got horses, and we follow on the track. I note this whilst
Godalming is getting ready. We have our arms. The Szgany must look
out if they mean to fight. Oh, if only Morris and Seward were with
us. We must only hope! If I write no more Goodby Mina! God bless
and keep you.
DR. SEWARD'S DIARY
5 November.—With the dawn we saw the body of Szgany before us
dashing away from the river with their leiter wagon. They
surrounded it in a cluster, and hurried along as though beset. The
snow is falling lightly and there is a strange excitement in the
air. It may be our own feelings, but the depression is strange. Far
off I hear the howling of wolves. The snow brings them down from
the mountains, and there are dangers to all of us, and from all
sides. The horses are nearly ready, and we are soon off. We ride to
death of some one. God alone knows who, or where, or what, or when,
or how it may be …
DR. VAN HELSING'S MEMORANDUM
5 November, afternoon.—I am at least sane. Thank God for that
mercy at all events, though the proving it has been dreadful. When
I left Madam Mina sleeping within the Holy circle, I took my way to
the castle. The blacksmith hammer which I took in the carriage from
Veresti was useful, though the doors were all open I broke them off
the rusty hinges, lest some ill intent or ill chance should close
them, so that being entered I might not get out. Jonathan's bitter
experience served me here. By memory of his diary I found my way to
the old chapel, for I knew that here my work lay. The air was
oppressive. It seemed as if there was some sulphurous fume, which
at times made me dizzy. Either there was a roaring in my ears or I
heard afar off the howl of wolves. Then I bethought me of my dear
Madam Mina, and I was in terrible plight. The dilemma had me
between his horns.
Her, I had not dare to take into this place, but left safe from
the Vampire in that Holy circle. And yet even there would be the
wolf! I resolve me that my work lay here, and that as to the wolveswolf! I resolve me that my work lay here, and that as to the wolves
we must submit, if it were God's will. At any rate it was only
death and freedom beyond. So did I choose for her. Had it but been
for myself the choice had been easy, the maw of the wolf were
better to rest in than the grave of the Vampire! So I make my
choice to go on with my work.
I knew that there were at least three graves to find, graves
that are inhabit. So I search, and search, and I find one of them.
She lay in her Vampire sleep, so full of life and voluptuous beauty
that I shudder as though I have come to do murder. Ah, I doubt not
that in the old time, when such things were, many a man who set
forth to do such a task as mine, found at the last his heart fail
him, and then his nerve. So he delay, and delay, and delay, till
the mere beauty and the fascination of the wanton Undead have
hypnotize him. And he remain on and on, till sunset come, and the
Vampire sleep be over. Then the beautiful eyes of the fair woman
open and look love, and the voluptuous mouth present to a kiss, and
the man is weak. And there remain one more victim in the Vampire
fold. One more to swell the grim and grisly ranks of the
Undead! …
There is some fascination, surely, when I am moved by the mere
presence of such an one, even lying as she lay in a tomb fretted
with age and heavy with the dust of centuries, though there be that
horrid odor such as the lairs of the Count have had. Yes, I was
moved. I, Van Helsing, with all my purpose and with my motive for
hate. I was moved to a yearning for delay which seemed to paralyze
my faculties and to clog my very soul. It may have been that the
need of natural sleep, and the strange oppression of the air were
beginning to overcome me. Certain it was that I was lapsing into
sleep, the open eyed sleep of one who yields to a sweet
fascination, when there came through the snow stilled air a long,
low wail, so full of woe and pity that it woke me like the sound of
a clarion. For it was the voice of my dear Madam Mina that Ia clarion. For it was the voice of my dear Madam Mina that I
heard.
Then I braced myself again to my horrid task, and found by
wrenching away tomb tops one other of the sisters, the other dark
one. I dared not pause to look on her as I had on her sister, lest
once more I should begin to be enthrall. But I go on searching
until, presently, I find in a high great tomb as if made to one
much beloved that other fair sister which, like Jonathan I had seen
to gather herself out of the atoms of the mist. She was so fair to
look on, so radiantly beautiful, so exquisitely voluptuous, that
the very instinct of man in me, which calls some of my sex to love
and to protect one of hers, made my head whirl with new emotion.
But God be thanked, that soul wail of my dear Madam Mina had not
died out of my ears. And, before the spell could be wrought further
upon me, I had nerved myself to my wild work. By this tim e I had
searched all the tombs in the chapel, so far as I could tell. And
as there had been only three of these Undead phantoms around us in
the night, I took it that there were no more of active Undead
existent. There was one great tomb more lordly than all the rest.
Huge it was, and nobly proportioned. On it was but one word.
DRACULA
This then was the Undead home of the King Vampire, to whom so
many more were due. Its emptiness spoke eloquent to make certain
what I knew. Before I began to restore these women to their dead
selves through my awful work, I laid in Dracula's tomb some of the
Wafer, and so banished him from it, Undead, for ever.
Then began my terrible task, and I dreaded it. Had it been but
one, it had been easy, comparative. But three! To begin twice more
after I had been through a deed of horror. For it was terrible with
the sweet Miss Lucy, what would it not be with these strange ones
who had survived through centuries, and who had been strenghtened
by the passing of the years. Who would, if they could, have fought
for their foul lives …
Oh, my friend John, but it was butcher work. Had I not been