view release on metacpan or  search on metacpan

t/dracula.DOS.txt  view on Meta::CPAN

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 13


DR. SEWARD'S DIARY--cont.

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 was
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 tonight.  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 nothing of them.  I shall see that poor
lad tomorrow evening, and, with his sanction, I shall use some."

When we had finished the work in hand, he said to me, "And now, friend
John, I think we may to bed.  We want sleep, both you and I, and rest
to recuperate.  Tomorrow we shall have much to do, but for the tonight
there is no need of us.  Alas!"

Before turning in we went to look at poor Lucy.  The undertaker had
certainly done his work well, for the room was turned into a small
chapelle ardente.  There was a wilderness of beautiful white flowers,
and death was made as little repulsive as might be.  The end of the
winding sheet was laid over the face.  When the Professor bent over
and turned it gently back, we both started at the beauty before us.
The tall wax candles showing a sufficient light to note it well.  All
Lucy's loveliness had come back to her in death, and the hours that
had passed, instead of leaving traces of 'decay's effacing fingers',
had but restored the beauty of life, till positively I could not
believe my eyes that I was looking at a corpse.

The Professor looked sternly grave.  He had not loved her as I had,
and there was no need for tears in his eyes.  He said to me, "Remain
till I return," and left the room.  He came back with a handful of
wild garlic from the box waiting in the hall, but which had not been
opened, and placed the flowers amongst the others on and around the
bed.  Then he took from his neck, inside his collar, a little gold
crucifix, and placed it over the mouth.  He restored the sheet to its
place, and we came away.

I was undressing in my own room, when, with a premonitory tap at the
door, he entered, and at once began to speak.

"Tomorrow I want you to bring me, before night, a set of post-mortem
knives."

t/dracula.DOS.txt  view on Meta::CPAN

As she was telling her terrible story, the eastern sky began to
quicken, and everything became more and more clear.  Harker was still
and quiet; but over his face, as the awful narrative went on, came a
grey look which deepened and deepened in the morning light, till when
the first red streak of the coming dawn shot up, the flesh stood
darkly out against the whitening hair.

We have arranged that one of us is to stay within call of the unhappy
pair till we can meet together and arrange about taking action.

Of this I am sure.  The sun rises today on no more miserable house in
all the great round of its daily course.




CHAPTER 22


JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL

3 October.--As I must do something or go mad, I write this diary.  It
is now six o'clock, and we are to meet in the study in half an hour
and take something to eat, for Dr. Van Helsing and Dr. Seward are
agreed that if we do not eat we cannot work our best.  Our best will
be, God knows, required today.  I must keep writing at every chance,
for I dare not stop to think.  All, big and little, must go down.
Perhaps at the end the little things may teach us most.  The teaching,
big or little, could not have landed Mina or me anywhere worse than we
are today.  However, we must trust and hope.  Poor Mina told me just
now, with the tears running down her dear cheeks, that it is in
trouble and trial that our faith is tested.  That we must keep on
trusting, and that God will aid us up to the end.  The end!  Oh my
God!  What end? . . . To work!  To work!

When Dr. Van Helsing and Dr. Seward had come back from seeing poor
Renfield, we went gravely into what was to be done.  First, Dr. Seward
told us that when he and Dr. Van Helsing had gone down to the room
below they had found Renfield lying on the floor, all in a heap.  His
face was all bruised and crushed in, and the bones of the neck were
broken.

Dr. Seward asked the attendant who was on duty in the passage if he
had heard anything.  He said that he had been sitting down, he
confessed to half dozing, when he heard loud voices in the room, and
then Renfield had called out loudly several times, "God!  God!  God!"
After that there was a sound of falling, and when he entered the room
he found him lying on the floor, face down, just as the doctors had
seen him.  Van Helsing asked if he had heard "voices" or "a voice,"
and he said he could not say.  That at first it had seemed to him as
if there were two, but as there was no one in the room it could have
been only one.  He could swear to it, if required, that the word "God"
was spoken by the patient.

Dr. Seward said to us, when we were alone, that he did not wish to go
into the matter.  The question of an inquest had to be considered, and
it would never do to put forward the truth, as no one would believe
it.  As it was, he thought that on the attendant's evidence he could
give a certificate of death by misadventure in falling from bed.  In
case the coroner should demand it, there would be a formal inquest,
necessarily to the same result.

When the question began to be discussed as to what should be our next
step, the very first thing we decided was that Mina should be in full
confidence.  That nothing of any sort, no matter how painful, should
be kept from her.  She herself agreed as to its wisdom, and it was
pitiful to see her so brave and yet so sorrowful, and in such a depth
of despair.

"There must be no concealment," she said.  "Alas!  We have had too
much already.  And besides there is nothing in all the world that can
give me more pain than I have already endured, than I suffer now!
Whatever may happen, it must be of new hope or of new courage to me!"

Van Helsing was looking at her fixedly as she spoke, and said,
suddenly but quietly, "But dear Madam Mina, are you not afraid.  Not
for yourself, but for others from yourself, after what has happened?"

Her face grew set in its lines, but her eyes shone with the devotion
of a martyr as she answered, "Ah no!  For my mind is made up!"

"To what?" he asked gently, whilst we were all very still, for each in
our own way we had a sort of vague idea of what she meant.

Her answer came with direct simplicity, as though she was simply
stating a fact, "Because if I find in myself, and I shall watch keenly
for it, a sign of harm to any that I love, I shall die!"

"You would not kill yourself?" he asked, hoarsely.

"I would.  If there were no friend who loved me, who would save me
such a pain, and so desperate an effort!"  She looked at him meaningly
as she spoke.

He was sitting down, but now he rose and came close to her and put his
hand on her head as he said solemnly.  "My child, there is such an one
if it were for your good.  For myself I could hold it in my account
with God to find such an euthanasia for you, even at this moment if it
were best.  Nay, were it safe!  But my child . . ."

For a moment he seemed choked, and a great sob rose in his throat.  He
gulped it down and went on, "There are here some who would stand
between you and death.  You must not die.  You must not die by any
hand, but least of all your own.  Until the other, who has fouled your
sweet life, is true dead you must not die.  For if he is still with
the quick Undead, your death would make you even as he is.  No, you
must live!  You must struggle and strive to live, though death would
seem a boon unspeakable.  You must fight Death himself, though he come
to you in pain or in joy.  By the day, or the night, in safety or in
peril!  On your living soul I charge you that you do not die.  Nay,
nor think of death, till this great evil be past."

The poor dear grew white as death, and shook and shivered, as I have
seen a quicksand shake and shiver at the incoming of the tide.  We
were all silent.  We could do nothing.  At length she grew more calm
and turning to him said sweetly, but oh so sorrowfully, as she held
out her hand, "I promise you, my dear friend, that if God will let me
live, I shall strive to do so.  Till, if it may be in His good time,
this horror may have passed away from me."