"Can you hear me?" Mesmer asked the sleeper, standing directly in front of him and speaking slowly and distinctly.
"I can." The response was slow in coming, and sepulchral in tone, but the words were clear. I stared at my friend. He still appeared to be asleep.
"What is your name?"
There was no immediate answer. But my companion raised his head, grimacing, like one in the throes of nightmare. His eyes opened, unseeing, and closed again. It was as if he were sleepwalking.
Mesmer persisted. "You have told me that French is not your native language."
"I have—that is true."
"What is your native tongue, then? English?"
I could have attested that that was not so; but at the moment I thought it wiser to say nothing.
When his patient did not answer, Mesmer ordered briskly: "Tell us something in your native language."
Again my friend evinced signs of agitation, but remained silent.
"Is it German?"
"No. No."
"What tongue did you speak as a child?"
There was no answer.
Mesmer made gestures with both hands. The perspiration glistened on his brow. The huge form in the chair before him appeared to be sinking deeper and deeper into slumber.
The questioning persisted, with the strain of it now evident upon both parties; until at last the poor fellow shrieked out something, a short phrase, and collapsed, to lie sobbing in a heap upon the floor. The sight was to me as pitiful as it was unexpected, and I could only gaze in amazement.
Now abandoning all efforts to extract information, Mesmer crouched beside the fallen figure of his patient, and concentrated his efforts on soothing and awakening him. In this he was able to achieve success with what seemed to me remarkable speed. My friend looked around him, blinking his eyes, and asked in a calm voice what had happened and why he was sitting on the floor. He listened to my puzzled attempts at explanation, and though he still did not remember, nodded as if the whole matter were not as unprecedented as it seemed to me.
A short while later we were leaving Mesmer's establishment, having been provided with much to think about. The man himself saw us to the door and even out into the street, urging my friend with apparent sincerity to come back for another session in a few days.
In the street I observed, among the throngs of revelers, certain figures whose presence I took as evidence that we were being followed. Saville's people, I thought. Now they certainly know that we are here.
I mentioned this to my friend, who was now greatly recovered, and he commented: "It's a French-sounding name, Saville. He may well have some family connections here, as well as paid agents."
When we had regained our lodging, after apparently having been successful in shaking off our followers, the two of us discussed what the words might have been that he had blurted out while in the state of controlled sleep that had somehow been induced by Mesmer.
My friend looked worried. "I don't remember saying anything. What language did I speak in? French? German?"
"Neither of those_I think. Nor was it English. It sounded like nothing I've ever heard. Unless_" Struck by a new thought, I stared at him.
"Well?"
"It might have been…"
"What?"
"Well, now that I come to think back on it, the phrase you spoke might have been in German. Something like Grosser Karl."
"Big Karl?" He whispered the words; I could see immediately that the name meant something to him.
I had heard of a certain Big Karl in Ingolstadt, though he is not mentioned anywhere in Walton's book.
My companion said, "I've heard them—Saville, Frankenstein, Clerval, all of them, talking about someone with that name. Someone who used to be Frankenstein's assistant in some way. I've never seen him, to my knowledge, but… and those are the words I spoke when I was pressed to reveal my name?"
"It might not have been that exactly. All I can say is that it did sound something like it."
"Big Karl," he repeated. I could see that he had been struck by some new idea.
"You cannot possibly be that Big Karl," I protested. "Frankenstein would certainly be able to recognize his own assistant. Wouldn't he?"
My companion only stared at me for some time, and uncharacteristically did not give me a direct answer.
Carnival is at its end. I will let you know where we decide to go into hiding.
In haste,
BF
Chapter 15
March 13,1783
Somewhere between Paris and Ingolstadt
I now have true marvels of which to write. All that has gone before in these pages, everything, save perhaps my own creation, is commonplace, compared to this. And yet, what is the real miracle after all? Something whispers to me that I have not yet found it.
It is not my intention to detail here the entire course of our pursuit, through the streets and byways of Paris, by Saville's agents; it will be enough to relate the means by which we effected our escape. Suffice it to say that the devils had somehow contrived to enlist some sizable body of French troops in their cause. And that our cause, as dawn drew near, was beginning to appear entirely hopeless.
Freeman, as on one or two previous occasions during the course of our adventures, might have vanished into one group of humanity or another, and got clean away. But he would not desert me. As for myself, a giant over seven feet tall stands out in a crowd no matter what he attempts to do in the way of a disguise.
Twice, as we fled in a circuitous route across the city, we had attempted to buy or rent vehicles, and each time our pursuers, closing in, had come near capturing us before we could conclude our bargaining. We had at last taken shelter in a park, which we had reason to believe was now thoroughly surrounded; Freeman more familiar with Paris than I was, told me it was the Place des Victoires, close by the Palais Royal. Despite the concealment offered by the park's vegetation, it fell short of providing an ideal shelter, for a crowd of people were nearby, inside the park and along one edge. The little that we could see and hear clearly suggested that they were engaged in some kind of purposeful activity. The sounds of heavy foot traffic came to us, and, though Carnival was over, torches and bonfires were keeping one section of the park illuminated.
We rested for a few moments, having immersed ourselves in the deepest shadows we could find.
"If we cannot bargain for a vehicle of some kind, then we must contrive to steal one," Freeman declared in a whisper. "Then you can ride concealed in the back while I drive."
"Well. We cannot remain here long, and there are no wagons in these bushes. Maybe over there, where there are lights." I could hear horses, and the creak of wheels. "We must take a look."
Having caught our breath, we worked our way closer to the sounds of undefined activity, until we were on the very fringe of it, near a path where workmen occasionally came and went, bearing what looked like heavy burdens.
Freeman plucked at my sleeve, and pointed.
Beyond the last barrier of bushes, near the center of the torchlight, there rose a looming shape, rounded, big as a small house, but wobbling almost as if it were alive. A vast bubble, of what looked like fabric painted gold and blue. The shape and size of it somehow pricked fiercely at my memory. I ought to know…
Somehow, dimly, I did.
But of what use this academic, abstract knowledge? Behind us, as we faced the lights of the workers who were busy around the balloon, I could hear the voices of another detachment of the searching soldiers, coming closer.