made one feel so good couldn’t be bad. After all, the procedure was meant to be a sort of therapy, wasn’t it? And ladies of good standing flocked here to the house and paid handsomely to receive it. In any case, he’d reassured her that there was no impropriety and she trusted him completely.
Justine was well aware how lucky she was. She knew of maids who toiled day and night for far less than she earned. Her duties were very light by comparison with stories she heard of other houses.
Indeed, Ralph had told her just the other night of one house he knew of where the maids were all got from the workhouse. He said that the master of that house was a high court judge who was on a crusade to reform ‘fallen women’ by his own unorthodox methods, which included tying them down and birching them when they displeased him. But that wasn’t even the worst of it, according to Ralph.
The judge had a special room in his house where the miscreant had to wait until he came to see her, to reprimand her for whatever she’d done wrong, and then she had to ask him very nicely to punish her. Ralph seemed to know the names of all these unfortunate maids and all the details of the elaborate disciplinary rituals they were subjected to, as though he’d somehow managed to insinuate himself into the house and watch. He had seemed especially fascinated by the plight of a girl called Sally, who had stolen some sherry from the butler’s pantry one evening and been made an example of before the entire household.
‘The judge made her wear a special uniform after that,’ he’d said, ‘with her skirts pinned up and her drawers removed entirely. So the other girls could see the stripes he’d painted on her arse and know that they’d suffer the same fate if they got out of line.’
Justine had blanched at the thought of being whipped for such trifling offences as spilling tea or dropping a fork while laying the table, to say nothing of the added humiliation for a crime like stealing. Which of course Justine would never commit. But Ralph had seemed peculiarly intrigued by the whole business. He had asked Justine if Dr Frankenstein was ever so strict with her and what happened to her when she displeased him. He didn’t seem to want to believe her when she assured him that her master was nothing like that terrible judge, that he was kind and gentle and very forgiving of her faults. He had never raised a hand to her and she held him in very high esteem. He was a perfect gentleman.
Something in Ralph’s expression had disquieted her. He almost seemed disappointed, as though he’d wanted to hear tales of harsh discipline at her master’s hands. Later he’d tried to get her to lift her skirts and show him her quim and her eyes had widened with fear, which only seemed to confirm what he suspected about Frankenstein’s cruelty.
‘Come on, Sally, let me see the marks,’ he pleaded, his voice low and hoarse.
‘Sally?’
‘Sorry, I meant Justine of course. It’s only that I was just telling you about Sally and … Oh, let me see. Just a peek.’
Justine didn’t dare let him see what her master had done to her, however pleasant it had been. The embarrassment would have killed her. So instead she put him off with chaste indignation and he became annoyed and called her a tease.
But she didn’t want to be a bad girl like the kind who ended up in the workhouse to be spirited away by cruel judges. She would be happy to show him everything on their wedding night. Justine was a good girl and she was determined to remain so. Ralph had stewed for a while and then cooled off. And if he was a little less enthusiastic when he said he would call on her again in a few days, well, that was fair enough. Once married, she would never deny him. She knew he would understand.
Justine wasn’t worldly wise but she did know that men had needs of a kind that women couldn’t understand. Her friend Daisy had told her all about it. Once, she had even shown Justine some drawings in a book, when her father had left her in charge of the bookshop for the day. Now there was a girl who was overworked! And she wasn’t even a maid – just a shop girl. Justine felt sorry for her, shut up in that dusty, gloomy shop all day, never allowed out for a walk in the park. Justine’s life was one of leisure by comparison.
Her thoughts turned from Daisy back to Ralph. Perhaps by the time she saw him again, the shaved hair would have grown back. Dr Frankenstein had said it shouldn’t take very long. Perhaps then she would let Ralph see. Just a little peek. Surely there could be no harm in that. Not if it was true love.
Justine warmed herself by the stove for a while before becoming curious once more about the unexpected visitor. Dr Pretorius had had a strange sort of case with him. At first she’d taken it for a medical bag but now that she thought about it, it had looked more like a birdcage under a cloth. Yes, and hadn’t she heard a little squeak of some kind when he set it down?
Knowing full well that it was none of her business, but also knowing that there were unlikely to be any consequences if she were caught (no matter what Ralph wanted to believe), she tiptoed back to the study door and crouched down to peer through the keyhole. Dr Pretorius was just unveiling the case and she was right; it was a cage! But what it contained was certainly no bird.
‘What on earth –?’ Frankenstein gasped, staring down at what Justine first took to be a doll.
Pretorius beamed with pride as he unlocked the door of the cage and coaxed the little creature out. ‘I call her Cleo.’
Justine clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle her cry of shock. What emerged from the cage was either a living doll or an extraordinarily tiny woman. Only a few inches high, she wore a filmy white dress that revealed more than it concealed. Her feet were bare and her long red hair cascaded down her back. She crept hesitantly towards Pretorius’s hand before climbing into it. He lifted her up and held her out for Frankenstein to see.
Her master shook his head in bewilderment and Pretorius gave a good-natured little laugh as he stroked the woman’s flowing red hair with a fingertip.
‘She’s a homunculus,’ he explained, ‘or homuncula, if you prefer. She is, after all, most assuredly female.’
‘But where did you … How did you …?’
Pretorius moved closer to the fire, presumably to warm the tiny creature. In doing so he provided Justine with an even better view of the proceedings. She could see that Cleo was quite lovely. Her minute hands and feet were exquisitely formed, as were the delicate features of her face. Around her neck she wore a gleaming gold band, very like a collar one would put on a pet. Justine was certain she could make out the glittering of a tiny gold chain attached to it.
‘Isn’t she splendid?’
Frankenstein simply nodded. He seemed quite unable to speak.
‘You see,’ Pretorius said with a touch of pride, ‘while you were skulking about in graveyards in the dead of night looking for specimens, I went to the very source of life itself. This little pet of mine was created wholly by me, grown in my laboratory as one might grow and tend a rare flower. Of course, in this case the flower has been given a rather special diet of aphrodisiacs. It is a formula I’ve been perfecting for years.’
Cleo wrapped her arms around Pretorius’s thumb as Frankenstein bent down for a closer look. She drew back as he reached out a finger to poke her.
‘There’s no need to be afraid,’ Pretorius told her. ‘Despite her fragile appearance she is surprisingly robust. And ever so … talented.’
Frankenstein blinked at him for a moment and then he broke into a hearty laugh. ‘You old devil! Are you telling me you’re corrupting this poor creature?’
Pretorius snorted. ‘My dear chap, she is no innocent maiden. She is as nature – and science – made her. Wholly in thrall to her baser urges and refreshingly uncontaminated by the strictures of this prudish society in which we live.’
Justine blinked in confusion, not understanding a word of what they were saying. If they meant that the fairy-like woman was some kind of animal, she didn’t understand why Frankenstein found it so amusing. And what was that about graveyards?
‘Is she perfectly formed?’