Frankenstein's Monster (17 page)

“If a dog wandered in, would you at least not treat it kindly?” I asked, hanging on to a pew. “It does not realize it offends, after all.”

“I’m sorry. I spoke too brusquely.”

He quickly moved to my side and opened the door to the pew so I could sit. I had to twist my body to get into it and even then sat with my knees squashed up to my chin. But the
seat was steady where my legs were not. I had walked too far too soon.

“I’m truly glad you have recovered,” Graham said, sitting in the pew ahead of me.

“Are you?” I asked. His eyes were swollen and red. Had he wept on my account? “You have been agonizing over what to do. My death would have forestalled such a decision.”

His cheeks flamed. “I wish no harm to any man.”

“But you don’t think I am a man.” I felt as if, during my long black sleep, my mind had been considering the same question. “Then what am I? Someone at the party said I was the new Adam. Am I a new type of man?”

“A new species?” He shook his head. “God made everything once and perfectly at Creation. If matter developed on its own …” The sentence was too dreadful to finish.

“This
matter,” I said, gesturing to myself, “did not develop on its own. I was created by a man.”

“You may be no more than a machine.” Graham turned away at the lie. “The Luddites destroyed machines they said would replace us. What would they have done with you and your like?”

“There is nothing to fear on that account. I’m the only one. But what am I? Do I have a soul? You must decide.”

He stared up at the cross as if waiting for his God to answer him. At last I could no longer watch his suffering. I gently touched his shoulder. He flinched.

“If you cannot decide,” I said tiredly, “can you at least give me a little bread? Even an animal needs to be fed.”

“Yes, of course.”

He brought me soup and bread; also a book of prayers, although he set it down without speaking of it. Perhaps he thought it would be sacrilege to proselytize an animal and so left it up to me to convert myself. I took the book with weary greed.

The days since I was attacked have passed as a blur: my vision, my insight, has been blinded. I have set down the incidents here, writing quickly in case my mind becomes again disordered, but I find no relief. Sometimes words are merely something to be rid of, like washing hands of filth.

Beneath my pain and confusion simmers black rage at Winterbourne. I burn with rancor. His rejection is far worse than the hate others have always shown me; he taunted me with something I had never before felt: hope. I want to rip him apart for being falsely kind. I want to ravage his world and all those he cherishes.

Graham has decided nothing about my nature, or nothing he would reveal.

Day by day I grow stronger; day by day, more agitated. I have moved into an upper room in the church. The sexton cleans only that which can be seen: both the upper room and its loft overlooking the nave have been neglected for years. His negligence benefits me.

Now that I have occupied the church, I know more of the town’s business. Besides the conversation from the street below, I hear gossip from the sexton, who is also the town apothecary. For him, each medicinal has a dark meaning, which he gladly interprets as one of the seven deadly sins. This one was in for a bromide of ground seashells—gluttony! That one, a poultice for his son’s infected back—anger!

Although Graham tries to silence him, he also prattles on about the stable boy’s murder. It is a favorite topic in town. The Patchwork Man is real! It stalks the night! Hurry home! Lock your doors! But even that may not be enough.…

After the sexton left this morning, Graham climbed the staircase and, fixing his eyes on me in an unwavering gaze, said, “Swear to me, for I must hear it from you again: are you indeed innocent of this murder?”

“I do swear it. I would have you believe me with certainty, and then share that certain belief with Winterbourne. I … I am innocent.”

“You hesitate.”

What should I say? Graham is a public proclamation for a religion that swings erratically between forgiveness and condemnation.

But truth has value in itself.

“Of
this
murder I am guiltless,” I admitted at last. “But other blood stains my hands. More would have, had not circumstances intervened.”

“Shall I tell Mr. Winterbourne that as well?” Graham asked sharply, my response obviously not the one he wanted. A new Adam? I had already fallen and been expelled from Eden.

“Everything I did, however wrong, I believed necessary to protect myself.”

Without meeting my eyes, Graham crept back down the stairs.

It is done and it cannot be undone; I have had my revenge after all.

So much to set down that I will run out of ink!

Late afternoon, a carriage was driven into the churchyard. Spying from the loft, I saw Winterbourne alight. He hurried into the church.

“Graham!”

No matter how enraged my earlier thoughts, they melted to nervous optimism. Perhaps here, in this place he must hold sacred, Winterbourne would at least listen to me.

The reverend hurried in. Winterbourne seized him by the arm.

“I must discuss a matter of urgency,” he said.

Glancing toward the loft, Graham led him out of the church and beyond earshot. At first he listened, but soon he was shaking his head vehemently. Winterbourne tightened his grip and would not let him go. Words poured out on each side. At last, the reverend nodded curtly, pushed him aside, and with obvious distress ran back into the church. Winterbourne followed.

“Speak no more of it!” Graham yelled, again glancing upward. “I’ve agreed under the strongest of protests, but I won’t hear another word! Wait while I gather what I need.”

“You need nothing. Come with me this second.”

Would Graham not take at least a moment to speak on my behalf? My thoughts must have been forceful, for he addressed Winterbourne more civilly.

“One moment, sir. Surely you can wait one moment more.”

“What is it?” Winterbourne asked impatiently.

“I heard that you attacked the Patchwork Man, as he called himself.”

“That vile thing?” Winterbourne’s brow darkened, almost as with blood, and his voice grew harsh. “After all these years, I am finally sympathetic to my brother-in-law’s obsession.”

No! I clutched the railing of the loft.

Graham turned to the altar, to the cross, and spoke softly: “I found him in the woods that night, gravely wounded. I … aided in his escape.”

“Are you mad?”

“Sir, remember that you are in church. I assisted him because he swore he was innocent.”

“If this thing is capable of murder, Reverend, surely it’s capable of lying.”

“I believed what he told me. Also, I believe he … is a man.”

I pressed my forehead to the railing, shuddering with the desire to weep. Graham’s voice held both his belief in me as well as something of the price he paid for it, exacted from his religion.

Winterbourne breathed hard with anger, too furious to speak; breath by breath, his reaction bled me of all gratitude and replaced it with hatred. The reverend continued: “The creature—I mean, Mr. Hartmann—wanted me to tell you he is innocent. And if I myself came to believe it, he wanted me to tell you that as well.”

“Mercy has made you a damned fool!” Winterbourne said. He grabbed his arm and dragged him through the door. “But fool or not, this day you’ll play your part for me.”

By the time I ran to the window, Graham had shaken himself loose, run to the sexton, and whispered into his ear. The man’s eyes grew round with wonder. Winterbourne pushed the minister into his carriage. At once the sexton ran into the street, gossiping with each person who passed.

I wore down the floorboards with pacing, besieged by wrath, humiliation, comfort, puzzlement.

Nearly two hours later, the sexton at last entered the church. Bloodlust clouding my eyes, I jumped over the railing and grabbed him from behind.

“What is Graham’s business with Winterbourne?” Had Lily’s health worsened that quickly they had called for the reverend? When the sexton did not answer, I squeezed tighter till his eyes bulged. “Tell me.”

“Wedding … Miss Winterbourne … Stuart Hawkins.”

Lily married? My prize danced a little farther beyond my reach. Just weeks ago Winterbourne had spoken about “any man” with whom he might arrange a match. Now there was a groom.

“Who’s Hawkins?” I asked.

The sexton could not answer. I loosened my arm.

“Has money. Does this and that. Import and export. Some whaling. Shipbuilder. Why, you never saw so strange a sight as a frigate sailing down a cobbled street on its way to the—”

I tightened my arm to shut him up.

“Matches are made every day,” I said. “Why does this one cause so much gossip?”

“Hasty weddings cause talk.”

“Hasty?”

“This evening. No banns, no license. Extreme poor health.”

Would Lily not live the three weeks to announce the banns?

“If Miss Winterbourne is so ill,” I asked, “why bother marrying?”

“Miss Winterbourne?” The sexton talked boldly, perhaps thinking gossip would earn him freedom. “It’s Hawkins who won’t last, what with him being old enough to be her father and coughin’ up blood. They’ll get the license afterward and pray he lives that long.”

“How does marriage benefit
him?”
I asked.

“He’ll die happy. Maybe even get an heir. Doesn’t take but the once.”

Gritting my teeth, I stifled him.
Get an heir?
So, no one knew of Lily’s illness.

“How does this benefit Winterbourne?” I asked, relaxing my arm again.

“His property’s entailed. If the daughter becomes Mrs. Hawkins, she needn’t fear ruin when Winterbourne dies. Nor
need his wife fear it. He’s just seein’ to his duties. He made Hawkins change his will first. The price of flesh.”

The price of flesh
. The words incensed me. I squeezed the sexton’s neck until his struggles became annoying, then let him drop to the floor. I paced up and down the church’s center aisle.

“Winterbourne,” I complained, “has caused me more pain than anyone in existence, with the exception of his brother-in-law. More so! Walton never deceived me. But this man invited me into his house—only to attack me!”

“Such injustice,” the sexton agreed, wheezing from my last assault, but all the while crawling away. “You do not deserve to be ill treated.”

“I swear, I will have my revenge after all!” I cried. “I was a fool to put it off.”

The sexton was nearly at the door. I grabbed him by the feet and yanked him back. He squealed over and over till I slapped him into silence. Propping him up against the base of the pulpit, I held his sweaty face so that he might at last look at me.

“Why are you leaving?” I asked. “You have to prepare the church for the wedding.”

“The wedding isn’t here.” His quavering voice once more broke into that piglike squeal. I raised my hand; he clapped his own against his mouth. “Do not kill me,” he whispered from behind his fingers.

“Give me no cause to do so. Where is the wedding?”

“The Winterbournes’ private chapel.”

A single blow rendered him senseless.

The chapel’s stained-glass windows, lit from within, were vibrant against the black sky. Although the small building was attached to the house, it sat at the end of its own drive leading through the grounds. Even with the ceremony’s haste, there
were guests, perhaps the result of the sexton’s gossip. Horses were tethered nearby to iron stanchions, their carriages still engaged, but only two of their drivers stood by.

I circled round from the far side. The chapel had double wooden doors with a great ringed handle on each. The iron circles rattled as one of the doors opened and a servant with a lantern emerged from within. He set the lantern between himself and the two drivers.

“It was faster’n lightnin’ to get ’em into the church,” the servant said. “Now it’s slower’n a snail to get ’em out. I never saw such prayin’ in my life.”

“Still, they’ll run outta breath sometime,” said one driver. “And I want my chance to eat before that. Go call Tim and Charlie and the others back from the kitchen. It’s their turn to watch the horses.”

The servant took the lantern and headed toward the main house.

“And hurry,” called the other driver. “They’ve had time enough to eat three times over.”

Silently I moved from the shadows. My presence made the horses skittish, which distracted the men. In just seconds I dragged their unconscious bodies to the side. I kicked at one of the empty stanchions till it loosened and then yanked it from the ground. When I hefted it, its weight as a bludgeon was satisfying. I shouldered it like a club and entered the chapel.

The first set of double doors led into a dark vestibule. Seeing a second set of doors, I set my eye at the crack.

Lily wore a white lace dress and veil, with a jeweled barrette in her hair that caught the candlelight. Next to her stood a slight, sickly man who leaned heavily on a cane. The ceremony was over. Margaret was congratulating the groom, although her movements were jerky and fearful. Winterbourne’s face
wore a peculiar smile. The crafty hawk was pleased. He had married off his daughter, done his duty, all the while successfully deceiving the man, as he deceived me.

But Lily! Her pale cheeks and fever-harsh eyes had been replaced by ineffable beauty. What cruel illness could paint so lovely a portrait? My anger thickened. No matter how Lily had teased me with intimate talk, I could never rightfully purchase such a prize. I did not have the price of flesh. Her husband could take from her by law what I could take only by violence—even though he and I were both corpses.

As if to agree, Hawkins was gripped by a terrible cough that wracked his body and stained his handkerchief. Graham, Winterbourne, and Margaret at once turned to help. Ignoring both the choking noises behind her and the good wishes offered on both sides, Lily walked away from the altar toward the closed double doors.

Yes, I thought, still peering through the crack, a more able bridegroom awaits you here. With growing hunger I gazed on her as she approached. When she was a few yards away, I burst through the vestibule doors. Men leapt up, some to flee, some to do battle. Matrons shrieked. Margaret fainted.