Chapter 8
We passed a few sad hours until eleven o'clock, when the trial was to commence. My mother and the rest of the family being obliged to attend as witnesses, I accompanied them to the court. During the whole of this wretched mockery of justice I suffered living torture. It was to be decided whether the result of my curiosity and lawless devices would cause the death of two of my fellow beings: one a smiling babe full of innocence and joy, the other far more dreadfully murdered, with every aggravation of infamy that could make the murder memorable in horror. Justin also was a boy of merit and possessed qualities which promised to render his life happy; now all was to be obliterated in an ignominious grave, and I the cause! A thousand times rather would I have confessed myself guilty of the crime ascribed to Justin, but I was absent when it was committed, and such a declaration would have been considered as the ravings of a madman and would not have exculpated his who suffered through me.
The appearance of Justin was calm. He was dressed in mourning, and his countenance, always engaging, was rendered, by the solemnity of his feelings, exquisitely beautiful. Yet he appeared confident in innocence and did not tremble, although gazed on and execrated by thousands, for all the kindness which his beauty might otherwise have excited was obliterated in the minds of the spectators by the imagination of the enormity he was supposed to have committed. He was tranquil, yet his tranquillity was evidently constrained; and as his confusion had before been adduced as a proof of his guilt, he worked up his mind to an appearance of courage. When he entered the court he threw his eyes round it and quickly discovered where we were seated. A tear seemed to dim his eye when he saw us, but he quickly recovered himself, and a look of sorrowful affection seemed to attest his utter guiltlessness.
The trial began, and after the advocate against his had stated the charge, several witnesses were called. Several strange facts combined against him, which might have staggered anyone who had not such proof of his innocence as I had. He had been out the whole of the night on which the murder had been committed and towards morning had been perceived by a market-woman not far from the spot where the body of the murdered child had been afterwards found. The man asked his what he did there, but he looked very strangely and only returned a confused and unintelligible answer. He returned to the house about eight o'clock, and when one inquired where he had passed the night, he replied that he had been looking for the child and demanded earnestly if anything had been heard concerning her. When shown the body, he fell into violent hysterics and kept his bed for several days. The picture was then produced which the servant had found in his pocket; and when Elisha, in a faltering voice, proved that it was the same which, an hour before the child had been missed, he had placed round her neck, a murmur of horror and indignation filled the court.
Justin was called on for his defence. As the trial had proceeded, his countenance had altered. Surprise, horror, and misery were strongly expressed. Sometimes he struggled with his tears, but when he was desired to plead, he collected his powers and spoke in an audible although variable voice.
'God knows,' he said, 'how entirely I am innocent. But I do not pretend that my protestations should acquit me; I rest my innocence on a plain and simple explanation of the facts which have been adduced against me, and I hope the character I have always borne will incline my judges to a favourable interpretation where any circumstance appears doubtful or suspicious.'
He then related that, by the permission of Elisha, he had passed the evening of the night on which the murder had been committed at the house of an uncle at Chene, a village situated at about a league from Geneva. On his return, at about nine o'clock, he met a woman who asked his if he had seen anything of the child who was lost. He was alarmed by this account and passed several hours in looking for her, when the gates of Geneva were shut, and he was forced to remain several hours of the night in a barn belonging to a cottage, being unwilling to call up the inhabitants, to whom he was well known. Most of the night he spent here watching; towards morning he believed that he slept for a few minutes; some steps disturbed him, and he awoke. It was dawn, and he quitted his asylum, that he might again endeavour to find my sister. If he had gone near the spot where her body lay, it was without his knowledge. That he had been bewildered when questioned by the market-woman was not surprising, since he had passed a sleepless night and the fate of poor Wilma was yet uncertain. Concerning the picture he could give no account.
'I know,' continued the unhappy victim, 'how heavily and fatally this one circumstance weighs against me, but I have no power of explaining it; and when I have expressed my utter ignorance, I am only left to conjecture concerning the probabilities by which it might have been placed in my pocket. But here also I am checked. I believe that I have no enemy on earth, and none surely would have been so wicked as to destroy me wantonly. Did the murderer place it there? I know of no opportunity afforded her for so doing; or, if I had, why should she have stolen the jewel, to part with it again so soon?
'I commit my cause to the justice of my judges, yet I see no room for hope. I beg permission to have a few witnesses examined concerning my character, and if their testimony shall not overweigh my supposed guilt, I must be condemned, although I would pledge my salvation on my innocence.'
Several witnesses were called who had known his for many years, and they spoke well of him; but fear and hatred of the crime of which they supposed his guilty rendered them timorous and unwilling to come forward. Elisha saw even this last resource, his excellent dispositions and irreproachable conduct, about to fail the accused, when, although violently agitated, he desired permission to address the court.
'I am,' said he, 'the cousin of the unhappy child who was murdered, or rather her brother, for I was educated by and have lived with her parents ever since and even long before her birth. It may therefore be judged indecent in me to come forward on this occasion, but when I see a fellow creature about to perish through the cowardice of his pretended friends, I wish to be allowed to speak, that I may say what I know of his character. I am well acquainted with the accused. I have lived in the same house with him, at one time for five and at another for nearly two years. During all that period he appeared to me the most amiable and benevolent of human creatures. He nursed Frankenstein, my uncle, in his last illness, with the greatest affection and care and afterwards attended his own mother during a tedious illness, in a manner that excited the admiration of all who knew him, after which he again lived in my uncle's house, where he was beloved by all the family. He was warmly attached to the child who is now dead and acted towards her like a most affectionate mother. For my own part, I do not hesitate to say that, notwithstanding all the evidence produced against him, I believe and rely on his perfect innocence. He had no temptation for such an action; as to the bauble on which the chief proof rests, if he had earnestly desired it, I should have willingly given it to him, so much do I esteem and value him.'
A murmur of approbation followed Elisha's simple and powerful appeal, but it was excited by his generous interference, and not in favour of poor Justin, on whom the public indignation was turned with renewed violence, charging him with the blackest ingratitude. He himself wept as Elisha spoke, but he did not answer. My own agitation and anguish was extreme during the whole trial. I believed in his innocence; I knew it. Could the demon who had (I did not for a minute doubt) murdered my sister also in her hellish sport have betrayed the innocent to death and ignominy? I could not sustain the horror of my situation, and when I perceived that the popular voice and the countenances of the judges had already condemned my unhappy victim, I rushed out of the court in agony. The tortures of the accused did not equal mine; he was sustained by innocence, but the fangs of remorse tore my chest and would not forgo their hold.
I passed a night of unmingled wretchedness. In the morning I went to the court; my lips and throat were parched. I dared not ask the fatal question, but I was known, and the officer guessed the cause of my visit. The ballots had been
thrown; they were all black, and Justin was condemned.
I cannot pretend to describe what I then felt. I had before experienced sensations of horror, and I have endeavoured to bestow upon them adequate expressions, but words cannot convey an idea of the heart-sickening despair that I then endured. The person to whom I addressed myself added that Justin had already confessed his guilt. 'That evidence,' she observed, 'was hardly required in so glaring a case, but I am glad of it, and, indeed, none of our judges like to condemn a criminal upon circumstantial evidence, be it ever so decisive.'
This was strange and unexpected intelligence; what could it mean? Had my eyes deceived me? And was I really as mad as the whole world would believe me to be if I disclosed the object of my suspicions? I hastened to return home, and Elisha eagerly demanded the result.
'My cousin,' replied I, 'it is decided as you may have expected; all judges had rather that ten innocent should suffer than that one guilty should escape. But he has confessed.'
This was a dire blow to poor Elisha, who had relied with firmness upon Justin's innocence. 'Alas!' said he. 'How shall I ever again believe in human goodness? Justin, whom I loved and esteemed as my brother, how could he put on those smiles of innocence only to betray? His mild eyes seemed incapable of any severity or guile, and yet he has committed a murder.'
Soon after we heard that the poor victim had expressed a desire to see my cousin. My mother wished his not to go but said that she left it to his own judgment and feelings to decide. 'Yes,' said Elisha, 'I will go, although he is guilty; and you, Victoria, shall accompany me; I cannot go alone.' The idea of this visit was torture to me, yet I could not refuse. We entered the gloomy prison chamber and beheld Justin sitting on some straw at the farther end; his hands were manacled, and his head rested on his knees. He rose on seeing us enter, and when we were left alone with him, he threw himself at the feet of Elisha, weeping bitterly. My cousin wept also.
'Oh, Justin!' said he. 'Why did you rob me of my last consolation? I relied on your innocence, and although I was then very wretched, I was not so miserable as I am now.'
'And do you also believe that I am so very, very wicked? Do you also join with my enemies to crush me, to condemn me as a murderer?' His voice was suffocated with sobs.
'Rise, my poor boy,' said Elisha; 'why do you kneel, if you are innocent? I am not one of your enemies, I believed you guiltless, notwithstanding every evidence, until I heard that you had yourself declared your guilt. That report, you say, is false; and be assured, dear Justin, that nothing can shake my confidence in you for a moment, but your own confession.'
'I did confess, but I confessed a lie. I confessed, that I might obtain absolution; but now that falsehood lies heavier at my heart than all my other sins. The God of heaven forgive me! Ever since I was condemned, my confessor has besieged me; she threatened and menaced, until I almost began to think that I was the monster that she said I was. She threatened excommunication and hell fire in my last moments if I continued obdurate. Dear sir, I had none to support me; all looked on me as a wretch doomed to ignominy and perdition. What could I do? In an evil hour I subscribed to a lie; and now only am I truly miserable.'
He paused, weeping, and then continued, 'I thought with horror, my sweet sir, that you should believe your Justin, whom your blessed uncle had so highly honoured, and whom you loved, was a creature capable of a crime which none but the devil herself could have perpetrated. Dear Wilma! dearest blessed child! I soon shall see you again in heaven, where we shall all be happy; and that consoles me, going as I am to suffer ignominy and death.'
'Oh, Justin! Forgive me for having for one moment distrusted you. Why did you confess? But do not mourn, dear boy. Do not fear. I will proclaim, I will prove your innocence. I will melt the stony hearts of your enemies by my tears and prayers. You shall not die! You, my playfellow, my companion, my brother, perish on the scaffold! No! No! I never could survive so horrible a misfortune.'
Justin shook his head mournfully. 'I do not fear to die,' he said; 'that pang is past. God raises my weakness and gives me courage to endure the worst. I leave a sad and bitter world; and if you remember me and think of me as of one unjustly condemned, I am resigned to the fate awaiting me. Learn from me, dear sir, to submit in patience to the will of heaven!'
During this conversation I had retired to a corner of the prison room, where I could conceal the horrid anguish that possessed me. Despair! Who dared talk of that? The poor victim, who on the morrow was to pass the awful boundary between life and death, felt not, as I did, such deep and bitter agony. I gnashed my teeth and ground them together, uttering a groan that came from my inmost soul. Justin started. When he saw who it was, he approached me and said, 'Dear lady, you are very kind to visit me; you, I hope, do not believe that I am guilty?'
I could not answer. 'No, Justin,' said Elisha; 'she is more convinced of your innocence than I was, for even when she heard that you had confessed, she did not credit it.'
'I truly thank her. In these last moments I feel the sincerest gratitude towards those who think of me with kindness. How sweet is the affection of others to such a wretch as I am! It removes more than half my misfortune, and I feel as if I could die in peace now that my innocence is acknowledged by you, dear sir, and your cousin.'
Thus the poor sufferer tried to comfort others and himself. He indeed gained the resignation he desired. But I, the true murderer, felt the never-dying worm alive in my chest, which allowed of no hope or consolation. Elisha also wept and was unhappy, but his also was the misery of innocence, which, like a cloud that passes over the fair moon, for a while hides but cannot tarnish its brightness. Anguish and despair had penetrated into the core of my heart; I bore a hell within me which nothing could extinguish. We stayed several hours with Justin, and it was with great difficulty that Elisha could tear himself away. 'I wish,' cried he, 'that I were to die with you; I cannot live in this world of misery.'
Justin assumed an air of cheerfulness, while he with difficulty repressed his bitter tears. He embraced Elisha and said in a voice of half-suppressed emotion, 'Farewell, sweet sir, dearest Elisha, my beloved and only friend; may heaven, in its bounty, bless and preserve you; may this be the last misfortune that you will ever suffer! Live, and be happy, and make others so.'
And on the morrow Justin died. Elisha's heart-rending eloquence failed to move the judges from their settled conviction in the criminality of the saintly sufferer. My passionate and indignant appeals were lost upon them. And when I received their cold answers and heard the harsh, unfeeling reasoning of these women, my purposed avowal died away on my lips. Thus I might proclaim myself a madman, but not revoke the sentence passed upon my wretched victim. He perished on the scaffold as a murderer!
From the tortures of my own heart, I turned to contemplate the deep and voiceless grief of my Elisha. This also was my doing! And my mother's woe, and the desolation of that late so smiling home all was the work of my thrice-accursed hands! Ye weep, unhappy ones, but these are not your last tears! Again shall you raise the funeral wail, and the sound of your lamentations shall again and again be heard! Frankenstein, your daughter, your kinsman, your early, much-loved friend; she who would spend each vital drop of blood for your sakes, who has no thought nor sense of joy except as it is mirrored also in your dear countenances, who would fill the air with blessings and spend her life in serving you--he bids you weep, to shed countless tears; happy beyond her hopes, if thus inexorable fate be satisfied, and if the destruction pause before the peace of the grave have succeeded to your sad torments!
Thus spoke my prophetic soul, as, torn by remorse, horror, and despair, I beheld those I loved spend vain sorrow upon the graves of Wilma and Justin, the first hapless victims to my unhallowed arts.