Seance for a Vampire

tongue, yet still the traces linger.”

“Holmes–”

He turned to me with an inquiring look.

“Holmes, is the name’Count Kulakov’ familiar to you?”

He thought a moment. “No. Who is he?”

“I ask because a man of that name’phoned to baker Street and left a message of sympathy for me.”

“Sympathy? because of my supposed demise?”

“I assumed that was the reason. The name sounds Russian, and your mention just now–”

“Quite so.” My friend was frowning. “Count Kulakov. but no, I am acquainted with no one... well, we shall see.”

Dracula, who had been listening intently, asked: “And you really can give no reason why you were spared?”

“I cannot. Perhaps, as I half-seriously suggested a moment ago, it was out of a mere uncertainty as to what to do with me. During the hour or more that I was in the immediate presence of my enemy, I am sure that there were intervals, some lasting a full minute, when he was not entirely aware of everything about him. Could I have freed myself from my bonds during one of those periods, I might have been able to escape. but the cord was strong, the knots were skillfully tied, and I was not allowed time to overcome them.”

“You say he was’not entirely aware’?”

“That is understating the case. The actuality was something more frightening; the word’catalepsy’ comes to mind. It was rather as if my antagonist were functioning in a trance, or under some kind of posthypnotic suggestion.”

Dracula and I were both intrigued by the medical possibilities, and the prince urged his cousin to give us more details.

Holmes did his best to provide them. The foreign vampire had sat immobile for minutes at a time, staring at nothing, as far as Holmes had been able to discern, except the very darkness of the night. “Again, the suggestion of real insanity looms. Had he been a breathing man, I should have strongly suspected epilepsy, or drugs.”

At this, Dracula shook his head doubtfully. “Among us, both epilepsy and drug use of any kind are practically unheard of.” The prince paused before adding, with evident reluctance: “Unfortunately, we do have cases of insanity.” He paused again before admitting: “And they are not particularly rare.”

Holmes turned toward his cousin. “Prince, he may have given us a valuable clue. There was a certain name he uttered–I do not think it was his own, but he pronounced it more than once. Does the name’Gregory Efimovich’ mean anything to you?”

Dracula shrugged minimally. “Male. A Christian name and patronymic, according to the Russian style of address.”

“Of course. but–?”

Our vampire colleague shook his head. “No. As the name of an individual, it means nothing to me. No more than does’Count Kulakov.’ Well, possibly they are the same.”

Holmes returned to the question of Louisa Altamont. His brief observation of that young woman when she appeared at the seance had been enough to convince him, even as I was convinced, that she had definitely passed into the nosferatu state. but my friend had seen nothing of her, indeed, he had seen or heard no one but his captor during the period of his captivity. He was keenly interested when Dracula reported that Louisa’s tomb was occupied by a living member of that race.

“We must call upon her, Prince.” Holmes consulted his watch. “Tonight, if at all possible.”

“‘Call upon her’?” I asked, puzzled.

“In her tomb, Watson, in her tomb!” Even as I shuddered inwardly, I took comfort in the fact that my companion had so far recovered as to display a flash of his old impatience.

Prince Dracula took the suggestion with perfect calm. “To arrange a conversation with the young one who now sleeps among her ancestors should not be too difficult. It may be that in the process, we will encounter the one who put her there as well.” He smiled. “If so, that problem at least may be rather quickly settled.”

The detective now turned his attention to me and requested that I give him a more detailed account of the events in and near the house following the seance. I complied, describing as fully as I could the savage attack on Abraham Kirkaldy, my conversations next morning with Armstrong and Merivale, and the subsequent attempt to murder me in London.

Holmes reacted with considerable alarm upon hearing a partial account of my communications with Mycroft.

He beat a fist softly upon the arm of his chair. “but this I did not expect! I must telephone–no, I prefer not to appear in public just yet. Let my survival remain a secret, if possible, for a little longer. Watson, you must find a telephone at once. Call Mycroft and reassure him regarding my safety.”

“Cousin Sherlock,” interposed Prince Dracula, “before you do that, allow me to make a suggestion.”

Twelve

The prince proceeded with a formal request for our opinions on a plan that had suggested itself to him. This involved returning to the chapel and there setting up an ambush in force, with the object of trapping the slayer and kidnapper when the latter sooner or later returned to the hidden crypt. but Holmes immediately though diplomatically expressed grave doubts regarding the likelihood of success and soon we had all agreed that the idea was untenable. After all, Holmes had lain in confinement from very early on Wednesday morning until around midday on Thursday, and the villain had not returned to the crypt during that interval. Given his evidently uncertain mental state, it seemed perfectly possible that he might never go back at all.

With that decided, our next step was to communicate with Mycroft. Knowing the extreme regularity of the man’s habits, I felt confident of being able to reach him at his desk at the ministry–or at the Diogenes Club during the evening, from a quarter to five till twenty to eight. After that, he was sure to be found in his rooms just opposite the club, across Pall Mall.

The Saracen’s Head, like most other inns, boasted a telephone. but since the instrument was located in one of the public rooms on the ground floor, any conversation conducted there might be uncomfortably public. Other’phones were sure to be available somewhere in the village–at the other inns, and at the railroad station if nowhere else–but I felt a similar problem would surely arise whichever one we attempted to use.

The prince, always at his best when faced with an immediate tactical problem, quickly suggested a scheme to enable me to conduct my call to London without being overheard. Dracula proceeded me downstairs and went into the public room, from whence, a moment later, I heard his voice raised in unfamiliar tones, calling jovially for a round of drinks for the house. With bewildering facility, he had adopted the character of a commercial traveler. When I presently followed my ally downstairs, all potential eavesdroppers were concentrating eagerly upon a story of amatory adventure, as thoroughly improbable as it was distracting. This tale was scarcely concluded before it was followed by another. In using the telephone, my only remaining problem would be the occasional wave of boisterous laughter emanating from the pub down the hall, which might interfere somewhat with hearing.

Reasonably confident now of privacy, I put through my call and had the satisfaction of promptly reaching Mycroft–the further satisfaction of remembering to call him by that name, and of being able to assure him that his brother was now safe.

“But,” I added, “he wishes to remain for a time out of view, and so has sent me to the telephone.”

“Thank God!” came the heartfelt sentiment across the wires. “Sherlock has come through what must have been a terrible experience. Can you tell me whether the precise nature of it was... was...?” It seemed that there were certain words Mycroft could not quite bring himself to say.

“It was, I regret to say, of the kind that we discussed in London. but he has come through it well.”

“Thank you, John, for your honesty.” Again the voice on the other end was quavering. “Is there anything I can do?”

“There may be several things.” We conferred briefly, quickly agreeing that there was no immediate need for Mycroft to come to Amberley.

“I was not looking forward to the journey. Tell me, what does Sherlock request?”