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Lord Godalming, I am empowered to read her letters and papers, for I am
deeply concerned about certain matters vitally important. In them I find
some letters from you, which show how great friends you were and how you
love her. Oh, Madam Mina, by that love, I implore you, help me. It is
for others' good that I ask--to redress great wrong, and to lift much
and terrible troubles--that may be more great than you can know. May it
be that I see you? You can trust me. I am friend of Dr. John Seward and
of Lord Godalming (that was Arthur of Miss Lucy). I must keep it private
for the present from all. I should come to Exeter to see you at once if
you tell me I am privilege to come, and where and when. I implore your
pardon, madam. I have read your letters to poor Lucy, and know how good
you are and how your husband suffer; so I pray you, if it may be,
enlighten him not, lest it may harm. Again your pardon, and forgive me.
"VAN HELSING."
_Telegram, Mrs. Harker to Van Helsing._
"_25 September._--Come to-day by quarter-past ten train if you can catch
it. Can see you any time you call.
"WILHELMINA HARKER."
MINA HARKER'S JOURNAL.
_25 September._--I cannot help feeling terribly excited as the time
draws near for the visit of Dr. Van Helsing, for somehow I expect that
it will throw some light upon Jonathan's sad experience; and as he
attended poor dear Lucy in her last illness, he can tell me all about
her. That is the reason of his coming; it is concerning Lucy and her
sleep-walking, and not about Jonathan. Then I shall never know the real
truth now! How silly I am. That awful journal gets hold of my
imagination and tinges everything with something of its own colour. Of
course it is about Lucy. That habit came back to the poor dear, and that
awful night on the cliff must have made her ill. I had almost forgotten
in my own affairs how ill she was afterwards. She must have told him
of her sleep-walking adventure on the cliff, and that I knew all about
it; and now he wants me to tell him what she knows, so that he may
understand. I hope I did right in not saying anything of it to Mrs.
Westenra; I should never forgive myself if any act of mine, were it even
a negative one, brought harm on poor dear Lucy. I hope, too, Dr. Van
Helsing will not blame me; I have had so much trouble and anxiety of
late that I feel I cannot bear more just at present.
I suppose a cry does us all good at times--clears the air as other rain
does. Perhaps it was reading the journal yesterday that upset me, and
then Jonathan went away this morning to stay away from me a whole day
and night, the first time we have been parted since our marriage. I do
hope the dear fellow will take care of himself, and that nothing will
occur to upset him. It is two o'clock, and the doctor will be here soon
now. I shall say nothing of Jonathan's journal unless he asks me. I am
so glad I have type-written out my own journal, so that, in case he asks
about Lucy, I can hand it to him; it will save much questioning.
* * * * *
_Later._--He has come and gone. Oh, what a strange meeting, and how it
all makes my head whirl round! I feel like one in a dream. Can it be all
possible, or even a part of it? If I had not read Jonathan's journal
first, I should never have accepted even a possibility. Poor, poor, dear
Jonathan! How he must have suffered. Please the good God, all this may
not upset him again. I shall try to save him from it; but it may be even
a consolation and a help to him--terrible though it be and awful in its
consequences--to know for certain that his eyes and ears and brain did
not deceive him, and that it is all true. It may be that it is the doubt
which haunts him; that when the doubt is removed, no matter
which--waking or dreaming--may prove the truth, he will be more
satisfied and better able to bear the shock. Dr. Van Helsing must be a
good man as well as a clever one if he is Arthur's friend and Dr.
Seward's, and if they brought him all the way from Holland to look after
Lucy. I feel from having seen him that he _is_ good and kind and of a
noble nature. When he comes to-morrow I shall ask him about Jonathan;
and then, please God, all this sorrow and anxiety may lead to a good
end. I used to think I would like to practise interviewing; Jonathan's
friend on "The Exeter News" told him that memory was everything in such
work--that you must be able to put down exactly almost every word
spoken, even if you had to refine some of it afterwards. Here was a rare
interview; I shall try to record it _verbatim_.
It was half-past two o'clock when the knock came. I took my courage _à
deux mains_ and waited. In a few minutes Mary opened the door, and
announced "Dr. Van Helsing."
I rose and bowed, and he came towards me; a man of medium weight,
strongly built, with his shoulders set back over a broad, deep chest and
a neck well balanced on the trunk as the head is on the neck. The poise
of the head strikes one at once as indicative of thought and power; the
head is noble, well-sized, broad, and large behind the ears. The face,
clean-shaven, shows a hard, square chin, a large, resolute, mobile
mouth, a good-sized nose, rather straight, but with quick, sensitive
nostrils, that seem to broaden as the big, bushy brows come down and the
mouth tightens. The forehead is broad and fine, rising at first almost
straight and then sloping back above two bumps or ridges wide apart;
such a forehead that the reddish hair cannot possibly tumble over it,
but falls naturally back and to the sides. Big, dark blue eyes are set
widely apart, and are quick and tender or stern with the man's moods. He
said to me:--
"Mrs. Harker, is it not?" I bowed assent.