My Mr. Rochester (12 page)

I didn’t want that kind of independence. Maybe it was because of the hole in my orphan’s heart, but I craved to belong to someone, to some place. Somewhere I was respected and equal.

The touch of a button extended one of the seats into a bed, and I lay down to watch the world roll by. The train rounded a bend and entered a tunnel then came out the other side into dark unpopulated country, its sky sparkling with unlimited stars. An ascending half moon hung low and serene. I turned on the overhead reading light.

A few hours later, many chapters into
Northern Lights,
it struck me: for the first time in five years, I was alone. My thoughts were uninterrupted, my reading uninterrupted.

The absence of other voices was heaven.

I stayed in my compartment all the next day, savoring the solitude, stretched out to read my precious forbidden trilogy. By afternoon I was well into
The Subtle Knife,
and I understood the novels’ threat
.
The tale of dust pried open a little further the Pandora’s Box within, first unlocked by Gideon Blackstone.

The train traveled through hours of sublime mountain scenery. Pine trees, waterfalls, and rushing streams gave way to oaks and foothills and down to a panorama of rolling farm country, the oaks mostly cleared away, the fields now bordered by willows and thorn trees.

It was past sundown when the train dropped me at Thornfield Halt. A man waiting beside a one-horse carriage touched the brim of his hat in salute. “Are you Miss Jane Eyre?”

“I am.”

“Well, you’d best get in then.” He smiled pleasantly as he put down the step and opened the door. “I’ll get your trunk.”

“How far is the journey to Thornfield Hall?” I said.

“Six miles, miss, not far. About an hour and a half.”

The carriage was very well built, with pneumatic springs, and the seat was comfortable. The ninety minutes could provide a good nap, but I was too excited to sleep. Soon I’d meet the people I would share my life with in the years to come.

Beyond the one daughter who was to be my pupil, I hoped Mrs. Fairfax had no other relatives living in the house. Hoped. Not expected. Thornfield was a Righteous Estate, and there were bound to be many living there. There would surely be Mr. Fairfax and likely more of the family and who knew how many servants, retainers, and hangers-on.

I began to feel a bit sorry for myself. I’d lived among fine people before, and I was miserable with them. What if Mrs. Fairfax turned out to be another Mrs. Reed! Yes, I wanted to belong somewhere, but belonging to the wrong people—people who didn’t like me, who didn’t understand me—was worse than being alone.

Then we passed through Millcote, and I remembered my guardian angel had guided me here, if only in my fancy. At once I felt better. I’d come to my Hamlet 1-3-78.

After the promised hour and a half, we stopped at the bottom of a hill. The driver got down and opened a large double gate fashioned of two iron gryphons facing each other. We ascended a long drive and stopped at the front of a mansion, foreboding in the dark but for a light in one window.

“Good evening, Miss Eyre.” A housemaid carrying a kerosene lamp greeted me. “Mrs. Fairfax sends her apologies for not meeting you personally. She’s gone to bed. I’m to show you to your room.”

She led me over the threshold into a square foyer and up a wide staircase. As with the carriage, the house wasn’t ornate, but all was of good quality and well cared for.

The maid showed me to a room in the middle of a long corridor, and the driver followed us in with my trunk. He left it on a bench at the end of the bed. He tipped his hat again, not in subservience but as a friendly gesture, and said goodnight.

“The bathroom is there.” The maid gestured toward a door. “And the closet and sitting area.”

“How many am I to share with?” There was only one bed but a rather large one. Three could sleep in it without running into each other, though I didn’t savor the prospect.

“No one shares a room at Thornfield.” The maid practically sniffed with indignation. She opened a drawer in the bedside table and withdrew a fat beeswax candle. “These are yours.” She put the candle in a lamp, lit it with a match, and returned the matches to the drawer. “The supply will be replenished when you begin to run low.”

“Thank you. I can put away—”

“We’re not stingy with candles and matches either,” she hastened to add. “If you need a candle through the night—for any reason—no one will mind.”

“I’ve kept you up late enough,” I said. “I’ll take care of my things.”

The room was wonderful. There was indeed an adjoining sitting room, and the bathroom had a deep claw foot tub. I changed into my nightgown and put away my clothes. The closet could have housed all Georgiana’s dresses—if she still wore them. My four looked forlorn hanging in a place so grand.

Transferring incidentals from my purse to a dresser drawer, I pulled out a cardboard card with four pop-outs. The pills! Georgiana must have slipped them in. I looked around with the sudden feeling I was being watched.
Good lord, Georgiana. What were you thinking?

The drugs were as illegal in Jefferson as they were in Idaho, and Jefferson was notoriously fervent about the EDLs. I couldn’t throw them away—they could be found and traced to me. I had to hide them where they wouldn’t be discovered during cleaning.

Someone ran through the hallway outside my door, and I froze in place until all was silent again. My gaze landed on the bed, and I thrust the contraband between the mattresses, as far in as I could. I crawled in under the covers and hoped they’d be safe until I came up with a better plan.

The bed was heavenly. Firm and soft at the same time. I had an abundance of pillows, a down comforter and a lovely quilted coverlet. I leaned over and blew out my candle. The crackle and pop of the dying fire serenaded me to deep sleep, and I dreamed.

In my dream I heard an insistent pounding, pounding, of an approaching monster. A magnificent black horse burst into my presence, ridden by a cloaked stranger. Horse and rider passed me by and metamorphosed into a thundering train. Its whistle blasted, and the train’s scream became a woman’s tortured wail.

« Chapter 12 »
Thornfield Righteous Estate

I awoke nearer to lunch than breakfast time. Someone had lit a fire on the grate and opened the chintz curtains. I sat up in the oh-so-comfortable bed with a smile on my face. My little chamber was the picture of coziness.

Late autumn sunshine poured in over the floral pattern on the papered walls and the thick Persian carpet on the buffed cherry wood floor. I wasn’t in Lowood anymore!

I rose and dressed, eager for the day. I felt my life was embarking upon a new and better epoch, one with flowers among the thorns.
Thank you,
I said silently to my guardian angel.

To meet my new employer and pupil, I chose one of my navy teacher’s dresses and a medium-sized linen collar with lace trim that covered my shoulders. Georgiana had called me plain, and the description fit.

I am no martyr, titillated by a hair shirt. I wish I were pretty, with rosy cheeks and a pert nose. That my lips were full and dark—or at least more than a mere horizontal line above my chin. I’d like to be tall and stately. It was a mistake of my genes that I’m so little and so plain. A sparrow without, a cockatiel within.

No. That is waxing on.

In truth I’m comfortable as a little bird, as Georgiana called me, a sparrow. I only resent being unremarkable when I’m not marked and wish to be. A contradiction in my nature I have never resolved.

The hall, the gallery, the staircase—all of Thornfield looked different in the daytime—less foreboding. Everywhere parted curtains let in the late October sun. There were good pictures on the walls, serigraphs and
giclees
as well as signed paintings and prints.

As I reached the bottom of the stairs, a grandfather clock tolled the hour. Ten in the morning! No wonder I felt so rested. The front door I’d come through the night before was in the foyer to my right. I turned left into a parlor. The furniture wasn’t new or stylish, but all was made of good quality woods and fabrics and well cared for.

A horde of maidservants went at the carpets, curtains, and windows with dusters and cleaning rags. A relieving sign. Antibiotics hadn’t been effective in a generation, and prevention was the best weapon against infection. I always believed Mrs. Reed employed so many maids not to provide work for the local people but out of fear for her own health.

I continued on through the open pocket door at the end of the room into a larger, more cheerful room. “Where can I find Mrs. Fairfax?” I asked a maid dusting a Steinway grand piano.

“In the garden, miss. Past the lilacs.” She curtsied and indicated a glass-paned French door.

I straightened my collar and went outside. I found myself on a broad and wide pressed concrete veranda surrounded by a marble stone half wall. Ceramic pots as high as my waist were scattered in the corners, empty now. I imagined them bursting with flowers in summer, a quartet playing at one end of the veranda and fine people dancing under the stars. I took the marble steps, crossed the cobblestone drive that came around from the front of the house, and walked through a set of spindly lilac bushes holding onto the last of this year’s leaves.

On the lawn I found a lady in her fifties or sixties wearing a black dress and a white widow’s cap. She stood up from one of two wicker chairs. A tuxedo cat meowed in protest at losing her lap. It arched its back, examining me resentfully.

“Miss Eyre, it’s so good to meet you,” the lady said. She had the very look I’d hoped for: relaxed and efficient with an air of kindness. “I’m afraid I don’t stay awake as late as I used to. I hope you didn’t have a tedious ride from the halt. John drives so slowly.”

“Mrs. Fairfax?” It felt odd being treated so graciously by my employer. I felt she didn’t expect a curtsy, so I nodded my head to show respect. “Everything is more comfortable than I could have wished. My room is lovely.”

“I’m glad you like it.” She asked me to take the other wicker chair and offered coffee and teacakes from the little table between us. “I put you near my room in the west wing. Mr. Rochester’s room is also in that corridor, but don’t concern yourself about that. He’s hardly ever in residence. The servants sleep in the east wing. The front rooms do have finer furnishings, but they’re so solitary. I didn’t want you to feel set apart.”

“Who is Mr. Rochester?” I said.

“Why, Mr. Rochester is the owner of Thornfield Righteous Estate.”

“Then you aren’t my employer?”

“Heavens, what a thought!” Mrs. Fairfax said. “Although I am related to the family. Mr. Rochester’s mother was a Fairfax, you see. Second cousin to my husband. But I never presume upon the relationship. I’m so glad you’ve come. I’ve felt lonely here without an equal to talk to.”

I found out that the men at Thornfield worked in the gardens and fields. The inmates of the house were female, all but John who served as a handyman and driver. He was married to Martha, the cook, and they had an apartment in the servants’ wing where the unmarried females, such as Leah who showed me to my room, slept. The other married employees lived in little cottages on the estate.

“Mr. Rochester seems an extravagant employer.”

“In some ways, I suppose,” Mrs. Fairfax said. She patted her lap, and the cat jumped up again. She scratched under its chin and repeated, “We see him so rarely.”

“When was he here last?”

“About two months ago, when he brought Adele. He was here for the day, long enough to give the order to hire a governess for her. Then he was gone again. The child speaks more French than English. I hardly know a thing about her.”

How curious. Was Adele Mr. Rochester’s bastard? Or perhaps a charity case, as I had been.

Mrs. Fairfax proposed to show me over the rest of the house. I followed, admiring all as we went.

“Before Adele came,” I said, “how long had Mr. Rochester been away?”

“Before? Oh. Let me think. I believe before this last time he hadn’t been to Thornfield in more than a year. He travels all over the world, you see. Once he was gone for four years. When he returned, I’d closed half the house and let most of the servants go, thinking to economize. He was furious.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Exactly! I thought I’d be praised for good management. Mr. Rochester ordered everyone hired back and their relatives too if they needed work. He said Thornfield must be kept spotless and ready. That he might descend upon us at any moment with a party of Anointed Elders and their ladies and retinue of politicians and vicars and bishops, and wouldn’t we be ashamed if all wasn’t as it should be.”

I smiled and said nothing but held to my first opinion. Mr. Rochester was an extravagant master. And an eccentric one if he took his duty to provide good employment so seriously.

“But do you know? He’s never once done as he threatened.” She looked at me with wonder. We live quite alone at Thornfield. It’s a world unto itself.”