A Sad Mistake

Book 0: A Mulholland / Strand Magazine Short

by R.L. Stine

Genres: Short Stories; Horror; Thrillers

Synopsis

A reclusive, haunted Dr. Frankenstein and his assistant are visited by a strange, persistent stranger in this haunting short story by R.L. Stine.

It's a dark and stormy night, and the new, unnamed assistant to the penniless Dr. Victor Frankenstein answers the front door's knock. There stands a stranger, who has managed to track down the elusive doctor and forces a wager: reanimate the man's dead brother or face exposure to the community at large. But who is gaming whom--will the massive corpse actually be revived?

"A Sad Mistake" by R.L. Stine is one of 20 short stories within Mulholland Books's Strand Originals series, featuring thrilling stories by the biggest names in mystery from the Strand Magazine archives. View the full series list at mulhollandbooks.com and listen to them all!

Release date: December 6, 2016

Publisher: Mulholland Books

Print pages: 22

Sample

When the stranger arrived at Dr. Frankenstein’s house, I did my best to send him away. Strangers aren’t normally drawn to Giron, our village, so distant from Geneva and unknown but to the farmers who have worked the hills for generations.

The man didn’t appear threatening. Far from it, with his slender face, damp straw-colored hair falling over square spectacles, his cheeks pale and pinched, his overcoat open and dust-covered from the journey, and his boots…I noted his boots especially—small for a man and caked with dirt.

The horse, a scrawny brown mare bathed in sweat, uttered a cough. Behind her, the canvas tarp over the man’s wagon rattled in the strong breeze that never stops blowing through our valley.

He looked down at me from the wagon seat. “My name is Nathaniel Borne. I believe this is the house of Dr. Victor Frankenstein,” he said formally. His voice was high, his diction clipped. Like a schoolteacher, I thought.

“You believe incorrectly,” I told him. “There is no one by that name in this house.”

He grunted. An unpleasant sound. He raised his eyes to the cabin door. “He is in there,” he said. “He must see me. He will avoid me at his peril.”

I saw his gaze and could read his thoughts: How could Victor Frankenstein be reduced to living in this lower-than-humble cabin?

A question I asked myself when I first found him. Living in this. . .