Outcasts (12 page)

“By far,” Mary murmured. She was still apprehensive, but the warmth of the fire and the effects of the unaccustomed rum were rendering her mood pleasant and agreeable. “Shelley, won't you—”

“As you can all see, there is no water inside the jar,” Shelley was saying to Byron. “Most experimenters are persuaded that the electrical fluid must itself be stored in a similar fluid. I agree with Doctor Franklin, however, that the electrical substance is finer than that, perhaps as fine as any alchemical substance.”

“Alchemical!” Polidori snorted. “Really, Mr. Shelley. Will you produce the Philosopher's Stone next, I wonder? Are we to be treated to a demonstration of the ‘magic' of Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus?”

Mary scowled at Polidori, but the young man was not looking at her.

“You misunderstand, as usual, Polly,” said Byron. He sloshed more brandy into a glass; the tang of it reached even where Mary sat. “Mr. Shelley has obtained the very elixir of life from the heavens. He has brought down the very fire of God.” Mary wondered if she was the only one who heard the irony in Byron's voice. “He seeks not a stone, but a fire. Like Prometheus, he means to steal fire from the gods.”

“He will burn himself, then,” said Polidori testily. “I have seen what this ‘fluid' can do to flesh and bone. You will want to spare the ladies—”

“Oh, bother,” said Claire, tossing her head. She strode across the room, reaching her hand towards the jar. “No one need spare me—”

“Stop!” Shelley grabbed her arm and pulled her away before she could touch the jar.

Byron bent over, giggling. “Maenad! Madwoman! Would you walk over a cliff in sheer defiance?”

Shelley put Claire behind him. “I will demonstrate, but you must stand back a little. Mary, I fancy my gloves are under that newspaper? Thank you.”

“Is it dangerous?” Mary asked, handing the leather gloves to Shelley.

“Not if you know what you are doing,” Shelley said. He pulled on the gloves carefully and picked up the poker from the fireplace. She noticed that his hair was standing up all around his head, as if he were a saint with a halo. Nothing could be farther from his religion—or lack of religion—but Mary found herself fighting both amusement and fear.

Wearing the gloves, Shelly held the poker out from his body as he advanced on the Leyden jar. His feet assumed the
en garde
stance of a fencer, one foot forward and one back. Byron, chuckling and rubbing a hand through his wet hair, backed against the side cabinet, his eyes on his friend.

“Mr. Shelley, I urge you to desist,” Polidori said. Mary thought that his earnest expression was completely negated by his pompous form of address. Really, was the man made of starch?

The tip of the poker approached the wire at the top of the jar. Suddenly there was a loud snap, and a tiny bolt of lightning leaped from the wire to the poker. Claire shrieked and jumped at Byron, who caught her with an oath. Polidori cried out something in Italian. Mary hardly noticed—her heart leaped in her chest, her skin went cold all over. But Shelley stood, cool and poised, in the center of the rug. “Don't worry,” he said. “It is completely tamed, as long as one takes precautions.”

“Oh! It was so loud! So bright!” Claire squealed, pawing at Byron.

Byron shoved her away, carelessly, his eyes on the jar. “Can you do it again, Shiloh?”

“I can do better than that,” Shelley said. “Tell me, Byron, have you a carcass of a chicken about?”

Byron raised an eyebrow. “You propose to revive a chicken? It is not enough to abjure the eating of animals, now you must resurrect them?” Nevertheless, he touched a bell. Fletcher walked
stolidly into the room. “Fetch, O Fletcher, a chicken from the store room. Or if we have no chicken, a turkey or a duck or a pigeon. Anything with wings, in fact, that is dead. Should you discover a heavenly angel, however, you must hide it from Shelley and bring us something else.”

Fletcher nodded stoically. “Yes, my lord.” He went away.

Polidori frowned. “I fear I have some idea of what you plan to attempt. I saw something like it myself, in Edinburgh.” He glanced around at Mary and Claire. “I, er, fancy the ladies would want to retire. The experiment, if you conduct it as I saw, would be most disturbing—”

“Oh, nonsense,” Claire said. She put her hands to her hair, re-arranging her curls. “We have heard it discussed often, have we not, Mary?”

Shelley turned to look at Mary. “You've seen a chicken revived?”

Mary sat down again, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. “Not quite. We live … we used to live near Newgate prison. One of our father's friends witnessed the exhibition there by Mr. Aldini. He came to dinner, and told us all about it afterward.”

“Oh, and how we screamed, didn't we Mary?” Claire laughed. “I declare we did not sleep a wink all night! So delicious!”

“It was horrible!” Mary squeezed her eyes shut. “Mr. Aldini inserted metal rods into the mouth and ear of a hanged felon. I can never forget what he told us. ‘The jaws of the deceased criminal began to quiver, and the adjoining muscles were horribly contorted, and one eye was actually opened. In the subsequent part of the process the right hand was raised and clenched.'” She opened her eyes. Byron was staring at her in fascination, while Shelley carefully wound a thin wire around the knob projecting from the jar.

At that moment Byron's manservant walked back into the room, carrying a plucked chicken on a plate. “Your chicken, my lord.”

“Put it here,” Shelley said, directing him to a clear space beside the Leyden jar. But Fletcher eyed the jar suspiciously, reluctance in every line of his body. “Oh, here, give it to me,” Shelley
said impatiently, and jerked the plate out of the man's hand. He slid the plate onto the table, grasped the wire in his gloved hand, and touched it to the cold corpse.

The headless body jerked once.

Claire screamed and clasped her hands to her face in delighted terror. Byron stared, then drank the rest of his brandy in one gulp.

The naked wings and thighs spasmed erratically. Mary stood frozen in shock as the headless creature twitched as if alive, as if trying to regain its feet and totter blindly out of the room. “Shelley …”

Her lover glanced over at her, his eyes cold and remote, off somewhere, far away from her. She felt a chill creep up her back.

“By God, sir!” cried Byron. “But this is amazing! You are bringing it to life again!”

Claire shrieked and covered her face with her hands, then immediately peeked through her fingers at the chicken.

Fascinated, Mary stepped closer. Was it possible? What would a headless chicken be able to do? Could it stand? Walk? How could it direct itself, with no head?

Claire pushed past her, clutched at Shelley's arm. “Oh, let me! Let me touch it!” She reached for the wire in Shelley's hand. Byron grabbed her from behind and shoved her aside.

“Idiot woman!” he said.

Shelley glanced over at Claire, amused. “If you touch this wire, my dear, you will dance indeed. And you will not like it.” He touched the wire to the chicken again. The whole body flexed, one leg jerking convulsively. Fletcher, staring, put his hand to his mouth and ran from the room.

“By God, sir, you could make this pullet dance!” Byron said, waving his empty glass. Half-drunk, he tottered backwards, colliding with Mary. “Oh, beg pardon, my dear.”

Mary disentangled herself from his lordship, pushed him towards Polidori, who caught him with a sound of distaste. “Your lordship is a trifle disguised,” she said. “Perhaps you should sit down.”

Shelley, paying no attention to the others, bent closer to the Leyden jar, adjusting something with his gloved hand.

“What, sit down?” Byron bellowed. “And miss the greatest amusement I have had since coming into this country? Why, I want to see that chicken cluck and fly and dance! Shelley, how dare you dance with my chicken, you … you vegetarian!”

Mary glared at Polidori. “Can you do something with him?”

The doctor merely shrugged helplessly. Byron staggered upright, weaving slightly now. Claire promptly came to his side, and he leaned on her. “I say, Shiloh, this is damned peculiar of you. You, who will not eat a chicken, now abuse its helpless corse? I would not have thought it of you.”

Shelley ignored him. He picked up a pair of tongs from the sideboard and inserted the joined ends into the hollow carcass. “Pour me some brandy,” he asked of no one in particular.

Byron was leaning on Claire and Polidori was dithering, so Mary stepped forward to the brandy decanter. She poured a half glass and handed it to her lover. Leaning in, she said, “Shelley, my dear, this will frighten Claire no end. You know how susceptible she is to disturbances. And in her delicate state …”

His blue eyes met hers, but his expression was distracted, as if he were far from her. “Thank you,” he said mechanically, and drained the glass. He handed it back to her. “Best step back, my love.”

Seeing what he was about to do, Claire released Byron, who staggered sideways.

“Damn you!” his lordship cried.

But Claire clapped her hands together. “Oh, famous! Do it again!” she cried breathlessly.

Shelley touched the wire from the Leyden jar to the ends of the tongs. The result was startling. The entire carcass convulsed violently, then shivered for several seconds. The wings and legs jerked and flapped spasmodically, and the stump of the tail flittered.

Claire squealed, then burst into screams. “Oh, horrible! Horrible!”

Byron clapped his hands over his ears, glaring at Claire. “Stop it! Stop it at once!”

John Polidori stepped between him and Claire, shielding her at the same time from the sight of the spasming corpse. “Don't look, Miss Clairmont! Turn away at once!”

A faint tendril of smoke rose from the body of the convulsing chicken, along with the smell of cooking meat. Dispassionately, Shelley removed the wire, then touched it to the tongs again. The chicken convulsed so violently it flipped off the plate onto the table. To Mary, it looked as if it were trying to escape the torture of the wire.

“Enough, Shelley,” she cried.

Shelley took the wire away. “Keep watching,” he said.

Byron and Mary leaned closer. The chicken lay inertly on the table, but then a faint twitch started in one wing. Another leg jerked once and stopped. A shiver went through the entire corpse.

“But you are not touching it with the apparatus!” cried Byron. “Why, man, you have revived it! You have brought it back to life!”

Mary put her hand to her mouth. The chicken shuddered once and then lay still. Shelley reached over and detached the wire from the Leyden jar. “Have you really?” Mary whispered.

Shelley looked at her, and this time it was her Shelley, her lover, the sweet natured poet was back. “Have I what?”

Mary swallowed. “Have you … restored it to life?”

Byron laughed. “Of course he has! What better act for one who will not eat a chicken, than to give it back its life! Oh, Shiloh, you threaten the livelihood of every butcher in Europe!”

Claire screamed and collapsed on the sofa. Polidori drew a bottle of smelling salts from an inside pocket and waved it under her nose.

Mary's gaze was locked with Shelley's. “Can you do it?” she whispered. “Can you bring the dead back to life?”

In her mind's eye, she saw the narrow lodgings in Nelson Square, the cold room with a small fire, the cradle holding its lifeless bundle. Her firstborn, her premature daughter, dead two weeks after birth. “I thought she was sleeping,” she whispered, lost
in the memory. Shelley took her hands. “Our little one, our first. I thought she was asleep, so I did not suckle her. But in the morning, I knew she was dead. And the doctor said she died … of convulsions.” The tears started behind her eyes; her hands shook. Shelley gripped them firmly. “Of convulsions …” Mary stared down at the quiet carcass on the table.

Shelley drew her into his embrace. “Don't think of it now, my dear. She is gone, we have our Will-mouse.”

Mary pushed herself out of his arms. “But don't you see? If we had known, if you'd been there, maybe with your … your jar. Maybe you could have revived her, maybe you could have saved her.” She kept her voice low, but it was not low enough.

“I don't know,” Shelley said. “I don't think it would have worked. She was too frail, my love. Too early.”

Polidori came up behind Shelley. “Mrs. Shelley, is there anything I can do?”

Hiding her tears, Mary shook her head and turned away. Polidori cleared his throat, embarrassed, and turned away.

“I say, Mr. Shelley,” he said. “Do you know, I read in
Galigiani's Messenger
that the authorities are so enamored of this new electricity, they are setting up rescue stations along the Thames.”

Byron limped up. “Rescue stations? For what?”

“For drowning victims,” Polidori said. “The idea, I perceive, is to attempt to revive drowned persons who are pulled from the water.”

Shelley gazed at him in fascination. “And does it work?”

Polidori shrugged. “I do not know. I have not read of any trial of it yet.”

Byron laughed and clapped Shelley on the shoulder. “Well, Shiloh, my love. We have here a lake, suitable for drowning. We have your Leyden jar. On whom shall we experiment?” He bowed at Polidori. “Doctor, will you assist the advance of science, and volunteer?”

“Oh!” Claire shrieked. “You are all of you horrible and mad!” She shrieked again and ran from the room.

“Damn it!” Byron said. “There she goes again. Shelley, we
must find her before she damages the furniture in her hysterics.”

Shelley carefully laid down the wire, removed his glove and laid it on the table. “Of course.” He followed Byron out of the room, following Claire's loud shrieks and groans.