#and in addition to ensuring people won't look to him for info about jonathan it also seems very fitting that dracula's version tends to

[vickyvicarious]

Last night the Count asked me in the suavest tones to write three letters, one saying that my work here was nearly done, and that I should start for home within a few days, another that I was starting on the next morning from the time of the letter, and the third that I had left the castle and arrived at Bistritz. [...] He explained to me that posts were few and uncertain, and that my writing now would ensure ease of mind to my friends; and he assured me with so much impressiveness that he would countermand the later letters, which would be held over at Bistritz until due time in case chance would admit of my prolonging my stay, that to oppose him would have been to create new suspicion. I therefore pretended to fall in with his views, and asked him what dates I should put on the letters. He calculated a minute, and then said:— "The first should be June 12, the second June 19, and the third June 29."

Dracula's goal with these letters is multifaceted. Of course, they're being used again as a way to psychologically torment Jonathan. He's being made to feel complicit again, being forced to cover up what he's now certain will be his own eventual murder. The deadline also gives him something to dread, but at the same time suggests that if he plays along he might survive until then, adding incentive to obey longer.

This also is just a straightforward coverup. Jonathan's previous dictated letter suggested he would be leaving the castle around June 12. So the first one of these picks up the false narrative then, stretching out the time even a little longer. The second finally has him leaving. And the third, a few days later, places him in Bistritz. This trip took him only a day or two on his journey into the castle, but in this version it takes him about nine days. Still, it places him a decent distance away from the castle, and in what Jonathan earlier described as "a fairly well-known place," one that seems to mark a sort of border. Jonathan considers it "practically on the frontier", while this is where Dracula chose to welcome him "to the Carpathians." So, by placing his last letter there, Jonathan is shown to have left Dracula's territory. He's not too close to home, but he's back amongst other people, and presumably will leave from Bistritz to continue heading west very shortly. This makes his disappearance lose both geographic and causal links with Dracula, and in fact places the blame most likely on other people, who perhaps robbed and killed this traveler.