Upon hearing the professor’s dire prediction of impending doom, Jonathan leapt from his prostrate position at Mina’s feet to confront Van Helsing face to face.
“In peril? What do you mean?” he asked.
Van Helsing once again reached for Jonathan’s collar, pulling it back to reveal the two swollen bit marks on his neck. “I mean that!” The professor glared at Jonathan, then at Mina and back to the startled young man.
Jonathan scratched at the bumps. “Oh that. It’s just a mosquito bite.”
“Yes,” Mina concurred as she joined them to squint at his neck. “From a humongous mosquito.”
“And I say it was no ordinary mosquito that inflicted that wound,” Van Helsing intoned.
“Then what was it, doctor?” Mina wrinkled her pretty little brow.
“A vampire!” The old man jabbed the air with an extended index finger for dramatic effect.
Jonathan and his fiancée looked at each other and burst out in giggles.
“Oh, Dr. Van Helsing, you’re so quaint.” Mina cooed.
“Quaint, am I?” He paused a bushy Teutonic eyebrow. “Then how do you explain Mr. Harker’s bizarre and completely un-British behavior when we first arrived?”
“What bizarre behavior?” Jonathan was flummoxed as he took his best Beau Brummel pose. “I am always the perfect British gentleman.”
Mina modestly tapped him on his shoulder, “Mmm, dearest, I hate to be disagreeable, but you were running around without your trousers.”
“Oh. You noticed that.” Jonathan pulled away in embarrassment. “Frankly, I am puzzled why I was dressed like that, or rather, undressed. Perhaps this could be a dream. Yes, just like those nightmares I have had of attending Our Lady of the Perpetual Headache and suddenly realizing I’m totally naked. Yes, that’s it! This is all a dream!”
Van Helsing slapped Jonathan hard on his face. The young man’s mouth flew open while his right hand instinctively rose to comfort the offended cheek.
“No,” Jonathan said seriously. “I suppose it isn’t a dream.”
Mina put her arms protectively around him and glanced at the doctor. “But a lapse in Jonathan’s good breeding doesn’t necessarily mean he’s been bitten by a vampire.”
“Then how else would you describe it?” Van Helsing asked.
“Well….” Mina paused to gather her thoughts, then she smiled. “It’s as Count Dracula said. It’s Transylvania. Romantic Transylvania.”
Jonathan looked at her, taken aback by her observation. “Transylvania romantic? You must have taken leave of your senses, Mina dearest. Transylvania is the armpit of the world.”
“A very acute assessment,” the professor commented.
“Then if Transylvania isn’t romantic…why were you running around without your trousers?” Mina asked.
“Well, if this isn’t a dream,” Jonathan paused to look at Van Helsing and rubbed his cheek, “and obviously it isn’t, then I haven’t the foggiest.”
“Then my explanation of a vampire is becoming more plausible?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Jonathan conceded. He took Mina by the hand and guided her to the sofa. When they sat, a poof of dust flew up. “Please proceed.”
After coughing away the dust particles, Mina asked, “What exactly do you mean by a vampire? Do you mean one of those nasty bats that carry rabies or some such dreadful disease?”

“Rabies!” Jonathan exclaimed, sitting straight up. “Do I have rabies?” He looked directly into Mina’s eyes. “Tell me darling. Am I foaming at the mouth yet?”
“You do not have rabies.” The doctor shook his head.
The young man fell back in relief. “Thank goodness! I look terrible in foam.”
“But unless you are very, very careful,” Van Helsing cautioned, “you may become one of the undead lying helpless in a coffin during the day and doomed to roam the earth at night, looking for innocent victims to suck life’s blood from their necks.”
“I think I’d rather foam at the mouth.” Jonathan’s healthy luster turned wan.
Mina still had trouble with the concept. “So what you are saying is that Jonathan has been bitten by one of these persons who sleep during the day and prey on the innocent at night?”
“Sounds like someone in the entertainment industry,” Jonathan added.
“I assure you, Mr. Harker, there is nothing entertaining about a vampire,” the doctor warned him.
Mina shook her head again. “If one of these vampires has bitten Jonathan, then why hasn’t he died?”
“Because the vampires want him to become one of them. After the first bite the victim takes on the characteristics of the vampire but may be brought out of the trance by a strong good influence—as your purity and love brought Mr. Harker back to his senses earlier this evening.”
Jonathan and Mina turned to face each other and hold hands.
“Darling! You saved me! Thank you!”
“Dearest! You’re welcome!”
“Don’t be so congratulatory yet,” the professor lectured them. “Mr. Harker is still in danger. If he’s bitten a second time, he will not come out of the spell of the vampire unless the vampire which has bitten him is destroyed. And if he is bitten a third time, he will become a vampire and will, himself, have to be destroyed.
Subconsciously Jonathan touched the bite marks on his neck. “This sounds more serious than I first assumed.”
“Who are these awful vampires?” Mina asked.
“They are Count Dracula and his three wives,” the doctor announced.
Jonathan and Mina arose in unison.
“You must be joking!” he exclaimed.
“I don’t believe it,” she concurred.
Van Helsing pointed at them. “Sit!”
Like good obedient children, they plopped down creating another cloud of dust. Mina coughed.
“Did you notice Count Dracula and his three wives have hair in the palm of their hands?”
“Yes,” Jonathan replied, “but I had the good taste not to mention it.”
“That’s one of the signs of the vampire,” the professor lectured.
“Oh,” the young man replied in a vacuous tone.
“Miss Mina,” Van Helsing continued, “did you not find it strange that when we first arrived this afternoon, when the sun was still high in the sky, we banged and banged at the door, and no one answered? And it was only after we returned when the sun had set that Count Dracula opened the door?”
“I assumed they were out on an important errand, like going to a florist.”
The professor turned his attention to her sweetheart. “Mr. Harker, during your stay here, have you seen any of them—Dracula, Salacia, Claustrophobia or Susie Belle—while the sun was in the sky?”
“Well, no.” Jonathan could be dumb as a stump.
“Of course you haven’t,” Van Helsing retorted. “Because a single ray of sunlight would destroy them.”
“I can understand that.” Mina nodded with wide eyes. “If I get too much sun I blister like an overripe tomato.”
Jonathan leaned into her and whispered, “I don’t think that’s what he means.”
“It most certainly is not what I meant. I mean they will drop dead where they stand, that their bodies will decompose into molding dust!”
“How disgusting.” Mina’s lips curled in repulsion.
“And both of you have observed that they don’t drink wine.”
Mina nodded in approval. “Very sensible of them.”
“That’s because they only drink blood.”
“See,” Jonathan said, nudging his girlfriend, “I told you drinking wine wasn’t all that bad.”
“Your supposed dream of seeing Dracula crawl up the wall was no dream,” Van Helsing said, turning his attention back to Jonathan. “Vampires have the ability to defy gravity.”
“Then which one has bitten Jonathan?” Mina asked.
“We can safely narrow it to the three unholy sisters,” he replied.
“I didn’t know they were sisters.” Mina fluttered her eyes. “They don’t look a thing alike.”
“I think the doctor’s speaking figuratively,” her fiancé gently informed her.
“Exactly, Mr. Harker!” Van Helsing’s loud exclamation startled the proper British couple. “We must determine which one it is and destroy her before she bites you again!”
Jonathan leaned forward. “How do you go about destroying a vampire?”
“I know!” Mina bounced on the sofa clapping her hands. “We could tell her that her ensemble does absolutely nothing for her. I know if someone told me that I would be utterly destroyed.”
“I think he’s talking about a different kind of destroyed,” her boyfriend offered.
“I’m talking about driving a stake through her heart!” Van Helsing relished every horrifying word he spat.
His drama was somehow lost on the couple. They regarded each other and giggled. Then they looked at the professor and asked in perfect unison, “Medium or well done?”
Jonathan and Mina were so pleased with their attempt at stand-up comedy they broke into another long, loud round of giggling.
Van Helsing was not impressed nor amused by their wit. He strode briskly to the sofa where they sat and slapped both of them with one fell swoop.