Dracula The Un-Dead

by Dacre Stoker

  Basarab seemed to grow larger as he loomed over Stoker. The author retreated along the desk ’s edge.

  “It was Van Helsing who murdered Lucy Westenra, not Dracula. Van Helsing botched the blood transfusion and poisoned Lucy’s blood. Dracula turned her into a vampire to save her.”

  “What do you know of Professor Van Helsing?” Stoker asked, retreating farther into the room. He felt as if all the warmth had run out of his body.

  The candlelight threw living shadows across Basarab’s face. “Van Helsing’s arrogance is matched only by his ignorance.”

  Stoker’s courage waned under Basarab’s withering gaze. His breath ran short. The weakness in his threats were obvious. “If you are here as an advocate for Quincey Harker in some libelous lawsuit, I warn you . . .”

  “You’re just like the pompous hypocrites in your novel,” Basarab said. “You really believe that by merely standing up to perceived evil, that evil will fall?”

  Stoker could retreat no more. He was backed into a corner. The room seemed to grow darker. Basarab was so close that he completely filled Stoker’s vision. Those eyes! Those black eyes! Stoker could feel his left arm growing numb and cold. He was on the verge of tears.

  “Dracula was a monster of my own imagination!”

  “No! He was a hero who did what he must to survive.” Basarab’s voice filled with pride as his speech rose to a crescendo. “Prince Dracula was ordained by the Pope himself as Captain of the Crusades. He stood alone in the name of God against the entire Ottoman Empire. Dracula would never shrink in fear of a ridiculous ass like Van Helsing and run back to Transylvania. You are, in fact, guilty of slander!”

  Sweat poured down Stoker’s face. He leaned against the wall for support, rubbing his dead arm. The room seemed to spin and tilt. Stoker averted his eyes to avoid Basarab’s soul-piercing stare. Pain seared through his arm and into his neck as he struggled to breathe. Stoker forced himself to meet Basarab’s gaze, even as he sensed himself sliding to the floor. “Who are you?” he gasped.

  Basarab snapped his hand around Stoker’s neck and squeezed. His face appeared to contort into that of a wolf, snapping at Stoker. “I am a gauntlet thrown before you,” he said in an eerily calm whisper. “I am your judgment before God!” He released Stoker, his face curdled in disgust.

  It was as if Basarab’s grip had been the dam holding back the flood of pain. Searing agony shot up Stoker’s neck, along the side of his jaw and into his brain. He grabbed his skull. It felt as if a hot poker had been thrust into his eye. Stoker collapsed to the floor. Basarab turned away from him. Stoker reached out for help, but was paralyzed. His pleas came out as dry wheezes.

  He could only watch helplessly as Basarab took hold of his most prized possession: the Dracula playbook.

  Then, blackness.

  Quincey could feel Deane’s eyes upon him as he sat in the aisle seat of the first row. They had not exchanged a single word. Quincey was still looking at his hands on the stage, contemplating the ramifications of his rash actions. He had pushed too hard.

  Footsteps stage left. It was judgment time.

  Basarab emerged from the backstage shadows, holding a booklet under his arm. He looked downstage at Deane and said simply, “Fetch a doctor. I fear Mr. Stoker has suffered a stroke.”

  It was not until Deane pounded up the steps to the stage that he was certain he had heard correctly.

  “What are you waiting for? Fetch a doctor!” Deane shouted as he ran past Quincey. He shot Basarab a glare before disappearing backstage. The actor gave no reaction. Quincey turned to Basarab, and his mentor gave him a nod. Once again, he had his charge and he was off to carry out his orders. He leapt down to the house floor and started up the aisle. If Stoker died now, Quincey would never have the opportunity to question him about his book, his parents’ secrets, or Dracula. He had to move fast.

  “Fools, fools!” Basarab’s baritone voice boomed from the stage. Quincey stopped and turned back to see Basarab, center stage, reading from the playbook.

  “What devil or witch was ever so great as Attila, whose blood flows in these veins?”

  Quincey knew time was of the essence, but he found himself riveted. Basarab had become the character of Count Dracula. His voice was haunted and hollow, his Eastern European accent more pronounced. The regal elegance fell away from his posture. His entire body seemed almost wolflike as he stalked the stage. The transformation was so quick and remarkable that it was almost supernatural. It was a drastic contrast to John Barrymore’s farcical interpretation.

  “But the warlike days are over,” Basarab growled. “Blood is too precious a thing in these years of dishonorable peace, and the glories of the great Dracula are no more than a tale that is told.”

  Basarab stood downstage center; the footlights cast a chilling glow upon his face. In his eyes were centuries of torment. He was all blood and rage.

  No longer reading from the book, but reciting as if from memory, Basarab allowed it to slip from his fingers. The angry wolf transformed again. Tears welled in his haunted eyes, his muscles strained and his head arched into the spotlight. So much pain. So much despair. Quincey stood in awe, frozen. Basarab continued to speak as if the lines were born in the depths of his own soul.

  “Time has finally caught me,” Basarab said, his eyes staring directly at Quincey, burning into his flesh. “There is no place in this age of machines and politicians and intellect for monsters roaming the countryside. Choose to evolve, or choose to die.”

  Quincey felt as if his feet were bolted to the ground. Basarab had transformed Dracula into a tragic hero, and in some distress, Quincey thought that if Basarab could so easily find sympathy in Dracula, how would he ever persuade his mentor to raise up arms against the monster?

  The urgency of finding a doctor for Stoker jarred him back to reality. Quincey burst out through the theatre doors and ran up the street, calling for help. A man came forward, claiming to be a doctor, and Quincey raced with him back to the theatre.

  Perhaps Basarab was not the ally Quincey needed. The loss of Stoker as a source of information was just the start of it. The demon had won the first battle and he had not even raised a single finger.

  CHAPTER XXXII.

  Arthur Holmwood stepped into the front hall of his house and was surprised to find no one waiting for him. The staff had cleared up after the dinner party. The house was immaculate. It was quiet, like walking through a graveyard.

  After the ruination of her perfectly planned dinner party, Arthur had expected Beth to be in the front room with a stern expression. Her absence spoke volumes. He supposed she wanted nothing to do with him at present. Wentworth, his butler, was meant to wait for his master until relieved and should have been at the door to take his coat, hat, and walking stick, but he was also nowhere to be found. It dawned on him that Beth might have dismissed Wentworth for the night, leaving him to fend for himself; another attempt to strike back at him for the humiliation she had suffered.

  The horrifying memory of Lucy’s crime scene photograph flashed across his mind. Thus it had been all evening. Like a bad meal, the images came up again and again. He needed to wash them away. Dropping his coat and hat onto his deacon’s bench, he marched into his study and poured himself a drink. Then he opened his eyes wide and dropped the crystal goblet in utter disbelief.

  The portrait of Lucy was back over the fireplace.

  Holmwood’s temper was ready to erupt. It had to be Beth. Whatever injustice his wife felt she’d suffered, this was a horrifying retaliation.

  The sound of a footfall in the outer foyer caught his attention. “Beth?” There was no answer. “Wentworth?”

  Again, there was no answer. A shadow moved across the marble floor. Someone was out there.

  He called out, “Hello?”

  More footsteps were the only response.

  Holmwood sprang out from behind the study doorway. “Who’s there, I say?”

  The hall was still. He was alone. The
temperature dropped ten degrees. He heard the faint sound of breathing. He looked around and, once again, found no one. That was when he saw that the window was open. Mystery solved. He laughed at his own paranoia and went to close the window. He imagined his old legionnaire comrades laughing at him. He closed the latch and turned to head back to the study to resume his drinking when he caught a familiar scent. Lilac? Surely not at this time of year. He felt the hairs on his arm stand at attention as he remembered that lilac was the scent Lucy used to wear. He had imported it directly from Paris for her.

  A soft female voice broke the silence: “Ar-thur.”

  Holmwood spun around. He was alone.

  “Beth?” The sound of his voice seemed unnaturally loud as it echoed in the vaulted ceiling. A silvery laugh chimed, as if coming from all directions at once. He recognized that laugh. But it couldn’t be. His senses were deceiving him.

  “Arthur,” the voice said again.

  Now it was directly above him. He glanced up the main staircase. What he saw there made his blood run cold. A luminescent figure slowly descended toward him, her body swaying like a cat as she drew near. A thick mane of flaming red hair cascaded down her shoulders; her porcelain white skin reflected the moonlight from the window. Her breasts rose and fell with each step; her eyes were soulless and black, her luscious, bloodred lips pouting. Her shroudlike white gown was torn, tattered, sheer, and revealing.

  “Lucy?!” Holmwood gasped, still unable to believe his eyes.

  She replied with that silvery harp laugh, revealing her sharp, glimmering teeth, and glided down the winding staircase.

  He fought to breathe. Every instinct, every fiber of his body wanted to take her into his arms. But Lucy was dead. His love was dead.

  As if she could read his innermost desires, she looked at him with sad compassion and said, “I know you wish to be with me, my beloved.”

  Lucy’s voice swept over him like a cleansing wave. It was as if time had stopped, and all the pain of the last twenty-five years had been washed away. Lucy opened her hands. A white mist emanated from her palms, drifting to the floor. As the mist gathered at her feet, she rose into the air, held aloft by its cushion.

  “Death is only the beginning, my love. There is so much more to life than the boundaries of the flesh.” She floated toward him.

  “No! This cannot be!” He had just seen the photographs of Lucy’s remains in her tomb. The shock of it was undoubtedly affecting his senses.

  “It’s dark here, Arthur. I’m so lonely. My arms ache to hold you.”

  No! Lucy was supposed to be in the light. Van Helsing had promised that plunging the stake into her heart would release her soul to heaven. . . .

  Lucy neared him, her arms outstretched. He felt torn in two. He so desperately wanted to embrace her once again. It was the same longing he had felt outside her mausoleum that fateful night. This time, there would be no Van Helsing to interfere.

  She was on top of him. He closed his eyes as he felt those gentle lips kiss him. Her touch was so electrifying, it felt as if his heart beat for the first time in a quarter-century. Her lips pulled suddenly away. No, he wanted the kiss to last for eternity.

  “Lucy, you don’t have to be alone. Let me be with you in the dark.”

  He opened his eyes and his heart stopped again. Lucy’s beautiful face exploded with horrific putrescence. Her face cracked and decomposed. Her pale skin turned purple. The scent of lilac soured into the stench of the grave. Lucy’s eyes sank back into her skull-like head, and her lips receded and tightened, revealing the extent of her fangs. Worms erupted from the arms encircling his neck, crawling through her rotted flesh. She opened her mouth to speak, only to vomit forth a waterfall of wriggling maggots.

  Holmwood stumbled back against the wall, frozen in fear. His love had become a nightmare. “Have pity on me!” he cried.

  Lucy’s muscles and sinews liquefied into black ooze, dripping off her bones. Her beautiful, harplike voice was gone. A hollow bell rang in her mouth. “Pity? The same pity you had for me when you drove the stake into my heart . . . my love!”

  Growling like a rabid animal, she pounced upon him, slamming him against the wall. Her bony talons pierced his wrists as she spread his arms, nailing them into the rosewood paneling, crucifying him. Holmwood screamed in agony.

  Lucy’s jaw unhinged, opening impossibly wide. Her fangs positioned themselves over his throat. His shrieks were silenced as she tore the larynx from his throat. In his last horrifying seconds, Arthur Holmwood witnessed his beloved Lucy tilt her head back in ecstasy, bathing in his blood.

  “Lucy!” he screamed as he sat up in the darkness, bewildered and lost. Was he dead? As his eyes focused, he realized he was in his bed. He reached to touch his neck. No wound, no blood. Merely a nightmare. He was breathing so quickly, his heart beating so fast, he thought he would have a heart attack.

  Holmwood heard a muffled sob beside him. With great trepidation he looked across.

  It was Beth. She was crying. There was agony in her eyes, such agony as he had never seen before. He knew what had happened. He had called out Lucy’s name in his sleep. He could only imagine the hurt Beth must have felt. Without a word, his wife ran out of the room. Though muffled from behind the wooden door of the closet, her sobs were no less painful to hear.

  He knew there were no words of comfort that would take away her pain. He despised himself. Beth’s love for him was deep and real. Yet, the more she loved him, the more he pushed her away. Even in death, he could not betray Lucy.

  He’d loved Lucy from the moment he saw her. They all had. Jonathan and Mina Harker, Jack Seward, Quincey P. Morris, and himself. After Jonathan passed his bar exam and left for Transylvania for his fateful meeting with Prince Dracula, Mina had searched for a way to fill the void in her life. Her best friend, Lucy, found the perfect way to ease Mina’s loneliness. She’d hosted a charity soirée at her home in Whitby to benefit the poor and homeless of Whitechapel. It was at this soirée that Jack, Quincey Morris, and Arthur had all found themselves on Lucy’s dance card. All three had instantly fallen in love with her. Arthur Holmwood and his two best friends had formed a gentleman’s agreement; they would woo and court Lucy to the utmost of their abilities, and let the best man win. Holmwood had never known such joy as the day Lucy chose him above all others. His friends toasted their happy union and their future of a long, loving life together, which had made him feel proud to call Jack and Quincey Morris his best men at his forthcoming wedding. A wedding that never happened.

  He dragged himself to Beth’s dressing table and stared at his wretched reflection in the vanity mirror. For so long, he had only wanted to die, to feel nothing, to be with Lucy in heaven. Perhaps it was just his guilt, but as much as he yearned for death, he feared it. The lives he had taken in war, he felt, were justified. God would forgive him for doing righteous work against evil men. The three men he had killed in duels were a different story. Unable to take his own life for fear of an eternity in hell, he had sought out others to do what he could not. He had provoked those men into action, insulted their honor so severely that he had left them no choice. They were fair duels, but his opponents were still dead for no other reason than his own cowardice.

  He touched the scar on his right cheek. His fingers traced up to where the tip of his ear had once been. Quincey Harker’s words echoed. Dracula is coming for revenge and you know it. Help me kill him once and for all.

  Holmwood thought back to the morning after driving the stake into Lucy’s heart. He’d stood before a statue of Christ in his family chapel and sworn an oath on Lucy’s grave that he would not rest until he’d destroyed the demon that had claimed her life.

  God had sent Lucy into his dream to remind him of his oath. After twenty-five wasted years, He was calling in His marker, and Arthur Holmwood was obliged to answer. It was the only way he could be assured of salvation and eternity with Lucy. In the morning, he would go to London in God’s name and seek out the demon.<
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  CHAPTER XXXIII.

  After Mr. Stoker was taken to the hospital, Quincey had returned to his rented lodgings. Then grim reality sank in. Stoker’s sudden inca pacitation had removed him as the only obstacle in Basarab’s acceptance of the role of Dracula. Deane was deeply in debt. He wouldn’t be foolish enough to cancel the play, so it would fall upon Deane to take over directing duties. What would that mean for Quincey?

  Although awed by Basarab’s powerful portrayal of Dracula’s soliloquy, it left Quincey uneasy. He could not allow Basarab to humanize Dracula. Quincey’s first thought was to tell Basarab the truth, but what could he say? Your national hero is a monster who destroyed my family, killed my father, and I am bound by honor to hunt and kill him? Quincey didn’t need to speak the words aloud to know how insane they sounded. What proof did he have? He paced about his room.

  First order of business was to return to the Lyceum and apologize to Deane for his boorish behavior. For his scheme to work, he had to win Deane back to his side.

  Quincey arrived at the Lyceum Theatre midmorning. There had been no mention in the newspaper of the events of the previous night, or of Mr. Stoker’s current condition. This did not surprise Quincey, since the unfortunate incident had happened too late in the evening to make the morning edition. Quincey was disturbed that Deane was not at the theatre, and none of the workers had any knowledge of Stoker’s health. He was just settling in to await Deane’s arrival when he was approached by Mr. Edwards, the house manager.

  Edwards was usually a sprightly fellow with a large smile. Quincey sensed trouble as Edwards approached, looking sombre. With pangs of panic in his stomach, Quincey’s mind immediately went to the worst: Deane was so enraged that he had canceled the production.

  As fate would have it, the horrors of Quincey’s imagination paled in comparison with the reality. Edwards presented him with a note that had been left for him at the stage door. Quincey frowned. He had left strict instructions with all Lyceum Theatre workers to beware a youthful-looking woman who might claim to be his mother. No one, under any circumstances, was to allow her entry to the theatre or divulge Quincey’s whereabouts. After all, he did not yet know whose side Mina was on.