CHAPTER IV
JONATHAN HARKER’S JOURNAL
31 May.—This morning when I woke I thought I would provide myself with some paper and envelopes from my bag and keep them in my pocket, so that I might write in case I should get an opportunity, but again a surprise, again a shock!
Every scrap of paper was gone, and with it all my notes, my memoranda, relating to railways and travel, my letter of credit, in fact all that might be useful to me were I once outside the castle. I sat and pondered awhile, and then some thought occurred to me, and I made search of my portmanteau and in the wardrobe where I had placed my clothes.
The suit in which I had travelled was gone, and also my overcoat and rug; I could find no trace of them anywhere. This looked like some new scheme of villainy…
Locking someone in your home against their will and stealing their property are both obviously crimes. It’s not like Dracula is even alleging that this is part of a just punishment for a crime Harker may have committed.
The relevant concept here is Extraterritoriality: is Harker subject to the laws of the land in which he is working, or to the laws of his citizenship (England)? Harker is not there in a diplomatic capacity, so he would be subject to the laws of the Austro-Hungarian empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, and the County of Dracula.
Count Dracula could claim that as administrator of that region, he was ensuring Harker’s safety by limiting his movements to a “safe zone” – this was/is common practice in dangerous areas. He could also claim that he removed certain business documents after Harker was caught attempting to exfiltrate information in encrypted form – Dracula could claim that he did do so to protect his personal business information. I’m not an expert on the legal system of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the late 1800s, but my intuition is that rural nobility had a pretty wide latitude in what they could do.