Dracula Theory, page 9
“I will say when you’ve had enough!” The Baron’s voice boomed off the high ceilings. “If you relish any hope of retaining my daughter’s hand in marriage, you will comply with my wishes. You will be involved in this new venture, otherwise you may take your leave and never step foot near, or lay eyes on, Mina again. Besides, imagine the fortune you’d stand to inherit, being the only son I could claim as heir to this veritable kingdom.”
Money never held sway over me, as it had the Baron. Of course, that wasn’t something I could confess to my future father-in-law. The only thing I cared about was Mina. The woman was my very heart and soul, and I would leap to my death for her. No matter how I felt about damning a seemingly innocent man to a most certain doom, there was no escaping my desperate need to have Mina Murray at my side. My conscience was sickened by the choice I had to make, but make it I would.
I reached my hand toward the Baron Murray. “Very well. I will do as you ask.”
“Splendid. At the moment we have no need for your particular skills. When the time comes, however, our new industry will require a lawyer on staff to ensure every “i” is dotted and every “t” is crossed. You will be placed on a retainer and must be available to us at all times.”
“I do have other clients’ needs to attend to.”
The Baron shook his head. “Not any longer. Murray Industries is your sole focus now. Fret not, Mr. Harker, you will be paid handsomely for your time. Whatever you are making annually, triple it.” Recognition lit the Baron’s eyes. “Ah! There it is.”
“There is what?” Van Helsing inquired.
“Every man has his price, and I just found Harker’s.” The Baron patted me on the back. “It’s good to know my son-in-law-to-be can be bought like every other man in the civilized world. Consider yourself a member of the growing capitalist party of the ruling upper class. Best of all, now that I know your price, the ability to control you has been made exponentially easier.” The Baron guffawed. “I’m only kidding, Harker. You are such an easy target.”
“What’s next, Baron?” Van Helsing pulled us out of the awkward moment.
“We work together to figure out the most profitable means of extracting and monetizing the blood of the vampire.” The Baron clapped his hands together. “Now, doesn’t that sound like fun?”
Not one damn bit.
I did not voice that opinion. I’d already witnessed, firsthand, what the Baron’s temper looked like. There was no reason to tempt that beast out for a second round.
“Abraham, I’m going to need you to design the machinery to safely draw the Count’s blood. I refuse to have someone on my payroll getting injured or that golden goose escaping. I don’t care what you have to do to make this happen. Spare no expense.”
Van Helsing nodded. “I believe I already have a good idea how to craft such a device. I will require a bit of help.”
The Baron pointed a meaty finger at Van Helsing. “Only hire those you can fully trust. Were our secret to find its way into the ears of the public before we’re ready to sell that first vial of the Murray Miracle, I would be ruined.” The Baron winced. “I don’t care for that name. We’ll have to come up with a title that has a bit more panache, one that’ll guarantee to bring the bourgeois begging for a dram of our product.”
Abraham nodded. “I’ll bring Mr. Renfield back. He already knows a good amount about the project, and—oddly enough—I find him more trustworthy than others of his kind lurking in the shadows. Although he may be a simple man of shallow thought, his silence is all but guaranteed with the right amount of coin.”
“Pay the man whatever it takes.” The Baron took a seat behind his desk and opened a ledger. “I expect to be operational as soon as humanly possible. I don’t want that demon held in your laboratory too long. His blood could sour, which would end the project before a single pound changed hands.”
Van Helsing pursed his lips. “I’ll have Mr. Renfield back in the fold by tomorrow morning. In the meantime, I’ll start drawing up plans for the necessary devices and hardware. With those in order, I can begin the process of building everything we need to make this happen.”
The Baron stood and reached his arm across his desk. Van Helsing grabbed the proffered hand and gave it a businessman’s shake. “Gentlemen, let’s make ourselves wealthy beyond imagination.”
I had just accepted a damnable proposition. My soul would burn in the fiery pits of hell for pressing flesh with this very devil.
*****
As much as I wanted to spend the afternoon contemplating my darkening future, I knew there was only one place for me—by Mina’s side. The assumption that she’d be bedridden for a time was struck down and I struck dumb when my carriage pulled up to the Baron’s house, and Mina raced out the front door to greet me. Thanks to the chilly autumn air, she’d donned a hooded overcoat that hid her radiant face in a cloak of shadows. Not a single inch of her silken flesh was exposed to the elements. The only conclusion I could reach was that, due to her recent malady, she’d grown slightly sensitive to the light of day. Not that I had any business making such a diagnosis, but it was in my nature to ponder anything that might affect my life.
“My love,” Mina spoke with an uninhibited glee, a melodious sound I hadn’t heard in such a long time.
“Darling, I am overwhelmed to hear your voice and see you’ve regained your health.”
“I’m told it was nothing short of a miracle.”
“You, my dear, are a miracle. That nature could produce such a perfect creature is beyond the boundaries of logic and reason. You are too much for this world, too lovely for human perception, too beautiful to exist.”
“And yet,” Mina laughed, “here I am.”
Arm in arm, Mina and I walked into the house. As soon as we crossed the threshold, Mina shed her coat. “Thank the gods, I was boiling in that thing.”
“Then why wear it? Why cover up such glory?”
Mina playfully smacked my arm. “You are such a cad, Jonathan.”
I pulled Mina into me and was nearly knocked back by the sight. “Mina?”
“What is it, my darling?”
At first, I assumed it a trick of the light, but when I turned her about the room, I realized there was no deception of nature. “Your eyes are such a pale shade of blue, they’re almost white.”
Mina grinned and ignored my comment. “Shall we retire to the boudoir?”
I couldn’t let this aberration pass. “If I know anything in this world, it is the color of your eyes, for I have gazed into their very depths for what seems like an eternity. The truth of their color was an emerald green to shame the costliest jewel. Of that there is no mistake. Now? You have the haunting glare of—” I dare not speak the word. “What has happened to you?”
“Don’t be silly, Jonathan. Eyes don’t change color. What you are seeing is what has always been. I am Mina now, just as I was Mina before.”
“No. Something is most assuredly not right here.”
“It’s probably just the remaining effects of my illness. If what you say is true, I am certain the color will return in a few days. But I’m still your Mina—nothing has changed there.”
Mina grabbed my hand and pulled it to her sex—thereby proving something had in fact changed. Mina Murray was never so forward, had been raised under the most proper circumstances, and respected the boundary that separated base behavior and propriety. “I want you, Jonathan Harker. Now.”
I couldn’t be certain, but I spotted a flicker of crimson red in Mina’s eyes. Given the circumstances, I attributed the anomaly to the blood rushing from my head and into my nether regions. As much as I wanted to fight Mina’s advances, it had been such a long time since we’d enjoyed sexual congress. We’d both tossed aside the idea of saving ourselves until after the wedding. It was such an outmoded idea, especially given how quickly English society was advancing.
Or so I’d convinced myself. Truth be told, the English evolved at a glacial pace.
“Tick tock, Jonathan. If you want me, you best take me now, else the flames of lust be extinguished.”
I was about to accept Mina’s advances, when one of the doctors arrived on the scene.
“There you are, Mina. How many times have I asked you to not exert yourself? You haven’t fully recovered. Now please, retire to your quarters and back into your bed.”
Mina spun a delightful turn. “Nonsense. I feel perfectly marvelous, as though I could race to the edge of England and back again without breaking a sweat. You’ve cured me, doctor.”
“Nevertheless, my dear girl—”
“Woman,” Mina interrupted.
“My apologies, Miss Murray.”
“Soon to be Mrs. Harker,” Mina sang.
“Please, Mina, let’s return to your bed.” The doctor gently grasped Mina by the shoulder and began to lead her away.
Mina’s head turned back to me and fell slightly toward her shoulder. “But I want—”
“—to get better, is the only proper way to complete that sentence.” The doctor continued escorting Mina toward the grand staircase.
I blew Mina a kiss, a gesture I’d hope would reassure her everything would soon return to normal. Of course, deep in the recesses of my mind, I wasn’t certain whom I was trying to convince. So much had changed so quickly. Mina. Her father. Dracula. My microcosm of an existence had been tipped on its ear, such that I could no longer grasp the narrative. My life, as it were, was no more.
To my shock, Mina unleashed a banshee’s wail and tossed the doctor across the room as if he were nothing more than an article of soiled clothing. The doctor’s head slammed into a wall with such force he was rendered instantly unconscious. Mina ignored the incident and raced back to me.
“Oh, Jonathan, they would have me caged like an animal, to be dissected and explored. My body yearns for so much more than to be a case in a textbook.”
I looked into Mina’s eyes, only to see the flicker of red had grown to encompass the pale blue of her irises. I backed away, unsure if what I’d seen was reality or some misplaced adventure of my mind. A flood of memory cascaded into the forefront of consciousness. The eyes I saw before me were no longer those of my beloved, but of Count Dracula.
“My love, what is it?” Mina asked me.
Fear gripped my heart. I couldn’t allow Mina to know what I’d seen, on the off-chance I was mistaken. Her fragile state—be it mental, physical, or emotional—couldn’t carry the weight of such a revelation.
“I believe the doctor has fallen and has injured his head. We best get him help.”
Mina turned to see the motionless body on the floor. “Good heavens, what happened to him?”
I didn’t dare confess the truth. So instead, I scooped up the body and made my way to the stairs. “Come, Mina, we mustn't waste a second.”
With Mina by my side, I carried the doctor to the floor of the recovery room, where I was certain a collection of physicians would be waiting. Upon our arrival, the men and women descended upon me, whisking the body from my arms and into a bed already prepped for the ill. No one bothered to ask either of us what had happened, nor did anyone attend to Mina. All attention was on the limp body of the doctor. It was then that the Baron and Van Helsing arrived.
The Baron approached. “My darling daughter, what are you doing out of bed?”
Mina said nothing, but instead pointed to the doctor. The subtext of her action was clear to me. To anyone else, it looked as though her gesture was a selfless act to say, “I am not the one who needs attention.”
The truth spoke otherwise.
A nurse walked past, carrying a small machine with tubes running out of either side. The woman approached the bed and handed the device to one of the other doctors. A young man rolled up his sleeve and offered his arm for bleeding.
“What is going on?” Van Helsing inquired.
“We’re not certain as to what befell Doctor Weimer, but he’s lost a significant amount of blood from what appears to be a nearly crushing blow to the head.”
My conscience faded into the background of my mind, ensuring I not confess to witnessing Mina being the cause of the doctor’s injury. My malfeasance would eventually get the best of me, but for the time being, I had to protect my beloved at all costs, else Mina’s fear of becoming little more than a lab rat come to fruition.
The attending doctor continued. “We’re going to do a transfusion, before the aftereffect of his accident is irreversible.”
“What aftereffect?” Van Helsing nudged the doctor.
“Brain damage. We believe if the brain is deprived of blood for too long, it will suffer irreparable damage.”
Van Helsing knelt beside the bed. “Wouldn’t logic dictate, at least in this particular scenario, that the blunt force trauma to the skull be the likely cause of brain damage? Besides, the man’s heart is still pumping blood throughout his system. It’s only pumping slightly less."
“And where did you study medicine, Mr. Van Helsing?” The doctor emphasized Mr. with enough strength to make it clear he was talking down to Abraham.
Van Helsing stood and backed away from the bed. “Very well. Make your mistake, but don’t beg me for assistance, when your patient goes to hell.”
“What would you do differently?”
Mina interrupted the confrontation. “Wouldn’t it be prudent to concentrate your efforts on fixing the doctor, instead of cutting each other down?”
To my surprise, Van Helsing opted to be the bigger man. “Mina is correct. My apologies, Doctor.” With a pinched face, and his trusty flask in hand, Van Helsing exited the room, the Baron following close behind.
“Well, we’re all a bit tense at the moment.” The doctor raised a single finger into the air. “There is, however, one thing you can do for me, Mr. Harker.”
“What is that?” I asked.
“Escort Miss Murray from the room. There’s no need to expose her to such calamity as is the human body in its unsealed form.”
For a brief moment, I wasn’t certain what the doctor meant. When he finally plunged a needle—one attached to a tube running from the machine—into the arm of Doctor Weimer, it became all too clear the man was trying to protect Mina from the horror of modern medicine. The doctor then sank the other needle into the arm of the waiting donor.
I turned Mina for the door, just as blood began to syphon from one man and into another. As we reached the threshold, Mina stopped, her body rigid and unmoving. She took a great sniff of the air once, twice, thrice.
“I smell it,” Mina whispered.
“What, my dear?”
“Blood.”
“Yes, darling, we all smell it.”
Mina’s arms went rigid, every muscle tensed as if she were about to fall into a fit of convulsion, and then strained to turn against my grip. To my shock, I couldn’t hold her in place. First her head turned, until it seemed her neck would snap at the root. When her head could pivot no more, she followed up with her shoulders. The turn continued at her waist until, eventually, she was facing the transfusion in process. Mina ducked away from me and came to rest, menacingly, at the bedside. With a single swipe, she knocked the attending doctor to the ground, removed the needle from the arm of Doctor Weimer, and inserted into her mouth. With a great suck, she drank deep from the machine. Gulp after gulp, Mina fed off the blood intended to save the man she’d swatted down in the hall below.
I did my best to not vomit at the sight of my fiancée drinking the blood of another human. It took great effort to steel my will enough to grab Mina’s feeding tube and pull it free from her mouth. My action was rewarded with a deep-throated growl, the likes I’d never before heard. Without warning, Mina sprinted across the room and, before she reached the wall, leaped into the air and crashed through a massive stained-glass window. Razor sharp shards of glass rained down on the surrounding heads.
When the last tinkle of falling ruin fell to silence, I raced to the window and looked downward. Mina was nowhere in sight. I’d expected to at least see her broken body on the ground, but there was nothing. This was some monstrous form of trickery, one that Mina wouldn’t confess to until she absolutely must. Either that, or something most foul was amiss. I didn’t want to even give the second option the pleasure of considering it a possibility.
And yet, Mina was nowhere to be found. Given how far she’d had to fall…
And then I saw her—or at least the bilious flow of her nightgown—running the periphery of the garden below. A demonic screech rose to rattle the empty window pane. I instantly recognized the scream—Mina Murray. There was no thought in my next moment, just action. I took off, at a sprinter’s pace, down the stairs and out into the garden. I wasn’t certain what I’d expected to see, but I could feel to my core that my betrothed couldn’t cause such chaos.
“Mina,” I shouted.
Thanks to the late fall weather, the garden was in the act of its final dance with entropy. The leaves had all turned and were decorating the ground with autumn’s palette. In all the open, empty space before me, Mina was nowhere to be found.
“Mina,” I shouted at the top of my lungs. Again, I was rewarded with silence. “How is this possible?”
An unholy scream sent my heart into a fluttering panic. I recognized the agonized cry as Mina’s and took off toward the sound. At the edge of a small copse of bare trees, Mina lay, naked, in a tightly wound curl on the ground, her white nightgown tossed aside in tatters. Her entire body shivered as though racked with pain. I couldn’t be certain if my eyes were deceiving me, but an acrid smoke wafted from her flesh. Without thinking, I covered Mina with my coat, scooped her into my arms, and took off toward the manse. I could feel Mina’s body relax under the weight and comfort of the thick, wool garment.
“Everything’s going to be okay, my love.” I assured Mina, even though my words rang hollow in my heart. I couldn’t be certain of anything at the moment. Mina did not need to know that. And so, I offered her a bit of comfort by way of the tiniest white lie.
“Jonathan?” Mina’s voice was weak.
