NOTE
Seven years ago we all went through the flames; and the happiness ofsome of us since then is, we think, well worth the pain we endured. Itis an added joy to Mina and to me that our boy's birthday is the sameday as that on which Quincey Morris died. His mother holds, I know, thesecret belief that some of our brave friend's spirit has passed intohim. His bundle of names links all our little band of men together; butwe call him Quincey.
In the summer of this year we made a journey to Transylvania, and wentover the old ground which was, and is, to us so full of vivid andterrible memories. It was almost impossible to believe that the thingswhich we had seen with our own eyes and heard with our own ears wereliving truths. Every trace of all that had been was blotted out. Thecastle stood as before, reared high above a waste of desolation.
When we got home we were talking of the old time--which we could alllook back on without despair, for Godalming and Seward are both happilymarried. I took the papers from the safe where they had been ever sinceour return so long ago. We were struck with the fact, that in all themass of material of which the record is composed, there is hardly oneauthentic document; nothing but a mass of typewriting, except the laternote-books of Mina and Seward and myself, and Van Helsing's memorandum.We could hardly ask any one, even did we wish to, to accept these asproofs of so wild a story. Van Helsing summed it all up as he said, withour boy on his knee:--
We want no proofs; we ask none to believe us! This boy will some dayknow what a brave and gallant woman his mother is. Already he knows hersweetness and loving care; later on he will understand how some men soloved her, that they did dare much for her sake.
JONATHAN HARKER.
THE END
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Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
in a very simply way=> in a very simple way {pg 68}
The Westminister Gazette, 25 September.=> The Westminster Gazette,25 September. {pg 165}
It have told him=> She must have told him {pg 169}
from md sight=> from my sight {pg}184
Goldaming=> Godalming {pg 226}
I I did not want to hinder him=> I did not want to hinder him {pg 267}
They lay in a sort of or-orderly=> They lay in a sort of orderly {pg279}
Translyvania=> Transylvania {pg 294}
this mrrning from Dardanelles=> this morning from Dardanelles {pg 313}