To believe in things that you cannot. Let me illustrate. I heard once
of an American who so defined faith: that faculty which enables us to
believe things which we know to be untrue. For one, I follow that man.
He meant that we shall have an open mind, and not let a little bit of
truth check the rush of a big truth, like a small rock does a railway
truck. We get the small truth first. Good! We keep him, and we value
him; but all the same we must not let him think himself all the truth in
the universe.
Then you want me not to let some previous conviction injure the
receptivity of my mind with regard to some strange matter. Do I read
your lesson aright?
Ah, you are my favourite pupil still. It is worth to teach you. Now
that you are willing to understand, you have taken the first step to
understand. You think then that those so small holes in the children s
throats were made by the same that made the hole in Miss Lucy?
I suppose so. He stood up and said solemnly:--
Then you are wrong. Oh, would it were so! but alas! no. It is worse,
far, far worse.
In God s name, Professor Van Helsing, what do you mean? I cried.
He threw himself with a despairing gesture into a chair, and placed his
elbows on the table, covering his face with his hands as he spoke:--
They were made by Miss Lucy!
CHAPTER XV
DR. SEWARD S DIARY--_continued_.
For a while sheer anger mastered me; it was as if he had during her life
struck Lucy on the face. I smote the table hard and rose up as I said to
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