HIGH STRANGENESS-Tales of the Macabre (8 page)

Walton almost laughed in the man's face. Demon?
God
would more appro
ximate the real character of Frankenstein's successful experimental being. He said, placing a calming hand on the other man's arm, “
We'll have no talk about demons and such things. I have been searching for a friend of mine, someone who deserted civilizat
i
on twenty years ago, someone I thought must by now be dead from exposure or starvation. That I've finally found his lair, and I admit it appears to be not unlike where a polar bear might take up residence, but now that I've found him, you cannot fully ima
g
ine my joy and thanksgiving. This man was once great. A learned man. He spoke fluently and visited all the great cities of the world. But something...tragic...caused him to turn his back on his fellow man, and I could not live with myself had I not made t
h
is ponderous trip to assure myself he still lived
—
or had finally found a restful peace in death. You do understand, don't you? You'll assure the others not to be afraid? We will return now, all of us, just as soon as we can. Our long journey is at an end.
”

The leader frowned trying to understand what was essentially an unreasonable and illogical story from the man who paid his salary, but after a moment, his breath pluming ghostly as fog from his lips, he nodded acquiescence the way a sheep will bow to the
shepherd's song. “
I'll tell the men,”
he said, and trundled away to the mouth of the cave where the rest of the party stood in stupefied wonder.

That night, with his lantern turned low to conserve oil, Walton could not stand the wait for the being's return
to his cave home. He took out the paper and began to write to Margaret about his discovery.

Dearest Sister,

Through divine providence I have not been killed, beset by my churlish supply bearers, or dropped off an ice crevice into an endless cavern. The Go
od Lord has answered my prayers and taken me to the very place of my dreams. I am here in the cave where Frankenstein's monster has been living! If something happens to me so that I do not make it back to your loving sphere, perhaps someone will bear this
missal to your hands so that you will know I have not wasted my money and my last year of health. I did not waste those years thinking about this incredible being; my life was not a squandering of my precious time on the ridiculous notion that the monster
still lived and walked on the same earth I did. I took a delusion
—
I know you thought me delusional!--and proved it to be reality.

He is here. Somewhere he is in this vicinity, roaming outside these ice-laden walls, hunting for food or scouring the snow for
something to burn at his fires. There is evidence all over that he was here within the last forty-eight hours. The coals from his last fire lie just as he left them. His bed of dried limbs where he lays his head is a long dark rectangle behind me, and hi
s
ax made from materials at hand (wood and stone and what appears to be strips of rabbit skin) leans against the freezing wall. He had even carved wooden bowls and utensils for his food. This is such a sight to see and I wish you were here with me to witne
s
s it.

I cannot tell you of my exuberance, how this makes me feel to be in the abode of the man I met that once and who ever after ruled my thoughts. It is like happening upon a casket of jewels when you are destitute. Or having been adrift at sea on a badl
y made raft for forty days and forty nights and finally making landfall upon a paradisaical shore. I feel as grand and full of passion as I am sure Frankenstein felt when first his creature moved and drew the first breath of life.

My men are in a dreadful mood and though I've sought to reassure them I have found a lost friend, I can see them even now at the mouth of the cave, their backs to me, and by observation of their agitated movements I know they are plotting to flee upon the
slightest provocation. Margaret, dear, we have progressed with our science and philosophical knowledge a long way from the days of idle witchcraft, spells, potions, and fear of the dark unknown, but these men are but a minute step from hysterical outright
mutiny. I have seen it before when on my ship in the sea that brought me into the north, and it consists of an unmistakable aura, a miasma of anxiety and trepidation that first seeps and then overwhelms men when they face a rip in the veil of natural even
t
s.

My joy is tempered by my own fear of how the men will react upon encountering “
my long lost friend.”
I expect a wailing and a cringing, for this being who has been in the studio of my mind for twenty years still causes me to shiver when memory takes me
too close to the surface of his true person. You know I have been at a loss to describe him except to tell you there is an instinctive drawing back from him, though his beauty is astounding. I know Frankenstein felt he had pieced together a freakish baske
t
of limbs and body parts to create a terrible looking being, but to me he always seemed to be a masterful thing of creation. He does inspire that dread all men harbor of the grave; he rankles the perceptions of what a man should be, and it is his “
new lif
e
”
that Frankenstein gave to him that causes us lesser mortals to quake and to turn away to evade seeing what God, in His mercy, dared not create out of dead parts. Still..to me....he has always been the most impressive of all men. He is the ultimate man.
T
he man we all might be if only we had our own dear Dr. Frankenstein to fix us...to correct us. If only my legs were so long, my arms so extended, my chest so wide, my head so ample. If only my torso was so muscled and my stomach so flat, my eyes so far-se
e
ing!

I grow sleepy, dear, or I would write more. The warmth from the fire, after my long day in the fierce biting cold, causes my head to droop on my shoulders. I have eaten heartily of potatoes cooked to a mush and chewy jerky of that fine venison I broug
ht from the last outpost. I am too happy. I feel a consuming content invading my body from my toes to my graying hair; I am satiated as a man can be who once
—
no, many times!--thought he was mad to follow after a nightmare, just to wrestle it from the dung
e
on into the full luminous glare of corporeality.

I hope the being does not find me sleeping, but I must rest now, and write more later when I know, beyond any doubt, I have done this good and righteous thing by coming to claim Frankenstein's world-shaking
creation.

Your most devoted brother,

Robert

* * *

The first he knew of the commotion, one man was dead.

Walton rose from the robes covering him near the fire and shrieked along with his men, the sounds issuing from his mouth without volition, so great was
his terror.

Out of the blackness of the cave's opening, back lit by a wide shaft of moonlight, stood the thing Walton feared and yet adored. Two of the men rushed toward the imposing figure, but the being brandished a length of raw corded wood that struck
them on the heads, knocking them back into the cave where they sprawled on their backs.

“
Don't!”
Walton called, anguished that it had come to this already, that his dream so easily slipped into fiendish nightmare. He didn't know if he called to his innoce
nt men or to the monster, but none of them listened.

A harsh ear-splitting bellow rent the air and another man was in the monster's big hands, held off his feet from the floor of the cave, struggling mightily to save his life. As Walton rushed forward, he
could see the tendons bulging on the monster's great arms and the veins filling to bursting point from the hapless victim's throat.

“
Let him go! Don't you recognize me? Don't you know me, Robert Walton, your master's friend? I'm WALTON. Hear me or, as God
is my witness, I will shoot you down without hesitation.”
Walton held a pistol on the monster, but whether he could actually kill with it, he did not know.

The monster's face turned slowly toward his voice and as his full features were presented, Walton fe
lt the gun wobble in his fist, felt his stomach turn over, and his mind fell back as if from a blow. What horrible malignant devil was this thing that held his gaze as though in a vise? The beauty was still there, hiding beneath insane eyes that knew no l
a
nguage or obeyed no laws. The skin was smooth over the wide sunken cheeks. The lips, compressed in rage, were black as they had been when Walton first saw him, but an unearthly hardness made them look carved from dense obsidian stone.

“
Please?”
Walton aske
d, his voice pleading softly. “
Let him go.”

The man dropped and his feet went out from under him. He scrambled to his knees, and hunched over, gasping in air. Walton watched in suspense as the man came to his feet and ran for the outside, disappearing into
the night. Suddenly it was clear Walton and the being were alone together. One man lay on the ice floor, but he was obviously never going to run or move again. His neck was broken, his head angled incorrectly, eyes staring. All the other men had fled in
f
ear for their lives. A despair filled Walton when he realized they surely had taken with them most of the supplies.

“
Now what shall we do?”
Walton asked quietly, coming closer to the being and reaching out tentatively with his fingers to touch him. “
Don't
draw back, I won't hurt you. I never meant to cause harm. Do you remember me now? Do you recall that meeting in the ship's cabin where your master died? Remember the story you told me?”

A cry of anguish and of buried rage arose from the creature's chest as
it staggered away from his touch into deeper shelter of the cave.

Walton, overcome with pity, approached him again. “
Do you still miss him? Do you still live with regret that he died?”

It occurred to Walton the being probably had not spoken aloud for year
s, maybe he had never spoken again after leaving the ship. If that was true, he might have forgotten by now even how to speak, how to form the words he had once so exquisitely voiced.

It was amazing that he had even remembered Walton's face. The recognitio
n in the being's eyes, just as he loosened hold of his victim's throat, had been unmistakable. There was a shadow of humanity that slowly came forth to defeat the fury of the animal the being had become to survive in the north alone. He knew Walton. Oh, h
e
knew him.

“
I came on this long journey to find you.”
Walton now said. He saw the monster lower himself before the fire and stretch out his marble white hands to the golden flames to warm himself. “
I knew in my soul that you had too much pride to destroy y
ourself on a pyre the way you said you would. You are a superior creation, built from flesh and blood, given life again, and you couldn't end it, could you? I knew, someway, that you still lived. And now I've found you.”

The first efforts at speech were li
ke gears grinding and flooded streams gurgling over their banks. The monster made guttural sounds, shook his great shaggy head, threw out his arms in frustration, and tried again to overcome the limitations of his unused, rusty vocal cords.

Finally the wor
ds he tried to bring forth were just intelligible enough for Walton, leaning in close and paying strict attention, to decipher.

“
You...should...shouldn't...have...come.”

“
Yes, I should have come. I had to come. Destiny meant it to be. I've spent my life ob
sessed with you and what you might be doing if you lived. I dream about you. I write about you. I could not die without knowing you better.”

“
I...I...am...a dangerous...
thing
...”

“
You do not have to be dangerous. I've thought about your former deeds
of murder and evil and came to the conclusion that had I been outcast from man, unloved, hated, feared, reviled, I might have done the same as you. What man can be set apart from the world and still be compassionate to it? Yes, you killed Frankenstein's f
r
iends and the ones he most loved, and he never forgave you for it, he died cursing you, but haven't the years alone taught you anything? Have you not come to terms with our God and asked to be relieved of your murderous desires?”

A look of absolute scorn s
uffused the being's face. Walton drew back, uncontrollably shaking and afraid to stare into those yellowish eyes.

“
I ask nothing...of...God! There is no...God...who would allow my creation in His...universe.”

Quietly, meekly, Walton said, “
All things come
from God, even you. And unto God you will return one day, as will we all.”