HIGH STRANGENESS-Tales of the Macabre by Billie Sue Mosiman Read Free Book Online Page A

has improved somewhat and my fretful cough kept u nder control with mild poultice and sweet stinking syrup they sell at the local prescription palace, I feel strong enough to make one last venture into the question that has burned within me for these twenty long, mostly undistinguished years. Does he sti l l live and breathe? Does that magnificent being lie scattered to the winds, a few bones scored with fire left behind, or did his pride eschew suicide at the last? And how will I know unless I pursue either his ashes or his footsteps across the frozen tund r a?
    There is small reason to dissuade me, Margaret. I don't wish to bring you more pain than you already suffer, but you must understand this thing I feel compelled to do. Will you forgive me if I take a ship and supply bearers for one last trek into the wh ite wilderness of the north? Will you find it in your heart to accept that this is the only way I can live out what days I have left to me without becoming so disturbed I will have to be put away from society?
    There are just the two of us left. I have lost all I loved since Frankenstein succumbed on my ship. There is no one to hold me safe, crazed with unanswered question, but you, only you, my beloved. Would you regard me with less devotion if I made the one pilgrimage my soul most desires?
    I will wait a f ortnight for your reply and if you beg that I not search out the being for your sake, I will have to live on unfulfilled and wretched, stumbling through the dark labyrinth that is my mind, my eyes seeking contact with heaven as the last reprieve. You know my hope has always been never to cause you harm or a moment's worry, but if you could see a way to release me from guilt at my proposed voyage, if you feel strong enough to unfetter your brother from his familial attachment for this one last endeavor, thi s one last adventure, I will bless your name as a saint forever.
    Your loving brother,
    Robert
    * * *
     
    Robert Walton accepted the glass of port offered to him by the Captain. “ I trust this will settle my stomach. Nothing else has been capable of it.” He drank a swallow, relishing the fine bodied taste upon his parched tongue. He had not eaten or drunk anything in hours due to how his digestion was misbehaving.
    “ It surprises me the voyage has been so difficult for you. We all know what a fine vessel you sailed y ourself at the helm as her good captain, sir.”
    Walton sighed and lowered the glass from his lips. “ I am afraid that was long ago. It has been many years since I've set foot aboard a ship.”
    “ And longer yet since you've been this far north, I expect?”
    “ When I came back from these regions on my last trip where my crew considered mutiny and the ice mountained around the ship's decks like walls, I swore never to brave closing in on such utter misfortune again.”
    “ Ah, well, these waters are not as dangerous for our ships today as they were in your time.” The Captain brought the decanter to the table where the overhead swinging lantern flame pierced the etched decanter glass and threw prisms of colored light dancin g onto the polished teak planks. “ I heard stories of your last trip. Sailors I served with in my youth told us tales I scarcely believe.”
    Walton glanced up, then abruptly away. He tested the port, willing his stomach to subside its rumbling. “ Sailors favor tales that can be retold, tales never to be taken at face value, my friend.”
    “ Yes, but the things I heard...”
    “ I dare say they weren't true.”
    The Captain eyed Walton skeptically. He was not a man to be put aside from curiosity. “ The man? The great huge bea uteous monster who came to Dr. Frankenstein's cabin? He was a myth?”
    Walton nodded. “ A creature of fevered imagination. You must recall we were facing extinction. Had not the ice floes broken apart and moved, we would have all died a cold death together.”
    The Captain drank his port in silence a while. The ship swayed gently