A FORTNIGHT HAD PASSED SINCE VAN HELSING LAST visited Harker and his wife, during which time he’d also not heard from Dr. Seward. Thomas Harker was now recovering well and was starting to regain his memory. He no longer doubted that Baron Székely, whom Wilma had met, was none other than Count Dracula himself.
One evening Van Helsing, Barrington, Tellet and Seward’s American friend, Morris, came to the couple’s home.347
Van Helsing spoke to them, explaining that it was their mission to deliberate and find a way to utterly destroy the public enemy they all knew. It had become clear that a conspiracy had been formed to thwart all that is good in society, and that there was but one man responsible for this: Count Dracula. This Count was—as folklore imagined certain creatures to be—half-man and half-animal, and had probably lived much longer than mortal men were meant to.348 Van Helsing explained that such beings were endowed with powers and qualities normal people do not know, but were denied other faculties common to ordinary humans. According to old texts: Such beings could not cross running water, their power dwindled in daylight, and although they could move about among humans, every now and then they needed to rest in the hallowed earth in which they had once been buried.
The Count had left behind his ancestral home in the Carpathians to increase the evil among men. It would have been clear to him that the obstacles ahead would be many, but he would have prepared for them. Among other things, he would have brought with him boxes filled with consecrated soil; in one of them he would have rested during the journey. Some of the boxes would likely also contain immense riches, as it would cost millions to effectuate the cunning schemes the Count had in mind.
Finally they had gathered to try and stop the Count and his evil band.
They agreed that the young couple would take up lodging349 near Carfax to make it easier to keep an eye on what was happening there.