The Classified Dossier: Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula(27)
“I drowned,” Mina said weakly. “Days ago. But somehow, I’m still here. How am I still here, Vlad?”
“I don’t know,” Dracula said. He spoke stiffly, even now gathering that mantle of aristocratic formality around him again, albeit slowly. “When I came into the house, I could not feel you, but you were down here just the same. I had not thought such a thing possible. I don’t understand, but I thank all powers in the world that you are returned to me.”
“It seems,” Holmes murmured, “that vampires cannot drown, after all. You have greatly misunderstood the effect of water on your own kind, Count Dracula.”
“But how?” Dracula said. Mina seemed to be recovering some of her strength and struggled to get up. Dracula solicitously assisted her, patiently helping her to a sitting position. He did not relinquish his grip even when she was upright, but remained with his hand supporting her.
“It feels,” Mina said, “very much like death.”
“Evidence suggests,” Holmes said, “that drowning brings on a fit, not unlike a coma would do in a normal person. What do you remember, Mrs…” He seemed at a sudden loss, smiling ruefully. “I do not know your proper title, madam. Countess?”
“Just Mina,” she said with a rueful smile of her own. “It’s all I’ve ever needed. Mr…?” She looked at us curiously.
Holmes bowed deeply. “I am Sherlock Holmes, madam, and very much at your disposal. This is my esteemed colleague, Dr Watson.”
Somewhat shamefully remembering my profession in the face of all the surprising events of the past few minutes, I made my way to Mina Dracula’s side. For a moment, it looked as if Count Dracula might bar my way, but he did not. Mina’s pulse was terrifyingly slow, even slower than my own had been last I tested it, and her skin was cold. Far colder than mine. I still had much data to gather before I had a full understanding of what constituted normal in a vampire, but my guess was that Mina was coming out of some kind of coma, just as Holmes surmised.
“Madam,” Holmes said. “What do you remember?”
Mina was clearly made of stern stuff. She showed no sign of hysterics, merely a bone-deep weariness. But she furrowed her brow, her dark eyes pondering, as she considered my friend’s question fully. “Very little. My abduction, of course, and when they put me in this horrible casket. Then they poured water in, water from the sea; I could taste the salt.” She shuddered. “I don’t think I shall ever enjoy being on a boat again, or even take a bath without remembering that. It was very much like drowning is all I can tell you. That, and the fact that I would do almost anything to avoid going through it again. I died. Or at least I thought I did.” She looked at the Count. “I never thought I’d see you again.” She touched the Count’s hand and he gripped hers. Her tone was not overwrought, but a deep well of sadness lay behind it.
“If Van Helsing is behind this, we shall clearly have to revise our supposition that it is an elder vampire at work here, for he cannot have been a vampire long if he was fully human when last you saw him.”
“Van Helsing?” Mina said. “He is involved in this?”
“We don’t know,” Dracula said.
“Whoever our opponent is,” Holmes said, and there was a note of admonition in his voice as he caught Dracula’s eye, “he clearly has a greater understanding of vampirism and the transformation than we do, despite your centuries of existence. Some experimentation may be required on our part.”
“But not,” Mina said with a rueful smile, “on me. That is another death I will avoid, thank you, gentlemen.” Her voice was still filled with exhaustion, but there was a lightness to it. I found myself in deep admiration for one who could make light of such an ordeal.
“Never again,” Count Dracula agreed. “On my life, I swear it.” This caused Mina’s smile to twitch, as if she again saw humour in the situation that everyone else had missed.
Dracula turned and looked at Holmes, but it seemed a difficult thing, as if tearing his gaze from Mina cost him something.
“Mr Holmes, forgive me,” he said simply. “When I thought I had lost her…” He shook his head, then lifted it, his pride returning to him, though he still continued to support Mina. “I meant what I said. I am a man of my word. Now that Mina is returned to me, you shall have all my powers at your disposal to protect London. No Englander shall ever have cause to fear the name Dracula.”
I could not help but find myself moved by this heartfelt statement, but Holmes seemed barely to have heard. He had moved to examine one of the crates that Mina’s imprisoning coffin had rested on. There were far more than it required to hold the coffin but quite a few had been damaged during the deluge of water and Holmes pried one of these partway open.
“We shall have great need of your assistance, I think, Count,” said Holmes, for he had indeed heard Dracula’s words. “See here.”
He yanked one of the lids off the rest of the way, revealing the contents. The crates were like coffins themselves, filled halfway with dirt.
The implications struck home at once. “Holmes,” I said, “the Mariner Priest is indeed making more vampires here!”
“Many more vampires,” Holmes said. “If the rest of these hold the same evidence.” He reached in and pulled from the dirt a small object. He held it up in the light of his pocket lantern. A button, blue as a robin’s egg. “Someone has been interred in here. There can be no doubt. There is evidence of a number of barrels having been here before, too. You can still see their impressions in the dirt.”