The Holmes-Dracula File

rooms with Dr. Seward and Lord Godalming. This gave me no reason to suspect the latter, but it strongly aroused my suspicions against Seward. When I came out into the sitting-room later, I took the liberty of stumbling against you in my bemused state, and emptied your pocket—I know in which one you always carry pills—of Seward's gift. A little chemical analysis, and I was certain of my foe, though I still had not a shred of evidence against him save for the pill itself. The drug was an East Indian one, unlikely to be fatal but producing a violent temporary madness. Sir Jasper Meek confirmed my findings. You were meant to give it to me, then call in Seward for more help. He would thus be enabled to interrogate me at his leisure in his stronghold at Purfleet. Now I knew he did not intend to kill me outright. I replaced the pill with a harmless substitute, put the box back into your pocket…'

'Holmes, I must apologize.'

'It is not at all necessary. If your plan unintentionally endangered my life, so did mine accidentally place yours in peril.'

'How did you work out your plan with Dracula?'

'Well, he and I pushed his great box up onto the roof, out of sight, so he might appear to have taken it away. We disarranged the sitting-room to suggest struggle or flight. Then, while I was busy with our disguises, the Count had time to tell me where the enemy had formerly kept their headquarters. Leaving him dressed in some of my clothing, I went out through our old second exit, that served us so well, as you must recall, in the recovery of the Mazarin Stone. I was thus free to take effective action in the field, against an enemy who thought me safely out of his way.

'Once I had found the abandoned building described to me by the Count, and entered it, inspection soon convinced me that the abandonment could be no more than temporary. In particular, I had been intrigued by Dracula's mention of rats that he heard there on his second visit. Now, men experimenting with transmission of plague by means of rats would hardly have allowed their laboratories to be so casually infested.

'I searched, and on a lower level, which the Count had not bothered to look at, I found hundreds of brown and black rats caged. Food and water had been provided for them, yet there was evidence of sickness, and I did not go too close. I hastened instead to enlist the help of Sir Jasper, and the faithful Lestrade. I am happy to report that the cages and their contents were drenched in carbolic and incinerated, shortly after being inspected for the last time by one of their owners, the late Dr. Fitzroy. Lestrade and I followed him back to Purfleet, while he thought himself secure.'

For a while we both were silent, as our cab labored forward in the morning traffic. Then stubbornly I came back to my subject.

'I admit, Holmes, that I may owe the Count my life. But I think he would as cheerfully have killed me, had I stood in his way. Holmes, the man is still at large, and he—he is a vampire.'

'Ha! You saw enough, did you, to convince yourself of that? Perhaps someday I shall ask to hear all the details.' Holmes folded his arms and sat back, softly whistling something from a French opera. His manner was, it seemed to me, very strangely altered from that of recent days; he could now speak lightly, almost frivolously, of this being whose mere existence had seemed likely to drive him mad.

I began another protest, which he interrupted. 'So, Watson, you are now convinced. Would you like to try to convince Lestrade? Besides, with what real wrongdoing can we charge the Count? In conscience, Watson. I do not speak strictly of the law.'

I could not immediately find an answer that adequately expressed my deep forebodings, and in a moment Holmes went on. 'It has long been my practice, as you know, to bend the law for special cases. If I could do so for Von Herder, how much more for the man who has, more than anyone else, saved London? In fact, I should like to reassure the Count that, insofar as the matter rests with me, he and his kind will be subjected to no probing and no publicity.'

'To reassure him? But how are we to communicate with this man at all?'

'Your gallantry does you credit, Watson. I myself heard enough from Madam Harker, and saw enough, to convince me that you cannot be ignorant of her status vis-e-vis the Count. But to use that road would show a certain lack of artistry on our part, and perhaps a certain indelicacy as well. We must be subtle, Watson… I think some statement to the effect that vampires are unheard of in English criminal practice, worked into one of your little tales—the tale in this case made up out of whole cloth—would serve the purpose admirably. What would you say to something like The Sussex Vampire as a title?'

'I would say that any story involving Sherlock Holmes, the art of ratiocination, and vampires, cannot fail to appear more than a little preposterous.'

'Oh, I quite agree, Watson, I quite agree. But then, my dear Watson, so does life.'