ed lips, and the patient quickly revived.

It seemed, however, that his poor injured brain had been working in
the interval, for when he was quite conscious, he looked at me
piercingly with an agonized confusion which I shall never forget, and
said, "I must not deceive myself. It was no dream, but all a grim
reality." Then his eyes roved round the room. As they caught sight
of the two figures sitting patiently on the edge of the bed he went
on, "If I were not sure already, I would know from them."

For an instant his eyes closed, not with pain or sleep but
voluntarily, as though he were bringing all his faculties to bear.
When he opened them he said, hurriedly, and with more energy than he
had yet displayed, "Quick, Doctor, quick, I am dying! I feel that I
have but a few minutes, and then I must go back to death, or worse!
Wet my lips with brandy again. I have something that I must say
before I die. Or before my poor crushed brain dies anyhow. Thank
you! It was that night after you left me, when I implored you to let
me go away. I couldn't speak then, for I felt my tongue was tied.
But I was as sane then, except in that way, as I am now. I was in an
agony of despair for a long time after you left me, it seemed hours.
Then there came a sudden peace to me. My brain seemed to become cool
again, and I realized where I was. I heard the dogs bark behind our
house, but not where He was!"

As he spoke, Van Helsing's eyes never blinked, but his hand came out
and met mine and gripped it hard. He did not, however, betray
himself. He nodded slightly and said, "Go on," in a low voice.

Renfield proceeded. "He came up to the window in the mist, as I had
seen him often before, but he was solid then, not a ghost, and his
eyes were fierce like a man's when angry. He was laughing with his
red mouth, the sharp white teeth glinted in the moonlight when he
turned to look back over the belt of trees, to where the dogs were
barking. I wouldn't ask him to come in at first, though I knew he
wanted to, just as he had wanted all along. Then he began promising
me things, not in words but by doing them."

He was interrupted by a word from the Professor, "How?"

"By making them happen. Just as he used to send in the flies when the
sun was shining. Great big fat ones with steel and sapphire on their
wings. And big moths, in the night, with skull and cross-bones on
their backs."

Van Helsing nodded to him as he whispered t