The Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë (12 page)

That moment reminded me how fear can enhance attraction. I felt an almost irresistible urge to touch his bruised cheek. “But it would inconvenience you,” I stammered.

“It would be my pleasure,” he said with somber emphasis.

I was quaking inside, every particle of my being alert to the implication that Gilbert White felt the same attraction as I. Alive with hope that rivaled fear, I nodded wordlessly.

His rare smile flashed. “Then good night until tomorrow, Miss Brontë,” he said, and descended the stairs.

Breathless and weak, I stood in the corridor, endeavoring to collect my thoughts. Likely, my recent mishaps had rendered me too leery of my fellow humans. If Gilbert White did have evil intentions regarding me, then he would not have saved me. We shared a mission as well as the potent alchemy that draws together a man and woman.

Thus I justified my good opinion of Mr. White; but later, while I lay in bed, I wondered more about him. Was I truly safe in the protection of my rescuer and possible suitor? Or was he a villain biding his time while scheming against me? Just before I finally slept, I recalled the premonition evoked during my first encounter with Gilbert White. What could it mean?

A
S I PREPARE TO DESCRIBE THE EVENTS THAT OCCURRED AFTER my return to Haworth, I realize that my version of them comprises but one portion of the story. Another belongs to my sister Emily. I then had no idea of her state of mind, for we were on such poor terms that we hardly spoke; and later, misfortune silenced Emily forever. I now face a difficult choice: Shall I allow her to remain as unknown to the world as she wished, or shall I reveal her nature in all its tragic, human beauty? The truth requires that I defy her wishes. It is my only hope of uncovering the complete facts of my story.

The table before me is covered with journals that Emily left. What she endured in the weeks following Isabel White’s murder lie in the words I have culled from these journals. May God forgive me if I have defiled her memory for the sake of veracity. With great foreboding I open the volume for that year and copy her account herewith.

Such bewilderment and consternation did Emily’s words cause me! How could she consider the mortal sin of taking her own life? Had I but known of her pain, I would have been more sensitive towards her. But she never gave me a clue. She always appeared supremely confident of her talent, as well she should have been: Her poems and stories were things of splendor that never failed to move me. In literary expertise she was the leader, my idol, even though I was her elder. And I never suspected that she cared what the critics said; she seemed so indifferent to public opinion, even during her youth. When Emily was seventeen, she came with me to Roe Head School where I taught. As eccentric in appearance as ever, she was the target of bullies, from whom I could not always protect her. But she never flinched at their tormenting. She held her head high, a soldier in an enemy prison camp. How I admired her! My weakness is that I always want people to like me—and my work—even when I care not for them. How I wished I could follow Emily’s example!

But now I understand that her attitude sheltered a tender soul. Emily pretended to scorn the critics while she bled inside from their harsh comments about
Wuthering Heights
. She hid her wounds from me.

When Anne and I at last returned to Haworth, we hurried into the kitchen, where Emily was kneading bread dough.

“Emily!” Anne cried. “How I’ve missed you!”

Emily glared. She showed no sign that she’d missed us or worried about us. Anne’s smile faded.

“Has all been well here while we were gone?” I asked anxiously. Emily behaved as though she had not heard me.

Anne offered our sister the book she had purchased in London. “We’ve brought you a present—it’s Tennyson’s poems.”

When Emily made no move to take the gift, Anne sighed and laid it on the table. Anne and I could only exchange worried glances and silently agree that we had best leave her alone until her mood passed. We crept out of the kitchen.

Two days after that unhappy homecoming, a spell of wet, chill weather descended upon Haworth. I donned my bonnet and cloak, armed myself with an umbrella, and headed down Church Road to post a letter to Ellen Nussey, my dearest friend. Ellen was something of a busybody, so avid was she to know everything I did or thought. I had lately neglected my correspondence with her, and I’d written a letter of vague explanation.

Moreover, I could no longer tolerate confinement in the parsonage, where acrimony reigned. Emily continued sulking. Branwell had gone into the village and returned home uproariously drunk. Anne had received a review from the
Spectator
that read, “
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
, like its predecessor, suggests the idea of considerable abilities ill applied . . .”

Although the wind now blew rain against me and tugged at my umbrella, I welcomed solitude. But solitude was not to be mine. As I neared the bottom of the lane, I was accosted by the Reverend Arthur Bell Nicholls.

“Good day, Miss Brontë,” he said in his thick Irish brogue. “May I walk with you?”

Mr. Nicholls had come from Dublin to be Papa’s curate. A man of twenty-nine years, he had heavy dark brown hair and eyebrows, heavy features, heavy legs, and a stolid, serious nature. I found him annoying, for he often sought me out although I could not imagine why. I reluctantly let him share my umbrella and accepted his company.

We walked down Main Street, through the village. The rows of stone cottages were grimy with peat smoke and dripping with rain. Mr. Nicholls and I skirted gutters overflowing with malodorous drainage from cesspits. Haworth is a poor, unhealthful place riddled with poverty born of slumps in the textile industry. Damp, tiny cellar dwellings house large families, fevers rage, and funerals comprise a large part of Papa’s duties. That day the village seemed even smaller and poorer than usual, after my recent adventures in London.

I refrained from speech in the hope that my companion would grow bored and leave me, for I wanted to think about Gilbert White. Mr. White and I had talked together on the train all the way from Keighley to Haworth. We at first discussed Isabel, but soon our conversation turned personal. I told Mr. White how I had happened upon some poems written by Emily and thought to publish a book of poetry by my sisters and myself. I admitted that only two copies had sold, but the venture had spurred me to attempt novels. Mr. White told me about growing up in the town of Bradford, his father’s fatal accident in a factory, and how charity had paid for his education at boarding school, then divinity college at Oxford. We had much in common—our Northern origins, our lives as charity children, our faith. He became the most intimate male acquaintance I’d ever had.

Before we parted at Keighley Station, he jotted on a paper the address of his vicarage, presented it to me, and said, “Shall we write to each other?”

“Do you mean—if I remember anything else about the men on the train—or if you learn anything from your mother?” I asked, astounded because no man I admired had ever before asked me to correspond with him. “Why, yes, of course.”

“Whatever you choose to write, I’ll be delighted to read,” Mr. White said earnestly.

I thought it prudent to wait until he wrote before writing him a letter, and while I waited, I relived every moment spent with him. I dressed my hair with undue care, as if he could see me; we carried on imaginary conversations in my mind. For a woman to nurture affection without proof of requital is sheer folly, as I well knew, but I could not help myself.

Now Arthur Nicholls said, “Yesterday, at the stationer’s shop, I met a stranger.” Close beside me under the umbrella, he smelled of cooked cabbage. How I wished I had Gilbert White as my companion instead! “He asked about you, Miss Brontë.”

“Oh?” I said, bored by anything the curate had to say.

“He wanted to know who your family and friends are, what you do, and what kind of character is yours,” said Mr. Nicholls.

Uneasiness stirred in me; the rain and gusting wind seemed colder than a moment ago. “What was this man’s name?”

“He didn’t say.”

My uneasiness quickened into alarm. “Well, what did he look like?”

“I didn’t really notice.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Nothing, of course. I don’t gossip to strangers.” Mr. Nicholls looked affronted.

There are people who have no notion of sketching a character or perceiving salient points of persons or things, and Mr. Nicholls belongs to this class. Would that he were as good at observation as he was discreet! Could the stranger be one of the men who had assaulted Anne and me on the train? I looked down Main Street towards the village green and the toll gate. Suddenly Haworth didn’t seem so isolated as before.

“Miss Brontë, I hope you’ve not been doing anything to attract improper attention from strange men,” Mr. Nicholls said in a tone of sententious concern. “As the daughter of a clergyman, you should be careful about your behavior, lest it reflect badly upon your father or the Church.”