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 secrets, 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 informed 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 unconsciously formed adinner, which had been at six o'clock, we unconsciously 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. Jonathan sat next to me. Opposite us were Lord
Godalming, Dr. Seward, and Mr. Morris, Lord Godalming being next
the Professor, 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 ascertained 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 evidence
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 isare 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