Dracula

wickedness which he may do
shall by the local people be attributed to me.
It makes me rage to think that this can go on, and whilst I am
shut up here, a veritable prisoner, but without that protection of the
law which is even a criminal's right and consolation.
I thought I would watch for the Count's return, and for a long
time sat doggedly at the window. Then I began to notice that there
were some quaint little specks floating in the rays of the
moonlight. They were like the tiniest grains of dust, and they whirled
round and gathered in clusters in a nebulous sort of way. I watched
them with a sense of soothing, and a sort of calm stole over me. I
leaned back in the embrasure in a more comfortable position, so that I
could enjoy more fully the aerial gambolling.
{CH04 ^paragraph 30}
Something made me start up, a low, piteous howling of dogs somewhere
far below in the valley, which was hidden from my sight. Louder it
seemed to ring in my ears, and the floating motes of dust to take
new shapes to the sound as they danced in the moonlight. I felt myself
struggling to awake to some call of my instincts; may, my very soul
was struggling, and my half-remembered sensibilities were striving
to answer the call. I was becoming hypnotised! Quicker and quicker
danced the dust; the moonbeams seemed to quiver as they went by me
into the mass of gloom beyond. More and more they gathered till they
seemed to take dim phantom shapes. And then I started, broad awake and
in full possession of my senses, and ran screaming from the place. The
phantom shapes, which were becoming gradually materialised from the
moonbeams, were those of the three ghostly women to whom I was doomed.
I fled, and felt somewhat safer in my own room, where there was no
moonlight and where the lamp was burning brightly.
When a couple of hours had passed I heard something stirring in
the Count's room, something like a sharp wail quickly suppressed;
and then there was silence, deep, awful silence, which chilled me.
With a beating heart, I tried the door; but I was locked in my prison,
and could do nothing. I sat down and simply cried.
As I sat I heard a sound in the courtyard without- the agonised
cry of a woman. I rushed to the window, and throwing it up, peered out
between the bars. There, indeed, was a woman with dishevelled hair,
holding her hands over her heart as one distressed with running. She
was leaning against a corner of the gateway. When she saw my face at
the window she threw herself forward, and shouted in a voice laden
with menace:-
"Monster, give me my child!"
She threw herself on her knees, and raising up her hands, cried
the same words in tones which wrung my heart. Then she tore her hair
and