I could not keep my eyes from the body as Lane secured the boat. Boothroyd and Miller leapt out, and then knelt down to take it onto the jetty. “Be careful,” I murmured. “For his sake.”

“Dead only an hour ago,” Boothroyd said. “He is served up nice and fresh.”

They carried the body into the workshop, and laid it down upon the long wooden table that I had set up. Boothroyd looked upon it with a certain satisfaction, as if he had despatched him himself. “It is the neatest job I have ever done,” he said.

I paid them ten guineas, as they had requested, and they returned to their boat. I could hear them laughing as they rowed away across the water.

HIS WAS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL CORPSE I had ever seen. It seemed that the flush had not left the cheeks, and that the mouth was curved in the semblance of a smile. There was no expression of sadness or of horror upon the face but, rather, one of sublime resignation. The body itself was muscular and firmly knit; the phthisis had removed any trace of superfluous fat, and the chest, abdomen and thighs were perfectly formed. The legs were fine and muscular, the arms most elegantly proportioned. The hair was full and thick, curling at the back and sides, and I noticed that there was a small scar above the left eyebrow. That was the only defect I could find.

There was no time to lose: perhaps I might still catch the fluttering spirit, too dazed or bruised to have yet left the body. I placed the metal bands across the head, and a strip across the forehead, before I began the procedure of covering the major nerves and organs with the electrical points. The wrists, the ankles and the neck were also bound with bracelets of brass since I believed that the electrical fluid at these points would bolster the circulation of the blood. The body was soft to the touch, and I hastened my work to ensure that the stiffness of death would not intervene. I even took a certain pleasure in arranging him upon the table, as if I were a sculptor or painter completing my composition. I intended to employ both electrical columns, to ensure that the greatest possible charge was available to me, but I had taken the precaution of firing them from several batteries so that I could lower the strength at a moment of danger.

With trembling hands I engaged the power of both and watched in fascination and excitement as the electrical fluid surged through the young body. There was the slightest agitation and then, to my alarm, dark red blood seeped out of his nose and ears; yet I reassured myself that this was an excellent sign of arterial movement. If the blood was circulating through his body, then a first stage had been accomplished. His heart then began to beat very quickly and, when I placed my hand upon his chest, there was a definite sensation of warmth. To my horror I sensed a smell of burning. There was smoke coming from his lower limbs, and I saw at once that the soles of his feet were becoming horribly blistered. I was tempted to lower the charge at once but then the crisis passed; the smoke disappeared, together with the smell of burning. I believed this sudden heat to be the effect of the lightning which I had observed around myself, in the earlier experiment, which had departed after a few seconds. His teeth then began to chatter, with such violence that I feared he might bite off his tongue; I placed a wooden spatula between his open lips. At this point I noticed that his penis had become erect, with a small bead of seminal fluid at its tip; then, mirabile dictu, tears began to roll down his face. I could not believe that he wept. I could only surmise that it was some organic or instinctive reaction to the changes wrought in his body. The tear ducts are notoriously weak.

What occurred in the next few minutes has left so deep and frightful a hold upon my imagination that I can never forget it, night or day; it haunts my sleeping as well as my waking hours, with a horror that is hardly capable of being endured. I noticed first the alteration to his hair: from lustrous black it changed by degrees to a ghastly yellow, and from its curled state it became lank and lifeless.

There is a fear of the dead coming alive, but this was more frightful: in a moment the body in front of me had gone through all the stages of decomposition before being reclaimed and restored to life. His skin seemed to quiver, with a motion like that of waves. But then he grew still. Now his appearance resembled nothing so much as wickerwork. His eyes had opened, but where before they had been of a blue-green hue they were now grey. The body itself had not been deformed in any way: it was as compact and as muscular as before, but it was of a different texture. It looked as if it had been baked. The face still had the remnants of beauty but was now utterly changed in hue, with the curious pattern of wickerwork I had already observed. All this was the work of an instant.

I stepped back in horror, and his eyes followed my movement.

I could not resist the strangeness of his gaze, and we stared at one another. I was observing someone who had gone beyond death and had returned, but what did he imagine that I was? I could see nothing in his eyes except the darkness from which he had come. His lips parted, and then there issued from him the strangest sequence of sounds I had ever heard: it was like a rolling cascade of tones and pitches, but utterly discordant and repulsive. They were the sounds from the depths, sounds which should have been muffled or stifled, but to my astonishment I realised that he was attempting to sing. He was singing to me, while he continued to gaze upon me, and I stood in such awe of him that I could not move. This was no longer Jack. This was something else.

I do not know how long I stood there, but he was at length overcome by some kind of convulsion of restlessness. He began to rise from the table. With no more effort than would suffice for the breaking of a twig he snapped the bands which held down his neck, wrists and ankles; then he sat upright.

He looked around the workshop, as an animal might survey his cage, and then once more turned to me. He smiled, if it may be called a smile; his blackened lips opened, and there was a frightful rictus running from ear to ear. I could see a set of brilliantly white teeth, all the more startling in his discoloured mouth.

I backed away, taking a few paces, and found myself against the wall of the workshop where I kept my glass vessels and retorts for experimental use. For a moment he seemed to lose interest in me. He noticed his penis, still erect, and with a groan he began to stimulate himself in front of me. I looked on in absolute astonishment as he laboured to produce the seminal fluid. What monstrous issue might emerge from one who had died and had been reborn? His most devoted efforts were unavailing, however, and he turned to me with a curiously submissive or perhaps embarrassed look. Did he consider me to be his keeper, or his guardian, or his creator? Had he sinned like Adam in the Garden?

He walked a few steps, and I noticed that his movements were light and vigorous. I saw that he was about to walk towards me and, in my alarm, I put out both of my hands in supplication. “No!” I shouted to him. “Come no closer, if you please!” He hesitated. I was not sure whether he still understood human speech, or whether my strident voice and gestures had deterred him.

He stood uncertainly in the middle of the room, and moved his head from side to side as if testing the muscles of his neck. He put his hands up to his face, and seemed perplexed by the mottled texture of his flesh; he examined his hands very carefully, and seemed not to recognise them as his own. Again he looked at me, craftily and almost cunningly; again I put out my hands to prevent him.