I opened the window and looked out into the night. I could smell the coal and charcoal from the domestic fires. Then I went over to the corner, picked up the mouse, and threw it down into the street. “There now. All your terror has gone. Would you prepare my bed?”
ON THE FOLLOWING MORNING I was about to set off for Limehouse, eager to test my new theory concerning the electrical charge, when Fred announced a visitor. Polidori entered the room, visibly excited, and flung himself down in a chair without invitation. “You are surprised to see me, Frankenstein? I hoped to find you here. You did not return to the villa, so I guessed that you had gone back. I could stand it no longer. Byron has become insufferable, and the poor Shelleys seem to follow his bidding in everything. I got back last night.” He was speaking in a disjointed manner. “You know that Byron is a danger?”
“I have my doubts about him.”
“Doubts? Certainties. He has seduced one of the girls in the neighbourhood of the villa, and the people there are ready to lynch him. His temper has become unbearable. He screams at the servants, and has abused Shelley to his face.”
“In what way?”
“He called him a doodler and an unknown scribbler.”
“And how did Shelley respond?”
“He went pale. Then he turned away and walked out of the room. I could take no more of it, Frankenstein. I left without warning, in case Byron should try and prevent me. When I last saw him he was on one of his drunken sprees, wandering in the garden and slashing at the trees with his cane.”
“Your laudanum would have calmed him.”
“You cannot give an opiate to a madman. It fuels his madness.”
“You think him insane?”
“Deranged. Degraded. Whatever word you wish.”
“No, Polidori. Madness is silent and secret. Don’t you think so? This ebullition of temper is the sign of an oversensitive constitution. Nothing more.”
“Whatever the cause of his lordship’s frenzy, I do not wish to witness it. So I have come back.”
“Do you have lodgings?”
“No.” He looked at me almost defiantly.
“Where are you going to stay?”
“I was hoping, Frankenstein, that I might stay with you.”
I could think of no convenient excuse for the moment. “Here?”
“This is where you live, is it not? I know that you have room to spare.”
In the course of that day, then, the bold and resourceful Polidori moved into Jermyn Street. There was a small room at the back that, he said, fitted him admirably. When I broke the news to Fred, he merely rolled his eyes.
“The doctor will be welcome, will he not?” I asked him.
“Oh yes, sir. Ever so welcome. I hope he eats cutlets.”
WHEN POLIDORI WAS SETTLED, I told him that I was obliged to return to my work. He nodded. He seemed to require no further explanation. So at twilight I travelled east to Limehouse. I had locked and bolted the workshop, to prevent the intrusion of neighbours, and I had barred the windows to forestall inquisitive eyes. So everything had remained untouched. I began at once to charge the electrical columns, and I was pleased to see them glow with new life. Within a few hours I was able to begin my experiments in altering the direction of the electrical fluid; I observed, for example, that by changing the position of the metallic plates and circuits that surrounded the columns, there was some momentary deflection in the fluid. I continued this work late into the night, but I could achieve nothing further. I needed greater force than any I could yet summon. I surmised, too, that I needed to discover another source of electrical attraction that would bend the fluid to its will. All this lay ahead of me.
I decided to walk back to Jermyn Street, hoping to clear my head in the quiet hour before dawn. Yet a strong wind had risen. As I walked through the streets, every falling leaf seemed to cast its shadow as it was dashed to the ground by the wind. I could see my own shadow, too, against the brickwork. It was bent forward, hastening onwards as if it had an existence of its own. And then once more he was walking beside me. He said nothing to me, but matched me pace for pace. “I have kept my promise,” he said at last in that clear sweet voice I had come to know so well. “You see. I will always be closer to you than you can imagine.” He stood still, and waited until I had taken a few steps further down the street. When I turned around, he had gone.
WHEN I ARRIVED in Jermyn Street, I was surprised to find Polidori in my study.
“My apologies, Victor. I wandered to your room quite by chance. I am in a wandering vein.” He seemed uneasy.
“You may wander where you will. I have no secrets.”
“Truly?” He looked at me warily, and not without a trace of malice.
“Why should I lie to you?”
“You are deep, Victor. Very deep. I do not think I will ever reach your depths.”
“There will be no reason ever to try.”
“I do know that you suffer from nervous fear.”
“Oh, I suffer from many things.” I cleared my throat. “I admit that there are times when I experience fear.”
“Are you afraid now?”
“Of what?”
“Of me.”
“Whatever is your reason for saying that?”
“You suspect me of something.”
“Suspect?”
“You tell me that you have no secrets. But you are afraid that I will find them out.” He laughed, but he was looking at me intently. “Have you ever done a wicked thing, Victor? Just to prove that you could do it?”
“Byron has asked me the very same question.”
“He is obsessed with the idea. He told me the story of one Monro, a clerk in holy orders. Did he tell you?”
“No.”
“It was some years ago now. Before you and I arrived here. This clerk had quite lost his faith. In his heart he said, there is no God. Yet still he took part in the services, gave out the wine and bread to his parishioners, preached from the pulpit on the Last Judgement and salvation.”
“A most arrant hypocrite.”
“He knew this. He reproached himself with bitter laments. He wept. He cut himself with knives. All this he confessed later. He had a great desire to free himself from his torments. But how was he to break free? By degrees he conceived a scheme-no, it must have happened all at once. He hit upon an act of the utmost unreason.”
“Go on.”
“If he were to commit a crime of malignant evil, without motive, he would be able to redeem himself. Say that he were to kill a child, for example. He would take no pleasure in it-he would choose a child at random, and then stifle it. Then he would be free of God. And what if he did take pleasure in the act? He would, as he put it to himself, become a god. There was no force in the universe higher than himself. There were no consequences to his action-no punishment, no shame, no guilt, no hell. He would have gone beyond the gates of good and evil. He would prove that all is allowable. That is what he said to himself.”
“And did he commit the crime he longed for?”
“He murdered an old woman. According to his testimony he picked her out of the crowd, one evening at twilight, and followed her home. He had taken off his clerical garb, and wore a simple coat and breeches. She lived alone in a cottage just beyond Hammersmith. It was there that he killed her. He stabbed her repeatedly with a knife taken from her own kitchen, and then made his escape under cover of darkness. The crime was widely reported but the murderer could not be discovered. The clerk, meanwhile, continued his ordinary life at the church. But he exulted. He led the divine service with greater fervour, and preached more eloquently than ever. He had found his salvation in one unreasonable act.”
“But then how was he apprehended?”
“This is the curious thing. He felt no remorse. He felt no guilt. Not even shame. On the contrary, he felt proud. So then, as the weeks passed, he experienced an overwhelming desire to tell his crime. He wished to announce his part. He wished to put it into words. He tried to restrain himself. But the desire to speak-to utter the final chapter, as it were-proved overwhelming. One Sunday morning, in his church, he mounted the pulpit and divulged his deed to his parishioners. He produced the knife from the folds of his cassock.”