I could only hope he would suspect the monster had taken Justine’s body after Victor refused to resume working his dark arts on her. Victor needed to believe I was innocent of any knowledge of his actions. Would that I could erase all I had done and seen!
Just as I was determined to creep back down to the dock, I again heard the approach of footsteps. My breath caught as I anticipated the monster’s return. But no. There were several sets of footsteps. Someone pounded on the door to the cottage.
“What is the meaning of this?” Victor asked.
“We are arresting you in connection with the disappearance of Henry Clerval. And we want to question you about several mysterious deaths in the area.”
“This is an outrage!” Victor said. “I cannot be held accountable for the actions of that fool. I certainly cannot be arrested for them!”
I prayed that he would not fly into a fit. If he lost control, it would only prove to them that they were right in their suspicions. I longed to run out and tell them the truth: that Henry Clerval was brokenhearted, not missing, and that any suspicious deaths were doubtless the work of the fiend, seeking everywhere to sow his murderous chaos and make Victor’s life a living hell.
But how could I make my case without sounding like a madwoman?
“Tell me where my son is!” a voice demanded. Henry’s father. So he had found Victor. There were some scuffling noises and a metallic clink, though nothing that sounded like a struggle.
“Look in that building,” one of the men directed. I froze, then darted behind the door. It opened inward, perfectly shielding me. A dark figure peered inside. All that greeted him was an empty table and the lamp I had thankfully dimmed.
He backed out and closed the door. “Nothing in there.”
“Nothing?” Victor exclaimed, his voice getting higher. I trembled, fearing what might come next. But he began to laugh. The sound had an edge to it that was worrisome, as bitter and howling as the night. At least Victor did not seem to be fighting them.
I collapsed against the wall with relief. If they had come but an hour earlier, they would have found Justine’s body! Doubtless they would have assumed evil on Victor’s part. I had not saved him from the monster. But I had saved him from himself and from the false judgment of the world. Though he was not entirely innocent—he had created the monster that had done these things—he was no murderer. His crimes were pride and ambition, stepping beyond the boundaries God set for the world. How did one punish those? The monster, surely, was punishing him enough.
The footsteps departed, taking Victor’s laughter with them.
I weighed my options, agonizing over my next course of action. Should I follow them? Plead Victor’s innocence?
And then I laughed. The monster, in its evil spree of violence, had created the safest refuge imaginable for Victor. It had no hope of getting to Victor in a prison cell. And I knew from the letters I had read that Victor’s father was already in the country. He would find Victor and easily secure his release. After that, they would travel home together, again preventing any mischief from the monster, which seemed loath to be seen by anyone but Victor.
I had not destroyed the monster, nor had I directly rescued Victor. But my trip here was not in vain.
After giving the men enough time to get their boat off and out of sight, I went back down to my own sad cargo. I practically crawled down the trail, hiding and looking behind myself for fear the monster was still on the island and would surprise me. But no one accosted me. I was alone.
I rowed back to the mainland in the dark, grateful that the fates had at last shown respect for Justine by calming the wind and giving me glassy waters. At the nearest visible town, I pushed us onshore. The spire of a church called to me. It was the work of a miserable hour carrying Justine’s body there, and then another few hours digging a grave with a stolen shovel. But the ground was soft and wet with recent rain.
I could not dig in the middle of the graveyard, but I did on the nearest border, beneath weeping boughs of a tree. Graveyards had never held any horror for me—though now I knew death was not as permanent a state as I had thought—and I relished the peaceful work of honoring my best friend’s earthly remains.
I held her body, placing a last kiss on her forehead. That was the one kindness amidst all this horror: I was able to say a proper goodbye to my truest, dearest Justine. Then I lowered her into her grave and let the earth claim her.
It was far less than she deserved but the most I could offer her. I gathered a bunch of thistles that were her favorite color and left them on the freshly turned dirt.
Morning dawned as bright and clear and terrible as glacial ice, and with it, my path:
The monster had promised its revenge on Victor’s wedding night. That meant I would know an exact time and place where I could expect it to show itself. And then I could end its sorry, hateful existence once and for all.
I would be ready.
Dear Elizabeth,
You cannot imagine my relief—and Victor’s—at hearing you are once again safe at our home in Geneva. I do not understand why you left but require no explanation. My joy at your return is enough to soothe all injuries.
You were probably quite surprised to come home and find my letter relating that I am in England. Circumstances necessitated that I travel here to defend Victor from baseless accusations of wrongdoing, leveled by Fredric Clerval.
I am sorry for your sake and for Victor’s that Henry grew to be such a disappointment, but I resent him for creating such trouble for us. I wonder if perhaps it was his plan all along as jealous revenge for Victor’s greater brilliance. Their family has been against ours all this time!
With Victor’s freedom secured, we are even now traveling back to Geneva to be reunited with you. Ernest remains in Paris at school, which is best for the time being. Let him grow and learn in peace, free from the spirit of mourning that naturally and inescapably suffuses our house at this time.
But my hope—long-cherished by my departed wife—is that you and Victor will soon bring happiness back by celebrating a most blessed event.
I am grateful for your delicacy in broaching the subject of a marital union with Victor. You are ever thoughtful to offer him his freedom should he view you more as a companion than a future wife. But I assure you that he cherishes nothing more than the thought of spending the rest of his life with you. He has told me repeatedly how determined he is that you two never be parted.
As such, we will proceed with a marriage as soon as possible upon our return. I am eager for the day you join our family legally as my daughter. We will travel with as much haste as God and the elements grant us to see that it is so. You can anticipate us within two weeks.
Victor shares my joy, though a lingering fever from his brief confinement prevents him from writing to you himself. He sends his love and devotion, and I send the warmest regards of my heart from a father to a daughter.
With all other regards nobly and lovingly sent,
Alphonse Frankenstein
I set down Judge Frankenstein’s letter. My entreaty—delicately and carefully worded—for Victor to return and marry me had succeeded.
And thus the date for my vengeance would be set.
I knew I should feel sorry that I looked forward to my wedding day not as a blessed moment to be forever united with the family who had sheltered and raised me, but as a day for bloody reckoning, when I would make that forever-damned monster pay for what it had taken from us.
I did not feel sorry.
Perhaps in another life, under other circumstances, knowing that Victor and I were to wed would fill me with relief that my place in the world would at last be secure, with all the legal protections the Frankenstein name would offer. Never again would I fear that I would be abandoned, that everything they had given might be taken away.
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Certainly only a few months earlier, receiving such oddly loving sentiments from Judge Frankenstein would have given me cause for celebration and happiness. Perhaps, if he had thus expressed himself ever in all our years under the same roof, I would not have chased after Victor and brought the monster back with me.
But I suspected it was that same monster and its devastating evil that had effected this change in Judge Frankenstein. Had he not lost so much, would he bother clinging to an orphan of no family, no fortune? Losing those things he loved most must have broken his heart enough that I finally found purchase there.
So be it. I did not doubt that Victor would want to marry me. I had always been the only girl in the world who mattered to him. If he was to marry anyone, it would be me. But I had feared that Judge Frankenstein would reject my claim on Victor. I was grateful to have his and Victor’s official approval, and to learn that they shared my desire for speed.
I had never been the type to imagine a wedding or what it would mean to be a wife, other than having binding protection. I tried now, envisioning something simple. Beautiful. But in my imagination, Justine was at my side, and Henry at Victor’s.
I had lost that ideal. And so I would push through, little caring about the wedding itself. It was the wedding night I had to plan for.
With no other women in the house to help me besides the maid, with whom I had no relationship, I was free to arrange the barest, most utilitarian wedding ever planned in the long history of the Frankenstein name. I scheduled a priest to marry us at the chapel nearest the edge of Geneva bordering the lake. I invited no one.
My one extravagance was a notice sent out to all the regional publications I could find, advertising the upcoming union of Victor Frankenstein and Elizabeth Lavenza.
The trap was set. And I was both bait and poison.
* * *
—
Once my plans were settled, I had nothing to do but wait. It was agonizing. I knew Victor and his father were making their slow and steady way home to me. And I knew that somewhere out there, the monster was doing the same. I was in the midst of a great spider’s web. Whether I would end up as the spider or the fly was yet to be determined. All I knew was that the strands that held me here had been woven since my childhood on the shores of Lake Como.
We were, all of us, bound in this deadly and horrible dance, until we died or triumphed.
A few days before I expected Victor and his father to return, I received another letter. But it was not from them.
It was from Mary, the bookseller in Ingolstadt. And it was addressed to Elizabeth and Justine. Another person who dwelt in a beautiful fantasy in which Justine still lived. I could not so much as bring myself to open it. Could not linger in words that assumed Justine was alive, that assumed the world was good and fair and as it should be.
And I could not think of Justine without remembering the stitches, the neck repaired from its injuries so that it could once again draw breath from dead mouth to dead lungs.
Despite some time and distance from having discovered Justine’s body, I had not moved any closer to forgiving Victor. I wanted, instead, to understand. He still tried to keep me in the dark about his monster. How deep his shame and horror at what his own hands had wrought on the world must be!
But in helping to destroy the monster, I would no longer be able to feign innocence, and he could no longer deny the truth. Once it was dead, Victor would have nothing further to hide from me, and we could speak plainly. It was another reason any thought of delay was unsupportable. With the monster’s death, so too would die any secrets between Victor and me. We would have only each other, a truth too terrible to be believed by outsiders binding us more permanently than any priest could.
I yearned for the freedom I anticipated.
Freedom from the monster.
Freedom from secrets.
Freedom from the fear of having nothing.
When at last they arrived home, I met them at the dock. Victor, gaunt and worn but with eyes burning as brightly as they ever had, disembarked and officially offered me his hand. I gladly accepted.
* * *
—
The ceremony was over almost as soon as it began. I wore white, as Victor had always preferred. He wore a suit, taken in at the last minute to fit his ever-leaner frame. He brushed his lips across mine after we were made man and wife. I kept turning toward the door, expecting the monster to darken the threshold and come roaring in to tear us asunder.
The door remained firmly closed.
Victor and I walked through the morning sun to the boat that would bring us back home. Though I doubted the monster would reveal itself in daylight, my every muscle tensed, anticipating attack.
Only when we were safely in the boat in the middle of the lake did I relax enough to take in my surroundings. I could not have said what we agreed to in the chapel, or whether I had smiled even once. I might have felt sorry, been certain Victor deserved more. But we were in this miserable state because of his monster.
Still, I smiled at him as he rowed our own boat back across the lake to the house, where Judge Frankenstein and a handful of strangers to me would have a reception in our honor. Victor did not return the smile, and I could not manage mine for long, either.
“You do not seem happy, Victor.” I debated calling him Husband, but that felt as unreal as a house without Justine and William. This whole endeavor was something I longed to wake up from. I ached to find Justine and Henry laughing in the boat with us, celebrating. To return home and let William and Ernest have too much cake. To luxuriate in being a wife, in being a Frankenstein.
Instead, I was slowly rowed back to a house empty of anyone I loved, hoping for a visit from a devil.
Victor looked up from where his gaze was fixed, troubled, on the horizon. “I will not be settled until I can at last claim victory over a problem that has drawn me low and caused me much agony. I have once again been ripped from my progress by stupid men.”
I wished he would speak plainly. He knew I had seen the monster, though he pretended it was the result of injury and a fevered mind. But if I pushed, he was likely to shut down entirely and not speak. And if I revealed that I knew the monster’s attack was imminent, he might arrange for me to be locked away somewhere to keep me safe. I could not let that happen.
“It is my hope that soon we will be able to leave this wretched state behind forever,” I told him.
His expression lifted and he laughed. “That is exactly my intention. Soon all this will be resolved, and we can live as we were meant to.” Then he fell back into his weighted silence, and I dared not disturb him again. He was closer to anger than anything else, doubtless on edge, dreading the same attack I hoped for.
I watched the house approach. Though the day was brilliantly sunny, I was seized with a premonition of doom. What if the monster was already in the house? I was not ready to face it! I did not know if I would ever be ready. I had spent so much time in anticipation of this confrontation. Now that it loomed, I found myself regretting the steps that had brought me here. Each pull of the oars moved us closer to our destruction.
“What is it?” Victor asked. “You look frightened.”
I joined him on his bench, tucking myself against his chest as he rowed. The steady beat of his heart was calming. “I want to keep you safe.”
I could hear his annoyance. “Nonsense. It is my job to keep you safe.” All aggravation left his voice, which became as cold and steady as the mountains watching over us. “And I will. I promise.”
* * *
—
Inside the house, though I braced for attack, I found only Judge Frankenstein and several men I did not know. They stood in the dining room. Pale roses, the edges of their petals already brown, wilted in the center of the table, surrounded by food that was sweating condensation. No one ate anything. Wh
y he should have invited strangers to our wedding party, I had no idea. But I had never understood him. I wanted them gone so I could retreat to my room and organize my supplies. I had been stockpiling oil and matches, as well as long branches I had fashioned into torches. I planned to hide them throughout the house so that wherever the monster surprised us, we would have a weapon handy.
“And here she is!” Victor’s father said. “Elizabeth Lavenza, raised as my own all these happy years, and now united with the Frankenstein family in marriage.”
The men looked at me as though I were being examined, then nodded, apparently satisfied. A heavyset gentleman with white hair and black eyes spoke. “We will have the assets accounted for so that Victor may gain access to them at any time. Please write ahead should you wish to obtain any of the funds. But the villa at Lake Como is now in the Lavenza name and available.”
“I would like to have the funds made available immediately”—Judge Frankenstein paused—“for their new life together, of course.”
“Yes,” the portly gentleman said. “Of course.” His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “But, in keeping with the inheritance rights the court agreed to, they will remain in the Lavenza name and pass only to her heirs. If no heirs are provided, the Lavenza fortune will be reclaimed by the Austrian Crown.”
I looked at them in confusion. I had prepared for attack by a monster. I had not prepared for whatever strange news this was.
Judge Frankenstein nodded, though his jaw twitched in irritation. “I have a detailed account of the money we have spent raising her. I am sure it is within bounds to request compensation.”
“What are they talking about, Judge Frankenstein?” I asked.
“Father,” he corrected me, smiling possessively.
“You can submit the list in writing, and your claim will be evaluated.” The speaker settled his hat on his head. “Or you can resolve it privately, now that she is your daughter. I recommend the latter. It will take less time.”