DRACULA
CHAPTER I
JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL
( Kept in shorthand. )
3 May. Bistritz. -Left Munich at 8:35 P. M., on Ist
May, arriving at Vienna early next morning ; should have
arrived at 6:46, but train was an hour late. Buda- Pesth
seems a wonderful place, from the glimpse which I got
of it from the train and the little I could walk through
the streets. I feared to go very far from the station, as we
arrived late and would start as near the correct time as
possible. The impression I had was that we were leaving
the West and entering the East ; the most western of
splendid bridges over the Danube, which is here of noble
width and depth, took us among the traditions of Turkish
rule.
We left in pretty good time, and came after nightfall to
Klausenburgh. Here I stopped for the night at the Hotel
Royale. I had for dinner, or rather supper, a chicken done
up some way with red pepper, which was very good but
thirsty. ( Mem. , get recipe for Mina. ) I asked the waiter,
and he said it was called " paprika hendl," and that, as it
was a national dish , I should be able to get it anywhere
along the Carpathians. I found my smattering of German
very useful here ; indeed, I don't know how I should be
able to get on without it .
Having had some time at my disposal when in London ,
I had visited the British Museum, and made search among
the books and maps in the library regarding Transylvania ;
I2 DRACULA
it had struck me that some foreknowledge of the country
could hardly fail to have some importance in dealing with
a nobleman of that country. I find that the district he
named is in the extreme east of the country, just on the
borders of three states, Transylvania , Moldavia and Buko-
vina, in the midst of the Carpathian mountains ; one of the
wildest and least known portions of Europe. I was not
able to light on any map or work giving the exact locality
of the Castle Dracula, as there are no maps of this country
as yet to compare with our own Ordnance Survey maps ;
but I found that Bistritz, the post town named by Count
Dracula, is a fairly well-known place. I shall enter here
some of my notes, as they may refresh my memory when
I talk over my travels with Mina.
In the population of Transylvania there are four dis-
tinct nationalities : Saxons in the South, and mixed with
them the Wallachs, who are the descendants_of_the
Dacians ; Magyars in the West, and Szekelys in the East
and North. I am going among the latter, who claim to be
descended from Attila and the Huns. This may be So, for
when the Magyars conquered the country in the eleventh
century they found the Huns settled in it . I read that every
known superstition in the world is gathered into the horse-
shoe of the Carpathians, as if it were the centre of some
sort of imaginative whirlpool ; if so my stay may be very
interesting. (Mem. , I must ask the Count all about them. )
I did not sleep well, though my bed was comfortable
enough, for I had all sorts of queer dreams. There was a
dog howling all night under my window, which may have
had something to do with it ; or it may have been the
paprika, for I had to drink up all the water in my carafe,
and was still thirsty. Towards morning I slept and was
wakened by the continuous knocking at my door, so I guess
I must have been sleeping soundly then. I had for break-
fast more paprika, and a sort of porridge of maize flour
which they said was " mamaliga, " and egg-plant stuffed
with forcemeat, a very excellent dish, which they call
"impletata. " (Mem. , get recipe for this also . ) I had to
hurry breakfast, for the train started a little before eight,
or rather it ought to have done so, for after rushing to theJONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL 3
station at 7:30 I had to sit in the carriage for more than
an hour before we began to move. It seems to me that
the further east you go the more unpunctual are the trains.
What ought they to be in China?
All day long we seemed to dawdle through a country
which was full of beauty of every kind. Sometimes we saw
little towns or castles on the top of steep hills such as we
see in old missals ; sometimes we ran by rivers and streams
which seemed from the wide stony margin on each side
of them to be subject to great floods. It takes a lot of
water, and running strong, to sweep the outside edge of a
river clear. At every station there were groups of people,
sometimes crowds, and in all sorts of attire. Some of them
were just like the peasants at home or those I saw coming
through France and Germany, with short jackets and
round hats and home-made trousers ; but others were very
picturesque. The women looked pretty, except when you
got near them, but they were very clumsy about the waist..
They had all full white sleeves of some kind or other, and
the most of them had big belts with a lot of strips of
something fluttering from them like the dresses in a bal-
let, but of course there were petticoats under them. The
strangest figures we saw were the Slovaks, who were
more barbarian than the rest, with their big cow-boy hats,
great baggy dirty-white trousers, white linen shirts, and
enormous heavy leather belts, nearly a foot wide, all
studded over with brass nails. They wore high boots, with
their trousers tucked into them, and had long black hair
and heavy black moustaches. They are very picturesque,
but do not look prepossessing. On the stage they would
be set down at once as some old Oriental band of brigands.
They are, however, I am told, very harmless and rather
wanting in natural self-assertion.
It was on the dark side of twilight when we got to
Bistritz , which is a very interesting old place. Being prac-
tically on the frontier-for the Borgo Pass leads from it
into Bukovina-it has had a very stormy existence, and it
certainly shows marks of it. Fifty years ago a series of
great fires took place, which made terrible havoc on five
separate occasions. At the very beginning of the seven-4 DRACULA
teenth century it underwent a siege of three weeks and
lost 13,000 people, the casualties of war proper being
assisted by famine and disease.
Count Dracula had directed me to go to the Golden
Krone Hotel, which I found, to my great delight, to be
thoroughly old- fashioned , for of course I wanted to see all
I could of the ways of the country. I was evidently ex-
pected, for when I got near the door I faced a cheery-
looking elderly woman in the usual peasant dress-white
undergarment with long double apron, front, and back, of
coloured stuff fitting almost too tight for modesty. When
I came close she bowed and said, "The Herr English-
man?" "Yes, " I said, "Jonathan Harker. " She smiled, and
gave some message to an elderly man in white shirt-
sleeves, who had followed her to the door . He went, but
immediately returned with a letter : -
"My Friend. -Welcome to the Carpathians. I am
anxiously expecting you. Sleep well to-night. At three to-
morrow the diligence will start for Bukovina ; a place on
it is kept for you. At the Borgo Pass my carriage will
await you and will bring you to me. I trust that your
journey from London has been a happy one, and that you
will enjoy your, stay in my beautiful land.
" Your friend,
"DRACULA. "
4 May. I found that my landlord had got a letter from
the Count, directing him to secure the best place on the
coach for me ; but on making inquiries as to details he
seemed somewhat reticent, and pretended that he could not
understand my German. This could not be true, because
up to then he had understood it perfectly ; at least , he
answered my questions exactly as if he did . He and his
wife, the old lady who had received me, looked at each
other in a frightened sort of way. He mumbled out that the
money had been sent in a letter, and that was all he knew.
When I asked him if he knew Count Dracula, and could
tell me anything of his castle, both he and his wife crossed
themselves , and, saying that they knew nothing at all ,JONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL 5
simply refused to speak further. It was so near the time
of starting that I had no time to ask any one else, for it
was all very mysterious and not by any means comfort-
ing.
Just before I was leaving, the old lady came up to my
room and said in a very hysterical way :
"Must you go ? Oh ! young Herr, must you go ?" She
was in such an excited state that she seemed to have lost
her grip of what German she knew, and mixed it all up
with some other language which I did not know at all .
I was just able to follow her by asking many questions.
When I told her that I must go at once, and that I was
engaged on important business, she asked again :
"Do you know what day it is ?" I answered that it was
the fourth of May. She shook her head as she said again :
"Oh, yes ! I know that ! I know that, but do you know
what day it is ?" On my saying that I did not understand ,
she went on :
" It is the eve of St. George's Day. Do you not know
that to-night, when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil
things in the world will have full sway? Do you know
where you are going, and what you are going to ? " She was
in such evident distress that I tried to comfort her, but
without effect. Finally she went down on her knees and
implored me not to go ; at least to wait a day or two before
starting. It was all very ridiculous but I did not feel com-
fortable. However, there was business to be done, and I
could allow nothing to interfere with it. I therefore tried
to raise her up, and said, as gravely as I could , that I
thanked her, but my duty was imperative, and that I must
go. She then rose and dried her eyes, and taking a cruci-
fix from her neck offered it to me. I did not know what to
do, for, as an English Churchman, I have been taught to
regard such things as in some measure idolatrous, and
yet it seemed so ungracious to refuse an old lady meaning
so well and in such a state of mind. She saw, I suppose,
the doubt in my face, for she put the rosary round my
neck, and said, " For your mother's sake," and went out
of the room. I am writing up this part of the diary whilst
I am waiting for the coach, which is, of course, late ; and6 DRACULA
the crucifix is still round my neck. Whether it is the old
lady's fear, or the many ghostly traditions of this place, or
the crucifix itself, I do not know, but I am not feeling
nearly as easy in my mind as usual. If this book should
ever reach Mina before I do , let it bring my good- bye.
Here comes the coach !
5 May. The Castle.-The grey of the morning has
passed, and the sun is high over the distant horizon, which
seems jagged, whether with trees or hills I know not,
for it is so far off that big things and little are mixed. I
am not sleepy, and, as I am not to be called till I awake,
naturally I write till sleep comes. There are many odd
things to put down, and, lest who reads them may fancy
that I dined too well before I left Bistritz , let me put
down my dinner exactly. I dined on what they called
"robber steak" -bits of bacon, onion, and beef, seasoned
with red pepper, and strung on sticks and roasted over
the fire, in the simple style of the London cat's meat ! The
wine was Golden Mediasch, which produces a queer sting
on the tongue, which is, however, not disagreeable. I had
only a couple of glasses of this, and nothing else.
When I got on the coach the driver had not taken his
seat, and I saw him talking with the landlady. They were
evidently talking of me, for every now and then they
looked at me, and some of the people who were sitting
on the bench outside the door-which they call by a name
meaning "word-bearer" came and listened, and then
looked at me, most of them pityingly. I could hear a lot
of words often repeated, queer words, for there were many
nationalities in the crowd ; so I quietly got my polyglot
dictionary from my bag and looked them out. I must say
they were not cheering to me, for amongst them were
"Ordog"-Satan, "pokol❞ —hell , "stregoica"-witch,
" vrolok" and "vlkoslak"-both of which mean the same
thing, one being Slovak and the other Servian for some-
thing that is either were-wolf or vampire. ( Mem. , I must
ask the Count about these superstitions. )
When we started, the crowd round the inn door, which
had by this time swelled to a considerable size, all madeJONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL 7
the sign of the cross and pointed two fingers towards me.
With some difficulty I got a fellow-passenger to tell me
what they meant ; he would not answer at first, but on
learning that I was English, he explained that it was a
charm or guard against the evil eye. This was not very
pleasant for me, just starting for an unknown place to
meet an unknown man ; but every one seemed so kind-
hearted, and so sorrowful, and so sympathetic that I could
not but be touched . I shall never forget the last glimpse
which I had of the inn-yard and its crowd of picturesque
figures, all crossing themselves, as they stood round the
wide archway, with its background of rich foliage of
oleander and orange trees in green tubs clustered in the
centre of the yard. Then our driver, whose wide linen
drawers covered the whole front of the box- seat— " gotza"
they call them cracked his big whip over his four small
horses, which ran abreast, and we set off on our journey.
I soon lost sight and recollection of ghostly fears in the
beauty of the scene as we drove along, although had I
known the language, or rather languages, which my fellow-
passengers were speaking, I might not have been able to
throw them off so easily. Before us lay a green sloping
land full of forests and woods, with here and there steep
hills , crowned with clumps of trees or with farmhouses,
the blank gable end to the road . There was everywhere a
bewildering mass of fruit blossom-apple, plum, pear,
cherry ; and as we drove by I could see the green grass
under the trees spangled with the fallen petals. In and out
amongst these green hills of what they call here the "Mit-
tel Land" ran the road, losing itself as it swept round the
grassy curve, or was shut out by the straggling ends of
pine woods, which here and there ran down the hillsides
like tongues of flame. The road was rugged, but still we
seemed to fly over it with a feverish haste . I could not
understand then what the haste meant, but the driver was
evidently bent on losing no time in reaching Borgo Prund.
I was told that this road is in summertime excellent, but
that it had not yet been put in order after the winter
snows. In this respect it is different from the general run
of roads in the Carpathians, for it is an old tradition that8 DRACULA
they are not to be kept in too good order. Of old the
Hospadars would not repair them, lest the Turk should
think that they were preparing to bring in foreign troops,
and so hasten the war which was always really at loading
point.
Beyond the green swelling hills of the Mittel Land rose
mighty slopes of forest up to the lofty steeps of the Car-
pathians themselves . Right and left of us they towered,
with the afternoon sun falling full upon them and bring-
ing out all the glorious colours of this beautiful range,
deep blue and purple in the shadows of the peaks, green
and brown where grass and rock mingled , and an endless
perspective of jagged rock and pointed crags, till these
were themselves lost in the distance, where the snowy
peaks rose grandly. Here and there seemed mighty rifts
in the mountains, through which, as the sun began to sink,
we saw now and again the white gleam of falling water.
One of my companions touched my arm as we swept round
the base of a hill and opened up the lofty, snow- covered
peak of a mountain, which seemed, as we wound on our
serpentine way, to be right before us: -
"Look ! Isten szek ! " — " " God's seat ! " —and he crossed
himself reverently.
As we wound on our endless way, and the sun sank
lower and lower behind us, the shadows of the evening be-
gan to creep round us. This was emphasised by the fact
that the snowy mountain-top still held the sunset, and
seemed to glow out with a delicate cool pink. Here and
there we passed Cszeks and Slovaks, all in picturesque
attire, but I noticed that goitre was painfully prevalent.
By the roadside were many crosses, and as we swept by,
my companions all crossed themselves. Here and there was
a peasant man or woman kneeling before a shrine, who
did not even turn round as we approached, but seemed in
the self- surrender of devotion to have neither eyes nor
ears for the outer world. There were many things new to
me : for instance, hay- ricks in the trees, and here and there
very beautiful masses of weeping birch, their white stems
shining like silver through the delicate green of the leaves.
Now and again we passed a leiter-wagon-the ordinaryJONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL
peasant's cart-with its long, snake-like vertebra, calcu-
lated to suit the inequalities of the road. On this were sure
to be seated quite a group of home-coming peasants, the
Cszeks with their white, and the Slovaks with their col-
oured, sheepskins, the latter carrying lance- fashion their
long staves, with axe at end. As the evening fell it began
to get very cold, and the growing twilight seemed to merge
into one dark mistiness the gloom of the trees, oak, beech,
and pine, though in the valleys which ran deep between the
spurs of the hills, as we ascended through the Pass, the
dark firs stood out here and there against the background
of late-lying snow. Sometimes, as the road was cut through
the pine woods that seemed in the darkness to be closing
down upon us, great masses of greyness, which here and
there bestrewed the trees, produced a peculiarly weird and
solemn effect, which carried on the thoughts and grim
fancies engendered earlier in the evening, when the falling
sunset threw into strange relief the ghost-like clouds
which amongst the Carpathians seem to wind ceaselessly
through the valleys . Sometimes the hills were so steep
that, despite our driver's haste, the horses could only go
slowly. I wished to get down and walk up them, as we do
at home, but the driver would not hear of it . " No, no, " he
said ; " you must not walk here ; the dogs are too fierce" ;
and then he added, with what he evidently meant for grim
pleasantry for he looked round to catch the approving
smile of the rest-"and you may have enough of such mat-
ters before you go to sleep. " The only stop he would make
was a moment's pause to light his lamps.
When it grew dark there seemed to be some excitement
amongst the passengers, and they kept speaking to him,
one after the other, as though urging him to further speed .
He lashed the horses unmercifully with his long whip, and
with wild cries of encouragement urged them on to further
exertions. Then through the darkness I could see a sort
of patch of grey light ahead of us, as though there were a
cleft in the hills. The excitement of the passengers grew
greater ; the crazy coach rocked on its great leather springs ,
and swayed like a boat tossed on a stormy sea. I had to
hold on. The road grew more level, and we, appeared to flyΤΟ DRACULA
along. Then the mountains seemed to come nearer to us
on each side and to frown down upon us ; we were enter-
ing on the Borgo Pass. One by one several of the pas-
sengers offered me gifts, which they pressed upon me
with an earnestness which would take no denial ; these
were certainly of an odd and varied kind, but each was
given in simple good faith, with a kindly word, and a
blessing, and that strange mixture of fear-meaning move-
ments which I had seen outside the hotel at Bistritz-the
sign of the cross and the guard against the evil eye. Then,
as we flew along, the driver leaned forward, and on each
side the passengers, craning over the edge of the coach,
peered eagerly into the darkness. It was evident that some-
thing very exciting was either happening or expected, but
though I asked each passenger, no one would give me the
slightest explanation. This state of excitement kept on for
some little time ; and at last we saw before us the Pass
opening out on the eastern side. There were dark, rolling
clouds overhead, and in the air the heavy, oppressive sense
of thunder. It seemed as though the mountain range had
separated two atmospheres, and that now we had got into
the thunderous one. I was now myself looking out for the
conveyance which was to take me to the Count. Each
moment I expected to see the glare of lamps through the
blackness ; but all was dark. The only light was the flicker-
ing rays of our own lamps, in which the steam from our
hard driven horses rose in a white cloud. We could see now
the sandy road lying white before us, but there was on it
no sign of a vehicle. The passengers drew back with a
sigh of gladness, which seemed to mock my own disap-
pointment. I was already thinking what I had best do,
when the driver, looking at his watch, said to the others
something which I could hardly hear, it was spoken so
quietly and in so low a tone ; I thought it was "An hour
less than the time." Then turning to me he said in German
worse than my own : —
" There is no carriage here. The Herr is not expected
after all. He will now come on to Bukovina, and return to-
morrow or the next day ; better the next day." Whilst he
was speaking the horses began to neigh and snort andJONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL II
plunge wildly, so that the driver had to hold them up.
Then, amongst a chorus of screams from the peasants and
a universal crossing of themselves, a calèche, with four
horses, drove up behind us, overtook us, and drew up
beside the coach. I could see from the flash of our lamps,
as the rays fell on them, that the horses were coal-black
and splendid animals. They were driven by a tall man,
with a long brown beard and a great black hat, which
seemed to hide his face from us. I could only see the
gleam of a pair of very bright eyes, which seemed red in
the lamplight, as he turned to us. He said to the driver : -
" You are early to-night, my friend. " The man stam-
mered in reply : -
"The English Herr was in a hurry ," to which the
stranger replied :—
"That is why, I suppose, you wished him to go on to
Bukovina. You cannot deceive me, my friend ; I know too
much, and my horses are swift." As he spoke he smiled,
and the lamplight fell on a hard- looking mouth, with very
red lips and sharp-looking teeth, as white as ivory. One of
my companions whispered to another the line from Bur-
ger's "Lenore" : -
"Denn die Todten reiten schnell" -
( " For the dead travel fast.")
The strange driver evidently heard the words, for he
looked up with a gleaming smile. The passenger turned his
face away, at the same time putting out his two fingers and
crossing himself. "Give me the Herr's luggage," said the
driver ; and with exceeding alacrity my bags were handed
out and put in the calèche. Then I descended from the side
of the coach, as the calèche was close alongside, the driver
helping me with a hand which caught my arm in a grip of
steel ; his strength must have been prodigious . Without a
word he shook his reins, the horses turned, and we swept
into the darkness of the Pass . As I looked back I saw the
steam from the horses of the coach by the light of the
lamps, and projected against it the figures of my late com-
panions crossing themselves. Then the driver cracked his12 DRACULA
whip and called to his horses, and off they swept on their
way to Bukovina. As they sank into the darkness I felt
a strange chill , and a lonely feeling came over me ; but a
cloak was thrown over my shoulders, and a rug across
my knees, and the driver said in excellent German :- -
" The night is chill, mein Herr, and my master the
Count bade me take all care of you . There is a flask of
slivovitz (the plum brandy of the country ) underneath the
seat, if you should require it . " I did not take any, but it
was a comfort to know it was there all the same. I felt a
little strangely, and not a little frightened . I think had
there been any alternative I should have taken it, instead
of prosecuting that unknown night journey. The carriage
went at a hard pace straight along, then we made a com-
plete turn and went along another straight road. It seemed
to me that we were simply going over and over the same
ground again ; and so I took note of some salient point,
and found that this was so. I would have liked to have
asked the driver what this all meant, but I really feared
to do so, for I thought that, placed as I was, any protest
would have had no effect in case there had been an inten-
tion to delay. By-and-by, however, as I was curious to
know how time was passing, I struck a match, and by its
flame looked at my watch ; it was within a few minutes of
midnight. This gave me a sort of shock, for I suppose the
general superstition about midnight was increased by my
recent experiences. I waited with a sick feeling of sus-
pense.
Then a dog began to howl somewhere in a farmhouse
far down the road-a long, agonised wailing, as if from
fear. The sound was taken up by another dog, and then
another and another, till, borne on the wind which now
sighed softly through the Pass , a wild howling began,
which seemed to come from all over the country, as far as
the imagination could grasp it through the gloom of the
night. At the first howl the horses began to strain and
rear, but the driver spoke to them soothingly, and they
quieted down, but shivered and sweated as though after
a run-away from sudden fright. Then, far off in the dis-
tance, from the mountains on each side of us began aJONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL 13
louder and a sharper howling-that of wolves-which
affected both the horses and myself in the same way-for
I was minded to jump from the calèche and run, whilst
they reared again and plunged madly, so that the driver
had to use all his great strength to keep them from bolt-
ing. In a few minutes, however, my own ears got accus-
tomed to the sound, and the horses so far became quiet
that the driver was able to descend and to stand before
them. He petted and soothed them, and whispered some-
thing in their ears, as I have heard of horse-tamers doing,
and with extraordinary effect , for under his caresses they
became quite manageable again, though they still trembled.
The driver again took his seat, and shaking his reins ,
started off at a great pace. This time, after going to the
far side of the Pass , he suddenly turned down a narrow
roadway which ran sharply to the right.
Soon we were hemmed in with trees, which in places
arched right over the roadway till we passed as through
a tunnel ; and again great frowning rocks guarded us
boldly on either side. Though we were in shelter, we could
hear the rising wind, for it moaned and whistled through
the rocks, and the branches of the trees crashed together
as we swept along. It grew colder and colder still, and fine,
powdery snow began to fall, so that soon we and all around
us were covered with a white blanket. The keen wind
still carried the howling of the dogs, though this grew
fainter as we went on our way. The baying of the wolves
sounded nearer and nearer, as though they were closing
round on us from every side. I grew dreadfully afraid,
and the horses shared my fear. The driver, however, was
not in the least disturbed ; he kept turning his head to left
and right, but I could not see anything through the dark-
ness .
Suddenly, away on our left, I saw a faint flickering blue
flame. The driver saw it at the same moment ; he at once
checked the horses, and, jumping to the ground, disap-
peared into the darkness. I did not know what to do, the
less as the howling of the wolves grew closer ; but while
I wondered the driver suddenly appeared again, and with-
out a word took his seat, and we resumed our journey. I14 DRACULA
think I must have fallen asleep and kept dreaming of the
incident, for it seemed to be repeated endlessly, and now
looking back, it is like a sort of awful nightmare. Once
the flame appeared so near the road, that even in the
darkness around us I could watch the driver's motions.
He went rapidly to where the blue flame arose it must
have been very faint, for it did not seem to illumine the
place around it at all-and gathering a few stones, formed
them into some device. Once there appeared a strange
optical effect : when he stood between me and the flame
he did not obstruct it, for I could see its ghostly flicker
all the same. This startled me, but as the effect was only
momentary, I took it that my eyes deceived me straining
through the darkness. Then for a time there were no blue
flames, and we sped onwards through the gloom, with the
howling of the wolves around us, as though they were
following in a moving circle.
At last there came a time when the driver went further
afield than he had yet gone, and during his absence, the
horses began to tremble worse than ever and to snort and
scream with fright. I could not see any cause for it, for
the howling of the wolves had ceased altogether ; but just
then the moon, sailing through the black clouds, appeared
behind the jagged crest of a beetling, pine-clad rock, and
by its light I saw around us a ring of wolves, with white
teeth and lolling red tongues, with long, sinewy limbs and
shaggy hair. They were a hundred times more terrible in
the grim silence which held them than even when they
howled. For myself, I felt a sort of paralysis of fear. It is
only when a man feels himself face to face with such
horrors that he can understand their true import.
All at once the wolves began to howl as though the
moonlight had had some peculiar effect on them. The
horses jumped about and reared , and looked helplessly
round with eyes that rolled in a way painful to see ; but
the living ring of terror encompassed them on every side ;
and they had perforce to remain within it . I called to the
coachman to come, for it seemed to me that our only
chance was to try to break out through the ring and to
aid his approach. I shouted and beat the side of theJONATHAN HARKER'S JOURNAL 15
calèche, hoping by the noise to scare the wolves from that
side, so as to give him a chance of reaching the trap. How
he came there, I know not, but I heard his voice raised in
a tone of imperious command, and looking towards the
sound, saw him stand in the roadway. As he swept his
long arms, as though brushing aside some impalpable ob-
stacle, the wolves fell back and back further still . Just then
a heavy cloud passed across the face of the moon, so
that we were again in darkness .
When I could see again the driver was climbing into
the calèche, and the wolves had disappeared . This was all
so strange and uncanny that a dreadful fear came upon
me, and I was afraid to speak or move. The time seemed
interminable as we swept on our way, now in almost com-
plete darkness , for the rolling clouds obscured the moon.
We kept on ascending, with occasional periods of quick
descent, but in the main always ascending. Suddenly, I be-
came conscious of the fact that the driver was in the act
of pulling up the horses in the courtyard of a vast ruined
castle , from whose tall black windows came no ray of
light, and whose broken battlements showed a jagged line against the moonlit sky.