"My tablets! Quick, my tablets!
                  `Tis meet that I put it down," etc.,

for now, feeling as though my own brain were unhinged or as if
the shock had come which must end in its undoing, I turn to my
diary for repose. The habit of entering accurately must help to
soothe me.

    The Count's mysterious warning frightened me at the time; it
frightens me more not when I think of it, for in the future he
has a fearful hold upon me. I shall fear to doubt what he may
say!

    When I had written in my diary and had fortunately replaced
the book and pen in my pocket I felt sleepy. The Count's warning
came into my mind, but I took pleasure in disobeying it. The
sense of sleep was upon me, and with it the obstinacy which
sleep brings as outrider. The soft moonlight soothed, and the
wide expanse without gave a sense of freedom which refreshed me.
I determined not to return to-night to the gloom-haunted rooms,
but to sleep here, where, of old, ladies had sat and sung and
lived sweet lives whilst their gentle breasts were sad for their
menfolk away in the midst of remorseless wars. I drew a great
couch out of its place near the corner, so that as I lay, I
could look at the lovely view to east and south, and unthinking
of and uncaring for the dust, composed myself for sleep. I
suppose I must have fallen asleep; I hope so, but I fear, for
all that followed was startlingly real--so real that now sitting
here in the broad, full sunlight of the morning, I cannot in the
least believe that it was all sleep.

    I was not alone. The room was the same, unchanged in any way
since I came into it; I could see along the floor, in the
brilliant moonlight, my own footsteps marked where I had
disturbed the long accumulation of dust. In the moonlight
opposite me were three young women, ladies by their dress and
manner. I thought at the time that I must be dreaming when I saw
them, they threw no shadow on the floor. They came close to me,
and looked at me for some time, and then whispered together. Two
were dark, and had high aquiline noses, like the Count, and
great dark, piercing eyes, that seemed to be almost red when
contrasted with the pale yellow moon. The other was fair, as
fair as can be, with great masses of golden hair and eyes like
pale sapphires. I seemed somehow to know her face, and to know
it in connection with some dreamy fear, but I could not
recollect at the moment how or where. All three had brilliant
white teeth that shone like pearls against the ruby of their
voluptuous lips. There was something about them that made me
uneasy, some longing and at the same time some deadly fear. I
felt in my heart a wicked, burning desire that they would kiss
me with those red lips. It is not good to note this down; lest
some day it should meet Mina's eyes and cause her pain; but it
is the truth. They whispered together, and then they all three
laughed--such a silvery, musical laugh, but as hard as though
the sound never could have come through the softness of human
lips. It was like the intolerable, tingling sweetness of
water-glasses when played on by a cunning hand. The fair girl
shook her head coquettishly, and the other two urged her on. One
said:--

    "Go on! You are first, and we shall follow; yours is the
right to begin." The other added:--

    "He is young and strong; there are kisses for us all." I lay
quiet, looking out from under my eyelashes in an agony of
delightful anticipation. The fair girl advanced and bent over me
till I could feel the movement of her breath upon me. Sweet it
was in one sense, honey-sweet, and sent the same tingling
through the nerves as her voice, but with a bitter underlying
the sweet, a bitter offensiveness, as one smells in blood.

    I was afraid to raise my eyelids, but looked out and saw
perfectly under the lashes. The girl went on her knees, and bent
over me, simply gloating. There was a deliberate voluptuousness
which was both thrilling and repulsive, and as she arched her
neck she actually licked her lips like an animal, till I could
see in the moonlight the moisture shining on the scarlet lips
and on the red tongue as it lapped the white sharp teeth. Lower
and lower went her head as the lips went below the range of my
mouth and chin and seemed to fasten on my throat. Then she
paused, and I could hear the churning sound of her tongue as it
licked her teeth and lips, and I could feel the hot breath on my
neck. Then the skin of my throat began to tingle as one's flesh
does when the hand that is to tickle it approaches
nearer--nearer. I could feel the soft, shivering touch of the
lips on the super sensitive skin of my throat, and the hard
dents of two sharp teeth, just touching and pausing there. I
closed my eyes in languorous ecstasy and waited--waited with
beating heart.

    But at that instant, another sensation swept through me as
quick as lightning. I was conscious of the presence of the
Count, and of his being as if lapped in a storm of fury. As my
eyes opened involuntarily I saw his strong hand grasp the
slender neck of the fair woman and with giant's power draw it
back, the blue eyes transformed with fury, the white teeth
champing with rage, and the fair cheeks blazing red with
passion. But the Count! Never did I imagine such wrath and fury,
even to the demons of the pit. His eyes were positively blazing.
The red light in them was lurid, as if the flames of hell fire
blazed behind them. His face was deathly pale, and the lines of
it were hard like drawn wires; the thick eyebrows that met over
the nose now seemed like a heaving bar of white-hot metal. With
a fierce sweep of his arm, he hurled the woman from him, and
then motioned to the others, as though he were beating them
back; it was the same imperious gesture that I had seen used to
the wolves. In a voice which, though low and almost in a whisper
seemed to cut through the air and then ring in the room he
said:--

    "How dare you touch him, any of you? How dare you cast eyes
on him when I had forbidden it? Back, I tell you all! This man
belongs to me! Beware how you meddle with him, or you'll have to
deal with me." The fair girl, with a laugh of ribald coquetry,
turned to answer him:--

    "You yourself never loved; you never love!" On this the
other women joined, and such a mirthless,hard, soulless laughter
rang through the room that it almost made me faint to hear; it
seemed like the pleasure of fiends. Then the Count turned, after
looking at my face attentively, and said in a soft whisper:--

    "Yes, I too can love; you yourselves can tell it from the
past. Is it not so? Well, now I promise you that when I am done
with him you shall kiss him at your will. Now go! Go! I must
awaken him, for there is work to be done."

    "Are we to have nothing to-night?" said one of them, with a
low laugh, as she pointed to the bag which he had thrown upon
the floor, and which moved as though there were some living
thing within it. For answer he nodded his head. One of the women
jumped forward and opened it. If my ears did not deceive me
there was a gasp and a low wail, as of a half smothered child.
The women closed round, whilst I was aghast with horror; but as
I looked, they disappeared, and with them the dreadful bag.
There was no door near them, and they could not have passed me
without my noticing. They simply seemed to fade into the rays of
the moonlight and pass out through the window, for I could see
outside the dim, shadowy forms for a moment before they entirely
faded away.

    Then the horror overcame me, and I sank down unconscious.

Jonathan Harker's Journal--continued.
I awoke in my own bed. If it be that I had not dreamt, the Count
must have carried me here. I tried to satisfy myself on the
subject, but could not arrive at any unquestionable result. To
be sure, there were certain small evidences, such as that my
clothes were folded and laid by in a manner which was not my
habit. My watch was still unwound, and I am rigorously
accustomed to wind it the last thing before going to bed, and
many such details. But these things are no proof, for they may
have been evidences that my mind was not as usual, and, for some
cause or another, I had certainly been much upset. I must watch
for proof. Of one thing I am glad; if it was that the Count
carried me here and undressed me, he must have been hurried in
his task, for my pockets are intact. I am sure this diary would
have been a mystery to him which he would not have brooked. He
would have taken or destroyed it. As I look round this room,
although it has been to me so full of fear, it is now a sort of
sanctuary, for nothing can be more dreadful than those awful
women, who were--who ARE--waiting to suck my blood.

LETTER, LUCY WESTENRA TO MINA MURRAY.

                                             "17, Chatham Street,
"My dearest Mina,--                                   "Wednesday.

    "I must say you tax me very unfairly with being a bad
correspondent. I wrote you twice since we parted, and your last
letter was only your second. Besides, I have nothing to tell
you. There is really nothing to interest you. Town is very
pleasant just now, and we go a great deal to picture-galleries
and for walks and rides in the park. As to the tall,
curly-haired man, I suppose it was the one who was with me at
the last Pop. Someone has evidently been telling tales. That was
Mr. Holmwood. He often comes to see us, and he and Mamma get on
very well together; they have so many things to talk about in
common. We met some time ago a man that would just do for you,
if you were not already engaged to Jonathan. He is an excellant
parti, being handsome, well off, and of good birth. He is a
doctor and really clever. Just fancy! He is only nine-and
twenty, and he has an immense lunatic asylum all under his own
care. Mr. Holmwood introduced him to me, and he called here to
see us, and often comes now. I think he is one of the most
resolute men I ever saw, and yet the most calm. He seems
absolutely imperturbable. I can fancy what a wonderful power he
must have over his patients. He has a curious habit of looking
one straight in the face, as if trying to read one's thoughts.

He tries this on very much with me, but I flatter myself he has
got a tough nut to crack. I know that from my glass. Do you ever
try to read your own face? I do, and I can tell you it is not a
bad study, and gives you more trouble than you can well fancy if
you have never tried it. He say that I afford him a curious
psychological study, and I humbly think I do. I do not, as you
know, take sufficient interest in dress to be able to describe
the new fashions. Dress is a bore. That is slang again, but
never mind; Arthur says that every day. There, it is all out,
Mina, we have told all our secrets to each other since we were
children; we have slept together and eaten together, and laughed
and cried together; and now, though I have spoken, I would like
to speak more. Oh, Mina, couldn't you guess? I love him. I am
blushing as I write, for although I think he loves me, he has
not told me so in words. But, oh, Mina, I love him; I love him;
I love him! There, that does me good. I wish I were with you,
dear, sitting by the fire undressing, as we used to sit; and I
would try to tell you what I feel. I do not know how I am
writing this even to you. I am afraid to stop, or I should tear
up the letter, and I don't want to stop, for I do so want to
tell you all. Let me hear from you at once, and tell me all
that you think about it. Mina, I must stop. Good-night. Bless
me in your prayers; and, Mina, pray for my happiness.

                                 "Lucy.

    "P. S.--I need not tell you this is a secret. Good-night
again.
                                 " L."

"My dearest Mina,--                      "24 May.

    "Thanks, and thanks, and thanks again for your sweet letter.
It was so nice to be able to tell you and to have your sympathy.

    My dear, it never rains but it pours. How true the old
proverbs are. Here am I, who shall be twenty in September, and
yet I never had a proposal till to-day, not a real proposal, and
to-day I had three. Just fancy! THREE proposals in one day!
Isn't it awful! I feel sorry, really and truly sorry, for two of
the poor fellows. Oh, Mina, I am so happy that I don't know what
to do with myself. And three proposals! But, for goodness' sake,
don't tell any of the girls, or they would be getting all sorts
of extravagant ideas, and imagining themselves injured and
slighted if in their very first day at home they did not get six
at least.

     Some girls are so vain! You and I, Mina dear, who are
engaged and are going to settle down soon soberly into old
married women, can despise vanity. Well, I must tell you about
the three, but you must keep it a secret, dear, from every one
except, of course, Jonathan. You will tell him, because I would,
if I were in your place, certainly tell Arthur. A woman ought to
tell her husband everything--don't you think so, dear?--and I
must be fair. Men like women, certainly their wives, to be quite
as fair as they are; and women, I am afraid, are not always
quite as fair as they should be.

     Well, my dear, number One came just before lunch.
I told you of him, Dr. John Seward, the lunatic asylum
man, with the strong jaw and the good forehead. He was
very cool outwardly, but was nervous all the same. He had
evidently been schooling himself as to all sorts of little
things, and remembered them; but he almost managed to sit down
on his silk hat, which men don't generally do when they are
cool, and then when he wanted to appear at ease he kept playing
with a lancet in a way that made me nearly scream. He spoke to
me, Mina, very straightforwardly. He told me how dear I was to
him, though he had known me so little, and what his life would
be with me to help and cheer him. He was going to tell me how
unhappy he would be if I did not care for him, but when he saw
me cry he said he was a brute and would not add to my present
trouble. Then he broke off and asked if I could love him in
time; and when I shook my head his hands trembled, and then with
some hesitation he asked me if I cared already for any one else.
He put it very nicely, saying that he did not want to wring my
confidence from me, but only to know, because if a woman's heart
was free a man might have hope. And then, Mina, I felt a sort of
duty to tell him that there was some one. I only told him that
much, and then he stood up, and he looked very strong and very
grave as he took both my hands in his and said he hoped I would
be happy, and that if I ever wanted a friend I must count him
one of my best.

     Oh, Mina dear, I can't help crying: and you must
excuse this letter being all blotted. Being proposed to is all
very nice and all that sort of thing, but it isn't at all a
happy thing when you have to see a poor fellow, whom you know
loves you honestly, going away and looking all broken-hearted,
and to know that, no matter what he may say at the moment, you
are passing out of his life. My dear, I must stop here at
present, I feel so miserable, though I am so happy.

                                       "Evening.
    Arthur has just gone, and I feel in better spirits than when
I left off, so I can go on telling you about the day. Well, my
dear, number Two came after lunch. He is such a nice fellow, and
American from Texas, and he looks so young and so fresh that it
seems almost impossible that he has been to so many places and
has such adventures. I sympathize with poor Desdemona when she
had such a stream poured in her ear, even by a black man. I
suppose that we women are such cowards that we think a man will
save us from fears, and we marry him. I know now what I would do
if I were a man and wanted to make a girl love me. No, I don't,
for there was Mr. Morris telling us his stories, and Arthur
never told any, and yet....My dear, I am somewhat previous. Mr.
Quincy P. Morris found me alone. It seems that a man always does
find a girl alone. No, he doesn't, for Arthur tried twice to
make a chance, and I helping him all I could; I am not ashamed
to say it now. I must tell you beforehand that Mr. Morris
doesn't always speak slang--that is to say, he never does so to
strangers or before them, for he is really well educated and has
exquisite manners--but he found out that it amused me to hear
him talk American slang, and whenever I was present, and there
was no one to be shocked, he said such funny things. I am
afraid, my dear, he has to invent it all, for it fits exactly
into whatever else he has to say. But this is a way slang has. I
do not know myself if I shall ever speak slang; I do not know if
Arthur likes it, as I have never heard him use any as yet. Well,
Mr. Morris sat down beside me and looked as happy and jolly as
he could, but I could see all the same that he was very nervous.
He took my hand in his, and said ever so sweetly....

    "'Miss Lucy, I know I ain't good enough to regulate the
fixin's of your little shoes, but I guess if you wait till you
find a man that is you will go join them seven young women with
the lamps when you quit. Won't you just hitch up along-side of
me and let us go down the long road together, driving in double
harness?"

    "Well, he did look so good humoured and so jolly that it
didn't seem half so hard to refuse him as it did poor Dr.
Seward; so I said, as lightly as I could, that I did not know
anything of hitching, and that I wasn't broken to harness at all
yet. Then he said that he had spoken in a light manner, and he
hoped that if he had made a mistake in doing so on so grave, so
momentous, an occasion for him, I would forgive him. He really
did look serious when he was saying it, and I couldn't help
feeling a bit serious too--I know, Mina, you will think me a
horrid flirt--though I couldn't help feeling a sort of
exultation that he was number two in one day. And then, my dear,
before I could say a word he began pouring out a perfect torrent
of love-making, laying his very heart and soul at my feet. He
looked so earnest over it that I shall never again think that a
man must be playful always, and never earnest, because he is
merry at times. I suppose he saw something in my face which
checked him, for he suddenly stopped, and said with a sort of
manly fervour that I could have loved him for if I had been
free:--

    "'Lucy, you are an honest-hearted girl, I know. I should
not be here speaking to you as I am now if I did not believe
you clean grit, right through to the very depths of your
soul. Tell me, like one good fellow to another, is there any one
else that you care for? And if there is I'll never trouble you a
hair's breadth again, but will be, if you will let me, a very
faithful friend."

    "My dear Mina, why are men so noble when we women are so
little worthy of them? Here was I almost making fun of this
great-hearted, true gentleman. I burst into tears--I am afraid,
my dear, you will think this a very sloppy letter in more ways
than one--and I really felt very badly. Why can't they let a
girl marry three men, or as many as want her, and save all this
trouble? But this is heresy, and I must not say it. I am glad to
say that, though I was crying, I was able to look into Mr.
Morris' brave eyes, and I told him out straight:--

    "'Yes, there is some one I love, though he has not told me
yet that he even loves me.' I was right to speak to him so
frankly, for quite a light came into his face, and he put out
both his hands and took mine--I think I put them into his--and
said in a hearty way:--

    "'That's my brave girl. It's better worth being late for a
chance of winning you than being in time for any other girl in
the world. Don't cry, my dear. If it's for me, I'm a hard nut to
crack; and I take it standing up. If that other fellow doesn't
know his happiness, well, he'd better look for it soon, or he'll
have to deal with me. Little girl, your honesty and pluck have
made me a friend, and that's rarer than a lover; it's more
selfish anyhow. My dear, I'm going to have a pretty lonely walk
between this and Kingdom Come. Won't you give me one kiss? It'll
be something to keep off the darkness now and then. You can, you
know, if you like, for that other good fellow--he must be a good
fellow, my dear, and a fine fellow, or you could not love
him--hasn't spoken yet.' That quite won me, Mina, for it was
brave and sweet of him, and noble too, to a rival--wasn't
it?--and he so sad; so I leant over and kissed him. He stood up
with my two hands in his, and as he looked down into my face--I
am afraid I was blushing very much--he said:--

    "'Little girl, I hold your hand, and you've kissed me, and
if these things don't make us friends nothing ever will. Thank
you for your sweet honesty to me, and goodbye.' He wrung my
hand, and taking up his hat, went straight out of the room
without looking back, without a tear or a quiver or a pause; and
I am crying like a baby. Oh, why must a man like that be made
unhappy when there are lots of girls about who would worship the
very ground he trod on? I know I would if I were free--only I
don't want to be free. My dear, this quite upset me, and I feel
I cannot write of happiness just at once, after telling you of
it, and I don't wish to tell of the number Three until it can be
all happy."
                              "Ever your loving
                                       "LUCY.

    "P. S.--Oh, about number Three--I needn't tell you of number
Three, need I? Besides, it was all so confused; it seemed only a
moment from his coming into the room till both his arms were
round me, and he was kissing me. I am very, very happy, and I
don't know what I have done to deserve it. I must only try in
the future to show that I am not ungrateful to God for all His
goodness to me in sending to me such a lover, such a husband,
and such a friend.
    "Goodbye."

    25 May.--Ebb tide in appetite today. Cannot eat, cannot
rest, so diary instead. Since my rebuff of yesterday I have a
sort of empty feeling. Nothing in the world seems of sufficient
importance to be worth the doing.... As I knew that the only
cure for this sort of thing was work, I went amongst the
patients. I picked out one who has afforded me a study of much
interest. He is so quaint that I am determined to understand him
as well as I can. Today I seemed to get nearer than ever before
to the heart of his mystery.

    I questioned him more fully than I had ever done, with a
view to making myself master of the facts of his hallucination.
In my manner of doing it there was, I now see, something of
cruelty. I seemed to wish to keep him to the point of his
madness--a thing which I avoid with the patients as I would the
mouth of hell.

    (Mem., Under what circumstances would I not avoid the pit of
hell?) Omnia Romae venalia sunt. Hell has its price! verb. sap.
If there be anything behind this instinct it will be valuable to
trace it afterwards accurately, so I had better commence to do
so, therefore--

    R. M, Renfield, aetat 59.--Sanguine temperament; great
physical strength; morbidly excitable; periods of gloom, ending
in some fixed idea which I cannot make out. I presume that the
sanguine temperament itself and the disturbing influence end in
a mentally-accomplished finish; a possibly dangerous man,
probably dangerous if unselfish. In selfish men caution is as
secure an armour for their foes as for themselves. What I think
of on this point is, when self is the fixed point the
centripetal force is balanced with the centrifugal; when duty, a
cause, etc., is the fixed point, the latter force is paramount,
and only accident of a series of accidents can balance it.

    "My dear Art,--                          "25 May.

    We've told yarns by the camp-fire in the prairies; and
dressed one another's wounds after trying a landing at the
Marquesas; and drunk healths on the shore of Titicaca. There are
more yarns to be told, and other wounds to be healed, and
another health to be drunk. Won't you let this be at my
camp-fire tomorrow night? I have no hesitation in asking you, as
I know a certain lady is engaged to a certain dinner party, and
that you are free. There will only be one other, our old pal at
the Korea, Jack Seward. He's coming, too, and we both want to
mingle our weeps over the wine cup, and to drink a health with
all our hearts to the happiest man in all the wide world, who
has won the noblest heart that God has made and best worth
winning. We promise you a hearty welcome, and a loving greeting,
and a health as true as your own right hand. We shall both swear
to leave you at home if you drink too deep to a certain pair of
eyes. Come!

                      "Yours, as ever and always,
                                   "QUINCEY P. MORRIS."

26 May.--Count me in every time. I bear messages which will
   make both your ears tingle.

Jonathan Harker's Journal.
    28 May.--There is a chance of escape, or at any rate of
being able to send word home. A band of Szgany have come to the
castle, and are encamped in the courtyard. These are gypsies; I
have notes of them in my book. They are peculiar to this part of
the world, though allied to the ordinary gipsies all the world
over. There are thousands of them in Hungary and Transylvania,
who are almost outside all law. They attach themselves as a rule
to some great noble or boyar, and call themselves by his name.
They are fearless and without religion, save superstition, and
they talk only their own varieties of the Romany tongue.

    I shall write some letters home, and shall try to get them
to have them posted. I have already spoken to them through my
window to begin acquaintanceship. They took their hats off and
made obeisance and many signs, which however, I could not
understand any more than I could their spoken language....

                           --------------

    I have written the letters. Mina's is in shorthand, and I
simply ask Mr. Hawkins to communicate with her. To her I have
explained my situation, but without the horrors which I may only
surmise. It would shock and frighten her to death were I to
expose my heart to her. Should the letters not carry, then the
Count shall not yet know my secret or the extent of my
knowledge....

                    ----------------------

    I have given the letters; I threw them through the bars of
my window with a gold piece, and made what signs I could to have
them posted. The man who took them pressed them to his heart and
bowed, and then put them in his cap. I could do no more. I stole
back to the study, and began to read. As the Count did not come
in, I have written here....

                    ----------------------

    The Count has come. He sat down beside me, and said in his
smoothest voice as he opened two letters:--

    "The Szgany has given me these, of which, though I know not
whence they come, I shall, of course, take care. See!"--he must
have looked at it--"one is from you, and to my friend Peter
Hawkins; the other"--here he caught sight of the strange symbols
as he opened the envelope, and the dark look came into his face,
and his eyes blazed wickedly--"the other is a vile thing, an
outrage upon friendship and hospitality! It is not signed. Well!
So it cannot matter to us." And he calmly held letter and
envelope in the flame of the lamp till they were consumed. Then
he went on:--

    "The letter to Hawkins--that I shall, of course, send on,
since it is yours. Your letters are sacred to me. Your pardon,
my friend, that unknowingly I did break the seal. Will you not
cover it again?" He held out the letter to me, and with a
courteous bow handed me a clean envelope. I could only redirect
it and hand it to him in silence. When he went out of the room I
could hear the key turn softly. A minute later I went over and
tried it, and the door was locked.

    When, an hour or two after, the Count came quietly into the
room, his coming awakened me, for I had gone to sleep on the
sofa. He was very courteous and very cheery in his manner, and
seeing that I had been sleeping, he said:--

    "So, my friend, you are tired? Get to bed. There is the
surest rest. I may not have the pleasure of talk to-night, since
there are many labours to me; but you will sleep, I pray." I
passed to my room and went to bed, and, strange to say, slept
without dreaming. Despair has its own calms.

    31 May.--This morning when I woke I thought I would provide
myself with some papers and envelopes from my bag and keep them
in my pocket, so that I might write in case I should get an
opportunity, but again a surprise, again a shock!

    Every scrap of paper was gone, and with it all my notes, my
memoranda, relating to railways and travel, my letter of credit,
in fact all that might be useful to me were I once outside the
castle. I sat and pondered awhile, and then some thought
occurred to me, and I made search of my portmanteau and in the
wardrobe where I had placed my clothes.

    The suit in which I had travelled was gone, and also my
overcoat and rug; I could find no trace of them anywhere. This
looked like some new scheme of villainy....

DR. SEWARD'S DIARY.

    5 June.--The case of Renfield grows more interesting the
more I get to understand the man. He has certain qualities very
largely developed; selfishness, secrecy, and purpose. I wish I
could get at what is the object of the latter. He seems to have
some settled scheme of his own, but what it is I do not know.
His redeeming quality is a love of animals, though, indeed, he
has such curious turns in it that I sometimes imagine he is only
abnormally cruel. His pets are of odd sorts. Just now his hobby
is catching flies. He has at present such a quantity that I have
had myself to expostulate. To my astonishment, he did not break
out into a fury, as I expected, but took the matter in simple
seriousness. He thought for a moment, and then said: "May I have
three days? I shall clear them away." Of course, I said that
would do. I must watch him.

There a gap here next post is June 17. So see you on June 17 for the next post.