Dracula in London Part 18

Your laughter expands, drowning out the thunder, and Berserker begins to howl in earnest, bas.h.i.+ng his body against the bars, drawing blood. The smell of it intoxicates you.

The mortals for miles around tremble at the unfamiliar sound and scent of wildness that strikes a primal cord.

The wolfs victory cry delights your ears, riding sharp and crisp through the wind. You are a pair, in unison, like lovers, or father and son, master and slave. Two warriors, unstoppable.

You raise a hand to the sky and lightning follows where you point, splitting a birch down the middle. You are a warlord now, as you were vivode throughout your existence. One deemed so fierce-mad even-that your countrymen fear you still. They learned to respect and fear you in the past, when you drove theOttomans buck from your boundaries, back over the Carpathian Mountains, back to the land where they belonged. They respected and feared you for preserving the law, for enforcing Christian values. Did you not punish the dishonest, those who would steal and lie and cheat for personal gain? And even as much as those you ruled respected and feared you, they loved you. Then, and now. Your reputation survived, even as has your body in this supple, corporeal form you continue. You are a hero to your countrymen. The British who have colonized so much of the world are simply modern Ottomans. You defeated the turbaned ones, you will erode from within this society that wears the high hat symbolizing the pinnacle of civilization.

You are Ruler of Transylvania, King of Terrors, Lord of the Undead. You are invincible.

That truth causes your lips to split apart and a long hiss to escape your throat, swirling through the air like a current that will crush everything in its wake, mingling with Berserker's mad howls. The wind whips the soul of every soon-to-be corpse in this park. It slices through to the subconscious Freud postulates. But humanity's creative inventors and astute thinkers cannot save them!

You have read that Kierkegaard preached an acceptance of fate, which includes suffering. That philosophy is repugnant to you. It is Nietzsche who speaks your creed. You and you alone are of paramount importance. The prattle of Marx and Engels will dissolve in the vapors of time-there is little strength in a collective without a strong leader.

Machiavelli, your contemporary, knew this. He spoke from your era, where politics sired all.

Berserker's instincts are aligned with your own. He understands all too well the rules of power and control as crucial for survival. He cannot cower at your just fury because he shares this reaction. You cannot bear to see him entrapped this way. It is not sentiment which inspires you but a sense of reestablis.h.i.+ng order. These mortals will pay for their insolence! Let them gloat for now. Their telegraphs and telephones and phonographs. Their printing presses and cameras. Their refinement of pistols and rifles and gunpowder. None of it will help them! All will incinerate in the blaze of a power greater than their own. All of their knowledge will crumble to dust.

Your knowledge has been gleaned over many lifetimes, knowledge that covers the spectrum of life, that totals the grains of sand on all of the beaches of the world! Mortal philosophy is correct in one thing-they will taste divine suffering through their servitude to you, their master. Your violent kiss will bequeath this destiny to them. They will languish in the knowledge that they will be like you but never be your equal.

With the strength of ten men, you direct the forces of nature. Your hand sprouts talons that claw the lock on the cage. Instantly, sparks shoot through you. In the deluge, the metal sizzles and melts. You grasp it in your hand, snap the lock, and pull open the door of the prison.

Berserker does not hesitate. In one leap, he is on the ground, before his master. "Go!"

you tell him, mentally directing his instincts toward Whitby and Hillingham. Toward the gla.s.s that separates you from Lucy, as if such tangible reality can stand in your way!

Berserker swivels his head to stare in the direction of the keeper. "When you have served me and my work is done," you remind him, "then and only then will you will reap yourreward!"

He hesitates but a moment. Then, swiftly, he sprints over the drowning gra.s.s and into the trees. Free. Alive. As lucid as can be.

Curtain Call Gary

A. Braunbeck

(From the unpublished papers of Charles Fort)

I have been, for most of my life, a collector of notes on subjects of great diversity-such as deviations from concentricity in the lunar crater Copernicus, to the great creature Melanicus and the super-bat upon whose wings it broods over the affairs of Man, as well as stationary meteor-radiants, the reported growth of hair on the bald head of a mummy, the appearance of purple Englishmen, instances of amphibians and blood raining down from the heavens, apparitions, phantoms, the d.a.m.ned, the excluded, wild talents, new lands, and "Did the girl swallow the octopus?"

But my liveliest interest is not so much in things as in the relations of things. I find now, in the twilight of my life, as I pour over the endless data that I have a.s.sembled throughout my days, that I think more and more about the alleged pseudo-relations we call "coincidences." What if these events, rather than being happenstance, are the final result of great, secret, dark machinations of the Universe interacting with the subconscious to produce an event or events which guide humanity down certain roads its members were destined to take?

I am writing now of a brief period I spent in London when I was thirty-six, in the early months of 1912 (nearly ten years before I decided to move there), and of a most singularly peculiar bookshop, its even more peculiar proprietor, and a bit of London Theatre history which none before me has ever recorded.

I was staying at a very comfortable rooming house in Bedford Place, just around the corner from the British Museum in Great Russell Street (since my visit to London was solely to search through the museum's vast archives of ma.n.u.scripts, the location of my rooms could not have been more advantageous for my purposes). On this particular day-kept from my research at the museum by a cryptic note delivered to my room early that morning-I was exploring the narrower, less-often traveled streets of the vicinity, in search of an address which seemed more and more to me a flight of fancy in the mind of whomever had composed the note, when the heavens opened wide and within moments the rain was pounding down violently. I was in Little Russell Street, just behind the church that fronts on Bloomsbury Way, and there was no way for me to find immediate shelter fromthe storm. The address written on the note was obviously someone's idea of a joke, for I had been up and down this street no less than three times.

So why had I not noticed the little bookshop before?

It seemed that as soon as the sun was obscured by the rain clouds, the tiny edifice simply appeared out of the rain, set between a baker's and a haberdashery where before there had been only, I am certain, a cramped alleyway.

I shall state here that, despite the path of research my life has been dedicated to, I am not a man who is given to either hallucination or flights of fancy. I neither believe nor disbelieve anything. I have shut myself away from the rocks and wisdom of ages, as well as the so-called great teachers of all time; I close the front door to Christ and Einstein and at the back door hold out a welcoming hand to rains of frogs and lands hidden above the clouds and the paths of lost spirits. "Come this way, let's see if you can explain yourselves,"

I say unto these phenomena, always taking care to look upon them with a cold clinician's eye. I cannot accept that the products of minds are subject-matter for belief systems. I neither saw nor did not see a bookshop hidden away on this street. It simply was, at that moment, where the moment before it was not.

I crossed the street and entered the place, nearly soaked through.

The first thing that a.s.saulted my senses was the so-very-right smell of the place.

Perhaps you have to be a true lover of books to understand what I mean by that, but the comforting, intoxicating, friendly scent of bindings! and old paper was nectar to my soul.

I called out, asking if anyone were there. When no response was forthcoming, I removed my coat, draped it on the rack near the door, and-after patting down my hair and shaking off the remnants of rain from my shoes and sleeves-proceeded to browse through the offerings.

The walls were lined from floor to ceiling with sagging shelves full of books, and I could see at a glance that, though the stock contained everything from academic texts to the usual cla.s.sics, its primary focus was on matters philosophical and occult; everywhere I turned there were books such as Agrippa's De Occulta Philosophia, the ancient notes of Anaxagoras of Clazomenae detailing his conclusions that the Earth was spherical, The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, the Hindu Rig Veda, the poems of Ovid, the plays of Aeschylus, Lucan's De Bello Civilia... my heart beat with tremendous antic.i.p.ation. What treasures would I find here?

It was only as I was admiring an ancient copy of the Popol Vuh which sat under a gla.s.s case in the center of a great table that I became aware that I was no longer alone. How I knew this I could not then say, though what was soon to follow would make the reason clear.

I turned and saw the proprietor.

Though he appeared to be only a few inches taller than I, there was, nonetheless, a sense of power and great, ma.s.sive presence about him. His fierce, dark eyes stared out atme from underneath thick eyebrows that met over his knife of a nose. His heavy white moustache drooped down past the corners of his mouth, drawing my attention at once to his red and seemingly swollen lips, which were flagrant and somehow femininely seductive against the glimmer of his face. Though he was obviously an older gentleman, he carried himself with the grace and power of a man fifteen years my junior.

"Mr. Fort," he said, in a heavily accented, full, rich ba.s.so voice the New York Opera would have swooned to have sing upon its stage, "I am so very pleased you were able to accept the invitation." He offered his hand. "It is a great honor to meet a gentleman such as yourself, who shares my interest is matters of data that Science has excluded."

I shook his hand. His grip was steel. I winced from the great pressure and the pain it sent shooting up my arm.

"I beg your pardon," he said, releasing my hand. "I sometimes forget that, in my enthusiasm, my handshake can be a bit..."

"Formidable?" I said, ma.s.saging my fingers.

His smile was slow in appearing but total in its chilling effectiveness. "What a kind way to put it." He turned and started toward a door near the back of the shop. "If you'll be kind enough to follow me, sir."

I did, though somewhat reluctantly. After all, what did I know of this fellow or his intent? True, in my studies I had come across many strange tales told by sometimes stranger individuals, but (at this point in my life, at least) I rarely had to meet any of these people face to face. Still, I must admit, my curiosity was stronger than either my anxiety or trepidation.

I need speak in a bit more detail of the cryptic note which was delivered to my room as I was readying myself for the day's research at the museum. It arrived in a heavy envelope which contained-aside from the letter itself-several newspaper clippings, which I will summarize momentarily. It read as follows: "My Dear Mr. Fort: I know that you will read the enclosed with great interest, but also with your Intellectual's eye. Come to the address written below before the noon hour and I will give you irrefutable proof that these incidents are, indeed, based on fact and not myth. I urge you to keep this appointment."

Below the body of the writing were these words: Denn die Todten reiten schnell ("For the dead travel fast," a line from Burger's "Lenore").

The letter was signed only: A.S.

Having read with great delight Mr. Jules Verne's famous novel, I found myself smiling at the thought that I might encounter the fict.i.tious Arne Saknussemm at the end of my own "journey."

The clippings came from newspapers such as Lloyd's Sunday News, the Brooklyn Eagle, Ottawa Free Press, and the Yorks.h.i.+re Evening Argus. All of them detailed stories of various bodies which were discovered to have died from ma.s.sive blood loss- often thebodies were drained totally of their blood supply. All of the deaths had another fact in common: each victim, though at first thought to have been the target of a robbery-related a.s.sault, was found to have "tiny puncture marks" near or on a major artery. Sometimes there were more than one pair of these marks (a body found in Chicago had at least thirty such puncture marks on her legs) but, in each case, saliva was found within these punctures, leading, naturally, to the conclusion that each of these victims had been killed by "mentally disturbed" individuals who suffered "the delusion of vampirism."

My hope is by now you will understand why my curiosity overpowered any anxiety I might have been experiencing.

The proprietor opened the door and led me down a long stone stairway which emptied out into a surprisingly cavernous bas.e.m.e.nt. Lighting a kerosene lantern, he proceeded to lead me down a slope in the floor to an area which I can only describe as being a sort-of hidden theatre; there were a few rows of seats (which smelled of old fire) and a raised stage, more than a few of whose boards still bore the black marks of a fire.

As I sat where the proprietor directed me, I noticed the insignia of the Lyceum Theatre on the back of the seat in front of me, and realized at once that these seats-as well as portions of the stage before me-had been scavenged from the great fire which destroyed the Lyceum in 1830. (That they might have been scavenged from the wreckage of the 1803 fire did not, at the time, seem a possibility to me.) The proprietor wandered away into the darkness, the light from the lantern growing smaller and more dim as he made his way through a curtain off to the side. I heard him moving around backstage, then a few squeaking sounds, a cough, and then the curtain fronting the stage rose slowly to reveal a series of chairs and small podiums, each on different levels, arranged in a manner befitting a "dramatic reading"-what is often called "Reader's Theatre" in America.

There was, however, only one person on the stage as the lights came up, and he was neither standing nor seated behind one of the podiums.

He was in a wheelchair, downstage center, illuminated by a spotlight from above. His face was half in shadow, even after he raised his head to look out at his "audience."

Newspaper clippings of blood-drained victims.

The Lyceum Theatre.

A.S.

I knew even before he spoke in his watered-down but still musical Irish brogue that I was in the presence of none other than Abraham-better known as "Bram"-Stoker.

"Mr. Fort," he said, barely above a whisper. "Thank you for coming. Have you paper and pen?"

"I do," I called from the darkness of the theatre, then produced said items from my jacket pocket. (Fortunately the light from the stage bled forward enough that I could seeto make notes.) "Excellent," said Mr. Stoker, then wiped at his mouth with a dark-stained handkerchief he clutched in one shaking, palsied hand.

I knew-as did many of his admirers-that Stoker had been in seclusion for the last few years. Ill health was rumored-a rumor which I saw now to be sadly true (though whether or not he was suffering from the final stages of untreated syphilis I had not the medical knowledge to ascertain). I can tell you that the rumored feeblemindedness was true, for several times during his narrative did Mr. Stoker begin muttering gibberish for minutes on end, until he would fall into something like a brief trance from which he would emerge lucid and articulate.

"I am a great admirer of your writings," he said from his place on the stage. "You must a.s.semble your articles into a book for publication one day."

"That is my intent," I replied, suddenly aware of the single bead of perspiration that was snaking down my spine.

"May I suggest, then," said Stoker, "that you call your work The Book of the d.a.m.ned?"

"Why?"

He laughed. It was not a pleasant sound. "Because all so-called 'unnatural phenomena'

comes from d.a.m.ned places, sir. Speak of d.a.m.ned places and you speak of places where powerful emotional forces have been penned up. Have you ever been within the walls of a prison, Mr. Fort? Where the ma.s.sed feelings of hatred, deprivation, claustrophobia, and brutalization have seeped into the very stones? One can feel it. The emotions resonate.

They seethe, trapped, waiting for release, waiting to be given form, Mr. Fort. What you might call an 'unconscious confluence' were you to label it in one of your articles.

"You now sit in the remnants of one such 'd.a.m.ned place,' sir: the charred remains of the Lyceum Theatre. These stage boards, the curtain above me, the very seats which surround you and the one in which you now sit, were discovered by myself in a bas.e.m.e.nt storage area of the Lyceum during my time there as manager-along, of course, with Sir Henry Irving, my own personal vampire."

He spoke living's name with a level of disgust that was absolutely chilling to hear. Even though Stoker attempted to hide his true feelings about Irving in his biography of the famous actor, it was now well known that, during the twenty-seven years Stoker worked as stage manager at the Lyceum, Irving treated him little better than a slave, paying him so very little that, upon Irving's death, Stoker was forced to borrow money from friends and relatives in order to survive; when he was no longer able to borrow money, he was forced to write such drivel as his latest (and, I suspicioned, what would be his last) novel, The Lair of the White Worm.

I could not help but share the sorrow of this broken man on the stage before me; there had been a potential for true literary greatness there, once, but no more... and the late Sir Henry Irving was as much to blame for that as were Stoker's so-called "personalindulgences."

"Remember as you listen, Mr. Fort: emotions resonate. They seethe, trapped, waiting for release, waiting to be given form."

I wrote down his words, though they seemed more the ramblings of a mind surrendering to the body's sicknesses.

Stoker coughed into his handkerchief once again. Even from my place in the "audience,"

I could see that he was coughing up blood. His handkerchief was useless to him now. I took my own, unused handkerchief from my pocket and rose to approach the stage and give it to him, but was stopped by the appearance of a great, dark wolf by Stoker's side.

It wandered on from stage left and seated itself next to his wheelchair. Even sitting on its haunches, it was nearly as tall as he. I had never seen such a magnificent and terrifying creature in all my life. It looked upon me with pitiless eyes that, in the light of the stage, glowed a deep, frightening crimson.

I returned the handkerchief to my pocket and took my seat once again.

"You'll come to no harm, Mr. Fort," said Stoker, reaching out to rub the fur at the nape of the great wolfs neck. The beast growled contentedly. I thought of a line from Stoker's most famous novel, about the Children of the Night, and what sweet music they made.

What follows is my transcription of Stoker's narrative. I have taken the liberty of removing the sometimes-prolonged pauses he took between words, as well as excising those instances where his crumbling mind led him down rambling paths of incomprehensibility.

I ask only that you remember this was a man who could have achieved true literary greatness, but who is now only remembered as the author of "that dreadful vampire book."

Even now, I still sorrow at the thought of What Might Have Been, had Fate been kinder to him.

The Narrative of Abraham (Bram) Stoker, as told to Charles Fort.

Little Russell Street, London, 1912.

I was born in Dublin in 1847, one of seven children. Though I was a very sickly child, I was nonetheless my mother's favorite. During those years I spent in my sickbed, my mother tended to me with great and loving care. Having fostered a lifelong fascination with stories of the macabre, she entertained me with countless Irish ghost stories-the worst kind there is, I should add. As a child I was lulled to sleep each night with tales of banshees, demons, ghouls, and horrific accounts of the cholera outbreak of 1832.

My mother was a remarkable woman-strong-minded, ambitious, proud, a writer-she hoped that I, too, might one day become a person of letters-a visitor to workhouses for wayward and indigent girls, and above all, she was a proponent of women's rights-much like her close friend, the mother of Oscar Wilde. I sincerely believe that, were it not for her kind ministrations on my behalf, I might have surrendered to the illnesses that plaguedmy early years. But she gave me strength and a sense of self-worth, and for that alone I shall always cherish her memory.

When I became of college age and was accepted at Trinity on an athletic scholars.h.i.+p-you would not know it to look at this pathetic body now, but there was a time when I was a champion. I was a record breaker, in my day... and, I must admit, I gained a reputation among the members of my cla.s.s for a somewhat exaggerated masculinity-some would even call it polemical. But I a.s.sure you that I was never less than chivalric toward the ladies with whom I kept company. I often wonder now if my way with the ladies back then is not the reason I am being punished in my final days with a wife so distant and frigid I might as well be wed to a corpse.

In 1871 I graduated with honours in science-Pure Mathematics, which enabled me to accept a civil service position at Dublin Castle. That same year I began to review theatrical positions in Dublin, and in 1876 I was privileged to review Sir Henry Irving's magnificent performance in Hamlet. Shortly thereafter, we became great friends-or so I thought.

The great actor is a strange beast, indeed, Mr. Fort, for his ego is such that it requires-nay, demands-constant feeding. Sir Henry was much like a child in that way. He took more of my friends.h.i.+p than he ever did return, but I was simply too awestruck * by the man's genius to take notice of this.

I became his stage manager when he took over management of the Lyceum Theatre.

That same year, I began to publish my writings-The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland. It was released to unanimous indifference from critics and the public alike. Sir Henry urged me to explore more "universal" themes in my work, much as Shakespeare and Milton and Marlowe did in theirs. The man was simply hoping that his lapdog a.s.sistant would, perhaps, compose a play in which he might once again take center stage and be the focus of attention... but I digress. I served Sir Henry well and loyally over the years. His opinion of my writing remained, as always, dismissive... until I wrote Dracula. On this, he at last expressed an opinion. "It is absolute, pandering rubbish," he said. Still, in "reward" for my many years of service and friends.h.i.+p to him, he agreed to allow me to stage a dramatic reading of the novel before its release from the publisher. The novel was, as I'm sure you know, quite dense, and so several long, sleepless editing sessions were required in order to make the work an acceptable length for theatrical presentation. During this period in the latter part of 1896, I insisted on being able to rehea.r.s.e with a cast so as to determine the success of my editing process. Sir Henry would not allow his personal company of actors to be "inconvenienced"-his word-with a "work in progress," and so left it up to me to a.s.semble a cast of unknowns with whom to rehea.r.s.e the piece. It took me several weeks, but at last I had my cast-with the exception of an acceptable actor to portray Abraham Van Helsing. But I shall come to that.

You need to understand that, during this period of intense concentration, the character of Count Dracula became even more alive to me than he was during the years of research it took to create him and write the novel. He was so alive to me, in fact, that I often found myself talking with him as I would stagger home nights after hours of emotionally draining rehearsal. "My dear Count," I would say, "have I lost all perspective where you are concerned?" I did this to relieve my anxiety: if the novel were not reducedto an acceptable three-hour theatrical entertainment, Sir Henry made it quite clear to me that he would not permit me to present the work to the public... not in his precious theatre. And so the Count became my constant companion, sir, my father-confessor, my only true friend.

I began to realize that the only way for the work to be made right was to necessarily make the cast believe in the Count as fiercely as did I. I spoke to them one night of my imaginary conversations with the Count, and though they were at first amused, they came to understand that my dedication to the project was unflappable. I have to say, they were far more accommodating to me than Sir Henry's personal players would ever be with him; being unknowns, there were no egos to soothe or feed. Until the last rehearsal, it was the purest, most enjoyable theatrical experience of my life.

Soon, all of the cast were holding conversations with the Count. I recall encountering the actress who portrayed Mina Murray one night during a break in the rehearsal: I found her offstage left, sitting with her book, eyes closed, whispering, "Why does someone as remarkable as you, dear Count, have to be so very, very wicked?" It moved me, sir, to hear that-and not only from her, but from all of the cast members. Oh, the stories I could tell you of their conversations with the Count. They came to believe in his existence as much as I.

Remember: emotions resonate. They seethe, trapped, waiting for release, waiting to be given form.

The deadline for my final draft of the performance text was rapidly approaching, and still I had not found an actor who I felt would adequately convey the essence of Van Helsing. It may seem a somewhat selfish point, but the other actors had so refined their vocal interpretations of my characters, had given them such life, that to bring in an actor who would be less than their equal would have been an insult to them.

Then one evening, after having ended rehearsal early, I found myself in this area of Little Russell Street, and came upon this very bookshop. As I wandered among its many volumes, the proprietor took me aside and asked, "Are you Mr. Bram Stoker, author of After Sunset?" "I am," I replied, seeing with some delight that he held a well-read copy of that very short story collection in his hands. "I am a great admirer of your stories," he said, offering the book to me, "and I would be honored if you would inscribe my copy."

I took the book from him with thanks, and proceeded to uncap the pen he offered, but somehow I managed to cut the tip of my thumb in the process. I bled a little upon the first page- not enough to ruin it, but enough that it could not be easily or neatly wiped away.

"Please do not worry yourself," said the proprietor to me as I signed my name to the t.i.tle.

"It can be taken care of."

After I returned the volume to him, he took it behind the counter and knelt down behind a shelf of books. A few moments later he emerged and showed me-much to my surprise-that the blood had been successfully removed from the t.i.tle paper. I noticed-but did not think much of-his licking his lips several times after rising from behind the counter. "I must say, Mr. Stoker, that I am greatly antic.i.p.ating the release ofyour new novel." "You may be one of the few persons in England who is," I replied, and we shared a jovial laugh at my remark.