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Chapter 26-27

Summary
Seward's diary, written on the train from Varna to Galatz, records that Mina is becoming more difficult to hypnotize. She still hears water, but it is a steady swirl rather than waves, suggesting that the Count is now traveling on inland water. She can also hear men's voices and ropes and chains being dragged along.
When the friends arrive in Galatz, they go to the ship, hoping to find the Count's box still on board. But the ship's captain tells them that a man called Immanuel Hildesheim has already unloaded the box. Hildesheim has passed on the box to a man called Petrof Skinsky, who deals with the Slovaks who trade along the river. The men look for Skinsky but he has disappeared. Then they learn that his body has been found in the churchyard with the throat torn open, as if by a wild animal.
Mina investigates the possible ways that the Count may return to his castle. She thinks that the most likely way is along the river. The men decide to split up: Holmwood and Harker will hire a steam launch and travel up the river; Morris and Seward will get horses and follow along the riverbank in case the Count lands; and Van Helsing and Mina will take a train and then a carriage.
As Holmwood and Harker are traveling up river, they hear from some Slovaks that a large double-crewed boat is traveling up river in front of them at more than the usual speed. The men believe that this is the Count's boat.
On the journey, Van Helsing hypnotizes Mina and her answers suggest that the Count is still on the river. Van Helsing worries about Mina, who is sleeping for long periods, has lost her appetite, and has given up her diary. As they approach the castle, she becomes alert and begins to looks unnaturally healthy. Van Helsing cannot now hypnotize her at all. That night, he makes a circle around her with the Communion wafers, to protect her. Van Helsing and Mina are visited by the three vampire women who had previously approached Harker. Mina tells Van Helsing that they pose no threat to her. This is because she is already one of them. The vampire women address Mina as "sister" and ask her to come with them. Mina, however, responds with fear and revulsion, which encourages Van Helsing. Van Helsing wards them off with Communion wafers, and they melt away into the mist. The horses die of fright.
Van Helsing leaves Mina sleeping within the consecrated circle and walks to the castle. In the chapel, he finds the graves of the three vampire women. Even Van Helsing is tempted by their voluptuous beauty and is almost deflected from his purpose by desire. But he is strengthened by the woeful wail of Mina, which he seems to hear. Then he sees a particularly grand tomb, with "Dracula" written on it. He lays some of the Communion wafer in the tomb and destroys the three female vampires. He seals the castle entrances with wafers to prevent the Count from going in.
Van Helsing returns to Mina and they set out into the snow to seek Harker and Holmwood. From a high vantage point, they see a cart driven by gypsies and carrying a large box. Two horsemen are approaching the cart from the south, and Van Helsing realizes that they are Morris and Seward. Two other horsemen are closing in from the north, and they are Harker and Holmwood. As the sun is setting, the men intercept the gypsies, threatening them with Morris's Winchester rifles. The gypsies try to defend the box, but Harker leaps onto the cart and throws the box to the ground. Morris is wounded by one of the gypsies' knives. Harker and Morris break open the box, revealing the Count lying within. The Count's look of hate turns to one of triumph as the sun sets, but Harker slashes the Count's throat as Morris plunges his knife into the Count's heart. Mina sees a look of peace pass over the Count's face before the body crumbles to dust. The gypsies flee. As Morris is dying, he points out that the scar on Mina's forehead has vanished.
Harker writes a postscript to the story. He and Mina have had a son, whom they have named Quincey, after their dead friend. They have revisited the Count's castle, where all traces of their adventures have disappeared. Holmwood and Seward are happily married. Harker realizes that amongst all their records of the events is barely a single authentic document: they have "nothing but a mass of type-writing." They could not ask anyone to "accept these as proofs of so wild a story." Van Helsing says this does not matter, as one day, young Quincey Harker will learn what a brave and gallant woman Mina is, and how some men loved her so much that "they did dare much for her sake."
Analysis
That the three vampire women almost manage to overwhelm the virtuous and wise Van Helsing with desire is testament to their great sexual power. He writes in his memorandum, "She was so fair to look on, so radiantly beautiful, so exquisitely voluptuous, that the very instinct of man in me, which calls some of my sex to love and to protect one of hers, made my head whirl with new emotion." However, Van Helsing is able to overcome his baser instincts and restore the women to a state of purity and innocence.
The Count's outwitting his enemies in going to Galatz instead of Varna shows that he is not yet defeated and is proving a formidable opponent. As Van Helsing's band draw closer to the Count's castle, the Count's powers begin to gain ascendancy over them. Van Helsing's scientific procedure of hypnotism ceases to work as Mina comes increasingly under the Count's influence.
The final battle is not merely between Van Helsing's band and the Count. It is between the modern scientific world of Western Europe and the ancient beliefs of the East; between Christianity and demonic powers; between the state of grace (redemption) and the state of damnation; and between reason and untrammeled sexual and animal instinct. The sign that Van Helsing's band - and all they stand for - has triumphed is the disappearance of the scar on Mina's forehead. Further resolution is provided by the happy marriages of Holmwood and Seward, and the blessing of the Harkers' marriage with a child who is named after all their friends. For the Victorians, sexual desire was made holy via the institution of marriage and the procreation of children. Van Helsing ends up as a grandfather figure to little Quincey Harker, ready to pass on his wisdom to the new generation.
Some critics see ambiguity in the fact that Quincey Harker, being Mina's child, must carry the blood of Count Dracula in his veins. But though the child is born on the anniversary of the Count's death, the notion that he is at all vampiric is probably not valid, as the total disappearance of Mina's scar leaves us in no doubt that she is as pure as she was before the Count entered her life.