The Frankenstein Papers

by Fred Saberhagen

  "What? What did you say?" Freeman was crouching at my side, as I moved on to the next rope. His voice was a whispered agony; some of the soldiers had come into plain sight now, and were looking in our direction. There was a closer outcry as some of the workers realized that we should not be doing what we were doing.

  "I said, we need a vehicle. Jump for that basket, now!" Freeman jumped, and vanished headfirst into the wicker work. I had to smash in the face of a worker who thought we should be stopped. I could only hope that the great bursting gas-bag was indeed capable of lifting two men, one twice the normal weight; but there did not seem to be many other options from which to choose.

  I, reaching out from inside the basket, quickly sliced the remaining ropes. At some risk I tore loose the hose of rubberized fabric that was still conducting hydrogen to the balloon. Instantly we were ascending, the lights of torch and bonfire dropping silently away below. There rose after us a great outcry of human voices and even a gunshot or two, that must have been badly aimed. In another moment we could see the uncountable window lights of the great city, also falling lower and lower beneath, our feet.

  It is a small basket to which we cling, barely large enough to contain us both. I wonder who were the intrepid aeronauts whose glory—whose transportation, at least—we have stolen?

  The winds at our present altitude, which I estimate at between three and four thousand feet, are bearing us in a stately fashion to the east, which fortunately is the direction that I desire to go. Dawn overtook us shortly after our ascent. We will be plainly visible to hundreds, thousands of people; and I have no doubt that our enemies on the ground will be able to carry out an effective pursuit as soon as they can recover from what must have been the stunning effect of our escape.

  Freeman of course has been overcome, since the beginning of our ascent, with the ecstasy of it all. He has never imagined that such a thing might be possible. But I—how can I analyze my own reactions? I am delighted to be in this balloon, and I do not believe that I have ever been in any similar vehicle before—no, I do not believe so—yet I am not astonished, either by the flight itself, or the magnificence of the view which it provides. The appearance of the earth from our unnatural elevation is something that, for me, trembles on the threshhold of familiarity.

  The experience seems natural and not natural at the same time. Is it possible that my brain was once that of a mountaineer?

  And at the same time, my thoughts are occupied on quite another level, still trying to understand what happened during my encounter with Mesmer. What did I really cry out, and in what language? Is it possible, possible at all, that I might actually be the peasant called Big Karl?

  Freeman, when we first discussed the possibility, quickly pointed out the absurdities that such an identification would entail. What peasant, to begin with, could possibly know all the languages that I can speak?

  My body of course might be, for all I know, that of Big Karl, my brain that of someone else entirely. Is it conceivable that the body, in mesmeric trance, remembers its right name even when its original brain is gone, and is able to communicate that knowledge with a shout?

  And, as always, there is the mystery of my face. I still have no idea whose that can be. No one's, probably, but mine. Some mistake by Frankenstein, that he was always too secretive to acknowledge.

  From the start of our flight, I had some idea that the air would grow colder as we rose higher, and such has proved to be the case. A suspicion has crossed my mind as well that the air will eventually prove too thin to breathe, if we rise high enough; but it seems after all that we shall not have to worry about that on this little trip. The bag is of some crudely rubberized cloth fabric, and I am sure it must be leaking. We are already beginning a descent. I pray it does not become too precipitous; there is little or nothing available for us to throw out to lighten ship.

  Later_There are clouds—I think they are clouds and not hills or mountains—off on the horizon to the south, and Freeman is determined to believe that they may be the Alps. He is permanently awestricken, it seems, and I have a hard time getting him to concentrate on what seems to me more important.

  "Freeman, exactly what did I say when Mesmer had cast me into that extraordinary state? Was there anything else, besides those two words that might have been a name?"

  But he is unable or unwilling even to try to think about it just now. Every minute—and we have been aloft for hours, the day is well advanced_he is still pointing out some new marvel.

  The roads below us and behind us now lie in full sunlight, and I scan them for evidence of the King's cavalry, or whatever other pursuers there may be. So far I can detect no sign of our enemies below, and I am somewhat heartened.

  I do see peasants in the fields below, interrupting their early morning labors to point upward at us and gesticulate. Work stops altogether as we pass, and many little figures go running off to spread the news. There will be plenty of witnesses to tell our pursuers which way we are drifting.

  Later_We came down, sooner than I had hoped we would, and rather hard, though fortunately on nothing harder than a plowed field. There was an incident of peasants and pitchforks. We were fortunate to get away unscathed; and the balloon, taken for some kind of demonic messenger, was attacked and totally destroyed. My last glimpse of the scene, as my friend and I vanished over an adjoining hilltop in a stolen farm wagon, showed a man who must have been the local priest, approaching the tattered ruin as if reluctantly, and well armed with holy water.

  On to Ingolstadt! I am now consumed with the idea that the answers I must have are to be found nowhere but there.

  Later_I have evolved a theory, but cannot decide if it is sane or not. Suppose that, somehow, Frankenstein's electric treatment not only restored life to what are now my brain and my body, but somehow altered me in both substance and appearance. So that now the personality and the body of Big Karl, along with those of one or more other contributors, still exist, but in an altered state, or each only intermittently or partially.

  Looking at the words after writing them down, my theory strikes me as utterly confused at best. If I were Frankenstein, I could explain it all by reference to the electric fluid. But to me that term explains nothing.

  Another thought: if I am Big Karl, entirely, then what happened to the dead body, or assemblage of dead bodies, that Frankenstein was attempting to animate on that November night? I remember seeing no such charnel exhibit in the room. Nor did Frankenstein and Clerval ever report seeing anything of the kind when they reentered the laboratory on the following morning.

  And what am I to make of Saville, that hard-headed man of business, and his oft-repeated solemn assurance that on that night he and Clerval had seen incontrovertible evidence of my creator's unqualified success? Saville would lie, of course, if he stood to gain by lying; but he was convincing when he said that he would not have staked his fortune and years of his life in pursuit of a goal whose basis remained to him unproven.

  But more and more I am convinced that I was not dead before that November night of lightning and of change. Whatever else may eventually be proved to be the truth, that at least has the ring, the feel of truth to me. I am not, I think, Frankenstein's creation after all; Franklin seemed doubtful that I could be. Then I am someone else…

  I remember—never shall I be able to forget—the awe with which Victor regarded me during that first daylight meeting between us, in the Bavarian forest. I look again at my own yellow skin, at the networked veins and tendons running underneath it. How could this body ever have been anything but what it is?

  And yet the same thing might be said of every human body. What magical transformations of growth, development, disease, decay, are worked in each of us by simple time and patient nature_how little we are able to understand any of these changes.

  Freeman and I are forging on our way, toward Ingolstadt and the nearby village where Big Karl is supposed to live. God grant that there the truth, or some substantial portion
of it, is waiting to be found.

  LETTER 12

  April 1,1783

  Bavaria—the vicinity of Big Karl's village

  Dear Father—

  I trust that you received my last letter, in which I gave, at some length, the particulars of our miraculous balloon adventure; at any rate, I am not going to repeat the details of that enterprise here, for there is fresh news of some importance to be told.

  I have success to report—and failure too. We have managed to learn something that may well have significance, and yet I fear that the whole situation regarding my companion's nature and his origins remains as unclear as it ever was.

  This village, where Big Karl was born and has lived most of his life, is just about as much of a backwater as you might expect. Or it would be, except for one circumstance. The proximity to the university town of Ingolstadt, where a number of them find employment, has rendered the inhabitants somewhat conversant with the great world. Since our arrival we have encountered two of the local clergy, both of whom at once assumed we had some connection with the university. I suspect that everyone in the village believes the same about us, and that as a result any oddities in our behavior are likely to be tolerantly overlooked.

  Since our arrival here we have asked everyone we meet about Big Karl. Apparently he has no immediate family. At least some of these people must know him well, but it would be hard to guess that from their answers. No one is willing to admit knowledge of Karl's present whereabouts, and all have difficulty recalling when and where they saw him last. One old woman, gazing up at my tall companion, took it for granted that he was some relative of Karl's; but when she was told that the visitor was "from the university" she immediately dismissed her earlier impression as absurd.

  One puzzling remark I have heard here was an allusion to "those marvelous boots—you know, Your Honor." And of course I didn't know, and don't. Nor has my tall friend the least idea of what the man who mentioned boots was talking about. The mysterious boots perhaps have something to do with the mysterious Grosser Karl, but what? What boots? Neither of us, to the best of our knowledge, have ever laid eyes on Karl, let alone any footgear he might have had in his possession.

  Later_Just now, talking to another man, we have stumbled over the boots again. He said: "I mean the ones that Karl was wearing, Your Honors, when he came home from Ingolstadt that time. They fit him so marvelously, and never wore out or leaked. I borrowed them from him once—had to pay to do it—and I hadn't worn them for half a day before they fit me as well as they had fit him when he had them on."

  At least I think that is what the last man was telling me; as you know, my German is imperfect. That of my companion is notably better, but even I can tell that his is an educated version of the language, and not the German that any of Big Karl's friends and relatives here are speaking.

  My friend has now, I think, given up entirely on the strange idea that he is really Karl himself, somehow transformed by electricity and the magic of the laboratory. We have encountered nothing here that would support that notion in the least. Now, when I try to press him on what he currently believes, his face clouds over and he shakes his great head in silence.

  By all reports Karl is a physically huge man, comparable in size to my friend—what we have seen of his relatives are all large people too—and is known for a certain cunning, and for his way of keeping his thoughts to himself until he judges that the proper time to act has come.

  But where is he now? No one here knows. Or, more likely, no one of these shrewd suspicious peasants is going to tell us, at least not until they have a better idea of why we are asking, what will happen to their fellow villager when he is found.

  We try our best to be reassuring on that score, but so far without result.

  I shall dispatch this letter through the Ingolstadt post when we reach that city, unless a better opportunity to send it off should present itself before then. And of course I will write you again, as soon as I have something new to report.

  Pray with me that the end of this maddening mystery may be somewhere in sight.

  In hopes,

  B. Freeman

  LETTER 13

  April 3,1783 Munich

  To: Victor Frankenstein, c/o Saville Enterprises, Paris

  From: Roger Saville

  My dearest Victor—

  I hasten to reply to your communication sent to me in care of my banker here in Munich. As for the absurd and poisonous suggestion you say you have received from "an eminent person now residing near Paris"—I can guess who that is—it does not really deserve an answer. But out of respect for your agitated state of mind, I hereby assure you that neither I nor any of my employees or associates had anything at all to do with the tragic deaths of your beloved Elizabeth, your brother William, or our dear friend Henry Clerval.

  With that calumny, I trust, disposed of, I must urge you as strongly as possible to give up this wild thought you say you have, of leaving Paris. Or, rather, do not leave that city for anywhere but London, where your laboratory and your work are waiting for you. I wish you had heeded my urgings to remain there; it was a mistake for you to come to Paris in the first place. You say that there are times when you despair of ever succeeding in your work; I answer that a great man like you must never speak of despair, you must put all such foolish thoughts entirely from your mind! We have, both of us, the best reasons in the world to expect renewed success from your labors, and that in the very near future. We have both seen, with our own eyes, the embodiment of your earlier success, walking about the world on two legs like a man.

  There, in my London house, my friend, inside your laboratory, is where your future (I might say all our futures) lies.

  On the other hand, there is certainly nothing at all that can be gained by your attempting to come on here. As for clearing the air between us, as you put it, I should hope that the atmosphere between two such fast friends cannot be poisoned by the maunderings of one old man, no matter how crafty and demoniacally clever he may be, no matter how much he may love to sow discord between friends, even as he has sown it between a mother nation and her colonies.

  But I have things of more importance to communicate.

  I urge you to leave to me the problem of recapturing the monster, and of dealing with the criminal agent Freeman. Whether the matter of the stolen aerostat can be hushed up, in the interests of peace, is to me a matter of indifference.

  We have not yet cornered Freeman and the fiend, but I am confident that we soon shall. That man, I insist, deserves whatever happens to him, while the unhappy creature of your creation will, as soon as he has given up rebellion, experience only kindness at my hands. I pledge you that I will show him every mercy that circumstances allow me to bestow.

  Some of the measures I contemplate against Freeman—and others—may seem stringent to you. That is due to the natural kindness of your heart, and your sweet unwillingness to see the evil of the world in its true blackness. I hope you are still confident that I have at heart only your welfare and that of the world at large (which has so often seemed to me ungrateful for both our contributions, your efforts at research, mine in spreading the blessed effects of commerce and civilization). There is a tone in your letter that implies I have sometimes acted only for personal gain, a tone that would wound me deeply, except that I know you are overwrought by prolonged strain and sharp personal tragedy.

  As for the book, that you have only lately taken the time to read in its entirety, I am sure that a moment's calm reflection will suffice to assure you that neither Captain Walton nor myself has ever had the slightest intention of portraying you or any member of your family in any light but the most truthful, and therefore the most complimentary. Those bungling editors, I assure you, shall be made to pay, for introducing falsehoods and exag-gerations on such a scale. I should not be at all surprised to discover that Franklin, the old bookseller and printer, was behind those machinations too.

  But all these difficulties, dear Vic
tor, lie properly in my sphere of activity and not in yours. How I wish, my dear friend, that I could persuade you not to waste your precious time upon these affairs of the world of sordid commerce and politics. Your domain is properly that of the spirit, and of the intellect; there you reign as monarch. We all look to you as to the father of the new age that is struggling to be born. The entire world_though in large part still unknowingly—awaits the additional marvels that you are going to create.

  Still, I hope you will allow me to leave such considerations, important as they are, aside for now, and proceed to the main purpose of my letter. It is to set your mind totally at ease regarding chances of your continued success in your most vital work—something you must never be allowed to doubt!

  Do you think, my friend, that I am an impractical man? My enemies have called me many things over the years, but never that. As sure as I am of your skill and your veracity, do you believe that I would have invested years of my life and thousands of my money, in pursuit of a scheme as impractical-sounding (I must be blunt) as yours? Would I have credited the claim of any man, even you, to be able to revive the dead, had I not the most unimpeachable evidence to support it—the witness of my own eyes and intellect?

  I purpose to set down here, for the first time, a true and complete account of what the circumstances were, that operated to convince me, absolutely and completely, that you did in fact accomplish exactly what you had claimed to do.

  As I have told you in the past, Henry Clerval (who alas is no longer able to speak to confirm my words) and I were both present on that fateful November night that saw the creature's animation. Not until now have I told you in detail exactly what we saw and heard. We had concealed ourselves among the branches of a large tree, the one that, you may remember, grew almost overhanging the sloping roof of Frau Bauer's lodging house. We were able to establish ourselves in such a position that, by looking into one window, we commanded the top of the front stair, and most of the length of the uppermost hall of the house. We also had the door to your laboratory in view, and at certain very important moments we were afforded glimpses into the very room where you had been conducting your experiments.