“Very well, Doctor,” said Mother. “Please proceed with all possible speed.”
I wondered how great my parents’ confidence was in Murnau. Were they filled with hope? Or did they think his treatment no more reliable than a recipe from an alchemist’s book?
Three days later Konrad’s treatment began.
Beside his bed was a metal stand. Hanging from it, upside down, was a sealed glass flask. It was filled with some manner of clear fluid-the special medicine Dr. Murnau had concocted. From the flask’s rubber stopper snaked a long tube that joined a hollow-tipped needle snugly tied to my brother’s forearm. The serpent’s end of the needle pricked his flesh and entered one of his veins. The liquid, through some ingenious device, dripped slowly, entering his blood gradually, minute by minute, hour by hour.
Dr. Murnau had given my brother a potent sleeping draft.
For two days Konrad lay in bed, still and pale as death.
Tomorrow night, during the new moon, we would make our trip to the Sturmwald.
CHAPTER SIX
Inside the boathouse, where the mighty foundation of Chateau Frankenstein rose slick and black from the lake, there was a thick door reinforced with bands of iron. It was always kept locked, though long ago Konrad and Elizabeth and I had found the key, hidden within a chink in the wall.
It was late afternoon when I took the key and opened the door. The dank smell of the dungeons wafted up to me. Hundreds of years before, the captured enemies of the Frankenstein family would have been dragged there, manacled. I stepped inside, lit my lantern, and closed the door behind me.
Ten steep steps brought me down to a narrow corridor, on either side of which were six cells. The doors hung open now. I went from cell to cell, sticking my lantern inside. So near the beauty of the lake, the mountain air-yet you would hardly know it here, with only a small barred window set high into the thick stone. My lantern light picked out some writing on the wall. A name: Guy de Montparnasse. And not far from it, another even fainter name. Casting my light about the cell, I saw five names-all prisoners from different times. I imagined them scratching the stone-with what? A tin spoon? A broken fingernail? A rotted tooth? Leaving some sign of themselves, like a cry to the outside world. A plea for remembrance. For a moment I felt breathless, but I forced myself to the next cell, and the next, until I found the one I sought.
My memory was correct. At the very end of the corridor was a larger cell. Perhaps for the most important prisoners. It had a crude wooden table and several chairs, and some shelves on the walls.
This would do.
On the table I set down my lantern, the wallet Polidori had given me, and a small bundle of measuring apparatus I had smuggled out of the kitchen. I needed a place where I could work in total secrecy, in case there was a spill, or a telltale odor that would alert my parents to my work.
Carefully I took out the vials of ingredients and set them in a row, then the mortar and pestle, and the set of minuscule measuring spoons. As promised, Polidori had written instructions for me.
My laboratory. I felt a curious eagerness and excitement. Never had I excelled at schoolwork. I was impatient, I was sloppy. But I had been charged with creating something and was determined to do it well.
Polidori had not lied. It was a simple concoction, and his instructions were clear. Yet I was extremely nervous. The success of our enterprise might rest on this. I measured everything twice and even thrice before adding it to the flask. And with every completed step, I felt a growing sense of satisfaction, and pride.
As I poured in the final ingredient, I started at the sound of footsteps.
“It’s only me,” whispered Elizabeth, and I saw the spill of her lantern light outside in the corridor before she appeared in the doorway.
“Do you remember, when I was ten, you and Konrad dared me to stay here half an hour without light?”
“And you did it,” I said, laughing.
“Of course,” she said, entering the cell and looking at the table. “Is it done?”
“It is,” I said, stoppering the flask and shaking it vigorously.
“You are very clever, Victor,” she said.
“Anyone might have done it,” I said, pleased by her praise.
“What is it, exactly? This vision of the wolf?”
“It is not as devilish as it sounds. Polidori explains it in his note. You remember when Father told us about the workings of the eye?”
“It is like a lens,” said Elizabeth. “When it needs light, the pupil opens wider to admit it.”
“Yes,” I said. “But the human eye isn’t accustomed to working well in the dark, not like many animals’ are. So this compound lets your eyes dilate more than usual to make use of whatever starlight is available.”
“It makes perfect sense,” she said. “Have you tested it?’
I shook my head. “There’s not enough. And we must use it sparingly, and only when necessary, for it lasts only an hour or so. And then we must not use it again for at least a month.”
“Why’s that?”
“Polidori says it can damage the tissues of the eye.”
“It does not sound entirely safe,” she remarked.
“He says it is, as long as we heed his instructions. How are the other preparations?”
“We are ready,” she said, and gave me her report. She and Henry had found a good measure of lightweight rope and had knotted it at regular intervals so we might climb it. They had assembled lanterns and matches, water flasks and cloaks, for it promised to be cold tonight-and had hidden it all at the entrance to the Sturmwald.
“There is one thing you have forgotten,” she said.
“What?” I asked.
“If I am to navigate the woods in total darkness and climb a tree, I need proper clothes. Clothes they do not make for women. I will need some trousers.”
“Trousers?” I said, amazed.
“You sound surprised.”
“I just assumed it would be Henry and me climbing the tree.”
“Oh.” She nodded humbly. “Yes, I suppose that makes the most sense. I can just wait at the bottom and do needlepoint by the light of the lantern-”
“Elizabeth-,” I said, hearing the fire kindling in her voice.
“-or just daydream about the latest Paris fashions.”
“Polidori said the tree is extremely high.”
“Rather like the one I rescued you from a few years ago?”
“I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about,” I lied, fighting hard not to smile.
“Yes, you do! The great elm in the east pasture? I can see by your face you remember!”
I remembered it exactly. Like me, Elizabeth was a keen climber of trees, and we had both gone very high. But when I’d looked down, I’d been paralyzed with fear. Elizabeth had reassured me, and bullied me safely down to the ground.
“Oh, that!” I said with a dismissive shrug. “I was only eleven.”
“So was I. You needed me then, and you need me now. You won’t get Henry up the tree anyway.”
“Why not?”
“Henry? Come, Victor, he’s no adventurer.”
“He’s very practical,” I said.
Elizabeth sniffed. “A pair of your trousers should do nicely. Some breeches and a tunic of some sort.”
“Yes, yes, of course,” I said. “I’ll bring some to your room.”
“Thank you.” She looked about the cell. “I am amazed you could concentrate in this place.”
“I was absorbed in my work.”
“Dr. Murnau seems very learned,” she said. “I wonder sometimes-”
