Atlas Nightshade

Day 3

Soon we were hemmed in with trees, which in places arched right over the

roadway till we passed as through a tunnel; and again great frowning

rocks guarded us boldly on either side. Though we were in shelter, we

could hear the rising wind, for it moaned and whistled through the

rocks, and the branches of the trees crashed together as we swept along.

It grew colder and colder still, and fine, powdery snow began to fall,

so that soon we and all around us were covered with a white blanket. The

keen wind still carried the howling of the dogs, though this grew

fainter as we went on our way. The baying of the wolves sounded nearer

and nearer, as though they were closing round on us from every side. I

grew dreadfully afraid, and the horses shared my fear. The driver,

however, was not in the least disturbed; he kept turning his head to

left and right, but I could not see anything through the darkness.

Suddenly, away on our left, I saw a faint flickering blue flame. The

driver saw it at the same moment; he at once checked the horses, and,

jumping to the ground, disappeared into the darkness. I did not know

what to do, the less as the howling of the wolves grew closer; but while

I wondered the driver suddenly appeared again, and without a word took

his seat, and we resumed our journey. I think I must have fallen asleep

and kept dreaming of the incident, for it seemed to be repeated

endlessly, and now looking back, it is like a sort of awful nightmare.

Once the flame appeared so near the road, that even in the darkness

around us I could watch the driver's motions. He went rapidly to where

the blue flame arose--it must have been very faint, for it did not seem

to illumine the place around it at all--and gathering a few stones,

formed them into some device. Once there appeared a strange optical

effect: when he stood between me and the flame he did not obstruct it,

for I could see its ghostly flicker all the same. This startled me, but

as the effect was only momentary, I took it that my eyes deceived me

straining through the darkness. Then for a time there were no blue

flames, and we sped onwards through the gloom, with the howling of the

wolves around us, as though they were following in a moving circle.

At last there came a time when the driver went further afield than he

had yet gone, and during his absence, the horses began to tremble worse

than ever and to snort and scream with fright. I could not see any cause

for it, for the howling of the wolves had ceased altogether; but just

then the moon, sailing through the black clouds, appeared behind the

jagged crest of a beetling, pine-clad rock, and by its light I saw

around us a ring of wolves, with white teeth and lolling red tongues,

with long, sinewy limbs and shaggy hair. They were a hundred times more

terrible in the grim silence which held them than even when they howled.

For myself, I felt a sort of paralysis of fear. It is only when a man

feels himself face to face with such horrors that he can understand

their true import.

All at once the wolves began to howl as though the moonlight had had

some peculiar effect on them. The horses jumped about and reared, and

looked helplessly round with eyes that rolled in a way painful to see;

but the living ring of terror encompassed them on every side; and they

had perforce to remain within it. I called to the coachman to come, for

it seemed to me that our only chance was to try to break out through the

ring and to aid his approach. I shouted and beat the side of the

calèche, hoping by the noise to scare the wolves from that side, so as

to give him a chance of reaching the trap. How he came there, I know

not, but I heard his voice raised in a tone of imperious command, and

looking towards the sound, saw him stand in the roadway. As he swept his

long arms, as though brushing aside some impalpable obstacle, the wolves

fell back and back further still. Just then a heavy cloud passed across

the face of the moon, so that we were again in darkness.

When I could see again the driver was climbing into the calèche, and the

wolves had disappeared. This was all so strange and uncanny that a

dreadful fear came upon me, and I was afraid to speak or move. The time

seemed interminable as we swept on our way, now in almost complete

darkness, for the rolling clouds obscured the moon. We kept on

ascending, with occasional periods of quick descent, but in the main

always ascending. Suddenly, I became conscious of the fact that the

driver was in the act of pulling up the horses in the courtyard of a

vast ruined castle, from whose tall black windows came no ray of light,

and whose broken battlements showed a jagged line against the moonlit

sky.

CHAPTER II

JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL--_continued_

_5 May._--I must have been asleep, for certainly if I had been fully

awake I must have noticed the approach of such a remarkable place. In

the gloom the courtyard looked of considerable size, and as several dark

ways led from it under great round arches, it perhaps seemed bigger than

it really is. I have not yet been able to see it by daylight.

When the calèche stopped, the driver jumped down and held out his hand

to assist me to alight. Again I could not but notice his prodigious

strength. His hand actually seemed like a steel vice that could have

crushed mine if he had chosen. Then he took out my traps, and placed

them on the ground beside me as I stood close to a great door, old and

studded with large iron nails, and set in a projecting doorway of

massive stone. I could see even in the dim light that the stone was

massively carved, but that the carving had been much worn by time and

weather. As I stood, the driver jumped again into his seat and shook the

reins; the horses started forward, and trap and all disappeared down one

of the dark openings.

I stood in silence where I was, for I did not know what to do. Of bell

or knocker there was no sign; through these frowning walls and dark

window openings it was not likely that my voice could penetrate. The

time I waited seemed endless, and I felt doubts and fears crowding upon

me. What sort of place had I come to, and among what kind of people?

What sort of grim adventure was it on which I had embarked? Was this a

customary incident in the life of a solicitor's clerk sent out to

explain the purchase of a London estate to a foreigner? Solicitor's

clerk! Mina would not like that. Solicitor--for just before leaving

London I got word that my examination was successful; and I am now a

full-blown solicitor! I began to rub my eyes and pinch myself to see if

I were awake. It all seemed like a horrible nightmare to me, and I

expected that I should suddenly awake, and find myself at home, with

the dawn struggling in through the windows, as I had now and again felt

in the morning after a day of overwork. But my flesh answered the

pinching test, and my eyes were not to be deceived. I was indeed awake

and among the Carpathians. All I could do now was to be patient, and to

wait the coming of the morning.

Just as I had come to this conclusion I heard a heavy step approaching

behind the great door, and saw through the c****s the gleam of a coming

light. Then there was the sound of rattling chains and the clanking of

massive bolts drawn back. A key was turned with the loud grating noise

of long disuse, and the great door swung back.

Within, stood a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white

moustache, and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck

of colour about him anywhere. He held in his hand an antique silver

lamp, in which the flame burned without chimney or globe of any kind,

throwing long quivering shadows as it flickered in the draught of the

open door. The old man motioned me in with his right hand with a courtly

gesture, saying in excellent English, but with a strange intonation:--

"Welcome to my house! Enter freely and of your own will!" He made no

motion of stepping to meet me, but stood like a statue, as though his

gesture of welcome had fixed him into stone. The instant, however, that

I had stepped over the threshold, he moved impulsively forward, and

holding out his hand grasped mine with a strength which made me wince,

an effect which was not lessened by the fact that it seemed as cold as

ice--more like the hand of a dead than a living man. Again he said:--