Shadows of the Lost Child
Page 34
I thought it would give us a much better future, Lucie and me. I also thought it would free up Mad.
That was my third and final mistake.
To be continued…
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Watching Charlotte Brontë Die: and other surreal stories
Extract from Watching Charlotte Brontë Die
We’d been in the flat a year when it happened.
The night had been cold, and extremely wet. I was sitting in my chair, over by the window.
My wife was out working, she usually was. It was then that I heard it, an enormous crash, a screech and a thud, followed by silence. Someone’s life, played out on the pavement. It wasn’t the first time our street had done that, claimed a victim, with its deadly camber, its rain-stroked curve. The road was treacherous, sometimes lethal.
I leapt from my chair and ran to the window. She was lying there, in the middle of the tarmac, broken, damaged, her head to one side. She was calm and quiet and didn’t move, and the bike beside her was bent out of shape. My heart stopped beating. It was Charlotte Brontë.
And it looked to me as if she was dead.
I dressed quickly, with trembling fingers, opened the door and ran down the stairs. The street would be empty, it was access only, apart from the tourists. There were no tourists on the street that night. I opened the door that led to outside and looked to the right, I knew the woman would be just around the bend. I rounded it quickly, as fast as I could. There was nobody there.
I blinked sharply and looked again, in case I’d missed her. I saw the rain, it was heavier now, streaming down gutters, flooding the road. I saw the light on an empty can, a broken bottle, remains of a toy. But that was all. No bike wheels spinning high in the air, no ghastly corpse, or crumpled victim propped against a wall. The street was damp and devoid of life, but also of death. I watched the water running away. All I could think was one small thought. I hadn’t known Charlotte could ride a bike.
It wasn’t the first time I’d seen her.
My wife has a job at the local uni, teaching English, she loves all things Brontë. That’s how we met, at a Brontë conference, in West Yorkshire. I married my wife because I love her, but also because she looks like Charlotte. I should feel guilty, but I don’t, not at all. I’m privately pleased and secretly proud, as if I’ve discovered a hidden treasure. Perhaps I have.
Charlotte Brontë, born again.
My skills and training are different from my wife’s. I’m not a teacher, I’m a writer’s researcher, but that’s alright, I love my work. I study theology as well as the Brontës, ferret out the facts from the archives. And I love the place where I find those facts, a cathedral library, and that’s the place where I first saw Charlotte. Not in one of the first editions, but there in person, right by the shelves.
I was up in the gallery, quietly working. Dozens of volumes piled up high. They were all so beautiful, all so original, it’s a wonder I did any work at all. I was taking a tract from the nearest shelf when I heard a noise and looked right down to the room below and there she was, right beneath me, and all lit up from the stained glass windows. I caught my breath. She was just like the photos, quaint and homely with a small, shy smile and rosebud lips. But her eyes were different, cool and piercing and quite unlike the rest of her look. Even though we were far apart, and I was standing up in the gallery, I could see those eyes, staring right through me. I watched and waited, noticed her beckon. But she still didn’t speak.
Forgetting where I was, I walked over to the railing. I forgot that the railing, normally solid and made of cast iron, had been replaced by a tape for repairs. Nobody ever came up here. All there was between me and a fall, a terrible drop, maybe death, was a thin strip of tape, not even taut. I was seconds away from the worst that could happen. I stopped suddenly, looked down at the floor. Miss Brontë had gone. I was safe, for the moment.
But she always came back.
A few weeks later, I was in the library, just for a change. The rain poured down on an autumn day. It was normally dark, the building was old, but today felt different, colder somehow. I shivered in the chill, caught in the alcove by the spiral staircase. The room I was in was called the Cage, it was small and narrow with a strange metal door, which looked more like a gate. Somewhat reminiscent of an old-fashioned lift in a French hotel. I was looking for a book but couldn’t find it, was thinking I’d have to go upstairs and visit the gallery once again. I wasn’t keen. I peered up the staircase and there was Charlotte, sitting at the top.
Her dark brown dress looked very real and so did she, she was reading a book. I wanted to touch her, stretch out a hand, but I thought if I did, she’d vanish like mist. So I smiled instead.
She ignored me completely.
Unable to resist, I walked towards her, and as I moved closer, the book she was reading slid out of her hands and fell to the floor. A cloud of dust filled my vision. When I could see, Miss Brontë had gone. I picked up the book.
It wasn’t like any I’d seen before.
To be continued…
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