* * *
—
“You forgot Victor’s new clothes,” Mary said, her lips pursed and her clever eyes examining my disheveled and breathless state. It was well past dark now.
I laughed, putting a hand to my head where my hat was askew due to the missing pin. “I could not find a shop in time. They were all closed, and then I got lost in an unfamiliar part of town. I have been wandering ever since! I am simply exhausted.”
Nodding, but showing little sympathy, Mary showed me to my room.
I waited several sleepless hours, until I judged it was time for the second half of this night’s unsavory activities. I longed for sleep. Longed to close my eyes and forget all I had seen and done. But I could not. Victor still needed me.
The clock in Mary’s sitting room showed just past one in the morning when I slipped out, carrying the supply of oil I had stolen from her closet.
The city had an entirely different character at night. Streetlamps were few and far between, and the buildings seemed great hulking beasts at night, watching with black eyes that reflected myself back at me. It would be so easy to disappear here. To wander into the dark and never be seen again.
I hurried, my cloak drawn around me with the hood up. I felt pursued at every step, constantly checking over my shoulder. But I was alone. I paused at the gatehouse, shrinking further into my cloak and eyeing the doors warily. No sounds greeted me. The entire world was silent, as though holding its breath to see what I would do.
The journey over the river, which during the rainy day had been unremarkable, felt like crossing a bridge to another world. A few of the boats had torches burning, so that it looked like portions of the jet-black river were on fire. Like the river Styx, a passageway directly to hell.
Shivering, I moved faster. I needed this night to be over, this last task accomplished. Once it was, I would be safe. At last I came to Victor’s residence. I would not call it a home. It was nothing of the sort. I lifted my hand to turn the knob—
The door was slightly ajar. I was certain I had closed it all the way when we left. Had I? I had been so eager to get Mary out and away from further exploration….And Justine had been talking to me….Maybe I had not waited for it to latch. I nudged it open with my foot, not daring to light my lamp. But there was no other light inside. The trapdoor above my head was firmly shut. I peered into Victor’s living quarters. The stove was still cold. I used one of my matches to light it, closing the flue and leaving the oven door open. Then I turned and—
A man loomed out of the darkness.
A shriek of terror left my mouth. Lashing out, I swung my container of oil into him. He toppled with a wooden clatter. The hat that had been atop the hatstand rolled away from me.
“Damn you, Victor,” I whispered. I had not noticed the hatstand during my earlier trip, being quite preoccupied. I picked up the hat and was hit with a shock of recognition even in the dark. I knew this hat.
It was Henry’s. I had purchased it for him, just before he left for Ingolstadt. I ran my fingers around the brim, feeling the velvet softness in contrast to the stiff shape of it. So Henry had found Victor when Victor was already living here. He had to have seen the madness taking hold. And still he had left.
Angry tears burned. He had left Victor, and he had left me. I did not know which betrayal hurt worse. Part of me, too, hated him for being able to decide to just leave. Some of us did not have that option, and never would.
I dropped the hat and poured some of the oil on it. I made a trail around the borders of the room until every last drop was emptied. Then I pushed Victor’s table into its path, as well as his wooden bed. I found more oil next to his stove and added that, soaking the bedsheets while I waited for the stove to heat up.
Finally, I went into the hall and draped the bedsheets on the ladder.
Back in the living quarters, I lit a match and dropped it onto Henry’s unfaithful hat. It burst into flames, which moved with liquid grace along the lines of oil on the floor. The heat was sudden and intense. I had done my job well. I backed out of the room, letting my eyes linger on Victor’s time here being erased.
No one would ever know what he had studied, how far down the path of his madness he had been allowed to stumble alone.
I lit the bedsheets and watched the fire climb the ladder to the trapdoor. Then I shut the front door behind me. No one would see the fire until it had overtaken the second floor. By then it would be too late to salvage anything. I backed up to the edge of the stone wall lining the steep riverbank and waited. I wanted to see the fire claim the horrors of his laboratory. I had to be sure.
It did not take long. Soon there was a glow, and then a brilliant, explosive burst that blew out the windows. I ducked as glass rained down around me. Whatever chemicals had soaked into the floor up there, they did not mix well with fire.
I laughed, lifting my face to the dry heat radiating from the building. No. They mixed perfectly with fire. But there was no smoke rising from the windows in the roof. They had been left open. How—
A scrambling, bumping tumult rumbled down the chute above my head. The one that led from the building to the river. Before I could turn to see what it was, something enormous splashed into the water.
I covered my mouth in horror. Had someone been inside?
I leaned over the edge, peering at the placid black surface of the water. I saw only the reflected flames behind me. Nothing disturbed the surface.
Perhaps something had been lodged inside the chute and been forced out by the change in air pressure. But the front door had been opened when I’d arrived. Who would have been there? Obviously no one was in the habit of visiting Victor. Maybe the drunkard from earlier in the day? But I had heard his splash. It was far smaller than this one.
Perhaps a jealous rival. Professor Krempe had seemed a little too keen to know what Victor had been up to since they lost contact. Had Victor secluded himself because he was being watched? But who would care about the lunatic theories of a man playing with stolen corpses and desecrated animals?
A more dangerous possibility seized me. The charnel house man, reminded of Victor’s debt by my visit, might have come to collect. I trembled, expecting him to arise with a roar and pull me into the water. But I could not turn away, could not expose my back to whatever awaited me.
I watched the water until my lungs burned from the smoke and I knew it was not safe or wise to stay at the scene of the crime. Nothing surfaced from the black depths of the river. It kept its secrets.
I would keep mine. And Victor’s, too.
I HAD PLANNED TO slip out of Mary’s house at dawn so I could check in on Justine and then spend the morning with Victor. But my nighttime activities caught up to my body, and I slept past the sun’s rising.
Hoping Mary was a late sleeper or had already gone to open her bookshop, I pinned my hat, its stability precarious. I missed my lost pin but knew Justine would have extras. Then I rushed out of my room to grab my cloak.
Mary was sitting, holding it.
“Good morning,” she said brightly.
“Good morning.” I tried to imitate her tone to hide my annoyance that I would have to talk to her. I had things to do.
“I am not certain you will be able to wash the stench of smoke from this cloak.” Her tone was conversational as she held it up. “Your dress from yesterday was already quite ruined by blood and filth, but this is a nice cloak. For arson, you should have worn an old one, or borrowed one of my uncle’s.”
I blinked, smiling blankly. “Forgive me, but I do not understand what you mean.”
“There was a terrible fire on the other side of the bridge early this morning. The fire brigade was able to put it out, but not before it destroyed a whole building. Imagine! An entire building, and everything inside, burned beyond salvaging. It is assumed the stove chimney had not been proper
ly cleaned.”
“That is a shame.” I sat opposite her, reaching for the cup of tea she had prepared for me. “I hope no one was hurt.”
“No, the building was as empty as we left it yesterday. And I am quite certain the stove was cold and unlit then.” She dropped my cloak and any pretense at delicacy as she leaned forward intently. “What did you find? Why did you burn it?”
“I do not know what you are talking about.”
“Oh, please do not pretend. You may look like an angel, but I am not a fool. You locked us out. You were afraid of discovering something you wanted no one else to see. And then you had time there, alone, to explore. What was so awful that you had to go back and burn down the building?”
I smiled, knowing full well my smile was sweeter than summer strawberries, my blue eyes as clear and dazzling as the sky. “Maybe I just like fires.”
To my surprise, Mary burst out with a wild laugh. It was the least feminine laugh I had ever heard. Nothing about it was prim or guarded. I wondered how she could even manage to breathe deeply enough in a corset to produce the sound. “Oh, I like you, Elizabeth Lavenza. I like you very much. I am a little bit afraid of you, but I think that makes me like you more. Well. I am going to throw your cloak out with the trash—in someone else’s neighborhood, of course—and then we are going to fetch Justine and check on your Victor.”
“You really do not need to come. You have already done so much.”
“Not nearly as much as you.” She grinned wickedly. “I have been stuck in the business of books for so long, I forgot how much fun being a part of a story can be.” She stood, popping a biscuit into her mouth and swallowing it almost whole. “I do not expect you to tell me the truth. I am happy to puzzle over this mystery on my own. As long as you promise not to burn down my house.” She looked at me, her expression shifting from playful to serious with a single movement of her finely shaped black eyebrows. “Please do not burn down my house.”
I matched her sincerity, grateful that she would be complicit in silence. “I promise I have no intention of burning anything ever again. And I appreciate your discretion. I can assure you my intent was only to protect Victor. He was— His work there was the product of an unwell mind. If others were to discover it, it could ruin his chances for future success. I will not let that happen.”
She nodded, pulling another cloak off a hook on the wall and handing it to me. It was worn, older than mine, but soft, and it smelled of ink and dust and leather, my favorite aromas. I felt instantly comforted wrapping myself in it.
“Will you answer something for me?” she asked as we sat in the back of a carriage on the way to the boardinghouse.
“Probably not with honesty,” I said, surprising myself by telling the truth.
“I am going to ask anyway. What is Victor to you that you searched so hard for him and went to such lengths to protect him? Surely he must be more than a cousin. Are you in love with him?”
I looked out the window as we passed the city center, now sunny and bright, as though its nighttime version were a dream best forgotten. Oddly, Mary’s having discovered my secrets freed up my willingness to talk. Normally I kept the truth behind closed doors and heavy locks, letting only careful shadows of it out into the world.
“He is my entire life,” I said. “And my only hope of a future.”
* * *
—
Victor left before the dirt had settled over his mother’s grave.
“I will be back when I have solved it,” he promised, pressing his lips to my forehead like a seal in wax.
And then I was the mistress of a house that had never been mine and still was not. I ran the household, overseeing basic management. Judge Frankenstein never gave me funds, always in charge of the budget himself. Madame Frankenstein’s personal maid was immediately dismissed. I was to assume Madame Frankenstein’s role but inherit none of her privileges. I was allowed only the cook, one maid, and Justine.
My relief at my unexpected foresight in getting Justine hired was immense. I had relatively little to do with Ernest, now attending school in town, and young William. Sweet though they were, children remained to me a foreign language that I could speak and understand but never felt comfortable with.
Justine flourished. She would have done the work of five household servants, but I did not let Judge Frankenstein realize that. She was not of low birth, after all.
In fact, I secretly suspected she was of higher birth than I.
Though I had kept my fears to myself all these years, with Victor gone and Madame Frankenstein dead, they bubbled to the surface whenever I ate a meal alone with Judge Frankenstein. With every delicate bite I took, every impeccably mannered sip of a drink, I wondered whether it would show. Whether he would know. Whether he already suspected.
They had bought me based on a lie.
It had to be the case. Looking back, it was laughable, really. Madame Frankenstein had told me the story they were given. It made no sense. How would a violent mite of a woman living in poverty in the woods come into possession of an imprisoned Italian nobleman’s daughter? Her story, woven of political woes and Austrian-seized fortunes, was as juvenile as something I would tell to get William to quiet and go to sleep. “The beautiful wife died bringing an even more beautiful daughter into the world! And though she was an angel, her father, bereft and angry, could not give up his righteous fight against those who had wronged him! Taken far away to a dark dungeon, the father left his daughter to be raised in meanness and the lowliest estate, until the day a kind and generous family found her and instantly knew she had been born to more than that.”
I would burn a book that defiled my mind with such trite nonsense. Instead, the more likely story: The woman had inherited me from a sister or a cousin. She resented another mouth to feed. When the Frankensteins took up residence at Lake Como and she saw their young son, she seized her opportunity. Took the pretty child and sold her, complete with newly brushed hair and a shining story to wrap her up in.
So it was that my mind was already gnawing anxious circles around my origin when Judge Frankenstein, gaunter and obviously in poorer health since the death of his wife, actually addressed me at dinner six months after Victor had left.
“Tell me, what do you remember of your father?”
My spoon paused halfway to my lips. I set it down so he would not see it tremble. He had indulged his wife for years, but she was gone now. Victor was fixed. The judge had no reason to keep me. What was I, after all, but a worthless stray whose usefulness was past?
I smiled. “I was so young when they took him away. I remember crying as the doors to our villa closed behind me and they loaded him, shackled, into a black carriage.” I remembered nothing of the sort.
“Do you know what your mother’s name was? Anything about her family?”
“Oh.” I batted my eyes as though the dim light were difficult to see in. “Let me think….I know I was named after her.” I did know that much, at least. “Pretty little Elizabeth, as pretty and useless as the Elizabeth you came from. I spit on her grave for burdening me with you,” my caretaker still hissed in my memory. “But I do not know what her family name was. I wish I did. Then I would have something of hers to hold on to.”
“Hmm.” His brows, wiry and gray with age, drew low over his dark eyes. Where Victor’s eyes were lively and intense, the judge’s were the heavy, forbidding brown of an aged gallows.
“Why do you ask?” I said as innocently as I could, keeping all trace of fear out of my voice.
“No particular reason.” His voice slammed the conversation shut.
I would have avoided him after that, but it was not necessary. Most days he spent shut up in the library. When I would sneak in at night to find a book, I would find his desk littered with papers and half-finished letters. He looked increasingly troubled, and his trouble affected m
e most deeply when I found a list on his desk titled “Drains on the Frankenstein Estate.”
There were no items listed, but it was not difficult to imagine my name at the top.
Without Victor, I had no reason to be here. And while the Frankensteins had been generous to take me in, they had also rendered me useless. If they had taken me on as a maid or even a governess, I would at least have employable skills, like Justine. Instead, I was treated as a cousin: pampered, and educated in disciplines that in no way translated into the ability to care for myself.
They had saved me from poverty and, in the same stroke, doomed me to utter dependence. If Judge Frankenstein kicked me out, I would have absolutely no claim or legal recourse to take anything with me. At any moment he could force me to leave, and I would once again be simply Elizabeth Lavenza, with no family, no home, and no money.
I would not let him do that.
I wrote Victor once a week without fail, desperate to remind him of how much he adored me. He had never mentioned when he might return. And then his letters stopped. Judge Frankenstein inquired about his son on occasion—making it clear that Victor had never bothered to write to his own father—and I resorted to making up responses, filling the ever-expanding months with stories about Victor’s studies, the exasperating and admirable qualities of his fellow students, and always, always, how much he missed me.
Justine could sense my growing unease and increased her kindness toward me. It was no use. As much as I loved having her there, she could do nothing to protect me.
I needed Victor back.
Or at least, I thought I did, until Henry Clerval surprised me with a different possibility.
“Come into town with me,” Henry said, nearly a year after Victor’s departure. He was working for his father now, and we rarely had time together. “When was the last time you were there?”
I went, sometimes, with Judge Frankenstein. But it was always in his boat and then his carriage, all our destinations predetermined and run by his pocket watch and adherence to his schedule. The idea of going to town and simply wandering struck me as delightful.