my people to have horses and carriages where they will
be most convenient."

"Look here, old fellow," said Morris, "it is a capital idea to have
all ready in case we want to go horse backing, but don't you think
that one of your snappy carriages with its heraldic adornments in a
byway of Walworth or Mile End would attract too much attention for our
purpose? It seems to me that we ought to take cabs when we go south
or east. And even leave them somewhere near the neighbourhood we are
going to."

"Friend Quincey is right!" said the Professor. "His head is what you
call in plane with the horizon. It is a difficult thing that we go to
do, and we do not want no peoples to watch us if so it may."

Mina took a growing interest in everything and I was rejoiced to see
that the exigency of affairs was helping her to forget for a time the
terrible experience of the night. She was very, very pale, almost
ghastly, and so thin that her lips were drawn away, showing her teeth
in somewhat of prominence. I did not mention this last, lest it
should give her needless pain, but it made my blood run cold in my
veins to think of what had occurred with poor Lucy when the Count had
sucked her blood. As yet there was no sign of the teeth growing
sharper, but the time as yet was short, and there was time for fear.

When we came to the discussion of the sequence of our efforts and of
the disposition of our forces, there were new sources of doubt. It
was finally agreed that before starting for Piccadilly we should
destroy the Count's lair close at hand. In case he should find it out
too soon, we should thus be still ahead of him in our work of
destruction. And his presence in his purely material shape, and at
his weakest, might give us some new clue.

As to the disposal of forces, it was suggested by the Professor that,
after our visit to Carfax, we should all enter the house in
Piccadilly. That the two doctors and I should remain there, whilst
Lord Godalming and Quincey found the lairs at Walworth and Mile End
and destroyed them. It was possible, if not likely, the Professor
urged, that the Count might appear in Piccadilly during the day, and
that if so we might be able to cope with him then and there. At any
rate, we might be able to follow him in force. To this plan I
strenuously objected, and so far as my going was concerned, for I said
that I intended to stay and protect Mina. I thought that my mind was
made up on the su