by John Kessel
The orchestra finished the song with a flourish, and the ladies and gentlemen swirled to a stop, bowed to one another while catching their breath, and applauded. The gentlemen escorted the ladies to their seats. Conversation hummed. Mary looked back at where Frankenstein had stood, but he was no longer there.
The second dance was called, and couples moved onto the floor to take their positions. Mary still did not see Frankenstein. The musicians began to play, the couples to dance. It was too late to join now. Still he did not appear.
Mary was surprised how defeated this left her. Her emotions had been touched more than she could have imagined. She felt angry, but also worried. Had her prying into his sadness driven him away?
After the end of the dance, Mr. Clerval came through the crowd to where the Bennets sat. “Excuse me, Miss Bennet?” he said to Mary.
“Yes.”
“You danced earlier with my friend Victor. Have you seen him about since then? Have any of you seen him?”
“He was there some minutes ago, before this dance,” Mary said.
“Is something amiss?” Mrs. Bennet asked.
“I seem to have lost him. Perhaps he has gone to the card room. Thank you.”
Clerval left.
The ball continued. Dance followed dance: quadrilles, reels, a minuet, the Boulanger. Though Kitty danced most of the dances, and spoke with several gentlemen, Mr. Sidwich paid her no additional attention; he seemed to be engaged in intimate conversation with a dark-haired young woman in a rich purple dress, a Miss Elphinstone from Bath.
Victor Frankenstein did not appear again, and Henry Clerval left shortly before the great clock at the end of the room struck twelve.
The cold March rain was still falling when, well after midnight, they left the ball. They waited under the portico while the coachman brought round the carriage. Kitty began coughing, her breath clouding the chilly air.
As they stood there, Mary noticed a hooded man, very tall, standing in the shadows at the corner of the lane. Full in the downpour, unmoving, he watched the town house and its guests without coming closer or going away, as if this observation were all his intention in life.
FOUR
Through the window of the town house, looking out on the storm, I saw him. He stood in the street at the end of the block, full in the rain, not much more than a shadow in the dim light. I could not see his face, but his size and his absolute stillness were unmistakable.
My mind was immediately out there, with him, while my body remained standing, well-dressed, at a ball in fashionable London. I hung suspended, the blood trickling through my veins, listening to the music of the orchestra behind me, the swish of dresses and tap of shoes on the dance floor, the buzz of conversations.
But only for a moment. While the music still played, I slipped quietly past the conversing men and women, the chaperones, the servants, the dancers, and out of the room. I found the cloakroom occupied by two chatting footmen. As I entered, the older one stood.
“May I help you, sir?”
“I would like my overcoat and hat.”
While he went to retrieve my coat, I asked the other, “Is there a way out of the house other than the front door? One that does not give onto the square?”
“There’s the servants’ entrance, sir. But I don’t believe—”
“Show me the way.”
The other returned with my hat and coat. I followed the footman down a hall and two flights of stairs, through a door, a turn into a narrow passageway, past a busy kitchen, to an exterior door at the end of the hall. He unlatched it. “There’s no cabs on the street at this hour, sir. Shall I go round to the front to fetch you one?”
“No.” I gave him a shilling. “By no means say anything to anyone. You never saw me.”
I opened the door on the pounding rain. Two stone steps led to a narrow, deserted street. I closed the door behind me and strode off, away from the square. The rain bounced off my shoulders and under my collar, glinting silver where it splattered on the cobblestones. Water flowed in the gutters.
How had he managed, with no allies or resources, to come all this way and find me in the midst of one of the largest cities in Europe? His capabilities were frightening.
It had been more than six months since I had agreed to create a mate for him, and in that time I had made no progress. I had scarcely addressed the matter.
During our months in London, I had managed to add some new chemicals and a Cruickshank battery to the equipment that I had brought from Geneva. But the longer I had gone without seeing the wretched thing, the easier it had been for me to fancy that he had drowned, or been killed or imprisoned somewhere on the long way from Geneva to Rotterdam.
One glimpse of his monstrous form had dispelled this delusion.
How long had he been observing me? Did he know where Clerval and I stayed? Perhaps if I hurried to the hotel, I might throw my clothing into a portmanteau and leave before he realized I was no longer at the ball. But even if I found a horse at midnight and stole away unseen, my leaving Henry risked exposing him to the Creature’s rage. And where would I go?
I wandered the streets through most of the night, afraid to return to the inn, afraid to flee. Eventually the rain let up and a wind blew away the clouds. Down Oxford Street I could see the moon, a day or so past full, hanging above the buildings in the cold night air. The rain that washed the gutters and the wind that chilled my cheeks had for the moment carried away the stench of the city. The fine shops of New Bond Street were dark. No reputable person was abroad.
I circled over to Albemarle Street and stood in front of the Royal Institution, where, a month earlier, I had spoken with a number of prominent physiologists and chemists about Davy’s Chemical Agencies of Electricity. Electricity: the fire of heaven, the spark that lit the mind. Davy had managed to create light by passing electricity through two carbon rods, but I knew from experience the union of electricity and light.
A blast of such light had started it all—a blinding glare that had changed my life. In the yard beside our house near Belrive had stood a huge old oak. Henry and I used to climb it when we were boys. We would pretend we were knights lost in Arabia, hiding from the Saracens, learning the secrets of the Eastern magical arts.
When I was fifteen, a violent thunderstorm came over the mountains. Even at a distance, the lightning and thunder of this storm were beyond any I had ever experienced. Bolts of fire shot between midnight-black clouds; when I closed my eyes, their blue image lingered. Wind whipped the leaves of the great oak, shaking its limbs, yet there came no rain. The storm exhilarated me. From the back door of the house I watched the spectacle, awestruck by the power of nature. As I stood there, a geyser of light surged out of the ground, meeting a torrent from above in an explosion that threw me from my feet.
The warm hand of my father on my breast called me back to my senses. “Victor. Victor,” he repeated softly.
“Father.”
He held me tightly. For the moment I was blind. My ears rang. When my eyes recovered, and my father helped me to my feet, I saw that, but for a blasted stump and some smoke that burned the charged air, the oak had vanished. In the morning, my father and I examined the site and found it strewn with thousands of narrow ribbons of wood six to ten inches long, no wider than two fingers.
When I asked my father the source of this almost unbelievable power, he replied, “Electricity.”
Later he explained what little was known of this element. We repeated Franklin’s experiment that drew electricity down from the skies. My imagination rushed ahead. Should a man ever control this power, he might someday hurl thunderbolts like Jove himself.
Thus I set my foot on the road that has led to my present misery.
The dawn rose between London’s buildings. The air warmed, and the sky was spotlessly clear, promising the first truly springlike day of the year.
By this time I had found my way to the Mall and St. James’s Park. The dripping trees were beginning
to bud, and the breeze blew ripples across the surface of the canal. The city was waking. I looked across the Carlton House Gardens to the home of the British prince regent, famous for his debaucheries. Had he committed any crimes equal to mine?
But this self-recrimination served no purpose. My flight from the ball had been ill considered. To have it confirmed that the Creature followed me was a blow, but no matter how monstrous he was, how subject to passion, he was a reasoning being. If he killed me, he would never get what he wanted. To the degree then that he believed I would fulfill my promise, I had power over him.
His revealing himself in that way was not an accident. He wanted me to see him—as a reminder of my task, and as a threat. If the thing was to be believed, he had suffered a great deal with extreme patience, but I could not know how far that patience would extend, for he had also told me how much he hated humankind. To be rid of him I must apply myself to the work of fashioning him a mate.
I made my way back to Piccadilly and Dorant’s Hotel. Shopkeepers were opening their establishments; servants swept the street before their masters’ town houses, a brewer’s cart made its way to the inn’s stable yard.
When I entered our rooms, Clerval started up from the chair where he had been dozing. “Thank God, Victor!” he said. “I’ve been worried to death.”
“Not to death, I hope.”
“Where have you been?”
“I’ve been walking,” I said, taking off my sodden coat. I sat in an armchair and pulled off my boots. “I have had enough of London, Henry. There is work that I must attend to, studies I must pursue that I have let idle too long. It is time we moved on to Oxford.”
“That’s all you have to say? I turned the ball upside down looking for you. I made a fool of myself before any number of the other guests.”
“Henry, since we’ve been here, you’ve been to dozens of plays, concerts, dinners, card parties, and balls. I’m sorry that I ruined this one for you, but I had a very good reason for leaving as I did.”
“Did it have something to do with that woman you danced with—Miss Bennet? I can’t say that she struck me as well favored.”
“There is more to her than a pretty face.” Miss Bennet had asked whether I had confided in Henry, as if she knew that I had not. She would no doubt have recommended I take this opportunity to unburden myself to him. “My leaving had nothing to do with her. It has to do with the fact that I am getting no work done. I need to visit Oxford.”
“But I’ve made friends here.” Henry studied me warily, watching for my reaction.
What were his friends to me? “You may correspond with your friends. We may stop in London on our way back home. If they are true friends, they may visit you in Geneva.”
Henry looked wounded. He slumped back into his chair.
I mastered my exasperation. “Henry, I am sorry that I left the party without telling you. That was wrong of me, and I hope you will accept my sincere apology. You have been a brother to me since we were seven years old. You know that no man means more to me than you.”
I rested my hand on his shoulder. He did not look up.
“You always knew that we would move on,” I continued. “I say it is time to do so. Whether you are with me or not, I will not sleep another night in this hotel.”
He looked up, and our eyes met for a moment. “I accept your apology. Yes, let us go. But only if we stop in Windsor along the way.”
I agreed, and Henry wrote to our lodgings in Oxford to let them know that we would be arriving in four days. We bought tickets for the mail coach leaving at five that afternoon. I had the hotel porter retrieve my equipment from the hotel’s storeroom. We packed our things. Henry begged my leave to say good-bye to some friend he had met at one of the parties. I encouraged him to do so, and he promised to return by three in the afternoon.
As he left the inn, and for some time afterward, I watched from our window, expecting to see the Creature. I paced the room, and then bestirred myself to write my father a letter full of pleasantries, telling him of our move to Oxford. I went down to a coffeehouse and ate a hasty meal. Henry returned in the afternoon. By the evening, our equipage was loaded onto the coach and we departed London with the driver, the liveried Royal Mail guard, and three other passengers—two inside with us and one riding above.
Henry’s spirits had risen. I had always taken advantage of his good nature, and he had always offered it to me. However abruptly we were leaving London, he looked forward to our further travels.
The coach made its way through London’s West End, past the former town house of the Duke of Buckingham and through the city’s environs. Cobbled streets gave way to roads still sodden from the rains. Though the road was well kept, the lurching of the coach left no chance for me to doze after my sleepless night, but the evening breeze that came through the windows was a welcome relief from the fetid city air.
Henry’s good mood did not endure past the setting of the sun. Despite the presence of the other passengers—Mr. and Mrs. Wilton, the man in a severe black coat and the woman in an unadorned bonnet—Henry said, in French, “Victor, I hope you will not mind my putting an observation to you.”
I replied in the same tongue. “What is it?”
“I know the grief that William’s death and Justine’s loss have brought you. No man of feeling could easily put aside such tragedies. It was my fervent hope—and your father’s, Ernest’s, and Elizabeth’s—that the change of scene might help you to lift your eyes from the past and open the future to you. Yet for the entirety of our time in London you stayed shut up in your room, when you were not buying some books, or some chemicals, or seeking out some dry professor.”
“I have researches I wish to pursue.”
“You called us brothers. We have not been so for a long time. Those bonds began to weaken on the day you went off to Ingolstadt. For two years we heard nothing of you. Your communications, when they came at all, varied from hysterical excitement to a few fatigued jottings. I worried. When I was finally sent to see you, I found you on the brink of the complete collapse that immediately followed.”
“For your rescue of me, Henry, I will be grateful as long as I live.”
“Why, then will you not let me rescue you now? This return to your scientific pursuits destroys your tranquility, rather than restoring it. You are descending into another abyss. I reach out my hand to pull you up. Won’t you grasp it?”
I was moved, and ashamed of how little consideration I had devoted to Henry. I had seen him as engrossed in trivialities, happy in his optimism, and envied the bright future that doubtless awaited him.
“I am sorry, Henry. There is much in what you say.”
“So tell me what it is that weighs upon you. And do not say it is the death of William. All this began before anything happened to William.”
My mind cast about for something to say that was not a lie. “It is the way that William died that troubles me.”
“That Justine murdered him? But here lies another mystery. I observed you throughout her trial. You insisted that she was innocent, despite the evidence against her.”
“She was innocent. Do you think she could have strangled William for the bauble that hung around his neck? You knew her as well as I. It is inconceivable.”
“We all believe her innocent. But your reaction was different. You were tortured by the accusations against her. It seemed to me that you protested her innocence so strongly because you knew something about the matter that none of the rest of us knew. I think that still. So—please, Victor—why won’t you tell me, your oldest and dearest friend, the man who saved your life and nursed you back to health when you collapsed in Ingolstadt, what you know?”
By this time Mr. and Mrs. Wilton had become silent as mice.
“Henry, I don’t wish to speak of any of this. Certainly not under these circumstances.” I tilted my head slightly in the direction of our fellow passengers. “If we keep on speaking French, these people will think we ar
e spies.”
Henry peered at the Wiltons in the dim light. “You say this is scientific research,” he continued in English. “We carry boxes of equipment with us, and still you purchase more. What do you hope to discover? Some new element? Some chemical device? A new battery?”
“It’s not a matter that I can explain simply. And it has the gravest consequences. If you only knew the risks involved—”
“In a new battery?”
I drew back. In a clipped voice I said, “No. Not a new battery.”
“Good. Because I must tell you that whatever it is you pursue, it does your mind, your soul—and your company, for that matter—no good. Solitude only deepens your melancholy. If you care at all for yourself, or for me, you will make more of an effort to engage with the world. You say yourself that this is what you need.”
“I came with you to Lord Henry’s ball.”
“And ran away in the middle of it as if pursued by ghosts. I think Miss Bennet must have said something to you. I saw you in conversation with her. You were completely engaged—more than you have been with me at any time in the last two months.”
“I should think you had enough company to occupy you.”
“None that I would prefer to yours.”
I sighed.
“Well, you have nothing to worry about, Henry. Your only rival for my attentions is, as you guessed, a new battery.”
Henry retreated into silence. I looked out the window. The driver had lit the coach’s lamps. Under the big moon I saw neat fields bound by hedges, and, in the distance, what must be the forests of Windsor.
Mr. Wilton said to his wife, “So, my love, shall we have some supper when the coach stops to change horses?”
We spent two days in Windsor and then moved on to Oxford, where we would remain for a month. Our itinerary was in one sense set, though subject to alteration should events require. From Oxford we would proceed to Matlock in Derbyshire, thence to Cumberland and Westmorland, and eventually to Scotland, where we had an invitation to stay with a friend, Dr. Marble, in Perth. It was my intention to separate from Henry there and continue to some remote place where I might set up my equipment and begin the delicate process of creating a bride for the monster.