For a while sheer anger mastered me; it was as if he had during her lifestruck Lucy on the face. I smote the table hard and rose up as I said tohim:--
"Dr. Van Helsing, are you mad?" He raised his head and looked at me, andsomehow the tenderness of his face calmed me at once. "Would I were!" hesaid. "Madness were easy to bear compared with truth like this. Oh, myfriend, why, think you, did I go so far round, why take so long to tellyou so simple a thing? Was it because I hate you and have hated you allmy life? Was it because I wished to give you pain? Was it that I wanted,now so late, revenge for that time when you saved my life, and from afearful death? Ah no!"
"Forgive me," said I. He went on:--
"My friend, it was because I wished to be gentle in the breaking toyou, for I know you have loved that so sweet lady. But even yet I donot expect you to believe. It is so hard to accept at once any abstracttruth, that we may doubt such to be possible when we have alwaysbelieved the 'no' of it; it is more hard still to accept so sad aconcrete truth, and of such a one as Miss Lucy. To-night I go to proveit. Dare you come with me?"
This staggered me. A man does not like to prove such a truth; Byronexcepted from the category, jealousy.
"And prove the very truth he most abhorred."
He saw my hesitation, and spoke:--
"The logic is simple, no madman's logic this time, jumping from tussockto tussock in a misty fog. If it be not true, then proof will be relief;at worst it will not harm. If it be true! Ah, there is the dread; yetvery dread should help my cause, for in it is some need of belief. Come,I tell you what I propose: first, that we go off now and see that childin the hospital. Dr. Vincent of the North Hospital, where the papers saythe child is, is friend of mine, and I think of yours since you were inclass at Amsterdam. He will let two scientists see his case, if he willnot let two friends. We shall tell him nothing, but only that we wish tolearn. And then----"
"And then?" He took a key from his pocket and held it up. "And then wespend the night, you and I, in the churchyard where Lucy lies. Thisis the key that lock the tomb. I had it from the coffin-man to giveto Arthur." My heart sank within me, for I felt that there were somefearful ordeal before us. I could do nothing, however, so I plucked upwhat heart I could and said that we had better hasten, as the afternoonwas passing....
We found the child awake. It had had a sleep and taken some food,and altogether was going on well. Dr. Vincent took the bandage fromits throat, and showed us the punctures. There was no mistaking thesimilarity to those which had been on Lucy's throat. They were smaller,and the edges looked fresher; that was all. We asked Vincent to whathe attributed them, and he replied that it must have been a bite ofsome animal, perhaps a rat; but, for his own part, he was inclined tothink that it was one of the bats which are so numerous on the northernheights of London. "Out of so many harmless ones," he said, "there maybe some wild specimen from the South of a more malignant species. Somesailor may have brought one home, and it managed to escape; or even fromthe Zoological Gardens a young one may have got loose, or one be bredthere from a vampire. These things do occur, you know. Only ten daysago a wolf got out, and was, I believe, traced up in this direction.For a week after, the children were playing nothing but Red Riding Hoodon the Heath and in every alley in the place until this 'bloofer lady'scare came along, since when it has been quite a gala-time with them.Even this poor little mite, when he woke up today, asked the nurse if hemight go away. When she asked him why he wanted to go, he said he wantedto play with the 'bloofer lady.'"
"I hope," said Van Helsing, "that when you are sending the child homeyou will caution its parents to keep strict watch over it. These fanciesto stray are most dangerous; and if the child were to remain out anothernight, it would probably be fatal. But in any case I suppose you willnot let it away for some days?"
"Certainly not, not for a week at least; longer if the wound is nothealed."
Our visit to the hospital took more time than we had reckoned on, andthe sun had dipped before we came out. When Van Helsing saw how dark itwas, he said:--
"There is no hurry. It is more late than I thought. Come, let us seeksomewhere that we may eat, and then we shall go on our way."
We dined at "Jack Straw's Castle" along with a little crowd ofbicyclists and others who were genially noisy. About ten o'clock westarted from the inn. It was then very dark, and the scattered lampsmade the darkness greater when we were once outside their individualradius. The Professor had evidently noted the road we were to go, forhe went on unhesitatingly; but as for me, I was in quite a mix-upas to locality. As we went further, we met fewer and fewer people,till at last we were somewhat surprised when we met even the patrolof horse police going their usual suburban round. At last we reachedthe wall of the churchyard, which we climbed over. With some littledifficulty--for it was very dark, and the whole place seemed so strangeto us--we found the Westenra tomb. The Professor took the key, openedthe creaky door, and standing back, politely, but quite unconsciously,motioned me to precede him. There was a delicious irony in the offer,in the courtliness of giving preference on such a ghastly occasion. Mycompanion followed me quickly, and cautiously drew the door to, aftercarefully ascertaining that the lock was a falling, and not a springone. In the latter case we should have been in a bad plight. Then hefumbled in his bag, and taking out a match-box and a piece of candle,proceeded to make a light. The tomb in the daytime, and when wreathedwith fresh flowers, had looked grim and gruesome enough; but now somedays afterwards, when the flowers hung lank and dead, their whitesturning to rust and their greens to browns; when the spider and thebeetle had resumed their accustomed dominance; when time-discolouredstone, and dust-encrusted mortar, and rusty, dank iron, and tarnishedbrass, and clouded silver-plating gave back the feeble glimmer of acandle, the effect was more miserable and sordid than could have beenimagined. It conveyed irresistibly the idea that life--animal life--wasnot the only thing which could pass away.
Van Helsing went about his work systematically. Holding his candle sothat he could read the coffin plates, and so holding it that the spermdropped in white patches which congealed as they touched the metal, hemade assurance of Lucy's coffin. Another search in his bag, and he tookout a turnscrew.
"What are you going to do?" I asked.
"To open the coffin. You shall yet be convinced." Straightway he begantaking out the screws, and finally lifted off the lid, showing thecasing of lead beneath. The sight was almost too much for me. It seemedto be as much an affront to the dead as it would have been to havestripped off her clothing in her sleep whilst living; I actually tookhold of his hand to stop him. He only said: "You shall see," and againfumbling in his bag, took out a tiny fret-saw. Striking the turnscrewthrough the lead with a swift downward stab, which made me wince, hemade a small hole, which was, however, big enough to admit the pointof the saw. I had expected a rush of gas from the week-old corpse. Wedoctors, who have had to study our dangers, have to become accustomed tosuch things, and I drew back towards the door. But the Professor neverstopped for a moment; he sawed down a couple of feet along one sideof the lead coffin, and then across, and down the other side. Takingthe edge of the loose flange, he bent it back towards the foot of thecoffin, and holding up the candle into the aperture, motioned to me tolook.
I drew near and looked. The coffin was empty.
It was certainly a surprise to me, and gave me a considerable shock, butVan Helsing was unmoved. He was now more sure than ever of his ground,and so emboldened to proceed in his task. "Are you satisfied now, friendJohn?" he asked.
I felt all the dogged argumentativeness of my nature awake within me asI answered him:
"I am satisfied that Lucy's body is not in that coffin; but that onlyproves one thing."
"And what is that, friend John?"
"That it is not there."
"That is good logic," he said, "so far as it goes. But how do you--howcan you--account for it n
ot being there?"
"Perhaps a body-snatcher," I suggested. "Some of the undertaker's peoplemay have stolen it." I felt that I was speaking folly, and yet it wasthe only real cause which I could suggest. The Professor sighed. "Ahwell!" he said, "we must have more proof. Come with me."
He put on the coffin-lid again, gathered up all his things and placedthem in the bag, blew out the light, and placed the candle also in thebag. We opened the door, and went out. Behind us he closed the door andlocked it. He handed me the key, saying: "Will you keep it? You hadbetter be assured." I laughed--it was not a very cheerful laugh, I ambound to say--as I motioned him to keep it. "A key is nothing," I said;"there may be duplicates; and anyhow it is not difficult to pick a lockof that kind." He said nothing, but put the key in his pocket. Then hetold me to watch at one side of the churchyard whilst he could watchat the other. I took up my place behind a yew-tree, and I saw his darkfigure move until the intervening headstones and trees hid it from mysight.
It was a lonely vigil. Just after I had taken my place I heard a distantclock strike twelve, and in time came one and two. I was chilled andunnerved, and angry with the Professor for taking me on such an errandand with myself for coming. I was too cold and too sleepy to be keenlyobservant, and not sleepy enough to betray my trust; so altogether I hada dreary, miserable time.
Suddenly, as I turned round, I thought I saw something like a whitestreak, moving between two dark yew-trees at the side of the churchyardfarthest from the tomb; at the same time a dark mass moved from theProfessor's side of the ground, and hurriedly went towards it. ThenI too moved; but I had to go round headstones and railed-off tombs,and I stumbled over graves. The sky was overcast, and somewhere faroff an early cock crew. A little way off, beyond a line of scatteredjuniper-trees, which marked the pathway to the church, a white, dimfigure flitted in the direction of the tomb. The tomb itself was hiddenby trees, and I could not see where the figure disappeared. I heard therustle of actual movement where I had first seen the white figure, andcoming over, found the Professor holding in his arms a tiny child. Whenhe saw me he held it out to me, and said:--