Strange and
terrible
as it is, it is _true_!
Dracula by Bram Stoker
"If it should be, and he came to London, with
its teeming millions. " . . . There may be a solemn duty; and if it come
we must not shrink from it. . . . I shall be prepared. I shall get my
typewriter this very hour and begin transcribing. Then we shall be ready
for other eyes if required. And if it be wanted; then, perhaps, if I am
ready, poor Jonathan may not be upset, for I can speak for him and never
let him be troubled or worried with it all. If ever Jonathan quite gets
over the nervousness he may want to tell me of it all, and I can ask him
questions and find out things, and see how I may comfort him.
_Letter, Van Helsing to Mrs. Harker. _
"_24 September. _
(_Confidence. _)
"Dear Madam,--
"I pray you to pardon my writing, in that I am so far friend as that I
send to you sad news of Miss Lucy Westenra's death. By the kindness of
Lord Godalming, I am empowered to read her letters and papers, for I
am deeply concerned about certain matters vitally important. In them I
find some letters from you, which show how great friends you were and
how you love her. Oh, Madam Mina, by that love, I implore you, help me.
It is for others' good that I ask--to redress great wrong, and to lift
much and terrible troubles--that may be more great than you can know.
May it be that I see you? You can trust me. I am a friend of Dr. John
Seward and of Lord Godalming (that was Arthur of Miss Lucy). I must keep
it private for the present from all. I should come to Exeter to see you
at once if you tell me I am privilege to come, and where and when. I
implore your pardon, madam. I have read your letters to poor Lucy, and
know how good you are and how your husband suffer; so I pray you, if
it may be, enlighten him not, lest it may harm. Again your pardon, and
forgive me.
"/Van Helsing. /"
_Telegram, Mrs. Harker to Van Helsing. _
"_25 September. _--Come to-day by quarter-past ten train if you can catch
it. Can see you any time you call.
"/Wilhelmina Harker. /"
/Mina Harker's Journal. /
_25 September. _--I cannot help feeling terribly excited as the time
draws near for the visit of Dr. Van Helsing, for somehow I expect
it will throw some light upon Jonathan's sad experience; and as he
attended poor dear Lucy in her last illness, he can tell me all about
her. That is the reason for his coming; it is concerning Lucy and her
sleep-walking, and not about Jonathan. Then I shall never know the
real truth now! How silly I am. That awful journal gets hold of my
imagination and tinges everything with something of its own colour. Of
course it is about Lucy. That habit came back to the poor dear, and that
awful night on the cliff must have made her ill. I had almost forgotten
in my own affairs how ill she was afterwards. She must have told him of
her sleep-walking adventure on the cliff, and that I knew all about it;
and now he wants me to tell him about it, so that he may understand. I
hope I did right in not saying anything of it to Mrs. Westenra; I should
never forgive myself if any act of mine, were it even a negative one,
brought harm on poor dear Lucy. I hope, too, Dr. Van Helsing will not
blame me; I have had so much trouble and anxiety of late that I feel I
cannot bear more just at present.
I suppose a cry does us all good at times--clears the air as other rain
does. Perhaps it was reading the journal yesterday that upset me, and
then Jonathan went away this morning to stay away from me a whole day
and night, the first time we have been parted since our marriage. I do
hope the dear fellow will take care of himself, and that nothing will
occur to upset him. It is two o'clock and the doctor will be here soon
now. I shall say nothing of Jonathan's journal unless he asks me. I am
so glad I have typewritten out my own journal, so that, in case he asks
about Lucy, I can hand it to him; it will save much questioning.
_Later. _--He has come and gone. Oh, what a strange meeting, and how
it all makes my head whirl round! I feel like one in a dream. Can it
be all possible, or even a part of it? If I had not read Jonathan's
journal first, I should never have accepted even a possibility. Poor,
poor, dear Jonathan! How he must have suffered. Please the good God all
this may not upset him again. I shall try to save him from it; but it
may be even a consolation and a help to him--terrible though it be and
awful in its consequences--to know for certain that his eyes and ears
and brain did not deceive him, and that it is all true. It may be that
it is the doubt which haunts him; that when the doubt is removed, no
matter which--waking or dreaming--may prove the truth, he will be more
satisfied and better able to bear the shock. Dr. Van Helsing must be
a good man as well as a clever one if he is Arthur's friend and Dr.
Seward's, and if they brought him all the way from Holland to look after
Lucy. I feel from having seen him that he is good and kind and of a
noble nature. When he comes tomorrow I shall ask him about Jonathan;
and then, please God, all this sorrow and anxiety may lead to a good
end. I used to think I would like to practise interviewing; Jonathan's
friend on "The Exeter News" told him that memory was everything in
such work--that you must be able to put down exactly almost every word
spoken, even if you had to refine some of it afterwards. Here was a rare
interview; I shall try to record it _verbatim_.
It was half-past two o'clock when the knock came. I took my courage
_a deux mains_ and waited. In a few minutes Mary opened the door, and
announced "Dr. Van Helsing. "
I rose and bowed, and he came towards me; a man of medium height,
strongly built, with his shoulders set back over a broad, deep chest and
a neck well balanced on the trunk as the head is on the neck. The poise
of the head strikes one at once as indicative of thought and power; the
head is noble, well-sized, broad, and large behind the ears. The face,
clean-shaven, shows a hard, square chin, a large, resolute, mobile
mouth, a good-sized nose, rather straight, but with quick, sensitive
nostrils, that seem to broaden as the big, bushy eyebrows come down and
the mouth tightens. The forehead is broad and fine, rising at first
almost straight and then sloping back above two bumps or ridges wide
apart; such a forehead that the reddish hair cannot possibly tumble
over it, but falls naturally back and to the sides. Big, dark blue eyes
are set widely apart, and are quick and tender or stern with the man's
moods. He said to me:--
"Mrs. Harker, is it not? " I bowed assent.
"That was Miss Mina Murray? " Again I assented.
"It is Mina Murray that I came to see that was friend of that poor dear
child Lucy Westenra. Madam Mina, it is on account of the dead I come. "
"Sir," I said, "you could have no better claim on me than that you were
a friend and helper of Lucy Westenra. " And I held out my hand. He took
it and said tenderly:--
"Oh, Madam Mina, I knew that the friend of that poor lily girl must be
good, but I had yet to learn----" He finished his speech with a courtly
bow. I asked him what it was that he wanted to see me about, so he at
once began:--
"I have read your letters to Miss Lucy. Forgive me, but I had to begin
to inquire somewhere, and there was none to ask. I know that you were
with her at Whitby. She sometimes kept a diary--you need not look
surprised, Madam Mina; it was begun after you left, and was made in
imitation of you--and in that diary she traces by inference certain
things to a sleep-walking in which she puts down that you saved her. In
great perplexity then I come to you, and ask you out of your so much
kindness to tell me all of it that you remember. "
"I can tell you, I think, Dr. Van Helsing, all about it. "
"Ah, then you have a good memory for facts, for details? It is not
always so with young ladies. "
"No, doctor, but I wrote it all down at the time. I can show it to you
if you like. "
"Oh, Madam Mina, I will be grateful; you will do me much favour. " I
could not resist the temptation of mystifying him a bit--I suppose it
is some of the taste of the original apple that remains still in our
mouths--so I handed him the shorthand diary. He took it with a grateful
bow, and said:--
"May I read it? "
"If you wish," I answered as demurely as I could. He opened it, and for
the instant his face fell. Then he stood up and bowed.
"Oh, you so clever woman! " he said. "I long knew that Mr. Jonathan was
a man of much thankfulness; but see, his wife have all the good things.
And will you not so much honour me and so help me as to read it for
me? Alas! I know not the shorthand. " By this time my little joke was
over, and I was almost ashamed; so I took the typewritten copy from my
work-basket and handed it to him.
"Forgive me," I said: "I could not help it; but I had been thinking
that it was of dear Lucy that you wished to ask, and so that you might
not have to wait--not on my account, but because I know your time must
be precious--I have written it out on the typewriter for you. "
He took it, and his eyes glistened. "You are so good," he said. "And may
I read it now? I may want to ask you some things when I have read. "
"By all means," I said, "read it over whilst I order lunch; and then you
can ask me questions whilst we eat. " He bowed and settled himself in a
chair with his back to the light, and became absorbed in the papers,
whilst I went to see after lunch, chiefly in order that he might not be
disturbed. When I came back I found him walking hurriedly up and down
the room, his face all ablaze with excitement. He rushed up to me and
took me by both hands.
"Oh, Madam Mina," he said, "how can I say what I owe to you? This paper
is as sunshine. It opens the gate to me. I am daze, I am dazzle, with so
much light; and yet clouds roll in behind the light every time. But that
you do not, cannot, comprehend. Oh, but I am grateful to you, you so
clever woman. Madam"--he said this very solemnly--"if ever Abraham Van
Helsing can do anything for you or yours, I trust you will let me know.
It will be pleasure and delight if I may serve you as a friend; as a
friend, but all I have ever learned, all I can ever do, shall be for you
and those you love. There are darknesses in life, and there are lights;
you are one of the lights. You will have happy life and good life, and
your husband will be blessed in you. "
"But, doctor, you praise me too much, and--and you do not know me. "
"Not know you--I, who am old, and who have studied all my life men and
women; I, who have made my speciality the brain and all that belongs
to him and all that follow from him! And I have read your diary that
you have so goodly written for me, and which breathes out truth in
every line. I, who have read your so sweet letter to poor Lucy of your
marriage and your trust, not know you! Oh, Madam Mina, good women tell
all their lives, and by day and by hour and by minute, such things that
angels can read; and we men who wish to know have in us something of
angels' eyes. Your husband is noble nature, and you are noble too, for
you trust, and trust cannot be where there is mean nature. And your
husband--tell me of him. Is he quite well? Is all that fever gone,
and is he strong and hearty? " I saw here an opening to ask him about
Jonathan, so I said:--
"He has almost recovered, but he has been greatly upset by Mr.
Hawkins's death. " He interrupted:--
"Oh yes, I know, I know. I have read your last two letters. " I went
on:--
"I suppose this upset him, for when we were in town on Thursday last he
had a sort of shock. "
"A shock, and after brain fever so soon! That was not good. What kind of
shock was it? "
"He thought he saw some one who recalled something terrible, something
which led to his brain fever. " And here the whole thing seemed to
overwhelm me in a rush. The pity for Jonathan, the horror which he
experienced, the whole fearful mystery of his diary, and the fear that
has been brooding over me ever since, all came in a tumult. I suppose I
was hysterical, for I threw myself on my knees and held up my hands to
him, and implored him to make my husband well again. He took my hands
and raised me up, and made me sit on the sofa, and sat by me; he held my
hand in his, and said to me with, oh, such infinite sweetness:--
"My life is a barren and lonely one, and so full of work that I have not
had much time for friendships; but since I have been 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 overwrought 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 all about Lucy, and so now we shall not
speak of it, lest it distress. I shall stay in Exeter to-night, for I
want to think 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:--
"Oh, my dear, if you only knew 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 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,
so 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--ay, 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 to-day I come to see you, for
I have learn all at once so much that again I am dazzle--dazzle 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 to-night
from Launceston and will be here at 10. 18, so that I shall have no fear
to-night. 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 had 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 it was he I saw. He has got younger, and how? Van Helsing
is the man to unmask him and hunt him out, if he is anything like what
Mina says. We sat late, and talked it all over. Mina is dressing, and I
shall call at the hotel in a few minutes and bring him over. . . .
He was, I think, surprised to see me. When I came into the room where
he was, and introduced myself, he took me by the shoulder and turned my
face round to the light, and said, after a sharp scrutiny:--
"But Madam Mina told me you were ill, that you had had a shock. " It
was so funny to hear my wife called "Madam Mina" by this kindly,
strong-faced old man. I smiled, and said:--
"I _was_ ill, I _have_ had a shock; but you have cured me already. "
"And how? "
"By your letter to Mina last night. I was in doubt, and then everything
took a hue of unreality, and I did not know what to trust, even the
evidence of my own senses. Not knowing what to trust, I did not know
what to do; and so had only to keep on working in what had hitherto been
the groove of my life. The groove ceased to avail me, and I mistrusted
myself. Doctor, you don't know what it is to doubt everything, even
yourself. No, you don't; you couldn't with eyebrows like yours. " He
seemed pleased, and laughed as he said:--
"So! You are physiognomist. I learn more here with each hour. I am with
so much pleasure coming to you to breakfast; and, oh, sir, you will
pardon praise from an old man, but you are blessed in your wife. " I
would listen to him go on praising Mina for a day, so I simply nodded
and stood silent.
"She is one of God's women, fashioned by His own hand to show us men
and other women that there is a heaven where we can enter, and that its
light can be here on earth. So true, so sweet, so noble, so little an
egoist--and that, let me tell you, is much in this age, so sceptical and
selfish. And you, sir--I have read all the letters to poor Miss Lucy
and some of them speak of you, so I know you since some days from the
knowing of others; but I have seen your true self since last night. You
will give me your hand, will you not? And let us be friends for all our
lives. "
We shook hands, and he was so earnest and so kind that it made me quite
choky.
"And now," he said, "may I ask you for some more help? I have a great
task to do, and at the beginning it is to know. You can help me here.
Can you tell me what went before your going to Transylvania? Later on I
may ask more help, and of a different kind; but at first this will do. "
"Look here, sir," I said, "does what you have to do concern the Count? "
"It does," he said solemnly.
"Then I am with you heart and soul. As you go by the 10. 30 train, you
will not have time to read them; but I shall get the bundle of papers.
You can take them with you and read them in the train. "
After breakfast I saw him to the station. When we were parting he said:
"Perhaps you will come to town if I send to you, and take Madam Mina
too. "
"We shall both come when you will," I said.
I had got him the morning papers and the London papers of the previous
night, and while we were talking at the carriage window, waiting for
the train to start, he was turning them over. His eye suddenly seemed
to catch something in one of them, "The Westminster Gazette"--I knew
it by the colour--and he grew quite white. He read something intently,
groaning to himself: "Mein Gott! Mein Gott! So soon! so soon! " I do not
think he remembered me at the moment. Just then the whistle blew, and
the train moved off. This recalled him to himself, and he leaned out of
the window and waved his hand, calling out: "Love to Madam Mina; I shall
write so soon as ever I can. "
_Dr. Seward's Diary. _
_26 September. _--Truly there is no such thing as finality. Not a week
since I said "Finis," and yet here I am starting fresh again, or rather
going on with the same record. Until this afternoon I had no cause to
think of what is done. Renfield had become, to all intents, as sane as
he ever was. He was already well ahead with his fly business; and he
had just started in the spider line also; so he had not been of any
trouble to me. I had a letter from Arthur, written on Sunday, and from
it I gather that he is bearing up wonderfully well. Quincey Morris is
with him, and that is much of a help, for he himself is a bubbling well
of good spirits. Quincey wrote me a line too, and from him I hear that
Arthur is beginning to recover something of his old buoyancy; so as to
them all my mind is at rest. As for myself, I was settling down to my
work with the enthusiasm which I used to have for it, so that I might
fairly have said that the wound which poor Lucy left on me was becoming
cicatrised. Everything is, however, now reopened; and what is to be the
end God only knows. I have an idea that Van Helsing thinks he knows too,
but he will only let out enough at a time to whet curiosity. He went to
Exeter yesterday, and stayed there all night. To-day he came back, and
almost bounded into my room at about half-past five o'clock, and thrust
last night's "Westminster Gazette" into my hand.
"What do you think of that? " he asked as he stood back and folded his
arms.
I looked over the paper, for I really did not know what he meant; but
he took it from me and pointed out a paragraph about children being
decoyed away at Hampstead. It did not convey much to me, until I reached
a passage where it described small punctured wounds on their throats. An
idea struck me, and I looked up. "Well? " he said.
"It is like poor Lucy's. "
"And what do make of it? "
"Simply that there is some cause in common. Whatever it was that injured
her has injured them. " I did not quite understand his answer:--
"That is true indirectly, but not directly. "
"How do you mean, Professor? " I asked. I was a little inclined to take
his seriousness lightly--for, after all, four days of rest and freedom
from burning, harrowing anxiety does help to restore one's spirits--but
when I saw his face, it sobered me. Never, even in the midst of our
despair about poor Lucy, had he looked more stern.
"Tell me! " I said. "I can hazard no opinion. I do not know what to
think, and I have no data on which to found a conjecture. "
"Do you mean to tell me, friend John, that you have no suspicion as
to what poor Lucy died of; not after all the hints given, not only by
events, but by me? "
"Of nervous prostration following on great loss or waste of blood. "
"And how the blood lost or waste? " I shook my head. He stepped over and
sat down beside me, and went on:--
"You are clever man, friend John; you reason well, and your wit is bold;
but you are too prejudiced. You do not let your eyes see nor your ears
hear, and that which is outside your daily life is not of account to
you. Do you not think that there are things which you cannot understand,
and yet which are; that some people see things that others cannot? But
there are things old and new which must not be contemplate by men's
eyes, because they know--or think they know--some things which other
men have told them. Ah, it is the fault of our science that it wants to
explain all; and if it explain not, then it says there is nothing to
explain. But yet we see around us every day the growth of new beliefs,
which think themselves new; and which are yet but the old, which pretend
to be young--like the fine ladies at the opera. I suppose now you do
not believe in corporeal transference. No? Nor in materialisation. No?
Nor in astral bodies. No? Nor in the reading of thought. No? Nor in
hypnotism----"
"Yes," I said. "Charcot has proved that pretty well. " He smiled as
he went on: "Then you are satisfied as to it. Yes? And of course
then you understand how it act, and can follow the mind of the great
Charcot--alas that he is no more! --into the very soul of the patient
that he influence. No? Then, friend John, am I to take it that you
simply accept fact, and are satisfied to let from premise to conclusion
be a blank? No? Then tell me--for I am student of the brain--how you
accept the hypnotism and reject the thought-reading. Let me tell you,
my friend, that there are things done to-day in electrical science
which would have been deemed unholy by the very men who discovered
electricity--who would themselves not so long before have been burned as
wizards. There are always mysteries in life. Why was it that Methuselah
lived nine hundred years, and 'Old Parr' one hundred and sixty-nine,
and yet that poor Lucy, with four men's blood in her poor veins, could
not live even one day? For, had she lived one more day, we could have
save her. Do you know all the mystery of life and death? Do you know the
altogether of comparative anatomy, and can say wherefore the qualities
of brutes are in some men, and not in others? Can you tell me why,
when other spiders die small and soon, that one great spider lived for
centuries in the tower of the old Spanish church and grew and grew,
till, on descending, he could drink the oil of all the church lamps? Can
you tell me why in the Pampas, ay and elsewhere, there are bats that
come at night and open the veins of cattle and horses and suck dry their
veins; how in some islands of the Western seas there are bats which hang
on the trees all day, that those who have seen describe as like giant
nuts or pods, and that when the sailors sleep on the deck, because that
it is hot, flit down on them, and then--and then in the morning are
found dead men, white as even Miss Lucy was? "
"Good God, Professor! " I said, starting up. "Do you mean to tell me
that Lucy was bitten by such a bat; and that such a thing is here in
London in the nineteenth century? " He waved his hand for silence, and
went on:--
"Can you tell me why the tortoise lives more long than generations of
men; why the elephant goes on and on till he have seen dynasties; and
why the parrot never die only of bite of cat or dog or other complaint?
Can you tell me why men believe in all ages and places that there are
some few who live on always if they be permit; that there are men and
women who cannot die? We all know--because science has vouched for the
fact--that there have been toads shut up in rocks for thousands of
years, shut in one so small hole that only hold him since the youth of
the world. Can you tell me how the Indian fakir can make himself to die
and have been buried, and his grave sealed and corn sowed on it, and
the corn reaped and be cut and sown and reaped and cut again, and then
men come and take away the unbroken seal, and that there lie the Indian
fakir, not dead, but that rise up and walk amongst them as before? " Here
I interrupted him. I was getting bewildered; he so crowded on my mind
his list of nature's eccentricities and possible impossibilities that
my imagination was getting fired. I had a dim idea that he was teaching
me some lesson, as long ago he used to do in his study at Amsterdam;
but he used then to tell me the thing, so that I could have the object
of thought in mind all the time. But now I was without his help, yet I
wanted to follow him, so I said:--
"Professor, let me be your pet student again. Tell me the thesis, so
that I may apply your knowledge as you go on. At present I am going in
my mind from point to point as a mad man, and not a sane one, follows an
idea. I feel like a novice blundering through a bog in a mist, jumping
from one tussock to another in the mere blind effort to move on without
knowing where I am going. "
"That is good image," he said. "Well, I shall tell you. My thesis is
this: I want you to believe. "
"To believe what? "
"To believe in things that you cannot. Let me illustrate. I heard once
of an American who so defined faith: 'that which enables us to believe
things which we know to be untrue. ' For one, I follow that man. He meant
that we shall have an open mind, and not let a little bit of truth check
the rush of a big truth, like a small rock does a railway truck. We get
the small truth first. Good! We keep him, and we value him; but all the
same we must not let him think himself all the truth in the universe. "
"Then you want me not to let some previous conviction injure the
receptivity of my mind with regard to some strange matter. Do I read
your lesson aright? "
"Ah, you are my favourite pupil still. It is worth to teach you. Now
that you are willing to understand, you have taken the first step to
understand. You think then that those so small holes in the children's
throats were made by the same that made the hole in Miss Lucy? "
"I suppose so. " He stood up and said solemnly:--
"Then you are wrong. Oh, would it were so! but alas! no. It is worse,
far, far worse. "
"In God's name, Professor Van Helsing, what do you mean? " I cried.
He threw himself with a despairing gesture into a chair, and placed his
elbows on the table, covering his face with his hands as he spoke:--
"They were made by Miss Lucy!
its teeming millions. " . . . There may be a solemn duty; and if it come
we must not shrink from it. . . . I shall be prepared. I shall get my
typewriter this very hour and begin transcribing. Then we shall be ready
for other eyes if required. And if it be wanted; then, perhaps, if I am
ready, poor Jonathan may not be upset, for I can speak for him and never
let him be troubled or worried with it all. If ever Jonathan quite gets
over the nervousness he may want to tell me of it all, and I can ask him
questions and find out things, and see how I may comfort him.
_Letter, Van Helsing to Mrs. Harker. _
"_24 September. _
(_Confidence. _)
"Dear Madam,--
"I pray you to pardon my writing, in that I am so far friend as that I
send to you sad news of Miss Lucy Westenra's death. By the kindness of
Lord Godalming, I am empowered to read her letters and papers, for I
am deeply concerned about certain matters vitally important. In them I
find some letters from you, which show how great friends you were and
how you love her. Oh, Madam Mina, by that love, I implore you, help me.
It is for others' good that I ask--to redress great wrong, and to lift
much and terrible troubles--that may be more great than you can know.
May it be that I see you? You can trust me. I am a friend of Dr. John
Seward and of Lord Godalming (that was Arthur of Miss Lucy). I must keep
it private for the present from all. I should come to Exeter to see you
at once if you tell me I am privilege to come, and where and when. I
implore your pardon, madam. I have read your letters to poor Lucy, and
know how good you are and how your husband suffer; so I pray you, if
it may be, enlighten him not, lest it may harm. Again your pardon, and
forgive me.
"/Van Helsing. /"
_Telegram, Mrs. Harker to Van Helsing. _
"_25 September. _--Come to-day by quarter-past ten train if you can catch
it. Can see you any time you call.
"/Wilhelmina Harker. /"
/Mina Harker's Journal. /
_25 September. _--I cannot help feeling terribly excited as the time
draws near for the visit of Dr. Van Helsing, for somehow I expect
it will throw some light upon Jonathan's sad experience; and as he
attended poor dear Lucy in her last illness, he can tell me all about
her. That is the reason for his coming; it is concerning Lucy and her
sleep-walking, and not about Jonathan. Then I shall never know the
real truth now! How silly I am. That awful journal gets hold of my
imagination and tinges everything with something of its own colour. Of
course it is about Lucy. That habit came back to the poor dear, and that
awful night on the cliff must have made her ill. I had almost forgotten
in my own affairs how ill she was afterwards. She must have told him of
her sleep-walking adventure on the cliff, and that I knew all about it;
and now he wants me to tell him about it, so that he may understand. I
hope I did right in not saying anything of it to Mrs. Westenra; I should
never forgive myself if any act of mine, were it even a negative one,
brought harm on poor dear Lucy. I hope, too, Dr. Van Helsing will not
blame me; I have had so much trouble and anxiety of late that I feel I
cannot bear more just at present.
I suppose a cry does us all good at times--clears the air as other rain
does. Perhaps it was reading the journal yesterday that upset me, and
then Jonathan went away this morning to stay away from me a whole day
and night, the first time we have been parted since our marriage. I do
hope the dear fellow will take care of himself, and that nothing will
occur to upset him. It is two o'clock and the doctor will be here soon
now. I shall say nothing of Jonathan's journal unless he asks me. I am
so glad I have typewritten out my own journal, so that, in case he asks
about Lucy, I can hand it to him; it will save much questioning.
_Later. _--He has come and gone. Oh, what a strange meeting, and how
it all makes my head whirl round! I feel like one in a dream. Can it
be all possible, or even a part of it? If I had not read Jonathan's
journal first, I should never have accepted even a possibility. Poor,
poor, dear Jonathan! How he must have suffered. Please the good God all
this may not upset him again. I shall try to save him from it; but it
may be even a consolation and a help to him--terrible though it be and
awful in its consequences--to know for certain that his eyes and ears
and brain did not deceive him, and that it is all true. It may be that
it is the doubt which haunts him; that when the doubt is removed, no
matter which--waking or dreaming--may prove the truth, he will be more
satisfied and better able to bear the shock. Dr. Van Helsing must be
a good man as well as a clever one if he is Arthur's friend and Dr.
Seward's, and if they brought him all the way from Holland to look after
Lucy. I feel from having seen him that he is good and kind and of a
noble nature. When he comes tomorrow I shall ask him about Jonathan;
and then, please God, all this sorrow and anxiety may lead to a good
end. I used to think I would like to practise interviewing; Jonathan's
friend on "The Exeter News" told him that memory was everything in
such work--that you must be able to put down exactly almost every word
spoken, even if you had to refine some of it afterwards. Here was a rare
interview; I shall try to record it _verbatim_.
It was half-past two o'clock when the knock came. I took my courage
_a deux mains_ and waited. In a few minutes Mary opened the door, and
announced "Dr. Van Helsing. "
I rose and bowed, and he came towards me; a man of medium height,
strongly built, with his shoulders set back over a broad, deep chest and
a neck well balanced on the trunk as the head is on the neck. The poise
of the head strikes one at once as indicative of thought and power; the
head is noble, well-sized, broad, and large behind the ears. The face,
clean-shaven, shows a hard, square chin, a large, resolute, mobile
mouth, a good-sized nose, rather straight, but with quick, sensitive
nostrils, that seem to broaden as the big, bushy eyebrows come down and
the mouth tightens. The forehead is broad and fine, rising at first
almost straight and then sloping back above two bumps or ridges wide
apart; such a forehead that the reddish hair cannot possibly tumble
over it, but falls naturally back and to the sides. Big, dark blue eyes
are set widely apart, and are quick and tender or stern with the man's
moods. He said to me:--
"Mrs. Harker, is it not? " I bowed assent.
"That was Miss Mina Murray? " Again I assented.
"It is Mina Murray that I came to see that was friend of that poor dear
child Lucy Westenra. Madam Mina, it is on account of the dead I come. "
"Sir," I said, "you could have no better claim on me than that you were
a friend and helper of Lucy Westenra. " And I held out my hand. He took
it and said tenderly:--
"Oh, Madam Mina, I knew that the friend of that poor lily girl must be
good, but I had yet to learn----" He finished his speech with a courtly
bow. I asked him what it was that he wanted to see me about, so he at
once began:--
"I have read your letters to Miss Lucy. Forgive me, but I had to begin
to inquire somewhere, and there was none to ask. I know that you were
with her at Whitby. She sometimes kept a diary--you need not look
surprised, Madam Mina; it was begun after you left, and was made in
imitation of you--and in that diary she traces by inference certain
things to a sleep-walking in which she puts down that you saved her. In
great perplexity then I come to you, and ask you out of your so much
kindness to tell me all of it that you remember. "
"I can tell you, I think, Dr. Van Helsing, all about it. "
"Ah, then you have a good memory for facts, for details? It is not
always so with young ladies. "
"No, doctor, but I wrote it all down at the time. I can show it to you
if you like. "
"Oh, Madam Mina, I will be grateful; you will do me much favour. " I
could not resist the temptation of mystifying him a bit--I suppose it
is some of the taste of the original apple that remains still in our
mouths--so I handed him the shorthand diary. He took it with a grateful
bow, and said:--
"May I read it? "
"If you wish," I answered as demurely as I could. He opened it, and for
the instant his face fell. Then he stood up and bowed.
"Oh, you so clever woman! " he said. "I long knew that Mr. Jonathan was
a man of much thankfulness; but see, his wife have all the good things.
And will you not so much honour me and so help me as to read it for
me? Alas! I know not the shorthand. " By this time my little joke was
over, and I was almost ashamed; so I took the typewritten copy from my
work-basket and handed it to him.
"Forgive me," I said: "I could not help it; but I had been thinking
that it was of dear Lucy that you wished to ask, and so that you might
not have to wait--not on my account, but because I know your time must
be precious--I have written it out on the typewriter for you. "
He took it, and his eyes glistened. "You are so good," he said. "And may
I read it now? I may want to ask you some things when I have read. "
"By all means," I said, "read it over whilst I order lunch; and then you
can ask me questions whilst we eat. " He bowed and settled himself in a
chair with his back to the light, and became absorbed in the papers,
whilst I went to see after lunch, chiefly in order that he might not be
disturbed. When I came back I found him walking hurriedly up and down
the room, his face all ablaze with excitement. He rushed up to me and
took me by both hands.
"Oh, Madam Mina," he said, "how can I say what I owe to you? This paper
is as sunshine. It opens the gate to me. I am daze, I am dazzle, with so
much light; and yet clouds roll in behind the light every time. But that
you do not, cannot, comprehend. Oh, but I am grateful to you, you so
clever woman. Madam"--he said this very solemnly--"if ever Abraham Van
Helsing can do anything for you or yours, I trust you will let me know.
It will be pleasure and delight if I may serve you as a friend; as a
friend, but all I have ever learned, all I can ever do, shall be for you
and those you love. There are darknesses in life, and there are lights;
you are one of the lights. You will have happy life and good life, and
your husband will be blessed in you. "
"But, doctor, you praise me too much, and--and you do not know me. "
"Not know you--I, who am old, and who have studied all my life men and
women; I, who have made my speciality the brain and all that belongs
to him and all that follow from him! And I have read your diary that
you have so goodly written for me, and which breathes out truth in
every line. I, who have read your so sweet letter to poor Lucy of your
marriage and your trust, not know you! Oh, Madam Mina, good women tell
all their lives, and by day and by hour and by minute, such things that
angels can read; and we men who wish to know have in us something of
angels' eyes. Your husband is noble nature, and you are noble too, for
you trust, and trust cannot be where there is mean nature. And your
husband--tell me of him. Is he quite well? Is all that fever gone,
and is he strong and hearty? " I saw here an opening to ask him about
Jonathan, so I said:--
"He has almost recovered, but he has been greatly upset by Mr.
Hawkins's death. " He interrupted:--
"Oh yes, I know, I know. I have read your last two letters. " I went
on:--
"I suppose this upset him, for when we were in town on Thursday last he
had a sort of shock. "
"A shock, and after brain fever so soon! That was not good. What kind of
shock was it? "
"He thought he saw some one who recalled something terrible, something
which led to his brain fever. " And here the whole thing seemed to
overwhelm me in a rush. The pity for Jonathan, the horror which he
experienced, the whole fearful mystery of his diary, and the fear that
has been brooding over me ever since, all came in a tumult. I suppose I
was hysterical, for I threw myself on my knees and held up my hands to
him, and implored him to make my husband well again. He took my hands
and raised me up, and made me sit on the sofa, and sat by me; he held my
hand in his, and said to me with, oh, such infinite sweetness:--
"My life is a barren and lonely one, and so full of work that I have not
had much time for friendships; but since I have been 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 overwrought 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 all about Lucy, and so now we shall not
speak of it, lest it distress. I shall stay in Exeter to-night, for I
want to think 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:--
"Oh, my dear, if you only knew 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 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,
so 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--ay, 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 to-day I come to see you, for
I have learn all at once so much that again I am dazzle--dazzle 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 to-night
from Launceston and will be here at 10. 18, so that I shall have no fear
to-night. 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 had 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 it was he I saw. He has got younger, and how? Van Helsing
is the man to unmask him and hunt him out, if he is anything like what
Mina says. We sat late, and talked it all over. Mina is dressing, and I
shall call at the hotel in a few minutes and bring him over. . . .
He was, I think, surprised to see me. When I came into the room where
he was, and introduced myself, he took me by the shoulder and turned my
face round to the light, and said, after a sharp scrutiny:--
"But Madam Mina told me you were ill, that you had had a shock. " It
was so funny to hear my wife called "Madam Mina" by this kindly,
strong-faced old man. I smiled, and said:--
"I _was_ ill, I _have_ had a shock; but you have cured me already. "
"And how? "
"By your letter to Mina last night. I was in doubt, and then everything
took a hue of unreality, and I did not know what to trust, even the
evidence of my own senses. Not knowing what to trust, I did not know
what to do; and so had only to keep on working in what had hitherto been
the groove of my life. The groove ceased to avail me, and I mistrusted
myself. Doctor, you don't know what it is to doubt everything, even
yourself. No, you don't; you couldn't with eyebrows like yours. " He
seemed pleased, and laughed as he said:--
"So! You are physiognomist. I learn more here with each hour. I am with
so much pleasure coming to you to breakfast; and, oh, sir, you will
pardon praise from an old man, but you are blessed in your wife. " I
would listen to him go on praising Mina for a day, so I simply nodded
and stood silent.
"She is one of God's women, fashioned by His own hand to show us men
and other women that there is a heaven where we can enter, and that its
light can be here on earth. So true, so sweet, so noble, so little an
egoist--and that, let me tell you, is much in this age, so sceptical and
selfish. And you, sir--I have read all the letters to poor Miss Lucy
and some of them speak of you, so I know you since some days from the
knowing of others; but I have seen your true self since last night. You
will give me your hand, will you not? And let us be friends for all our
lives. "
We shook hands, and he was so earnest and so kind that it made me quite
choky.
"And now," he said, "may I ask you for some more help? I have a great
task to do, and at the beginning it is to know. You can help me here.
Can you tell me what went before your going to Transylvania? Later on I
may ask more help, and of a different kind; but at first this will do. "
"Look here, sir," I said, "does what you have to do concern the Count? "
"It does," he said solemnly.
"Then I am with you heart and soul. As you go by the 10. 30 train, you
will not have time to read them; but I shall get the bundle of papers.
You can take them with you and read them in the train. "
After breakfast I saw him to the station. When we were parting he said:
"Perhaps you will come to town if I send to you, and take Madam Mina
too. "
"We shall both come when you will," I said.
I had got him the morning papers and the London papers of the previous
night, and while we were talking at the carriage window, waiting for
the train to start, he was turning them over. His eye suddenly seemed
to catch something in one of them, "The Westminster Gazette"--I knew
it by the colour--and he grew quite white. He read something intently,
groaning to himself: "Mein Gott! Mein Gott! So soon! so soon! " I do not
think he remembered me at the moment. Just then the whistle blew, and
the train moved off. This recalled him to himself, and he leaned out of
the window and waved his hand, calling out: "Love to Madam Mina; I shall
write so soon as ever I can. "
_Dr. Seward's Diary. _
_26 September. _--Truly there is no such thing as finality. Not a week
since I said "Finis," and yet here I am starting fresh again, or rather
going on with the same record. Until this afternoon I had no cause to
think of what is done. Renfield had become, to all intents, as sane as
he ever was. He was already well ahead with his fly business; and he
had just started in the spider line also; so he had not been of any
trouble to me. I had a letter from Arthur, written on Sunday, and from
it I gather that he is bearing up wonderfully well. Quincey Morris is
with him, and that is much of a help, for he himself is a bubbling well
of good spirits. Quincey wrote me a line too, and from him I hear that
Arthur is beginning to recover something of his old buoyancy; so as to
them all my mind is at rest. As for myself, I was settling down to my
work with the enthusiasm which I used to have for it, so that I might
fairly have said that the wound which poor Lucy left on me was becoming
cicatrised. Everything is, however, now reopened; and what is to be the
end God only knows. I have an idea that Van Helsing thinks he knows too,
but he will only let out enough at a time to whet curiosity. He went to
Exeter yesterday, and stayed there all night. To-day he came back, and
almost bounded into my room at about half-past five o'clock, and thrust
last night's "Westminster Gazette" into my hand.
"What do you think of that? " he asked as he stood back and folded his
arms.
I looked over the paper, for I really did not know what he meant; but
he took it from me and pointed out a paragraph about children being
decoyed away at Hampstead. It did not convey much to me, until I reached
a passage where it described small punctured wounds on their throats. An
idea struck me, and I looked up. "Well? " he said.
"It is like poor Lucy's. "
"And what do make of it? "
"Simply that there is some cause in common. Whatever it was that injured
her has injured them. " I did not quite understand his answer:--
"That is true indirectly, but not directly. "
"How do you mean, Professor? " I asked. I was a little inclined to take
his seriousness lightly--for, after all, four days of rest and freedom
from burning, harrowing anxiety does help to restore one's spirits--but
when I saw his face, it sobered me. Never, even in the midst of our
despair about poor Lucy, had he looked more stern.
"Tell me! " I said. "I can hazard no opinion. I do not know what to
think, and I have no data on which to found a conjecture. "
"Do you mean to tell me, friend John, that you have no suspicion as
to what poor Lucy died of; not after all the hints given, not only by
events, but by me? "
"Of nervous prostration following on great loss or waste of blood. "
"And how the blood lost or waste? " I shook my head. He stepped over and
sat down beside me, and went on:--
"You are clever man, friend John; you reason well, and your wit is bold;
but you are too prejudiced. You do not let your eyes see nor your ears
hear, and that which is outside your daily life is not of account to
you. Do you not think that there are things which you cannot understand,
and yet which are; that some people see things that others cannot? But
there are things old and new which must not be contemplate by men's
eyes, because they know--or think they know--some things which other
men have told them. Ah, it is the fault of our science that it wants to
explain all; and if it explain not, then it says there is nothing to
explain. But yet we see around us every day the growth of new beliefs,
which think themselves new; and which are yet but the old, which pretend
to be young--like the fine ladies at the opera. I suppose now you do
not believe in corporeal transference. No? Nor in materialisation. No?
Nor in astral bodies. No? Nor in the reading of thought. No? Nor in
hypnotism----"
"Yes," I said. "Charcot has proved that pretty well. " He smiled as
he went on: "Then you are satisfied as to it. Yes? And of course
then you understand how it act, and can follow the mind of the great
Charcot--alas that he is no more! --into the very soul of the patient
that he influence. No? Then, friend John, am I to take it that you
simply accept fact, and are satisfied to let from premise to conclusion
be a blank? No? Then tell me--for I am student of the brain--how you
accept the hypnotism and reject the thought-reading. Let me tell you,
my friend, that there are things done to-day in electrical science
which would have been deemed unholy by the very men who discovered
electricity--who would themselves not so long before have been burned as
wizards. There are always mysteries in life. Why was it that Methuselah
lived nine hundred years, and 'Old Parr' one hundred and sixty-nine,
and yet that poor Lucy, with four men's blood in her poor veins, could
not live even one day? For, had she lived one more day, we could have
save her. Do you know all the mystery of life and death? Do you know the
altogether of comparative anatomy, and can say wherefore the qualities
of brutes are in some men, and not in others? Can you tell me why,
when other spiders die small and soon, that one great spider lived for
centuries in the tower of the old Spanish church and grew and grew,
till, on descending, he could drink the oil of all the church lamps? Can
you tell me why in the Pampas, ay and elsewhere, there are bats that
come at night and open the veins of cattle and horses and suck dry their
veins; how in some islands of the Western seas there are bats which hang
on the trees all day, that those who have seen describe as like giant
nuts or pods, and that when the sailors sleep on the deck, because that
it is hot, flit down on them, and then--and then in the morning are
found dead men, white as even Miss Lucy was? "
"Good God, Professor! " I said, starting up. "Do you mean to tell me
that Lucy was bitten by such a bat; and that such a thing is here in
London in the nineteenth century? " He waved his hand for silence, and
went on:--
"Can you tell me why the tortoise lives more long than generations of
men; why the elephant goes on and on till he have seen dynasties; and
why the parrot never die only of bite of cat or dog or other complaint?
Can you tell me why men believe in all ages and places that there are
some few who live on always if they be permit; that there are men and
women who cannot die? We all know--because science has vouched for the
fact--that there have been toads shut up in rocks for thousands of
years, shut in one so small hole that only hold him since the youth of
the world. Can you tell me how the Indian fakir can make himself to die
and have been buried, and his grave sealed and corn sowed on it, and
the corn reaped and be cut and sown and reaped and cut again, and then
men come and take away the unbroken seal, and that there lie the Indian
fakir, not dead, but that rise up and walk amongst them as before? " Here
I interrupted him. I was getting bewildered; he so crowded on my mind
his list of nature's eccentricities and possible impossibilities that
my imagination was getting fired. I had a dim idea that he was teaching
me some lesson, as long ago he used to do in his study at Amsterdam;
but he used then to tell me the thing, so that I could have the object
of thought in mind all the time. But now I was without his help, yet I
wanted to follow him, so I said:--
"Professor, let me be your pet student again. Tell me the thesis, so
that I may apply your knowledge as you go on. At present I am going in
my mind from point to point as a mad man, and not a sane one, follows an
idea. I feel like a novice blundering through a bog in a mist, jumping
from one tussock to another in the mere blind effort to move on without
knowing where I am going. "
"That is good image," he said. "Well, I shall tell you. My thesis is
this: I want you to believe. "
"To believe what? "
"To believe in things that you cannot. Let me illustrate. I heard once
of an American who so defined faith: 'that which enables us to believe
things which we know to be untrue. ' For one, I follow that man. He meant
that we shall have an open mind, and not let a little bit of truth check
the rush of a big truth, like a small rock does a railway truck. We get
the small truth first. Good! We keep him, and we value him; but all the
same we must not let him think himself all the truth in the universe. "
"Then you want me not to let some previous conviction injure the
receptivity of my mind with regard to some strange matter. Do I read
your lesson aright? "
"Ah, you are my favourite pupil still. It is worth to teach you. Now
that you are willing to understand, you have taken the first step to
understand. You think then that those so small holes in the children's
throats were made by the same that made the hole in Miss Lucy? "
"I suppose so. " He stood up and said solemnly:--
"Then you are wrong. Oh, would it were so! but alas! no. It is worse,
far, far worse. "
"In God's name, Professor Van Helsing, what do you mean? " I cried.
He threw himself with a despairing gesture into a chair, and placed his
elbows on the table, covering his face with his hands as he spoke:--
"They were made by Miss Lucy!
