In the Balkans, Investigator John Merriman, [John Wengraf], and his team close in on Count Dracula, [Francis Lederer], hoping to trap him inside his tomb. But when they pry open the casket, it is empty—the centuries‑old predator has already slipped away and boarded a train toward the United States. On the journey, Dracula assumes a new identity as Bellac Gordal, [Norbert Schiller], a Czech artist traveling to California to visit his extended family in Carleton.
Bellac arrives to a warm yet uneasy welcome from his cousin Cora Mayberry, [Greta Granstedt], and her children, the hopeful Mickey Mayberry, [Jimmy Baird], and the bright Rachel Mayberry, [Norma Eberhardt], who share a passion for art, especially clothing design. The family’s initial curiosity about Bellac quickly edges into wariness as he keeps his distance, seemingly detached from their everyday life. The very next day, Mickey’s beloved cat goes missing and is later found mutilated in an abandoned mineshaft, casting a shadow over the town and foreshadowing the danger that Bellac’s presence heralds.
Unbeknownst to them, Bellac has a hidden resting place in the nearby mine, a private lair featuring a coffin where he sleeps and gathers strength. Rachel’s fascination with Bellac grows, and she notices his mounting aloofness, though he occasionally explains away his odd hours as bouts of painting. At the parish house, where Rachel tends to the elderly and infirm, including the blind Jennie Blake, [Virginia Vincent], Bellac’s influence begins to blur the lines between memory and nightmare as he visits Jennie and offers to grant sight before biting her neck.
The next morning, Rachel is summoned to the parish house and finds Jennie feverish and claiming that a man entered her room through the window. Jennie collapses and dies soon after, and in the wake of her funeral, Mack Bryant, a detective assigned by John Merriman, arrives to investigate Bellac and any connection to a German death on a train. Bellac himself appears at the house, prompting Bryant to examine Bellac’s immigration records and passport before meeting with Merriman outside to reveal what he has uncovered.
Bellac returns to Jennie’s tomb and awakens the dead woman. Bryant later hears Jennie’s voice calling him from the woods near the train station and goes to investigate, only to be fatally mauled by a white wolf that prowls the area. That night, Rachel invites Bellac to a Halloween party at the parish house, but he declines. A tense exchange follows as Rachel confronts Bellac about his isolation, and she drifts into a dreamlike state in which Bellac asks her to remove Jennie’s crucifix pendant from her neck and offers her eternal life. The next morning, Rachel discovers the crucifix lying on the floor, a chilling sign that something has crossed from dream to reality.
Meierman, together with Reverend Whitfield, confronts Rachel with his findings while the town prepares for the Halloween festivities. Before departing for the party, Rachel finds a portrait of herself in Bellac’s room depicting her inside a coffin. Bellac then appears downstairs, and Rachel grows terrified when she notices his reflection does not appear in a mirror. Tim, her boyfriend, arrives moments later, and Rachel leaves with him to the party in a trance-like state.
Whitfield and Meierman pull Rachel aside at the party, urging her to help them trap Bellac. They discover Jennie’s crypt has emptied again, prompting a stakeout at the cemetery. Meanwhile, Jennie returns to her crypt during the stakeout, an eerie sign of the vampire’s influence. Rachel slips away from the party and heads to the abandoned mineshaft to confront Bellac, while Tim follows to keep her safe. Bellac momentarily hypnotizes Tim, who nevertheless refuses to surrender to him and instead moves toward the safety of Jennie’s crucifix.
As the stakeout continues, Bellac’s control tightens: he attempts to lure Tim into joining him and Rachel in “surviving this dying world” together. In a final struggle, Tim wields Jennie’s crucifix to resist Bellac, forcing the vampire toward a shaft. Bellac collapses in a dramatic fall, impaled on a large wooden post and disintegrating into a clothed skeleton as Rachel, Tim, and the witnesses look on, the town left to confront the aftermath of a night when the living barely escaped the dead.
