"stoker-dracula-168" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stoker Bram)

It was on the dark side of twilight when we got to Bistritz, which
is a very interesting old place. Being practically on the frontier-
for the Borgo Pass leads from it into Bukovina- it has had a very
stormy existence, and it certainly shows marks of it. Fifty years
ago a series of great fires took place, which made terrible havoc on
five separate occasions. At the very beginning of the seventeenth
century it underwent a siege of three weeks and lost 13,000 people,
the casualties of war proper being assisted by famine and disease.

Count Dracula had directed me to go to the Golden Krone Hotel, which
I found, to my great delight, to be thoroughly old-fashioned, for of
course I wanted to see all I could of the ways of the country. I was
evidently expected, for when I got near the door I faced a
cheery-looking elderly woman in the usual peasant dress-white
undergarment with long double apron, front, and back, of coloured
stuff fitting almost too tight for modesty. When I came close she
bowed, and said, "The Herr Englishman?" "Yes," I said, "Jonathan
Harker." She smiled, and gave some message to an elderly man in
white shirt-sleeves, who had followed her to the door. He went, but
immediately returned with a letter:-

"My Friend.- Welcome to the Carpathians. I am anxiously expecting
you. Sleep well to-night. At three tomorrow the diligence will start
for Bukovina; a place on it is kept for you. At the Borgo Pass my
carriage will await you and will bring you to me. I trust that your
journey from London has been a happy one, and that you will enjoy your
stay in my beautiful land."

"Your friend,

"DRACULA."

4 May.- I found that my landlord had got a letter from the Count,
directing him to secure the best place on the coach for me; but on
making inquiries as to details he seemed somewhat reticent, and
pretended that he could not understand my German. This could not be
true, because up to then he had understood it perfectly; at least,
he answered my questions exactly as if he did. He and his wife, the
old lady who had received me, looked at each other in a frightened
sort of way. He mumbled out that the money had been sent in a
letter, and that was all he knew. When I asked him if he knew Count
Dracula, and could tell me anything of his castle, both he and his
wife crossed themselves, and, saying that they knew nothing at all,
simply refused to speak further. It was so near the time of starting
that I had no time to ask any one else, for it was all very mysterious
and not by any means comforting.

Just before I was leaving, the old lady came up to my room and
said in a very hysterical way: