Monster

by Shane Peacock

  “Captain!” he shouts. But the old man doesn’t move.

  “He can’t help you!” booms a voice from the shore.

  Edgar turns and regards Godwin, walking very slowly toward the boat now. In a few seconds he will almost step onto the deck. Edgar is beside himself. What can he do? Where can he go? Flee!

  He runs to the bow of the boat and spots the big black harpoon, pointing out toward the ocean, long and iron and deadly. He can see it has been loaded and cocked, as if it were abandoned just as it was about to be fired. There is blood all over it and part of a human finger is glued to its surface, right near the trigger.

  “EDGAR!”

  It’s Lucy. She has run ahead of Jonathan and can see the scene about to unfold in front of her, but she is still a hundred feet away.

  Godwin turns toward her for an instant. As he does, Edgar seizes the explosive harpoon gun and swings it around on its swivel and, placing his finger right next to the severed one, squeezes the trigger.

  The harpoon takes flight like a rocket, exploding from the mechanism in a concussion that rocks the coastline and hisses directly at Percy Godwin as he is turned toward Lucy Lear. It is an unexpected sound and though the creature rotates back and reacts quickly, he’s too late. The whizzing harpoon sucks into him in the very center of his chest just below his throat and goes right through him, through his breastbone and out his back right next to the spine, the harpoon’s huge tip emerging on the other side, the barbs fully out, dripping red. It knocks him down and pins him to the earth.

  But he gets up. He reaches his arms over his shoulders, displacing them in a gruesome manner, and then pushes himself to his feet, the harpoon impaled in him, its attached rope, which had unwound like a spinning top, connecting him to the ship as if it were a tightrope.

  Lucy halts.

  “Excellent shot,” says Godwin. “Bravo!” Then he walks toward the boat.

  “EDGAR!” screams Lucy again. She runs toward them. Jonathan stops and lowers his forehead to Tiger’s and kneels down with her still motionless in his arms.

  Godwin is staggering, the harpoon that sticks out nearly three feet on either side of his chest disturbing his balance. He gets onto the deck and the force of his weight pushing against the boat shoves it away from the shore and it begins to float out into the fjord. The creature walks past the captain, turning toward the bow where Edgar awaits him with his eyes large. Brim cannot believe that Godwin is still alive. He sees the hag advancing across the water behind the boat, walking upon the surface.

  “I am designed too well,” says the monster, as though he has read Edgar’s mind. “I am perfect.”

  “No you aren’t,” says Edgar. He points toward Lucy, standing on the shore looking out at the boat with her hands held over her mouth. “You could never do what she did. I saw that it disturbed you.”

  Godwin hesitates. He is so close now that with another step he could reach out and strike his enemy. “I am an example of science at its zenith. I am the very incarnation of human progress.”

  “You have no soul,” says Edgar.

  “SHUT UP!” shouts the creature and he steps right up to Edgar. His horrific face is just a few feet away.

  “And you will never have one,” says Edgar Brim.

  Godwin halts. Edgar sees his face quiver. He stands there silent for a long while, and then a tear drops from a yellow eye. “But perhaps,” he says quietly, “I might make one.” He looks pleadingly at Edgar. “How…how would I do that?”

  “There is only one way,” says Edgar, “and it has nothing to do with science, though much to do with progress, but of an invisible sort. A soul cannot be quantified. There is no physical evidence of it. You do not make one. It is far more difficult than that.”

  “Tell me…please…and I will try.”

  “Do what she did,” says Edgar, and he nods in Lucy’s direction.

  Godwin looks over at her, then beyond her to Jonathan, slumping forward with the limp body of his beloved in his arms, and then back to Edgar. The boat is drifting farther out into the water. The monster nods his head pitifully and falls with a crash to his knees and sobs. The harpoon’s tip smacks against the deck and shakes him from head to foot. Then he rises again and steps toward the edge of the boat.

  “Could you tell me a joke first, a real joke, and see if I can laugh?”

  Edgar says nothing and they stand in silence facing each other for a moment. Then Godwin touches his head, running his hands along the scars on his skull and caresses his hideous face and looks down to his attached appendages.

  “Perhaps then, Mr. Brim, you might push me?”

  Edgar steps forward and shoves Percy Godwin overboard. He hits the frigid water with a huge splash, landing on his back. Edgar looks down upon him. The monster is staring back, his eyes wide open in his ghastly, man-made face. He gazes at Edgar as his body, attached to the heavy harpoon, sinks into the Arctic Ocean. Edgar remembers this creature hugging him, the terror in his eyes when he asked about a soul.

  “The sea here, right beneath this boat, is awfully deep too,” the captain had said. “I’ve heard tell it goes all the way to hell.”

  As Edgar watches those horrible eyes vanish, he hopes it isn’t true.

  Then he hears a groan. Over near the big hoist, the captain is stirring. Edgar slumps toward him, and by the time he gets there, the old man has gotten to all fours. He looks up at the boy.

  “It was a beast of the sea,” says the captain. “It came upon us suddenly, as if it were tracking us, as if it wanted revenge, the biggest one I have ever seen! It must have come up from somewhere far below the ocean floor. It sideswiped my ship, lad. It drove its nose into us and knocked several of my men overboard and then it thrashed its giant tail and sent others flying into masts and hoists and weapons, breaking bones and severing limbs. The blood was everywhere. My first mate, he loaded the harpoon, but it was as if this monster knew what he was doing! It came at him with his huge mouth wide and seemed to swallow him up!”

  “Calm yourself,” says Edgar. “You are safe now.”

  “It was pale in color,” shouts the captain. “I swear this whale was nearly white!”

  “We need to get home immediately. Can you take us?”

  “Young man, do you believe in the devil?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you think that the devil could rise up from the depths and take us to hell for our sins? For I believe that is what happened here. I ask you, do you believe in the devil?”

  Edgar looks toward the shore and sees Lucy standing there staring back at him with a longing look. Jonathan is now beside her. He has set Tiger on the rocks at their feet and is bending over her, his hands caressing her face. Edgar looks toward the bow of the boat and sees the hag crouching on the empty harpoon gun, leering back at him.

  Then a sound erupts out of the stillness of the gray arctic day. It is unearthly, louder than any animal could accomplish. It echoes over Spitsbergen and across the calm water like thunder from another world. It hadn’t seemed to come from anywhere.

  “What was that?” asks the captain, fear distorting his face.

  Edgar can hear little William Shakespeare back in that room on Drury Lane, apparently hopelessly mad and surrounded by his ghostly friends, telling him that Professor Lear killed the real Grendel, that they destroyed the vampire, and that if they kill this Frankenstein creature, something worse will come for them.

  Edgar looks toward the hag. She is gone. But he knows she is real.

  The horrible cry invades the silence again, filling the air around them.

  The captain squirms along the boards in the blood as if scrambling to get away from something, his teeth chattering.

  On the shore at Lucy and Jonathan’s feet, Tiger still doesn’t seem to be moving.

  What, thinks Edgar, could be worse?

  This second novel in The Dark Missions of Edgar Brim trilogy continues the exploration of a late-nineteenth-century boy who suff
ers from what we would call an anxiety disorder. He is trying to kill his fears, aided by companions with different approaches to the things that may or may not threaten us.

  In my attempt to tell a different and at times complicated sort of horror story, I was fortunate to have as an ally editor Lara Hinchberger, returning for a second time with insightful contributions and sympathetic ways that continued to be invaluable. Copyeditor Shana Hayes again helped us bring our work over the finish line, as did Peter Phillips. And Tara Walker lent her support again, not just as a driving force for the project and for Tundra Books and Penguin Random House, but as an expert in everything Mary Shelley. Jennifer Lum and Rachel Cooper have once more provided us with a stunning cover, a fitting successor to the much-praised first one.

  This novel, as was the first, is steeped in classic sensation and horror literature, so there are many authors and books to acknowledge. First is Edgar Allan Poe, who gave not just two parts of his name, but also his inimitable style and works to all of Edgar Brim. Of prime importance this time is the immortal Mary Shelley’s classic Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, and in companion with it The New Annotated Frankenstein by Leslie S. Klinger, whose remarkable work I have leaned on several times before. Miranda Seymour’s biography Mary Shelley helped make the great lady real. H.G. Wells actually appears in this book and several of his extraordinary creations—The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds and of course, in a starring role, The Island of Doctor Moreau—are featured. Michael Sherborne’s excellent biography, H.G. Wells: Another Kind of Life, greatly aided me as I tried to make the great man stand up and talk to my characters. Robert Louis Stevenson makes a quick appearance too, as does his extraordinary novel The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. James Pope-Hennessy’s biography of Stevenson was most certainly helpful as well.

  As always, I also want to thank my continuing companions in life, Sophie, Johanna, Hadley and Sam, fearlessly sticking by me as I make my way through another endeavor in that horrifying world of the arts.

  I look forward to the third Brim book. “What could be worse?” asks Edgar at the end of this novel as he contemplates the emergence of a third and final monster. We shall see.

  Praise for

  The Dark Missions Of Edgar Brim

  “Peacock weaves the frissons of classic Gothic horror into the reality of a culture entranced by its own dark creations. This thrilling historical mystery will have readers anxiously turning pages and checking under their beds.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “Peacock calls up the ghostly haunting atmosphere of the moors with graceful prose and quiet but vivid imagery…the portrayal of Edgar as a frightened, anxious boy and his growth into someone who acknowledges fear but doesn’t give in to it makes him an appealing hero, and his triumph over evil is sure to garner applause. The final chapter ensures there are more monsters to be caught and more books to come.”

  —Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books

  “The Dark Missions of Edgar Brim is good fun, loaded with thrills and discoveries, old journals and secret connections, hidden rooms, and mysterious, cloaked figures. By including real-life personalities from the period, such as Bram Stoker and celebrated actor Henry Irving, Peacock captures the feel of the late 19th century, and doesn’t neglect the shadows and fog so essential for a book of this sort.”

  —Quill and Quire

  “The Dark Missions of Edgar Brim is a thrilling story that includes fantastic gruesome imagery, moments of unexpected humour, and plenty of surprises.”

  —CM Magazine

  “The Dark Missions of Edgar Brim…is a creepy, action-packed adventure. Filled with references to classic horror stories, from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Premature Burial’, and, of course, Stoker’s Dracula, at times the novel feels like an enthusiastic homage to gothic fiction.”

  —National Reading Campaign

  THE DARK MISSIONS OF EDGAR BRIM

  Edgar Brim has suffered from nightly terrors since he was in his cradle, exposed to tales of horror by his novelist father. After the sudden death of his only parent, Brim is sent by his stern new guardian to a grim school in Scotland. There, his nightmares intensify and he is ridiculed for his fears. But years later, when sixteen-year-old Edgar finds his father’s journal, he becomes determined to confront his demons and his bullies. And soon the horrific death of a schoolmate triggers Brim’s involvement with an eccentric society that believes monster from famous works of literature are real.

  With the aid of an unusual crew of friends, Brim sets about on a dark mission—one that begins in a cemetery on the bleak Scottish moors and ends in a spine-chilling climax on the stage of the Royal Lyceum Theatre in London.

  Accolades and praise for Shane Peacock’s Boy Sherlock Holmes series:

  Finalist, Governor General’s Literary Award (Becoming Holmes)

  Winner, Arthur Ellis Award’s Best Juvenile / YA Crime Book (Eye of the Crow, Becoming Holmes)

  Winner, Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People (Vanishing Girl)

  Finalist, TD Canadian Children’s Literature Prize (Eye of the Crow, Death in the Air, The Dragon Turn)

  Winner, IODE Violet Downey Award (Eye of the Crow, Vanishing Girl)

  Honour Book, Canadian Library Association’s Book of the Year (Eye of the Crow, Vanishing Girl, The Secret Fiend)

  Shortlisted, Canadian Library Association’s Book of the Year (Death in the Air, The Dragon Turn, Becoming Holmes)

  Shortlisted, OLA Silver Birch Award (Eye of the Crow, Death in the Air)

  Junior Library Guild Selection (entire series)

  “Creative references to Doyle’s characters abound…and Sherlock himself is cleverly interpreted….[made] both fascinating and complex….plenty of readers will like the smart, young detective they find here, and find themselves irresistibly drawn into his thrilling adventures.”

  —Starred Review, Top Ten Crime Fiction for Youth, Booklist (Eye of the Crow)

  “The details of the plot are plausible, the pacing well timed, and the historical setting vividly depicted….On balance, the characters enrich the book and help give Holmes’s storied abilities credence.”

  —Starred Review, School Library Journal (Eye of the Crow)

  Shane Peacock has created…a thrilling, impeccably paced murder mystery. Peacock reveals the budding detective’s very real fears and insecurities, providing just enough detail about the young Sherlock’s methods to make him an entirely believable teenage precursor to the master detective. Peacock also neatly creates a sense of the bustle of Victorian London, making the squalid grunginess of the East End almost waft off the pages.”

  —Starred Review, Books of the Year 2007, Quill & Quire (Eye of the Crow)

  EYE OF THE CROW

  It is the spring of 1867, and a yellow fog hangs over London. In the dead of night, a woman is brutally stabbed and left to die in a pool of blood. No one sees the terrible crime. Or so it seems.

  Nearby, a brilliant, bitter boy dreams of a better life. He is the son of a Jewish intellectual and a highborn lady—social outcasts—impoverishment the price of their mixed marriage. The boy’s name is Sherlock Holmes.

  Strangely compelled to visit the scene, Sherlock comes face to face with the young Arab wrongly accused of the crime. By degrees, he is drawn to the center of the mystery, until he, too, is a suspect.

  Danger runs high in this desperate quest for justice. As the clues mount, Sherlock sees the murder through the eye of its only witness. But a fatal mistake and its shocking consequence change everything and put him squarely on a path to becoming a complex man with a dark past—and the world’s greatest detective.

  DEATH IN THE AIR

  Still reeling from his mother’s death, brought about by his involvement in solving London’s brutal East End murder, young Sherlock Holmes commits himself to fighting crime…and is soon immersed in another case. While visiting his father at wor
k, Sherlock stops to watch a dangerous high-trapeze performance, framed by the magnificent glass ceiling of the legendary Crystal Palace. But without warning, the aerialist drops, screaming and flailing to the floor. He lands with a sickening thud, just feet away and rolls almost onto the boy’s boots. He is bleeding profusely and his body is grotesquely twisted. Leaning over, Sherlock brings his ear up close. “Silence me…” the man gasps and then lies still. In the mayhem that follows, the boy notices something amiss that no one else sees—and he knows that foul play is afoot. What he doesn’t know is that his discovery will set him on a trail that leads to an entire gang of notorious and utterly ruthless criminals.

  VANISHING GIRL

  When a wealthy young socialite mysteriously vanishes in Hyde Park, young Sherlock Holmes is compelled to prove himself once more. There is much at stake: the kidnap victim, an innocent child’s survival, the fragile relationship between himself and the beautiful Irene Doyle. Sherlock must act quickly if he is to avoid the growing menace of his enemy, Malefactor, and further humiliation at the hands of Scotland Yard.

  As twisted and dangerous as the backstreets of Victorian London, this third case in The Boy Sherlock Holmes series takes the youth on a heart-stopping race against time to the countryside, the coast, and into the haunted lair of exotic—and deadly—night creatures.

  Despite the cold, the loneliness, the danger, and the memories of his shattered family, one thought keeps Sherlock going; soon, very soon, the world will come to know him as the master detective of all time.

  THE SECRET FIEND

  In 1868, Benjamin Disraeli becomes England’s first Jewish-born prime minister. Sherlock Holmes welcomes the event—but others fear it. The upper classes worry that the black-haired Hebrew cannot be good for the empire. The wealthy hear rumblings as the poor hunger for sweeping improvements to their lot in life. The winds of change are blowing.