Frankenstein's Bride (12 page)

Alas, a flinging out of my arm jolted some knick-knack from the parlor table. I heard it, but slept on. Not so Mrs. Downey,
who, a woman to her fingertips, could in her sleep hear a pin drop in the cellar. I was woken by a cry from the doorway: “Mr.
Goodall! What are you doing here? Why are you not in bed?”

Mrs. Downey, a wrap over her shift, hair falling down her back, holding a candle in her hand, was a pretty sight, I thought,
coming from sleep. She glanced about the room, taking in the fallen bibelot, happily unbroken, and then her eyes began to
roam on, in search, I think, of the bottle or bottles she thought must be involved in the affair. I had already deduced the
late Mr. Downey had not been a temperate man. Yawning and rubbing my eyes I told her I was on watch for trouble, though not,
as she had discovered, conscientious enough to carry out my self-designated duties.

She responded vehemently saying she could bear all this no longer. There were mysteries and secrets in the house, she knew
I had anxieties I was not revealing to her, I was not to imagine she had not perceived Gilmore's extra vigilance or did not
know I was at the back of it. She had not been told what Gilmore, her sister's own servant, had revealed to me as to his running
off. Now there was danger—“I repeat,” she said, “I can bear this secrecy no longer. Surely I have a right to know what is
happening? My sister's, my own and my defenseless child's safety appears threatened by a mystery. And,” she concluded, “if
you believe keeping secrets concerning myself and my family to be chivalrous then I have the honor to inform you it is not.
It is merely folly.”

Like most men, I do not like to hear myself roundly abused by a woman on waking. I became a little angry. “For God's sake,
Cordelia, I am doing my best,” I exclaimed—this was the first time I had used her Christian name and I was surprised to hear
it burst from my lips.

She did not comment on this use of her name, only saying gently, “Would it not be better to tell me what is happening?”

I sighed and leaned back, feeling very weary. “It is very late, Cordelia.”

“That does not concern you for you are on watch,” she said pertly. “I will make a little tea and butter some bread. We will
call it an early breakfast and it will restore you.”

And this she did, rekindling the embers of the fire, suspending the brass kettle on its hook above it, taking the loaf set
out for breakfast and toasting slices in front of the flames; while I, fighting sleep, wondered if I should tell her all,
or any of the story. If I were wrong? Could it be right to pass off suppositions as truth, frightening a woman? Such struggles
availed me nothing in the face of pretty Mrs. Downey at work with a toasting-fork, her hair curling down her back. Looking
as she did, she would have set a Trappist monk singing a roundelay. I asked myself were she indeed my sister, but widowed,
with a child, would I have the right to keep knowledge and therefore the power of deciding her own affairs, from her?

So—warning her that the story I had to tell was unpleasant and frightening, and that she herself would have to decide how
much of it to believe, I told her all, or almost all the story. Throughout my relation, which must have taken half an hour,
she sat quietly looking at me with a level gaze, moving only when she stood to offer me tea or make more toast. I was ravenously
hungry. I was astonished by her calm. At some points I thought it might be she could not understand what I was telling her
but, no, she understood perfectly. I concluded my tale by weakly appealing to her for a judgment: “Mrs. Downey—Cordelia—tell
me, do you think I am deluded, a false accuser of my friend Victor Frankenstein?”

Gravely she told me, “I do not think you understand everything about this, Jonathan” (she used my own first name, I noticed).
“There are mysteries here. But I am sure much of what you say is correct. Remember, I have known Donald Gilmore since he first
came to my sister's house as a lad. His tale concerning Mr. Frankenstein may not be accurate in every point, but not, I think,
the fiction Mr. Frankenstein makes it out to be.”

“Cordelia,” I said, and I may say the joy of using her name and having her use mine filled me. “What you say relieves my mind.
I feared I was mad.”

She said pensively. “Not that, but I am afraid I think Mr. Frankenstein a danger to you. And the singer, Maria Clementi—and
very possibly her companion, too.”

I think I have said I thought Cordelia, as I now will call her, a little hard on Maria, whom she had never met, through jealousy,
perhaps, and because she had a respectable woman's mistrust of actresses and the like. “Miss Clementi is the purest and most
innocent creature imaginable, as you would know if you met her,” said I.

“Whom you last saw in a carriage, laughing with a man you describe as one of the most degenerate creatures you ever encountered—”

I sighed. “I know. It is a mystery. And now Hugo and Lucy Feltham are at Cheyne Walk and I know not what may be occurring
there. Now I have dragged you into this affair. What can I do?”

“Wash your hands of the business now,” she told me.

“But I fear you and your household are in danger. How can I turn my back and pretend nothing is the matter?”

“Then go to the magistrate Mr. Wortley in the morning and inform him you have reason to believe the man who killed Mrs. Frankenstein
is at the Chelsea wharf. Demand that he should be taken up and questioned,” said the lady, evidently once a keen student of
her late husband, the lawyer.

“My dear Cordelia,” I said, taking her hand. “Of all women you are the most excellent.”

She seized back her hand. “My goodness, Jonathan,” she cried. “You are too bold. I should not be here with you at all at this
hour and dressed as I am.” And with that she whisked out of the room and I heard her go upstairs. But though she had reproved
me, she had called me by my given name. She had not been severe.

Filled with a surprising joy, I might have sat on in delighted contemplation of a life to be, but I had not done my patrol
for some hours now, so was obliged to take up my chilly vigil again. Until morning there was no sign of anything untoward
inside or outside the house. I resolved to adopt Cordelia's suggestion. I would lay information against the man on the wharf
as early as possible that morning. Some evidence concerning the attack might be got from him and, at all events, once in prison
he would not be able to harm anyone.

And it was my dear Cordelia who had clear-headedly gone straight to this solution! I began to dream of a future with her,
if only she would consent to marry me. I began to imagine her at Kittering, mistress of my house, tender friend to my sisters,
comfort to my father as he grew older. Would she have me? A worldly woman would not have hesitated—but Cordelia was not a
worldly woman. She would do only what her heart directed.

I went wearily to bed at six, when the loyal Gilmore took over from me. I thought of Cordelia—my head touched the pillow—I
was asleep.

Yet it was not of Cordelia I dreamed. I dreamed instead of that awful figure I had so recently encountered. In my dream he
was bare-chested and barefoot on some tropical island under a strong sun. He stood on yellow sand, gazing out over a blue
sea. There was the distorted figure, misshapen face, burning eyes and tangled mass of wild black hair. I felt the heart within
his breast drumming, sensed the violent movements of his brain, with its capacity for sudden, violent emotion, for good or
ill. And then he altered. His face softened and became more regular, his great black eyes ceased to burn like coals and took
on a gentler light—he smiled. From somewhere in the trees surrounding the bay I heard a voice, singing. It was the true voice
of Maria Clementi, heard in dream, though she was not to be seen. She sang some old mediaeval tune, somberly yet with great
feeling and conviction. It was a song such as one hears in holy processions in Spain and Italy. And the man stood, as if he
could not hear her, looking out to sea.

The notes of Maria's song were in my ears as Gilmore, according to my instructions, awoke me at half past seven. Not much
later I was on my feet in the dining-room, having taken a cup of coffee from the hand of Cordelia (already up and fresh as
a new coin, though silent to her sister on the subject of the night's doings). I intended setting off immediately for the
house of Mr. Wortley, who lived only a few streets away. At that moment the doorbell jangled and in came my friends Hugo and
Lucy, dressed for traveling. This was very strange for the hour was early and there had been nothing about their going the
day before. Moreover, few with any choice would set off for Kent with snow on the ground and the chance of more to come.

Invited to take some breakfast Hugo agreed with some relief and urged his wife to sit down and take something. She, however,
pale, with two angry red spots on her cheeks, remained standing and shook her head determinedly. Cordelia stood up and, putting
an arm round her shoulders, led her to a chair by the fire. She spoke to her softly and evidently induced her to take some
cordial.

Mrs. Frazer, at the table, gazed at this scene in surprise.

“Well, Hugo,” I asked, “what brings you here so early?”

Eating heartily, he said, “I apologize for this early arrival, Mrs. Downey, and thank you for your kindness. I regret there
is an unhappy affair to discuss.”

“You had better say what it is, Hugo,” I told him.

He glanced at Mrs. Frazer, sitting at the table alertly, eyebrows raised, and at Cordelia, standing near his wife.

“I have been made aware of something amiss at Cheyne Walk,” Cordelia then said. Mrs. Frazer's eyebrows went further up at
this.

It was Lucy who turned her head from the fire and said to her. “We have left that house.”

“In haste, I assume,” said I.

She stood up again and took a position by the fire, her eyes bright and her whole body rigid with anger. Showing none of Hugo's
compunction about what ought or ought not to be discussed before ladies, she exclaimed passionately. “That woman—that actress—Clementi—arrived
at midnight last night. You were right, Jonathan, to accuse Victor of continuing to court that woman when he should have been
mourning his poor wife. But what none of us could have known, believed—ah—it's disgraceful—Elizabeth hardly in her grave—monstrous—I
told Hugo I could not stay.” And again Cordelia urged her to sit down and calm herself.

With Lucy seated once more Hugo continued the story. “Let me explain why we could stay no longer at Cheyne Walk. She—the woman
Clementi—arrived as Lucy says late last night in a carriage, still in her gold stage dress, her face brightly painted, the
very model of a—well, I will spare us all the word. Lucy and I had just gone to our room, but came down again when the bell
rang, for it was very late and I had been alarmed Jonathan, by what you said the previous day. She burst in, dressed as I
have described, and straight away fell to sobbing in the hall. Victor, who had come from his study, went into something like
a frenzy, clasped her to him, told her (for she could say nothing, of course) that some coarse man must have pressed his attentions
on her and frightened her, threatened murder, called fire and brimstone on the head of her supposed abuser—all the while she
clung to him, giving no assent or denial to his suppositions about what had brought her to the house. There in the hall in
front of Lucy and myself he embraced her, she entwined about him, he told her he loved her, swore he would marry her. And
all the while she clung to him, with her painted face turned up to his, allowing him to woo her. Even as we watched, unable
to think what to do, he drew her tenderly into the study and closed the door. We heard him turn the key in the lock.”

“He slammed the door, rather, in our faces, without a word,” Lucy exclaimed. “We would have left then, but it was late, dark
and cold. We were forced to sleep there, as much as we could, rose early, packed and left. There was no sign of Victor or
the woman.”

“The study door was open as we left,” Hugo reported. “There was no one in the room. I felt we could not leave London without
coming to you, Jonathan, and telling you of this new state of affairs. I was disturbed by your argument yesterday with Victor—and
bewildered. But after what we have just seen I ask myself—what am I, what is anybody, to think of Victor Frankenstein? I am
sorry, Mrs. Downey, to bring this unpleasantness to your house.”

“You are well out of that horrible place,” said Cordelia. “Jonathan was on his way to lay information against the deformed
man of whom he spoke to you yesterday. What you do not know is that when he left you, he saw the fellow climbing over the
wall of Mr. Frankenstein's house, then bravely followed him to his lair and questioned him.”

“That's more than I would have done,” said Hugo. “What did he say?”

“The fellow is feeble-witted and hard to understand,” I said, “but he knows the name of Frankenstein and, my impression was,
resents him bitterly. Like you, I do not know what to think.”

As I spoke, there came another jangle at the doorbell and Mrs. Frazer, who had sat in amazement as this conversation continued,
jumped up to answer it herself, no doubt expecting more alarms—as was the case, for she was almost pushed back into the room
by a determined Mrs. Jacoby who came through the door like a tornado. Behind her was Gabriel Mortimer, less cock-ofthe- walk
now, and looking grim.

“Maria—have you seen her?” Mrs. Jacoby demanded of me.

“What?” cried Cordelia standing up. “Who are you? Why do you come here?”

“This is Mrs. Jacoby, Miss Clementi's companion, and Mr. Mortimer, her impresario,” I explained. “Mr. Mortimer, Mrs. Jacoby,
this lady rightly asks why you come here, uninvited, at this hour. Do you suppose I have Miss Clementi hidden somewhere in
the house?” At that point I confess I was anxious to dispel any impression Cordelia might have that they had any reason to
suppose this might be the case.

Mrs. Jacoby replied to my question, saying passionately, “Of course I don't think she's here. But I believe she may be at
Frankenstein's. You are his friend.”