Chapter XXVIII
Jonathan Harker's Journal
10 Jan— It's been more than a century since the last time I wrote my journal. Yet this event today is so extraordinary that I feel the urge to take out my dust-covered, moth-eaten dear journal to put it down. Yes, this dear booklet reminds me of the horrible memory, the days when I was imprisoned by the evil Count, by the name of Dracula, whom we together, Dr. Van Helsing, Dr. Seward, Arthur, poor Quincey, dear Mina and I, had destroyed. After my encounter with the Count and his fellow vampires, after our struggle to put these undead to death, I thought nothing would ever sound "extraordinary" to me. Why? I've seen the most unusual, the most mysterious, and the most unbelievable, have I not? Then, what is it now that is so extraordinary? Regrettably, it still has to do with the devilish Count. No, not only devilish. He was the devil himself. He was the horror!
Cutting from Telegraph, 10 Jan 2007
(Pasted in Jonathan Harker's Journal)
From a correspondent.
Brasov.
Romanian officials were embroiled in a battle yesterday over who has the right to buy the country's most popular tourist site, known as Dracula's Castle, after it went on the market late last year.
Bran Castle, briefly home to Prince Vlad Tepes III, known as Vlad the Impaler and the inspiration for Bram Stoker's Count Dracula, was returned to the Habsburg family last year after being seized by the Communists in 1956. Within months, Dominic von Habsburg put the castle up for sale for £40 million. ……
Vlad gained his grisly reputation because of his habit of executing opponents by impaling them on spikes and watching as they slowly bled to death.
Jonathan Harker's Journal
Continued—Dracula's castle, the top tourist attraction? Ignorant people. Were it not for our secret effort, you would all be ruled by the undead wretch. If that being the case, no garlic, nor wooden stakes, would ever save you people from his evil teeth. People's fascination with Dracula is deplorable, not knowing what they are worshipping. Vlad the impaler is nothing compared to Count Dracula, who im-paled with his very own teeth, or fangs! Sharp, evil, merciless fangs. Why? With virtually no blood left in the body, his victims died with pale faces. He was the im-paler, indeed. Fortunately, this ultra-impaler is no more. And the castle that was once so abominated has become a tacky symbol for the "Dracula industry"......
How soon has time! The world has changed! Yet I change not much, only more ghastly I become. Poor I, if only I had been killed as poor brave Quincey! No, it's not possible. By that time we brought the Count to his end, I must have been already undead. It must have happened when I was in the castle, so stealthily so that it remained unknown to me until all my beloved had gone. One day I felt I could no longer stand the sunlight; another day I felt the most damnable thirst for… for blood. Ah, damn this torturous, prolonged life! Curse you, Dracula! The horror! The horror!