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The maid knocked on the door, peering meekly in. “A letter for you, Miss.”
I stepped forward, but she shook her head. “For Miss Justine.”
Justine never got letters. She appeared as puzzled as I about who would be writing her. I wondered if perhaps it was Henry. Another stab of jealousy pierced my heart, but I let it go. I had wanted both Victor and Henry for my own. It was inevitable I would lose one. I could be glad just to hear that Henry was doing well in England.
Justine opened the letter with a distracted smile, still paying more attention to William’s disastrous writing. But as she read, the color drained from her face. She looked up, searching for me. I rushed to her just as she stumbled and fainted, insensible, in my arms.
“What is it?” Ernest demanded, fear raising his voice to a piercing whine.
I nodded toward the sofa. Ernest helped me get Justine placed comfortably there. Then I retrieved the letter that had fallen to the floor. I scanned the contents.
“Oh! Her mother died. Last week.”
“God rest her soul,” Ernest said sadly, crossing himself in imitation of Justine.
If God has any sense, he will damn her worthless soul for how she treated Justine, I thought.
* * *
—
After Victor left for Ingolstadt, with Henry occupied working for his father, Justine was my only friend. She took her role as governess to the boys as seriously as Victor had ever applied himself to his studies. I might have brought her to the Frankensteins out of an impulse to save her, but she turned out to be the best thing possible for the younger brothers. The death of their mother saddened them. But in beautiful, bright, infinitely loving Justine, they had more of a mother than their own had ever been.
One day not long after Victor’s departure, the cook took ill. With no one to go to town to collect supplies, I eagerly volunteered and insisted Justine come with me.
She wrung her hands. “What about the boys?”
“Justine, you have not left this house since you got here! Surely you deserve an afternoon off. The maid will look in on them, and Ernest is old enough to be in charge for a few hours. Right, Ernest?”
He looked up from his one-sided game of chess. “I can do that for Justine! You should go and—” He paused, his face screwing up in thought as he tried to come up with something a woman might enjoy. “You should go and buy some ribbons!”
“Three ribbons!” William added. He had recently turned three and was obsessed with the number.
Justine laughed. She kissed Ernest and kissed and hugged little William far longer than a few hours’ absence demanded. Then, finally, I got her out of the house and across the lake.
My last trip to Geneva had yielded me Justine. I had no hopes for an equally fortuitous trip this time, but it was a relief to be out of the house. Victor had just written of getting settled in Ingolstadt, telling me of his professors and his rooms. I had imagined it so fully I felt as though I were actually there.
But I was not. I was still here.
Geneva, at least, offered some distraction. Justine dutifully bought three red ribbons so she could show them to Ernest as proof that his idea was good and count them with William. She also found some candy for the boys, though why they deserved any extra kindness from the woman who spent all her waking hours being kind to them, I did not know.
We were in the middle of the market picking out vegetables when a shrieking demon flew into Justine, knocking her to the ground.
“You monster!” the demon screamed, and I realized it was Justine’s mother. “You killed them!”
Justine struggled beneath her mother, the woman’s hands like claws tearing at her face and her clothes. I dropped my things and yanked her away from Justine.
“Madame!” I shouted. “Calm yourself!”
Justine’s mother’s chin was covered with spittle as she continued shouting the most profane accusations. “You sold yourself to witches! The devil claimed you as his own the day you were born! I knew it! I could feel it! I tried my best to beat it out of you, but you won! You won, you wicked creature! Damnation on you!”
Justine was sitting on the ground, crying. “What did I do?”
“Nothing!” I answered.
“You killed them!” her mother screamed. “My precious babies, my beloved children. You killed them!” She tried to push past me once again, and I could scarcely restrain her. By now she had raised such a commotion that several men hurried over and helped me hold her in place. She writhed and contorted, throwing her body every which way before finally collapsing.
“My babies!” Justine’s mother cried. “You killed them. They are all dead, and it is your fault. You left us. You left, and they died. God will remember, Justine. God will remember that you betrayed your own blood and became a rich man’s whore to raise other people’s children. God will remember! Your soul is damned! Hell has marked you for its own since the day you entered this world!”
