Stokers Shadow by Paul Butler Read Free Book Online Page B

auditorium again. A fuzzy darkness sweeps across the rows of empty seats in front of him. The theatre smell pervades the cool air: the scent of wax polish; the ghost of perfume from evenings past. William is seventeen and the magic of childhood and the theatre has long passed. But he realizes with a prickly nervousness this is a big night for his father, the eve of Dracula’s publication. Bram and thepublisher have been frantically sending notes back and forth for the past few days. His father has been even busier than usual. William – usually shy, morose and distant from his father – has become preoccupied with this, his father’s latest venture. He knows there is something special about this book, that it marks a more concentrated, prolonged period of writing than is customary in his father’s life. And the result of all the excitement, the event to mark the end of several years of solitary work, is this evening.
    Fewer people are present than everyone had hoped. William’s mother has not turned up at all, but the young man knows this is just her quirk, her dislike of the macabre subject and her unease with the fact her husband writes it. And there is something slipshod about the presentation. The actors Irving has allowed his father to use from the company are mainly too young and inexperienced for the parts they are reading.
    But the main problem is the length of time it is all taking. William’s seat is becoming uncomfortable. Dissatisfied noises penetrate the darkness from several areas of the auditorium at once – not the muffled, polite throat clearings of an audience absorbed, but loud, careless coughs and fragments of conversation. This is a “pre-publication reading,” not a performance, and with actors merely standing on podiums running through pages of description and dialogue, it is becoming cumbersome.
    There is too ample a stretch of time in which to dwell on all the shortcomings: the hurried nature of the makeup; the white dust of fake grey hair on the actor playing Abraham Van Helsing; the anemic vampire with the weak voice declaringwith a comic lisp that his revenge will spread over centuries. But worst of all is the contrivance of having so much of the reading go to the vampire-hunting hero, Professor Van Helsing, with the thick, fake Dutch accent and the dialogue his father has written which painstakingly recreates the grammatical mistakes such a character might make.
    William squirms in his seat towards the back of the main auditorium. Sweat drips down his spine. “Though we men have much valour and determination with which to protect our so dear charges,” Van Helsing drones on, “we must also needs be armed with much knowledge, as knowledge too is a sturdy armour in which we must wrap ourselves. Is it not so, my dear Madam Mina?”
    The chatting of the audience has become constant now. There should be a dramatic pause here, but instead there is a steady murmur. “So, I must implore you,” continues Van Helsing, a cloud of dust flying off his wig, “what is it that you are trying to tell us, my brave young patient?”
    â€œOnly this, professor,” Mina replies, looking sincerely into the empty seats and indifferent loungers. “He who has wrought all this great misery upon us all … “
    Someone guffaws. William feels a wire tensing inside him.
    â€œâ€¦ the very one who has caused this great ordeal …”
    More laughter William’s fists tighten.
    â€œâ€¦ is the saddest soul of all …”
    Suddenly, voices from behind him rise even more than usual; their tone is excited and conspiratorial. He hears the word “Irving.” A hush follows; a hush that has been absent for every moment of the long performance; a hush that is for thebenefit of the great actor alone. William knows that Irving is watching somewhere from the back. Hooves begin galloping in William’s chest. He wants to rush