I was so caught up in my thoughts that I failed to notice Charlotte’s expression dimming or the door being opened, and was in the midst of relating a story to Charlotte when Frankenstein appeared in my peripheral vision. Terror filled me with the thought that I had betrayed my secret knowledge to him, and worse, betrayed Charlotte’s confidence, but when Frankenstein laughed out loud I realized that wasn’t the case.
“Ah, my dear pet,” he exclaimed happily. “You now have the ability to use your jaw muscles. How wonderful! But what are you trying to do to Sophie? Eat her? She is not food, my pet! Or am I mistaken? Are you so bewitched by her beauty that you are trying to enjoy her carnally? I am afraid that too great a distance separates you both for your lips to reach, at least not without my help!”
Frankenstein giggled to himself, and when he picked up the bowl that Charlotte’s head rested in I thought he was going to bring her to me to force our lips to press. Instead, though, he smiled mockingly at me and placed his index finger on her lips for her to suckle on, all the while giggling in that insidious manner of his. Oh how I despised him and wished that I had regained enough strength to throttle him! But even as I burned in my hatred I was relieved that he had failed to divine the true nature of what he had seen.
Frankenstein’s giggling ceased. A hardness showed in his eyes as he placed Charlotte on her shelf. Then he turned those cruel eyes toward me, studying me as if I were little more than an insect under a piece of glass.
“If you have the strength to move your jaw muscle, I wonder what other strength you have recovered? Can you not yet move your fingers, your toes?” he mused softly. “More importantly, I must wonder why you are hiding this from me? Is it simply an animal cunning that has taken over?”
He pursed his lips as he continued his black-hearted study of me. During it I fought to keep my expression empty so that I might hide my intelligence from him. At last he gave up.
“Is it that my presence simply leaves you paralyzed with fear, the same as a fox may leave a rabbit?” he queried. “Whatever the reason, it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you are regaining your strength, and with luck this new arm that I have crafted will grow to be part of you. And perhaps enough intelligence will develop in your brain so that someday I may learn the truth regarding this curious behavior of yours. We shall see.”
Frankenstein proceeded to lower me once more. Shortly after he left I heard a low but horrible bellowing noise, as if made by a wild animal with its leg caught in a trap. Only after I later felt a sensation of wetness upon my cheeks did I understand that I was the source of this terrible noise. It was the sound of my own weeping.
CHAPTER
5
I became familiar with a routine. A dreary and mostly hellish routine. No matter what the human spirit may be confronted with, we appear to possess the capacity for settling into habits so that we may be able to survive our circumstances, no matter how horrific they may be. After seeing the appendage that was removed from me, I had to confront the fact that my being was something other than that of a man, but still, I stubbornly believed my spirit and sentiments to be human.
Each night Frankenstein would perform his ungodly rituals. During the day I was mostly left alone to contemplate the horrors that had befallen me, with my only respite being when every third day or so I would be raised to a more vertical position. The reason for this, according to my host, was to keep my blood from settling and more rot from occurring, although I suspected Frankenstein also took perverse pleasure in having Charlotte and I face each other. Little could he have suspected that I greatly welcomed the company of Charlotte a fellow creature made equally as miserable as myself. During these brief respites we would converse in our silent manner. While I desperately wished to know what I had become, I made no attempt to extract from her the nature of my appearance. Mostly from Charlotte I received the warmth of human compassion, which was completely absent from Frankenstein, who radiated nothing but mockery and cruelty.
The appendage that Frankenstein manufactured to replace the one that had decayed successfully attached itself to my body. As the days passed, my strength grew, although what I had was still very little. I did however gain the power to move my neck sufficiently to see more of my surroundings. The room I had been placed in appeared to be a laboratory, with both familiar and unfamiliar medical apparatus cluttering several tables. Enough sensation had also returned to my skin so that I determined that a fabric had been lain across my body. My appearance was still mostly a mystery to me. I lacked even the strength to lift my hands to the necessary height so that I could view them.
Not once did I sleep. Perhaps this inability was due to Frankenstein’s nightly satanic chanting. Or perhaps sleep was simply a component missing from the form of creature that I resided within. Or it could be simply that my lack of physical activity left me with no compulsion to sleep. There were other normal bodily functions that were absent within me, most noticeably that I did not receive any nourishment or liquids. I wondered about that, for every known species of creature requires nourishment and water to survive, and I had had neither for over forty days. I suspected that the foul ointment Frankenstein applied to me nightly had been seeping into my body and, in some ungodly way, was providing me the nourishment that food and water would normally give.
As the days passed, Frankenstein’s demeanor grew decisively excited. He scurried about his laboratory, his cheeks flushing a bright pink, all the while remarking that we were soon to be visited by an honored guest. It was late one afternoon when I heard Frankenstein’s voice drifting in from outside of the room, and soon realized he was conversing in French with another man. The two of them must have been in a room adjacent to the one that I was housed in, and I could hear them without much strain through the walls. At first the two men exchanged pleasantries with Frankenstein addressing this other man as “my dear Marquis.” He spoke with a reverence and subservience that seemed unnatural for him. After Frankenstein had expressed his hope that this other man had enjoyed a comfortable journey, his voice nearly tittered in excitement as he commented on the notorious stories he had heard over the years concerning a Rose Keller.
“Bah!” this other man exclaimed angrily. “They made it out as if I had slaughtered and dismembered a roomful of wenches instead of merely flogging the ass of one particularly opportunistic whore! And the way they treated me. A nobleman. All because of a few welts on the backside of a whore? Enough of that. Victor, must you keep me in suspense much longer? I have been anticipating this creation of yours ever since we began our correspondences and you proposed the idea to me.”
“I will be keeping you in suspense a while longer for I have another surprise for you. Really only a novelty, but one that I believe you will find of interest.”
The door to the laboratory opened and Frankenstein entered moving in an excited pace. I dared to lift my head high enough to spot him, but he was too eager in his intentions to notice. Near breathless, he raced to where Charlotte rested and took hold of the bowl that she was within. He exited the room while carrying the bowl in one hand and stroking her scalp with his other. From beyond I heard this other man, this Marquis, shout out in surprise.
“Its eyes! They’re moving! Does it possess intelligence?”
“Sadly, no. She is little more than an amusement. But watch how she suckles my finger when I place it near her mouth.”