Dracula
minutes. Forgive me for troubling you. With all blessings,
“Your loving
“MINA HARKER.”
_Dr. Seward’s Diary._
_20 September._--Only resolution and habit can let me make an entry
to-night. I am too miserable, too low-spirited, too sick of the world
and all in it, including life itself, that I would not care if I heard
this moment the flapping of the wings of the angel of death. And he has
been flapping those grim wings to some purpose of late--Lucy’s mother
and Arthur’s father, and now.... Let me get on with my work.
I duly relieved Van Helsing in his watch over Lucy. We wanted Arthur to
go to rest also, but he refused at first. It was only when I told him
that we should want him to help us during the day, and that we must not
all break down for want of rest, lest Lucy should suffer, that he agreed
to go. Van Helsing was very kind to him. “Come, my child,” he said;
“come with me. You are sick and weak, and have had much sorrow and much
mental pain, as well as that tax on your strength that we know of. You
must not be alone; for to be alone is to be full of fears and alarms.
Come to the drawing-room, where there is a big fire, and there are two
sofas. You shall lie on one, and I on the other, and our sympathy will
be comfort to each other, even though we do not speak, and even if we
sleep.” Arthur went off with him, casting back a longing look on Lucy’s
face, which lay in her pillow, almost whiter than the lawn. She lay
quite still, and I looked round the room to see that all was as it
should be. I could see that the Professor had carried out in this room,
as in the other, his purpose of using the garlic; the whole of the
window-sashes reeked with it, and round Lucy’s neck, over the silk
handkerchief which Van Helsing made her keep on, was a rough chaplet of
the same odorous flowers. Lucy was breathing somewhat stertorously, and
her face was at its worst, for the open mouth showed the pale gums. Her
teeth, in the dim, uncertain light, seemed longer and sharper than they
had been in the morning. In particular, by some trick of the light, the
canine teeth looked longer and sharper than the rest. I sat down by her,
and presently she moved uneasily. At the same moment there came a sort
of dull flapping or buffeting at the window. I went over to it softly,
and peeped out by the corner of the blind. There was a full moonlight,
and I could see that the noise was made by a great bat, which wheeled
round--doubtless attracted by the light, although so dim--and every now
and again struck the window with its wings. When I came back to my seat,
I found that Lucy had moved slightly, and had torn away the garlic
flowers from her throat. I replaced them as well as I could, and sat
watching her.
Presently she woke, and I gave her food, as Van Helsing had prescribed.
She took but a little, and that languidly. There did not seem to be with
her now the unconscious struggle for life and strength that had hitherto
so marked her illness. It struck me as curious that the moment she
became conscious she pressed the garlic flowers close to her. It was
certainly odd that whenever she got into that lethargic state, with the
stertorous breathing, she put the flowers from her; but that when she
waked she clutched them close. There was no possibility of making any
mistake about this, for in the long hours that followed, she had many
spells of sleeping and waking and repeated both actions many times.
At six o’clock Van Helsing came to relieve me. Arthur had then fallen
into a doze, and he mercifully let him sleep on. When he saw Lucy’s face
I could hear the sissing indraw of his breath, and he said to me in a
sharp whisper: “Draw up the blind; I want light!” Then he bent down,
and, with his face almost touching Lucy’s, examined her carefully. He
removed the flowers and lifted the silk handkerchief from her throat. As
he did so he started back, and I could hear his ejaculation, “Mein
Gott!” as it was smothered in his throat. I bent over and looked, too,
and as I noticed some queer chill came over me.
The wounds on the throat had absolutely disappeared.
For fully five minutes Van Helsing stood looking at her, with his face
at its sternest. Then he turned to me and said calmly:--
“She is dying. It will not be long now. It will be much difference, mark
me, whether she dies conscious or in her sleep. Wake that poor boy, and
let him come and see the last; he trusts us, and we have promised him.”
I went to the dining-room and waked him. He was dazed for a moment, but
when he saw the sunlight streaming in through the edges of the shutters
he thought he was late, and expressed his fear. I assured him that Lucy
was still asleep, but told him as gently as I could that both Van
Helsing and I feared that the end was near. He covered his face with his
hands, and slid down on his knees by the sofa, where he remained,
perhaps a minute, with his head buried, praying, whilst his shoulders
shook with grief. I took him by the hand and raised him up. “Come,” I
said, “my dear old fellow, summon all your fortitude: it will be best
and easiest for her.”
When we came into Lucy’s room I could see that Van Helsing had, with
his usual forethought, been putting matters straight and making
everything look as pleasing as possible. He had even brushed Lucy’s
hair, so that it lay on the pillow in its usual sunny ripples. When we
came into the room she opened her eyes, and seeing him, whispered
softly:--
“Arthur! Oh, my love, I am so glad you have come!” He was stooping to
kiss her, when Van Helsing motioned him back. “No,” he whispered, “not
yet! Hold her hand; it will comfort her more.”
So Arthur took her hand and knelt beside her, and she looked her best,
with all the soft lines matching the angelic beauty of her eyes. Then
gradually her eyes closed, and she sank to sleep. For a little bit her
breast heaved softly, and her breath came and went like a tired child’s.
And then insensibly there came the strange change which I had noticed in
the night. Her breathing grew stertorous, the mouth opened, and the pale
gums, drawn back, made the teeth look longer and sharper than ever. In a
sort of sleep-waking, vague, unconscious way she opened her eyes, which
were now dull and hard at once, and said in a soft, voluptuous voice,
such as I had never heard from her lips:--
“Arthur! Oh, my love, I am so glad you have come! Kiss me!” Arthur bent
eagerly over to kiss her; but at that instant Van Helsing, who, like me,
had been startled by her voice, swooped upon him, and catching him by
the neck with both hands, dragged him back with a fury of strength which
I never thought he could have possessed, and actually hurled him almost
across the room.
“Not for your life!” he said; “not for your living soul and hers!” And
he stood between them like a lion at bay.
Arthur was so taken aback that he did not for a moment know what to do
or say; and before any impulse of violence could seize him he realised
the place and the occasion, and stood silent, waiting.
I kept my eyes fixed on Lucy, as did Van Helsing, and we saw a spasm as
of rage flit like a shadow over her face; the sharp teeth champed
together. Then her eyes closed, and she breathed heavily.
Very shortly after she opened her eyes in all their softness, and
putting out her poor, pale, thin hand, took Van Helsing’s great brown
one; drawing it to her, she kissed it. “My true friend,” she said, in a
faint voice, but with untellable pathos, “My true friend, and his! Oh,
guard him, and give me peace!”
“I swear it!” he said solemnly, kneeling beside her and holding up his
hand, as one who registers an oath. Then he turned to Arthur, and said
to him: “Come, my child, take her hand in yours, and kiss her on the
forehead, and only once.”
Their eyes met instead of their lips; and so they parted.
Lucy’s eyes closed; and Van Helsing, who had been watching closely, took
Arthur’s arm, and drew him away.
And then Lucy’s breathing became stertorous again, and all at once it
ceased.
“It is all over,” said Van Helsing. “She is dead!”
I took Arthur by the arm, and led him away to the drawing-room, where he
sat down, and covered his face with his hands, sobbing in a way that
nearly broke me down to see.
I went back to the room, and found Van Helsing looking at poor Lucy, and
his face was sterner than ever. Some change had come over her body.
Death had given back part of her beauty, for her brow and cheeks had
recovered some of their flowing lines; even the lips had lost their
deadly pallor. It was as if the blood, no longer needed for the working
of the heart, had gone to make the harshness of death as little rude as
might be.
“We thought her dying whilst she slept,
And sleeping when she died.”
I stood beside Van Helsing, and said:--
“Ah, well, poor girl, there is peace for her at last. It is the end!”
He turned to me, and said with grave solemnity:--
“Not so; alas! not so. It is only the beginning!”
When I asked him what he meant, he only shook his head and answered:--
“We can do nothing as yet. Wait and see.”
CHAPTER XIII
DR. SEWARD’S DIARY--_continued_.
The funeral was arranged for the next succeeding day, so that Lucy and
her mother might be buried together. I attended to all the ghastly
formalities, and the urbane undertaker proved that his staff were
afflicted--or blessed--with something of his own obsequious suavity.
Even the woman who performed the last offices for the dead remarked to
me, in a confidential, brother-professional way, when she had come out
from the death-chamber:--
“She makes a very beautiful corpse, sir. It’s quite a privilege to
attend on her. It’s not too much to say that she will do credit to our
establishment!”
I noticed that Van Helsing never kept far away. This was possible from
the disordered state of things in the household. There were no relatives
at hand; and as Arthur had to be back the next day to attend at his
father’s funeral, we were unable to notify any one who should have been
bidden. Under the circumstances, Van Helsing and I took it upon
ourselves to examine papers, etc. He insisted upon looking over Lucy’s
papers himself. I asked him why, for I feared that he, being a
foreigner, might not be quite aware of English legal requirements, and
so might in ignorance make some unnecessary trouble. He answered me:--
“I know; I know. You forget that I am a lawyer as well as a doctor. But
this is not altogether for the law. You knew that, when you avoided the
coroner. I have more than him to avoid. There may be papers more--such
as this.”
As he spoke he took from his pocket-book the memorandum which had been
in Lucy’s breast, and which she had torn in her sleep.
“When you find anything of the solicitor who is for the late Mrs.
Westenra, seal all her papers, and write him to-night. For me, I watch
here in the room and in Miss Lucy’s old room all night, and I myself
search for what may be. It is not well that her very thoughts go into
the hands of strangers.”
I went on with my part of the work, and in another half hour had found
the name and address of Mrs. Westenra’s solicitor and had written to
him. All the poor lady’s papers were in order; explicit directions
regarding the place of burial were given. I had hardly sealed the
letter, when, to my surprise, Van Helsing walked into the room,
saying:--
“Can I help you, friend John? I am free, and if I may, my service is to
you.”
“Have you got what you looked for?” I asked, to which he replied:--
“I did not look for any specific thing. I only hoped to find, and find I
have, all that there was--only some letters and a few memoranda, and a
diary new begun. But I have them here, and we shall for the present say