Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

Blackthorne Manor was dead quiet.

“Hello?” Angelika called, walking through the house. “Where is everybody?”

It had been almost a week since the night of the secret-society formation under the stars, and as always, Victor was right. Being in a secret society was not very exciting. Nor was being courted by two competing men. She hadn’t seen Christopher since that night, and Will was occupied fixing up his new cottage.

“Angelika Frankenstein, the woman who managed to secure two suitors, only to never see them again,” she said out loud to the portrait of her mother. “Mama, I think they both have forgotten about me.”

Caroline didn’t appear to care.

Desperate for some conversation, Angelika went to Victor’s bedroom, where the door stood open. The poor bed was crooked from the wall. It was a good thing he was giving Lizzie a break from his ardent natural science activities; unless they were somewhere else. Lizzie would surely be with child soon. Angelika felt a terrified pulse run through her whenever she thought of that. She was being left behind.

Wouldn’t it be nice to be so passionately occupied herself, in a lake house as the roses bloomed? What worried her was this: in her nightly erotic dreams, the face of the man changed without her permission.

Angelika halted at the window and watched as Jacob worked Percy on a long lead in a circle, trotting him over ground poles. The animal gleamed, and his ears were pricked forward.

“Everybody is occupied today, even my horse. What would I do with my time if I lived completely alone?” Angelika asked herself out loud. “What would I do if I could do anything?”

Her new awareness of her various privileges told her this: she was already at that decision point. She did not have any strong urge to go out to the laboratory. But she did remember her mother’s fabric and trimmings in the trunk at the foot of her bed.

“Perhaps I will try making Edwin something new to wear,” she decided aloud. It felt like a good, cheery thing to do, and she went off with a new purpose, to find a sharp pair of scissors. “I could pay the tailor to give me lessons to refresh my skills. I could embroider my own quilt.”

Technically, Will was the last project she had worked on, and his comment about mindless needlepoint did echo in her mind, but he was whitewashing the walls of his new address; was his pastime any better? He was pulling away rapidly and had seemed so eager to leave the manor house he’d practically run away. She’d resisted the urge to visit him at least fifty times.

She repeated her mantra aloud now:

“Let him make the effort. I must have an invitation.”

The search for scissors brought her to her father’s study, where she found Sarah, diligently completing her hour of required reading and writing. She sat knock-kneed on a small stool in a dim corner, with a book on her lap and a slate abandoned by her foot. She flinched when Angelika’s shadow fell across the page.

“Hello,” Angelika said to her. “How are your studies?” She didn’t need to wait for Sarah’s reply. The girl looked wretched. “Don’t sit slumped on this stool. Come, sit at the desk. Show me what you are working on.” She wrote out the alphabet, and they read and wrote for an hour.

Angelika felt a corresponding glow in her chest as Sarah worked, and how with each passing minute the girl was growing in confidence to speak and engage. Doing good things for people felt marvelous. Wouldn’t it be a fine thing for Will to walk in during a study session to witness this good deed? He usually only witnessed her dismal failures. She remembered the boardinghouse.

“I could buy you a bag of coal if you like. How much is it?” Angelika patted herself for coins.

“I am warm from my walk back in the evenings; it is no matter.”

Angelika regularly saw Sarah at bedtime and lighting the fires at dawn. She pictured ravines full of bad men. “And how far is this walk?”

This interrogation was causing Sarah to grow increasingly uncomfortable. “I am not complaining.” She got to her feet and backed around the desk. “Mistress, please do not think I am unsuited. I can work harder. My parents need me to work.”

“That’s not what I am leading toward. I am very happy with you.” Angelika could have kicked herself for her carelessness. Sarah was her responsibility now, as long as she was mistress of Blackthorne Manor. “Where’s Mary?”

“She had another one of her turns. But don’t say anything, please. I must go help with lunch.” Sarah rushed out of the room, turning in the direction of the kitchen.

“Someone has made that girl skittish, and I think I know who.” Angelika scowled and began the long trudge upstairs. And trudge she did. By the time she took her last step into the servants’ quarters in the attic of Blackthorne Manor, she was short of breath and wheezed for an embarrassingly long time against the stair rail with her heart drumming in her ears.

“And to think—Mary makes this trip, every day.” Once she could breathe again and the beads of sweat were wiped from her brow, Angelika felt composed enough to discuss Sarah’s living arrangements. She just had to muster some courage.

She had probably ventured up here once as a child, but was brutally chastised by Mary. She could feel the gusts of wind through the dark slate roof. One leap of excitement and Mary would crack her head clean through.

There was only one door, painted a dark maroon, with a silver horseshoe nailed to it. Angelika knocked meekly. There was no answer. One knew instinctively not to go into a sleeping bear’s den, and it took courage to push the door open a crack. The scent of wet wool was released.

“Mary,” Angelika said. “I must speak with you.” There was still no answer. “Are you ill?” She pushed the door open wide and stood there, completely astonished by what she saw.

Mary’s tiny home was how Angelika imagined a mouse might live. Every wall surface was decorated with . . . scraps. The old woman had apparently kept every offcut of fabric, discarded garment, pretty soap paper, or decorated parchment. Similar colors were overlaid and grouped together in a pleasing harmony, and in the dim light from the one dormer window Angelika could appreciate the artistry applied.

“A lifetime of Frankenstein refuse has been repurposed,” Angelika marveled quietly. Had she ever thought to buy her a gift during her trips to Paris? The old woman would have been in raptures over a few yards of silk, or gold fringing. “This is something we have in common. I, too, am passionate about fine fabrics.” She ventured in further, but could not stand at full height. “Is this why her back is so bent?”

A dish of glass marbles was glowing on the windowsill, beneath a drying row of ancient undergarments that Angelika would not see fit to wipe Belladonna’s face with. Doll making must have been her hobby, because she had a row of simple creations made of wooden clothespins, each with a little gown and a painted face that made Angelika smile.

There was no sound or movement deeper within the room. Fearing what she might find, she stepped closer to a pair of curtains and peeked through.

Mary was lying on her back, mouth open wide and skin sagging over her skull, and Angelika’s heart almost leapt out of her throat. But then she made a crackling inhale, and everything was all right again.

“Mary,” Angelika said, sitting gingerly on the edge of the low bed. “Mary, it’s me.”

The old woman jolted awake. Confusion gave way to slow recognition in her watery blue eyes, and a fearsome scowl spread across her face. This was a monumental intrusion, and Angelika’s inner child was screeching at her to run for her life.

Mary asked, “What time is it?”

“Just lie back. You are unwell?” Angelika shook her head when Mary attempted to rise. “No. Stay still, I order you. You have had a turn?”

Mary sank down against her pillow, expression mutinous. “Who told you that?”

“I guessed. What type of turn, and how often do you have them?”

“That’s my business, missy.”

The two women stared at each other.

Seeking to calm her, Angelika said, “Sarah and the cook have lunch in hand, and besides, everybody is busy. There may be no one to serve today.”

Giving in to the urge to retreat, Angelika tied back the bedroom curtains and went to the window. She bent low beneath a holey gusset to peer outside. “I can see Will’s house from here.” It was the first in a row of five stone structures. She could even make out a cheerful wisp of smoke rising from his chimney. “Perhaps I should come up here to spy on him.”

A grand, optimistic idea struck her now: when she accepted his eventual marriage proposal, Will could give his cottage to Sarah. She turned to Mary to suggest it, but the old woman had a hard look on her face.

“I have not seen either of my suitors in an age. Maybe they’ve changed their minds,” Angelika joked with a half smile, expecting her to agree. But Mary just lay with her hands folded on her stomach, regarding her with an inscrutable expression. “I wasn’t sure what to expect,” Angelika said, polishing Mary’s window with her sleeve. “But I thought being courted would involve more romance.”

Silence. Perhaps turning the conversation back to Mary would be better.

“How old were you when you met your own husband, William?” She picked up a peg doll and waggled it at Mary. “This is rather sweet.”

“Was there a reason for your visit, beyond idiotic chitchat? If not, I want you out.” The old woman crackled with anger now. “What makes you think you can just walk in here?”

Angelika had to swallow down a retort that might go something like This is my house. Some of that sentiment was admittedly in her tone when she replied, “Yes, as a matter of fact, there was something I wanted to discuss with you. It’s plain that you’re no longer able to keep up as you once did.” She waved an arm at Mary’s supine body. “If you are having health troubles, it is time to let the new staff take over.”

Mary said incredulously, “What?”

“It is ridiculous to hear that you are having turns and feeling so unwell.” They weren’t friends, but surely it wasn’t something Angelika should have to find out about from another servant. “I’m saying we must discuss how much longer you will be working in your current role.”

Mary echoed, “How much longer?”

“And I wanted to discuss Sarah’s living arrangements, but seeing as you’re in a foul mood, that can be separate.”

“I’ve worked here since before you were born.”

“I can see that,” Angelika said, looking around. She was about to think of how to tempt Mary into considering retirement—more time for doll making and looking at this view?—when Mary rolled off the bed in an incredibly nimble movement and folded Angelika’s arm behind her back to hustle her out.

“Ouch,” Angelika cried out.

“I started working for your grandfather,” Mary hissed. “I watched your father meet your mother and marry her. I saw Victor being born, then you crying the house down for years. I’ve kept every secret, when I could have had you taken away in irons.”

“You’re hurting me!”

“And now you come up to my private quarters, touching my personal things, to tell me I am no longer required?”

Angelika protested with her cheek on the doorframe, “I didn’t say that. Things will be changing, that is all, and we don’t need you for the difficult work. Lizzie will be mistress soon, and Will has seen to it that we almost have a full staff again. I thought you’d be pleased to hang up your duster and sleep past the rooster crow. You know we will compensate you generously for your years of service.”

Mary ignored that and instead asked, “Who will be head housekeeper?”

“You’re already training Sarah.” If everyone accepted the girl’s meek shyness and allowed her to grow in confidence, she could see no reason why it shouldn’t work out. With a noise of utter contempt, Mary pushed Angelika out.

“I always knew you were heartless, Angelika Frankenstein. Good riddance. And by the way”—she pointed a finger in her face—“I pray for the poor soul who marries you.”

The door was slammed, and Angelika was left stunned on the landing, rubbing her burning wrist and rotating her shoulder.

She probably did sound like a fleeing child as she took the stairs. She’d certainly had this kind of red, tight, upset feeling before, and she’d clutched a doll in her hand, both then and now. How had she so utterly botched that conversation?

Angelika ran below her mother’s portrait but kept her eyes down. “I should have asked Lizzie to broach it with her. It is practically her house now, after all. Dammit, I should have just left it.”

Angelika ran through the kitchen, where the warm cooking smells made her feel sick, and headed down the path to the laboratory, but it wasn’t Lizzie she sought. Approximately once a year Victor afforded her a genuine hug. Perhaps she’d be in luck.

As she climbed the stairs to the laboratory and walked across the landing, she sharpened her hearing in case she was about to walk in on a passionate scene she would not be able to erase. Then she heard Lizzie say, “And when are you going to tell Jelly?”

Victor: “Nothing’s certain yet.”

Lizzie said, “But if you had to make a prediction?”

“It’s not certain,” Victor repeated, but now his tone was different. Bleaker. “We are in entirely new realms of science. He knows that.”

“She deserves to know. This is her entire future. She cannot make a proper choice without knowing it.”

“Inevitably she will work it out; she’s a clever little monkey. But let’s begin again with this formulation. I need to train you well if you are to be my very special new assistant. Let me tell you exactly how I like it.” Victor’s tone became velvety.

Angelika wrinkled her nose. She’d better make herself known, and fast.

“I deserve to know what?” Angelika’s voice caused them both to jump. Lizzie dropped a glass tube and it smashed at her feet. “Is it Will?”

“Jelly, don’t sneak.” Victor picked up Lizzie and sat her on the bench, and then bent to scrape together the glass fragments. “How long were you there?”

“Long enough to know that secrets are being kept. It’s about Will’s fatherhood prospects, isn’t it?” She belatedly remembered to dash the tears from her cheeks with the back of one hand. “It’s fine, he told me already. And I’ve just had a row with Mary.”

“That statement could apply on any given day,” Victor said.

It was not a hug day. At least, not for Angelika. Once he straightened up, he stood between Lizzie’s legs and put his arms around her. On the floor was an open crate, and on the bench was the new microscope. Victor hadn’t even come to tell her it had arrived.

Lizzie wore Angelika’s work apron. “Are you all right, Jelly?” she asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

The sight of her wearing that apron hit in the way the diamond ring should have; it was a jealous-lonely-loss type of feeling compounded on top of the feelings Mary had just instilled. She could see on the opposite bench that a simple chemical experiment was laid out, one she had learned many years ago.

There was steam rising from her regular mug, and her pencil was behind Lizzie’s ear, and the apron looked better on her. Mary was not the only one retiring today.

“Jelly? What’s the matter?” Lizzie asked again.

“You’re officially his new assistant?” Angelika asked, trying her best to smile and sound normal, but it was clear from their faces that she was not succeeding. More tears fell. “I’m sure he’ll keep you terribly busy, just like I was. Make sure you don’t make him repeat himself, or he’ll positively shout at you, and don’t ever drop a glass tube again. That’s the only one you’re allowed to break for your whole life.”

“Jelly.” Lizzie said her nickname like an apology.

It was time for another escape—as dignified as she could—this one made worse by Victor’s disgusted voice. “She’s seeking attention, as usual.” He was right, of course. He always was. “Let her go.”

Angelika fled the building. “Let me go,” she chanted as she ran across the lawn in the direction of the orchard, Will, anywhere but here. She felt like she could run all the way to Larkspur Lodge, to lie on her true childhood bed, until she worked out her new place in this world. “Let me go, let me go—”

Then, she saw him, on the edges of the forest, with a gold glint on one hand. The last man she ever expected, and he was looking right at her, and she imagined she saw compassion in his look.

It was Victor Frankenstein’s missing creation.

And because she did not know what else to do, she lifted her hand in a wave, and walked to him.