The Daughter of Doctor Moreau(17)

“Carlota!” Her father had burst into the room and knelt next to her, touched her face. “Carlota, are you hurt?”

He helped her sit up. Carlota shook her head and took a shallow breath. “No. It…it bit Lupe.”

“Boy, bring that light!”

Cachito jumped off the table and held the lamp up. Her father asked Lupe to show her the leg, and Lupe obeyed. Her father muttered something and then stood up. His eyes fell upon the dead creature and then up at the Englishman.

“What is the meaning of this carnage?”

“It was my fault, papa,” Carlota said, clutching his hand. “We wanted to see the hybrid.”

“Your fault!”

Carlota did not want to say anything, but she nodded a weak yes. Her father stepped aside, his eyes hard. She wondered if he was going to hit her. He’d never punished her physically, but she might have preferred it to the coldness that spread across his face.

“Mr. Laughton, I must tend to Lupe’s wounds. Would you assist me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Papa, what should I do?”

“You get out of my sight,” he said. The words were close to a growl, and she felt the tears brimming in her eyes, but the Englishman was there and he was looking at her with such pity, and her father looked at her with such rage that she dare not cry.

Carlota rubbed her hands together and quietly exited the laboratory.



* * *



—

She heard them talking the next morning, in the sitting room. Her father and Laughton. If Mr. Lizalde or anyone else had been aware of the commotion the previous night, she did not know. She prayed it was not the case.

“It shan’t be like that, it was a singular accident,” her father said. Carlota pressed herself close to the door, out of sight but listening carefully.

“But the risk remains.”

“As you yourself pointed out, there is always a risk when it comes to wild animals. I’m thankful for what you did last night. I think you are the right man for the job.”

There was a pause. The tinkling of glass.

“Did Lizalde tell you in his detailed notes about me that I drink?” the young man asked.

“Is that a serious problem for you?”

“Wouldn’t it be a serious problem for you?”

“What you do in your spare time does not concern me, as long as you can function in the daytime.”

The young man laughed. There was no mirth to it, and the sound resembled the barking of a dog. “I always do my job.”

“Then we’ll get along. Do you want the position?”

“Yes,” the man declared without hesitation.

She wondered how he could say that after what had happened, how he could sound dignified and composed after standing in the middle of the laboratory in a pool of blood with a corpse by his feet.

She poked her head through the doorway to look at them. Her father did not see her, but Laughton was at an angle so that his eyes immediately fixed on her. Like Cachito had said, they had no color. Gray and watery and void of sentiment.

She recalled what Ramona had said, that Yaxaktun was the end of the world. And she thought that yes, this man was here because he believed that was the case, that he had reached the end of the world and he was simply waiting for the annihilation of all things.





PART





TWO



(1877)





Chapter 6


    Montgomery


He woke up to a piercing headache and the sun bright on his face and cursed himself for being lazy. The doctor did not chide him for his drinking, because Montgomery fulfilled his duties. In fact, Montgomery suspected the doctor was pleased that he drank. How he could have ever imagined the man might object, he didn’t know. It was a way to control him, similar to how he controlled the hybrids, with his sermons and his mystique.

The drink kept Montgomery in check. He’d tried to abstain more than a few times in the six years he’d been at Yaxaktun, but then he’d head into town to run an errand and there he’d be, sitting in a cheap den, inhaling the scent of rank tobacco and downing glass after glass. Or else he’d find one of the many bottles of aguardiente stashed around the house and uncork that.

But it was Friday, and Moreau would want to administer the injections. He splashed water on his face and dressed, eyeing the clock with a frown, and headed to the kitchen.

Ramona and Lupe were making tortillas, palming the dough into shape. The rhythmic clapping of their hands was a familiar melody.

“Good morning, Mr. Laughton,” Ramona said. “You want a cup of coffee?”

“Good morning. Yes, thank you. Is the doctor in his laboratory?”

“No. The gout is bothering him. Loti said he was tossing and turning last night. She gave him something for it early this morning. He’s napping and she’s out for a walk.”

Ramona stood up and set water to boil while Lupe continued with her work. The coffee was efficiently, quickly prepared, and he downed it with equal haste.

“I’m going to hazard a guess that Carlota has gone to the cenote,” he said, rubbing his temple and setting the clay cup down. The previous night he’d been thinking of his sister. It was the anniversary of her death, and this made him sink into a foul mood; not even writing his letters to Fanny could soothe him.