Vampire (van Helsing Diaries Book 1)

by Peter Cawdron

  Jonathan Harker’s Journal

  3 May. Bistritz.—Left Munich at 8:35 P.M., on 1st May,

  arriving at Vienna early next morning; should have arrived

  at 6:46, but the train was an hour late.

  Immediately, the style of writing strikes me as unusual. I’ve read a few of the classics, such as Frankenstein and War of the Worlds, but they were always set firmly in the realm of fiction. Dracula, though, has an eerie realism. It’s hard to shake the feeling I’m not reading an actual account of what happened during those dark days.

  I flick through the tattered paperback, focusing more on the notations toward the end of the book. Why, I’m not entirely sure. Looking at the contents without following along in chronological order allows me to feel detached from the story, keeping it firmly in the category of fiction. What seemed ludicrous yesterday, today is all too real. A pencil mark in the margin draws my attention to a particular passage.

  ...the howling of the wolves without grew louder and angrier; their red jaws, with champing teeth, and their blunt-clawed feet... they leaped and came in through the open door.

  A chill runs through my bones. Those words conjure up painful memories still raw from this morning. Scared, I slam the book shut, pushing it across the table away from me. My heart races.

  “This isn’t happening,” I say, talking to myself in a quiet corner of the restaurant. “This is absurd. There’s no such thing as vampires.”

  I can’t help but berate myself.

  “You’re being silly, Jane. Stupid. Snap out of this.”

  And yet, deep down, something in the words of Bram Stoker resonates within me. The murder of Mavis Harrison, the similarities between the suicides of James Fallon and Eva Guntage, the similarities between Fallon and Ellison. And Fallon’s words. He couldn’t have known why Eva went to that gas station last night. He couldn’t have known she had a daughter or that her daughter was sick and in need of painkillers.

  No, I’m reading too much into things. This is an age of reason, not superstition. The 21st Century is no place for paranoid medieval fears.

  But that wolf.

  Reluctantly, I open the book again, flipping through several pages and noting the changing title in various sections.

  Mina Murray’s Journal

  Dr. Seward’s Diary.

  (Kept in the phonograph)

  Letter, Quincey P. Morris to Hon. Arthur Holmwood.

  The more I read, the less Dracula sounds like fiction. This is a collection of diary entries, a reconstruction of events compiled well after the fact, perhaps decades later. Stoker has woven them together and no doubt taken license with missing or incomplete details, but the essence of what he’s describing is not as farfetched as I had originally assumed.

  “What if there is fact behind fiction?” I ask myself in a mumble. “What if beyond the legend there’s a glimmer of truth?”

  No, I can’t believe it. I’ve seen too many movies. Vampires draw blood. That hasn’t happened. Nothing I’ve seen over the past day fits the descriptions in this book. I’m being irrational.

  The case of Renfield grows more interesting the more I get to understand the man…

  Bram Stoker’s description of the prisoner Renfield is eerily reminiscent of both Fallon and Ellison. Is there more to their fragile mental state than I have considered?

  I found Renfield sitting placidly in his room with his hands folded, smiling benignly. At the moment he seemed as sane as any one I ever saw…

  For the first week after his attack he was perpetually violent…

  His spiders are now becoming as great a nuisance as his flies… when a horrid blow-fly, bloated with some carrion food, buzzed into the room, he caught it, held it exultantly for a few moments between his finger and thumb, and, before I knew what he was going to do, put it in his mouth and ate it. I scolded him for it, but he argued quietly that it was very good and very wholesome; that it was life, strong life, and gave life to him.

  Life.

  Renfield’s comments have been underlined, but by whom? Martin Ellison or Mavis Harrison?

  For all the talk of vampires, the real issue is life, not blood.

  Blood is the means, not the end.

  And these words, written over a hundred years ago, printed on a page several decades later, trouble me as though they were written this morning.

  Perhaps superstitions have muddied the waters. Whenever I think of vampires, the first thing I imagine is Count Dracula biting the neck of some young damsel, but perhaps that’s a distortion distracting from the real issue. Maybe that aspect of the myth has been exaggerated. I have to be careful to read what is written and not read my own cultural expectations into this narration.

  To my surprise, the book isn’t concerned solely with vampires and the undead. The majority of the discussion is about the mental state of those that encounter this phenomenon. Mina, Lucy, Renfield, even Jonathan Harker—they all suffer terribly, just as I have seen with Fallon and Ellison. The pressure of what they were dealing with led to what we would describe today as a mental breakdown.

  Professor Van Helsing unlocked the door to the tomb, and we entered, closing it behind us. Then he took from his bag the lantern, which he lit, and also two wax candles, which, when lighted, he stuck, by melting their own ends, on other coffins, so that they might give light sufficient to work by. When he again lifted the lid off Lucy’s coffin we all looked and saw that the body lay there in all its death-beauty. But there was no love in my own heart, nothing but loathing for the foul Thing which had taken Lucy’s shape without her soul. I could see even Arthur’s face grow hard as he looked. Presently he said to Van Helsing:—

  “Is this really Lucy’s body, or only a demon in her shape?”

  Slowly, the chaos of the past day is taking form.

  Stoker’s words are precise. “The foul Thing which had taken Lucy’s shape without her soul,” is chilling to consider.

  I make a note in the margin.

  The soul is gone. The shell remains. The body. But it’s no longer Lucy.

  Flicking through and looking at the various notes and underlined sections, I come across a passage that makes my blood run cold.

  The nosferatu do not die ... 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 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.

  Unknown?

  Although I have no way of knowing precisely what Bram Stoker meant, to my mind this is more than some disappearing magic act. He’s describing the vampire blending back into society unnoticed, and I wonder if this is what I have observed in the death of Mavis Harrison, James Fallon, and Eva Guntage. Is this the machinations of evil hiding in the shadows?

  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 nothing; 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.

  The note written in the margin beside this underlined section has the characteristic leftward slant of Mavis Harrison.

  I cannot let this happen.

  She knew.

  Was Ellison…

  The glass window beside me rattles violently.

  As if in response to the defiant words I’ve read, the storm outside lashes the windows, distracting me. This is like no blizzard I have ever seen. The windows flex with the changing pressure, threatening to break. A
gust of wind blows open the doors and snow swirls within the entry way, frightening a young child and his mother.

  One of the waiters comes over and says, “Excuse me. The storm is getting worse so we’re closing the restaurant. We don’t want to be stranded here by the snow.”

  I acknowledge him, but I’m not really listening to his words. I’m too engrossed in what I’m reading.

  He can transform himself into a wolf, as we gather from the ship arrival in Whitby, when he tear open the dog; he can be as bat, as Madam Mina saw him on the window at Whitby

  Bram Stoker, or more precisely, Professor Van Helsing is describing what we would call a shapeshifter, but such a concept is impossible according to modern science. The laws of physics are such that it is simply not possible to rearrange and compress matter into vastly different volumes without some other explanation at work.

  These notes were second or perhaps even third hand by the time they reached Bram Stoker. Maybe Dracula wasn’t shifting shapes so much as shifting between already existing forms. That would explain the comments by Van Helsing.

  I read on. It’s apparent the real story of Dracula is radically different to the Hollywood portrayals I’m familiar with.

  A man came out of the shop with small parcels, and gave it to the lady, who then drove off. The dark man kept his eyes fixed on her, and when the carriage moved up Piccadilly he followed in the same direction, and hailed a hansom. Jonathan kept looking after him, and said, as if to himself: “I believe it is the Count, but he has grown young. My God, if this be so! Oh, my God! My God! If I only knew! If I only knew!”

  …I remained silent. I drew him away quietly, and he, holding my arm, came easily. We walked a little further, and then went in and sat for a while in the Green Park. It was a hot day for autumn, and there was a comfortable seat in a shady place.

  During the day?

  Count Dracula moved around in broad daylight?

  My preconceptions about vampires are being shown as folly. I barely notice as the restaurant empties. The customers are gone, along with most of the staff. A lone clerk stands by the register, tallying receipts.

  Although I’d like to think I have other reasons to be troubled, still being somewhat shaken by the encounter with a wolf this morning, I find myself full of doubt as to where reality ends and insanity begins. Bram Stoker’s Dracula is hypnotic, drawing me in deeper as I read.

  My dear, dear Madam Mina, now more than ever must we find him even if we have to follow him to the jaws of Hell!” She grew paler as she asked faintly:—

  “Why?”

  “Because,” he answered solemnly, “he can live for centuries, and you are but mortal woman. Time is now to be dreaded.”

  What if Van Helsing is right, and this evil can perpetuate itself for centuries, even millennia?

  The novel describes Dracula being killed in the final pages of the book as his throat is slit and a knife is plunged into his heart. His body crumbles to dust, but I think Harker and Quincy may have missed something critical. Van Helsing was there, but he was providing cover from a distance with a Winchester rifle. If he had been closer he would have seen it. He would have known what happened when Jonathan sprung open that old coffin lid. Dracula was a shell, a vessel. Like Lucy, the outer form never betrayed the foul thing within.

  Perhaps a bite is not needed. Perhaps just a touch.

  What if Dracula escaped without being noticed? What if he faked his death just as Van Helsing had predicted, so as to outlive his pursuers? What if this evil still walks the Earth?

  Hell has its price!

  I cannot help but jot my own notes in this journal, adding to the body of knowledge slowly accumulating over generations to expose this evil.

  Has evil passed through the centuries unnoticed? Vlad the Impaler? Jack the Ripper? What about the Boston Strangler, who was murdered by an unknown prison mate? Similarities with Ellison stabbing a prisoner last year? Who was that prisoner? Why did he stab him? Covering tracks?

  There’s no more room in the tiny margin, forcing me to turn the page and keep writing to avoid breaking my train of thought.

  So many opportunities to hide. Two world wars, the oppression of the Nazis, the various communist regimes. So many unsolved murders related to phantom serial killers. Have we been so foolish as to miss an evil that spans generations?

  I turn the page and continue writing.

  Ellison was repelled by touch. Perhaps we’ve been so fixated on the sensational. Blood dripping from puncture wounds on the neck. Bullets riddling a body. Perhaps we’ve missed the means of transmission. Touch.

  For a moment, I’m stunned by that one word. Writing out my thoughts has helped the concept crystalize in my mind.

  Touch.

  I turn another page and write out the chain of transmission as best I understand what has transpired in recent days.

  This is no virus, but its mode of transmission is similar. Is this foul thing from another world? Before Ellison, I know not. But Ellison to Mavis. Mavis to Fallon. Fallon to Eva. And always switching. Then he covers his tracks, killing those he has displaced.

  From Eva to???

  I continue reading.

  The page I’m on describes Jonathan and Mina trailing the Count as he tries to disappear back into the shadows, moving from one hiding place to another.

  My phone rings and I jump, startled by the sudden noise. In my mind, I was back in the 1800s, walking through London with Mina, venturing through the forest of Europe with Jonathan. The harsh melody drags me back to an aging restaurant in Boise, Idaho. As crazy as it sounds, where better for a vampire to hide?

  “Hello?” I say, speaking into my cell phone.

  “Tell me you’re not out in this storm?” Sheriff Cann says. “Alan is worried sick about you. He’s tried calling you half a dozen times, but the storm is playing havoc with reception.”

  “I’m fine,” I say. Two clipped words is all I can manage as my head swings with the realization of the evil I’ve stumbled upon.

  “He asked me to tell you his car broke down. He wants you to pick him up from the hospital at five.”

  “Okay,” I say.

  The sheriff asks, “So, did you find what you were looking for?”

  “I think so,” I reply.

  “And?”

  “And who found the body of Eva Gunter? Was it her husband?”

  “No. Her neighbor. Her husband works the night shift. Her neighbor saw her through a basement window. A woman by the name of Jasmine Halter.”

  And I sense evil taking one more step into the shadows.

  I can’t help myself. I have to ask, “She saw into a basement window with all this snow piling up outside?”

  The sheriff is quiet.

  “What’s the address?” I ask.

  “Jane. You don’t need to do this.”

  “Yes, I do,” I say, packing my bag and heading for the door.

  “First responders didn’t notice anything unusual.”

  “They wouldn’t,” I say, stepping out into the fury of the storm. I race to get to my car. Once inside, I lock the doors and start the engine. The phone call automatically transfers to the car stereo.

  “2310 Maple Drive, over in Carlisle,” the sheriff says.

  “That’s only a couple of blocks from here.”

  “I can dispatch a criminal investigation unit to meet you there,” the sheriff says.

  “No, not just yet.”

  “You think this is a hot zone?” he asks. “Are you expecting trouble?”

  “I—I don’t know.”

  “Jane, if you know something, you have to tell me.”

  “You’d think I was crazy,” I say, driving the car out of the parking lot. “Listen. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Just following a hunch. It’s probably nothing.”

  The sheriff says, “I’m going to dispatch a mobile unit. Wait until they get there, okay? If you’re right, you’ll have backup. If you’re not, well, you owe the guy
s some beers at the station.”

  “Deal,” I say, having no intention of waiting. I suspect this is our undoing. We’re naive and the vampire exploits our ignorance. For the most part, we have no idea what we’re dealing with, and the vampire uses that to his advantage. I suspect even old Van Helsing was clutching at straws with some of his pronouncements, trying to bring together the fragile threads of a knowledge long lost.

  Chapter 05: Legion

  2310 Maple Drive is a nondescript suburban home buried in winter. If it wasn’t for the multiple tire tracks crushing the snow on the front lawn, there would be no indication of the tragedy that unfolded here this morning when Eva Gunter took her own life. But I’m not convinced this was suicide. To my mind, there is an evil that binds these deaths, something insidious, hidden in the darkness.

  The two story home has a large wooden fence on one side, erected by the neighbor on the left. A “Beware of the Dog” sign indicates why, but from my perspective, this limits the options. The neighbor on this side could never have seen in through a basement window.

  I walk around the front of the home with my boots crunching in the snow. On the far side, a chain-link fence separates the adjacent property. There are two low windows on this side of the house, but they’re mostly buried in snow. How anyone could see in them, I don’t know. I doubt they did. There are no footprints other than mine, and the next property begins with a garage. No windows look out from the neighbor’s house toward 2310 Maple.

  My fingers tighten on the compact Colt 45 buried in my jacket pocket, and I shrug my shoulders, fighting off more than the bitter cold. This is the point of no return. Am I being paranoid? Am I going insane?