight she must not have to do with this so terrible
affair. It is not good that she run a risk so great. We men are
determined, nay, are we not pledged, to destroy this monster? But it is
no part for a woman.Even if she be not harmed, her heart may fail her in
so much and so many horrors and hereafter she may suffer,both in
waking,from her nerves, and in sleep,from her dreams. And, besides, she
is young woman and not so long married, there may be other things to
think of some time,if not now.You tell me she has wrote all, then she
must consult with us, but tomorrow she say goodbye to this work, and we
go alone."

I agreed heartily with him, and then I told him what we had found in his
absence, that the house which Dracula had bought was the very next one
to my own. He was amazed, and a great concern seemed to come on him.

"Oh that we had known it before!" he said, "for then we might have
reached him in time to save poor Lucy. However, `the milk that is spilt
cries not out afterwards,'as you say. We shall not think of that, but go
on our way to the end." Then he fell into a silence that lasted till we
entered my own gateway. Before we went to prepare for dinner he said to
Mrs. Harker, "I am told, Madam Mina, by my friend John that you and your
husband have put up in exact order all things that have been, up to this
moment."

"Not up to this moment, Professor,"she said impulsively, "but up to this
morning."

"But why not up to now? We have seen hitherto how good light all the
little things have made. We have told our se- crets, and yet no one who
has told is the worse for it."

Mrs. Harker began to blush, and taking a paper from her pockets, she
said, "Dr. Van Helsing, will you read this, and tell me if it must go
in. It is my record of today. I too have seen the need of putting down
at present everything, however trivial, but there is little in this
except what is personal. Must it go in?"

The Professor read it over gravely, and handed it back, saying, "It need
not go in if you do not wish it, but I pray that it may. It can but make
your husband love you the more, and all us, your friends, more honor
you, as well as more esteem and love." She took it back with another
blush and a bright smile.

And so now, up to this very hour, all the records we have are complete
and in order. The Professor took away one copy to study after dinner,
and before our meeting, which is fixed for nine o'clock. The rest of us
have already read everything, so when we meet in the study we shall all
be in- formed as to facts, and can arrange our plan of battle with this
terrible and mysterious enemy.


 MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL


 30 September.--When we met in Dr. Seward's study two hours after
dinner, which had been at six o'clock, we un- consciously formed a sort
of board or committee. Professor Van Helsing took the head of the table,
to which Dr. Seward motioned him as he came into the room. He made me
sit next to him on his right, and asked me to act as secretary. Jon-
athan sat next to me. Opposite us were Lord Godalming, Dr. Seward, and
Mr. Morris, Lord Godalming being next the Pro- fessor, and Dr. Seward in
the center.

The Professor said, "I may, I suppose, take it that we are all
acquainted with the facts that are in these papers." We all expressed
assent, and he went on, "Then it were, I think, good that I tell you
something of the kind of enemy with which we have to deal. I shall then
make known to you something of the history of this man, which has been
as- certained for me. So we then can discuss how we shall act, and can
take our measure according.

"There are such beings as vampires, some of us have ev- idence that they
exist. Even had we not the proof of our own unhappy experience, the
teachings and the records of the past give proof enough for sane
peoples. I admit that at the first I was sceptic. Were it not that
through long years I have trained myself to keep an open mind, I could
not have believed until such time as that fact thunder on my ear.`See!
See! I prove, I prove.' Alas! Had I known at first what now I know, nay,
had I even guess at him, one so precious life had been spared to many of
us who did love her. But that is gone, and we must so work, that other
poor souls perish not, whilst we can save. The nosferatu do not die like
the bee when he sting once. He is only stronger, and being stronger,
have yet more power to work evil. This vampire which is amongst us is of
himself so strong in person as twenty men, he is of cunning more than
mortal, for his cunning be the growth of ages, he have still the aids of
necromancy, which is, as his etymology imply, the divination by the
dead, and all the dead that he can come nigh to are for him at command,
he is brute, and more than brute,he is devil in callous, and the heart
of him is not, he can,within his range, direct the elements, the storm,
the fog,the thunder, he can command all the meaner things, the rat, and
the owl, and the bat, the moth,and the fox, and the wolf, he can grow
and become small, and he can at times vanish and come unknown. How then
are we to begin our strike to destroy him? How shall we find his where,
and having found it, how can we destroy? My friends, this is much, it is
a terrible task that we undertake, and there may be consequence to make
the brave shudder. For if we fail in this our fight he must surely win,
and then where end we? Life is nothings, I heed him not. But to fail
here, is not mere life or death. It is that we become as him, that we
henceforward become foul things of the night like him, without heart or
conscience, preying on the bodies and the souls of those we love best.
To us forever are the gates of heaven shut, for who shall open them to
us again? We go on for all time abhorred by all, a blot on the face of
God's sunshine, an arrow in the side of Him who died for man. But we are
face to face with duty, and in such case must we shrink? For me, I say
no, but then I am old, and life, with his sunshine, his fair places, his
song of birds, his music and his love, lie far behind. You others are
young. Some have seen sorrow, but there are fair days yet in store. What
say you?"

Whilst he was speaking, Jonathan had taken my hand. I feared, oh so
much, that the appalling nature of our danger was overcoming him when I
saw his hand stretch out, but it was life to me to feel its touch, so
strong, so self reliant, so resolute.A brave man's hand can speak for
itself, it does not even need a woman's love to hear its music.

When the Professor had done speaking my husband looked in my eyes, and I
in his, there was no need for speaking between us.

"I answer for Mina and myself," he said.

"Count me in, Professor," said Mr. Quincey Morris, laconically as usual.

"I am with you," said Lord Godalming, "for Lucy's sake, if for no other
reason."

Dr. Seward simply nodded.

The Professor stood up and, after laying his golden cru- cifix on the
table, held out his hand on either side. I took his right hand, and Lord
Godalming his left, Jonathan held my right with his left and stretched
across to Mr.Morris. So as we all took hands our solemn compact was
made. I felt my heart icy cold, but it did not even occur to me to draw
back. We resumed our places, and Dr. Van Helsing went on with a sort of
cheerfulness which showed that the serious work had begun. It was to be
taken as gravely, and in as businesslike a way, as any other transaction
of life.

"Well, you know what we have to contend against, but we too, are not
without strength. We have on our side power of combination, a power
denied to the vampire kind, we have sources of science, we are free to
act and think, and the hours of the day and the night are ours equally.
In fact, so far as our powers extend, they are unfettered, and we are
free to use them.We have self devotion in a cause and an end to achieve
which is not a selfish one. These things are much.

"Now let us see how far the general powers arrayed ag- ainst us are
restrict, and how the individual cannot.In fine, let us consider the
limitations of the vampire in general, and of this one in particular.

"All we have to go upon are traditions and supersti- tions.These do not
at the first appear much, when the matter is one of life and death, nay
of more than either life or death.Yet must we be satisfied,in the first
place because we have to be, no other means is at our control, and
secondly, because, after all these things, tradition and superstition,
are everything. Does not the belief in vampires rest for others, though
not, alas! for us, on them! A year ago which of us would have received
such a possibility,in the midst of our scientific, sceptical,
matter-of-fact nineteenth century? We even scouted a belief that we saw
justified under our very eyes. Take it, then, that the vampire, and the
belief in his limitations and his cure, rest for the moment on the same
base. For, let me tell you, he is known everywhere that men have been.
In old Greece, in old Rome, he flourish in Germany all over, in France,
in India,even in the Chermosese, and in China, so far from us in all
ways, there even is he, and the peoples for him at this day. He have
follow the wake of the berserker Icelander, the devil-begotten Hun, the
Slav, the Saxon, the Magyar.

"So far, then, we have all we may act upon, and let me tell you that
very much of the beliefs are justified by what we have seen in our own
so unhappy experience. The vampire live on, and cannot die by mere
passing of the time, he can flourish when that he can fatten on the
blood of the living. Even more, we have seen amongst us that he can even
grow younger, that his vital faculties grow strenuous,and seem as though
they refresh themselves when his special pabulum is plenty.

"But he cannot flourish without this diet, he eat not as others. Even
friend Jonathan, who lived with him for weeks, did never see him eat,
never! He throws no shadow, he make in the mirror no reflect, as again
Jonathan observe. He has the strength of many of his hand, witness again
Jona- than when he shut the door against the wolves, and when he help
him from the diligence too. He can transform himself to wolf, as we
gather from the ship arrival in Whitby, when he tear open the dog, he
can be as bat,as Madam Mina saw him on the window at Whitby, and as
friend John saw him fly from this so near house, and as my friend
Quincey saw him at the window of Miss Lucy.

"He can come in mist which he create, that noble ship's captain proved
him of this, but, from what we know, the dis- tance he can make this
mist is limited, and it can only be round himself.

"He come on moonlight rays as elemental dust, as again Jonathan saw
those sisters in the castle of Dracula. He be- come so small, we
ourselves saw Miss Lucy, ere she was at peace, slip through a
hairbreadth space at the tomb door. He can, when once he find his way,
come out from anything or into anything, no matter how close it be bound
or even fused up with fire, solder you call it. He can see in the dark,
no small power this, in a world which is one half shut from the light.
Ah, but hear me through.

"He can do all these things, yet he is not free. Nay, he is even more
prisoner than the slave of the galley, than the madman in his cell. He
cannot go where he lists, he who is not of nature has yet to obey some
of nature's laws, why we know not. He may not enter anywhere at the
first, unless there be some one of the household who bid him to come,
though afterwards he can come as he please.His power ceases, as does
that of all evil things, at the coming of the day.

"Only at certain times can he have limited freedom. If he be not at the
place whither he is bound, he can only change himself at noon or at
exact sunrise or sunset. These things we are told, and in this record of
ours we have proof by inference. Thus, whereas he can do as he will
within his limit,when he have his earth-home,his coffin-home, his hell-
home, the place unhallowed, as we saw when he went to the grave of the
suicide at Whitby, still at other time he can only change when the time
come. It is said, too, that he can only pass running water at the slack
or the flood of the tide. Then there are things which so afflict him
that he has no power, as the garlic that we know of, and as for things
sacred,as this symbol, my crucifix, that was amongst us even now when we
resolve, to them he is nothing, but in their presence he take his place
far off and silent with respect. There are others,too, which I shall
tell you of, lest in our seeking we may need them.

"The branch of wild rose on his coffin keep him that he move not from
it, a sacred bullet fired into the coffin kill him so that he be true
dead, and as for the stake through him, we know already of its peace, or
the cut off head that giveth rest. We have seen it with our eyes.

"Thus when we find the habitation of this man-that-was, we can confine
him to his coffin and destroy him, if we obey what we know. But he is
clever. I have asked my friend Arminius, of Buda-Pesth University, to
make his record, and from all the means that are, he tell me of what he
has been. He must, indeed, have been that Voivode Dracula who won his
name against the Turk, over the great river on the very frontier of
Turkey-land. If it be so, then was he no common man, for in that time,
and for centuries after,he was spoken of as the cleverest and the most
cunning, as well as the bravest of the sons of the `land beyond the
forest.' That mighty brain and that iron resolution went with him to his
grave, and are even now arrayed against us. The Draculas were, says
Arminius, a great and noble race, though now and again were scions who
were held by their coevals to have had dealings with the Evil One. They
learned his secrets in the Scholomance, amongst the mountains over Lake
Hermanstadt, where the devil claims the tenth scholar as his due. In the
records are such words as `stregoica' witch, `ordog' and `pokol' Satan
and hell, and in one manuscript this very Dracula is spoken of as
`wampyr,'which we all understand too well. There have been from the
loins of this very one great men and good women, and their graves make
sacred the earth where alone this foulness can dwell. For it is not the
least of its terrors that this evil thing is rooted deep in all good, in
soil barren of holy memories it cannot rest."

Whilst they were talking Mr.Morris was looking steadily at the window,
and he now got up quietly,and went out of the room. There was a little
pause, and then the Professor went on.

"And now we must settle what we do. We have here much data, and we must
proceed to lay out our campaign. We know from the inquiry of Jonathan
that from the castle to Whitby came fifty boxes of earth, all of which
were delivered at Carfax, we also know that at least some of these boxes
have been removed. It seems to me, that our first step should be to
ascertain whether all the rest remain in the house beyond that wall
where we look today, or whether any more have been removed. If the
latter, we must trace . . ."

Here we were interrupted in a very startling way. Out- side the house
came the sound of a pistol shot, the glass of the window was shattered
with a bullet, which ricochetting from the top of the embrasure, struck
the far wall of the room. I am afraid I am at heart a coward, for I
shrieked out. The men all jumped to their feet, Lord Godalming flew over
to the window and threw up the sash. As he did so we heard Mr. Morris'
voice without, "Sorry! I fear I have alarmed you. I shall come in and
tell you about it."

A minute later he came in and said, "It was an idiotic thing of me to
do, and I ask your pardon, Mrs. Harker, most sincerely, I fear I must
have frightened you terribly. But the fact is that whilst the Professor
was talking there came a big bat and sat on the window sill. I have got
such a horror of the damned brutes from recent events that I cannot
stand them, and I went out to have a shot, as I have been doing of late
of evenings, whenever I have seen one. You used to laugh at me for it
then, Art."

"Did you hit it?" asked Dr. Van Helsing.

"I don't know, I fancy not, for it flew away into the wood." Without
saying any more he took his seat, and the Professor began to resume his
statement.

"We must trace each of these boxes, and when we are ready, we must
either capture or kill this monster in his lair, or we must, so to
speak, sterilize the earth, so that no more he can seek safety in
it.Thus in the end we may find him in his form of man between the hours
of noon and sunset, and so engage with him when he is at his most weak.

"And now for you,Madam Mina,this night is the end until all be well. You
are too precious to us to have such risk. When we part tonight, you no
more must question. We shall tell you all in good time. We are men and
are able to bear, but you must be our star and our hope, and we shall
act all the more free that you are not in the danger,such as we are."

All the men, even Jonathan, seemed relieved, but it did not seem to me
good that they should brave danger and, per- haps lessen their safety,
strength being the best safety, through care of me, but their minds were
made up, and though it was a bitter pill for me to swallow, I could say
nothing, save to accept their chivalrous care of me.

Mr. Morris resumed the discussion, "As there is no time to lose, I vote
we have a look at his house right now. Time is everything with him,and
swift action on our part may save another victim."

I own that my heart began to fail me when the time for action came so
close, but I did not say anything, for I had a greater fear that if I
appeared as a drag or a hindrance to their work,they might even leave me
out of their counsels altogether. They have now gone off to Carfax, with
means to get into the house.

Manlike, they had told me to go to bed and sleep, as if a woman can
sleep when those she loves are in danger!I shall lie down, and pretend
to sleep, lest Jonathan have added anxiety about me when he returns.

 DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


1 October, 4 a.m.--Just as we were about to leave the house, an urgent
message was brought to me from Renfield to know if I would see him at
once, as he had something of the utmost importance to say to me. I told
the messenger to say that I would attend to his wishes in the morning, I
was busy just at the moment.

The attendant added, "He seems very importunate, sir. I have never seen
him so eager.I don't know but what, if you don't see him soon, he will
have one of his violent fits." I knew the man would not have said this
without some cause, so I said, "All right, I'll go now," and I asked the
others to wait a few minutes for me, as I had to go and see my patient.

"Take me with you,friend John," said the Professor."His case in your
diary interest me much, and it had bearing,too, now and again on our
case. I should much like to see him, and especial when his mind is
disturbed."

"May I come also?" asked Lord Godalming.

"Me too?" said Quincey Morris. "May I come?" said Harker. I nodded, and
we all went down the passage together.

We found him in a state of considerable excitement, but far more
rational in his speech and manner than I had ever seen him. There was an
unusual understanding of himself, which was unlike anything I had ever
met with in a lunatic, and he took it for granted that his reasons would
prevail with others entirely sane. We all five went into the room, but
none of the others at first said anything. His request was that I would
at once release him from the asylum and send him home.This he backed up
with arguments regarding his complete recovery, and adduced his own
existing sanity.

"I appeal to your friends,"he said,"they will, perhaps, not mind sitting
in judgement on my case. By the way, you have not introduced me."

I was so much astonished, that the oddness of introduc- ing a madman in
an asylum did not strike me at the moment, and besides,there was a
certain dignity in the man's manner, so much of the habit of equality,
that I at once made the introduction, "Lord Godalming, Professor Van
Helsing, Mr. Quincey Morris,of Texas, Mr. Jonathan Harker, Mr.
Renfield."

He shook hands with each of them, saying in turn, "Lord Godalming, I had
the honor of seconding your father at the Windham, I grieve to know, by
your holding the title, that he is no more. He was a man loved and
honored by all who knew him, and in his youth was, I have heard, the
inventor of a burnt rum punch, much patronized on Derby night. Mr.
Morris, you should be proud of your great state. Its recep- tion into
the Union was a precedent which may have far- reaching effects
hereafter, when the Pole and the Tropics may hold alliance to the Stars
and Stripes. The power of Treaty may yet prove a vast engine of
enlargement, when the Monroe doctrine takes its true place as a
political fable. What shall any man say of his pleasure at meeting Van
Hel- sing? Sir, I make no apology for dropping all forms of conventional
prefix. When an individual has revolutionized therapeutics by his
discovery of the continuous evolution of brain matter, conventional
forms are unfitting, since they would seem to limit him to one of a
class. You, gentlemen, who by nationality, by heredity, or by the
possession of natural gifts, are fitted to hold your respective places
in the moving world, I take to witness that I am as sane as at least the
majority of men who are in full possession of their liberties. And I am
sure that you, Dr. Seward, human- itarian and medico-jurist as well as
scientist, will deem it a moral duty to deal with me as one to be
considered as un- der exceptional circumstances."He made this last
appeal with a courtly air of conviction which was not without its own
charm.

I think we were all staggered. For my own part, I was under the
conviction, despite my knowledge of the man's character and history,
that his reason had been restored,and I felt under a strong impulse to
tell him that I was satis- fied as to his sanity, and would see about
the necessary formalities for his release in the morning. I thought it
better to wait, however, before making so grave a statement, for of old
I knew the sudden changes to which this parti- cular patient was liable.
So I contented myself with making a general statement that he appeared
to be improving very rapidly, that I would have a longer chat with him
in the morning, and would then see what I could do in the direction of
meeting his wishes.

This did not at all satisfy him, for he said quickly, "But I fear, Dr.
Seward, that you hardly apprehend my wish. I desire to go at once,here,
now, this very hour, this very moment, if I may. Time presses, and in
our implied agree- ment with the old scytheman it is of the essence of
the con- tract. I am sure it is only necessary to put before so
admirable a practitioner as Dr. Seward so simple, yet so momentous a
wish, to ensure its fulfilment."

He looked at me keenly, and seeing the negative in my face, turned to
the others, and scrutinized them closely.Not meeting any sufficient
response, he went on, "Is it possible that I have erred in my
supposition?"

"You have," I said frankly, but at the same time, as I felt, brutally.

There was a considerable pause,and then he said slowly, "Then I suppose
I must only shift my ground of request. Let me ask for this concession,
boon, privilege, what you will. I am content to implore in such a case,
not on personal grounds, but for the sake of others. I am not at liberty
to give you the whole of my reasons, but you may, I assure you, take it
from me that they are good ones,sound and unselfish, and spring from the
highest sense of duty.

"Could you look, sir, into my heart, you would approve to the full the
sentiments which animate me. Nay, more, you would count me amongst the
best and truest of your friends."

Again he looked at us all keenly. I had a growing con- viction that this
sudden change of his entire intellectual method was but yet another
phase of his madness, and so determined to let him go on a little
longer, knowing from experience that he would, like all lunatics, give
himself away in the end. Van Helsing was gazing at him with a look of
utmost intensity, his bushy eyebrows almost meeting with the fixed
concentration of his look. He said to Renfield in a tone which did not
surprise me at the time, but only when I thought of it afterwards, for
it was as of one addressing an equal, "Can you not tell frankly your
real reason for wishing to be free tonight? I will undertake that if you
will satisfy even me, a stranger, without prejudice, and with the habit
of keeping an open mind,Dr. Seward will give you, at his own risk and on
his own responsibility, the privilege you seek."

He shook his head sadly, and with a look of poignant regret on his face.
The Professor went on, "Come, sir, bethink yourself. You claim the
privilege of reason in the highest degree, since you seek to impress us
with your com- plete reasonableness. You do this, whose sanity we have
reason to doubt,since you are not yet released from medical treatment
for this very defect. If you will not help us in our effort to choose
the wisest course, how can we perform the duty which you yourself put
upon us? Be wise, and help us, and if we can we shall aid you to achieve
your wish."

He still shook his head as he said, "Dr. Van Helsing, I have nothing to
say. Your argument is complete, and if I were free to speak I should not
hesitate a moment, but I am not my own master in the matter.I can only
ask you to trust me. If I am refused, the responsibility does not rest
with me."

I thought it was now time to end the scene, which was becoming too
comically grave, so I went towards the door, simply saying, "Come, my
friends, we have work to do. Goodnight."

As, however, I got near the door, a new change came over the patient. He
moved towards me so quickly that for the moment I feared that he was
about to make another homi- cidal attack. My fears, however, were
groundless, for he held up his two hands imploringly, and made his
petition in a moving manner. As he saw that the very excess of his
emotion was militating against him, by restoring us more to our old
relations, he became still more demonstrative. I glanced at Van Helsing,
and saw my conviction reflected in his eyes, so I became a little more
fixed in my manner, if not more stern, and motioned to him that his
efforts were unavailing. I had previously seen something of the same
con- stantly growing excitement in him when he had to make some request
of which at the time he had thought much, such for instance, as when he
wanted a cat, and I was prepared to see the collapse into the same
sullen acquiescence on this occasion.

My expectation was not realized, for when he found that his appeal would
not be successful,he got into quite a fran- tic condition.He threw
himself on his knees, and held up his hands, wringing them in plaintive
supplication, and poured forth a torrent of entreaty, with the tears
rolling down his cheeks,and his whole face and form expressive of the
deepest emotion.

 "Let me entreat you, Dr.Seward, oh, let me implore you, to let me out
of this house at once. Send me away how you will and where you will,
send keepers with me with whips and chains, let them take me in a strait
waistcoat, manacled and leg-ironed,even to gaol, but let me go out of
this.You don't know what you do by keeping me here. I am speaking from
the depths of my heart, of my very soul. You don't know whom you wrong,
or how, and I may not tell. Woe is me! I may not tell. By all you hold
sacred, by all you hold dear, by your love that is lost, by your hope
that lives, for the sake of the Almighty, take me out of this and save
my soul from guilt! Can't you hear me, man? Can't you understand? Will
you never learn? Don't you know that I am sane and earnest now, that I
am no lunatic in a mad fit, but a sane man fighting for his soul? Oh,
hear me! Hear me! Let me go, let me go, let me go!"

I thought that the longer this went on the wilder he would get, and so
would bring on a fit, so I took him by the hand and raised him up.

"Come," I said sternly, "no more of this, we have had quite enough
already. Get to your bed and try to behave more discreetly."

He suddenly stopped and looked at me intently for sev- eral moments.
Then, without a word, he rose and moving over, sat down on the side of
the bed. The collapse had come, as on former occasions, just as I had
expected.

When I was leaving the room, last of our party, he said to me in a
quiet, well-bred voice, "You will, I trust, Dr. Seward, do me the
justice to bear in mind, later on, that I did what I could to convince
you tonight."


CHAPTER 19


  JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL


1 October, 5 a.m.--I went with the party to the search with an easy
mind,for I think I never saw Mina so absolutely strong and well. I am so
glad that she consented to hold back and let us men do the work.
Somehow, it was a dread to me that she was in this fearful business at
all, but now that her work is done, and that it is due to her energy and
brains and foresight that the whole story is put together in such a way
that every point tells, she may well feel that her part is finished, and
that she can henceforth leave the rest to us. We were, I think, all a
little upset by the scene with Mr. Renfield. When we came away from his
room we were silent till we got back to the study.

Then Mr. Morris said to Dr. Seward, "Say, Jack, if that man wasn't
attempting a bluff,he is about the sanest lunatic I ever saw. I'm not
sure, but I believe that he had some serious purpose, and if he had, it
was pretty rough on him not to get a chance."

Lord Godalming and I were silent, but Dr. Van Helsing added, "Friend
John, you know more lunatics than I do, and I'm glad of it, for I fear
that if it had been to me to de- cide I would before that last
hysterical outburst have given him free. But we live and learn, and in
our present task we must take no chance, as my friend Quincey would say.
All is best as they are."

Dr. Seward seemed to answer them both in a dreamy kind of way, "I don't
know but that I agree with you. If that man had been an ordinary lunatic
I would have taken my chance of trusting him, but he seems so mixed up
with the Count in an indexy kind of way that I am afraid of doing any-
thing wrong by helping his fads.I can't forget how he prayed with almost
equal fervor for a cat,and then tried to tear my throat out with his
teeth.Besides, he called the Count `lord and master', and he may want to
get out to help him in some diabolical way.That horrid thing has the
wolves and the rats and his own kind to help him, so I suppose he isn't
above trying to use a respectable lunatic. He certainly did seem
earnest, though. I only hope we have done what is best. These things, in
conjunction with the wild work we have in hand, help to unnerve a man."

The Professor stepped over, and laying his hand on his shoulder, said in
his grave, kindly way, "Friend John, have no fear. We are trying to do
our duty in a very sad and terrible case, we can only do as we deem
best. What else have we to hope for, except the pity of the good God?"

Lord Godalming had slipped away for a few minutes, but now he returned.
He held up a little silver whistle, as he remarked, "That old place may
be full of rats, and if so, I've got an antidote on call."

Having passed the wall, we took our way to the house, taking care to
keep in the shadows of the trees on the lawn when the moonlight shone
out. When we got to the porch the Professor opened his bag and took out
a lot of things, which he laid on the step, sorting them into four
little groups, evidently one for each. Then he spoke.

"My friends,we are going into a terrible danger, and we need arms of
many kinds. Our enemy is not merely spiritual. Remember that he has the
strength of twenty men, and that, though our necks or our windpipes are
of the common kind,and therefore breakable or crushable, his are not
amenable to mere strength. A stronger man, or a body of men more strong
in all than him, can at certain times hold him, but they can- not hurt
him as we can be hurt by him. We must, therefore, guard ourselves from
his touch. Keep this near your heart." As he spoke he lifted a little
silver crucifix and held it out to me, I being nearest to him, "put
these flowers round your neck," here he handed to me a wreath of
withered garlic blossoms, "for other enemies more mundane, this revolver
and this knife,and for aid in all, these so small electric lamps, which
you can fasten to your breast, and for all, and above all at the last,
this, which we must not desecrate needless."

This was a portion of Sacred Wafer, which he put in an envelope and
handed to me. Each of the others was similarly equipped.

"Now,"he said,"friend John, where are the skeleton keys? If so that we
can open the door, we need not break house by the window, as before at
Miss Lucy's."

Dr. Seward tried one or two skeleton keys, his mechani- cal dexterity as
a surgeon standing him in good stead. Pre- sently he got one to suit,
after a little play back and forward the bolt yielded, and with a rusty
clang, shot back. We pressed on the door, the rusty hinges creaked, and
it slowly opened. It was startlingly like the image conveyed to me in
Dr. Seward's diary of the opening of Miss Westenra's tomb, I fancy that
the same idea seemed to strike the others, for with one accord they
shrank back. The Professor was the first to move forward, and stepped
into the open door.

"In manus tuas, Domine!"he said, crossing himself as he passed over the
threshold.We closed the door behind us, lest when we should have lit our
lamps we should possibly attract attention from the road. The Professor
carefully tried the lock, lest we might not be able to open it from
within should we be in a hurry making our exit. Then we all lit our
lamps and proceeded on our search.

The light from the tiny lamps fell in all sorts of odd forms, as the
rays crossed each other, or the opacity of our bodies threw great
shadows. I could not for my life get away from the feeling that there
was someone else amongst us. I suppose it was the recollection, so
powerfully brought home to me by the grim surroundings, of that terrible
experience in Transylvania. I think the feeling was common to us all,
for I noticed that the others kept looking over their shoulders at every
sound and every new shadow,just as I felt myself doing.

The whole place was thick with dust.The floor was seem- ingly inches
deep, except where there were recent footsteps, in which on holding down
my lamp I could see marks of hob- nails where the dust was cracked. The
walls were fluffy and heavy with dust, and in the corners were masses of
spider's webs,whereon the dust had gathered till they looked like old
tattered rags as the weight had torn them partly down. On a table in the
hall was a great bunch of keys, with a time- yellowed label on each.They
had been used several times, for on the table were several similar rents
in the blanket of dust, similar to that exposed when the Professor
lifted them.

He turned to me and said,"You know this place, Jonathan. You have copied
maps of it, and you know it at least more than we do. Which is the way
to the chapel?"

I had an idea of its direction, though on my former visit I had not been
able to get admission to it, so I led the way,and after a few wrong
turnings found myself opposite a low, arched oaken door, ribbed with
iron bands.

"This is the spot," said the Professor as he turned his lamp on a small
map of the house, copied from the file of my original correspondence
regarding the purchase. With a little trouble we found the key on the
bunch and opened the door. We were prepared for some unpleasantness, for
as we were opening the door a faint, malodorous air seemed to ex- hale
through the gaps, but none of us ever expected such an odor as we
encountered. None of the others had met the Count at all at close
quarters, and when I had seen him he was either in the fasting stage of
his existence in his rooms or, when he was bloated with fresh blood, in
a ruined building open to the air, but here the place was small and
close,and the long disuse had made the air stagnant and foul. There was
an earthy smell, as of some dry miasma, which came through the fouler
air. But as to the odor itself, how shall I describe it? It was not
alone that it was composed of all the ills of mortality and with the
pungent, acrid smell of blood, but it seemed as though corruption had
become itself corrupt. Faugh! It sickens me to think of it. Every breath
exhaled by that monster seemed to have clung to the place and
intensified its loathsomeness.

Under ordinary circumstances such a stench would have brought our
enterprise to an end, but this was no ordinary case, and the high and
terrible purpose in which we were in- volved gave us a strength which
rose above merely physical considerations. After the involuntary
shrinking consequent on the first nauseous whiff, we one and all set
about our work as though that loathsome place were a garden of roses.

We made an accurate examination of the place, the Pro- fessor saying as
we began, "The first thing is to see how many of the boxes are left, we
must then examine every hole and corner and cranny and see if we cannot
get some clue as to what has become of the rest."

A glance was sufficient to show how many remained, for the great earth
chests were bulky,and there was no mistaking them.

There were only twenty-nine left out of the fifty! Once I got a fright,
for, seeing Lord Godalming suddenly turn and look out of the vaulted
door into the dark passage beyond, I looked too, and for an instant my
heart stood still. Some- where, looking out from the shadow, I seemed to
see the high lights of the Count's evil face, the ridge of the nose, the
red eyes, the red lips, the awful pallor. It was only for a moment, for,
as Lord Godalming said,"I thought I saw a face, but it was only the
shadows," and resumed his inquiry, I turned my lamp in the direction,and
stepped into the passage. There was no sign of anyone,and as there were
no corners, no doors, no aperture of any kind, but only the solid walls
of the passage, there could be no hiding place even for him. I took it
that fear had helped imagination, and said nothing.

A few minutes later I saw Morris step suddenly back from a corner, which
he was examining. We all followed his movements with our eyes,for
undoubtedly some nervousness was growing on us, and we saw a whole mass
of phosphorescence, which twinkled like stars. We all instinctively drew
back. The whole place was becoming alive with rats.

For a moment or two we stood appalled, all save Lord Godalming, who was
seemingly prepared for such an emergency. Rushing over to the great
iron-bound oaken door, which Dr. Seward had described from the outside,
and which I had seen myself, he turned the key in the lock, drew the
huge bolts, and swung the door open. Then, taking his little silver
whistle from his pocket, he blew a low, shrill call. It was answered
from behind Dr. Seward's house by the yelping of dogs, and after about a
minute three terriers came dashing round the corner of the house.
Unconsciously we had all moved towards the door, and as we moved I
noticed that the dust had been much disturbed. The boxes which had been
taken out had been brought this way. But even in the minute that had
elapsed the number of the rats had vastly increased.They seemed to swarm
over the place all at once, till the lamp- light, shining on their
moving dark bodies and glittering, baleful eyes, made the place look
like a bank of earth set with fireflies. The dogs dashed on, but at the
threshold suddenly stopped and snarled,and then,simultaneously lifting
their noses, began to howl in most lugubrious fashion. The rats were
multiplying in thousands, and we moved out.

Lord Godalming lifted one of the dogs, and carrying him in, placed him
on the floor.The instant his feet touched the ground he seemed to
recover his courage, and rushed at his natural enemies. They fled before
him so fast that before he had shaken the life out of a score, the other
dogs, who had by now been lifted in the same manner, had but small prey
ere the whole mass had vanished.

With their going it seemed as if some evil presence had departed, for
the dogs frisked about and barked merrily as they made sudden darts at
their prostrate foes, and turned them over and over and tossed them in
the air with vicious shakes. We all seemed to find our spirits rise.
Whether it was the purifying of the deadly atmosphere by the opening of
the chapel door, or the relief which we experienced by finding ourselves
in the open I know not, but most certainly the shadow of dread seemed to
slip from us like a robe, and the occasion of our coming lost something
of its grim signi- ficance, though we did not slacken a whit in our
resolution. We closed the outer door and barred and locked it,and bring-
ing the dogs with us, began our search of the house. We found nothing
throughout except dust in extraordinary pro- portions, and all untouched
save for my own footsteps when I had made my first visit. Never once did
the dogs exhibit any symptom of uneasiness, and even when we returned to
the chapel they frisked about as though they had been rabbit hunting in
a summer wood.

The morning was quickening in the east when we emerged from the front.
Dr. Van Helsing had taken the key of the hall door from the bunch, and
locked the door in orthodox fashion, putting the key into his pocket
when he had done.

"So far," he said, "our night has been eminently suc- cessful. No harm
has come to us such as I feared might be and yet we have ascertained how
many boxes are missing. More than all do I rejoice that this, our first,
and perhaps our most difficult and dangerous, step has been accomplished
without the bringing thereinto our most sweet Madam Mina or troubling
her waking or sleeping thoughts with sights and sounds and smells of
horror which she might never forget.One lesson, too, we have learned, if
it be allowable to argue a particulari, that the brute beasts which are
to the Count's command are yet themselves not amenable to his spiritual
power, for look,these rats that would come to his call, just as from his
castle top he summon the wolves to your going and to that poor mother's
cry, though they come to him, they run pell-mell from the so little dogs
of my friend Arthur.We have other matters before us, other dangers,other
fears, and that monster . . . He has not used his power over the brute
world for the only or the last time tonight. So be it that he has gone
elsewhere. Good! It has given us opportunity to cry `check'in some ways
in this chess game,which we play for the stake of human souls. And now
let us go home. The dawn is close at hand, and we have reason to be
content with our first night's work. It may be ordained that we have
many nights and days to follow, if full of peril, but we must go on, and
from no danger shall we shrink."

The house was silent when we got back, save for some poor creature who
was screaming away in one of the distant wards, and a low, moaning sound
from Renfield's room. The poor wretch was doubtless torturing
himself,after the manner of the insane, with needless thoughts of pain.

I came tiptoe into our own room, and found Mina asleep, breathing so
softly that I had to put my ear down to hear it. She looks paler than
usual. I hope the meeting tonight has not upset her. I am truly thankful
that she is to be left out of our future work, and even of our
deliberations. It is too great a strain for a woman to bear.I did not
think so at first, but I know better now. Therefore I am glad that it is
settled. There may be things which would frighten her to hear, and yet
to conceal them from her might be worse than to tell her if once she
suspected that there was any concealment. Henceforth our work is to be a
sealed book to her, till at least such time as we can tell her that all
is finished, and the earth free from a monster of the nether world. I
daresay it will be difficult to begin to keep sil- ence after such
confidence as ours, but I must be resolute, and tomorrow I shall keep
dark over tonight's doings, and shall refuse to speak of anything that
has happened. I rest on the sofa, so as not to disturb her.


1 October, later.--I suppose it was natural that we should have all
overslept ourselves, for the day was a busy one, and the night had no
rest at all. Even Mina must have felt its exhaustion,for though I slept
till the sun was high, I was awake before her, and had to call two or
three times before she awoke. Indeed, she was so sound asleep that for a
few seconds she did not recognize me, but looked at me with a sort of
blank terror, as one looks who has been waked out of a bad dream. She
complained a little of being tired, and I let her rest till later in the
day. We now know of twenty-one boxes having been removed, and if it be
that several were taken in any of these removals we may be able to trace
them all. Such will, of course, immensely simplify our labor, and the
sooner the matter is attended to the better. I shall look up Thomas
Snelling today.

DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


1 October.--It was towards noon when I was awakened by the Professor
walking into my room. He was more jolly and cheerful than usual, and it
is quite evident that last night's work has helped to take some of the
brooding weight off his mind.

After going over the adventure of the night he suddenly said, "Your
patient interests me much. May it be that with you I visit him this
morning? Or if that you are too occupy, I can go alone if it may be. It
is a new experience to me to find a lunatic who talk philosophy, and
reason so sound."

I had some work to do which pressed, so I told him that if he would go
alone I would be glad, as then I should not have to keep him waiting, so
I called an attendant and gave him the necessary instructions. Before
the Professor left the room I cautioned him against getting any false
impress- ion from my patient.

"But," he answered, "I want him to talk of himself and of his delusion
as to consuming live things. He said to Madam Mina, as I see in your
diary of yesterday, that he had once had such a belief. Why do you
smile, friend John?"

"Excuse me," I said, "but the answer is here." I laid my hand on the
typewritten matter."When our sane and learned lunatic made that very
statement of how he used to consume life, his mouth was actually
nauseous with the flies and spiders which he had eaten just before Mrs.
Harker entered the room."

Van Helsing smiled in turn. "Good!" he said. "Your memory is true,
friend John. I should have remembered. And yet it is this very obliquity
of thought and memory which makes mental disease such a fascinating
study. Perhaps I may gain more knowledge out of the folly of this madman
than I shall from the teaching of the most wise. Who knows?"

I went on with my work,and before long was through that in hand. It
seemed that the time had been very short indeed, but there was Van
Helsing back in the study.

"Do I interrupt?" he asked politely as he stood at the door.

"Not at all,"I answered. "Come in. My work is finished, and I am free. I
can go with you now, if you like."

"It is needless, I have seen him!"

"Well?"

"I fear that he does not appraise me at much.Our inter- view was short.
When I entered his room he was sitting on a stool in the center,with his
elbows on his knees, and his face was the picture of sullen discontent.
I spoke to him as cheerfully as I could, and with such a measure of
respect as I could assume. He made no reply whatever. 'Don't you know
me?' I asked. His answer was not reassuring. "I know you well enough,
you are the old fool Van Helsing. I wish you would take yourself and
your idiotic brain theories somewhere else. Damn all thick-headed
Dutchmen!' Not a word more would he say, but sat in his implacable
sullenness as indifferent to me as though I had not been in the room at
all. Thus departed for this time my chance of much learn- ing from this
so clever lunatic, so I shall go, if I may, and cheer myself with a few
happy words with that sweet soul Madam Mina. Friend John, it does
rejoice me unspeakable that she is no more to be pained, no more to be
worried with our terrible things. Though we shall much miss her help, it
is better so."

"I agree with you with all my heart," I answered ear- nestly, for I did
not want him to weaken in this matter. "Mrs. Harker is better out of it.
Things are quite bad enough for us, all men of the world, and who have
been in many tight places in our time, but it is no place for a woman,
and if she had remained in touch with the affair, it would in time
infallibly have wrecked her."

So Van Helsing has gone to confer with Mrs. Harker and Harker, Quincey
and Art are all out following up the clues as to the earth boxes. I
shall finish my round of work and we shall meet tonight.


 MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL


1 October.--It is strange to me to be kept in the dark as I am today,
after Jonathan's full confidence for so many years,to see him manifestly
avoid certain matters, and those the most vital of all. This morning I
slept late after the fatigues of yesterday, and though Jonathan was late
too, he was the earlier. He spoke to me before he went out, never more
sweetly or tenderly, but he never mentioned a word of what had happened
in the visit to the Count's house. And yet he must have known how
terribly anxious I was. Poor dear fellow! I suppose it must have
distressed him even more than it did me. They all agreed that it was
best that I should not be drawn further into this awful work, and I
acquiesced. But to think that he keeps anything from me! And now I am
crying like a silly fool, when I know it comes from my hus- band's great
love and from the good, good wishes of those other strong men.

That has done me good. Well, some day Jonathan will tell me all. And
lest it should ever be that he should think for a moment that I kept
anything from him, I still keep my journal as usual. Then if he has
feared of my trust I shall show it to him, with every thought of my
heart put down for his dear eyes to read. I feel strangely sad and
low-spirited today. I suppose it is the reaction from the terrible
excitement.

Last night I went to bed when the men had gone, simply because they told
me to. I didn't feel sleepy, and I did feel full of devouring anxiety. I
kept thinking over every- thing that has been ever since Jonathan came
to see me in London, and it all seems like a horrible tragedy, with fate
pressing on relentlessly to some destined end. Everything that one does
seems, no matter how right it me be, to bring on the very thing which is
most to be deplored. If I hadn't gone to Whitby, perhaps poor dear Lucy
would be with us now. She hadn't taken to visiting the churchyard till I
came, and if she hadn't come there in the day time with me she wouldn't
have walked in her sleep. And if she hadn't gone there at night and
asleep, that monster couldn't have des- troyed her as he did. Oh, why
did I ever go to Whitby? There now, crying again! I wonder what has come
over me today. I must hide it from Jonathan, for if he knew that I had
been crying twice in one morning . . . I, who never cried on my own
account,and whom he has never caused to shed a tear, the dear fellow
would fret his heart out.I shall put a bold face on, and if I do feel
weepy, he shall never see it. I suppose it is just one of the lessons
that we poor women have to learn . . .

I can't quite remember how I fell asleep last night. I remember hearing
the sudden barking of the dogs and a lot of queer sounds, like praying
on a very tumultuous scale, from Mr. Renfield's room, which is somewhere
under this. And then there was silence over everything, silence so
profound that it startled me,and I got up and looked out of the
window.All was dark and silent, the black shadows thrown by the moon-
light seeming full of a silent mystery of their own. Not a thing seemed
to be stirring, but all to be grim and fixed as death or fate,so that a
thin streak of white mist,that crept with almost imperceptible slowness
across the grass towards the house, seemed to have a sentience and a
vitality of its own. I think that the digression of my thoughts must
have done me good, for when I got back to bed I found a lethargy
creeping over me. I lay a while, but could not quite sleep, so I got out
and looked out of the window again. The mist was spreading, and was now
close up to the house, so that I could see it lying thick against the
wall, as though it were stealing up to the windows. The poor man was
more loud than ever, and though I could not distinguish a word he said,
I could in some way recognize in his tones some passionate en- treaty on
his part. Then there was the sound of a struggle, and I knew that the
attendants were dealing with him. I was so frightened that I crept into
bed, and pulled the clothes over my head, putting my fingers in my ears.
I was not then a bit sleepy, at least so I thought, but I must have
fallen asleep, for except dreams, I do not remember anything until the
morning, when Jonathan woke me. I think that it took me an effort and a
little time to realize where I was, and that it was Jonathan who was
bending over me. My dream was very peculiar, and was almost typical of
the way that waking thoughts become merged in, or continued in, dreams.

I thought that I was asleep,and waiting for Jonathan to come back. I was
very anxious about him, and I was powerless to act, my feet, and my
hands, and my brain were weighted,so that nothing could proceed at the
usual pace. And so I slept uneasily and thought. Then it began to dawn
upon me that the air was heavy, and dank, and cold. I put back the
clothes from my face, and found, to my surprise, that all was dim
around. The gaslight which I had left lit for Jonathan, but turned down,
came only like a tiny red spark through the fog, which had evidently
grown thicker and poured into the room. Then it occurred to me that I
had shut the window before I had come to bed. I would have got out to
make certain on the point, but some leaden lethargy seemed to chain my
limbs and even my will.I lay still and endured, that was all. I closed
my eyes, but could still see through my eyelids. (It is won- derful what
tricks our dreams play us, and how conveniently we can imagine.) The
mist grew thicker and thicker and I could see now how it came in, for I
could see it like smoke, or with the white energy of boiling water,
pouring in, not through the window, but through the joinings of the
door. It got thicker and thicker, till it seemed as if it became con-
centrated into a sort of pillar of cloud in the room,through the top of
which I could see the light of the gas shining like a red eye. Things
began to whirl through my brain just as the cloudy column was now
whirling in the room, and through it all came the scriptural words "a
pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night." Was it indeed such
spiritual guidance that was coming to me in my sleep? But the pillar was
composed of both the day and the night guiding, for the fire was in the
red eye, which at the thought gat a new fas- cination for me, till, as I
looked, the fire divided, and seemed to shine on me through the fog like
two red eyes,such as Lucy told me of in her momentary mental wandering
when,on the cliff,the dying sunlight struck the windows of St.Mary's
Church. Suddenly the horror burst upon me that it was thus that Jonathan
had seen those awful women growing into real- ity through the whirling
mist in the moonlight, and in my dream I must have fainted, for all
became black darkness.The last conscious effort which imagination made
was to show me a livid white face bending over me out of the mist.

I must be careful of such dreams, for they would unseat one's reason if
there were too much of them. I would get Dr. Van Helsing or Dr. Seward
to prescribe something for me which would make me sleep, only that I
fear to alarm them. Such a dream at the present time would become woven
into their fears for me. Tonight I shall strive hard to sleep naturally.
If I do not, I shall tomorrow night get them to give me a dose of
chloral, that cannot hurt me for once, and it will give me a good
night's sleep. Last night tired me more than if I had not slept at all.


2 October 10 p.m.--Last night I slept, but did not dream. I must have
slept soundly, for I was not waked by Jonathan coming to bed, but the
sleep has not refreshed me, for today I feel terribly weak and
spiritless. I spent all yesterday trying to read, or lying down
dozing.In the after- noon, Mr. Renfield asked if he might see me.Poor
man, he was very gentle, and when I came away he kissed my hand and bade
God bless me. Some way it affected me much.I am crying when I think of
him. This is a new weakness, of which I must be careful. Jonathan would
be miserable if he knew I had been crying. He and the others were out
till dinner time,and they all came in tired. I did what I could to
brighten them up, and I suppose that the effort did me good, for I
forgot how tired I was. After dinner they sent me to bed, and all went
off to smoke together, as they said, but I knew that they wanted to tell
each other of what had occurred to each during the day. I could see from
Jonathan's manner that he had something important to communicate. I was
not so sleepy as I should have been, so before they went I asked
Dr.Seward to give me a little opiate of some kind, as I had not slept
well the night before. He very kindly made me up a sleeping draught,
which he gave to me, telling me that it would do me no harm, as it was
very mild . . . I have taken it, and am waiting for sleep, which still
keeps aloof.I hope I have not done wrong, for as sleep begins to flirt
with me, a new fear comes, that I may have been foolish in thus
depriving myself of the power of waking. I might want it. Here comes
sleep. Goodnight.


CHAPTER 20


 JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL


1 October, evening.--I found Thomas Snelling in his house at Bethnal
Green, but unhappily he was not in a condi- tion to remember anything.
The very prospect of beer which my expected coming had opened to him had
proved too much,and he had begun too early on his expected debauch. I
learned, however, from his wife, who seemed a decent, poor soul, that he
was only the assistant of Smollet, who of the two mates was the
responsible person. So off I drove to Walworth, and found Mr. Joseph
Smollet at home and in his shirtsleeves, taking a late tea out of a
saucer. He is a decent, intell- igent fellow, distinctly a good,
reliable type of workman, and with a headpiece of his own. He remembered
all about the incident of the boxes, and from a wonderful dog-eared
note- book,which he produced from some mysterious receptacle about the
seat of his trousers, and which had hieroglyphical entries in thick,
half-obliterated pencil, he gave me the destinations of the boxes. There
were, he said, six in the cartload which he took from Carfax and left at
197 Chicksand Street, Mile End New Town,and another six which he
deposited at Jamaica Lane, Bermondsey. If then the Count meant to
scatter these ghastly refuges of his over London, these places were
chosen as the first of delivery,so that later he might distribute more
fully. The systematic manner in which this was done made me think that
he could not mean to con- fine himself to two sides of London. He was
now fixed on the far east on the northern shore, on the east of the
southern shore, and on the south.The north and west were surely never
meant to be left out of his diabolical scheme, let alone the City itself
and the very heart of fashionable London in the south-west and west.I
went back to Smollet, and asked him if he could tell us if any other
boxes had been taken from Carfax.

He replied, "Well guv'nor, you've treated me very 'an'some", I had given
him half a sovereign, "an I'll tell yer all I know. I heard a man by the
name of Bloxam say four nights ago in the 'Are an' 'Ounds, in Pincher's
Alley, as 'ow he an' his mate 'ad 'ad a rare dusty job in a old 'ouse at
Purfleet. There ain't a many such jobs as this 'ere, an' I'm thinkin'
that maybe Sam Bloxam could tell ye summut."

I asked if he could tell me where to find him. I told him that if he
could get me the address it would be worth another half sovereign to
him. So he gulped down the rest of his tea and stood up, saying that he
was going to begin the search then and there.

At the door he stopped, and said, "Look 'ere, guv'nor, there ain't no
sense in me a keepin' you 'ere. I may find Sam soon, or I mayn't, but
anyhow he ain't like to be in a way to tell ye much tonight.Sam is a
rare one when he starts on the booze. If you can give me a envelope with
a stamp on it, and put yer address on it, I'll find out where Sam is to
be found and post it ye tonight. But ye'd better be up arter 'im soon in
the mornin', never mind the booze the night afore."

This was all practical, so one of the children went off with a penny to
buy an envelope and a sheet of paper, and to keep the change.When she
came back, I addressed the envelope and stamped it, and when Smollet had
again faithfully pro- mised to post the address when found, I took my
way to home. We're on the track anyhow. I am tired tonight, and I want
to sleep. Mina is fast asleep, and looks a little too pale. Her eyes
look as though she had been crying. Poor dear, I've no doubt it frets
her to be kept in the dark, and it may make her doubly anxious about me
and the others. But it is best as it is.It is better to be disappointed
and worried in such a way now than to have her nerve broken. The doctors
were quite right to insist on her being kept out of this dreadful
business. I must be firm, for on me this particular burden of silence
must rest. I shall not ever enter on the subject with her under any
circumstances.Indeed,It may not be a hard task, after all, for she
herself has become reticent on the subject, and has not spoken of the
Count or his doings ever since we told her of our decision.


2 October, evening--A long and trying and exciting day. By the first
post I got my directed envelope with a dirty scrap of paper enclosed, on
which was written with a carpen- ter's pencil in a sprawling hand, "Sam
Bloxam, Korkrans, 4 Poters Cort, Bartel Street, Walworth. Arsk for the
depite."

I got the letter in bed, and rose without waking Mina. She looked heavy
and sleepy and pale, and far from well. I determined not to wake her,
but that when I should return from this new search, I would arrange for
her going back to Exeter. I think she would be happier in our own home,
with her daily tasks to interest her, than in being here amongst us and
in ignorance. I only saw Dr. Seward for a moment, and told him where I
was off to, promising to come back and tell the rest so soon as I should
have found out anything. I drove to Walworth and found, with some
difficulty, Potter's Court. Mr. Smollet's spelling misled me, as I asked
for Poter's Court instead of Potter's Court. However, when I had found
the court, I had no difficulty in discovering Cor- coran's lodging
house.

When I asked the man who came to the door for the "depite," he shook his
head, and said, "I dunno 'im. There ain't no such a person 'ere. I never
'eard of 'im in all my bloomin' days. Don't believe there ain't nobody
of that kind livin' 'ere or anywheres."

I took out Smollet's letter, and as I read it it seemed to me that the
lesson of the spelling of the name of the court might guide me. "What
are you?" I asked.

"I'm the depity," he answered.

I saw at once that I was on the right track. Phonetic spelling had again
misled me. A half crown tip put the deputy's knowledge at my disposal,
and I learned that Mr. Bloxam, who had slept off the remains of his beer
on the previous night at Corcoran's,had left for his work at Poplar at
five o'clock that morning. He could not tell me where the place of work
was situated, but he had a vague idea that it was some kind of a
"new-fangled ware'us," and with this slender clue I had to start for
Poplar.It was twelve o'clock before I got any satisfactory hint of such
a building, and this I got at a coffee shop, where some workmen were
having their dinner. One of them suggested that there was being erected
at Cross Angel Street a new "cold storage" building, and as this suited
the condition of a "new-fangled ware'us," I at once drove to it. An
interview with a surly gatekeeper and a surlier foreman, both of whom
were appeased with the coin of the realm, put me on the track of Bloxam.
He was sent for on my suggestion that I was willing to pay his days
wages to his foreman for the privilege of asking him a few questions on
a private matter. He was a smart enough fellow, though rough of speech
and bearing. When I had promised to pay for his information and given
him an earnest, he told me that he had made two journeys between Carfax
and a house in Piccadilly, and had taken from this house to the latter
nine great boxes, "main heavy ones," with a horse and cart hired by him
for this purpose.

 I asked him if he could tell me the number of the house in Piccadilly,
to which he replied, "Well, guv'nor, I forgits the number, but it was
only a few door from a big white church, or somethink of the kind, not
long built. It was a dusty old 'ouse, too, though nothin' to the
dustiness of the 'ouse we tooked the bloomin' boxes from."

"How did you get in if both houses were empty?"

"There was the old party what engaged me a waitin' in the 'ouse at
Purfleet. He 'elped me to lift the boxes and put them in the dray. Curse
me, but he was the strongest chap I ever struck, an' him a old feller,
with a white mous- tache, one that thin you would think he couldn't
throw a shadder."

How this phrase thrilled through me!

"Why, 'e took up 'is end o' the boxes like they was pounds of tea, and
me a puffin' an' a blowin' afore I could upend mine anyhow, an' I'm no
chicken, neither."

"How did you get into the house in Piccadilly?" I asked.

"He was there too. He must 'a started off and got there afore me, for
when I rung of the bell he kem an' opened the door 'isself an' 'elped me
carry the boxes into the 'all."

"The whole nine?" I asked.

"Yus, there was five in the first load an' four in the second. It was
main dry work, an' I don't so well remember 'ow I got 'ome."

I interrupted him, "Were the boxes left in the hall?"

"Yus, it was a big 'all, an' there was nothin' else in it."

I made one more attempt to further matters. "You didn't have any key?"

"Never used no key nor nothink. The old gent, he opened the door 'isself
an' shut it again when I druv off. I don't remember the last time, but
that was the beer."

"And you can't remember the number of the house?"

"No, sir. But ye needn't have no difficulty about that. It's a 'igh 'un
with a stone front with a bow on it, an' 'igh steps up to the door. I
know them steps, 'avin' 'ad to carry the boxes up with three loafers
what come round to earn a copper. The old gent give them shillin's, an'
they seein' they got so much, they wanted more. But 'e took one of them
by the shoulder and was like to throw 'im down the steps, till the lot
of them went away cussin'."

I thought that with this description I could find the house, so having
paid my friend for his information,I start- ed off for Piccadilly.I had
gained a new painful experience. The Count could, it was evident, handle
the earth boxes him- self. If so, time was precious, for now that he had
achieved a certain amount of distribution, he could, by choosing his own
time, complete the task unobserved. At Piccadilly Circus I discharged my
cab, and walked westward. Beyond the Junior Constitutional I came across
the house described and was sat- isfied that this was the next of the
lairs arranged by Dracula. The house looked as though it had been long
unten- anted. The windows were encrusted with dust, and the shutters
were up. All the framework was black with time, and from the iron the
paint had mostly scaled away. It was evi- dent that up to lately there
had been a large notice board in front of the balcony. It had, however,
been roughly torn away, the uprights which had supported it still
remaining. Behind the rails of the balcony I saw there were some loose
boards, whose raw edges looked white. I would have given a good deal to
have been able to see the notice board intact, as it would, perhaps,
have given some clue to the ownership of the house. I remembered my
experience of the investiga- tion and purchase of Carfax, and I could
not but feel that I could find the former owner there might be some
means disco- vered of gaining access to the house.

There was at present nothing to be learned from the Piccadilly side, and
nothing could be done, so I went around to the back to see if anything
could be gathered from this quarter. The mews were active, the
Piccadilly houses being mostly in occupation. I asked one or two of the
grooms and helpers whom I saw around if they could tell me anything
about the empty house. One of them said that he heard it had lately been
taken, but he couldn't say from whom.He told me, however,that up to very
lately there had been a notice board of "For Sale" up, and that perhaps
Mitchell, Sons, & Candy the house agents could tell me something, as he
thought he remembered seeing the name of that firm on the board. I did
not wish to seem too eager, or to let my informant know or guess too
much,so thanking him in the usual manner,I strol- led away. It was now
growing dusk, and the autumn night was closing in, so I did not lose any
time. Having learned the address of Mitchell, Sons, & Candy from a
directory at the Berkeley, I was soon at their office in Sackville
Street.

The gentleman who saw me was particularly suave in man- ner, but
uncommunicative in equal proportion. Having once told me that the
Piccadilly house, which throughout our in- terview he called a
"mansion," was sold, he considered my business as concluded. When I
asked who had purchased it, he opened his eyes a thought wider, and
paused a few seconds before replying, "It is sold, sir."

"Pardon me," I said, with equal politeness, "but I have a special reason
for wishing to know who purchased it."

Again he paused longer, and raised his eyebrows still more. "It is sold,
sir," was again his laconic reply.

"Surely," I said, "you do not mind letting me know so much."

"But I do mind," he answered. "The affairs of their clients are
absolutely safe in the hands of Mitchell, Sons, & Candy."

This was manifestly a prig of the first water,and there was no use
arguing with him. I thought I had best meet him on his own ground, so I
said, "Your clients, sir, are happy in having so resolute a guardian of
their confidence. I am myself a professional man."

Here I handed him my card. "In this instance I am not prompted by
curiosity, I act on the part of Lord Godalming, who wishes to know
something of the property which was, he understood, lately for sale."

These words put a different complexion on affairs. He said, "I would
like to oblige you if I could, Mr. Harker, and especially would I like
to oblige his lordship. We once carried out a small matter of renting
some chambers for him when he was the Honorable Arthur Holmwood. If you
will let me have his lordship's address I will consult the House on the
subject, and will, in any case, communicate with his lordship by
tonight's post. It will be a pleasure if we can so far deviate from our
rules as to give the required infor- mation to his lordship."

I wanted to secure a friend, and not to make an enemy, so I thanked him,
gave the address at Dr. Seward's and came away. It was now dark, and I
was tired and hungry. I got a cup of tea at the Aerated Bread Company
and came down to Purfleet by the next train.

I found all the others at home. Mina was looking tired and pale, but she
made a gallant effort to be bright and cheerful. It wrung my heart to
think that I had had to keep anything from her and so caused her
inquietude. Thank God, this will be the last night of her looking on at
our con- ferences, and feeling the sting of our not showing our con-
fidence. It took all my courage to hold to the wise reso- lution of
keeping her out of our grim task. She seems some- how more reconciled,
or else the very subject seems to have become repugnant to her, for when
any accidental allusion is made she actually shudders. I am glad we made
our resolution in time,as with such a feeling as this,our growing
knowledge would be torture to her.

I could not tell the others of the day's discovery till we were alone,
so after dinner, followed by a little music to save appearances even
amongst ourselves, I took Mina to her room and left her to go to bed.
The dear girl was more affectionate with me than ever,and clung to me as
though she would detain me, but there was much to be talked of and I
came away. Thank God, the ceasing of telling things has made no
difference between us.

When I came down again I found the others all gathered round the fire in
the study. In the train I had written my diary so far, and simply read
it off to them as the best means of letting them get abreast of my own
information.

When I had finished Van Helsing said, "This has been a great day's work,
friend Jonathan. Doubtless we are on the track of the missing boxes. If
we find them all in that house, then our work is near the end. But if
there be some missing, we must search until we find them. Then shall we
make our final coup, and hunt the wretch to his real death."

We all sat silent awhile and all at once Mr. Morris spoke, "Say! How are
we going to get into that house?"

"We got into the other,"answered Lord Godalming quickly.

"But, Art, this is different. We broke house at Carfax, but we had night
and a walled park to protect us. It will be a mighty different thing to
commit burglary in Piccadilly, either by day or night. I confess I don't
see how we are going to get in unless that agency duck can find us a key
of some sort."

Lord Godalming's brows contracted, and he stood up and walked about the
room.By-and-by he stopped and said, turning from one to another of us,
"Quincey's head is level. This burglary business is getting serious. We
got off once all right, but we have now a rare job on hand. Unless we
can find the Count's key basket."

As nothing could well be done before morning, and as it would be at
least advisable to wait till Lord Godalming should hear from Mitchell's,
we decided not to take any ac- tive step before breakfast time. For a
good while we sat and smoked, discussing the matter in its various
lights and bearings. I took the opportunity of bringing this diary right
up to the moment. I am very sleepy and shall go to bed . . .

Just a line. Mina sleeps soundly and her breathing is regular. Her
forehead is puckered up into little wrinkles, as though she thinks even
in her sleep. She is still too pale, but does not look so haggard as she
did this morning. Tomorrow will, I hope, mend all this. She will be
herself at home in Exeter. Oh, but I am sleepy!

 DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


1 October.--I am puzzled afresh about Renfield. His moods change so
rapidly that I find it difficult to keep touch of them, and as they
always mean something more than his own well-being, they form a more
than interesting study. This morning, when I went to see him after his
repulse of Van Helsing, his manner was that of a man commanding destiny.
He was, in fact, commanding destiny,subjectively. He did not really care
for any of the things of mere earth, he was in the clouds and looked
down on all the weaknesses and wants of us poor mortals.

I thought I would improve the occasion and learn some- thing, so I asked
him, "What about the flies these times?"

He smiled on me in quite a superior sort of way, such a smile as would
have become the face of Malvolio, as he answered me, "The fly, my dear
sir, has one striking feature. It's wings are typical of the aerial
powers of the psychic faculties. The ancients did well when they
typified the soul as a butterfly!"

I thought I would push his analogy to its utmost logi- cally, so I said
quickly, "Oh, it is a soul you are after now, is it?"

His madness foiled his reason,and a puzzled look spread over his face
as, shaking his head with a decision which I had but seldom seen in him.

He said, "Oh, no, oh no! I want no souls. Life is all I want." Here he
brightened up. "I am pretty indifferent about it at present. Life is all
right. I have all I want. You must get a new patient, doctor, if you
wish to study zoophagy!"

This puzzled me a little, so I drew him on. "Then you command life. You
are a god, I suppose?"

He smiled with an ineffably benign superiority. "Oh no! Far be it from
me to arrogate to myself the attributes of the Deity. I am not even
concerned in His especially spirit- ual doings. If I may state my
intellectual position I am, so far as concerns things purely
terrestrial,somewhat in the position which Enoch occupied spiritually!"

This was a poser to me.I could not at the moment recall Enoch's
appositeness, so I had to ask a simple question, though I felt that by
so doing I was lowering myself in the eyes of the lunatic. "And why with
Enoch?"

"Because he walked with God."

I could not see the analogy, but did not like to admit it, so I harked
back to what he had denied. "So you don't care about life and you don't
want souls. Why not?" I put my question quickly and somewhat sternly, on
purpose to dis- concert him.

The effort succeeded, for an instant he unconsciously relapsed into his
old servile manner, bent low before me, and actually fawned upon me as
he replied. "I don't want any souls, indeed, indeed! I don't. I couldn't
use them if I had them. They would be no manner of use to me. I couldn't
eat them or . . ."

He suddenly stopped and the old cunning look spread over his face, like
a wind sweep on the surface of the water.

"And doctor, as to life, what is it after all? When you've got all you
require, and you know that you will never want, that is all. I have
friends, good friends, like you, Dr. Seward."This was said with a leer
of inexpressible cunn- ing. "I know that I shall never lack the means of
life!"

I think that through the cloudiness of his insanity he saw some
antagonism in me, for he at once fell back on the last refuge of such as
he, a dogged silence. After a short time I saw that for the present it
was useless to speak to him. He was sulky, and so I came away.

Later in the day he sent for me. Ordinarily I would not have come
without special reason, but just at present I am so interested in him
that I would gladly make an effort. Besides, I am glad to have anything
to help pass the time. Harker is out, following up clues, and so are
Lord Godalming and Quincey. Van Helsing sits in my study poring over the
record prepared by the Harkers. He seems to think that by accurate
knowledge of all details he will light up on some clue. He does not wish
to be disturbed in the work, without cause. I would have taken him with
me to see the patient, only I thought that after his last repulse he
might not care to go again. There was also another reason. Renfield
might not speak so freely before a third person as when he and I were
alone.

I found him sitting in the middle of the floor on his stool, a pose
which is generally indicative of some mental energy on his part. When I
came in, he said at once, as though the question had been waiting on his
lips. "What about souls?"

It was evident then that my surmise had been correct. Unconscious
cerebration was doing its work, even with the lunatic. I determined to
have the matter out.

"What about them yourself?" I asked.

He did not reply for a moment but looked all around him, and up and
down, as though he expected to find some inspira- tion for an answer.

"I don't want any souls!" He said in a feeble, apolo- getic way. The
matter seemed preying on his mind, and so I determined to use it, to "be
cruel only to be kind." So I said, "You like life, and you want life?"

"Oh yes! But that is all right. You needn't worry about that!"

"But," I asked,"how are we to get the life without get- ting the soul
also?"

This seemed to puzzle him, so I followed it up, "A nice time you'll have
some time when you're flying out here, with the souls of thousands of
flies and spiders and birds and cats buzzing and twittering and moaning
all around you. You've got their lives, you know, and you must put up
with their souls!"

Something seemed to affect his imagination, for he put his fingers to
his ears and shut his eyes, screwing them up tightly just as a small boy
does when his face is being soaped. There was something pathetic in it
that touched me. It also gave me a lesson, for it seemed that before me
was a child, only a child, though the features were worn, and the
stubble on the jaws was white. It was evident that he was undergoing
some process of mental disturbance, and knowing how his past moods had
interpreted things seemingly foreign to himself, I thought I would enter
into his mind as well as I could and go with him

The first step was to restore confidence, so I asked him, speaking
pretty loud so that he would hear me through his closed ears,"Would you
like some sugar to get your flies around again?"

He seemed to wake up all at once, and shook his head. With a laugh he
replied, "Not much! Flies are poor things, after all!" After a pause he
added, "But I don't want their souls buzzing round me, all the same."

"Or spiders?" I went on.

"Blow spiders! What's the use of spiders? There isn't anything in them
to eat or . . ." He stopped suddenly as though reminded of a forbidden
topic.

"So, so!" I thought to myself, "this is the second time he has suddenly
stopped at the word `drink'. What does it mean?"

Renfield seemed himself aware of having made a lapse, for he hurried on,
as though to distract my attention from it, "I don't take any stock at
all in such matters. `Rats and mice and such small deer,' as Shakespeare
has it, `chicken feed of the larder' they might be called. I'm past all
that sort of nonsense. You might as well ask a man to eat molecules with
a pair of chopsticks, as to try to inter- est me about the less
carnivora, when I know of what is before me."

"I see," I said."You want big things that you can make your teeth meet
in? How would you like to breakfast on an elephant?"

"What ridiculous nonsense you are talking?" He was getting too wide
awake, so I thought I would press him hard.

"I wonder," I said reflectively, "what an elephant's soul is like!"

The effect I desired was obtained, for he at once fell from his
high-horse and became a child again.

"I don't want an elephant's soul, or any soul at all!" he said. For a
few moments he sat despondently. Suddenly he jumped to his feet, with
his eyes blazing and all the signs of intense cerebral excitement. "To
hell with you and your souls!" he shouted. "Why do you plague me about
souls? Haven't I got enough to worry, and pain, to distract me al-
ready, without thinking of souls?"

He looked so hostile that I thought he was in for anot- her homicidal
fit, so I blew my whistle.

The instant, however, that I did so he became calm, and said
apologetically, "Forgive me, Doctor. I forgot myself. You do not need
any help. I am so worried in my mind that I am apt to be irritable. If
you only knew the problem I have to face, and that I am working out, you
would pity, and tol- erate, and pardon me. Pray do not put me in a
strait waist- coat. I want to think and I cannot think freely when my
body is confined. I am sure you will understand!"

He had evidently self-control, so when the attendants came I told them
not to mind, and they withdrew. Renfield watched them go. When the door
was closed he said with con- siderable dignity and sweetness, "Dr.
Seward, you have been very considerate towards me. Believe me that I am
very,very grateful to you!"

I thought it well to leave him in this mood, and so I came away. There
is certainly something to ponder over in this man's state. Several
points seem to make what the American interviewer calls "a story," if
one could only get them in proper order. Here they are:

Will not mention "drinking."

Fears the thought of being burdened with the "soul" of anything.

Has no dread of wanting "life" in the future.

Despises the meaner forms of life altogether, though he dreads being
haunted by their souls.

Logically all these things point one way! He has assu- rance of some
kind that he will acquire some higher life.

He dreads the consequence, the burden of a soul.Then it is a human life
he looks to!

And the assurance . . . ?

Merciful God! The Count has been to him, and there is some new scheme of
terror afoot!


Later.--I went after my round to Van Helsing and told him my suspicion.
He grew very grave, and after thinking the matter over for a while asked
me to take him to Renfield. I did so. As we came to the door we heard
the lunatic within singing gaily, as he used to do in the time which now
seems so long ago.

When we entered we saw with amazement that he had spread out his sugar
as of old. The flies, lethargic with the autumn, were beginning to buzz
into the room. We tried to make him talk of the subject of our previous
conversation, but he would not attend. He went on with his singing, just
as though we had not been present. He had got a scrap of paper and was
folding it into a notebook. We had to come away as ignorant as we went
in.

His is a curious case indeed. We must watch him tonight.


 LETTER, MITCHELL, SONS & CANDY TO LORD GODALMING.


 "1 October. "My Lord,

"We are at all times only too happy to meet your wishes. We beg, with
regard to the desire of your Lordship,expressed by Mr. Harker on your
behalf, to supply the following infor- mation concerning the sale and
purchase of No.347,Piccadilly. The original vendors are the executors of
the late Mr. Arch- ibald Winter-Suffield. The purchaser is a foreign
nobleman, Count de Ville, who effected the purchase himself paying the
purchase money in notes `over the counter,' if your Lordship will pardon
us using so vulgar an expression. Beyond this we know nothing whatever
of him.

 "We are, my Lord,

 "Your Lordship's humble servants,

"MITCHELL, SONS & CANDY."

DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


2 October.--I placed a man in the corridor last night, and told him to
make an accurate note of any sound he might hear from Renfield's room,
and gave him instructions that if there should be anything strange he
was to call me. After dinner, when we had all gathered round the fire in
the study, Mrs. Harker having gone to bed,we discussed the attempts and
discoveries of the day. Harker was the only one who had any result, and
we are in great hopes that his clue may be an important one.

Before going to bed I went round to the patient's room and looked in
through the observation trap. He was sleeping soundly, his heart rose
and fell with regular respiration.

This morning the man on duty reported to me that a little after midnight
he was restless and kept saying his prayers somewhat loudly. I asked him
if that was all. He replied that it was all he heard. There was
something about his manner, so suspicious that I asked him point blank
if he had been asleep. He denied sleep, but admitted to having "dozed"
for a while.It is too bad that men cannot be trusted unless they are
watched.

Today Harker is out following up his clue, and Art and Quincey are
looking after horses. Godalming thinks that it will be well to have
horses always in readiness, for when we get the information which we
seek there will be no time to lose. We must sterilize all the imported
earth between sunrise and sunset. We shall thus catch the Count at his
weakest, and without a refuge to fly to. Van Helsing is off to the
British Museum looking up some authorities on ancient medicine. The old
physicians took account of things which their followers do not
accept,and the Professor is searching for witch and demon cures which
may be useful to us later.

I sometimes think we must be all mad and that we shall wake to sanity in
strait waistcoats.

Later.--We have met again.We seem at last to be on the track, and our
work of tomorrow may be the beginning of the end. I wonder if Renfield's
quiet has anything to do with this. His moods have so followed the
doings of the Count, that the coming destruction of the monster may be
carried to him some subtle way. If we could only get some hint as to
what passed in his mind, between the time of my argument with him today
and his resumption of fly-catching, it might afford us a valuable clue.
He is now seemingly quiet for a spell . . . Is he? That wild yell seemed
to come from his room . . .

The attendant came bursting into my room and told me that Renfield had
somehow met with some accident. He had heard him yell, and when he went
to him found him lying on his face on the floor, all covered with blood.
I must go at once . . .


CHAPTER 21


 DR. SEWARD'S DIARY


3 October.--Let me put down with exactness all that happened, as well as
I can remember, since last I made an entry. Not a detail that I can
recall must be forgotten. In all calmness I must proceed.

When I came to Renfield's room I found him lying on the floor on his
left side in a glittering pool of blood. When I went to move him, it
became at once apparent that he had re- ceived some terrible
injuries.There seemed none of the unity of purpose between the parts of
the body which marks even lethargic sanity. As the face was exposed I
could see that it was horribly bruised,as though it had been beaten
against the floor. Indeed it was from the face wounds that the pool of
blood originated.

The attendant who was kneeling beside the body said to me as we turned
him over, "I think, sir, his back is broken. See, both his right arm and
leg and the whole side of his face are paralysed." How such a thing
could have happened puzzled the attendant beyond measure. He seemed
quite bewil- dered, and his brows were gathered in as he said, "I can't
understand the two things. He could mark his face like that by beating
his own head on the floor. I saw a young woman do it once at the
Eversfield Asylum before anyone could lay hands on her. And I suppose he
might have broken his neck by falling out of bed, if he got in an
awkward kink. But for the life of me I can't imagine how the two things
occurred. If his back was broke, he couldn't beat his head, and if his
face was like that before the fall out of bed,there would be marks of
it."

I said to him, "Go to Dr. Van Helsing, and ask him to kindly come here
at once. I want him without an instant's delay."

The man ran off, and within a few minutes the Professor, in his dressing
gown and slippers, appeared. When he saw Renfield on the ground, he
looked keenly at him a moment,and then turned to me. I think he
recognized my thought in my eyes, for he said very quietly, manifestly
for the ears of the attendant, "Ah, a sad accident! He will need very
care- ful watching, and much attention. I shall stay with you my- self,
but I shall first dress myself. If you will remain I shall in a few
minutes join you."

The patient was now breathing stertorously and it was easy to see that
he had suffered some terrible injury.

Van Helsing returned with extraordinary celerity, bear- ing with him a
surgical case. He had evidently been thinking and had his mind made up,
for almost before he looked at the patient, he whispered to me, "Send
the attendant away. We must be alone with him when he becomes conscious,
after the operation."

I said, "I think that will do now, Simmons. We have done all that we can
at present. You had better go your round,and Dr. Van Helsing will
operate. Let me know instant- ly if there be anything unusual anywhere."

The man withdrew, and we went into a strict examination of the patient.
The wounds of the face were superficial.The real injury was a depressed
fracture of the skull, extending right up through the motor area.

The Professor thought a moment and said,"We must reduce the pressure and
get back to normal conditions,as far as can be. The rapidity of the
suffusion shows the terrible nature of his injury. The whole motor area
seems affected. The suffusion of the brain will increase quickly, so we
must tre- phine at once or it may be too late."

As he was speaking there was a soft tapping at the door. I went over and
opened it and found in the corridor without, Arthur and Quincey in
pajamas and slippers,the former spoke, "I heard your man call up Dr. Van
Helsing and tell him of an accident. So I woke Quincey or rather called
for him as he was not asleep. Things are moving too quickly and too
strangely for sound sleep for any of us these times. I've been thinking
that tomorrow night will not see things as they have been. We'll have to
look back, and forward a little more than we have done. May we come in?"

I nodded, and held the door open till they had entered, then I closed it
again. When Quincey saw the attitude and state of the patient, and noted
the horrible pool on the floor, he said softly, "My God! What has
happened to him? Poor, poor devil!"

I told him briefly, and added that we expected he would recover
consciousness after the operation, for a short time, at all events. He
went at once and sat down on the edge of the bed, with Godalming beside
him. We all watched in patience.

"We shall wait," said Van Helsing, "just long enough to fix the best
spot for trephining,so that we may most quickly and perfectly remove the
blood clot, for it is evident that the haemorrhage is increasing."

The minutes during which we waited passed with fearful slowness. I had a
horrible sinking in my heart, and from Van Helsing's face I gathered
that he felt some fear or apprehension as to what was to come. I dreaded
the words Renfield might speak. I was positively afraid to think. But
the conviction of what was coming was on me, as I have read of men who
have heard the death watch.The poor man's breath- ing came in uncertain
gasps.Each instant he seemed as though he would open his eyes and speak,
but then would follow a prolonged stertorous breath,and he would relapse
into a more fixed insensibility. Inured as I was to sick beds and death,
this suspense grew and grew upon me. I could almost hear the beating of
my own heart, and the blood surging through my temples sounded like
blows from a hammer.The silence finally became agonizing. I looked at my
companions, one after ano- ther, and saw from their flushed faces and
damp brows that they were enduring equal torture. There was a nervous
sus- pense over us all, as though overhead some dread bell would peal
out powerfully when we should least expect it.

At last there came a time when it was evident that the patient was
sinking fast. He might die at any moment. I looked up at the Professor
and caught his eyes fixed on mine. His face was sternly set as he spoke,
"There is no time to lose. His words may be worth many lives. I have
been think- ing so, as I stood here. It may be there is a soul at stake!
We shall operate just above the ear."

Without another word he made the operation. For a few moments the
breathing continued to be stertorous. Then there came a breath so
prolonged that it seemed as though it would tear open his chest.
Suddenly his eyes opened, and became fixed in a wild, helpless
stare.This was continued for a few moments, then it was softened into a
glad surprise, and from his lips came a sigh of relief.He moved
convulsively, and as he did so, said, "I'll be quiet, Doctor. Tell them
to take off the strait waistcoat. I have had a terrible dream, and it
has left me so weak that I cannot move. What's wrong with my face? It
feels all swollen, and it smarts dreadfully."

He tried to turn his head, but even with the effort his eyes seemed to
grow glassy again so I gently put it back. Then Van Helsing said in a
quiet grave tone, "Tell us your dream, Mr. Renfield."

As he heard the voice his face brightened, through its mutilation, and
he said, "That is Dr. Van Helsing. How good it is of you to be here.
Give me some water, my lips are dry, and I shall try to tell you. I
dreamed" . . .

He stopped and seemed fainting. I called quietly to Quincey, "The
brandy, it is in my study, quick!" He flew and returned with a glass,
the decanter of brandy and a carafe of water. We moistened the parched
lips, and the patient quickly revived.

It seemed, however, that his poor injured brain had been working in the
interval,for when he was quite conscious, he looked at me piercingly
with an agonized confusion which I shall never forget, and said, "I must
not deceive myself. It was no dream, but all a grim reality." Then his
eyes roved round the room. As they caught sight of the two figures
sitting patiently on the edge of the bed he went on, "If I were not sure
already, I would know from them."

For an instant his eyes closed, not with pain or sleep but
voluntarily,as though he were bringing all his faculties to bear. When
he opened them he said, hurriedly, and with more energy than he had yet
displayed, "Quick, Doctor,quick, I am dying! I feel that I have but a
few minutes, and then I must go back to death, or worse! Wet my lips
with brandy again. I have something that I must say before I die. Or
before my poor crushed brain dies anyhow. Thank you! It was that night
after you left me, when I implored you to let me go away. I couldn't
speak then, for I felt my tongue was tied. But I was as sane then,
except in that way, as I am now. I was in an agony of despair for a long
time after you left me, it seemed hours. Then there came a sudden peace
to me. My brain seemed to become cool again, and I realized where I was.
I heard the dogs bark behind our house, but not where He was!"

As he spoke, Van Helsing's eyes never blinked, but his hand came out and
met mine and gripped it hard. He did not, however, betray himself. He
nodded slightly and said, "Go on," in a low voice.

Renfield proceeded. "He came up to the window in the mist, as I had seen
him often before, but he was solid then, not a ghost, and his eyes were
fierce like a man's when angry. He was laughing with his red mouth, the
sharp white teeth glinted in the moonlight when he turned to look back
over the belt of trees, to where the dogs were barking. I wouldn't ask
him to come in at first,though I knew he wanted to, just as he had
wanted all along. Then he began promising me things, not in words but by
doing them."

He was interrupted by a word from the Professor, "How?"

"By making them happen. Just as he used to send in the flies when the
sun was shining. Great big fat ones with steel and sapphire on their
wings. And big moths, in the night, with skull and cross-bones on their
backs."

Van Helsing nodded to him as he whispered to me uncon- sciously, "The
Acherontia Atropos of the Sphinges, what you call the `Death's-head
Moth'?"

The patient went on without stopping, "Then he began to whisper.`Rats,
rats, rats! Hundreds, thousands, millions of them, and every one a
life.And dogs to eat them, and cats too. All lives! All red blood, with
years of life in it, and not merely buzzing flies!' I laughed at him,
for I wanted to see what he could do. Then the dogs howled, away beyond
the dark trees in His house. He beckoned me to the window. I got up and
looked out,and He raised his hands,and seemed to call out without using
any words. A dark mass spread over the grass, coming on like the shape
of a flame of fire. And then He moved the mist to the right and left,and
I could see that there were thousands of rats with their eyes blazing
red, like His only smaller. He held up his hand, and they all stopped,
and I thought he seemed to be saying, `All these lives will I give you,
ay,and many more and greater, through countless ages, if you will fall
down and worship me!' And then a red cloud, like the color of blood,
seemed to close over my eyes, and before I knew what I was doing, I
found myself opening the sash and saying to Him, `Come in, Lord and
Master!' The rats were all gone, but He slid into the room through the
sash, though it was only open an inch wide, just as the Moon herself has
often come in through the tini- est crack and has stood before me in all
her size and splendor."

His voice was weaker, so I moistened his lips with the brandy again, and
he continued, but it seemed as though his memory had gone on working in
the interval for his story was further advanced. I was about to call him
back to the point, but Van Helsing whispered to me, "Let him go on. Do
not interrupt him. He cannot go back, and maybe could not pro- ceed at
all if once he lost the thread of his thought."

He proceeded, "All day I waited to hear from him, but he did not send me
anything, not even a blowfly,and when the moon got up I was pretty angry
with him.When he did slide in through the window, though it was shut,
and did not even knock, I got mad with him. He sneered at me, and his
white face looked out of the mist with his red eyes gleaming, and he
went on as though he owned the whole place, and I was no one. He didn't
even smell the same as he went by me. I couldn't hold him. I thought
that, somehow, Mrs. Harker had come into the room."

The two men sitting on the bed stood up and came over, standing behind
him so that he could not see them, but where they could hear better.
They were both silent, but the Pro- fessor started and quivered. His
face, however,grew grimmer and sterner still. Renfield went on without
noticing, "When Mrs. Harker came in to see me this afternoon she wasn't
the same. It was like tea after the teapot has been watered." Here we
all moved, but no one said a word.

He went on, "I didn't know that she was here till she spoke, and she
didn't look the same. I don't care for the pale people. I like them with
lots of blood in them, and hers all seemed to have run out. I didn't
think of it at the time, but when she went away I began to think,and it
made me mad to know that He had been taking the life out of her." I
could feel that the rest quivered, as I did. But we remained otherwise
still. "So when He came tonight I was ready for Him. I saw the mist
stealing in, and I grabbed it tight. I had heard that madmen have
unnatural strength. And as I knew I was a madman, at times anyhow, I
resolved to use my power. Ay, and He felt it too,for He had to come out
of the mist to struggle with me. I held tight, and I thought I was going
to win,for I didn't mean Him to take any more of her life, till I saw
His eyes. They burned into me, and my strength became like water. He
slipped through it, and when I tried to cling to Him, He raised me up
and flung me down. There was a red cloud before me,and a noise like
thunder,and the mist seemed to steal away under the door."

His voice was becoming fainter and his breath more ster- torous. Van
Helsing stood up instinctively.

"We know the worst now," he said. "He is here, and we know his purpose.
It may not be too late. Let us be armed, the same as we were the other
night, but lose no time, there is not an instant to spare."

There was no need to put our fear, nay our conviction, into words, we
shared them in common. We all hurried and took from our rooms the same
things that we had when we entered the Count's house. The Professor had
his ready, and as we met in the corridor he pointed to them
significantly as he said, "They never leave me, and they shall not till
this unhappy business is over. Be wise also, my friends. It is no common
enemy that we deal with Alas! Alas! That dear Madam Mina should suffer!"
He stopped,his voice was breaking, and I do not know if rage or terror
predominated in my own heart.

Outside the Harkers' door we paused. Art and Quincey held back, and the
latter said, "Should we disturb her?"

"We must," said Van Helsing grimly. "If the door be locked, I shall
break it in."

"May it not frighten her terribly? It is unusual to break into a lady's
room!"

Van Helsing said solemnly, "You are always right. But this is life and
death. All chambers are alike to the doctor. And even were they not they
are all as one to me tonight. Friend John, when I turn the handle, if
the door does not open, do you put your shoulder down and shove. And you
too, my friends. Now!"

He turned the handle as he spoke, but the door did not yield. We threw
ourselves against it. With a crash it burst open, and we almost fell
headlong into the room. The Pro- fessor did actually fall,and I saw
across him as he gathered himself up from hands and knees. What I saw
appalled me. I felt my hair rise like bristles on the back of my neck,
and my heart seemed to stand still.

The moonlight was so bright that through the thick yellow blind the room
was light enough to see. On the bed beside the window lay Jonathan
Harker, his face flushed and breathing heavily as though in a stupor.
Kneeling on the near edge of the bed facing outwards was the white-clad
figure of his wife. By her side stood a tall, thin man,clad in black.
His face was turned from us, but the instant we saw we all recognized
the Count, in every way, even to the scar on his forehead. With his left
hand he held both Mrs. Harker's hands, keeping them away with her arms
at full ten- sion. His right hand gripped her by the back of the neck,
forcing her face down on his bosom. Her white night-dress was smeared
with blood, and a thin stream trickled down the man's bare chest which
was shown by his torn-open dress. The attitude of the two had a terrible
resemblance to a child forcing a kitten's nose into a saucer of milk to
compel it to drink. As we burst into the room, the Count turned his
face, and the hellish look that I had heard described seemed to leap
into it. His eyes flamed red with devilish passion. The great nostrils
of the white aquiline nose opened wide and quivered at the edge, and the
white sharp teeth, behind the full lips of the blood dripping mouth,
clamped together like those of a wild beast. With a wrench, which threw
his victim back upon the bed as though hurled from a height, he turned
and sprang at us. But by this time the Professor had gained his feet,
and was holding towards him the envelope which contained the Sacred
Wafer. The Count suddenly stopped, just as poor Lucy had done outside
the tomb, and cowered back. Further and further back he cowered, as we,
lifting our crucifixes, advanced. The moonlight suddenly failed, as a
great black cloud sailed across the sky. And when the gaslight sprang up
under Quincey's match, we saw nothing but a faint vapor. This, as we
looked, trailed under the door, which with the recoil from its bursting
open, had swung back to its old position. Van Helsing, Art, and I moved
forward to Mrs. Harker, who by this time had drawn her breath and with
it had given a scream so wild, so ear-piercing, so des- pairing that it
seems to me now that it will ring in my ears till my dying day. For a
few seconds she lay in her helpless attitude and disarray. Her face was
ghastly, with a pallor which was accentuated by the blood which smeared
her lips and cheeks and chin. From her throat trickled a thin stream of
blood. Her eyes were mad with terror. Then she put before her face her
poor crushed hands, which bore on their white- ness the red mark of the
Count's terrible grip, and from behind them came a low desolate wail
which made the terrible scream seem only the quick expression of an
endless grief. Van Helsing stepped forward and drew the coverlet gently
over her body, whilst Art, after looking at her face for an instant
despairingly, ran out of the room.

Van Helsing whispered to me, "Jonathan is in a stupor such as we know
the Vampire can produce. We can do nothing with poor Madam Mina for a
few moments till she recovers herself. I must wake him!"

He dipped the end of a towel in cold water and with it began to flick
him on the face, his wife all the while hold- ing her face between her
hands and sobbing in a way that was heart breaking to hear. I raised the
blind, and looked out of the window. There was much moonshine, and as I
looked I could see Quincey Morris run across the lawn and hide him- self
in the shadow of a great yew tree. It puzzled me to think why he was
doing this. But at the instant I heard Har- ker's quick exclamation as
he woke to partial consciousness, and turned to the bed. On his face, as
there might well be, was a look of wild amazement. He seemed dazed for a
few se- conds, and then full consciousness seemed to burst upon him all
at once, and he started up.

His wife was aroused by the quick movement, and turned to him with her
arms stretched out,as though to embrace him. Instantly, however, she
drew them in again, and putting her elbows together,held her hands
before her face,and shuddered till the bed beneath her shook.

"In God's name what does this mean?" Harker cried out. "Dr. Seward, Dr.
Van Helsing, what is it? What has happened? What is wrong? Mina, dear
what is it? What does that blood mean? My God, my God! Has it come to
this!" And, raising himself to his knees,he beat his hands wildly
together."Good God help us! Help her! Oh, help her!"

With a quick movement he jumped from bed, and began to pull on his
clothes,all the man in him awake at the need for instant exertion. "What
has happened? Tell me all about it!" he cried without pausing. "Dr. Van
Helsing you love Mina, I know. Oh, do something to save her. It cannot
have gone too far yet. Guard her while I look for him!"

His wife, through her terror and horror and distress, saw some sure
danger to him. Instantly forgetting her own grief, she seized hold of
him and cried out.

"No! No! Jonathan, you must not leave me. I have suffered enough
tonight, God knows, without the dread of his harming you. You must stay
with me. Stay with these friends who will watch over you!" Her
expression became frantic as she spoke. And, he yielding to her, she
pulled him down sitting on the bedside, and clung to him fiercely.

Van Helsing and I tried to calm them both.The Professor held up his
golden crucifix, and said with wonderful calm- ness, "Do not fear, my
dear. We are here, and whilst this is close to you no foul thing can
approach. You are safe for tonight, and we must be calm and take counsel
together."

She shuddered and was silent, holding down her head on her husband's
breast. When she raised it, his white night- robe was stained with blood
where her lips had touched, and where the thin open wound in the neck
had sent forth drops. The instant she saw it she drew back, with a low
wail, and whispered, amidst choking sobs.

"Unclean, unclean! I must touch him or kiss him no more. Oh,that it
should be that it is I who am now his worst enemy, and whom he may have
most cause to fear."

To this he spoke out resolutely, "Nonsense, Mina.It is a shame to me to
hear such a word. I would not hear it of you. And I shall not hear it
from you. May God judge me by my deserts, and punish me with more bitter
suffering than even this hour, if by any act or will of mine anything
ever come between us!"

He put out his arms and folded her to his breast. And for a while she
lay there sobbing. He looked at us over her bowed head,with eyes that
blinked damply above his quivering nostrils. His mouth was set as steel.

After a while her sobs became less frequent and more faint, and then he
said to me, speaking with a studied calm- ness which I felt tried his
nervous power to the utmost.

"And now, Dr. Seward, tell me all about it. Too well I know the broad
fact. Tell me all that has been."

I told him exactly what had happened and he listened with seeming
impassiveness, but his nostrils twitched and his eyes blazed as I told
how the ruthless hands of the Count had held his wife in that terrible
and horrid position, with her mouth to the open wound in his breast.It
interested me, even at that moment,to see that whilst the face of white
set passion worked convulsively over the bowed head, the hands tenderly
and lovingly stroked the ruffled hair. Just as I had finished, Quincey
and Godalming knocked at the door. They entered in obedience to our
summons. Van Helsing looked at me questioningly. I understood him to
mean if we were to take advantage of their coming to divert if possible
the thoughts of the unhappy husband and wife from each other and from
themselves. So on nodding acquiescence to him he asked them what they
had seen or done. To which Lord Godalming answered.

"I could not see him anywhere in the passage, or in any of our rooms. I
looked in the study but, though he had been there, he had gone. He had,
however . . ." He stopped suddenly, looking at the poor drooping figure
on the bed.

Van Helsing said gravely, "Go on, friend Arthur. We want here no more
concealments. Our hope now is in knowing all. Tell freely!"

So Art went on, "He had been there, and though it could only have been
for a few seconds, he made rare hay of the place. All the manuscript had
been burned, and the blue flames were flickering amongst the white
ashes. The cylin- ders of your phonograph too were thrown on the fire,
and the wax had helped the flames."

Here I interrupted. "Thank God there is the other copy in the safe!"

His face lit for a moment, but fell again as he went on. "I ran
downstairs then, but could see no sign of him. I looked into Renfield's
room, but there was no trace there except . . ." Again he paused.

"Go on," said Harker hoarsely. So he bowed his head and moistening his
lips with his tongue, added, "except that the poor fellow is dead."

Mrs. Harker raised her head, looking from one to the other of us she
said solemnly, "God's will be done!"

I could not but feel that Art was keeping back some- thing. But, as I
took it that it was with a purpose, I said nothing.

Van Helsing turned to Morris and asked,"And you, friend Quincey, have
you any to tell?"

"A little," he answered. "It may be much eventually, but at present I
can't say. I thought it well to know if possible where the Count would
go when he left the house. I did not see him, but I saw a bat rise from
Renfield's window, and flap westward. I expected to see him in some
shape go back to Carfax, but he evidently sought some other lair. He
will not be back tonight, for the sky is reddening in the east, and the
dawn is close. We must work tomorrow!"

He said the latter words through his shut teeth. For a space of perhaps
a couple of minutes there was silence,and I could fancy that I could
hear the sound of our hearts beat- ing.

Then Van Helsing said, placing his hand tenderly on Mrs. Harker's head,
"And now, Madam Mina, poor dear, dear, Madam Mina, tell us exactly what
happened. God knows that I do not want that you be pained, but it is
need that we know all.For now more than ever has all work to be done
quick and sharp, and in deadly earnest. The day is close to us that must
end all, if it may be so, and now is the chance that we may live and
learn."

The poor dear lady shivered, and I could see the ten- sion of her nerves
as she clasped her husband closer to her and bent her head lower and
lower still on his breast. Then she raised her head proudly, and held
out one hand to Van Helsing who took it in his,and after stooping and
kissing it reverently, held it fast. The other hand was locked in that
of her husband, who held his other arm thrown round her pro- tectingly.
After a pause in which she was evidently ordering her thoughts, she
began.

"I took the sleeping draught which you had so kindly given me, but for a
long time it did not act. I seemed to become more wakeful, and myriads
of horrible fancies began to crowd in upon my mind. All of them
connected with death, and vampires, with blood, and pain, and trouble."
Her hus- band involuntarily groaned as she turned to him and said
lovingly, "Do not fret, dear. You must be brave and strong, and help me
through the horrible task. If you only knew what an effort it is to me
to tell of this fearful thing at all, you would understand how much I
need your help. Well, I saw I must try to help the medicine to its work
with my will, if it was to do me any good,so I resolutely set myself to
sleep. Sure enough sleep must soon have come to me, for I remember no
more. Jonathan coming in had not waked me, for he lay by my side when
next I remember. There was in the room the same thin white mist that I
had before noticed. But I forget now if you know of this. You will find
it in my diary which I shall show you later. I felt the same vague
terror which had come to me before and the same sense of some presence.
I turned to wake Jonathan, but found that he slept so soundly that it
seemed as if it was he who had taken the sleeping draught,and not I. I
tried, but I could not wake him. This caused me a great fear, and I
looked around terrified. Then indeed, my heart sank within me. Beside
the bed, as if he had stepped out of the mist, or rather as if the mist
had turned into his figure, for it had entirely disappeared, stood a
tall, thin man, all in black. I knew him at once from the description of
the others. The waxen face, the high aquiline nose, on which the light
fell in a thin white line, the parted red lips, with the sharp white
teeth show- ing between, and the red eyes that I had seemed to see in
the sunset on the windows of St. Mary's Church at Witby. I knew, too,
the red scar on his forehead where Jonathan had struck him. For an
instant my heart stood still, and I would have screamed out, only that I
was paralyzed. In the pause he spoke in a sort of keen, cutting whisper,
pointing as he spoke to Jonathan.

"`Silence! If you make a sound I shall take him and dash his brains out
before your very eyes.' I was appalled and was too bewildered to do or
say anything. With a mocking smile, he placed one hand upon my shoulder
and, holding me tight, bared my throat with the other, saying as he did
so, `First, a little refreshment to reward my exertions. You may as well
be quiet. It is not the first time, or the second, that your veins have
appeased my thirst!' I was bewildered, and strangely enough, I did not
want to hinder him.I suppose it is a part of the horrible curse that
such is, when his touch is on his victim. And oh, my God, my God, pity
me! He placed his reeking lips upon my throat!" Her husband groaned
again. She clasped his hand harder, and looked at him pity- ingly, as if
he were the injured one, and went on.

"I felt my strength fading away, and I was in a half swoon. How long
this horrible thing lasted I know not, but it seemed that a long time
must have passed before he took his foul, awful, sneering mouth away. I
saw it drip with the fresh blood!"The remembrance seemed for a while to
overpower her, and she drooped and would have sunk down but for her
husband's sustaining arm. With a great effort she recovered herself and
went on.

"Then he spoke to me mockingly, `And so you, like the others, would play
your brains against mine. You would help these men to hunt me and
frustrate me in my design! You know now, and they know in part already,
and will know in full before long, what it is to cross my path. They
should have kept their energies for use closer to home. Whilst they
play- ed wits against me, against me who commanded nations, and
intrigued for them, and fought for them, hundreds of years before they
were born, I was countermining them. And you, their best beloved one,
are now to me, flesh of my flesh, blood of my blood, kin of my kin, my
bountiful wine-press for a while, and shall be later on my companion and
my helper. You shall be avenged in turn, for not one of them but shall
minister to your needs. But as yet you are to be punished for what you
have done. You have aided in thwarting me. Now you shall come to my
call.When my brain says "Come!" to you, you shall cross land or sea to
do my bidding. And to that end this!'

With that he pulled open his shirt, and with his long sharp nails opened
a vein in his breast. When the blood began to spurt out, he took my
hands in one of his, holding them tight, and with the other seized my
neck and pressed my mouth to the wound, so that I must either suffocate
or swallow some to the . . . Oh, my God! My God! What have I done? What
have I done to deserve such a fate, I who have tried to walk in meekness
and righteousness all my days. God pity me! Look down on a poor soul in
worse than mortal peril. And in mercy pity those to whom she is dear!"
Then she began to rub her lips as though to cleanse them from pollution.

As she was telling her terrible story, the eastern sky began to quicken,
and everything became more and more clear. Harker was still and quiet.
But over his face, as the awful narrative went on, came a grey look
which deepened and deep- ened in the morning light, till when the first
red streak of the coming dawn shot up, the flesh stood darkly out
against the whitening hair.

We have arranged that one of us is to stay within call of the unhappy
pair till we can meet together and arrange about taking action.

Of this I am sure. The sun rises today on no more miserable house in all
the great round of its daily course.