_11 p. m._--I gave Renfield a strong opiate to-night,enough to make even him sleep,and took away his pocket-book to look at it.The thought that has been buzzing about my brain lately is complete,and the theory proved.My homicidal maniac is of a peculiar kind.I shall have to invent a new classification for him,and call him a zoöphagous (life-eating) maniac;what he desires is to absorb as many lives as he can,and he has laid himself out to achieve it in a cumulative way.He gave many flies to one spider and many spiders to one bird,and then wanted a cat to eat the many birds.What would have been his later steps?It would almost be worth while to complete the experiment.It might be done if there were only a sufficient cause.Men sneered at vivisection,and yet look at its results to-day!Why not advance science in its most difficult and vital aspect--the knowledge of the brain?Had I even the secret of one such mind--did I hold the key to the fancy of even one lunatic--I might advance my own branch of science to a pitch compared with which Burdon-Sanderson’s physiology or Ferrier’s brain-knowledge would be as nothing. If only there were a sufficient cause!I must not think too much of this, or I may be tempted;a good cause might turn the scale with me,for may not I too be of an exceptional brain, congenitally?
How well the man reasoned;lunatics always do within their own scope.I wonder at how many lives he values a man,or if at only one. He has closed the account most accurately,and to-day begun a new record.How many of us begin a new record with each day of our lives?
To me it seems only yesterday that my whole life ended with my new hope,and that truly I began a new record.So it will be until the Great Recorder sums me up and closes my ledger account with a balance to profit or loss. Oh, Lucy, Lucy, I cannot be angry with you, nor can I be angry with my friend whose happiness is yours; but I must only wait on hopeless and work. Work!work!
If I only could have as strong a cause as my poor mad friend there--a good,unselfish cause to make me work--that would be indeed happiness.
_Mina Murray’s Journal._
_26 July._--I am anxious,and it soothes me to express myself here;it is like whispering to one’s self and listening at the same time.And there is also something about the shorthand symbols that makes it different from writing. I am unhappy about Lucy and about Jonathan. I had not heard from Jonathan for some time, and was very concerned; but yesterday dear Mr. Hawkins, who is always so kind, sent me a letter from him. I had written asking him if he had heard, and he said the enclosed had just been received. It is only a line dated from Castle Dracula, and says that he is just starting for home. That is not like Jonathan; I do not understand it, and it makes me uneasy. Then, too, Lucy, although she is so well, has lately taken to her old habit of walking in her sleep. Her mother has spoken to me about it, and we have decided that I am to lock the door of our room every night. Mrs. Westenra has got an idea that sleep-walkers always go out on roofs of houses and along the edges of cliffs and then get suddenly wakened and fall over with a despairing cry that echoes all over the place. Poor dear, she is naturally anxious about Lucy, and she tells me that her husband, Lucy’s father, had the same habit; that he would get up in the night and dress himself and go out, if he were not stopped. Lucy is to be married in the autumn, and she is already planning out her dresses and how her house is to be arranged. I sympathise with her, for I do the same, only Jonathan and I will start in life in a very simple way, and shall have to try to make both ends meet. Mr. Holmwood--he is the Hon. Arthur Holmwood, only son of Lord Godalming--is coming up here very shortly--as soon as he can leave town, for his father is not very well, and I think dear Lucy is counting the moments till he comes. She wants to take him up to the seat on the churchyard cliff and show him the beauty of Whitby. I daresay it is the waiting which disturbs her; she will be all right when he arrives.
* * * * *
_27 July._--No news from Jonathan.I am getting quite uneasy about him,though why I should I do not know;but I do wish that he would write,if it were only a single line.Lucy walks more than ever,and each night I am awakened by her moving about the room.Fortunately, the weather is so hot that she cannot get cold;but still the anxiety and the perpetually being wakened is beginning to tell on me, and I am getting nervous and wakeful myself. Thank God, Lucy’s health keeps up. Mr. Holmwood has been suddenly called to Ring to see his father, who has been taken seriously ill. Lucy frets at the postponement of seeing him, but it does not touch her looks; she is a trifle stouter, and her cheeks are a lovely rose-pink. She has lost that anæmic look which she had. I pray it will all last.
* * * * *
_3 August._--Another week gone,and no news from Jonathan, not even to Mr. Hawkins,from whom I have heard. Oh, I do hope he is not ill.He surely would have written.I look at that last letter of his,but somehow it does not satisfy me.It does not read like him, and yet it is his writing.There is no mistake of that.Lucy has not walked much in her sleep the last week,but there is an odd concentration about her which I do not understand;even in her sleep she seems to be watching me.She tries the door, and finding it locked,goes about the room searching for the key.
_6 August._--Another three days, and no news.This suspense is getting dreadful.If I only knew where to write to or where to go to,I should feel easier;but no one has heard a word of Jonathan since that last letter.I must only pray to God for patience.Lucy is more excitable than ever,but is otherwise well. Last night was very threatening,and the fishermen say that we are in for a storm.I must try to watch it and learn the weather signs.To-day is a grey day,and the sun as I write is hidden in thick clouds,high over Kettleness.Everything is grey--except the green grass,which seems like emerald amongst it; grey earthy rock;grey clouds, tinged with the sunburst at the far edge,hang over the grey sea,into which the sand-points stretch like grey fingers.The sea is tumbling in over the shallows and the sandy flats with a roar,muffled in the sea-mists drifting inland.The horizon is lost in a grey mist. All is vastness;the clouds are piled up like giant rocks,and there is a “brool” over the sea that sounds like some presage of doom.Dark figures are on the beach here and there,sometimes half shrouded in the mist,and seem “men like trees walking.” The fishing-boats are racing for home,and rise and dip in the ground swell as they sweep into the harbour,bending to the scuppers. Here comes old Mr. Swales.He is making straight for me, and I can see,by the way he lifts his hat, that he wants to talk....
I have been quite touched by the change in the poor old man.When he sat down beside me,he said in a very gentle way:--
“I want to say something to you, miss.” I could see he was not at ease,so I took his poor old wrinkled hand in mine and asked him to speak fully;so he said, leaving his hand in mine:--