When the news reached Leghorn that Felix had been stripped of wealth and rank, the merchant commanded his daughter to think no more of her lover and prepare to return to her native country. Safie’s generous nature was outraged; she tried to expostulate, but her father left her angrily, reiterating his tyrannical mandate. A few days later the Turk entered her apartment in haste and told her he had reason to believe his residence had been divulged and that he would speedily be delivered up to the French government. He had hired a vessel to convey him to Constantinople and would sail in a few hours, leaving her under the care of a confidential servant to follow at her leisure with the greater part of his property, which had not yet arrived.
Left alone, Safie resolved her course. A residence in Turkey was abhorrent to her; her religion and her feelings were alike averse to it. From papers of her father that fell into her hands she learned of the exile of her lover and the name of the spot where he resided. She hesitated, but at length she formed her determination. Taking some jewels that belonged to her and a sum of money, she quitted Italy with an attendant, a native of Leghorn who understood the common language of Turkey, and set out for Germany.
She arrived in safety at a town about twenty leagues from the cottage of De Lacey, but there her attendant fell dangerously ill. Safie nursed her with the most devoted affection, yet the poor girl died, and the Arabian was left alone, unacquainted with the language of the country and utterly ignorant of the customs of the world. She fell, however, into good hands. The Italian had mentioned the name of the place for which they were bound, and after her death the woman of the house in which they had lived took care that Safie should arrive in safety at the cottage of her lover.
Chapter 17
The creature’s long tale ended on the icy mountain, and he fixed his gaze on Victor, waiting for an answer. Victor, bewildered, could not yet grasp what was being asked of him.
“You must create a female for me, with whom I can live in the interchange of those sympathies necessary for my being. This you alone can do, and I demand it of you as a right which you must not refuse.”
The memory of the creature’s cruelties rekindled Victor’s anger. “I do refuse it,” he said. “No torture shall ever extort a consent from me. Shall I create another like yourself, whose joint wickedness might desolate the world? Begone!”
The creature replied coolly that Victor was in the wrong. He was malicious because he was miserable, shunned and hated by all mankind. His creator would gladly destroy him if he could—would that be called murder? “If I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear,” he swore, “and chiefly towards you my arch-enemy.” His face twisted into contortions too horrible to behold, then he mastered himself and tried once more to reason.
His request, he said, was moderate: only a creature of another sex, as hideous as himself, with whom he could share a barren but harmless life in some far wilderness. Their food would be acorns and berries; their bed, dried leaves. “For that one creature’s sake I would make peace with the whole kind!”
Victor was moved. He could not deny that, as his maker, he owed the creature whatever portion of happiness lay in his power to bestow. But when he looked up at the filthy mass that moved and talked, his heart sickened, and pity curdled into horror. Still, he reasoned: if he could not sympathise, what right had he to withhold the small joy he could grant?
He pressed the creature on how he could keep faith, when he had already shown such malice. Might not this be a feint?
The creature answered sharply. Without ties or affections, hatred and vice must be his portion. A companion’s love would unmake the cause of his crimes and link him to the chain of existence.
Victor fell to thinking. He recalled the creature’s early display of virtue, blighted by the loathing of those who should have sheltered him. He considered his powers—to exist in ice-caves, to vanish among inaccessible ridges—faculties it would be vain to cope with. After long reflection, he concluded that justice demanded compliance.
“I consent to your demand,” he said, “on your solemn oath to quit Europe for ever, and every other place in the neighbourhood of man, as soon as I shall deliver into your hands a female who will accompany you in your exile.”
The creature swore by the sun, by the blue sky of heaven, and by the fire of love that burned his heart. Victor should never behold him again. He begged Victor to go home and commence his labours. Then he suddenly departed, perhaps fearing a change of heart, descending the mountain with a speed greater than the flight of an eagle, and was quickly lost among the undulations of the sea of ice.
The tale had occupied the whole day. Victor began his descent toward the valley, his heart heavy, his steps slow. Night found him at the halfway resting-place beside the fountain, beneath dark pines, the stars shining at intervals through passing clouds. He wept bitterly, clenching his hands. “Oh! stars and clouds and winds,” he cried, “if ye really pity me, crush sensation and memory; but if not, depart, depart, and leave me in darkness.”
Morning found him still on the path. He did not rest at Chamounix, but pushed on to Geneva. Even in his own heart he could find no words for what he felt; the sensations weighed on him with a mountain’s weight. When at last he entered his father’s house, his haggard looks woke intense alarm. He answered no question, scarcely spoke. He felt as if a ban had been laid upon him, as though he had no right to claim their sympathies. Yet he loved them to adoration, and to save them he resolved to dedicate himself to his most abhorred task. The prospect of that occupation made every other circumstance of existence pass before him like a dream, and that one thought alone possessed the reality of life.
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