Stokers Shadow by Paul Butler Page A

kept it all hidden and encoded.”
    â€œI don’t think there’s anything hidden or encoded about it,” William insists, wondering at this lie and feeling his face burn again as he repeats it. “It’s a simple, straightforward story about vampirism.”
    â€œI don’t think it is about vampirism. I think it’s about something else.”
    â€œNaturally,” William responds. “You’ve been reading Freud.”
    â€œDo you ever think about Henry Irving?”
    William shakes his head impatiently.
    â€œI mean,” continues Maud, “about what his influence on the novel might have been?”
    â€œThe only influence he might have had is lead actor if Dracula was ever turned into a stage production.” William begins to scan the paper again but immediately his imagination is overtaken by a matching of pictures so vivid and intense it cannot be denied: the pigeons whirling around Irving’s statue meld into the pamphlet illustration of the German film, the thin, crooked vampire and the banner garland of flying rats obeying their master.
    â€œWhy are you so sure about that?”
    â€œSure about what?”
    â€œYou made up your mind that the answer was ‘no’ before I even asked the full question.”
    â€œI don’t understand you,” William says frowning, lowering the newspaper again.
    â€œYou don’t want to talk about Irving and his influence on your father. It’s a painful subject for you.”
    â€œNonsense,” William insists. “I was talking in great detail about Irving to Mary, my mother’s new girl.”
    â€œYou talked to the maid about Irving?” Maud says.
    â€œShe did most of the talking.” William pretends to be absorbed in a headline. “And she’s not a maid, I told you. More of a companion.”
    â€œWell, whoever she is, she’s lucky to get you to talk about something personal without prising it out of you the way I have to.”
    William drops the paper onto his lap. “Firstly, it wasn’t a personal conversation, it was small-talk. Secondly, I felt sorryfor the girl at the beck and call of my mother. And lastly and most importantly, I was walking down the same street at the same time so my options were either to talk to the girl or ignore her, pretending not to know who she was. I’m sure that’s the course of which my mother would have approved. I’m rather surprised to find you agreeing with her on such matters.”
    William is breathless and overheated after this diatribe. He snaps the paper up again, but has to put it down as his wife responds.
    â€œThose were your only two options, were they, William?”
    â€œYes.”
    Feigning confidence, William begins to look at the paper again.
    â€œSometimes I wonder. You talk about your mother’s judgment failing. I’m not so sure she’s the only one.”
    â€œWhat is the matter with you, Maud?”
    â€œI’m sorry,” Maud sighs. “I just find it hurtful when you can be so carefree, so natural with some people, yet so brittle when you’re with me.”
    â€œMaud, I can assure you I have not been ‘carefree’, as you put it, with anyone in the last little while.” He suddenly feels tender towards her and speaks gently. “You are not missing out on anything. I am quite miserable all the time.”
    Quite suddenly, Maud relaxes and laughs affectionately.
    Ruby enters with a tea tray.
    William and Maud become silent.

C HAPTER V
    Mary drowses, watching the curtains ripple and flutter, caressed by unseen hands, drawn silently through to the other side and returned just as gently into the room. She lies in the room’s darkest corner beneath a sheet and a single blanket. The moon radiates like a bright half-halo through the little open square. Blue light skims off the window ledge and touches the tip of the bedpost at her toe
.
    Mary follows the