Dracula's a pretty rough customer, but for some reason, just before you guide your Belmont to fight him, he gives you a full arsenal of stuff to use to defeat him. It seems like a pretty large tactical error on his part, so I can't really understand why, but I'm not one to look gift-arsenals in the mouth.

Take a look at this screen. It's the last staircase before you face-off with Dracula. You waltz up the stairs, go into his chambers, and then he kills you.

But, what's not immediately obvious is that there is an invisible platform, an invisible staircase, and another invisible platform.

Hop on down and nose-up to the edge of the screen. You'll see a brief flash, and then stuff will start raining from the heavens. Food, whip upgrades, Hearts,

a Cross (Boomerang),

a double-shot powerup

a triple-shot powerup

Getting back up is a little bit of a challenge. Getting to the the second platform is pretty easy, just take the invisible staircase. But getting back on the visible platform is a little tougher... since it's kind of hard to tell where the invisible one ends and the Bottomless Pit of Death begins. But if you botch it, you'll end up on the same screen, primed to fill your inventory up again, so no big loss.