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dinner.  This afternoon she made a funny remark.  We were coming home
for dinner, and had come to the top of the steps up from the West Pier
and stopped to look at the view, as we generally do.  The setting sun,
low down in the sky, was just dropping behind Kettleness.  The red
light was thrown over on the East Cliff and the old abbey, and seemed
to bathe everything in a beautiful rosy glow.  We were silent for a
while, and suddenly Lucy murmured as if to herself . . .

"His red eyes again!  They are just the same."  It was such an odd
expression, coming apropos of nothing, that it quite startled me.  I
slewed round a little, so as to see Lucy well without seeming to stare
at her, and saw that she was in a half dreamy state, with an odd look
on her face that I could not quite make out, so I said nothing, but
followed her eyes.  She appeared to be looking over at our own seat,
whereon was a dark figure seated alone.  I was quite a little startled
myself, for it seemed for an instant as if the stranger had great eyes
like burning flames, but a second look dispelled the illusion.  The red
sunlight was shining on the windows of St. Mary's Church behind our
seat, and as the sun dipped there was just sufficient change in the
refraction and reflection to make it appear as if the light moved.  I
called Lucy's attention to the peculiar effect, and she became herself
with a start, but she looked sad all the same.  It may have been that
she was thinking of that terrible night up there.  We never refer to
it, so I said nothing, and we went home to dinner.  Lucy had a headache
and went early to bed.  I saw her asleep, and went out for a little
stroll myself.

I walked along the cliffs to the westward, and was full of sweet
sadness, for I was thinking of Jonathan.  When coming home, it was then
bright moonlight, so bright that, though the front of our part of the
Crescent was in shadow, everything could be well seen, I threw a glance
up at our window, and saw Lucy's head leaning out.  I opened my
handkerchief and waved it.  She did not notice or make any movement
whatever.  Just then, the moonlight crept round an angle of the
building, and the light fell on the window.  There distinctly was Lucy
with her head lying up against the side of the window sill and her eyes
shut.  She was fast asleep, and by her, seated on the window sill, was
something that looked like a good-sized bird.  I was afraid she might
get a chill, so I ran upstairs, but as I came into the room she was
moving back to her bed, fast asleep, and breathing heavily.  She was
holding her hand to her throat, as though to protect if from the cold.

I did not wake her, but tucked her up warmly.  I have taken care that
the door is locked and the window securely fastened.

She looks so sweet as she sleeps, but she is paler than is her wont,
and there is a drawn, haggard look under her eyes which I do not like.
I fear she is fretting about something.  I wish I could find out what it
is.


15 August.--Rose later than usual.  Lucy was languid and tired, and
slept on after we had been called.  We had a happy surprise at
breakfast.  Arthur's father is better, and wants the marriage to come
off soon.  Lucy is full of quiet joy, and her mother is glad and sorry
at once.  Later on in the day she told me the cause.  She is grieved to
lose Lucy as her very own, but she is rejoiced that she is soon to have
some one to protect her.  Poor dear, sweet lady!  She confided to me
that she has got her death warrant.  She has not told Lucy, and made me
promise secrecy.  Her doctor told her that within a few months, at
most, she must die, for her heart is weakening.  At any time, even now,
a sudden shock would be almost sure to kill her.  Ah, we were wise to
keep from her the affair of the dreadful night of Lucy's sleep-walking.


17 August.--No diary for two whole days.  I have not had the heart to
write.  Some sort of shadowy pall seems to be coming over our
happiness.  No news from Jonathan, and Lucy seems to be growing weaker,
whilst her mother's hours are numbering to a close.  I do not
understand Lucy's fading away as she is doing.  She eats well and
sleeps well, and enjoys the fresh air, but all the time the roses in
her cheeks are fading, and she gets weaker and more languid day by day.
At night I hear her gasping as if for air.

I keep the key of our door always fastened to my wrist at night, but
she gets up and walks about the room, and sits at the open window.
Last night I found her leaning out when I woke up, and when I tried to
wake her I could not.

She was in a faint.  When I managed to restore her, she was weak as
water, and cried silently between long, painful struggles for breath.
When I asked her how she came to be at the window she shook her head
and turned away.

I trust her feeling ill may not be from that unlucky prick of the
safety-pin.  I looked at her throat just now as she lay asleep, and the
tiny wounds seem not to have healed.  They are still open, and, if
anything, larger than before, and the edges of them are faintly white.
They are like little white dots with red centres.  Unless they heal
within a day or two, I shall insist on the doctor seeing about them.



LETTER, SAMUEL F. BILLINGTON & SON, SOLICITORS WHITBY,
TO MESSRS. CARTER, PATERSON & CO., LONDON.

17 August

"Dear Sirs,--Herewith please receive invoice of goods sent by Great
Northern Railway.  Same are to be delivered at Carfax, near
Purfleet, immediately on receipt at goods station King's Cross.  The
house is at present empty, but enclosed please find keys, all of
which are labelled.

"You will please deposit the boxes, fifty in number, which form the
consignment, in the partially ruined building forming part of the
house and marked 'A' on rough diagrams enclosed.  Your agent will
easily recognize the locality, as it is the ancient chapel of the
mansion.  The goods leave by the train at 9:30 tonight, and will be
due at King's Cross at 4:30 tomorrow afternoon.  As our client
wishes the delivery made as soon as possible, we shall be obliged by
your having teams ready at King's Cross at the time named and
forthwith conveying the goods to destination.  In order to obviate
any delays possible through any routine requirements as to payment
in your departments, we enclose cheque herewith for ten pounds,
receipt of which please acknowledge.  Should the charge be less than
this amount, you can return balance, if greater, we shall at once
send cheque for difference on hearing from you.  You are to leave
the keys on coming away in the main hall of the house, where the
proprietor may get them on his entering the house by means of his
duplicate key.

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"My young sir, I do not ask so much as that, not the last!"

"What shall I do?"  There was fire in his eyes, and his open nostrils
quivered with intent.  Van Helsing slapped him on the shoulder.

"Come!" he said.  "You are a man, and it is a man we want.  You are
better than me, better than my friend John."  Arthur looked bewildered,
and the Professor went on by explaining in a kindly way.

"Young miss is bad, very bad.  She wants blood, and blood she must
have or die.  My friend John and I have consulted, and we are about to
perform what we call transfusion of blood, to transfer from full veins
of one to the empty veins which pine for him.  John was to give his
blood, as he is the more young and strong than me."--Here Arthur took
my hand and wrung it hard in silence.--"But now you are here, you are
more good than us, old or young, who toil much in the world of
thought.  Our nerves are not so calm and our blood so bright than
yours!"

Arthur turned to him and said, "If you only knew how gladly I would
die for her you would understand . . ."  He stopped with a sort of
choke in his voice.

"Good boy!" said Van Helsing.  "In the not-so-far-off you will be
happy that you have done all for her you love.  Come now and be
silent.  You shall kiss her once before it is done, but then you must
go, and you must leave at my sign.  Say no word to Madame.  You know
how it is with her.  There must be no shock, any knowledge of this
would be one.  Come!"

We all went up to Lucy's room.  Arthur by direction remained outside.
Lucy turned her head and looked at us, but said nothing.  She was not
asleep, but she was simply too weak to make the effort.  Her eyes
spoke to us, that was all.

Van Helsing took some things from his bag and laid them on a little
table out of sight.  Then he mixed a narcotic, and coming over to the
bed, said cheerily, "Now, little miss, here is your medicine.  Drink
it off, like a good child.  See, I lift you so that to swallow is
easy.  Yes."  She had made the effort with success.

It astonished me how long the drug took to act.  This, in fact, marked
the extent of her weakness.  The time seemed endless until sleep began
to flicker in her eyelids.  At last, however, the narcotic began to
manifest its potency, and she fell into a deep sleep.  When the
Professor was satisfied, he called Arthur into the room, and bade him
strip off his coat.  Then he added, "You may take that one little kiss
whiles I bring over the table.  Friend John, help to me!"  So neither
of us looked whilst he bent over her.

Van Helsing, turning to me, said, "He is so young and strong, and of
blood so pure that we need not defibrinate it."

Then with swiftness, but with absolute method, Van Helsing performed
the operation.  As the transfusion went on, something like life seemed
to come back to poor Lucy's cheeks, and through Arthur's growing
pallor the joy of his face seemed absolutely to shine.  After a bit I
began to grow anxious, for the loss of blood was telling on Arthur,
strong man as he was.  It gave me an idea of what a terrible strain
Lucy's system must have undergone that what weakened Arthur only
partially restored her.

But the Professor's face was set, and he stood watch in hand, and with
his eyes fixed now on the patient and now on Arthur.  I could hear my
own heart beat.  Presently, he said in a soft voice, "Do not stir an
instant.  It is enough.  You attend him.  I will look to her."

When all was over, I could see how much Arthur was weakened.  I
dressed the wound and took his arm to bring him away, when Van Helsing
spoke without turning round, the man seems to have eyes in the back of
his head, "The brave lover, I think, deserve another kiss, which he
shall have presently."  And as he had now finished his operation, he
adjusted the pillow to the patient's head.  As he did so the narrow
black velvet band which she seems always to wear round her throat,
buckled with an old diamond buckle which her lover had given her, was
dragged a little up, and showed a red mark on her throat.

Arthur did not notice it, but I could hear the deep hiss of indrawn
breath which is one of Van Helsing's ways of betraying emotion.  He
said nothing at the moment, but turned to me, saying, "Now take down
our brave young lover, give him of the port wine, and let him lie down
a while.  He must then go home and rest, sleep much and eat much, that
he may be recruited of what he has so given to his love.  He must not
stay here.  Hold a moment!  I may take it, sir, that you are anxious
of result.  Then bring it with you, that in all ways the operation is
successful.  You have saved her life this time, and you can go home
and rest easy in mind that all that can be is.  I shall tell her all
when she is well.  She shall love you none the less for what you have
done.  Goodbye."

When Arthur had gone I went back to the room.  Lucy was sleeping
gently, but her breathing was stronger.  I could see the counterpane
move as her breast heaved.  By the bedside sat Van Helsing, looking at
her intently.  The velvet band again covered the red mark.  I asked
the Professor in a whisper, "What do you make of that mark on her
throat?"

"What do you make of it?"

"I have not examined it yet," I answered, and then and there proceeded
to loose the band.  Just over the external jugular vein there were two
punctures, not large, but not wholesome looking.  There was no sign of
disease, but the edges were white and worn looking, as if by some
trituration.  It at once occurred to me that that this wound, or
whatever it was, might be the means of that manifest loss of blood.
But I abandoned the idea as soon as it formed, for such a thing could
not be.  The whole bed would have been drenched to a scarlet with the
blood which the girl must have lost to leave such a pallor as she had
before the transfusion.

"Well?" said Van Helsing.

"Well," said I.  "I can make nothing of it."

The Professor stood up.  "I must go back to Amsterdam tonight," he
said "There are books and things there which I want.  You must remain
here all night, and you must not let your sight pass from her."

"Shall I have a nurse?" I asked.

"We are the best nurses, you and I.  You keep watch all night.  See
that she is well fed, and that nothing disturbs her.  You must not
sleep all the night.  Later on we can sleep, you and I.  I shall be
back as soon as possible.  And then we may begin."

"May begin?" I said.  "What on earth do you mean?"

"We shall see!" he answered, as he hurried out.  He came back a moment

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still asleep.  I looked into her room and saw her, but did not go in,
lest I should disturb her."  The Professor smiled, and looked quite
jubilant.  He rubbed his hands together, and said, "Aha!  I thought I
had diagnosed the case.  My treatment is working."

To which she replied, "You must not take all the credit to yourself,
doctor.  Lucy's state this morning is due in part to me."

"How do you mean, ma'am?" asked the Professor.

"Well, I was anxious about the dear child in the night, and went into
her room.  She was sleeping soundly, so soundly that even my coming
did not wake her.  But the room was awfully stuffy.  There were a lot
of those horrible, strong-smelling flowers about everywhere, and she
had actually a bunch of them round her neck.  I feared that the heavy
odour would be too much for the dear child in her weak state, so I took
them all away and opened a bit of the window to let in a little fresh
air.  You will be pleased with her, I am sure."

She moved off into her boudoir, where she usually breakfasted early.
As she had spoken, I watched the Professor's face, and saw it turn
ashen gray.  He had been able to retain his self-command whilst the
poor lady was present, for he knew her state and how mischievous a
shock would be.  He actually smiled on her as he held open the door
for her to pass into her room.  But the instant she had disappeared he
pulled me, suddenly and forcibly, into the dining room and closed the
door.

Then, for the first time in my life, I saw Van Helsing break down.  He
raised his hands over his head in a sort of mute despair, and then
beat his palms together in a helpless way.  Finally he sat down on a
chair, and putting his hands before his face, began to sob, with loud,
dry sobs that seemed to come from the very racking of his heart.

Then he raised his arms again, as though appealing to the whole
universe.  "God!  God!  God!" he said.  "What have we done, what has
this poor thing done, that we are so sore beset?  Is there fate
amongst us still, send down from the pagan world of old, that such
things must be, and in such way?  This poor mother, all unknowing, and
all for the best as she think, does such thing as lose her daughter
body and soul, and we must not tell her, we must not even warn her, or
she die, then both die.  Oh, how we are beset!  How are all the powers
of the devils against us!"

Suddenly he jumped to his feet.  "Come," he said, "come, we must see and
act.  Devils or no devils, or all the devils at once, it matters not.
We must fight him all the same."  He went to the hall door for his
bag, and together we went up to Lucy's room.

Once again I drew up the blind, whilst Van Helsing went towards the
bed.  This time he did not start as he looked on the poor face with
the same awful, waxen pallor as before.  He wore a look of stern
sadness and infinite pity.

"As I expected," he murmured, with that hissing inspiration of his
which meant so much.  Without a word he went and locked the door, and
then began to set out on the little table the instruments for yet
another operation of transfusion of blood.  I had long ago recognized
the necessity, and begun to take off my coat, but he stopped me with a
warning hand.  "No!" he said.  "Today you must operate.  I shall
provide.  You are weakened already."  As he spoke he took off his coat
and rolled up his shirtsleeve.

Again the operation.  Again the narcotic.  Again some return of colour
to the ashy cheeks, and the regular breathing of healthy sleep.  This
time I watched whilst Van Helsing recruited himself and rested.

Presently he took an opportunity of telling Mrs. Westenra that she
must not remove anything from Lucy's room without consulting him.
That the flowers were of medicinal value, and that the breathing of
their odour was a part of the system of cure.  Then he took over the
care of the case himself, saying that he would watch this night and
the next, and would send me word when to come.

After another hour Lucy waked from her sleep, fresh and bright and
seemingly not much the worse for her terrible ordeal.

What does it all mean?  I am beginning to wonder if my long habit of
life amongst the insane is beginning to tell upon my own brain.



LUCY WESTENRA'S DIARY

17 September.--Four days and nights of peace.  I am getting so strong
again that I hardly know myself.  It is as if I had passed through
some long nightmare, and had just awakened to see the beautiful
sunshine and feel the fresh air of the morning around me.  I have a
dim half remembrance of long, anxious times of waiting and fearing,
darkness in which there was not even the pain of hope to make present
distress more poignant.  And then long spells of oblivion, and the
rising back to life as a diver coming up through a great press of
water.  Since, however, Dr. Van Helsing has been with me, all this bad
dreaming seems to have passed away.  The noises that used to frighten
me out of my wits, the flapping against the windows, the distant
voices which seemed so close to me, the harsh sounds that came from I
know not where and commanded me to do I know not what, have all
ceased.  I go to bed now without any fear of sleep.  I do not even try
to keep awake.  I have grown quite fond of the garlic, and a boxful
arrives for me every day from Haarlem.  Tonight Dr. Van Helsing is
going away, as he has to be for a day in Amsterdam.  But I need not be
watched.  I am well enough to be left alone.

Thank God for Mother's sake, and dear Arthur's, and for all our
friends who have been so kind!  I shall not even feel the change, for
last night Dr. Van Helsing slept in his chair a lot of the time.  I
found him asleep twice when I awoke.  But I did not fear to go to
sleep again, although the boughs or bats or something flapped almost
angrily against the window panes.




THE PALL MALL GAZETTE 18 September.

THE ESCAPED WOLF PERILOUS ADVENTURE OF OUR INTERVIEWER

INTERVIEW WITH THE KEEPER IN THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS

After many inquiries and almost as many refusals, and perpetually
using the words 'PALL MALL GAZETTE' as a sort of talisman, I managed

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gave more colour to the pale cheeks.  When he saw her, Arthur was
simply choking with emotion, and none of us could speak.  In the hours
that had passed, the fits of sleep, or the comatose condition that
passed for it, had grown more frequent, so that the pauses when
conversation was possible were shortened.  Arthur's presence, however,
seemed to act as a stimulant.  She rallied a little, and spoke to him
more brightly than she had done since we arrived.  He too pulled
himself together, and spoke as cheerily as he could, so that the best
was made of everything.

It is now nearly one o'clock, and he and Van Helsing are sitting with
her.  I am to relieve them in a quarter of an hour, and I am entering
this on Lucy's phonograph.  Until six o'clock they are to try to rest.
I fear that tomorrow will end our watching, for the shock has been too
great.  The poor child cannot rally.  God help us all.




LETTER MINA HARKER TO LUCY WESTENRA

(Unopened by her)

17 September

My dearest Lucy,

"It seems an age since I heard from you, or indeed since I
wrote.  You will pardon me, I know, for all my faults when
you have read all my budget of news.  Well, I got my husband back
all right.  When we arrived at Exeter there was a carriage
waiting for us, and in it, though he had an attack of gout, Mr.
Hawkins.  He took us to his house, where there were rooms for us
all nice and comfortable, and we dined together.  After dinner
Mr. Hawkins said,

"'My dears, I want to drink your health and prosperity, and
may every blessing attend you both.  I know you both from
children, and have, with love and pride, seen you grow up.
Now I want you to make your home here with me.  I have left
to me neither chick nor child.  All are gone, and in my
will I have left you everything.'  I cried, Lucy dear, as
Jonathan and the old man clasped hands.  Our evening was a
very, very happy one.

"So here we are, installed in this beautiful old house, and
from both my bedroom and the drawing room I can see the
great elms of the cathedral close, with their great black
stems standing out against the old yellow stone of the cathedral,
and I can hear the rooks overhead cawing and cawing and
chattering and chattering and gossiping all day, after the manner
of rooks--and humans.  I am busy, I need not tell you, arranging
things and housekeeping.  Jonathan and Mr. Hawkins are busy all
day, for now that Jonathan is a partner, Mr. Hawkins wants to
tell him all about the clients.

"How is your dear mother getting on?  I wish I could run up
to town for a day or two to see you, dear, but I dare not
go yet, with so much on my shoulders, and Jonathan wants
looking after still.  He is beginning to put some flesh on
his bones again, but he was terribly weakened by the long
illness.  Even now he sometimes starts out of his sleep in
a sudden way and awakes all trembling until I can coax him
back to his usual placidity.  However, thank God, these
occasions grow less frequent as the days go on, and they
will in time pass away altogether, I trust.  And now I have
told you my news, let me ask yours.  When are you to be
married, and where, and who is to perform the ceremony, and
what are you to wear, and is it to be a public or private
wedding?  Tell me all about it, dear, tell me all about
everything, for there is nothing which interests you which
will not be dear to me.  Jonathan asks me to send his 'respectful
duty', but I do not think that is good enough from the junior
partner of the important firm Hawkins & Harker.  And so, as you
love me, and he loves me, and I love you with all the moods and
tenses of the verb, I send you simply his 'love' instead.
Goodbye, my dearest Lucy, and blessings on you.

"Yours,

"Mina Harker"



REPORT FROM PATRICK HENNESSEY, MD, MRCSLK, QCPI, ETC, ETC,
TO JOHN SEWARD, MD

20 September

My dear Sir:

"In accordance with your wishes, I enclose report of the
conditions of everything left in my charge.  With regard to
patient, Renfield, there is more to say.  He has had another
outbreak, which might have had a dreadful ending, but which, as
it fortunately happened, was unattended with any unhappy results.
This afternoon a carrier's cart with two men made a call at the
empty house whose grounds abut on ours, the house to which, you
will remember, the patient twice ran away.  The men stopped at
our gate to ask the porter their way, as they were strangers.

"I was myself looking out of the study window, having a
smoke after dinner, and saw one of them come up to the
house.  As he passed the window of Renfield's room, the
patient began to rate him from within, and called him all
the foul names he could lay his tongue to.  The man, who
seemed a decent fellow enough, contented himself by telling
him to 'shut up for a foul-mouthed beggar', whereon our man
accused him of robbing him and wanting to murder him and
said that he would hinder him if he were to swing for it.
I opened the window and signed to the man not to notice, so
he contented himself after looking the place over and making up
his mind as to what kind of place he had got to by saying, 'Lor'
bless yer, sir, I wouldn't mind what was said to me in a bloomin'
madhouse.  I pity ye and the guv'nor for havin' to live in the
house with a wild beast like that.'

"Then he asked his way civilly enough, and I told him where
the gate of the empty house was.  He went away followed by
threats and curses and revilings from our man.  I went down
to see if I could make out any cause for his anger, since

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morning?  Or if that you are too occupy, I can go alone if it may be.
It is a new experience to me to find a lunatic who talk philosophy,
and reason so sound."

I had some work to do which pressed, so I told him that if he would go
alone I would be glad, as then I should not have to keep him waiting,
so I called an attendant and gave him the necessary instructions.
Before the Professor left the room I cautioned him against getting any
false impression from my patient.

"But," he answered, "I want him to talk of himself and of his delusion
as to consuming live things.  He said to Madam Mina, as I see in your
diary of yesterday, that he had once had such a belief.  Why do you
smile, friend John?"

"Excuse me," I said, "but the answer is here."  I laid my hand on the
typewritten matter.  "When our sane and learned lunatic made that very
statement of how he used to consume life, his mouth was actually
nauseous with the flies and spiders which he had eaten just before
Mrs. Harker entered the room."

Van Helsing smiled in turn.  "Good!" he said.  "Your memory is true,
friend John.  I should have remembered.  And yet it is this very
obliquity of thought and memory which makes mental disease such a
fascinating study.  Perhaps I may gain more knowledge out of the folly
of this madman than I shall from the teaching of the most wise.  Who
knows?"

I went on with my work, and before long was through that in hand.  It
seemed that the time had been very short indeed, but there was Van
Helsing back in the study.

"Do I interrupt?" he asked politely as he stood at the door.

"Not at all," I answered.  "Come in.  My work is finished, and I am
free.  I can go with you now, if you like."

"It is needless, I have seen him!"

"Well?"

"I fear that he does not appraise me at much.  Our interview was
short.  When I entered his room he was sitting on a stool in the
centre, with his elbows on his knees, and his face was the picture of
sullen discontent.  I spoke to him as cheerfully as I could, and with
such a measure of respect as I could assume.  He made no reply
whatever.  'Don't you know me?' I asked.  His answer was not
reassuring: 'I know you well enough; you are the old fool Van
Helsing.  I wish you would take yourself and your idiotic brain
theories somewhere else.  Damn all thick-headed Dutchmen!'  Not a word
more would he say, but sat in his implacable sullenness as indifferent
to me as though I had not been in the room at all.  Thus departed for
this time my chance of much learning from this so clever lunatic, so I
shall go, if I may, and cheer myself with a few happy words with that
sweet soul Madam Mina.  Friend John, it does rejoice me unspeakable
that she is no more to be pained, no more to be worried with our
terrible things.  Though we shall much miss her help, it is better
so."

"I agree with you with all my heart," I answered earnestly, for I did
not want him to weaken in this matter.  "Mrs. Harker is better out of
it.  Things are quite bad enough for us, all men of the world, and who
have been in many tight places in our time, but it is no place for a
woman, and if she had remained in touch with the affair, it would in
time infallibly have wrecked her."

So Van Helsing has gone to confer with Mrs. Harker and Harker, Quincey
and Art are all out following up the clues as to the earth boxes.  I
shall finish my round of work and we shall meet tonight.





MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL

1 October.--It is strange to me to be kept in the dark as I am today,
after Jonathan's full confidence for so many years, to see him
manifestly avoid certain matters, and those the most vital of all.
This morning I slept late after the fatigues of yesterday, and though
Jonathan was late too, he was the earlier.  He spoke to me before he
went out, never more sweetly or tenderly, but he never mentioned a
word of what had happened in the visit to the Count's house.  And yet
he must have known how terribly anxious I was.  Poor dear fellow!  I
suppose it must have distressed him even more than it did me.  They
all agreed that it was best that I should not be drawn further into
this awful work, and I acquiesced.  But to think that he keeps
anything from me!  And now I am crying like a silly fool, when I know
it comes from my husband's great love and from the good, good wishes
of those other strong men.

That has done me good.  Well, some day Jonathan will tell me all.  And
lest it should ever be that he should think for a moment that I kept
anything from him, I still keep my journal as usual.  Then if he has
feared of my trust I shall show it to him, with every thought of my
heart put down for his dear eyes to read.  I feel strangely sad and
low-spirited today.  I suppose it is the reaction from the terrible
excitement.

Last night I went to bed when the men had gone, simply because they
told me to.  I didn't feel sleepy, and I did feel full of devouring
anxiety.  I kept thinking over everything that has been ever since
Jonathan came to see me in London, and it all seems like a horrible
tragedy, with fate pressing on relentlessly to some destined end.
Everything that one does seems, no matter how right it may be, to bring
on the very thing which is most to be deplored.  If I hadn't gone to
Whitby, perhaps poor dear Lucy would be with us now.  She hadn't taken
to visiting the churchyard till I came, and if she hadn't come there
in the day time with me she wouldn't have walked in her sleep.  And if
she hadn't gone there at night and asleep, that monster couldn't have
destroyed her as he did.  Oh, why did I ever go to Whitby?  There now,
crying again!  I wonder what has come over me today.  I must hide it
from Jonathan, for if he knew that I had been crying twice in one
morning . . . I, who never cried on my own account, and whom he has
never caused to shed a tear, the dear fellow would fret his heart out.
I shall put a bold face on, and if I do feel weepy, he shall never see
it.  I suppose it is just one of the lessons that we poor women have
to learn . . .

I can't quite remember how I fell asleep last night.  I remember
hearing the sudden barking of the dogs and a lot of queer sounds, like



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