This Monstrous Thing(33)

The automaton dragged me from the workshop and across the yard, metal fingers digging grooves into my skin. My arms were burning by the time we reached the house. I tried to bolt again in the kitchen, but the automaton adjusted its grip so its arms crisscrossed my chest, pinning my arms to my sides and making it hard to breathe, let alone escape.

I was tossed into my room so roughly that I stumbled, caught my foot on the edge of the rug, and crashed to the floor. The automaton stood at the threshold, eyes fixed on me, then slammed the door. A moment later I heard the shudder of a lock.

I tried the handle, but it wouldn’t give. There wasn’t a keyhole to pick, just the slick iron handle. I started pounding on the door first with my fist and then with my whole arm, shouting, though I was certain neither Geisler nor Clémence was about, and the house’s only other inhabitants would likely side with their fellow who had locked me in. When that got me nowhere, I tried knocking off the handle with the fire poker, though I only half expected that to work, and giving it a shock from the pulse gloves, but that did even less.

When throwing myself into the door only left me with a bruised shoulder, I tried the window instead, but I could barely get my fingers wedged into the narrow gap between the latch and the ledge. When I finally did, I found the window had been frozen shut by the storm, and no amount of tugging freed it.

After a good quarter of an hour spent trying to crack the ice, I gave up and sank down with my back against the door, still halfheartedly hammering as I tried to work out what to do. I picked up Frankenstein from where I had left it on the hearth rug and stared at the neat type without reading, until my eyes crossed.

I don’t know how long I was trapped in my bedroom—my newly repaired clocks had been abandoned in the workshop. But Frankenstein was still in my lap when a key scraped in the lock above my head. I tried to stand but wasn’t fast enough, so when the door opened behind me, I fell backward onto the hearth rug.

Geisler looked down at me from the doorway, Clémence peering over his shoulder. “God’s wounds, Alasdair, what’s the matter?”

“Your automatons,” I said, scrambling to my feet. “One of them locked me in.”

Geisler scowled. “Stupid things,” he murmured. “I’m so sorry. Please understand, they are imperfect creations, and they always seem to take things a bit too far when dealing with strangers.”

“It’s all right,” I said. “I thought . . .”

Geisler raised an eyebrow. “Thought what?”

I glanced at Clémence. She was scrubbing at a spot on her hand. “I don’t know,” I finished.

“Well, you’re all right.” Geisler smiled, then clapped me sharply on the shoulder. My arms were still sore from the automaton’s grip, and I felt the throb all the way to my fingertips. “Were you out in the workshop, by chance?”

The question felt like a trick, but I knew I’d left evidence there and couldn’t get around the truth for long if I lied. “I was working on some clocks,” I replied. “It helps me think.”

“That must have been it, then. My automatons work on strict instructions to keep intruders from the workshop. There’s always the danger of thieves, you know.”

I nodded, though I couldn’t think of a thing there worth stealing.

“If you stay away, I expect they’ll leave you alone.” He smiled again, but it felt like bit like a warning. “Apologies, Alasdair, my deepest apologies.”

Geisler trooped down the hallway and disappeared into his bedroom, but Clémence stayed behind, watching me with no hint of a smirk on her face. “Are you all right?” she asked once Geisler was out of sight.

“What? Yes.”

“I know they can be rough.”

“I’m fine.” I held up Frankenstein, cover toward her. “Have you read this?”

“Why?”

“Just tell me, have you?”

“Yes.”

“The main character, Victor,” I pressed on. “What do you think of him?”

She shrugged. “I don’t really remember.”

“Well, try to.”

I must have looked wild, because she leaned backward, away from the door. For a moment, I thought she was going to walk away, but then she sucked in her cheeks and said, “I think he’s thoughtless and arrogant.” My heart sank, but she wasn’t finished. “But I understand it. I understand why he did it. He didn’t mean for things to get out of hand, and he didn’t handle them well when they did.”

“Do you know—maybe this sounds daft.” I scrubbed a hand through my hair. “Do you know if Geisler wrote it? I mean—that’s ridiculous, isn’t it? When I say it aloud—”

“I thought that too, when I first read it,” she said.

“Truly?”

She glanced down the hallway behind her, then took a step into my room. “I think he must be involved somehow. It was all he talked about for months. Had copies shipped in special from London when it was first printed there. It must have cost a fortune. He was just so . . . I’m not sure how to describe it. Feverish about it, I suppose. This sort of wild thrill, though I never quite figured out if he was excited by it or panicked. Perhaps a bit of both.” She glanced down the hallway again. “Look, I have to go to the market in town and then fetch Geisler’s keys from his office, but I’ll be back later if you want to talk more about it.”