Confusion darkened his eyes, reminding Frankenstein of Adelaide. “Why would you help me? What’s in it for you?”
“As you noticed, I am a medical man.” Frankenstein refused to lie and call himself a doctor. “Even if I were not bound by a medial oath”—which he wasn’t but why split hairs?—“I am bound by my sense of moral decency.” Frankenstein applied antiseptic to a pad and dabbed the area around the injury. “Just as I could not leave you to die in the streets of a drug overdose, I cannot let you go until your wound is healed. If you go too soon, infection is very likely, and your untimely demise will most certainly follow.”
Loren lowered the gun. “I’m not giving you this.”
“Keep it if you wish, just don’t point it at me.” Frankenstein swabbed directly over the wound with a fresh pad, frowning when no blood emerged at all.
“Why do you keep making that face?”
“Because it should be bleeding more.”
“Not bleeding is good, though, right?”
“Not in this case.” Frankenstein handed him a cylinder of rawhide. “Here, bite down on this.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I need to probe the wound to make sure your bowel wasn’t nicked by the blade.” Once Loren prepared himself, Frankenstein pried the wound open. Loren’s blocked scream splashed spittle but didn’t stop Frankenstein’s probing fingers. What he saw stunned him. Not a nick anywhere within the cavity. Gleaming intestines with pulsating strands of red veins glistened within the cavity, showing clear health and vitality. Astonishingly, even the edges of the wound seemed to have started healing. He’d never seen anything like it. He could practically see the skin knitting before his eyes. “There, there. All is done.”
He removed the rawhide from Loren’s mouth.
“Aren’t you going to stitch it up?”
“No. I’m concerned about infection.” Frankenstein didn’t think the wound needed stitches, not now, at least, but he didn’t want Loren to know just how quickly he’d managed to heal. “I’m going to clean it again and bandage it.”
“It’s okay?”
“The damage is quite extensive.” The lie came effortlessly but he found it necessary. “If you keep it covered and refrain from any vigorous activity—”
“Like what?”
“Like running or fighting or anything more than staying still. Any aggressive movement might reopen it and we will have to go through all of this again and I might have to stitch it up.” Frankenstein gave him his most determined expression. “Do you understand?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Loren flopped back on the table but he seemed more relieved than angry.
“Now. Tell me the truth.” Frankenstein placed a thick bandage over the wound then helped Loren sit up so he could wrap strips of old sheets around him to hold the bandage in place. “Why do you need to hide?”
“What does it matter?”
“It matters to me if you are a murderer.”
“Murderer?” Loren scoffed. “Hardly.”
“Well, then?”
“You’re a doctor. That’s what you’ll do. Doctor me and then I’ll be on my way once I heal.”
“You’re running from someone.”
“What makes you think that?”
“The fact that they tried to poison you and then stabbed you.” Frankenstein waited for an answer that didn’t come. “If you tell me the truth, perhaps I can help.”
“And why would a fancy man like yourself be doing that?”
“Well, you’re in my home. I can hardly protect myself, you, and my staff if I don’t know.”
“They’ll never look for me here.”
“You found me.”
“Yeah.” He frowned. “But I’d been here before.”
“Yes. Of course.” Frankenstein wondered if he’d felt the same curious pull between them but perhaps it only went one way. Or pain had clouded his mind. “Still, there is a chance that your location could get out. If I understood, I could help.”
“You won’t believe me.”
“Try me.”
Loren considered as he looked around. “Can we maybe sit somewhere more comfortable?” He nodded toward the bottle of whisky. “Maybe with some of that to ease the pain?”
Frankenstein considered saying no but alcohol had a tendency to loosen tongues. He helped Loren off the exam table then over to the corner where two chairs flanked a circular table. He’d always imagined himself sitting there with his assistant, discussing their experiments, but he’d never found anyone he trusted enough to share his ideas with. Adelaide had come the closest but shame more than a lack of trust had held him back.
He seated his patient and then himself before pouring two small glasses of whisky. He felt an absolutely bizarre compulsion to make a toast that he quashed. Instead, he lifted his glass and consumed the contents in one gulp. It burned pleasantly all the way down then spread out, relaxing his limbs.
Loren matched him, uttering a loud and contented sigh after draining his glass. “I do so love that feeling.”
“Which?”
“How it burns and then makes everything go limp.”
Frankenstein nodded and poured more into their glasses. “Tell me.”
“It’s a long story.”
“We have time.”
But they didn’t. The bell on the wall rang.
“What’s that?” Loren asked, looking around the laboratory for the source.
“Clerval, my butler, needs me.”
“Why doesn’t he just come and knock on the bleeding door, then?”
“Because I asked him not to do that.” The bell gave Frankenstein a chance to put sensitive things away before unlocking the upper entrance to the lab. “Come. You have to hide.”
“Hide? Why?”
“I do not know why he needs me so it’s best if you are not in sight should someone wish to look down here.”
“Oh. Right.”
Frankenstein took him to the little room under the stairs. With empty crates placed in front, along with other brick-a-brack, no one would bother to look behind. Even if they did, he didn’t think they would notice the woodwork actually concealed a door. He didn’t think even his butler knew there was a small room there. Inside, a chair and table along with a lamp.
“Light it and then close the door. Do not come out. I will return for you.”
“Can I take the whisky?”
“No.” Frankenstein had a sudden vision of him spilling the spirits and then knocking over the lamp and setting the entire house on fire. “Just stay here and stay quiet.”
Once he had him settled, Frankenstein hurried upstairs. He expected Adelaide to be waiting for him in the parlor but the look on Clerval’s face said something else entirely.
“The police are here.”
The police often came when they needed his services so they could hurry him to the station or a crime scene but this visit was not for that purpose. His butler’s face made that clear. Energy danced along the very tips of Frankenstein’s fingers, prompting him to place them behind his back.
Instead of pestering Clerval for details, Frankenstein entered the parlor. The constable and several of his under officers stood in a nervous circle.
“Constable Higgins.” Frankenstein extended his hand as he approached, taking the man’s hand into his to give him a solid handshake. Too late he felt the electricity in his body seeking an outlet. He gave the man a slight shock. “Oh, dear. Forgive me. Simply static electricity.”
“Of course.” Higgins rubbed at his hand.
“Condolences on the loss of your wife.” Frankenstein had sent his cook over with food but had not gone himself for fear of seeming too familiar. “How can I be of service to you?”
“Well, you’ve already put my mind at ease just stepping into the room.”
“Pardon me?”
“You’re alive.”
“Yes.” Frankenstein laughed nervously. “Was there some doubt?”
“There was.” Constable Higgins took off his hat and scratched at his head, sending a cascade of flakes to the shoulders of his coat. “You seem to be in fine fettle.”
“I assure you, I am.” But he wasn’t. Had his experiment already been found out? “How can I be of service to you?” he asked again, straining to sound relaxed when he was anything but.
“I think we need to conduct this interview down at the station.”
“Interview?” Frankenstein would have started shaking but the whisky left him feeling calm. He only hoped he didn’t smell of it. Midday drinking, while not uncommon, was certainly frowned upon.
“Well, sir, that is…” Constable Higgins trailed off but never picked up the thread of his thought. “I think you might be safer there.”
“Safer?” Visions of angry townsfolk with pitchforks and torches, screaming for his death by hanging, flashed in his mind. How the devil had they discovered what he’d done? Struggling to keep his heart from pounding right out of his chest, Frankenstein managed to sputter, “Safer from what?”
“From your clients.”
“My clients?” Baffled beyond belief, Frankenstein moved to the liquor tray. “Do any of you—no? Well, I hope you don’t mind if I do.” He took his time pouring the drink, stalling so he could try to grasp what was going on. He lifted his glass to the group and then downed it in one swallow. Sweet heat and numbing bliss flowed out along his limbs. Whatever had caused this bizarre turn of events, he felt he could now face it without reacting in a panic. “Why in the world would my clients wish to do me harm?”
“Because you bleeding reversed the spells!” Henderson, who managed to look like a worn shoe and sound like a bleating sheep, pointed his truncheon Frankenstein’s direction.
“Stop that.” Constable Higgins slapped the stick down.
“Well, he had to know he’d be facing their wrath.”
“I assure you, I did nothing of the sort.” Frankenstein poured himself one more drink. Unlike most, alcohol did not loosen his tongue but tightened it and made his mind keen to find patterns and solve dilemmas.
“You did!” Henderson insisted.
“Ask yourself one question, Officer Henderson. Just one,” Frankenstein said.
“I be the one asking the questions!” Officer Henderson didn’t even get his truncheon lifted to his waist before Higgins slapped it down.
“That’s enough with you.” Higgins pushed Henderson toward the vestibule. “Go and watch the front door.”
Frankenstein offered his question to Higgins, who seemed to be the only one not on the warpath. “Why would I do such a thing? Why would I reverse the spells I’d cast for my clients?”
“A good question, one that brought me here,” Higgins said, his voice calm. “We thought someone had accosted you or forced you to do this foul thing or perhaps you had died. Barnabas Shelly, when he passed on, all his reanimations ended. I thought…well, that is clearly not the case here.”
“Yes. I remember reading or hearing about that.” It had been yet another reason the Resurrection Ministry had given for not wanting humans brought back. Imagine the horror of having a loved one suddenly turn to dust just because the necromancer died? “But I tell you, I did not do this. How it happened, I do not know, but it was not done by my intention. That much I can tell you.”
“Then someone undid your spells.”
“I do not see how.” Only the caster could undo a resurrection incantation. “Unless…” Frankenstein trailed off, his mind ticking over everything he’d read in the last month or so, ever since his conversation with Adelaide and his renewed interest in human reanimation. There had been something in one of those occult texts. Something about drawing upon the darkest of powers to undo the greatest of wrongs. But who would smut their soul to kill hundreds of pets?
“Unless what?” Higgins asked, stepping close and warning the other officers to keep silent, something they did but only barely. Mostly they continued to grumble and grouse while glaring intently at him.
A crash drew all their attentions toward the front of the house.
“What in the world?” Before Frankenstein could step forward and investigate, the police rushed past him and out the door. Feeling like a child woken up in the middle of a dream, he moved to the window.
Over a dozen people milled about in the street in front of his home. They spoke loudly but that soon swelled until they screamed things, vile curses and horrific slurs, in the direction of his home. He couldn’t make out all the words, but he didn’t need to when their fury was clear enough. Some shook their fists or made other rude hand gestures but most were scrabbling at the street, finding the biggest rocks they could. Frankenstein couldn’t be certain but it seemed to him Henderson was egging the crowd on rather than trying to calm them down.
“Blast it, Henderson.” Clearly, Higgins saw his behavior too. Higgins pointed to one of the other officers. “Get him out of here. Now.” Higgins didn’t hesitate. He rushed outside and lifted his hands to the crowd. His bellow drowned out their shouts but even he couldn’t hold back the tide of angry souls.
Frankenstein felt the moment from his nightmare returning to him. They didn’t carry pitchforks and torches but they had rocks and naked aggression.
“We have to go, sir.” Clerval took his arm while one of the police officers took the other.
“No.” He couldn’t leave his creature downstairs. If they found out what he was, this public outcry would only get worse. “I am not leaving.”
“Sir, this is no time to be brave.”
“I’m not being brave.” Frankenstein shook off the grasping hands of his butler and the police officer. “I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“I don’t think they’re going to listen to that explanation.” The police officer grasped Frankenstein’s arm again and this time he didn’t do it gently but with a show of strength that told Frankenstein he would be no match for the man.
“No!” Electricity pulsed through him.
“Blimey!” The officer released his hold and jumped back. “What in the—you shocked me.”
Frankenstein looked down at his hands. Blue and white sparkles danced over his fingertips.
“Sir?” Clerval took a step back.
“I don’t—”
“Stop it right now.” The officer reached for his truncheon.
“I’m not doing it on purpose!” Frankenstein realized the more agitated he became the bigger and brighter the energy field became. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”
Noise from outside drew him back to the window.
Half the crowd had stepped back, apparently calmed by Constable Higgins, but the other half surged forward, egged on by Officer Henderson.
If he went outside and lifted his hands… No. He didn’t dare. Instilling fear in them would only deepen their anger. He had to calm them. To lower the volume not increase it. But how?
“I’m sorry, sir. You’ve left me no choice.” The officer struck the back of Frankenstein’s head. In the span of a day, he’d been rendered unconscious twice.
Chapter Five
Frankenstein awoke in a most familiar bedroom of blue, green, and cream.
“Ah, there you are.” Adelaide loomed above him. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”
“Did they destroy my home?”
“Once the police dragged you away, the crowd followed.” Adelaide helped him sit up then handed him a glass of dirty looking water.
He lifted his brow instead of asking.
“It will make you feel better.”
“What is it?”
“Something for the pain.”
He considered saying no but the throbbing in his head threatened to make him vomit. He could hardly go and tend to his creation if he couldn’t walk without being sick. He downed it and gagged at the bitterness. Just like his quick bouts of unconsciousness, he’d now taken opium twice in as many days.
“There we are.” Adelaide set the glass a
side. “Now, let us—what do you think you’re doing?”
“Getting out of bed.”
“No, no. You’re to stay in bed until the knot on your head goes down.”
Instead of fighting with her, he simply rolled over to the other side of the bed and slipped out. He found himself dressed in his underclothes but felt no such worry being so underdressed in front of Adelaide.
“You cheeky boy.” Adelaide hurried around the bed. “Back in, I say.”
“I cannot.” Frankenstein spied his clothing on the wooden valet in the corner of the room. “There is something most urgent I must attend to.”
“What could be more important than your health?”
My creature, he thought, but said, “I have an experiment in my laboratory that I cannot leave behind.”
“Whatever it was is most certainly gone now.”
“What—whatever do you mean?” Frankenstein paused in dressing himself.
“Urged on by the public outcry, the police scoured your home, looking for proof that you’d either been compelled to remove the pet reanimation spells or—you must tell me. Why did you do it?”
“I didn’t.”
“So you are the victim of foul play.” Adelaide frowned. “Or foul spells. I suppose I must think of a better way to express that idea.”
Frankenstein finished dressing then checked his appearance in the mirror. Heavens. He looked one step up from a street vagrant with his unshaven cheeks and disheveled hair. He turned, ready to ask Adelaide for help, but decided not looking like himself might be for the best. Angry pet owners couldn’t accost him in the street if they didn’t recognize him.
“My dear, you can’t go home.”
“I must.”
“The police have the place surrounded.”
“Why?”
“To keep the populace from burning the place down.”
His heart pounded so hard he heard the pulse in his ears. The thought of Loren, waiting all alone, with only a half-bottle of whisky and a small plate of sandwiches to sustain him? No. He had to retrieve him. If something happened and he was trapped inside, Frankenstein would never forgive himself.
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