For answer he crossed himself, pointed to the spot we had left, and drew his carriage in the direction of the other road, indicating a cross, and said, first in German, then in English : "Buried him—liim what killed themselves."

I remembered the old custom of burying suicides at crossroads : "Ah ! I see, a suicide. How interesting 1" But for the life of me I could not make out why the horses were frightened.

Whilst we were talking, we heard a sort of sound between a yelp and a bark. It was far away ; but the horses got very restless, and it took Johann all his time to quiet them. He was pale, and said : "It sounds like a wolf—but yet there are no wolves here now."

"No ?" I said, questioning him ; "isn't it long since the wolves were so near the city ?"

"Long, long," he answered, "in the spring and summer; but with the snow the wolves have been here not so long."

Whilst he was petting the horses and trying to quiet them,

(,G BRAM STOKER

dark clouds drifted rapidly across the sky. The sunshine passed away, and a breath of cold wind seemed to drift past us. It was only a breath, however, and more in the nature of a warning than a fact, for the sun came out brightly again. Johann looked under his lifted hand at the horizon and said :

"The storm of snow, he comes before long time." Then he looked at his watch again, and, straightway, holding his reins firmly—for the horses were still pawing the ground restlessly, and shaking their heads—he climbed to his box as though the time had come for proceeding on our journey.

I felt a little obstinate, and did not at once get into the carriage.

"Tell me," I said, "about this place where the road leads." And I pointed down.

Again he crossed himself and mumbled a prayer, before he answered : "It is unholy."

"What is unholy ?" I enquired.

"The viUage."

"Then there is a village ?"

"No, no. No one lives there hundreds of years."

My curiosity was piqued : "But you said there was a village."

"There was."

"Where is it now ?"

Whereupon he burst out into a long story in German and English, so mixed up that I could not quite understand exactly what he said, but roughly I gathered that long ago, hundreds of years, men had died there and been buried in their graves ; and sounds were heard under the clay, and when the graves were opened, men and women were found rosy with life, and their mouths red with blood. And so, in haste to save their lives (ay, and their souls !—and here he crossed himself), those who were left fled away to other places, where the living lived, and the dead were dead and not—not something. He was evidently afraid to speak the last words. As he proceeded with his narration, he grew more and more excited. It seemed as if his imagination had got hold of him, and he ended in a perfect paroxysm of fear—white-faced, perspiring, trembling and looking round him, as if expecting that some dreadful presence would manifest itself there in the bright sunshine on the open plain. Finally, in an agony of desperation, he cried :

DRACULA'S GUEST 67

"Waipurgis nacht I" and pointed to the carriage for me to get in. All my English blood rose at this, and, standing back, I said :

"You are afraid, Johann—you are afraid. Go home ; I shall return alone ; the walk will do me good." The carriage door was open, I took from the seat my oak walking-stick— which I always carry on my holiday excursions—and closed the door, pointing back to Munich, and said, "Go home, Johann—^Waipurgis nacht doesn't concern Englishmen."

The horses were now more restive than ever, and Johann was trying to hold them in, while excitedly imploring me not to do anything so foolish. I pitied the poor fellow, he was so deeply in earnest; but all the same I could not help laughing. His English was qmte gone now. In his anxiety he had forgotten that his only means of making me understand was to talk my language, so he jabbered away in his native German. It began to be a little tedious. After giving the direction, "Home !" I turned to go down the cross-road into the valley.

With a despairing gesture, Johann turned his horses towards Munich. I leaned on my stick and looked after him. He went slowly along the road for a while : then there came over the crest of the hill a man tall and thin. I could see so much in the distance. When he drew near the horses, they began to jump and kick about, then to scream with terror. Johann could not hold them in ; they bolted down the road, running away madly. I watched them out of sight, then looked for the stranger, but I found that he, too, was gone.

With a Hght heart I turned down the side road through the deepening valley to which Johann had objected. There was not the slightest reason, that I could see, for his objection ; and I dare say I tramped for a couple of hours without thinking of time or distance, and certainly without seeing a person or a house. So far as the place was concerned, it was desolation itself. But I did not notice this particularly till, on turning a bend in the road, I came upon a scattered fringe of wood ; then I recognized that I had been impressed unconsciously by the desolation of the region through which I had passed.

I sat down to rest myself, and began to look around. It struck me that it was considerably colder than it had been at the commencement of my walk—a sort of sighing sound

68 BRAM STOKER

seemed to be around me, with, now and then, high overhead, a sort of muffled roar.