Lucy and I sat awhile, and it was all so beautiful before us that we took
hands as we sat, and she told me all over again about Arthur and their coming
marriage. That made me just a little heart-sick, for I haven't heard from
Jonathan for a whole month.
The same day. I came up here alone, for I am very sad. There was no letter
for me. I hope there cannot be anything the matter with Jonathan. The clock has
just struck nine. I see the lights scattered all over the town, sometimes in
rows where the streets are, and sometimes singly. They run right up the Esk and
die away in the curve of the valley. To my left the view is cut off by a black
line of roof of the old house next to the abbey. The sheep and lambs are
bleating in the fields away behind me, and there is a clatter of donkeys' hoofs
up the paved road below. The band on the pier is playing a harsh waltz in good
time, and further along the quay there is a Salvation Army meeting in a back
street. Neither of the bands hears the other, but up here I hear and see them
both. I wonder where Jonathan is and if he is thinking of me! I wish he were
here.
DR. SEWARD'S DIARY
5 June.--The case of Renfield grows more interesting the more I get to
understand the man. He has certain qualities very largely developed,
selfishness, secrecy, and purpose.
I wish I could get at what is the object of the latter. He seems to have
some settled scheme of his own, but what it is I do not know. His redeeming
quality is a love of animals, though, indeed, he has such curious turns in it
that I sometimes imagine he is only abnormally cruel. His pets are of odd
sorts.
Just now his hobby is catching flies. He has at present such a quantity that
I have had myself to expostulate. To my astonishment, he did not break out into
a fury, as I expected, but took the matter in simple seriousness. He thought
for a moment, and then said, "May I have three days? I shall clear them
away." Of course, I said that would do. I must watch him.
18 June.--He has turned his mind now to spiders, and has got several very
big fellows in a box. He keeps feeding them his flies, and the number of the
latter is becoming sensibly diminished, although he has used half his food in
attracting more flies from outside to his room.
1 July.--His spiders are now becoming as great a nuisance as his flies, and
today I told him that he must get rid of them.
He looked very sad at this, so I said that he must some of them, at all
events. He cheerfully acquiesced in this, and I gave him the same time as
before for reduction.
He disgusted me much while with him, for when a horrid blowfly, bloated with
some carrion food, buzzed into the room, he caught it, held it exultantly for a
few moments between his finger and thumb, and before I knew what he was going
to do, put it in his mouth and ate it.
I scolded him for it, but he argued quietly that it was very good and very
wholesome, that it was life, strong life, and gave life to him. This gave me an
idea, or the rudiment of one. I must watch how he gets rid of his spiders.
He has evidently some deep problem in his mind, for he keeps a little
notebook in which he is always jotting down something. whole pages of it are
filled with masses of figures, generally single numbers added up in batches,
and then the totals added in batches again, as though he were focussing some
account, as the auditors put it.
8 July.--There is a method in his madness, and the rudimentary idea in my
mind is growing. It will be a whole idea soon, and then, oh, unconscious
cerebration, you will have to give the wall to your conscious brother.