Dracula - Bram Stoker

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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 beet-

      ling, 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 the caleche, 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 hi the roadway.

      As he swept his long arms, as though brushing aside some im-

      palpable obstacle, 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 hi darkness.

      When I could see again the driver was climbing into the

      caleche, and the wolves had disappeared. This was all so strange

      and uncanny that a dreadful fear came upon me, and I was

      Jonathan Marker’s Journal 13

      afraid to speak or move. The time seemed interminable as we

      swept on our way, now in almost complete darkness, for the roll-

      ing clouds obscured the moon. We kept on ascending, with oc-

      casional periods of quick descent, but in the main always

      ascending. Suddenly, I became 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.

      CHAPTER II

      JONATHAN BARKER’S JOURNAL continued

      5 May. I must have been asleep, for certainly if I had been

      fully awake I must have noticed the approach of such a remark-

      able place. In the gloom the courtyard looked of considerable

      size, and as several dark ways led from it under great round

      arches, it perhaps seemed bigger than it really is. I have not yet

      been able to see it by daylight.

      When the caleche stopped, the driver jumped down and held

      out his hand to assist me to alight. Again I could not but notice

      his prodigious strength. His hand actually seemed like a steel

      vice that could have crushed mine if he had chosen. Then he

      took out my traps, and placed them on the ground beside me as

      I stood close to a great door, old and studded with large iron

      nails, and set in a projecting doorway of massive stone. I could

      see even in the dim light that the stone was massively carved,

      but that the carving had been much worn by time and weather.

      As I stood, the driver jumped again into his seat ’and shook the

      reins; the horses started forward, and trap and all disappeared

      .down one of the dark openings.

      I stood in silence where I was, fc~ I did not know what to do.

      Of bell or knocker there was no sign; through these frowning

      walls and dark window openings it was not likely that my voice

      could penetrate. The time I waited seemed endless, and I felt

      doubts and fears crowding upon me. What sort of place had I

      come to, and among what kind of people? What sort of grim ad-

      venture was it on which I had embarked? Was this a customary

      incident in the life of a solicitor’s clerk sent out to explain the

      purchase of a London estate to a foreigner? Solicitor’s clerk!

      Mina would not like that. Solicitor for just before leaving Lon-

      don I got word that my examination was successful; and I am

      now a full-blown solicitor! I began to rub my eyes and pinch

      myself to see if I were awake. It all seemed like a horrible night-

      mare to me, and I expected that I should suddenly awake, and

      14

      Jonathan Marker’s Journal 15

      find myself at home, with the dawn struggling in through the

      windows, as I had now and again felt in the morning after

      a day of overwork. But my flesh answered the pinching test,

      and my eyes were not to be deceived. I was indeed awake and

      among the Carpathians. All I could do now was to be patient,

      and to wait the coming of the morning.

      Just as I had come to this conclusion I heard a heavy step

      approaching behind the great door, and saw through the chinks

      the gleam of a coming light. Then there was the sound of rattling

      chains and the clanking of massive bolts drawn back. A key was

      turned with the loud grating noise of long disuse, and the great

      door swung back.

      Within, stood a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white

      moustache, and clad in black from head to. oot, without a single

      speck of colour about him anywhere. He ’held in his hand an

      antique silver lamp, in which

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