Author's note:
Hello lovely people. I'm so sorry it took this long to get this final chapter to you. I thought I would be able to finish this before I had to move my life to a new city, but I just didn't quite make it. This chapter was also oddly difficult for me to write. Usually endings are a simple matter for me, but this one I rewrote a few times. There are so many different emotions of so many different people to juggle… I'm still not sure if I'm entirely happy with it, but I didn't want to deprive you of closure any longer. So here it is. Thank you for all your reviews and support. Much love,
L&P
…
Chapter 28
Five years later.
The hazy grey of dawn was fading slowly into a less forbidding clearness. Mist clung to the dips and pits in the fields and roads. The weather was fair, but a bit stickier than it had been in Paris. The air smelled different here—fresher, with more pine, as if it came down straight off the snow-capped mountains.
Stones crunched under the slowing wheels of Papa's carriage and hedges lined the long, narrow drive. Tall elms and oaks loomed behind them, casting the space into twilight.
Finally the carriage pulled up alongside the front and gave us the prospect of the manor. A silver plaque on the gate read Frankenstein.
My husband's mouth had been set into a hard shape, his eyes faraway, for the later part of our journey. I looked to him but he was already ducking out the carriage to come around and help me out on the other side. Papa followed him. When he opened the door for me and took my hand to lead me out, I gazed hard at his impassive face, but I could not tell what he was feeling.
Papa helped Jeannine out of the carriage after I climbed out, but we left our suitcases where they were.
We came upon no gardenhands or servants as we went through the handsome wire gate and approached the manor. I thought it very likely that my uncle had dismissed them for the evening, to avoid strange rumors circulating in town about his family and its visitors. Adam was dressed well; he wore his cloak, and the shock of his scarring was disguised somewhat by the makeup he was obliged to wear when moving in public, in carriages and inns, but he was nonetheless an unsettling sight that would be best left unseen by household help.
Papa and I shared glances often. He and I led our small party, with Adam and Jeannine following. There was no patio in the front, only double doors complimented left and right by long rows of tall, darkened windows.
Before Papa could ring, the door was opened to us.
My uncle Alphonse looked a great deal older than I had seen him last, but then I knew I must as well. He looked like an old man in truth now.
"Daniel," he greeted. He was making an effort not to stare at Adam behind the two of us and instead look his former brother-in-law in the eyes.
Papa held out a hand and the two shook and pressed their cheeks to one another's.
"It has been a long time," Papa said gently.
"Come in. Let's not greet in the doorway."
I expected others to be waiting in the entry hall, but the hall was deserted, though well-lit. Papa turned and held out his arm for Jeannine to come closer. "May I introduce to you my wife, Jeannine Moreau."
Alphonse kissed her in welcome. "A pleasure, madame."
Jeannine nodded in response, murmuring, "For me as well." She looked apprehensive, but not timid. Motherhood and society had slowly given Jeannine a stiffer backbone and better poise than she had had when she first had married my father.
Adam stood beside me, moving only when necessary. I could feel the tenseness of his body. I reminded myself again that my uncle had invited us here, and that he had included Adam in that invitation.
Alphonse glanced at my husband often, unable to help it. But he took my hand and kissed my cheeks in greeting easily enough.
"Chandelle… It's good to see you again. You look well."
I was wearing the more conservative clothing of a married woman, and his eyes did not miss it, though I knew he had already years ago likely connected the differing surname with which I signed my letters to Adam's, and what that implied.
"Thank you, Uncle. I have…I've missed you."
"Yes." He gazed at me. "Yes, I've missed you, too."
Alphonse finally addressed Adam. He did not move toward him or raise a hand, but his voice was not angry when he greeted stiffly, "Monsieur Bordelon."
"Monsieur Frankenstein," Adam responded quietly. "I was…surprised by your invitation."
"Yes… Well, my sons… It seems that some closure is desired by all. Is it not so?"
Adam glanced at me. "I know that Chandelle was gladdened to receive it. She has missed being a part of your family."
"Well." Uncle took my arm and we began walking through the manor. "Elizabeth has been asking for you every half an hour since dawn. Let's go and see her." He glanced at me with just a hint of apology on his face. "Her boys are staying with friends elsewhere today."
For their safety, were his unspoken words. I was disappointed I would not be able to meet Elizabeth's sons, but I would not begrudge Victor and Elizabeth their caution.
"You have been swamped by boys, and us by girls, Uncle," I joked gently as we crossed slowly toward the doors to the side gardens. "My sisters Claire and Larue, and then one of my friends recently married and his wife delivered a girl only—what—three months ago now? Although, I think he's in for a boy, next. He has it coming to him."
As I spoke, we stepped through the open doors out onto the garden patio, and it was a good thing I had ended my sentence, else I would have trailed off.
They stood when we came out. Victor, Elizabeth, and Ernest.
Victor was a healthier weight, and moved with a leisure and ease he had not had when last I had set my eyes on him. I remembered him as a gaunt, haunted scarecrow, ready to bolt or to howl at provocation. He looked now like a comfortable member of the French gentry. A professor, perhaps. A father. He was much older and appeared calmer.
Elizabeth had not quite kept her figure after two children, but her face, though older now, was as lovely and guileless as ever. The sun gave her pale hair a heavenly shine. Tears had sprung into her skyblue eyes at the sight of me. She had not changed much. But Earnest I barely recognized.
He had still been a youth when last I had been in Geneva. He was now a man. Like his brother Victor, he still had little need of spectacles, and he was perhaps even handsomer than Victor had been at his age. There was a stiffness to his body that comes when one tries to hide discomfort with formality. He was well-dressed, and there was something about his hands that was more sure and graceful than before, when he had been young. I knew he had not gone into service, but still he looked like a solider. He held his back very straight.
Papa greeted everyone first to smooth over the shock and awkwardness of the reunion. Jeannine followed in his wake, smiling sweetly in her soft way, and warming the tense atmosphere. The patio was a lovely space—old cobblestones smooth underfoot, sound wood and wicker furniture, gardens in early bloom surrounding, and the sun, though pale yet in its morning angle, looked as if it might grow full and buttery in a few hours.
Papa's greetings to Elizabeth and Ernest were warm, but he greeted Victor with a cold resentment that was just a notch above open hostility. When Papa had learned that it would not only be Alphonse we would be visiting, but that Victor would be there as well, it had taken a week for Adam and I to convince him to still accept the invitation.
I barely paid attention to what was spoken. I held back with my husband, watching the quick but frequent glances he was receiving. After an initial size-up, Adam attempted to avoid the gazes of Victor and Ernest, but his gaze kept being dragged to the face of his creator as if by an undeniable force. Adam's face was tight, but did not show pain. I too glanced up at him often to make certain he was alright.
When I went to greet my cousins, he held back, and Papa and Jeannine went to his side. Jeannine patted his arm gently and he gave her a heartfelt glance of gratitude. Victor, Elizabeth, and Ernest watched the exchange avidly. Their eyes missed very little that Adam did.
My greeting to Ernest was the most uncomfortable of my greetings; he and I had parted under hostile circumstances and had not corresponded since. I was fortified to see sadness in his eyes instead of hate.
"Let us sit down," Uncle murmured. We sat; all except Elizabeth, who excused herself to go fetch tea and refreshments for us.
I sat beside my love and placed his large left hand in my lap, my hands cupped around his. I looked up at him and he met my eyes reassuringly.
We spoke of pleasantries, of the seasons, of births and changes. Politics, science, and the wars of Europe. How business was for my father. How the mother I no longer knew was getting on. Elizabeth's two boys, and Jeannine and Papa's two older girls.
Adam was silent unless Papa, Jeannine, or I asked him a direct question, and even then, his voice was low and smooth, though the room stopped dead to listen to it. No Frankenstein addressed him, though they all watched him as if he were a tiger sleeping in their midst. Gratifyingly, however, they seemed to struggle to try and move beyond it. Elizabeth even tried to smile at him once or twice. Victor and Ernest did not glare at him; their expressions were carefully smooth and taut.
My father made a point of mentioning things that spoke to Adam's security and esteemed place in our lives: he was his son-in-law and brother to his two small daughters, and if Adam featured in any family stories he told, he was charming and gentle in them. Papa's protective championing made Adam's place in our family evident, and I also hoped the mentions would continue to tame Adam's fierce and frightening appearance in their eyes. I knew he looked less fearsome than he had when Victor, Alphonse, and Ernest had seen him last, and the venue had been well-chosen—the pleasantness of the gardens and the breeze and sunlight were soothing. There could be no monsters in such a place.
It was a remarkably normal scene to me, as the memories of our last encounter with this family another had been burned so vividly on my memory, but…many years had passed. Minds turn over and cool in such time. I felt as if we were all authors of our lives looking back on the past and realizing we had not known enough. Wishing to write it all again.
The specter of guilt slowly returned to Victor's countenance, dark and heavy, and it deepened the lines on his face and seemed to resurrect something of the damaged man he had been in those days and nights years ago. They did not often meet gazes, but when Adam's eyes were elsewhere, Victor's were on him, watching him with pain evident in his eyes and in the angles of his body. When my and my father's eyes were on Victor they were hard and cold, and those looks Victor accepted as a guilty man accepts the whip.
The morning grew into afternoon, and Elizabeth served trays of food and drink so we were never hungry despite the lack of a formal meal. There were no staff in the manor to serve one.
When pleasantries finally were exhausted, Alphonse finally made an effort to address Adam directly.
"As I believe I mentioned in my latest letter," he said, "I think the painting you sent us, Adam, is an incredible piece. The subjects of it are not so young anymore, and so I daresay it flatters us. It brings out the similarities in our features in a way other portraits never have."
He was alluding to the portrait of himself, Victor, and Ernest that Adam had done many years ago and which had been collecting dust in his studio until it seemed it would be better served sent to Geneva.
"It is an early piece," Adam replied slowly, "but I'm pleased to hear it was appreciated."
Elizabeth glanced at her husband, and then ventured, "When Daniel mentioned in a letter that you had become rather well known in certain circles, we, well, we were curious, and took a trip to see one of your galleries in Florence. They were very lovely. Some of them were very strange and sad, but others were…well, they were like a painted song, I believe were my words." She glanced at her silent husband again as if he might corroborate. He said nothing. She looked back to Adam. "You're very talented. I almost fainted at the prices of two of the pieces." She ventured a smile at her small joke.
Adam returned a brief smile in acknowledgement of her kindness. "You flatter me, madame. I am no student of art, and my pieces could have just as easily been laughed out of Paris as commanded such prices."
"Greco and Vermeer were laughed at and passed over in their time," she replied gently. "Paris has sometimes laughed even at great artists."
"Ah, you make me feel woefully uneducated. This is why I avoid my own galleries."
Elizabeth smiled at his self-deprecation. "Are you…getting enough to eat?" she inquired hesitantly.
"I am indeed, and very grateful for your kind hospitality."
"I…" Her voice faltered for a moment. She held her fingers anxiously and looked to Victor again, but he seemed unable to put forth words of his own. She soldiered on: "It is a difficult situation for everyone…there is so much terrible… But…I know Victor has been… Well, there is so much regret—on-on both sides. But it…it's important—for us—to see you like this. To—to see all of you and know that there has been healing after the pain for you—as there has been for us."
Adam's voice was even lower when he replied, but it was clear. "My own remorse for my actions is bottomless, and I never expected to be invited back into this house. Even so, I feel I still have to right to be here. But Chandelle…and Daniel and Jeannine—they have done nothing but bestow kindness, even where it was not deserved, and I am grateful your two families will not be estranged anymore because of me. And I am as equally glad to see you happy, and to know, as you put it, that there has been healing."
"Nothing can forgive what was done—on either side," Alphonse put in carefully. "But time and a study of your letters and—and my son's laboratory journals—impressed upon all of us slowly an understanding of a balance of the scale of evil done here between you and—our family. And Daniel and Chandelle's letters and descriptions of the life you've been able to live with them made it clear to us that your character was…misjudged."
Adam seemed to have no reply. I squeezed his hand. I said in his stead, "Adam and I don't entertain the notion that our two families will be ever be close, but that you understand and have thought about his life and listen to him now—it means a great deal."
A lull came when no one spoke. I looked at my father, wondering what more could be said.
Victor shifted, and drew everyone's eyes. He opened his mouth finally and spoke, addressing the man he had created.
"And so you are…you are happy, then."
Adam gazed at the man whose hands had given him life and weighed his reply. The breeze ruffled his dark hair. Finally he simply answered, "Yes." He shifted his weight slightly. "It is more than I deserve, but I will not give it up."
Victor shuddered slightly as Adam spoke, but he did not rebuke him or send him any hateful glances.
"We have our own life in Paris and Lyon," Adam continued. "Do not trouble yourself with the concern that we will in any way infringe upon yours. I think it best that you and I…that we be separated by a healthy distance. We…bring out the worst in one another." He paused a moment, then continued, "The moment one of your family extended me sympathy, I was no longer your enemy. This is difficult to understand, I know, but I hope after today you come away truly certain that your family is safe…and that there is no more enmity between us. At least, not from me."
There was again quiet for a few moments. Then Victor replied slowly, "I believe… I do believe that to be the case."
Adam nodded in acknowledgement.
There was a weighty quiet until rather unexpectedly the breeze snatched a napkin from one of the tables and tossed it square into my father's chest. He huffed in amusement. The tenseness sieved away as we all worked to place cups or plate on anything that might fall prey to the unpredictable spring breeze. To make her laugh, Adam put a cup and saucer on Jeannine's head as if she might fly away. Elizabeth cracked a smile at that, too.
Nothing particularly memorable was spoken of after, but shoulders now lighter from the lessening of long-held weights warmed in the sun. We took our leave in the very late afternoon, claiming dinner plans. No cheeks brushed Adam's, and no Frankenstein touched him in farewell, but in every eye, old fury had cooled to the touch. Elizabeth and I would spend a few weeks in the south together in the autumn. Alphonse would visit my father in Lyon on his next trip to France to see my mother.
When we were all back in the gently swaying carriage and leaving the Frankenstein manor behind along a wide dirt road, all four of us could finally fully relax again. I pressed myself against Adam's side and he pulled me tight to him with one arm. His eyes were still far away and stone-like, gazing out the carriage window. I gazed up at him, wondering what kinds of thoughts were swirling through his mind. I longed to comfort him with my touch and to soften the lines of his face with gentle kisses, but now could not be the time.
I reached up to cup his cheek, and he met my worrying gaze. "Love?" I asked him softly. "How do you feel?"
He took my hand at his cheek and moved it to his mouth so he could kiss the backs of my fingers. His gaze was thoughtful, but a lightness was in his eyes. He caressed my chin gently. "Mon cher," he murmured, "everything has come back around to its beginning, and the uncertain earth has settled." He gazed back out the window. "Victor Frankenstein and I will likely never set eyes on one another again, but that is how it should be. His family believes that the scale of good and evil done between us is settled… An unexpected and merciful blessing." His eyes returned to me and he pulled me close. He took my hand, placed it gently in the center of his chest over his heart, and exhaled slowly. His next words were heavy. "Chandelle, my darling…I feel…at peace."
My arms slipped upwards to clasp around his neck and he settled me easily in his lap so I could hold myself tighter to him. I buried my face against his warm skin and closed my eyes. I knew papa and Jeannine were looking on, but they were long used to our effusiveness.
"And when we get home to Lyon," he murmured in a contented rumble, his voice at the edge of breaking with emotion, "your dear sisters will fight over who gets to sit on my lap and read to me. Oliver and your father and I will play poker until we've had too much to drink and then we'll laugh until we have to wipe away tears. You and I will be together. And the past will let our joy free of its teeth. The shadow that has been hanging over us of all that came before…it has gone…and washed us clean."
I could hear the tears in his voice. I felt Jeannine's arm around me and saw my papa's hand on Adam's shoulder. With his warm neck against my cheek I could smell pine and wool and all the fear and doubt and joy and passion that had come before. I could smell the parlor room where he had dropped to his knees before me in silver moonlight. I smelled the dawn mornings reading to one another, the dusty linens of the farmhouse, the city smoke in his hair the night he had returned and vowed his love. I could smell all of our nights of pleasure, our arguments and laughter and soft moments. I could smell his unassailable strength, and his soothing voice…its depth and gravity…the voice of a man whose innocence was eviscerated by cruelty and who loves all the more fiercely because of it.
"Don't cry, sweet girl," he whispered thickly.
"For joy, my love," I whispered in return. I kissed his scarred skin and repeated tenderly, "For joy."
…
la fin
