Dracula: Renfield's Last Words

Renfield was badly hurt, and Van Helsing operated at once, hoping he would wake long enough to speak.Arthur and Quincey came in and waited silently by the bed.At last Renfield opened his eyes and whispered, “I am dying, and I must tell you everything.”

He told them that the Count had come to his window in the mist and promised him thousands of rats, all full of life.“Come in, Lord and Master!” Renfield had said, and he had opened the window and let the Count inside.But when Renfield saw how pale Mina had become, he understood that the Count was taking her life.

That night he tried to fight the Count, but the Count’s burning eyes made him weak, and he was thrown to the floor.The men ran upstairs with their crosses and broke open the Harkers’ door.Jonathan lay on the bed in a deep, unnatural sleep, and the Count was holding Mina tightly beside him.

When the Count saw the crosses, he stepped back, and then he became a faint mist and slipped away under the door.There was blood on Mina’s lips and on her white nightdress, and she gave a terrible scream.“Unclean, unclean!” she cried, pulling away from her husband.

Jonathan held her close and said that nothing would ever come between them.Then Mina told them the worst: the Count had drunk her blood, and then he had forced her to drink some of his, so that she would come whenever he called.Downstairs, poor Renfield had died, and in the study the Count had thrown all their papers into the fire, though luckily a copy was locked in the safe.