Dracula
London, none there are who would not know me for a stranger. That is not
enough for me. Here I am noble; I am _boyar_; the common people know me,
and I am master. But a stranger in a strange land, he is no one; men
know him not--and to know not is to care not for. I am content if I am
like the rest, so that no man stops if he see me, or pause in his
speaking if he hear my words, ‘Ha, ha! a stranger!’ I have been so long
master that I would be master still--or at least that none other should
be master of me. You come to me not alone as agent of my friend Peter
Hawkins, of Exeter, to tell me all about my new estate in London. You
shall, I trust, rest here with me awhile, so that by our talking I may
learn the English intonation; and I would that you tell me when I make
error, even of the smallest, in my speaking. I am sorry that I had to be
away so long to-day; but you will, I know, forgive one who has so many
important affairs in hand.”
Of course I said all I could about being willing, and asked if I might
come into that room when I chose. He answered: “Yes, certainly,” and
added:--
“You may go anywhere you wish in the castle, except where the doors are
locked, where of course you will not wish to go. There is reason that
all things are as they are, and did you see with my eyes and know with
my knowledge, you would perhaps better understand.” I said I was sure of
this, and then he went on:--
“We are in Transylvania; and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are
not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things. Nay, from
what you have told me of your experiences already, you know something of
what strange things there may be.”
This led to much conversation; and as it was evident that he wanted to
talk, if only for talking’s sake, I asked him many questions regarding
things that had already happened to me or come within my notice.
Sometimes he sheered off the subject, or turned the conversation by
pretending not to understand; but generally he answered all I asked most
frankly. Then as time went on, and I had got somewhat bolder, I asked
him of some of the strange things of the preceding night, as, for
instance, why the coachman went to the places where he had seen the blue
flames. He then explained to me that it was commonly believed that on a
certain night of the year--last night, in fact, when all evil spirits
are supposed to have unchecked sway--a blue flame is seen over any place
where treasure has been concealed. “That treasure has been hidden,” he
went on, “in the region through which you came last night, there can be
but little doubt; for it was the ground fought over for centuries by the
Wallachian, the Saxon, and the Turk. Why, there is hardly a foot of soil
in all this region that has not been enriched by the blood of men,
patriots or invaders. In old days there were stirring times, when the
Austrian and the Hungarian came up in hordes, and the patriots went out
to meet them--men and women, the aged and the children too--and waited
their coming on the rocks above the passes, that they might sweep
destruction on them with their artificial avalanches. When the invader
was triumphant he found but little, for whatever there was had been
sheltered in the friendly soil.”
“But how,” said I, “can it have remained so long undiscovered, when
there is a sure index to it if men will but take the trouble to look?”
The Count smiled, and as his lips ran back over his gums, the long,
sharp, canine teeth showed out strangely; he answered:--
“Because your peasant is at heart a coward and a fool! Those flames only
appear on one night; and on that night no man of this land will, if he
can help it, stir without his doors. And, dear sir, even if he did he
would not know what to do. Why, even the peasant that you tell me of who
marked the place of the flame would not know where to look in daylight
even for his own work. Even you would not, I dare be sworn, be able to
find these places again?”
“There you are right,” I said. “I know no more than the dead where even
to look for them.” Then we drifted into other matters.
“Come,” he said at last, “tell me of London and of the house which you
have procured for me.” With an apology for my remissness, I went into my
own room to get the papers from my bag. Whilst I was placing them in
order I heard a rattling of china and silver in the next room, and as I
passed through, noticed that the table had been cleared and the lamp
lit, for it was by this time deep into the dark. The lamps were also lit
in the study or library, and I found the Count lying on the sofa,
reading, of all things in the world, an English Bradshaw’s Guide. When I
came in he cleared the books and papers from the table; and with him I
went into plans and deeds and figures of all sorts. He was interested in
everything, and asked me a myriad questions about the place and its
surroundings. He clearly had studied beforehand all he could get on the
subject of the neighbourhood, for he evidently at the end knew very much
more than I did. When I remarked this, he answered:--
“Well, but, my friend, is it not needful that I should? When I go there
I shall be all alone, and my friend Harker Jonathan--nay, pardon me, I
fall into my country’s habit of putting your patronymic first--my friend
Jonathan Harker will not be by my side to correct and aid me. He will be
in Exeter, miles away, probably working at papers of the law with my
other friend, Peter Hawkins. So!”
We went thoroughly into the business of the purchase of the estate at
Purfleet. When I had told him the facts and got his signature to the
necessary papers, and had written a letter with them ready to post to
Mr. Hawkins, he began to ask me how I had come across so suitable a
place. I read to him the notes which I had made at the time, and which I
inscribe here:--
“At Purfleet, on a by-road, I came across just such a place as seemed to
be required, and where was displayed a dilapidated notice that the place
was for sale. It is surrounded by a high wall, of ancient structure,
built of heavy stones, and has not been repaired for a large number of
years. The closed gates are of heavy old oak and iron, all eaten with
rust.
“The estate is called Carfax, no doubt a corruption of the old _Quatre
Face_, as the house is four-sided, agreeing with the cardinal points of
the compass. It contains in all some twenty acres, quite surrounded by
the solid stone wall above mentioned. There are many trees on it, which
make it in places gloomy, and there is a deep, dark-looking pond or
small lake, evidently fed by some springs, as the water is clear and
flows away in a fair-sized stream. The house is very large and of all
periods back, I should say, to mediæval times, for one part is of stone
immensely thick, with only a few windows high up and heavily barred with
iron. It looks like part of a keep, and is close to an old chapel or
church. I could not enter it, as I had not the key of the door leading
to it from the house, but I have taken with my kodak views of it from
various points. The house has been added to, but in a very straggling
way, and I can only guess at the amount of ground it covers, which must
be very great. There are but few houses close at hand, one being a very
large house only recently added to and formed into a private lunatic
asylum. It is not, however, visible from the grounds.”
When I had finished, he said:--
“I am glad that it is old and big. I myself am of an old family, and to
live in a new house would kill me. A house cannot be made habitable in a
day; and, after all, how few days go to make up a century. I rejoice
also that there is a chapel of old times. We Transylvanian nobles love
not to think that our bones may lie amongst the common dead. I seek not
gaiety nor mirth, not the bright voluptuousness of much sunshine and
sparkling waters which please the young and gay. I am no longer young;
and my heart, through weary years of mourning over the dead, is not
attuned to mirth. Moreover, the walls of my castle are broken; the
shadows are many, and the wind breathes cold through the broken
battlements and casements. I love the shade and the shadow, and would
be alone with my thoughts when I may.” Somehow his words and his look
did not seem to accord, or else it was that his cast of face made his
smile look malignant and saturnine.
Presently, with an excuse, he left me, asking me to put all my papers
together. He was some little time away, and I began to look at some of
the books around me. One was an atlas, which I found opened naturally at
England, as if that map had been much used. On looking at it I found in
certain places little rings marked, and on examining these I noticed
that one was near London on the east side, manifestly where his new
estate was situated; the other two were Exeter, and Whitby on the
Yorkshire coast.
It was the better part of an hour when the Count returned. “Aha!” he
said; “still at your books? Good! But you must not work always. Come; I
am informed that your supper is ready.” He took my arm, and we went into
the next room, where I found an excellent supper ready on the table. The
Count again excused himself, as he had dined out on his being away from
home. But he sat as on the previous night, and chatted whilst I ate.
After supper I smoked, as on the last evening, and the Count stayed with
me, chatting and asking questions on every conceivable subject, hour
after hour. I felt that it was getting very late indeed, but I did not
say anything, for I felt under obligation to meet my host’s wishes in
every way. I was not sleepy, as the long sleep yesterday had fortified
me; but I could not help experiencing that chill which comes over one at
the coming of the dawn, which is like, in its way, the turn of the tide.
They say that people who are near death die generally at the change to
the dawn or at the turn of the tide; any one who has when tired, and
tied as it were to his post, experienced this change in the atmosphere
can well believe it. All at once we heard the crow of a cock coming up
with preternatural shrillness through the clear morning air; Count
Dracula, jumping to his feet, said:--
“Why, there is the morning again! How remiss I am to let you stay up so
long. You must make your conversation regarding my dear new country of
England less interesting, so that I may not forget how time flies by
us,” and, with a courtly bow, he quickly left me.
I went into my own room and drew the curtains, but there was little to
notice; my window opened into the courtyard, all I could see was the
warm grey of quickening sky. So I pulled the curtains again, and have
written of this day.
* * * * *
_8 May._--I began to fear as I wrote in this book that I was getting too
diffuse; but now I am glad that I went into detail from the first, for
there is something so strange about this place and all in it that I
cannot but feel uneasy. I wish I were safe out of it, or that I had
never come. It may be that this strange night-existence is telling on
me; but would that that were all! If there were any one to talk to I
could bear it, but there is no one. I have only the Count to speak with,
and he!--I fear I am myself the only living soul within the place. Let
me be prosaic so far as facts can be; it will help me to bear up, and
imagination must not run riot with me. If it does I am lost. Let me say
at once how I stand--or seem to.
I only slept a few hours when I went to bed, and feeling that I could
not sleep any more, got up. I had hung my shaving glass by the window,
and was just beginning to shave. Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder,
and heard the Count’s voice saying to me, “Good-morning.” I started, for