The World Within (14 page)

In their walks, their new shared world takes shape.

They agree that, as in all their plays, it should take the form of an island. After scouring
A Grammar of General Geography
, they call the new land Gondal and set it in the North Pacific. But Emily doesn’t want the old imaginary landscapes of their plays: deserts and palm trees and fantastical cities with their palaces of lapis lazuli, streets paved with precious stones, and paradisal gardens — the sort of thing that Charlotte loves. After reading Walter Scott, her mind is full of mountains and moorlands, waterfalls tumbling into deep ravines, forests and rocky shores.

She suggests this landscape to Anne for Gondal. “It’s just like here,” she says, waving her arm at the scene before them. “And it’s
real
.”

Anne nods enthusiastically. “It’s better if it’s real.”

Emily grins with delight. She doesn’t want magical transformations either, or genii appearing and bringing people back to life. It’s wonderful that Anne feels the same.

They decide that just as they used to do when they were all working on the Glass Town saga, they’ll divide Gondal into separate regions, with each of them taking responsibility for developing their own main characters. They’ll develop the new saga in the old way, talking about everything together and acting out various scenes and events on their walks, then writing it down at home, each working on their own bits, when they get the chance in the mornings and evenings when Papa and Aunt leave them to their own devices.

Because she loves the secrecy of it, Emily proposes that they still use the same minute print and make miniature books. “And we won’t let Branwell read them, will we? Or Charlotte.”

Anne looks worried. “Won’t we? That seems unkind.”

Emily tosses her head. “Well, they’ve been unkind to us, so it serves them right.”

To prevent Anne arguing about it, she rushes on to outline some ideas she’s had about some of her new heroes and heroines.

“I’ve thought of a chief man called Julius Brenzaida. At the start of it all he’s a student and he’s in love with Princess Rosina. She loves him, but she’s not sitting around waiting for him to notice her.”

She doesn’t want her Rosina to be like Charlotte’s heroines, who are horribly languid and never
do
anything. She wants her to be like Diana Vernon, spirited and self-willed and as Scott describes her:
Accustomed to mind nobody’s opinion but her own.

“She encourages Julius to rebel against the college authorities and they imprison him in a dungeon under the Palace of Instruction, where he undergoes horrible tortures. But the worst part of his suffering is being separated from his beloved Rosina. What do you think?”

She waits anxiously while Anne considers her suggestion. Her sister nods. “Yes, I think that sounds intriguing.”

Emily feels like cheering. After having her contributions mocked and belittled by the others, it’s so encouraging to receive a positive reaction. And it’s so liberating to be in charge of it all. Because really she is — she’s been taking the lead and Anne seems content to follow her. The novelty of having someone look up to her adds to the delight of the whole venture.

But when Emily suggests that Julius takes on himself all the responsibility for his imprisonment, Anne shakes her head. “I don’t think he would feel that. It doesn’t ring true.”

Emily frowns. “Of course it does. It’s his actions that have caused him to suffer.”

“I think, however much he loves her, he would blame Rosina for urging him to rebel.”

“No, that’s nonsense. What do you know about love? You’re just a child.”

Anne raises her head and gives Emily a look.

After a moment Emily says, “Sorry. That sounded like Charlotte, didn’t it?”

Anne nods.

Gazing at her, Emily sees suddenly what it might be like to be Anne, to be the youngest and therefore always somehow disregarded. “You must get tired of everyone treating you like the baby of the family.”

Anne looks thoughtful and then she says, “It’s quite nice to be spoiled. But sometimes I think the rest of you don’t realize that I have my own ideas and am quite capable of forming my own judgment of things. Such as how Julius would feel.” She gives Emily a challenging look.

Emily goes to protest, then stops and considers. Finally she throws up her hands. “You’re right. He never stops loving Rosina, but he’ll blame her and he’ll tell her so. And she deserves it.”

Emily whistles to Grasper and, as they walk on, she slips her arm through Anne’s.

One afternoon, walking in a direction they’ve never taken before, they come across a remote farmhouse.

Emily has always considered the parsonage a sturdy house, constructed with the harsh winters of the Yorkshire moors in mind, but she can see that, with its narrow, deep-set windows and stout cornerstones, this house, Top Withens, was built to withstand even more extreme weather.

It needed to be, up here.

She notices that the firs and thorns at one end of the house are slanted, their growth distorted by the force of the wind that’s blowing fiercely on this autumn day.

What must it be like to live up here in the dark months of winter, cut off by deep snow? Hearing the onslaught of the gales blasting against the windows, day after day?

She tries to imagine it, peering at the house for clues. What if the inhabitants were like her Gondal people, with passions as powerful as the wind, full of bitter jealousies and resentments? How would they fare, closeted up together for months at a time, scarcely seeing another living soul? Such a situation could easily breed violence, perhaps even murder.

Excited by the possibilities, she falls into a reverie. Suddenly Anne nudges her. A face is peering at them from one of the windows. Seizing Anne’s arm, Emily turns tail and flees, but when they are a safe distance away she can’t resist glancing back, fixing the image of that isolated house and its situation in her mind.

One blustery afternoon in November Emily and Anne’s rambles bring them to the hillside above Ponden Hall.

As they gaze down at the old grey stone house, Anne says, “Remember what Papa said about Mr. Heaton’s library? Shall we go down and see if we can visit it today?”

Emily hesitates. Papa has recently seen the Heatons’ library and he reported that it was very fine. “I don’t know. I don’t want to have to see the family.”

Anne looks wistfully at the hall. “But just think — all those books. Can’t we just have a look? We won’t have to stay long.”

Emily is in an agony of indecision. The lure of the books is dreadfully tempting. Like the others, she has read and reread Papa’s small but precious stock of books until she knows them virtually by heart, and he can rarely afford a new volume. He has a subscription with the Keighley circulating library and will get books for them from time to time, but there’s only a limited selection. The thought of having a whole library to browse in for herself …

“All right, but we must try not to get trapped in a conversation.”

In the lane they stop and peer round a pillar at the house. Emily’s just screwing up her courage to go and knock at the door when it opens and a boy hails them.

“Pa says you’re to come in, if you please.”

Tying Grasper to a boot scraper, they follow the boy into the house. As they pass through the doorway, the date carved on a plaque above it catches Emily’s eye — 1801.

It’s a date that sticks in her memory, for it means a lot to Papa — the year of the union of Ireland with Great Britain.

Inside, Emily finds herself in a spacious room. She recognizes Mr. Heaton, with his ruddy face and thinning hair, from church. Clad in knee breeches and gaiters, he’s sitting by a huge fireplace in which a tremendous fire of coal and wood as well as peat is blazing away. Opposite him, with some knitting in her lap, is his wife, a round, comfortable-looking woman. The boy joins his little brothers at the table; there are open books in front of them, but they’re far more interested in their visitors.

Having five pairs of eyes gazing at her is too much for Emily. Her instinct is to turn and run, but Mr. Heaton has risen and is greeting them. “Miss Emily, isn’t it? And Miss Anne? How do you do, young ladies? I hope I see you well.”

“We are very well, thank you, Mr. Heaton.” Anne blushes furiously. “Aren’t we, Emily?”

“Yes,” says Emily stiffly. This is a mistake. They should never have come in.

She offers monosyllabic replies to Mr. Heaton’s inquiries about Papa’s health and that of the rest of the family. He addresses them all to her, but she refuses to look him in the face. She hates it when strangers peer at you as if they’ve a right to know what you’re thinking and feeling. Her eyes dart round the room.

It’s nothing like their parlor at home, but nor is it the luxurious room Emily would expect of a wealthy man like Mr. Heaton — a room with crimson and gold furnishings and crystal chandeliers such as Charlotte described in the palaces of Glass Town.

It’s more like a farmhouse. A great oak cabinet fills one end, the shelves above laden with silver jugs, enormous pewter dishes, and gleaming tankards. Overhead, legs of beef and ham dangle from hooks in the dark wooden ceiling and a rack of drying oatcakes hangs at one end of the room. Instead of a picture above the fireplace, there are some fearsome old guns.

Emily can’t believe that somewhere in this house there can be any library at all, let alone a “fine” one.

By now, an awkward silence has fallen. Anne nudges her and she forces herself to say, “Mr. Heaton, Papa said your library is very impressive.”

“Ah yes, indeed.” Mr. Heaton smiles expansively. “I would say it’s the largest hereabouts. We have a Shakespeare First Folio, you know. You’d like to see it, no doubt?”

“Oh yes, please.”

The oldest boy is out of his seat in a flash. “Let me show them, Pa.”

His father laughs. “Aha, I see one of you has made a conquest. Which of the young ladies has won your heart, William, my boy?”

Flushing scarlet, the lad studies his boots.

Emily is puzzled. What does Mr. Heaton mean? But when his father says, “Go on, then, son, show the young ladies the way,” and the boy raises his eyes to hers, she sees a look in them that she’s only ever seen in Grasper’s eyes — one of dumb devotion.

She cringes inwardly as they follow him upstairs. Silly boy, what does he think he’s doing looking at her like that? He can’t be more than twelve.

The sight of the library drives all other thoughts from her head.

Mr. Heaton wasn’t exaggerating — there are more books here than Emily has ever dreamed of. She dives at the shelves, scanning them wildly. History, biography, travel … and here are the poets: some she’s heard of — Burns and Moore — and others unfamiliar to her. She’s tempted to seize volume after volume from the shelves and fill her arms with this treasure.

Taking a deep breath, she makes herself calm down. She looks again more carefully and eventually selects just one book — Byron’s
Don Juan.

Soon she’s so deeply immersed in it she’s hardly aware of the boy creeping out and leaving them to it, or of Anne turning pages occasionally.

“Well, now, Miss Emily.” Mr. Heaton’s abrupt entry into the room makes her jump. “I don’t want to spoil your entertainment, but Mrs. Heaton was wondering whether it wasn’t time for you to be getting your sister back to the parsonage. I’ll take you in the gig, if you like.”