I shook my head. “It sometimes hurts where my fingers used to be. A kind of phantom pain.”
He placed his perfect hand on mine. “Thank you, Victor.”
During breakfast the next day another message arrived bearing the magistrates’ stamp. Father opened it at once and read it in silence. He sighed.
“Polidori has completely vanished.”
“How can that be?” exclaimed Mother. “The riders could easily have overtaken his carriage.”
“Unless he was never in a carriage,” Father said. “Even without the use of his legs, he might be able to ride a horse of his own-take remote alpine paths and venture into France. We have no authority to pursue him there-nor would we have much luck finding him, the place is in such chaos.”
“Might he have accomplices?” Mother asked, looking at the three of us.
“Krake was the only accomplice we knew of,” I said. “But he might have paid people to help him, I suppose.”
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows. “He looked so impoverished.”
I remembered how he had talked about the myth of the lynx, the Keeper of the Secrets of the Forest, harvesting gemstones from its own urine.
“Maybe he had money saved up,” I said.
“Well, if he’s disappeared for good, there will be no trial,” Father said. “No one need hear of this again.”
He looked at me pointedly as he said it.
“As long as he’s left Geneva for good,” Mother said, “I am satisfied.”
“He would be a fool to stay,” said Henry. “His place is burned to the ground, and he is conspicuous in his wheelchair. He’d be caught instantly.”
My neck tingled. It was childish, but I couldn’t help wondering if the alchemist had worked some dark wonder to make himself invisible. I imagined him at night, dragging himself through the streets, his shoes and clothes scraping on the cobblestones. Dragging himself ever closer to Chateau Frankenstein.
Later that day Elizabeth and I stood in the courtyard with Henry to see him off. I shook his hand and then embraced him.
“You have a lion’s heart, as well as a poet’s,” I said.
He shook his head with a grin, but I could tell he was pleased.
“I was not brave compared with you two,” he said. “I possess only a small courage-but it is good to know that.”
“Nonsense,” said Elizabeth, kissing him on the cheek.
He flushed.
“Good-bye, Henry,” I said.
“Good-bye,” he replied, “and do try to stay out of mischief while I am gone.”
“Write us another play,” I said, “that we can all perform before summer is out.”
“I will.”
“The doctor says I will have scars,” Elizabeth said. “I never thought myself vain, but I am vain, and it upsets me more than I can say.”
We were in the library, sunlight pouring through the windows.
Konrad had been taking his meals in bed so far, but said he would like to get up later and join us for dinner. Dr. Murnau would remain only a day longer, and said Konrad’s progress was most encouraging.
He’d examined my hand again this morning, and was pleased with Polidori’s chisel work. There was no sign of infection. He said he knew some very fine craftsmen who could fashion me a pair of wooden fingers to strap onto my hand.
He’d also told Elizabeth she could remove the bandage on her cheek.
“They will be very faint scars,” I said now, looking at them. “Whisker thin. You would have to know they were there to even notice them.”
She laughed bitterly. “They will be clearly visible. Konrad cannot love me now.”
I could not help laughing, and the misery in her face was quickly replaced with anger.
“How is that amusing?”
“Elizabeth,” I said, “Konrad would be the biggest fool in the world if he thought a few scratches could dim your beauty. There cannot be a lovelier young woman in all the republic. I would say all of Europe, but I have not seen all the young women there yet.”
She smiled, and looked down, and the color rose in her cheeks. “Thank you, Victor, that is very sweet of you.”
I did not understand why, but I found something compelling about those scars. The claws of a lynx had raked her cheek and left their mark. And it was a mark too of her own wild nature. She could not hide it-and the wolf in me found her all the more desirable for it. But I would not think of her in such a way anymore. I was done with coveting what was my brother’s. My resolve would be as strong as stone.
“In the elevator,” she said abruptly. “At Polidori’s. In the dark.”
I looked out the window. I knew exactly what she was talking about. “Hmm? What of it?” I asked carelessly.
“That kiss was for you.”
I said nothing-had nothing to say. I was secretly ecstatic but wished too that she had never told me. For I feared these words would germinate in my devilish heart and send forth tendrils that might crack even my granite resolve.
I just smiled, and it took all my will to lift my feet and leave the room.
We sat out on the balcony wrapped in blankets, for the clear night was cool. It was just the two of us. Above the mountain peaks to the west was the last indigo hint of sunset.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “That whole business with Elizabeth. I-”
“Victor, you don’t need to say anything.”
“I was a complete ass.”
Konrad chuckled. “Well, I don’t think I’ve ever been angrier in my entire life. That’s quite a skill you have.”
“It’s a good thing you fainted,” I said. “Or you might’ve killed me. I’d never seen that look in your eyes. You do forgive me, though, don’t you?”
He smiled, and I knew the answer was yes. “And by the way,” he said, “I’ve never thought myself better than you.”
I snorted. “Except at Greek and Latin and fencing and-”
“I didn’t mean like that. I meant as a person.”
For a moment I made no reply. “Well, I don’t know if I believe you, but it’s very nice of you to say. Thank you.”
“You’re impossible,” he said, shaking his head.
“Ah, that’s more like it,” I said.
“Do you still imagine interplanetary travel for yourself?” he asked, looking up at the first stars.
“At the very least,” I said. “And you will go to the New World?”
“Only if you come with me.”
“Just the two of us,” I said.
“Just the two of us.”
“We’ll do it the moment Father gives us permission,” I said.
Konrad smiled. “Given recent events, that might not be for several decades.”
But we talked on with great enthusiasm, about the lands across the ocean, and what kind of adventures might be had there. It was as if we were little again, with the atlas spread before us on the library floor. We talked about how, if we reached the farthest coast of the New World, we might continue on, across the Pacific to the Orient. I loved the idea of traveling west with my brother, always west, chasing the sun.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
