The Dracula Tape, Fred Saberhagen [the dot read aloud TXT] 📗

beloved. I might have been looking into the dining room of a fine hotel. Waiters wearing breeches of blue silk, white stockings, and buckled shoes were pouring chilled champagne. The light of fine lamps, swaying only gently with the motion of the train, fell upon mahogany paneling and heavy furniture of solid oak.

      And there indeed was Mina, lovelier than ever in a new open gown. Beside her at table sat her husband, gray and changed even as she had said, staring fixedly into space. With the now oddly matched couple dined Drs. Van Helsing and Seward; across the aisle, Lord Godalming and Quincey Morris, both in tweeds that might do well as shooting costumes, made hand gestures that suggested they were discussing the flight paths of game birds, or mayhap of bats, over their veal cordon bleu.

      All seemed to be going according to plan. But judging from the fresh, full condition of the plates, Mina was not likely to be back in her sleeping compartment for some time. Meanwhile I could try to ascertain just which cabin was hers, and this I proceeded to attempt, making my way to the ladies’ sleeping car and peering down as well as I could into its series of windows. Unfortunately these apertures were all so heavily curtained that I could learn nothing; the noise of the train was such that I could hear no sounds from inside the car. At last I came to one window with curtains open enough for me to see that the compartment inside was untenanted at the moment. I moved to slip inside, but found my way suddenly barred — it was the old familiar block against entering a domicile unasked.

      Mumbling imprecations to myself, and wondering if Mina would realize that I needed another invitation to be able to come to her, I crawled on to the end of the train. The last car, as I soon learned, contained a smoking lounge and library, and its end was graced by a small observation platform.

      Anxious to be out of the rush of wind and greasy smoke, I gave this platform only the most cursory look before swinging myself down onto it, and missed seeing the dark form of a man who stood motionless in a corner and gazed out at the scattered lights of farms and hamlets that flew by us in the night. In the surrounding roar of air and iron I could not hear his lungs or heart, and the glowing signal of his cigar became visible only when he turned to face me. I realized that I had been an instant too late in taking my own stance at the rail, as an interested observer of the countryside; yet I looked back at him as insouciantly as possible, daring him, as it were, to believe the evidence of his own eyes concerning my arrival.

      He was a man about thirty-five years of age, of middle height, with a small, well-trimmed beard and brown, liquid, intelligent, and somehow powerful eyes. He removed the large, black cigar from his mouth and stared at me with the frank astonishment of one who could indeed believe his eyes’ report that I had come down from the roof.

      Casually I snapped my collapsible hat back into shape and replaced it on my head. Then I nodded affably to my companion and prepared to engage him in conversation; it was necessary to learn whether my own survival was going to require throwing this unfortunate person from the train, or whether he could be brought around to the belief that he had not really seen what he had seen at all.

      “Bon soir, monsieur,” I offered, and switched to German when his rather hesitant reply came in an accent that betrayed his greater familiarity with that tongue.

      “Good evening,” he answered, and had to stare a moment longer before blinking and offering an apology. “Pray forgive my staring. But — but I was lost in thought here, and it seemed to me that — that you arrived here on the platform … as if from nowhere.” Hesitant though his words were at first, they soon acquired a tone of firm dominance that was evidently more natural for him.

      “Quite understandable,” I murmured. “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Dr. Emile Corday, of the Akademie der Wissenschaften, in Vienna.”

      He was nonplussed again; once more I had blundered. From behind my glasses I scanned the passing scenery, looking out for a haystack into which I could toss him, thus getting an inconvenient observer out of the way for an essential day or two, if not forever. It was beginning to look as if his departure from the train would be required, but I was loath to take his life.

      “The Akademie …?” he muttered. “But I myself … that is, I thought I was fairly well acquainted with all …”

      “Ach, of course I have not been active there for some years. I am at present in the employ of a London firm … no, thank you, no cigar, Herr —?”

      He reached to grasp my hand by way of self-introduction, and opened his mouth to announce his name, but at that moment we plunged into a short tunnel and his words were lost on me.

      After such intensive dousing in engine smoke as the tunnel had afforded us we moved by common consent to re-enter the interior of the train. It was of course the smoking car we entered; I froze momentarily, anticipating immediate and desperate action, when I recognized two of the — exclusively male, of course — inhabitants as Arthur and Quincey, who seemed to have just seated themselves and lit cigars.

      I contrived to sit with my back to them as my new companion and I took seats not far away; he had his own cigar new-lighted and was likely to wish to remain in this car for some minutes. Nor did I wish to leave him until I was sure how much he had seen, or thought he had