“I am with you,” said Lord Godalming, “for Lucy’s sake,if for no other reason.”
Dr. Seward simply nodded. The Professor stood up and,after laying his golden crucifix on the table,held out his hand on either side.I took his right hand, and Lord Godalming his left;Jonathan held my right with his left and stretched across to Mr.Morris. So as we all took hands our solemn compact was made.I felt my heart icy cold,but it did not even occur to me to draw back.We resumed our places, and Dr.Van Helsing went on with a sort of cheerfulness which showed that the serious work had begun. It was to be taken as gravely, and in as businesslike a way, as any other transaction of life:--
“Well, you know what we have to contend against; but we,too, are not without strength.We have on our side power of combination--a power denied to the vampire kind;we have sources of science;we are free to act and think;and the hours of the day and the night are ours equally.In fact, so far as our powers extend,they are unfettered, and we are free to use them.We have self-devotion in a cause,and an end to achieve which is not a selfish one.These things are much.
“Now let us see how far the general powers arrayed against us are restrict,and how the individual cannot. In fine,let us consider the limitations of the vampire in general,and of this one in particular.
“All we have to go upon are traditions and superstitions.These do not at the first appear much,when the matter is one of life and death--nay of more than either life or death. Yet must we be satisfied; in the first place because we have to be--no other means is at our control--and secondly, because, after all, these things--tradition and superstition--are everything. Does not the belief in vampires rest for others--though not, alas!for us--on them?A year ago which of us would have received such a possibility,in the midst of our scientific, sceptical,matter-of-fact nineteenth century?We even scouted a belief that we saw justified under our very eyes.Take it, then, that the vampire,and the belief in his limitations and his cure,rest for the moment on the same base. For,let me tell you, he is known everywhere that men have been.In old Greece, in old Rome;he flourish in Germany all over, in France, in India,even in the Chernosese; and in China,so far from us in all ways, there even is he,and the peoples fear him at this day.He have follow the wake of the berserker Icelander,the devil-begotten Hun, the Slav, the Saxon,the Magyar. So far, then, we have all we may act upon;and let me tell you that very much of the beliefs are justified by what we have seen in our own so unhappy experience. The vampire live on, and cannot die by mere passing of the time; he can flourish when that he can fatten on the blood of the living. Even more, we have seen amongst us that he can even grow younger; that his vital faculties grow strenuous, and seem as though they refresh themselves when his special pabulum is plenty. But he cannot flourish without this diet; he eat not as others. Even friend Jonathan, who lived with him for weeks, did never see him to eat, never!He throws no shadow; he make in the mirror no reflect,as again Jonathan observe.He has the strength of many of his hand--witness again Jonathan when he shut the door against the wolfs, and when he help him from the diligence too. He can transform himself to wolf, as we gather from the ship arrival in Whitby, when he tear open the dog; he can be as bat, as Madam Mina saw him on the window at Whitby, and as friend John saw him fly from this so near house, and as my friend Quincey saw him at the window of Miss Lucy. He can come in mist which he create--that noble ship’s captain proved him of this; but, from what we know, the distance he can make this mist is limited, and it can only be round himself. He come on moonlight rays as elemental dust--as again Jonathan saw those sisters in the castle of Dracula. He become so small--we ourselves saw Miss Lucy, ere she was at peace, slip through a hairbreadth space at the tomb door. He can, when once he find his way, come out from anything or into anything, no matter how close it be bound or even fused up with fire--solder you call it. He can see in the dark--no small power this, in a world which is one half shut from the light. Ah, but hear me through. He can do all these things, yet he is not free. Nay; he is even more prisoner than the slave of the galley, than the madman in his cell. He cannot go where he lists; he who is not of nature has yet to obey some of nature’s laws--why we know not. He may not enter anywhere at the first, unless there be some one of the household who bid him to come; though afterwards he can come as he please. His power ceases, as does that of all evil things, at the coming of the day. Only at certain times can he have limited freedom. If he be not at the place whither he is bound, he can only change himself at noon or at exact sunrise or sunset. These things are we told, and in this record of ours we have proof by inference. Thus, whereas he can do as he will within his limit, when he have his earth-home, his coffin-home, his hell-home, the place unhallowed, as we saw when he went to the grave of the suicide at Whitby; still at other time he can only change when the time come. It is said, too, that he can only pass running water at the slack or the flood of the tide. Then there are things which so afflict him that he has no power, as the garlic that we know of; and as for things sacred, as this symbol, my crucifix, that was amongst us even now when we resolve, to them he is nothing, but in their presence he take his place far off and silent with respect. There are others, too, which I shall tell you of, lest in our seeking we may need them. The branch of wild rose on his coffin keep him that he move not from it; a sacred bullet fired into the coffin kill him so that he be true dead; and as for the stake through him, we know already of its peace; or the cut-off head that giveth rest. We have seen it with our eyes.