summoned to here by my friend John Seward I have known so many good
people and seen such nobility that I feel more than ever, and it
has grown with my advancing years, the loneliness of my life.
Believe me, then, that I come here full of respect for you, and you
have given me hope, hope, not in what I am seeking of, but that
there are good women still left to make life happy, good women,
whose lives and whose truths may make good lesson for the children
that are to be. I am glad, glad, that I may here be of some use to
you. For if your husband suffer, he suffer within the range of my
study and experience. I promise you that I will gladly do all for
him that I can, all to make his life strong and manly, and your
life a happy one. Now you must eat. You are over-wrought and
perhaps over-anxious. Husband Jonathan would not like to see you so
pale, and what he like not where he love, is not to his good.
Therefore for his sake you must eat and smile. You have told me
about Lucy, and so now we shall not speak of it, lest it distress.
I shall stay in Exeter tonight, for I want to think much over what
you have told me, and when I have thought I will ask you questions,
if I may. And then too, you will tell me of husband Jonathan's
trouble so far as you can, but not yet. You must eat now,
afterwards you shall tell me all."
After lunch, when we went back to the drawing room, he said to
me, "And now tell me all about him."
When it came to speaking to this great learned man, I began to
fear that he would think me a weak fool, and Jonathan a madman,
that journal is all so strange, and I hesitated to go on. But he
was so sweet and kind, and he had promised to help, and I trusted
him, so I said,
"Dr. Van Helsing, what I have to tell you is so queer that you
must not laugh at me or at my husband. I have been since yesterday
in a sort of fever of doubt. You must be kind to me, and not think
me foolish that I have even half believed some very strange
things."
He reassured me by his manner as well as his words when he said,things."
He reassured me by his manner as well as his words when he said,
"Oh, my dear, if you only know how strange is the matter regarding
which I am here, it is you who would laugh. I have learned not to
think little of any one's belief, no matter how strange it may be.
I have tried to keep an open mind, and it is not the ordinary
things of life that could close it, but the strange things, the
extraordinary things, the things that make one doubt if they be mad
or sane."
"Thank you, thank you a thousand times! You have taken a weight
off my mind. If you will let me, I shall give you a paper to read.
It is long, but I have typewritten it out. It will tell you my
trouble and Jonathan's. It is the copy of his journal when abroad,
and all that happened. I dare not say anything of it. You will read
for yourself and judge. And then when I see you, perhaps, you will
be very kind and tell me what you think."
"I promise," he said as I gave him the papers. "I shall in the
morning, as soon as I can, come to see you and your husband, if I
may."
"Jonathan will be here at half-past eleven, and you must come to
lunch with us and see him then. You could catch the quick 3:34
train, which will leave you at Paddington before eight." He was
surprised at my knowledge of the trains offhand, but he does not
know that I have made up all the trains to and from Exeter, so that
I may help Jonathan in case he is in a hurry.
So he took the papers with him and went away, and I sit here
thinking, thinking I don't know what.
LETTER (by hand), VAN HELSING TO MRS. HARKER
25 September, 6 o'clock
"Dear Madam Mina,
"I have read your husband's so wonderful diary. You may sleep
without doubt. Strange and terrible as it is, it is true! I will
pledge my life on it. It may be worse for others, but for him and
you there is no dread. He is a noble fellow, and let me tell you
from experience of men, that one who would do as he did in going
down that wall and to that room, aye, and going a second time, isdown that wall and to that room, aye, and going a second time, is
not one to be injured in permanence by a shock. His brain and his
heart are all right, this I swear, before I have even seen him, so
be at rest. I shall have much to ask him of other things. I am
blessed that today I come to see you, for I have learn all at once
so much that again I am dazzled, dazzled more than ever, and I must
think.
"Yours the most faithful,
"Abraham Van Helsing."
LETTER, MRS. HARKER TO VAN HELSING
25 September, 6:30 p. m.
"My dear Dr. Van Helsing,
"A thousand thanks for your kind letter, which has taken a great
weight off my mind. And yet, if it be true, what terrible things
there are in the world, and what an awful thing if that man, that
monster, be really in London! I fear to think. I have this moment,
whilst writing, had a wire from Jonathan, saying that he leaves by
the 6:25 tonight from Launceston and will be here at 10:18,so that
I shall have no fear tonight. Will you, therefore, instead of
lunching with us, please come to breakfast at eight o'clock, if
this be not too early for you? You can get away, if you are in a
hurry, by the 10:30 train, which will bring you to Paddington by
2:35. Do not answer this, as I shall take it that, if I do not
hear, you will come to breakfast.
"Believe me,
"Your faithful and grateful friend,
"Mina Harker."
JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL
26 September.—I thought never to write in this diary again, but
the time has come. When I got home last night Mina had supper
ready, and when we had supped she told me of Van Helsing's visit,
and of her having given him the two diaries copied out, and of how
anxious she has been about me. She showed me in the doctor's letter
that all I wrote down was true. It seems to have made a new man of
me. It was the doubt as to the reality of the whole thing that
knocked me over. I felt impotent, and in the dark, and distrustful.
But, now that I know, I am not afraid, even of the Count. He has
succeeded after all, then, in his design in getting to London, and