all advanced too; the four of us ranged in a line before the door of the
tomb. Van Helsing raised his lantern and drew the slide; by the
concentrated light that fell on Lucy s face we could see that the lips
were crimson with fresh blood, and that the stream had trickled over her
chin and stained the purity of her lawn death-robe.
We shuddered with horror. I could see by the tremulous light that even
Van Helsing s iron nerve had failed. Arthur was next to me, and if I had
not seized his arm and held him up, he would have fallen.
When Lucy--I call the thing that was before us Lucy because it bore her
shape--saw us she drew back with an angry snarl, such as a cat gives
when taken unawares; then her eyes ranged over us. Lucy s eyes in form
and colour; but Lucy s eyes unclean and full of hell-fire, instead of
the pure, gentle orbs we knew. At that moment the remnant of my love
passed into hate and loathing; had she then to be killed, I could have
done it with savage delight. As she looked, her eyes blazed with unholy
light, and the face became wreathed with a voluptuous smile. Oh, God,
how it made me shudder to see it! With a careless motion, she flung to
the ground, callous as a devil, the child that up to now she had
clutched strenuously to her breast, growling over it as a dog growls
over a bone. The child gave a sharp cry, and lay there moaning. There
was a cold-bloodedness in the act which wrung a groan from Arthur; when
she advanced to him with outstretched arms and a wanton smile he fell
back and hid his face in his hands.
She still advanced, however, and with a languorous, voluptuous grace,
said:--
Come to me, Arthur. Leave these others and come to me. My arms are
hungry for you. Come, and we can rest together. Come, my husband, come!
There was something diabolically sweet in her tones--something of the
tingling of glass when struck--which rang through the brains even of us
who heard the words addressed to another. As for Arthur, he seemed under
a spell; moving his hands from his face, he opened wide his arms. She
was leaping for them, when Van Helsing sprang forward and held between
them his little golden crucifix. She recoiled from it, and, with a
suddenly distorted face, full of rage, dashed past him as if to enter
the tomb.
216