I rose to my feet and stood there, so shocked I could not move. Van Helsing gave me a swift glance and began to bring Jonathan out of the trance. “You will wake now. There is nothing to fear. You feel at peace...”
Jonathan sat up suddenly, then leaned forward and dropped his face onto his hands, uttering a long drawn out groan. “My God. My God,” he said.
“You remember what you said?” Van Helsing asked.
“I remember... everything.”
“Madam Mina, come. Sit down,” Van Helsing said gently. “You keep the brandy... here? Sit, we shall all have a glass.”
He brought the brandy and three glasses from the sideboard, and we sipped in silence. Eventually Van Helsing said, “Madam Mina, painful as the question is, delicate as it is, I must ask it. Did you know, or suspect, or even imagine, that your lover was not Jonathan – but Dracula?”
“I – I cannot answer.” I found, to my shock, that I could not in honesty give a clear, “No.” This realization made me redden with shame, made Jonathan groan again and twist his head away. I said, trying to explain, as if I could, “That is, I felt that we were not ourselves, either of us. It was something beyond our power to control. Outlandish as it sounds, I believe we were both entranced in some way.”
Van Helsing only nodded, but he looked graver than ever. “And you, also, have felt that some evil force has tried to enter you, take over your spirit as it did your husband’s? In your journal, you describe a sound of wings...”
“Well, yes. I have sensed such things, more than once. But I held myself steady, and prayed, until whatever it was that tried to enter me gave up and left me alone. And I put it down to nervous fancy. Professor, tell us the truth! Is this all in our imaginations? Or is it... something more?”
He held my hand. “Little girl, I have not yet an answer. That you and Jonathan both have dreams and nightmares and bad feelings so alike – this might be no more than that you pick up each from the other, being so close. But I like it not. I like it not.”
Jonathan spoke up fiercely, “Well, what if it isn’t all in our minds? Now I can remember what happened, it seems utterly real! I was myself, yet somehow taken over by the Count’s accursed spirit, as if he were directing my actions, laughing at me. I acted in a most beast-like, unforgiveable way to my wife, before the fit was over! How am I to live with myself, not knowing why it is happening, or if it might happen again?”
I added, “There has been a feeling of doom upon us, regardless of what we do to cheer ourselves.”
Van Helsing was quiet, thinking. Jonathan went on hoarsely, “Is it possible that these events are not in our minds at all? That Dracula’s spirit – I won’t call it a soul – has somehow survived, and come for vengeance?”
As he spoke the gas-lights wavered. His words sent a shudder through me. I hoped desperately that Van Helsing would put our fears to rest, assuring us that it was all due to memory, some condition of the brain that might be corrected by scientific means. Instead, his noble face seemed to age five years with worry. “I wish I could assure you once and for all that your fears are unfounded. But without proof, I cannot. Perhaps such a creature Undead remains Undead for ever, in some form. And yet I cannot forget the expression of peace on the monster’s face as we delivered the final blows! Could such an expression be a deception, the precursor of a temporary sleep only, or knowledge that he dies not?”
“Professor, don’t!” I said quickly.
He saw me tremble, and pressed his hand on mind. “Forgive me, Madam Mina, I do not mean so to alarm you. I am thinking aloud. But you will see, I do not take your concerns lightly. You and your husband are not of fanciful disposition. And we would be fools not to consider even the possibility of some supernatural attack upon you, though God forbid it should be so.”
“What shall we do?”
“To begin, there are simple protections that we know are effective. All members of the household must wear crosses. I shall have garlic sent from Amsterdam, as before, to seal all windows and entrance to the house. And wild rose to put upon the doors.”
As he spoke, I saw Jonathan’s face working. Suddenly he jumped up and cried vehemently, “No! I will not have all that – that paraphernalia in the house again! It makes superstitious fools and prisoners of us all. Is there any proof that it would be effective against an attack upon our minds?”
Van Helsing shook his head. “No, but–”
“Then I won’t allow it!” Calming down, he sat beside me, his head in his hands. “No, Professor. None of that yet, I beg you. I do not want to believe that we have to go through all that sorrow again. The garlic and such might even summon the evil into some more substantial form.”
“How?” I gasped.
“By making it seem too real.”
Again a racking silence, as if our little world had been shaken by an earthquake.
“Perhaps Jonathan is right,” I said. “What would we tell Elena, Quincey and the servants? I don’t wish them to know anything of this tempest!”
We were silent for a while. Van Helsing gave a heavy sigh. “Very well, friend Jonathan. You are right, it has not come to that. For now, I ask only that you both continue to keep a record of all your dreams and moods, noting times of day or night. I watch over you. I study my books for some reference that may help. The question I ask is this: can a vampire have a ghost that haunts us? Or is it that our own minds turn against us – deceiving us that our memories are at peaceful rest, only to rear out of sleep like fiery dragons when least we expect it?”
Later
Sleep will not come. My lip is swollen and pains me, my head aches from turning our conversation over and over in my mind.
Now that I am watching for something to happen, nothing does!
A while ago, I went to Jonathan’s room. All I wanted was to slip my arms around him that we might comfort each other and thus find easeful rest. I went to his bedside and put my hand upon him, whispering, “Jonathan?” But he started away from me. When he turned up the lamp, his eyes were fierce with dread. “Keep away from me, Mina!” he said. “Until I am free of him, you must not come near me!”
“But Jonathan,” I said, “I am not afraid of you. I refuse to be afraid! I can’t sleep. Let me comfort you.”
Then a look of such cold suspicion crossed his face that it makes me weep to recollect it. “Did you come in here thinking to find him?”
The inference so horrified me that I gasped, and backed away. “If you think that, I – I cannot stay until I am free of this stain of suspicion!”
As if stricken by what he’d said, he reached out to me. “Mina – I am sorry – I–” But I fled the room, I could bear no more. We are both under some horrible spell. I feel so alone, I will see if Elena is awake.
Strange, Elena is not in her room! Nor was she in the kitchen, where I might have expected to meet a fellow non-sleeper. She may have been with Quincey – but as there was no light under his door, I did not wish to disturb him. Now I feel sleep coming at last, thank God. I will not fight it.
* * *
JONATHAN HARKER’S JOURNAL
4 November
Relations remain difficult between Mina and myself. After all these years without a cross word, never a moment of disharmony! I cannot believe it is happening – but I cannot forgive her, can barely bring myself to look at her.
It was not me to whom she submitted when those black fits came upon me, but to Dracula. She cannot, or will not, admit it, but I know the truth. We both know, and therefore we cannot speak openly, cannot even look each other in the eye. Of course we maintain the veneer of civility for the benefit of our guests – Elena suspects nothing – but Van Helsing is too shrewd to be fooled.
After breakfast he took me into the study and spoke fervently. “My friend, I beg your forgiveness for bringing this trouble to you!”
“What do you mean?” I said, puzzled. “The trouble is all ours; you are helping to alleviate it.”
“I mean that by hypnotizing
you, I brought to the surface matters between yourself and Mina that were better left unspoken. But now they are said, they poison the love between you. Ah, this is all my fault! I would do anything to undo it!”
To this I could say nothing, for he was right. Not that I blame him in any way!
For who is to blame? Myself, for being so weak as to let Dracula’s vile phantom inside me, or Mina, who resisted his attack on her mind yet welcomed his vicarious embrace? Oh God, dear God. Or is Dracula alone to blame? Surely it is part of his hellish power that we fail to see through his deceits? Yet how can we deny all responsibility? For every time we fail to resist evil, we collude with it.
Is it possible that Mina loved – loves – Dracula? Not love – let me not sully that purest of emotions – but a foul parody of affection that vampires weave to ensnare the sympathetic human mind. How else could she welcome him so fervently into her arms? Or is it simply that I have gone mad?
How I despise myself for casting such vile stains upon my wife’s character – she who has always been a perfect angel, to me and to everyone about us! Not her fault, I tell myself; she is too tender. But each time I look at her I remember her gleaming eyes, her parted lips, as if she had turned into one of those fiends from Castle Dracula.
I am sitting on the terrace as I write, trying to make sense of all this. Elena has come to sit beside me. She seems so serene. She says nothing yet her presence soothes me; as if, standing outside our trouble and untouched by it, she has the power to cleanse the taint from my soul... for a little while, at least.
* * *
MINA HARKER’S JOURNAL
4 November
Again I feel refreshed for a morning with Elena and Quincey, two innocents untouched by all this!
Van Helsing is talking of bringing Dr Seward and Lord Godalming here, but we have said no, not yet. We cannot ask them to fight an invisible enemy! Van Helsing is taking this so seriously, it alarms us more. It is a strain to carry on as normal, yet we must; it is our only hope, and of course our duty to protect Quincey and others.
I am doing all in my power to ensure a happy day and a peaceful night; that is, keeping everyone busy, and praying at every spare moment.
5 November
All is quiet at last. I am exhausted but I must record what has happened, painful as it is.
Last night, an hour after I had gone to bed and still lay awake, I thought I heard sounds of disturbance from another room – Van Helsing’s or Jonathan’s, for it was a man’s voice I could hear. It was hard to discern. He sounded as if he were arguing with himself, a sort of low growling punctuated by the occasional shout, and thumps as if furniture were being violently moved about. It was unspeakably chilling to hear these sounds, so faint I was not sure if I imagined them. I got up, put on a dressing-gown and went along the corridor.
The sound was coming from Van Helsing’s room; I met Jonathan, approaching from the other direction. “Perhaps he is ill,” I said. I was glad to see my husband, despite the barrier that has fallen between us.
Jonathan knocked but there was no answer. The sounds from inside the room were now distinct. Van Helsing was groaning, uttering staccato barks of pain, and there were muffled thumps as if he were throwing himself around the room. Urgently Jonathan tried the door, but found it locked. He knocked briskly, calling out, “Professor, what’s wrong? Let us in!”
At once the door shook, as if Van Helsing had thrown himself against it. He shouted in a gruff voice, “No! You cannot come in! Leave me, for your own safety!”
My sense of foreboding transfixed me. I took a step back, but Jonathan didn’t hesitate. He flung his shoulder to the door and the lock gave. The door burst inwards. Van Helsing, in his white nightrobe, was standing a few feet away; his bed was in disarray, his reading table overturned and books scattered everywhere. The wall mirror lay broken on the carpet. But this was nothing to the chaos of his expression. His pale hair was on end, his face savage and wild, and his eyes so bloodshot the whites were near scarlet.
“Professor, what has happened?” said Jonathan.
He started forward but Van Helsing put out his hands saying in a tortured, cracked tone, “No, no, Jonathan, keep away! Take your wife away, don’t come near, I beg you!”
I saw that he had a big knife in his right hand; the very bowie knife, I believe, that Quincey Morris used to slay Dracula. We both stood still a moment; I could find no power to speak or move. As we watched, Van Helsing, breathing fast and hard, turned the knife and began to force it towards his own left wrist. Sweat streamed down his high forehead.
Ignoring his warnings, Jonathan rushed to him. He tried to seize the arm that wielded the knife, crying, “No! What the devil are you doing?”
Van Helsing’s eyes blazed red and his lips drew back. Never did I dream that good wise face should show such savagery – but I never dreamed it of Jonathan, either. I cried out but neither man heeded me. Then Van Helsing turned the knife from himself and began to lash out at Jonathan instead. My husband put his arms up to defend himself. The blade came stabbing viciously at him and I held my breath as Van Helsing drove him around the room, slashing at him, his expression hideous.
“Fools!” he cried. “Now you see that I have power over each one of you, and I have all eternity to torment you to your graves and beyond!”
He slashed the arms of Jonathan’s nightshirt to rags. Red blood oozed through. Jonathan fell back on the bed, his arms across his face. He was crying out in agony. A great crimson weight of blood was gathering in his sleeve, dripping through the material onto the bed-linen. With a sob I rushed to him. Van Helsing, meanwhile, stumbled against the side of the bed and stopped, appearing to struggle within himself.
He gasped. He spoke strangled words of Dutch that I could not discern. His face flickered – almost physically changed – between his own physiognomy and another that was evil but horribly familiar to me. He lifted the knife, turned it towards himself and to my astonishment began to force the point two-handed towards his own diaphragm. His struggle was terrible to witness. I wanted to stop him but could not move. His mouth was wide open and his red eyes held mine all the time, making me feel somehow embarrassed – exposed – almost violated, as if an appalling intimacy were passing between us.
The blade indented the folds of his nightshirt. A spreading stain of blood appeared. I shrank back, cradling Jonathan against me, because I was sure Van Helsing meant to kill himself – but as soon as he drew blood, he uttered a terrible cry and fell heavily onto the bed beside us. The knife clattered away. Van Helsing lay gasping and shuddering.
I cannot say how long we remained there: a few minutes only, though it seemed a frozen, ghastly tableau at the time. Then Van Helsing sat up and put his head in his large hands. He was weeping. “My friends, it is worse, far worse than I could imagine. Your minds did not deceive you. Even dead, the vampire has a spirit that reaches through time to wreak vengeance. What are we to do?”
Some time later, after we had bound up both men’s wounds and taken some wine to fortify ourselves, Van Helsing told us what had happened.
“I undressed for bed, then sat at the table to study my books. I was not sleepy so I intended to work into the early hours. But as I read I begin to feel strange; the lamp seems dim and I cannot focus on the words. I have a hallucination that the inside of my skull is a great, dark room, and that a voice is whispering in the darkness. I feel a fluttering like bats’ wings, soft and intrusive, most unpleasant, but I cannot shake it off. And then I feel... I cannot describe it. I feel him come into this room, which is also my mind.”
“Dracula?” I asked. He nodded. “Are you sure?”
“I know that malevolent will all too well!” Van Helsing said hoarsely. “It could be no other. There is only one like him, with such an evil, primitive, arrogant spirit. He possessed me. I was still myself, and yet I knew I was him.”
“Yes,” Jonathan put in. “That’s how it was with me!”
“Our two spi
rits immediately begin to war against each other. I fight to drive him out. He laughs at me. ‘Now you know the extent of my power,’ says Dracula. ‘It is limitless. I can do worse than haunt you; I can control you. If I can order your actions, strongest of my enemies, how easily then can I possess those around you! Your good comrades, your sweet women-folk I can make do anything. And you will never know where I am or who to trust!’” Van Helsing slumped. “Well, I fight him with all my might. I must seem a madman, reeling around the room, shouting to myself – for the damage I cause, please forgive me – but I could not make him leave. Then it seemed to me that the only way to force him out was to harm my own body. I got the knife from among my belongings and that was when Jonathan entered. I begged you to stay away, knowing Dracula would try to harm you. He wanted to kill you, my friend!”
Shuddering, I leaned my head against my husband’s. Van Helsing went on, “I cannot begin to express my horror at what I was forced to do. I cannot ask you to forgive me. At last I knew that the only way to make him stop was to kill myself, to stake my own heart. That is what I tried to do. But the moment I pierced the skin, Dracula fled my body.” He was quiet for a moment, then groaned. “Mijn God, how are we to fight this? To banish him physically from the house was one thing – but to keep him from our very minds–! Must we destroy ourselves to destroy him?”
To see Van Helsing brought so low distressed me unutterably. I did my best to comfort and cheer the men, and they rallied, but my heart was not in it.
Jonathan’s right arm is very badly injured. The knife has severed some nerves and tendons in his forearm, and he can barely move the hand. Van Helsing said it is possible the damage may never heal. He wept with remorse for having inflicted the injury, but Jonathan spoke stoically though he was white with shock. “It was not you who did this, Professor. It was he, our enemy, Dracula.”
How extraordinary that Elena and Quincey should have slept through it! But what a mercy that they did!
6 November
Jonathan and Van Helsing are resting. We have had to tell Mary and the others that Jonathan slipped and cut his arm; I wish they would not fuss so! An atmosphere of oppression lies on the whole house and nothing will dispel it. We look upon each other with suspicion, watching for the slightest sign of – what can I call it? Possession, infection. What a terrible feeling it is to trust no-one, and not to be fully trusted! Surely, the last time, even in our deepest horror, we never lost faith in one another – even when I came so nearly into Dracula’s power.
Dracula the Undead: A Chilling Sequel to Dracula Page 12