Atlas Nightshade

Day 69

CHAPTER XXII

JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL

_3 October._--As I must do something or go mad, I write this diary. It

is now six o'clock, and we are to meet in the study in half an hour and

take something to eat; for Dr. Van Helsing and Dr. Seward are agreed

that if we do not eat we cannot work our best. Our best will be, God

knows, required to-day. I must keep writing at every chance, for I dare

not stop to think. All, big and little, must go down; perhaps at the end

the little things may teach us most. The teaching, big or little, could

not have landed Mina or me anywhere worse than we are to-day. However,

we must trust and hope. Poor Mina told me just now, with the tears

running down her dear cheeks, that it is in trouble and trial that our

faith is tested--that we must keep on trusting; and that God will aid us

up to the end. The end! oh my God! what end?... To work! To work!

When Dr. Van Helsing and Dr. Seward had come back from seeing poor

Renfield, we went gravely into what was to be done. First, Dr. Seward

told us that when he and Dr. Van Helsing had gone down to the room below

they had found Renfield lying on the floor, all in a heap. His face was

all bruised and crushed in, and the bones of the neck were broken.

Dr. Seward asked the attendant who was on duty in the passage if he had

heard anything. He said that he had been sitting down--he confessed to

half dozing--when he heard loud voices in the room, and then Renfield

had called out loudly several times, "God! God! God!" after that there

was a sound of falling, and when he entered the room he found him lying

on the floor, face down, just as the doctors had seen him. Van Helsing

asked if he had heard "voices" or "a voice," and he said he could not

say; that at first it had seemed to him as if there were two, but as

there was no one in the room it could have been only one. He could swear

to it, if required, that the word "God" was spoken by the patient. Dr.

Seward said to us, when we were alone, that he did not wish to go into

the matter; the question of an inquest had to be considered, and it

would never do to put forward the truth, as no one would believe it. As

it was, he thought that on the attendant's evidence he could give a

certificate of death by misadventure in falling from bed. In case the

coroner should demand it, there would be a formal inquest, necessarily

to the same result.

When the question began to be discussed as to what should be our next

step, the very first thing we decided was that Mina should be in full

confidence; that nothing of any sort--no matter how painful--should be

kept from her. She herself agreed as to its wisdom, and it was pitiful

to see her so brave and yet so sorrowful, and in such a depth of

despair. "There must be no concealment," she said, "Alas! we have had

too much already. And besides there is nothing in all the world that can

give me more pain than I have already endured--than I suffer now!

Whatever may happen, it must be of new hope or of new courage to me!"

Van Helsing was looking at her fixedly as she spoke, and said, suddenly

but quietly:--

"But dear Madam Mina, are you not afraid; not for yourself, but for

others from yourself, after what has happened?" Her face grew set in its

lines, but her eyes shone with the devotion of a martyr as she

answered:--