15
HE HAD FINISHED SPEAKING, and turned back towards the Thames. I could see that he was in thrall to some powerful emotion, and I could almost feel pity for his miserable state. He was doomed to wander across the earth, in search of nothing that the world could give to him-love, friendship, compassion were all denied to him. If it were true that he could not die, that the fearful terms of his existence were ever renewed, he would endure in his wilderness. “What would you have me do?” I asked him.
“Do? Once you create life, you must take responsibility for it. You are responsible!”
“I will create no more life. I pledge that to you.”
“A weak answer, sir. Do you not realise the bond between us? There is a pact of fire that can never be abrogated. I am wedded to you so closely that we might be the same person. I was conceived and shaped in your hands.” He turned around at that moment, and faced me. “I have no one except you. Will you abandon me? You are my last hope. My last refuge.” I bowed down and wept. “You weep for yourself, and not for me.”
“I pity you.”
“Spare your pity for yourself.”
“I would give everything I have to release you from your suffering. If I could reduce you once more to inanimate matter, I would gladly do so. Do you wish for that?”
We both remained in silence for a long time. I was still seated, while he paced up and down the workshop in an agony of thought. Finally he stopped beside my chair. “I can be your child. Or your servant. I can watch over you, and protect you from harm.”
“That cannot be.”
“Cannot? I know no such word. We have an adamantine bond. What is ‘cannot’?”
“That bond is a frightful one. You have become the dark agent of desolation.”
“Through your will.”
“My purpose was benign. I had hoped to create a being of infinite benevolence. One in whom the forces of nature would have worked together to awaken a new spiritual being. I believed in the perfectibility of mankind-”
“Oh, don’t speak of that. Since you awakened me, as you put it, I have witnessed nothing but fear and woe and violence.”
“You have caused them.”
“But you are the ultimate cause.”
“Listen to me. I shared with my friends a new creed of liberty and unselfishness. I had hoped to advance it.”
“Your new creed has proved to be an illusion then. Mankind is not to be improved.”
“You are mistaken in that. There will be, there must be, progress in the sciences.”
“Behold your progress. Here I stand.”
When I saw him exulting over me, my pity for him turned to anger. “I abjure you. I beg you to remove yourself to some distant place and trouble men no more.”
“You wish me to travel to some vast desert or distant island. Or perhaps to some ice precipice among the loftiest mountains?”
“Anywhere out of this world.”
“So my suffering is less important than your repose.”
“The repose of all.”
“It is an interesting proposition. In this instance, then, I would ask you to form for me a companion in this secluded life.”
“What?”
“Create me another being who can become my bride, of the same nature and the same characteristics as myself.”
“Insanity.”
“Wherefore insane? We will be estranged from all the world, but we will never be separated from one another. I do not say that we will enjoy bliss, but we will at least be free from suffering. Who can I speak to? There is no one. I am alone in the world. Do you know this affliction? I think not. You have not experienced the feeling of being utterly cast away, of being adrift on the margin of life unseen and unheard. If I cry out, there is no one to care for me. If I am in agony of spirit, there is no one to console me. It is in your power to mend my loneliness. Do not deny me this request.”
“How can I proceed with such a monstrous task? My instruments have all been destroyed-by you.”
“It is a matter of expense. That is all. You know how to conjure forth the electrical power. You can construct the machines.”
“You seriously intend me to take a female from the grave and animate her?”
“If you consent, neither you nor any other man will look upon this face again. My companion and I will lead a harmless life of simple toil. We shall find our rest on the kind earth, and content ourselves with the seclusion of a hidden island; we shall drink the waters of the brook, and eat the acorns. We shall be sufficient one to another.”
I sat in a daze of wonder and apprehension. I envisaged all the scenes of this process: the assembly of the electrical machines, the body or the parts of a woman taken from the tomb and brought down to Limehouse, the light and heat of the terrible creation. And then yet one more being to arise from the table, with all the powers I knew she would possess! Might they then not couple, and have offspring? No. The dead could not breed new life. Of that I was certain.
“She must be young and beautiful,” he said.
“I cannot consent.”
“We will leave the world to those who are happy in it. Freed from the hatred of my fellow creatures, I shall express all the benevolence that you once hoped to find in me. I will no longer curse and rage against you. I swear by the light of the sun. I swear that I will leave you for ever.”
I entertained his argument for a moment only, since I remained firm in my detestation and rejection of a proposal that might have intolerable consequences. “It is not to be contemplated.”
“You would destroy my one chance of happiness? Of salvation?”
“I would deny you the chance of wreaking more havoc and misery upon the world, with a companion your equal in strength and purpose.”
“Very well, sir. I am fearless, and therefore powerful. I say this clearly to you now, even though I am wrapped in anger and in the contemplation of revenge. Your days will pass in dread and horror, and soon enough you will repent of all the injuries you have inflicted on me. One day you will curse the sun that gazes on your misery.”
“I charge you this. Do not follow me!”
“Oh, is that the sum of your fears? Let me tell you now that you can never escape me. If you will not create for me a companion, then I choose you to be my spouse. We shall be inseparable, two living things joined together. Do you delight in the prospect as much as I do?”
“I can travel to the outermost reaches of the world-”
“Do not think of fleeing to the wilderness. The wilderness in me is greater. I will find you out.”
“Can I not reason with you?”
“Reason? What has reason to do with this? The pact between us is of fire and blood.”
“So you will shadow me, will you? Then you will be a subordinate creature, a slave to my wishes.”
“No. I will not be with you always. I will not be with you often. But when you are least ready, then I will be there. What if I were to appear on your wedding night?”
“How can there be such a thing, when I know that you are somewhere around me?”
“Precisely. I am no slave. I am your master. And remember this, sir. You are sure to be visited by me.” He went over to the door, and seemed to exult in the power of the night and the river. “Now for the estuary,” he said. “I pledge myself to eternal pain!”
I SAT, OR RATHER CROUCHED, in my chair, amid the rubble which was all that remained of my work, as the hours passed. It has been said that evils come to an end, but that fear endures for ever. I had entered a state of being which could only be curtailed with my death. And how, how, in these first hours, did I long for death to come! I sat in the workshop until dawn but then, through some brute or animal instinct, I returned home through the streets of London. There was a heavy rain to which I paid very little regard; it seemed to be no more than the accompaniment of my dread, throwing up vistas of mist and mud along every street.
When eventually I came up to my door in Jermyn Street,
Fred greeted me with a most perplexed expression. “You are all water, sir. You will rush into the gutter.”
“Take me inside, Fred. I can hardly stand.”
He helped me across the threshold, and at once began to take off my boots. “There is enough water here,” he said, “to fill the Fleet.” He began wringing out my coarse woollen socks. Then he went into my private closet, and brought me several towels; with these I retreated into my bedroom where I undressed myself and lay down upon the bed.
How many hours I slept, I do not know. I was awoken by the entrance of Fred, bearing a plate of chops and tomatoes. He placed it carefully beside me on the bed, and from a pocket withdrew a letter sealed with a wafer. “This has come from a gentleman,” he said. “You know who.”
It was a letter from Bysshe, entreating me to travel up to Marlow and join him in what he called my riparian paradise. I realised, in the instant of reflection upon this proposal, that I had contracted a most curious weakness. I had lost all of my energy of mind, my animation in the affairs of life. I had in effect lost all will and sense of volition. It was the most singular sensation in the world. Out of dread, and horror, had come meekness and submission. The fear had not left me. Far from it. But it had become my perpetual partner, my double, my shadow, without which I would not exist. So I was left singularly unable or unwilling to make any decision for myself, in any matter concerning my fate. I ate the chops and tomatoes that Fred had prepared for me, and told him to pack my valise for Marlow. He asked if he could accompany me on the journey-as my “jolly” as he put it in the language of the street-and I assented without giving the matter any thought.
WE LEFT JERMYN STREET SOON AFTER, and hired a post-chaise from Catherine Street to Marlow; Fred kept up a continuous line of chatter all the while, which pleased me greatly. It relieved me of any need to talk, or to think, as we made our way out of the capital into the fields and hedgerows of Buckinghamshire. He pointed out the milestones on the way, the number of gravel pits in Kensington, the geese in Chiswick, and the bad roads of Brentford. He told me that he and his brother used to bathe in the Thames, until the filth in the river became insupportable. He told me that twelve thousand people passed over London Bridge each day, and that there were elves in the Highgate woods. He reckoned Marlow to be a “comfortable” town, and explained to me in some detail how he had found Bysshe’s house by dint of earnest enquiries among the trades men. After a short silence he volunteered the information that he also had witnessed Daniel Westbrook’s execution.
“What?” I said. “You walked to Newgate after I had left the house?”
“Yes, sir. I hope I did no wrong in that. There was nothing to mind in the house, you see. It was all neat and perfect.”
“You rogue. You led me to believe that you stood guard perpetually.”
“Nobody can be perpetual, Mr. Frankenstein. I needed the air.”
“A foul air by Newgate.”
“This it is, sir. I had never been to a hanging before. I wished to see the thing.”
“And you did.” I leaned over to him. “So did I.”
Suddenly I began to weep. I bent forward in the carriage and sobbed, the tears unbidden and unexpected. Fred passed me a handkerchief, and looked steadfastly out of the window until I had composed myself. Eventually I sat back, and put my head against the leather rest. We were travelling along a stretch of road beside the Thames, and I noticed that the current of the river was turbid and irregular. There was something lying in the water, impeding its progress. “There is the boundary stone,” Fred said. “We will be there shortly.”
We arrived at dusk. The air by the river was chill and laden with moisture, but Fred led me briskly down the principal street of the town. It was wide enough for two carriages, and muddy after recent rain, but we crossed it without any difficulty. We turned left down a smaller thoroughfare, lined with superior shops and houses. “Here we are, sir. This is the house.”
It was a two-storey villa of recent construction with a plain lattice-work porch and large windows on the ground floor. “Will you knock, Fred?” I had not the slightest energy.
The door was opened by Bysshe himself, who seemed astonished to see me so soon after he had despatched his invitation. “My dear Frankenstein,” he said, “you are like an apparition. I was just speaking of you! And here is the boy, looking as fresh scrubbed as a Tenterden apple. Come in.” We entered a narrow hallway, where there was a plentiful supply of boots and umbrellas. I had forgotten that Bysshe had a strange partiality for umbrellas, of whatever description, and an equally strong propensity for losing them. He led us into the drawing room, a brilliantly lit room with long damask curtains and comfortable furniture of the provincial style. Sitting by the fireside were a gentleman of middle age and a young lady, evidently deep in talk.
“Here is the man,” Bysshe said, “whom I was describing. It is the oddest and most singular coincidence. This is Mr. Godwin, Victor, and his daughter Mary.”
The man rose from his chair, and greeted me with great cordiality; his daughter took my hand, and welcomed me to Albion House as if she were the mistress of it. “We have been considering the name of Albion, Mr. Frankenstein,” her father said. “Bysshe believes it is derived from Alba, the Celtic word for Britain. But I believe it to be more classical. I take it to spring from albus, meaning white. Thus from the white cliffs. What is your opinion?” He was wearing a pair of pebble spectacles that seemed to emphasise his pale and almost rimless eyes. His manner was cordial, as I have said, but somewhat too intense and magisterial; it seemed to be a forced cordiality.
“I have not the least idea, sir. I am sorry-”
Bysshe brought a chair for me, and offered me a glass of Madeira wine that I willingly accepted. “You are tired after your journey, Victor.” He had noticed my listlessness and weariness. “This will revive you.”
The father and daughter looked at me with placid interest, and waited for me to speak.
“It has been a hard time,” I said.
“Of course. William and Mary know all the sad facts of the matter. You can speak freely.”
“I do not know if I can speak at all.”
“You attended Harriet’s funeral?”
“Yes.”
“And were you present at Daniel’s execution?”
I looked round for Fred, but he had silently left the room, no doubt in search of the company of Bysshe’s servants.
“Yes. He died bravely. He was an innocent man.”
“How do you know that, sir?” Mr. Godwin put the question to me in a challenging manner.
“I know it. I know-I knew-Daniel Westbrook. I saw him in his prison cell. There was no gentler being on the earth. He had nothing to do with this crime. Nothing whatever.”
“No one else was suspected,” Mr. Godwin said. “We read the public prints, even in Marlow.”
“The murderer walks free.”
“Do you have private information, Mr. Frankenstein?” Miss Godwin asked me this with the faintest impression of a smile.
“No. I have no information on the subject except that which instinct and intuition give me. I am sure that, as a lady, you will grant me that right.”
She gave me a keen glance then. “Instinct is very right and just. My father adopts more rational principles, but I have always believed in the divining powers of the imagination.”
“She has read Coleridge,” her father said. “She is an enthusiast for the divine afflatus.”
“Without the imagination, Father, the human frame is dust and ashes.”
“You cannot go so far, Mary.”
“I may trespass into the world of the ideal, may I not?”
Bysshe had been listening in silence to their conversation, and I could not help but notice the profound admiration that he evinced for Mary. It seemed to me strange that, after the recent death of Harriet, he should be so struck by another woman. Yet I was not wholly surprised by his interest. I had heard of Mary’s mother, Mary Wo
llstonecraft Godwin. She was the author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman that, as a student in Switzerland, I had read with great fervour. Yes. Fervour is the word. She had instilled in me a love of liberty in all its forms, and I believed that human happiness should be the prerogative of all regardless of sex. I hoped to see in Miss Godwin some sign or token of her mother’s genius. I soon gathered that she had quieter but no less interesting virtues.
Bysshe seemed to divine my interest because, a moment later, he led me to the other end of the room on the excuse that he wished for a “private symposium.”
“I could not have endured the funeral, Victor,” he said. “The horror of it. The senselessness of it. I still think of her as a dear, good girl. I will never lose that memory.”
“What of your child?”
“Ianthe is better with the Westbrooks. I have made arrangements that an annual income be paid to them through my banker.” He looked at me in appeal, as if seeking my approval.
“You have done what is necessary, Bysshe.”
“And what is right?”
“Of course.” I was silent for a moment. “You have mentioned Mr. Godwin to me before.”
“Did I tell you that I visited him in Somers Town? I have always admired him, ever since I read his Enquiry Concerning Political Justice. I share his belief that Man can be improved and even perfected.”
“Indeed? How does he reach that conclusion?”
“You never used to be so sceptical, Victor.”
“I merely ask the question.”
“Mr. Godwin is animated by a keen sense of the natural man. The first men were not savage or cruel. In their natural state they were peaceful and benevolent. It is only the tyranny of law and custom that has made us what we are. But man is perfectible. Once we have removed his shackles, he will be capable of perpetual improvement.”
The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein Page 19
