Lucy grew pale and weak. Dr. John Seward, a young psychiatrist, called his old teacher, Professor Abraham Van Helsing from Amsterdam. Van Helsing looked at Lucy’s throat and whispered, “This is no ordinary illness. The wounds are like pinpricks. And she is losing blood, but there is no bleeding.” Van Helsing placed garlic flowers around Lucy’s room and wore a crucifix. “These will keep the evil away,” he said. But Lucy’s mother, not understanding, removed the garlic. That night, a bat flew against the window. The next morning, Lucy was deathly pale. Her gums had receded, and her teeth looked longer.
Jonathan took a great Bowie knife and plunged it into Dracula’s throat. At the same time, Quincey Morris drove a stake through his heart. The Count’s body crumbled into dust before their eyes. A smile of peace crossed his hideous face—then nothing.
“He will control her,” Van Helsing warned. “But that bond is also a chain. We can track him through her hypnosis.”
“My revenge has only just begun.” This adaptation is in the public domain. You may freely copy, distribute, and print this text for personal or educational use.
But Jonathan was a man of business, not of superstition. As night fell, a black coach drawn by four horses arrived. The driver’s face was hidden in shadow. They raced through the Borgo Pass, and wolves howled on every side. At last, the great castle loomed before him—a crumbling fortress of stone and decay. Count Dracula greeted him at the door. He was a tall, pale man dressed in black. His breath smelled of blood, and his hands were cold as ice. “Welcome,” he said in a low, polite voice. “Enter freely and of your own will.”