Gondwana Ranch

Gondwana, Texas 75042

U.S.A.

August 18, 1999

Dearest Mina,

Soon we’ll be living in a new century. Perhaps there we shall discover ill defined states of mind, at present unknown. You, who have returned from the dead, will be better able to face them than I.

For my own part, I am more prepared than I was to acknowledge that many people spend periods of their lives in more unusual mental states—not neurotic or psychotic—than science is at present inclined to allow. I also know those nameless psychic states valued by many rebels of society. They are not for me. In the account that follows—in which we both feature—there’s terror, horror, wonder, and something that has no name. A kind of nostalgia for what has never been experienced.

Did all this happen? Was I mad? Did you pass through those dreadful gates set at the end of life? I still see, with shut eyes but acute mental vision, those unhallowed things that appeared. And I believe that I would rather be mad than that they should run loose on the world.

Have patience and hope. We still have a long way to go together, dearest.

Your loving Joe

NOW YORK, May 24—A sale of books was held in the auction rooms of Christie, Manson & Woods, Park Avenue, New York, on May 23, 1996.

A first edition of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula was sold for $6,900 to an anonymous buyer. The volume was published in Cr. 8vo. by Constable & Co. of Westminister, in May 1897, bound in yellow boards blocked in red. This copy was in remarkably fine condition.

On the flyleaf was written, in faded Stephens ink:

To Joseph Bodenland,

Who gave the mammals their big chance—

And me a title—

Affectionately,

This perplexing message was dated Chelsea, May 1897, and signed with a flourish by the author, Bram Stoker.