3 October.—As I must do something or go mad, I write this diary.
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 today. 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 today. 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. 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?”
H