第98章

"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 center, 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 me 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 praying on a very tumultuous scale, from Mr. Renfield's room, which is somewhere under this.

And then there was silence over everything, silence so profound that it startled me, and I got up and looked out of the window.

All was dark and silent, the black shadows thrown by the moonlight seeming full of a silent mystery of their own.

Not a thing seemed to be stirring, but all to be grim and fixed as death or fate, so that a thin streak of white mist, that crept with almost imperceptible slowness across the grass towards the house, seemed to have a sentience and a vitality of its own.