Dr. Frankenstein's Daughters Read online

  Needless to say, they refuse to admit women, but Anthony has promised to give Ingrid a tour of the school including the medical laboratories and, if possible, to smuggle her into his anatomy lecture, though for that she must dress as a man.

  June 26

  I am in love with the beautiful old city of Edinburgh with its ancient castle fortress on a high hill in the center of town. Stately neoclassic buildings from the middle of the 1700s surround the older part of town, which dates back to the year 1300. The city is no museum piece, though. It is as thriving and busy a city as any.

  This morning Ingrid left our hotel in the old part of town to meet Anthony Verde with some of our uncle’s clothing stuffed in a large bag. For a moment he questioned if he should let her go off with a young man unchaperoned. This made Ingrid laugh. “It can’t harm my reputation since I’ll look like a boy,” she said. “And Anthony is the sweetest young man; there is no need to worry about him.”

  Luckily, our uncle is so focused on his business interests that he hasn’t really been paying much attention to our comings and goings. This has allowed us considerable freedom which we never knew with our grandfather.

  For Ingrid’s sake, I hope this Anthony does have more than friendship in mind and will divert her from thoughts of our sickly neighbor, Lieutenant Hammersmith. I recall she once wrote me that Anthony was quite good-looking. The ways of attraction are certainly mysterious.

  I am eager to hear how her day at the medical school is progressing, but now I must ready myself to meet Johann.

  When he sees the woman I have become, he will be unable to resist me.

  FROM THE JOURNAL OF

  INGRID VDW FRANKENSTEIN

  June 26, 1815

  What a day I am having with Anthony! He has gone off momentarily to ask a friend something about his class here at the medical college of Edinburgh and has left me here at an outdoor table. I am using the time to make this entry in my journal.

  It was good to see my old friend. He is, as always, lively and handsome with his dark, soulful eyes. It was so generous of him to give me a tour of the medical school. We shared great hilarity over my disguise as a male student. I can assure you I looked utterly ridiculous with Uncle Ernest’s large trousers belted under my armpits and his hat down over my ears. It drew quite a few quizzical glances from Anthony’s fellow medical students. It was all we could do to keep from bursting into gales of laughter.

  The high point was by far the anatomy lecture. How I envy him the chance to sit in on these demonstrations! There with about fifty other students, I sat on an ascending set of wooden benches and looked down upon a real human body! A corpse, to be exact.

  The cadaver was slit down the middle so that the heart and lungs were exposed. At first I found this shockingly gruesome and turned away in revulsion. But, quite honestly, it was only a matter of minutes before my fascination bade me return to the sight. From then on I could not look away. I was so keenly aware of what an opportunity this was.

  The surgeon-lecturer lifted the heart right up from the body and held it out for all to see. He pointed out the valves and explained their workings. The corpse must have been newly deceased, for when he squeezed the heart, blood gushed from a slash in each of the wrists.

  After the class, Anthony pulled me into a doorway of the medical school and handed me a package wrapped in burlap. “I smuggled it from the medical library for you,” he whispered. “You must swear to return it when you have finished studying it. It’s not theft as long as I return it.”

  “I swear,” I promised excitedly. I began to open it, but Anthony gripped my arm.

  “Not here,” he warned. “Someone might see you.”

  Clutching the book to my chest, I thanked him. Leaving the university, we walked to a shop filled with students buying dried sausages, smoked fish, breads, and other food items for their lunch. We bought a loaf of bread, some cheese, and two apples for our lunch and then went to sit on one of the outdoor benches set up to the side of the store. “I’ve never seen a dead body before,” I said as we ate. “How does the school come by them?”

  A wary, guarded look came over Anthony’s face.

  “They claim that all the cadavers are from people who have donated their bodies to science,” he said in a hushed tone. “But there is some question about that.”

  “What kind of question?” I asked.

  “My classmate swears he recognized one of the bodies as belonging to a beggar who lived under a bridge.”

  “Are you saying he was killed so that they could use his body?”

  Anthony shrugged, which I interpreted as a yes.

  “Would the university do such a thing?” I asked.

  “Not the university itself,” Anthony said, leaning closer. “But there are men who make a living providing cadavers to medical schools. Since Edinburgh has one of the largest, they tend to congregate in the area.”

  A chill ran up my spine at the very thought of it. “Are you saying that Edinburgh is full of murderers?”

  “Some are just grave robbers,” he allowed.

  “Just!” I cried, and then clapped my hand over my mouth. “That’s bad enough,” I added in a whisper.

  “Others simply stay near the hospitals and charnel houses for the poor. They pretend to be family and claim the bodies of those who die with no one to bury them.”

  “That’s terrible,” I said.

  “Yes and no,” Anthony equivocated. “Murder is bad, yes. But using the bodies of those who are already dead to benefit the living … I think it can be all right. That is why the university looks the other way, as they say. It is for the greater good, and no one is hurt by it.”

  “I suppose,” I said, even though I couldn’t get over the feeling that it was a sort of desecration to those who had died and not intended for their bodies to be donated.

  “Listen, my friend,” Anthony went on, brightening. “You come tomorrow and I will get you into the lecture on guts.”

  “The intestines?”

  “Yes. You will love it when they start taking out the intestines. They never stop coming.”

  “It sounds fascinating,” I said.

  Anthony began tapping my hand with rapid intensity. “Look! Over there, Ingrid!” He directed my gaze out to the street. “That man with the dirty hat and jacket, the one with the long blond hair.”

  I spied the disheveled man. “What about him?”

  “They say he is a grave robber, and I myself have seen him making deliveries of large, human-sized bundles at the back door of the school’s laboratories.”

  “What’s his name?” I inquired.

  “Gallagher.”

  I peered at the man and thought he seemed quite disreputable. Was I looking at a real murderer, a grave robber, or merely a man who haunted the hospitals awaiting opportunity? Whatever his degree of criminality, it was chilling to be so close to such a person. It was hard to believe that a man like Gallagher would be walking freely in the daylight. I would have imagined him staying strictly to the shadows and cover of night.

  As though he sensed our gaze upon him, Gallagher turned his head sharply in our direction and stared at us. His glare was so sinister it sent a chill through me and I looked away. When I glanced back, he was gone.

  Anthony appeared as shaken as I felt. “He provides a service,” he said after a moment or two. “I try not to think about it too much.”

  “That’s probably the wisest approach,” I agreed.

  FROM THE DIARY OF

  BARONESS GISELLE FRANKENSTEIN

  June 26, 1815

  Today was warm enough to wear my blue silk traveling suit, the one with the empire waist and long jacket. Our hotel room has a fire in which I was able to warm my hair curling tongs, so I could frame my face in curls and form a few ringlets at the sides. Satisfied that I looked my best, I met my uncle, who has his own room at the end of the hall. After complimenting me on my beauty, he walked with me to the restaurant where Johann and I h
ad agreed to meet.

  I was grateful that Baron Frankenstein escorted me through the winding and hilly streets of the medieval center of Edinburgh. More than once the low heels of my boots caught in the uneven Belgian blocks that make up the old roadways, and if my uncle’s arm had not been there to catch, I might have stumbled. Moreover, Baron Frankenstein was a dear and stayed with me at the restaurant as we waited for Johann to arrive. The place was lovely, all dark carved wood, mirrors, leaded glass, crisp white linen tablecloths, and lit candles in iron sconces. The clientele was refined and the waiters dressed in white shirts with black pants under their aprons.

  “I am so glad to see you again,” I told him sincerely as we sat sipping tea. It surprised me how fond I’d become of my uncle, yet it was true. I had missed his protective presence while he was away.

  “And I you. Your health has improved since last I saw you,” Baron Frankenstein observed.

  “You are right, I am happy to say,” I agreed. “Though when the nights are windy and wet, I still feel congested. It is worst when I lay down to sleep.”

  “It can be a rough climate,” Baron Frankenstein said. “Although temperate, it is damp and the wind is like nothing I have seen anywhere else.”

  The wind had become even more severe of late, and I found its intensity unnerving sometimes. It wasn’t always easy to recognize where the roar of the ocean ended and the wail of the wind began. To step out of doors was to surrender oneself to a restless world of crashing waves and rustling leaves; the wind ran across the pasture grasses, moving them as though some invisible creature was parting the greenery. One’s clothing and hair were constantly buffeted by an unseen hand.

  “The wind clogs my ears and gives me bad dreams,” I admitted to Baron Frankenstein.

  A worried expression washed over his face, and when I inquired what was concerning him, he asked if I’d experienced further episodes of walking in my sleep. I assured him that I had not. I didn’t elaborate on my nightmares, so as not to worry him, but I am starting to believe that the rattling and clanking of the wind pounding against the antique stones of the castle somehow gets into my mind and agitates it. Since arriving in Orkney, my dreams are the strangest I have ever experienced: I dream I am places I have never seen, talking to people I have never met.

  Sensing someone’s eyes on me, I glanced at the doorway and there I spied Johann. My heart leapt at the sight of him with his tall, strong physique, thick blond hair, and handsome face. As he approached, Baron Frankenstein prepared to depart, promising to meet me back at the hotel. Clearly he was eager to be off to his business meeting and that was fine by me since I longed to have Johann all to myself.

  Johann and Baron Frankenstein exchanged quick cordialities and my uncle then left.

  “Giselle, you are more gorgeous than ever,” Johann said after kissing my hand and taking a seat beside me. “Being a baroness suits you.”

  It surprised me that he knew of my title, but then I recalled I had mentioned it to Margaret, my friend back in Ingolstadt.

  “Do you think so?” I responded coyly. “In what way does it suit me?” This was of course a shameless ploy to elicit compliments from him, but I wanted to hear what he would say. I wanted to hear all the sweet words I had so longed for back in the very recent past when I had hoped he would love me, when I had hung on his every small expression of interest or the merest smile.

  “It may be the fresh air, but were your eyes always such a vivid violet blue as they are now?” Johann inquired.

  “I don’t think they have changed.” It was hard to be casual when I was so excited to see him, but it was important not to seem overly eager, especially after the way I had previously embarrassed myself.

  Johann leaned closer to me and smiled. “Then it must be the time that has passed. You are now seventeen, are you not? You have turned a corner and become more womanly somehow.”

  “I can’t imagine that being seventeen by only two weeks should make such a difference in one’s appearance or demeanor,” I protested.

  “Yes, but I have not seen you in a month’s time, since you upset everyone with your abrupt departure. Before you left, I thought of you as being much younger than I am.”

  “I am only two years younger than you,” I reminded him.

  “Two years is a good age difference between a man and a woman.” Johann clutched my hand while gazing into my eyes with a deeply earnest expression. Then he drew me forward until our faces were very close. “Giselle,” he murmured.

  Feeling certain he would kiss me, I let my eyelids drift downward and then close softly as his lips brushed mine. The pleasure of it was so lovely that I melted toward him, resting my hand on his arm: It was hard to believe that the moment I had so often dreamed of was happening at last.

  Slowly, he drew back. “Forgive my boldness, but you have grown so womanly, Giselle, that I am quite overwhelmed at the sight of you. You were always a beautiful girl, but you have become the most ravishing woman.”

  “Thank you, Johann,” I replied in a dreamy tone, not removing my hand from his arm. “You are kind to say so.”

  “It is not kindness but sincerity.”

  I ate up this flattery as though his admiration were a kind of sweet food I had been starved for. To be sitting alone in a restaurant with such a good-looking suitor made me feel sophisticated and — yes, I must admit it — beautiful. And although of late I have attracted the attentions of passing men, I have never before been so gallantly declared to be ravishing.

  As our eyes met, I was transported back to the time when I had once desired his love and esteem more than life itself. I didn’t care if his behavior might be considered improper. To me, it was as if we were in a world all our own.

  “I feel that you love me still, Giselle,” Johann said softly. “Say it is so and you will make me happy, for I am consumed with my love for you. If you meant your absence to make me wretched, it has indeed. I have missed you every hour of every day.”

  My powers of critical thought seemed to have slipped beneath the surface of some sea of love and all I could do was take Johann at his word.

  “Tell me you still love me,” he urged. “I adore you and was a fool not to see it sooner.”

  At this I dropped my eyes, avoiding his gaze, unsure of how to compose my facial expression because the sheer happy delight I must have emanated was not the womanly aura I wished to project. Sliding my hand from his arm, I suggested that we should order our food.

  “You’re trembling,” he noted tenderly.

  “It’s only hunger,” I lied. In truth his nearness, his voice, his touch had left me shaken, feeling vulnerable and unsure of what to say or do next. There was no mistaking the emotion: I was once more as completely consumed by Johann as I had been before.

  We ordered a lunch of lamb chops and potatoes, and while we ate, Johann did most of the talking. He told me how much he wanted to travel, that leaving Germany for the first time had kindled his appetite to see the world.

  “We could go together, Giselle,” he suggested with avid enthusiasm. “Your castle could be our starting point for exploring all of Scandinavia. Maybe we would go from there to Russia — perhaps even experience the Orient. We’d have to be married, of course.”

  “Married?” Had he really just used that word?

  “Naturally. Imagine what a beautiful wedding we could have at the castle on the ocean!”

  I easily pictured the gala reception since I had been envisioning my wedding day for as long as I could remember, even knew what my frothy white gown and billowing veil would look like. But all my life I had imagined that the man who asked me to marry him would be on bended knee, speaking beseechingly as he held forth a dazzling ring.

  “Such a wedding might be too time-consuming, though,” he said. “I think we should marry quickly. We could return to Edinburgh and be married by a judge, or even an itinerant minister if you prefer.”

  “What would be the reason for haste?” I asked.
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  “The sooner we’re married, the sooner we can begin our life together. Imagine me, the lord of a castle on the ocean, married to a beautiful, smart, entrancing baroness! Not too bad for the son of a lawyer to become a member of the nobility.”

  “I find your suggestion somewhat pragmatic,” I said. Was this what he was after — my castle and my title?

  “Forgive me, Giselle! I was simply swept away with my visions of our happy life together. Of course I should not have presumed you would marry me, but you have always been fond of me, have you not?”

  It suddenly irked me that — despite my previous declaration — he was so sure of himself, so confident that I would melt into his arms.

  “I have liked you well enough,” I said. “But life has changed.”

  “I know it has changed,” he said. “You are now a baroness, a woman of independent fortune, and you need a husband to share it with.”

  “Do you believe that someone should be you?” I asked, surprised by the coldness I heard creeping into my voice.

  “A woman needs a husband to help manage her affairs,” he replied.

  “And to spend her money?”

  This remark was met with silence and an expression I could not interpret. A frost came into his eyes, causing me to think I had angered him. Fear of what angry words he would utter next made my heart quicken as I felt my shoulders lift, preparing for a battle of unpleasant words. I was relieved when he smiled suddenly.

  “Let’s discuss this further as we stroll,” he suggested.

  “You’re not angry?” I asked.

  “You have misunderstood me.”

  “I don’t think I have,” I said in a straightforward manner. “I once made a declaration of love that you rebuffed. Now word of my fortune has made you change your mind.”

  I was suddenly seized with a great desire to be away from him. I was filled with humiliation at being so used.