 CHAPTER IV. I awoke in my own bed. If it be that I had not dreamt, the count must have carried me here. I tried to satisfy myself on the subject, but could not arrive at any unquestionable results. To be sure, there were certain small evidences, such as that my clothes were folded and laid by in a manner which was not my habit. My watch was still unwound, and I am rigorously accustomed to wind it the last thing before going to bed, and many such details. These things are no proof, for they may have been evidences that my mind was not as usual, and for some cause or another I had certainly been much upset. I must watch for proof. Of one thing I am glad. If it was that the count carried me here and undressed me, he must have been hurried in his task, for my pockets are intact. I am sure this diary would have been a mystery to him, which he would not have brooked. He would have taken or destroyed it. As I look round this room, although it has been to me so full of fear, it is now a sort of sanctuary, for nothing could be more dreadful than those awful women who were, who are, waiting, to suck my blood. 18 May. I have been down to look at that room again in daylight, for I must know the truth. When I got to the doorway at the top of the stairs, I found it closed. It had been so forcibly driven against the jam that part of the woodwork was splintered. I could see that the bolt of the lock had not been shot, but the door is fastened from the inside. I fear it was no dream, and must act on this surmise. 19 May. I am surely in the toils. Last night the count asked me in the suavist tones to write three letters, one saying that my work here was nearly done, and that I should start for home within a few days, another that I was starting on the next morning from the time of the letter, and the third that I had left the castle and arrived at Bistritz. I would feign have rebelled, but felt that in the present state of things it would be madness to quarrel openly with the count, whilst I am so absolutely in his power, and to refuse would be to excite his suspicion and to arouse his anger. He knows that I know too much, and that I must not live lest I be dangerous to him. My only chance is to prolong my opportunities. Something may occur which will give me a chance to escape. I saw in his eyes something of that gathering wrath which was manifest when he hurled that fair woman from him. He explained to me that posts were few and uncertain, and that my writing now would ensure ease of mind to my friends, and he assured me with so much impressiveness that he would countermand the later letters, which would be held over at Bistritz until due time in case chance would admit of my prolonging my stay, that to oppose him would have been to create new suspicion. I therefore pretended to fall in with his views and asked what dates I should put on the letters. He calculated a minute and then said, The first should be June 12th, the second June 19th, and the third June 29th. I now know the span of my life. God help me. 28 May There is a chance of escape, or at any rate of being able to send word home. A band of Sagani have come to the castle and are encamped in the courtyard. These are gypsies. I have notes of them in my book. They are peculiar to this part of the world, though allied to the ordinary gypsies all the world over. There are thousands of them in Hungary and Transylvania who are almost outside all law. They attach themselves as a rule to some great noble or boyar and call themselves by his name. They are fearless and without religion save superstition, and they talk only their own varieties of the Romani tongue. I shall write some letters home and shall try to get them to have them posted. I have already spoken to them through my window to begin acquaintanceship. They took their hats off and made obeisance and many signs, which, however, I could not understand any more than I could their spoken language. I have written the letters. Minas is in shorthand and I simply ask Mr. Hawkins to communicate with her. To her I have explained my situation, but without the horrors which I may only surmise. It would shock and frighten her to death were I to expose my heart to her. Should the letters not carry, then the count shall not yet know my secret or the extent of my knowledge. I have given the letters. I threw them through the bars of my window with a gold piece and made what signs I could to have them posted. The man who took them pressed them to his heart and bowed, and then put them in his cap. I could do no more. I stow back to the study and began to read. As the count did not come in I have written here. The count has come. He sat down beside me and said in his smoothest voice as he opened two letters, the Sigani has given me these, of which, though I know not whence they come, I shall of course take care. See, he must have looked at it. One is from you and to my friend Peter Hawkins. The other, here he caught sight of the strange symbols as he opened the envelope, and the dark look came into his face and his eyes blazed wickedly. The other is a vile thing, an outrage upon friendship and hospitality. It is not signed. Well, so it cannot matter to us, and he calmly held letter and envelope in the flame of the lamp till they were consumed. Then he went on, the letter to Hawkins, that I shall of course send on since it is yours. Your letters are sacred to me. Your pardon, my friend, that unknowingly I did break the seal. Will you not cover it again? He held out the letter to me, and with a courteous bow handed me a clean envelope. I could only redirect it and hand it to him in silence. When he went out of the room I could hear the key turn softly. A minute later I went over and tried it, and the door was locked. When an hour or two after the count came quietly into the room his coming awakened me for I had gone to sleep on the sofa. He was very courteous and very cheery in his manner, and seeing that I had been sleeping he said, So, my friend, you are tired? Get to bed. There is the surest rest. I may not have the pleasure of talk to-night, since there are many labours to me, but you will sleep, I pray. I passed to my room and went to bed, and, strange to say, slept without dreaming. Despair has its own calms. 31 May This morning when I woke I thought I would provide myself with some papers and envelopes from my bag and keep them in my pocket, so that I might write in case I should get an opportunity, but again a surprise, again a shock. Every scrap of paper was gone, and with it all my notes, my memoranda relating to railways and travel, my letter of credit, in fact all that might be useful to me were I once outside the castle. I sat and pondered a while, and then some thought occurred to me, and I made search of my portmanteau and in the wardrobe where I had placed my clothes. The suit in which I had travelled was gone, and also my overcoat and rug. I could find no trace of them anywhere. This looked like some new scheme of villainy. 17 June This morning, as I was sitting on the edge of my bed, cuddling my brains, I heard without a cracking of whips and pounding and scraping of horses feet up the rocky path beyond the courtyard. With joy I hurried to the window, and saw, drive into the yard, two great lighter wagons, each drawn by eight sturdy horses, and at the head of each pair, a slovak, with his wide hat, great nail-studded belt, dirty sheepskin and high boots. They had also their long staves in hand. I ran to the door, intending to descend and try and join them through the main hall, as I thought that way might be open for them. Again a shock, my door was fastened on the outside. Then I ran to the window and cried to them. They looked up at me stupidly and pointed, but just then the headman of the sagani came out, and seeing them pointing to my window said something at which they laughed. Henceforth no effort of mine, no piteous cry or agonised entreaty would make them even look at me. They resolutely turned away. The lighter wagons contained great square boxes with handles of thick rope. These were evidently empty by the ease with which the slovaks handled them and by their resonance as they were roughly moved. When they were all unnoted and packed in a great heap in one corner of the yard, the slovaks were given some money by the sagani, and spitting on it for luck, lazily each went to his horse's head. Shortly afterwards I heard the crackling of their whips die away in the distance. 24 June. Last night the count left me early and locked himself into his own room. As soon as I dared I ran up the winding stair and looked out of the window which opened south. I thought I would watch for the count, for there is something going on. The sagani are quartered somewhere in the castle and are doing work of some kind. I know it for now and then I hear a far away muffled sound as of matic and spade and whatever it is it must be the end of some ruthless villainy. I had been at the window somewhat less than half an hour. When I saw something coming out of the count's window I drew back and watched carefully and saw the whole man emerge. It was a new shock to me to find that he had on the suit of clothes which I had worn whilst travelling here and slung over his shoulder the terrible bag which I had seen the women take away. There could be no doubt as to his quest and in my garb too. This then is his new scheme of evil that he will allow others to see me as they think so that he may both leave evidence that I have been seen in the towns or villages posting my own letters and that any wickedness which he may do shall by the local people be attributed to me. It makes me rage to think that this can go on and whilst I am shut up here a veritable prisoner but without that protection of the law which is even a criminal's right and consolation I thought I would watch for the count's return and for a long time sat doggedly at the window. Then I began to notice that there were some quaint little specks floating in the rays of the moonlight. They were like the tiniest grains of dust and they whirled round and gathered in clusters in a nebulous sort of way. I watched them with a sense of soothing and a sort of calm stroll over me. I leaned back in the embrasure in a more comfortable position so that I could enjoy more fully the aerial gambling. Something made me start up a low piteous howling of dogs somewhere far below in the valley which was hidden from my sight. Louder it seemed to ring in my ears and the floating motes of dust to take new shapes to the sound as they danced in the moonlight. I felt myself struggling to wake to some call of my instincts. Nay, my very soul was struggling and my half-remembered sensibilities were striving to answer the call. I was becoming hypnotized. Quicker and quicker danced the dust. The moonbeams seemed to quiver as they went by me into the mass of gloom beyond. More and more they gathered till they seemed to take dim phantom shapes. And then I started, broad awake and in full possession of my senses and ran screaming from the place. The phantom shapes which were becoming gradually materialized from the moonbeams were those three ghostly women to whom I was doomed. I fled and felt somewhat safer in my own room where there was no moonlight and where the lamp was burning brightly. When a couple of hours had passed I heard something stirring in the council room, something like a sharp wail quickly suppressed. And then there was silence, deep awful silence which chilled me. With a beating heart I tried the door, but I was locked in my prison and could do nothing. I sat down and simply cried. As I sat I heard a sound in the courtyard without the agonized cry of a woman. I rushed to the window and throwing it up peered between the bars. There indeed was a woman with dishevelled hair holding her hands over her heart as one distressed with running. She was leaning against the corner of the gateway. When she saw my face at the window she threw herself forward and shouted in a voice laden with menace, Monster, give me my child! She threw herself on her knees and raising up her hands cried the same words in tones which rung my heart. Then she tore her hair and beat her breast and abandoned herself to all the violences of extravagant emotion. Finally she threw herself forward and though I could not see her I could hear the beating of her naked hands against the door. Somewhere high overhead probably on the tower I heard the voice of the Count calling in his harsh metallic whisper. His call seemed to be answered from far and wide by the howling of wolves. Before many minutes had passed a pack of them poured like a pent-up dam when liberated threw the wide entrance into the courtyard. There was no cry from the woman and the howling of the wolves was but short. Before long they streamed away singly licking their lips. I could not pity her for I knew now what had become of her child and she was better dead. What shall I do? What can I do? How can I escape from this dreadful thing of night, gloom and fear? 25 June No man knows till he has suffered from the night how sweet and dear to his heart and I the morning can be. When the sun grew so high this morning that it struck the top of the great gateway opposite my window the high spot which it touched seemed to me as if the dove from the ark had lighted there. My fear fell from me as if it had been a vaporous garment which dissolved in the warmth. I must take action of some sort whilst the courage of days upon me. Last night one of my post-dated letters went to post the first of that fatal series which is to blot out the very traces of my existence from the earth. Let me not think of it. Action! It has always been at night-time that I have been molested or threatened or in some way in danger or in fear. I have not yet seen the count in the daylight. Can it be that he sleeps when others wake, that he may be awake whilst they sleep? If I could only get into his room but there is no possible way. The door is always locked, no way for me. Yes, there is a way, if one dares to take it. Where his body has gone, why may not another body go? I have seen him myself crawl from his window. Why should I not imitate him and go in by his window? The chances are desperate, but my need is more desperate still. I shall risk it. At the worst it can only be death, and a man's death is not a calf's, and the dreaded hereafter may still be open to me. God help me in my task. Goodbye, Mina, if I fail. Goodbye, my faithful friend and second father. Goodbye all, and last of all, Mina. Same day, later. I have made the effort, and God helping me have come safely back to this room. I must put down every detail and order. I went whilst my courage was fresh straight to the window on the south side and at once got outside on this side. The stones are big and roughly cut, and the mortar has by process of time been washed away between them. I took off my boots and ventured out on the desperate way. I looked down once so as to make sure that a sudden glimpse of the awful depth would not overcome me, but after that kept my eyes away from it. I know pretty well the direction and distance of the counts window and made for it as well as I could, having regard to the opportunities available. I did not feel dizzy. I suppose I was too excited, and the time seemed ridiculously short till I found myself standing on the window sill and trying to raise up the sash. I was filled with agitation, however, when I bent down and slid feet foremost in through the window. Then I looked around for a count, but with surprise and gladness made a discovery. The room was empty. It was barely furnished with odd things which seemed to have never been used. The furniture was something the same style as that in the south rooms and was covered with dust. I looked for the key, but it was not in the lock and I could not find it anywhere. The only thing I found was a great heap of gold in one corner, gold of all kinds, Roman and British and Austrian and Hungarian and Greek and Turkish money, covered with a film of dust as though it had lain long in the ground. None of it that I noticed was less than three hundred years old. There were also chains and ornaments, some jeweled, but all of them old and stained. At one corner of the room was a heavy door. I tried it for, since I could not find the key of the room or the key of the outer door which was the main object of my search, I must make further examination, or all my efforts would be in vain. It was open and led through stone passage to a circular stairway which went steeply down. I descended, minding carefully where I went for the stairs were dark, being only lit by loopholes in the heavy masonry. At the bottom there was a dark tunnel-like passage through which came a deathly, sickly odour. The odour of old earth newly turned. As I went through the passage the smell grew closer and heavier. At last I pulled open a heavy door which stood ajar and found myself in an old ruined chapel which had evidently been used as a graveyard. The roof was broken and in two places were steps leading to vaults, but the ground had recently been dug over and the earth placed in great wooden boxes, manifestly those which had been brought by the Slovaks. There was nobody about and I made a search over every inch of the ground so as not to lose a chance. I went down even into the vaults where the dim light struggled although to do so was a dread to my very soul into two of these I went, but saw nothing except fragments of old coffins and piles of dust. In the third however I made a discovery there in one of the great boxes of which there were fifty in all on a pile of newly dug earth lay the Count. He was either dead or asleep. I could not say which for eyes were open and stony but without the glassiness of death and the cheeks had the warmth of life though all their pallor the lips were as red as ever but there was no sign of movement, no pulse, no breath, no beating of the heart. I bent over him and tried to find any sign of life but in vain. He could not have laying there long for the earthy smell would have passed away in a few hours. By the side of the box was its cover pierced with holes here and there. I thought he might have the keys on him and when I went to search I saw the dead eyes and in them dead though they were such a look of hate though unconscious of me or my presence that I fled from the place and leaving the Count's room by the window crawled again up the castle wall. After gaining my room I threw myself panting upon the bed and tried to think. 29 June Today's the date of my last letter and the Count has taken steps to prove that it was genuine for again I saw him leave the castle by the same window and in my clothes. As he went down the wall lizard fashion I wished I had a gun or some lethal weapon that I might destroy him but I fear that no weapon wrought alone by man's hand would have any effect on him. I dared not wait to see him return for I feared to see those weird sisters. I came back to the library and read there till I fell asleep. I was awakened by the Count who looked at me as grimly as a man could look, as he said. Tomorrow my friend we must part. You return to your beautiful England I to some work which may have such an end that we may never meet. Your letter home has been dispatched. Tomorrow I shall not be here but all shall be ready for your journey. In the morning come the Sagani who have some labours of their own here and also some Slovaks. When they have gone my carriage shall come for you and shall bear you to the Borgo Pass to meet the diligence from Bucovina to Bistritz but I am in hopes that I shall see more of you at Castle Dracula. I suspected him and determined to test his sincerity. Sincereity! It seems like a profanation of the word to write it in connection with such a monster so I asked him point blank. Why may I not go to-night? Because, dear sir, my coachmen and horses are away on a mission. But I would walk with pleasure. I want to get away at once. He smiled such a soft, smooth, diabolical smile that I knew there was some trick behind his smoothness. He said, And your baggage? I do not care about it. I can send for it some other time. Count stood up and said with a sweet courtesy which made me rub my eyes it seemed so real. You English have a saying which is close to my heart for its spirit is that which rules our boyars. Welcome the coming. Speed the parting guest. Come with me, my dear young friend. Not an hour shall you wait in my house against your will though sad I am at your going and that you so suddenly desire it. Come with a stately gravity. He with the lamp preceded me down the stairs and along the hall. Suddenly he stopped. Hark! Close at hand came the howling of many wolves. It was almost as if the sound sprang up at the rising of his hand just as the music of a great orchestra seems to leap under the baton of the conductor. After a pause of a moment he receded in his stately way to the door drew back the ponderous boats unhooked the heavy chains and began to draw it open. To my intense astonishment I saw that it was unlocked. Suspiciously I looked all round but could see no key of any kind. As the door began to open the howling of the walls without grew louder and angrier the red jaws with champing teeth and the blunt clawed feet as they leaped came in through the opening door. I knew that to struggle at the moment against the count was useless. With such allies as these at his command I could do nothing. But still the door continued slowly to open and only the count's body stood in the gap. Suddenly it struck me that this might be the moment and means of my doom. I was to be given to the walls and at my own instigation. There was a diabolical wickedness in the idea great enough for the count and as the last chance I cried out shut the door, I shall wait till morning and I covered my face with my hands to hide my tears of bitter disappointment. With one sweep of his powerful arm the count threw the door shut and the great bolts clanged and echoed through the hall as they shot back into their places. In silence we returned to the library and after a moment or two I went to my own room. The last I saw of Count Dracula was his kissing his hand to me with a red light of triumph in his eyes and with a smile that Judas in Hell might be proud of. When I was in my room and about to lie down I thought I heard a whispering at my door. I went to it softly and listened and lest my ears deceived me I heard the voice of the Count back, back to your own place your time is not yet come wait, have patience tonight is mine tomorrow night is yours. There was a low sweet ripple of laughter and in a rage I threw open the door and saw without the three terrible women licking their lips as I appeared they all joined in a horrible laugh and ran away. I came back to my room and threw myself on my knees it is then so near the end tomorrow, tomorrow Lord help me and those to whom I am dear 30 June these may be the last words I ever write in this diary I slept till just before the dawn and when I woke I threw myself on my knees for I determined that if death came you should find me ready at last I felt the subtle change in the air and knew that the morning had come then came the welcome cock crow and I felt that I was safe with a glad heart I opened the door ran down the hall I had seen that the door was unlocked and now escape was before me with hands that trembled with eagerness I unhooked the chains and threw back the massive boats but the door would not move despair seized me I pulled and pulled at the door and shook it till massive as it was it rattled in its casement I could see the boat shot it had been locked after I left the count then a wild desire took me to obtain the key at any risk and I determined then and there to scale the wall again and gain the count's room he might kill me but death now seemed the happier choice of evils without a pause I rushed up to the east window and scrambled down a wall as before into the count's room it was empty but that was as I expected I could not see a key anywhere but the heap of gold remained I went through the door in the corner and down the winding stair and along the dark passage to the old chapel I knew now well enough where to find the monster I sought the great box was in the same place but the lid was laid on it not fastened down but with the nails ready in their places to be hammered home I knew I must reach the body for the key so I raised the lid and laid it back against the wall and then I saw something which filled my very soul with horror there lay the count but looking as if his youth had been half restored the white hair and moustache were changed to dark iron grey the cheeks were fuller and the white skin seemed ruby red underneath the mouth was redder than ever for on the lips were gouts of fresh blood which trickled from the corners of the mouth and ran down over the chin and neck even the deep burning eyes seemed set amongst swollen flesh for the lids and pouches underneath were bloated it seemed as if the whole awful creature was simply gorged with blood he lay like a filthy leech exhausted with his repletion I shuddered as I bent over to touch him and every sense in me revolted at the contact but I had to search or I was lost the coming night might see my own body a banquet in a similar war to those horrid three I felt all over the body but no sign could I find of the key then I stopped and looked at the count there was a mocking smile on the bloated face which seemed to drive me mad this was the being I was helping to transfer to London where perhaps for centuries to come he might amongst its teeming millions satiate his lust for blood and create a new and ever-widening circle of semi-demons to baton on the helpless the very thought drove me mad a terrible desire came upon me to rid the world of such a monster there was no lethal weapon at hand but I seized a shovel which the workmen had been using to fill the cases and lifting it high struck with the edge downward at the hateful face but as I did so the head turned and the eyes fell upon me with all their blaze of basilisk horror the sight seemed to paralyze me and the shovel turned in my hand and glanced from the face merely making a deep gash above the forehead the shovel fell from my hands across the box and as I pulled it away the flange of the blade caught the edge of the lid which fell over again and hid the horrid thing from my sight the last glimpse I had was of the bloated face blood stained and fixed with a grin of malice which would have held its own in the nethermost hell I thought and thought what should be my next move but my brain seemed on fire and I waited with a despairing feeling growing over me as I waited I heard in the distance a gypsy song sung by merry voices coming closer and through their song the rolling of heavy wheels and the cracking of whips the sagani and the slovaks of whom the count had spoken were coming with a last look around and at the box which contained the vile body I ran from the place and gained the count's room determined to rush out at the moment the door should be opened with strained ears I listened and heard downstairs the grinding of the key in the great lock and the falling back of the heavy door there must have been some other means of entry or someone had a key for one of the locked doors then there came the sound of many feet tramping and dying away in some passage which sent up a clanging echo I turned to run down again towards the vault where I might find the new entrance but at the moment there seemed to come a violent puff of wind and the door to the winding stair blew too with a shock that sent the dust from the lintels flying when I ran to push it open I found that it was hopelessly fast I was again a prisoner and the net of doom was closing round me more closely as I write there is in the passage below a sound of many tramping feet and the crash of weights being set down heavily doubtless the boxes with their freight of earth there was a sound of hammering it is the box being nailed down now I can hear the heavy feet tramping again along the hall with many other idle feet coming behind them the door is shut the chains rattle there is a grinding of the key in the lock I can hear the key withdrawn then another door opens and shuts I hear the creaking of lock and both Hark! in the courtyard and down past the rocky way the roll of heavy wheels the crack of whips and the chorus of the sagani as they pass into the distance I am alone in the castle with those horrible women For Meena is a woman and there is naught in common they are devils of the pit I shall not remain alone with them I shall try to scale the castle wall farther than I have yet attempted I shall take some of the gold with me lest I want it later I may find a way from this dreadful place and then away for home away to the quickest and nearest train away from the cursed spot from this cursed land where the devil and his children still walk with earthly feet at least God's mercy is better than that of those monsters and the precipice is steep and high at its foot a man may sleep as a man goodbye all Meena Dracula by Bram Stoker Chapter 5 Read by Dennis Sayers Letter from Miss Meena Murray to Miss Lucy Westonra Ninth of May my dearest Lucy forgive my long delay in writing but I have been simply overwhelmed with work the life of an assistant schoolmistress is sometimes trying I am longing to be with you and by the sea where we can talk together freely and build our castles in the air I've been working very hard lately because I want to keep up with Jonathan's studies and I have been practicing shorthand very assiduously when we are married I shall be able to be useful to Jonathan and if I can stenograph well enough I can take down what he wants to say in this way and write it out for him on the typewriter at which also I am practicing very hard he and I sometimes write letters in shorthand and he is keeping a stenographic journal of his travels abroad when I am with you I shall keep a diary in the same way I don't mean one of those two pages to the week with Sundays squeezed in a corner diaries but a sort of journal which I can write in whenever I feel inclined I do not suppose there will be much of interest to other people but it is not intended for them I may show it to Jonathan some day if there is anything in it worth sharing but it really is an exercise book I shall try to do what I see lady journalists doing interviewing and writing descriptions and trying to remember conversations I am told that, with a little practice one can remember all that goes on all that one hears said during a day however we shall see I will tell you of my little plans when we meet I have just had a few hurried lines from Jonathan from Transylvania he is well and will be returning in about a week I am longing to hear all of his news it must be nice to see strange countries I wonder if we, I mean Jonathan and I shall ever see them together there is the ten o'clock bell ringing good-bye your loving Mina tell me all the news when you write you have not told me anything for a long time I hear rumours and especially of a tall, handsome, curly-haired man Letter Lucy Weston Ra to Mina Murray Seventeen Chatham Street, Wednesday my dearest Mina I must say you tax me very unfairly with being a bad correspondent I wrote you twice since we parted and your last letter was only your second besides I have nothing to tell you there is really nothing to interest you town is very pleasant just now and we go a great deal to picture galleries and for walks and rides in the park as to the tall, curly-haired man I suppose it was the one who was with me at the last pop someone has evidently been telling tales that was Mr. Homewood he often comes to see us and he and Mamar get on very well together they have so many things to talk about in common we met some time ago a man that would just do for you if you were not already engaged to Jonathan he is an excellent party being handsome, well-off and of good birth he is a doctor and really clever just fancy he is only nine and twenty and he has an immense lunatic asylum all under his own care Mr. Homewood introduced him to me and he called here to see us and often comes now I think he is one of the most resolute men I ever saw and yet the most calm he seems absolutely imperturbable I can fancy what a wonderful power he must have over his patients he has a curious habit of looking one straight in the face as if trying to read one's thoughts he tries this on very much with me but I flatter myself he has got a tough nut to crack I know that from my glass do you ever try to read your own face? I do and I can tell you it is not a bad study and gives you more trouble than you can well fancy if you have never tried it he says that I afford him a curious psychological study and I humbly think I do I do not as you know take sufficient interest in dress to be able to describe the new fashions dress is a bore that is slang again but never mind Arthur says that every day there it is all out Meena we have told all our secrets to each other since we were children we have slept together and eaten together and laughed and cried together and now though I have spoken I would like to speak more oh Meena couldn't you guess I love him I am blushing as I write for although I think he loves me he has not told me so in words but oh Meena I love him I love him there that does me good I wish I were with you dear sitting by the fire undressing as we used to sit and I would try to tell you what I feel I do not know how I am writing this even to you I am afraid to stop or I should tear up the letter and I don't want to stop for I do so want to tell you all let me hear from you at once and tell me all that you think about it Meena pray for my happiness Lucy P.S. I need not tell you this is a secret good night again L Letter Lucy Westenra to Meena Murray May 24th my dearest Meena thanks and thanks and thanks again for your sweet letter it was so nice to be able to tell you and to have your sympathy my dear it never rains but it pours how true the old proverbs are here am I who shall be twenty in September and yet I never had a proposal till today not a real proposal and today I had three just fancy three proposals in one day and it awful I feel sorry really and truly sorry for two of the poor fellows oh Meena I am so happy that I don't know what to do with myself and three proposals but for goodness sake don't tell any of the girls or they would be getting all sorts of extravagant ideas and imagining themselves injured and slighted if in their very first day at home they did not get six at least some girls are so vain you and I Meena dear engaged and are going to settle down soon soberly into old married women can despise vanity well I must tell you about the three but you must keep it a secret dear from everyone except of course Jonathan you will tell him because I would if I were in your place certainly tell Arthur a woman ought to tell her husband everything don't you think so dear and I must be fair men like women certainly their wives to be quite as fair as they are and I am afraid are not always quite as fair as they should be well my dear number one came just before lunch I told you of him Dr. John Seward the lunatic asylum men with the strong John the good for it he was very cool outwardly but was nervous all the same he had evidently been schooling himself as to all sorts of little things and remembered them but he almost managed to sit down on his silk hat which men don't generally do when they are cool and then when he wanted to appear at ease he kept playing with a lancet in a way that made me nearly scream he spoke to me meaner very straight forwardly he told me how dear I was to him though he had known me so little and what his life would be with me to help and cheer him he was going to tell me how unhappy he would be if I did not care for him but when he saw me cry he said he was a brute and would not add to my present trouble then he broke off and asked if I could love him in time and when I shook my head his hands trembled and then with some hesitation he asked me if I cared already for anyone else he put it very nicely saying that he did not want to ring my confidence from me but only to know because if a woman's heart was free a man might have hope and then meaner I felt a sort of duty to tell him that there was someone I only told him that much and then he stood up and he looked very strong and very grave as he took both my hands in his and said he hoped I would be happy and that if I ever wanted a friend I must count him one of my best oh meaner dear I can't help crying and you must excuse this letter being all blotted being proposed to is all very nice and all that sort of thing but it isn't at all a happy thing when you have to see a poor fellow whom you know loves you honestly going away and looking all broken hearted and to know that no matter what he may say at the moment you are passing out of his life my dear I must stop here at present I feel so miserable though I am so happy evening Arthur has just gone and I feel in better spirits than when I left off so I can go on telling you about the day well my dear number two came after lunch he is such a nice fellow an American from Texas and he looks so young and so fresh that it seems almost impossible that he has been to so many places and has such adventures I sympathize with poor Desdemona when she had such a stream poured in her ear even by a black man I suppose that we women are such cowards that we think a man will save us from fears and we marry him I know now what I would do if I were a man and wanted to make a girl love me no I don't for there was Mr. Morris telling us his stories and Arthur never told any and yet my dear I am somewhat previous Mr. Quincy P. Morris found me alone it seems that a man always does find a girl alone no he doesn't for Arthur tried twice to make a chance and I helping him all I could I am not ashamed to say it now I must tell you beforehand that Mr. Morris doesn't always speak slang that is to say he never does so to strangers or before them for he is really well educated and has exquisite manners I do not doubt that it amused me to hear him talk American slang and whenever I was present and there was no one to be shocked he said such funny things I am afraid my dear he has to invent it all for it fits exactly into whatever else he has to say but this is a way slang has I do not know myself if I shall ever speak slang I do not know if Arthur likes it as I have never heard him use any as yet well Mr. Morris sat down beside me but I could see all the same that he was very nervous he took my hand in his and said ever so sweetly Miss Lucy I know I ain't good enough to regulate the fixings of your little shoes but I guess if you wait till you find a man that is you will go join them seven young women with the lamps when you quit won't you just hitch up alongside of me and let us go down the long road together driving in double harness well he did look so good humid and so jolly that it didn't seem half so hard to refuse him as it did poor Dr. Seward so I said as lightly as I could that I did not know anything of hitching and that I wasn't broken to harness at all yet then he said that he had spoken in a light manner and he hoped that if he had made a mistake in doing so on so grave so momentous an occasion for him I would forgive him he really did look serious when he was saying it and I couldn't help feeling a sort of exultation that he was number two in one day and then my dear before I could say a word he began pouring out a perfect torrent of love-making laying his very heart and soul at my feet he looked so earnest over it that I shall never again think that a man must be playful always and never earnest because he is merry at times I suppose he saw something in my face which checked him for he suddenly stopped and said with a sort of manly fervour that I could have loved him for I had been free Lucy you are an honest hearted girl I know I should not be here speaking to you as I am now if I did not believe you clean grit right through to the very depths of your soul tell me like one good fella to another is there anyone else that you care for and if there is I'll never trouble you a hairs breath again but will be if you will let me a very faithful friend my dear Mina why are men so noble when we women are so little worthy of them here was I almost making fun of this great hearted true gentleman I burst into tears I am afraid my dear you will think this a very sloppy letter in more ways than one and I really felt very badly why can't they let a girl merry three men or as many as want her and save all this trouble but this is heresy and I must not say it I am glad to say that though I was crying I was able to look into Mr. Morris' brave eyes and I told him out straight yes there is someone I love though he has not told me yet that he even loves me I was right to speak to him so frankly for quite a light came into his face and he put out both his hands and took mine I think I put them into his and said in a hearty way that's my brave girl it's better worth being late for a chance of winning you than being in time for any other girl in the world don't cry my dear but for me I'm a hard nut to crack and I take it standing up if that other fellow doesn't know his happiness well he better look for it soon or he'll have to deal with me little girl your honesty and pluck have made me a friend and that's rarer than a lover it's more selfish anyhow my dear I'm going to have a pretty lonely walk between this and kingdom come won't you give me one kiss it'll be something to keep off the darkness now and then you can you know if you like for that other good fellow he hasn't spoken yet that quite won me Mina for it was brave and sweet of him and noble too to a rival wasn't it and he's so sad so I lent over and kissed him he stood up with my two hands in his and as he looked down into my face I am afraid I was blushing very much he said little girl I hold your hand and you've kissed me and if these things don't make us friends nothing ever will thank you for your sweet honesty to me and goodbye he rung my hand and taking up his hat went straight out of the room without looking back without a tear or a quiver or a pause and I am crying like a baby oh why must a man like that be made unhappy when there are lots of girls about who would worship the very ground he trod on I know I would if I were free only I don't want to be free my dear this quite upset me and I feel I cannot write of happiness just at once after telling you of it and I don't wish to tell of the number three until it can be all happy ever your loving Lucy p.s. oh about number three I needn't tell you of number three need I besides it was also confused it seemed only a moment from his coming into the room till both his arms were round to me and he was kissing me I am very very happy and I don't know what I have done to deserve it I must only try in the future to show that I am not ungrateful to God for all his goodness to me in sending to me such a lover such a husband and such a friend goodbye Dr. Seward's Diary kept in phonograph 25 May Ebtide in appetite today cannot eat cannot rest so diary instead since my rebuff of yesterday I have a sort of empty feeling nothing in the world seems of sufficient importance to be worth doing as I knew that the only cure for this sort of thing was work I went amongst the patients I picked out one who has afforded me a study of much interest he is so quaint that I am determined to understand him as well as I can today I seem to get nearer than ever before to the heart of his mystery I questioned him more fully than I had ever done with a view to making myself master of the facts of his hallucination in my manner of doing it there was I now see something of cruelty I seem to wish to keep him to the point of his madness a thing which I avoid with the patients I would the mouth of hell memorandum under what circumstances would I not avoid the pit of hell omnia rome venalia sunt hell has its price if there be anything behind this instinct it will be valuable to trace it afterwards accurately so I had better commenced to do so therefore R. M. Renfield age 59 sanguine temperament great physical strength morbidly excitable periods of gloom ending in some fixed idea which I cannot make out I presume that the sanguine temperament itself and the disturbing influence end in a mentally accomplished finish a possibly dangerous man probably dangerous if unselfish in selfish men caution is as secure an armor for their foes as for themselves what I think on this point is when self is the fixed point the centripetal force is balanced with the centrifugal when duty a cause etc is the fixed point the latter force is paramount and only accident or a series of accidents can balance it and another health to be drunk won't you let this be at my campfire tomorrow night I have no hesitation in asking you as I know a certain lady is engaged to a sudden dinner party and that you are free there will only be one other a old pal at the Korea Jack Seward he's coming too and we both want to mingle our weeps over the wine cup and to drink a health with all our hearts the happiest man in all the wide world who has won the noblest heart that God has made and best worth winning we promise you a hearty welcome and a loving greeting and a health as true as your own right hand we shall both swear to leave you at home if you drink too deep into a certain pair of eyes come yours as ever and always Quincy P. Morris telegram from Arthur Holmwood to Quincy P. Morris 26 May count me in every time I bear messages which will make both your ears tingle art End of Chapter 5 Chapter 6 of Dracula this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Dracula by Bram Stoker Chapter 6 read by Elizabeth Clett Denny Sear Mina Murray's Journal 24th July Whitby Lucy met me at the station looking sweeter and lovelier than ever and we drove up to the house at the Crescent in which they have rooms this is a lovely place the little river, the Esk runs through a deep valley which broadens out as it comes near the harbour a great viaduct runs across with high piers through which the view seems somehow further away than it really is the valley is beautifully green and it is so steep that when you're on the high land on either side you look right across it unless you are near enough to see down the houses of the old town are all wide away from us are all red roofed and seem piled up one over the other anyhow like the pictures we see of Nuremberg right over the town as the ruin of Whitby Abbey which was sacked by the Danes and which is the scene of part of Marmian where the girl was built up in the wall it is a most noble ruin of immense size and full of beautiful and romantic bits there is a legend that a white lady is seen in one of the windows between it and the town there is another church the parish one round which is a big graveyard all full of tombstones this to my mind is the nicest spot in Whitby for it lies right over the town and has a full view of the harbour and all up the bay to where the headland called Kettleness stretches out into the sea it descends so steeply over the harbour that part of the bank has fallen away and some of the graves have been destroyed in one place part of the stonework of the graves stretches out over the sandy pathway far below there are walks with seats beside them through the churchyard and people go and sit there all day long looking at the beautiful view and enjoying the breeze I shall come and sit here often myself and work indeed I am writing now with my book and my knee and listening to the talk of three old men who are sitting beside me they seem to do nothing all day they sit here and talk the harbour lies below me with on the far side one long granite wall stretching out into the sea with a curve outwards at the end of it in the middle of which has a lighthouse a heavy sea wall runs along outside of it on the near side the sea wall makes an elbow crooked inversely and its end too has a lighthouse between the two piers there is a narrow opening into the harbour which then suddenly widens it is nice at high water but when the tide is out it shoals away to nothing and there is merely the stream of the esk running between banks of sand with rocks here and there outside the harbour on this side there rises for about half a mile a great reef the sharp of which runs straight out from behind the south lighthouse at the end of it is a buoy with a bell which swings in bad weather and sends in a mournful sound on the wind they have a legend here that when a ship is lost bells are heard out at sea I must ask the old man about this he is coming this way he is a funny old man he must be awfully old for his face is gnarled and twisted like the bark of a tree he tells me that he is nearly a hundred and that he was a sailor in the green and fishing fleet when Waterloo was fought he is, I am afraid, a very skeptical person for when I asked him about the bells at sea and the white lady at the abbey he said very brusquely I wouldn't fash Macel about them miss them things be all wore out mind I don't say they never was but I do say that they wasn't in my time they be all very well for comers and trippers and the like but not for a nice young lady like you them feet folks from York and Leeds that be always eating cured herons and drinking tea and looking out to buy cheap jet would creed out I wonder, Macel, who would be in a good mood I wonder, Macel, who would be bothering telling lies to them even the newspapers, which is full of fool talk I thought he would be a good person to learn interesting things from so I asked him if he would mind telling me something about the whale fishing in the old days he was just settling himself to begin when the clock struck six whereupon he laboured to get up and said I must gang again words home now miss my granddaughter doesn't like to be kept waiting when the tea is ready for it takes me time to cramble a boon the grease for there be a many of them and miss I lack belly timber sadly by the clock he hobbled away and I could see him hurrying as well as he could down the steps the steps are a great feature on the place they lead from the town to the church there are hundreds of them I do not know how many and they wind up in a delicate curve the slope is so gentle that a horse could easily walk up and down them I think they must originally have had something to do with the abbey I shall go home too Lucy went out visiting with her mother and as they were only duty calls I did not go 1st August I came up here an hour ago with Lucy and we had a most interesting talk with my old friend and the two others who always come and join him he is evidently the sir oracle of them and I should think must have been in his time a most dictatorial person he will not admit anything and down faces everybody if he can't out-argue them he bullies them and then takes his silence for agreement with his views Lucy was looking sweetly pretty in her white lawn frock she has got a beautiful colour since she has been here I notice that the old men did not lose any time in coming and sitting near her when we sat down she is so sweet with old people I think they all fell in love with her she has come and did not contradict her but gave me double share instead I got him on the subject of the legends and he went off at once into a sort of sermon I must try to remember it and put it all down it be all fool talk lock, stock and barrel that's what it be a note helps these buns and wafts and bogus and bar guests and boguls and all and ent them is only fit to such bairns and dizzy women a beldron they be note but air blebs they and all grims and signs and warrants be all invented by Parsons and illsome Burke bodies and railway touters to skier and scunner halflings and to get folks to do something that they don't other inclined to makes me ireful to think of them why it's them that not content with printing lies and paper and preaching them out of pulpits does want to be cut in them on the tombstones look here all round you where you wilt all them steens holding up their heads as well as they can out of their pride is a cant simply tumbling down with the weight of the lies wrote on them here lies the body or sacred to the memory wrote on all of them and yet in nigh half of them there beant no bodies at all and the memories of them beant care to pinch a snuff about much less sacred quare scodermen to the day of judgment when they come tumbling up in their death-sarks all juped together and trying to drag their tomb-steams with them to prove how good they was some of them trimlin' and ditherin' with their hands that doesn't and slippery from lyin' in the sea that they can't even keep their gurp of them I could see from the old fellow self-satisfied air and the way in which he looked round for the approval of his cronies that he was showing off so I put in a word to keep him going oh, Mr. Swales, you can't be serious surely these tomb-steams are not all wrong? yablins? there may be a porous few not wrong savin' where they make out the people too good for there be folk that do think a balm-bowl be like the sea if only it be their own the whole thing be only lies now look you here you come here a stranger and you see this Kirkgarth I nodded for I thought it better to ascend though I did not quite understand his dialect I knew it had something to do with the church he went on and you can't say that all these steams be a boon folk that hapt be here snod and snog I sent it again then that be just where the lie comes in why there be scores of these lay-bed that be tomb as old Dunn's back-a-box on Friday night he nudged one of his companions and they all laughed and my gog how could they be otherwise look at that one the aft-a-sabaft the beer-bank read it I went over and read Edward Spentslag master mariner murdered by pirates off the coast of Andres April 1854 age 30 when I came back Mr. Swales went on who brought him home I wonder where the body lay under why I could name you a dozen whose bones lie in the Greenland seas above he pointed northwards or where the currents may have drifted them there be the steams round you you can with your young eyes read the small print of the lies from here this Braithwaite Lowery I knew his father lost in the lively off Greenland in twenty or Andrew Woodhouse drowned in the same seas in 1777 or John Paxton caped farewell a year later or old John Rawlings whose grandfather sailed with me drowned in the gulf of Finland in fifty do you think that all these men will have to make a rush to Whitby when the trumpet sounds I have meanderums about it I tell you that when they got here they'd be jumbling and jostling one another in the way that it'd be ought to like a fight on the ice in the old days when we'd be at one another from daylight to dark and try and tie up our cuts by the Aurora Borealis this was evidently local pleasantry for the old man cackled over it and his cronies joined in with gusto but said I surely you are not quite correct for you start on the assumption that all the poor people all their spirits will have to take their tombstones with them on the day of judgment do you think that will really be necessary well what else be they tombstones for answer me that miss to please their relatives I suppose to please their relatives to please their relatives you suppose this he said with intense scorn how will it please their relatives to know that lies is wrote over them and that everybody in the place knows that they be lies he pointed to a stone at our feet which had been laid down as a slab on which the seat was rested close to the edge of the cliff read the lies on that rough stone he said the letters were upside down to me where I sat but Lucy was more opposite to them so she lent over and read sacred to the memory of George Cannon who died in the hope of a glorious resurrection on July 29th, 1873 falling from the rocks at Kettleness this tomb was erected by his soaring mother to her dearly beloved son he was the only son of his mother and she was a widow really, Mr. Swales, I don't see anything very funny in that she spoke her comment very gravely and somewhat severely you don't see old funny ha-ha! but that's because he don't go home the sorrow in mother was a hell-cat that hated him because he was a screwed, a regular lammeter he was and he hated her so that he committed suicide in order that she mightn't get an insurance he put on his life he blew nigh the top of his head off with an old musket that I had for scaring Crows with to aren't for Crows then for it brought the Cleggs and the dopes to him that's the way he fell off the rocks and as to hopes of a glorious resurrection I've often heard him say in the cell that he hoped he'd go to hell for his mother was so pious that she'd be sure to go to heaven and he didn't want to addle where she was now isn't that steam at any rate he hammered it with his stick as he spoke a pack of lies and would it make Gabriel Kekkel when Jordy comes panting out the grease with the top steam balanced on his hump and asked to be took his evidence I did not know what to say but Lucy turned to the conversation as she said, rising up oh, why did you tell us any of this it is my favourite seat and I cannot leave it and now I find I must go on sitting over the grave of a suicide that won't harm you, my pretty and it may make poor Jordy glad some to have so tremela sitting on his lap that won't hurt you why I've sat here often on for nigh twenty years past and it hasn't worn me no harm don't you fash about them as lies under you or that doesn't lie there either it'll be time for you to be getting scart when you see the tombsteens all run away with and the places bears a stubble field oh, there's the clock and I must gang my service to you ladies and off he hobbled Lucy and I sat a while and it was all so beautiful before us that we took hands as we sat and he told me over all again about Arthur and their coming marriage that made me just a little hard sick for I haven't heard from Jonathan for a whole month the same day I came up here alone for I'm very sad there is no letter for me I hope there cannot be anything the matter with Jonathan the clock has just struck nine I see the lights scattered all over the town sometimes in rows where the streets are and sometimes singly they run right up the esk and die away in the curve of the valley to my left the view is cut off by a black line of roof of the old house next to the abbey the sheep and lambs are bleeding in the fields away behind me and there is a clatter of donkeys hoofs up the paved road below the band on the pier is playing a harsh waltz in good time and farther along the key there is a Salvation Army meeting in a back street neither of the bands hears the other but up here I hear and see them both I wonder where Jonathan is and if he is thinking of me I wish he were here Dr. Seward's Diary 5 June the case of Wrenfield grows more interesting the more I get to understand the man he has certain qualities very largely developed selfishness secrecy and purpose I wish I could get at what is the object of the latter he seems to have some settled scheme of his own but what it is I do not know his redeeming quality is a love of animals though indeed he has such curious turns in it that I sometimes imagine he is only abnormally cruel his pets are of odd sorts just now his hobby is catching flies he has at present such a quantity that I have had myself to expostulate to my astonishment he did not break out into a fury as I expected but took the matter in simple seriousness he thought for a moment and then said may I have three days away of course I said that would do I must watch him 18 June he has turned his mind now to spiders and has got several very big fellows in a box he keeps feeding them his flies and the number of the latter is becoming sensibly diminished although he has used half his food in attracting more flies from outside to his room 1 July his spiders are now becoming as great a nuisance as his flies and today I told him that he must get rid of them he looked very sad at this so I said that he must some of them at all events he cheerfully acquiesced in this and I gave him the same time as before for reduction he disgusted me much while with him for when a horrid blowfly bloated with some carrying food buzzed into the room he caught it held it exultantly for a few moments between his finger and thumb and before I knew what he was going to do put it in his mouth I scolded him for it but he argued quietly that it was very good and very wholesome that it was life strong life and gave life to him this gave me an idea or the rudiment of one I must watch how he gets rid of his spiders he has evidently some deep problem in his mind for he keeps a little notebook in which he is always jotting down something whole pages of it are filled with masses of figures generally single numbers added up in batches and then the totals added in batches again as though he were focusing some account as the auditors put it 8 July in his madness and the rudimentary idea in my mind is growing it will be a whole idea soon and then unconscious celebration you will have to give the wall to your conscious brother I kept away from my friend for a few days so that I might notice if there were any change things remained as they were but that he has parted with some of his pets and got a new one he has managed to get a sparrow and has already partially tamed it his means of taming is simple for already the spiders have diminished those that do remain however are well fed for he still brings in the flies by tempting them with food 19 July we are progressing my friend has now a whole colony of sparrows and his flies and spiders are almost obliterated when I came in he ran to me and said he wanted to ask me a great favor a very, very great favor and as he spoke he fond on me like a dog to teach him what it was and he said with a sort of rapture in his voice and bearing a kitten a nice little sleek playful kitten that I can play with and teach and feed and feed and feed I was not unprepared for this request for I had noticed how his pets went on increasing in size in vivacity but I did not care that his pretty family of tamed sparrows should be wiped out in the same manner as the flies and spiders so I said I would see about it and asked him if he would not rather have a cat than a kitten his eagerness betrayed him as he answered oh yes I would like a cat I only asked for a kitten lest you should refuse me a cat no one would refuse me a kitten would they I shook my head and said that at present I feared it would not be possible but that I would see about it his face fell and I could see a warning of danger in it for there was a sudden fierce side long look which meant killing the man is an undeveloped homicidal maniac I shall test him with his present craving and see how it will work out then I shall know more 10 p.m. I have visited him again and found him sitting in a corner brooding when I came in he threw himself on his knees before me and implored me to let him have a cat that his salvation depended on it I was firm however and told him that he could not have it whereupon he went without a word and sat down gnawing his fingers in the corner where I had found him I shall see him in the morning early 20 July visited Ringfield very early before attendant went his rounds found him up and humming a tune he was spreading out his sugar which he had saved in the window and was manifestly beginning his fly catching again and beginning it cheerfully and with a good grace I looked around for his birds and not seeing them asked him where they were he replied without turning round that they had all flown away there were a few feathers about the room and on his pillow a drop of blood I said nothing but went and told the keeper to report to me if there was anything odd about him during the day 11 a.m. attendant has just been to see me to say that Ringfield has been very sick and has disgorged a whole lot of feathers my belief is doctor that he has eaten his birds and that he just took them and ate them raw 11 p.m. I gave Ringfield a strong opiate tonight enough to make even him sleep and took away his pocketbook to look at it the thought that has been buzzing about my brain lately is complete and the theory is proved my homicidal maniac is of a peculiar kind I shall have to invent a new classification for him and call him a zoophagus and he has laid himself out to achieve it in a cumulative way he gave many flies to one spider and many spiders to one bird and then wanted a cat to eat the many birds what would have been his later steps it would almost be worth while to complete the experiment it might be done if there were only a sufficient cause men sneered at vivisection and yet look at its results today why not advance science in its most difficult and vital aspect the knowledge of the brain had I even the secret of one such mind and I hold the key to the fancy of even one lunatic I might advance my own branch of science to a pitch compared with which burden Sanderson's physiology or farrier's brain knowledge would be as nothing if only there were a sufficient cause I must not think too much of this or I may be tempted good cause might turn the scale with me for may not I too be of an exceptional brain congenitally how well the man reasoned lunatics always do within their own scope I wonder at how many lives he values a man or if at only one he has closed the account most accurately and today begun a new record how many of us begin a new record with each day of our lives to me it seems only yesterday that my whole life ended with my new hope and that truly I began a new record so it shall be until the great recorder sums me up and closes my ledger account with a balance to profit or loss oh Lucy Lucy I cannot be angry with you nor can I be angry with my friend whose happiness is yours but I must only wait on hopeless and work work work if I could have as strong a cause as my poor mad friend there a good unselfish cause to make me work that would be indeed happiness Mina Murray's Journal 26 July I am anxious and it soothes me to express myself here it is like whispering to one's self and listening at the same time and there is also something about the shorthand symbols that makes it different from writing I am unhappy about Lucy and about Jonathan I had not heard from Jonathan for some time and was very concerned but yesterday dear Mr. Hawkins who is always so kind sent me a letter from him I had written asking him if he had heard and he said the enclose had just been received it is only a line dated from Castle Dracula and says that he is just starting but it's not like Jonathan I do not understand it and it makes me uneasy then too Lucy although she is so well has lately taken to her old habit of walking in her sleep her mother has spoken to me about it and we have decided that I am to lock the door of our room every night Mrs. Weston rose got an idea that sleepwalkers always go out on roofs of houses and along the edges of cliffs and then get suddenly wakened or fall over with a despairing cry that echoes all over the place poor dear she is naturally anxious about Lucy and tells me that her husband, Lucy's father had the same habit and that he would get up in the night and dress himself and go out if you were not stopped Lucy is to be married in the autumn and she is already planning out her dresses and how her house is to be arranged I sympathize with her for I do the same only Jonathan and I will start in life in a very simple way to make both ends meet Mr. Holmwood he is the Honorable Arthur Holmwood only son of Lord Godelming is coming up here very shortly as soon as he can leave town for his father is not very well and I think dear Lucy is counting the moments till he comes she wants to take him up to the seat in the churchyard cliff and show him the beauty of Whitby I dare say it is the waiting which disturbs her she will be all right when he arrives 27th July no news from Jonathan I am getting quite uneasy about him though why I should I do not know but I do wish that he would write if it were only a single line Lucy walks more than ever and each night I am awakened by her moving about the room fortunately the weather is so hot that she cannot get cold but still the anxiety and the perpetually being awakened is beginning to tell on me and I am getting nervous and wakeful myself thank God Lucy's health keeps up Mr. Holmwood has been suddenly called to ring to see his father who has been taken seriously ill Lucy frets at the postponement of seeing him but it does not touch her looks she is a trifle stouter and her cheeks are a lovely rose pink she has lost the anemic look which she had I pray it will all last 3rd August another week has gone by and no news from Jonathan to Mr. Hawkins from whom I have heard how I do hope he is not ill he surely would have written I look at that last letter of his but somehow it does not satisfy me it does not read like him and yet it is his writing there is no mistake of that Lucy has not walked much in her sleep the last week but there is an odd concentration about her which I do not understand even in her sleep she seems to be watching me she tries the door and finding it locked goes about the ROM searching for the key 6th August another three days and no news this suspense is getting dreadful if I only knew where to write to or where to go to I should feel easier but no one has heard a word of Jonathan since that last letter I must only pray to God for patience Lucy is more excitable than ever but is otherwise well last week was very threatening and the fishermen say that we are in for a storm I must try to watch it and learn the weather signs today is a grey day and the sun as I write is hidden in thick clouds high over kettleness everything is grey except the green grass which seems like emerald amongst it grey earthy rock grey clouds tinged with the sunburst at the far edge hang over the grey sea into which the sand points stretch like grey figures the sea is tumbling in over the shallows and the sandy flats with a roar muffled in the sea mists drifting inland the horizon is lost in a grey mist all vastness the clouds are piled up like giant rocks and there is a brule over the sea that sounds like some passage of doom dark figures are on the beach here and there sometimes half shrouded in the mist and seem men like trees walking the fishing boats are racing for home and rise and dip in the ground swell as they sweep into the harbour bending to the scuppers here comes old Mr. Swales he is making straight for me and I can see by the way he lifts his hat that he wants to talk I have been quite touched by the change in the poor old man when he sat down beside me he said in a very gentle way I want to say something to you miss I could see he was not at his ease so I took his poor old wrinkled hand in mine and asked him to speak fully so he said leaving his hand in mine I'm afraid my dearie that I must have shocked you by all the wicked things I've been saying about the dead and such like for weeks past but I didn't mean them and I want you to remember that when I'm gone we old folks that be daffled and with one foot above to the crookhole don't altogether like to think of it and we don't want to feel scarred of it and that's why I've took to make in light of it and rubbed my own heart a bit but lord love you miss I ain't afraid of dying, not a bit only I don't want to die if I can help it my time must be nigh at hand no for I be odd and a hundred years is too much for any man to expect and I'm so nigh at that a odd man is already wet in his scythe you see I can't get out of the habit of caffin about it all at once the chaffs will wag as they be used to some day soon the angel of death will trump it for me but don't you do all and greet me dearie for he saw that I was crying if he should come this very night I'd not refuse to answer his call for life be after all only a waiting for something else than what we're doing and death be odd that we can rightly depend on but I'm content for it's coming to me my dearie and coming quick it may be coming while we be looking and wondering maybe it's in that wind out over the sea that's bringing with it loss and wreck sad hearts look look he cried suddenly there's something in that wind and in the house beyond that sounds and looks and tastes and smells like death it's in the air I feel it coming Lord make me answer cheerful when my call comes he held up his arms devoutly and raised his hat his mouth moved as though he were praying after a few minutes silence he got up shook hands with me dressed me and said goodbye and hobbled off it all touched me and upset me very much I was glad when the Coast Guard came along with his spy-glass under his arm he stopped to talk with me as he always does but all the time kept looking at a strange ship I can't make her out he said she's a Russian by the look of her but she's knocking about in the queerest way she doesn't know her mind a bit coming but can't decide whether to run up north in the open or to put in here look there again she's steered mighty strangely for she doesn't mind the hand on the wheel changes about with every puff of wind we'll hear more of her before this time tomorrow