Chapter 14 It Happens #2
For a moment I stood, unable to move. More flashes of lightning broke the scene into still, hideous fragments. Pike’s wide, staring eyes. The trickle of blood from his nose. His right arm, falling off the edge…
I was moving before I knew it. I grabbed him by an arm and a leg and hauled him back onto the solidity of the roof.
Then, doing my best to ignore the dark smear and the damp, coppery smell, I pulled him back the way we’d come.
Lowering him through the skylight took a bit of doing, but the logical part of my brain seemed to have locked the rest of me away, and it approached the problem with cold precision.
Men think we are delicate creatures, but believe me, we can move a body if we must. I angled the ladder beneath the window, propping the end on my work table, and sort of slid him down it, like the ramp that bricklayers use sometimes for unloading their carts.
It softened his landing somewhat, though the wet thump of him is something I will never forget.
I went down the ladder myself and arranged the sodden heap of humanity into something a bit more decorous.
I laid him out on his back, his hands at his sides.
His hands were blackened where he’d clutched the branch, and smoking faintly.
Now that we were in a confined space, I could perceive that they smelled of charred meat.
I had to put a hand to my mouth to avoid emptying my stomach.
His face was frozen in a look of surprise. His eyes were wide and staring.
I fancied his mouth still carried a hint of his last gloating grin.
My candle still burned steady in the corner where I’d left it. I sat back on my haunches next to it and considered the body of Septimus Pike.
It wasn’t like the night I revived my father. Pike was dead. His corpse was not unduly damaged—most of the blood appeared to issue from a wound on the scalp, but the skull seemed to be intact. However, the body was already growing cold. The blank, staring eyes held no spark of life.
I’m ashamed to admit that the cold, logical part of me that seemed to hold the reins asked: Well, is that such a bad thing?
Was it? Of course it was. In all my reading on morality, not one philosopher or man of God had proclaimed that if a young man stole your ideas you were allowed to kill him.
And how was I to dispose of his body? At the point that one is asking that question, I realized, one may be certain that one is on the wrong path.
I thought of you then, Holzmann. We had of late been corresponding about the question of reanimation—do you remember?
I am sure you thought it was all theoretical—I never told you about Cariad, for fear you would think me insane, but now that is the least of my worries—but it was you, you recall, who maintained that it was possible.
And what was more, you suggested several revisions to the apparatus that I’d used on Papa.
In particular, you suggested the use of a great deal more electrical power…
There was no time to lose. Already the storm was starting to move away. I set to work. First I removed the fellow’s clothes. It was the first time I’d seen a nude male up close.
Hard to see what all the fuss was about. Perhaps my sisters’ husbands look more appealing, not being dead.
I took my formulae from his pockets. They were soaked with his blood and the ink was running. What a horrid man. Only the thought of how difficult it would be to get his corpse down three flights of stairs kept me going. At least he would not get to steal the formulae now.
Except, of course, for the one he’d already stolen. And what if he’d read them before I’d walked in on him? Probably he had. Probably he would quickly reconstruct them. And there was nothing I could do.
I pushed the thought away. That was if I could save his life, which was yet to be seen.
I’d recently splurged on a lovely long roll of copper wire, and this I cut into lengths of around six to eight feet.
I wrapped one end of each piece in damp wool and secured them to his temples, his chest, his tongue, and—well, you remember, Holzmann, we discussed the necessity of introducing the charge to certain orifices—and all the other necessary parts of his anatomy.
When I was done, he lay on the table with a thicket of slender, shining wires protruding upward from his corpse.
The wires shone and twisted in the flickering candlelight. I had the eerie sensation that I was witnessing his soul leave his body. Then I shook off the unscientific thought. If all went well, I would see the opposite.
I gathered the copper strands, twisting them together like wool going into a spinning wheel. I wrapped them around the end of the wire on the spool, then, careful not to disturb my fragile framework, I unrolled it while climbing up the ladder.
The rain lashed me full in the face the moment I opened the skylight. The stinging assault was more than welcome, though. It meant the storm was still going strong.
I crawled up and across the roof to the tallest chimney. I wrapped the wire about it and thrust the end toward the sky. The spool was just long enough. The end of the wire was now the highest point of Longbourn.
Science had done what it could. Now it was up to Providence. Or, perhaps, Zeus.
I had not long to wait. I had scarcely settled back down inside next to my candle when there was another brilliant flash.
BZZAP!
In the flickering light, I saw the body twist and arch. The dead heels drummed on the table.
Then he fell still.
For a long moment, there was nothing. My ears were still ringing with the explosive sound, my eyes dazzled by the brightness of the lightning. I blinked and blinked. In the rain pouring through the ceiling, the candle fizzled out.
In the darkness, I heard a gasp.