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 tonight?” 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.
CHAPTER 4
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.
18 May.—I have been down to look at that
room again in daylight, for I must know the truth.
When I got to the doorway at the top of the stairs
I found it closed. It had been so forcibly driven
against the jamb that part of the woodwork was splintered.
I could see that the bolt of the lock had not been
shot, but the door is fastened from the inside.
I fear it was no dream, and must act on this surmise.
