Mr. Rochester

by Sarah Shoemaker

  As for myself, I had a stateroom of my own, at the far end of the saloon. I would still come in the evenings to soothe Bertha with a mug of grog and a bit of laudanum, but for the rest of the time, I was able to move about as if she were unknown to me. Otherwise, I spent a great deal of my time making plans.

  Of course there were whisperings among the passengers about the mysterious woman in the first cabin. There were speculations that she was an illegitimate daughter of Bonaparte, returning to cause trouble in France, or perhaps even the Infanta Isabel Maria of Portugal—poor Bertha, if she had still had her senses, would have enjoyed such an elevation in status. Others suggested she was a dangerous prisoner of some sort, off to meet her fate. Those who noted my evening visitations to the stateroom eyed me with curiosity and suspicion, but I ignored them. The one or two gentlemen who eased close to me in conversation did not get from me any satisfaction, and eventually they gave up, but the distance that I forced myself to maintain from them made the journey frightfully tiresome.

  In the first week of June, we heard the cry of land being sighted, and nearly all the passengers scrambled up to the deck to see for themselves, I among them—I, perhaps, more excited and more anxious than the rest. I had not quite expected it, but when I heard that cry, when I saw for myself that dim strip of darkness at the horizon that I knew to be England, my heart fairly burst out of my chest.

  * * *

  Everson met us at the port of Liverpool, which was a frenzy of activity. It was, I realized, markedly different from the West Indies, where almost no one felt the pressure of time or the urgency of accomplishment. I had forgotten the pace of life at home.

  Since I had visited Bertha’s room before debarking the boat, with what I hoped was one last dose of laudanum, the four of us—Molly and Tiso and Everson and I—contrived to move her, leaning heavily on my shoulder and already beyond consciousness, from the boat to the waiting coach with a minimum of difficulty. The crew and lingering passengers stared after us, disappointed, I imagine, to see that the sequestered passenger was only an oddly dressed woman with wild black hair, and not some fiend destined for the gallows.

  Everson waved us off as we left, the whipcrack and the rattle of the coach telling us we were on our way. We were traveling as the mail coaches did, at maximum speed, changing horses every hour or two, and with any luck we would be at our destination before nightfall. I sat back, satisfied that all had gone so well.

  * * *

  Though it was well past teatime when we drove through Millcote, it was still twilight; but it was nearly dark when we came upon the road to Ferndean. By then my heart was pounding so strongly in anticipation that I could barely hear the footman’s question: “Shall we enter, sir?”

  “Yes, indeed,” I called to him.

  Nearly there, I thought. Everson had assured me that the house was ready, with heavy draperies at the windows and strong locks on all the doors. There was also to be a woman from the village, Mrs. Greenway, staying there as housekeeper and cook, who would teach Molly and Tiso the ways of the Yorkshire countryside.

  I still held hopes of enticing Molly with her freedom and with the run of Ferndean Manor, to stay on at length in England. If Molly stayed at Bertha’s side, I assumed, things could remain for Bertha very much as they had been at Valley View. I could have my own life a half day’s ride away at Thornfield-Hall: close enough to Ferndean for me to be able to respond to emergencies, yet far enough that I might even forget from time to time that I had a mad wife ensconced there.

  At last the lights of Ferndean appeared, and when we approached, Mrs. Greenway opened the door as Molly and I helped Bertha into the house. Tiso ran ahead of us, darting from room to room and up the stairs and back down, wonder in her eyes and a broad grin on her face. She poked at the fire in the grate, opened cupboards in the kitchen and chests in the bedrooms, rubbed her bare feet on the rugs—she had never seen a rug before, for in the climate of Jamaica, no one save the governor had rugs—and she even tested a dipper of water from a bucket to make sure, I presume, that water in England tasted the same. From the expression on her face, I gathered that it did not, though I myself had never noted the difference.

  I had assumed that I would be able to leave for Thornfield-Hall the next morning. But it became clear, from the way Bertha clung to me as I tried to pay the coach driver, that my plan would have to wait. As soon as I could, I took her up to her room and began undressing her for sleep. She was only half-conscious, but awake enough to reach for me and try to pull off my clothing as well. I pushed her unruly hair back from her face and tried to lock her eyes with mine. “It is late, Antoinetta,” I said urgently. “You must sleep.”

  “Fuck me,” she whispered, reclining on the bed.

  “It is too late for that.” I kept my voice steady.

  “Fuck me, you ugly bastard!” she screamed.

  Suddenly I was filled with hate: the crudeness of Bertha’s language, the wildness of her hair, disgust even for the life I had lived for the past five and a half years—a slaveholder, married to a madwoman. I wanted it over; I wanted to be shut of Bertha forever. I could have screamed as loudly as she had—but I pressed my lips together and left her in her new bed, in her new house, screaming at me as I left for a walk around the grounds. It felt unforgivable: Ferndean and Thornfield now defiled by what I had done in bringing Bertha to England.

  * * *

  Before Bertha awoke, I returned to her room. Just outside her door I found Molly and Tiso curled up on the floor, a rug over each of them for warmth. In my rage, and to my shame, I had forgotten all about them, about the fact that they would not have understood that beds awaited them in Bertha’s chambers—that they indeed were expected to sleep in beds. They did not know so many things, and it was up to me to make sure their way was made smooth; I could in good conscience do no less.

  Indeed, although I wanted nothing other than to hurry off to Thornfield-Hall, I saw that I would have to stay at Ferndean much longer than planned. I remained with Bertha that morning since she seemed distraught by her new surroundings, and later I had a long conversation with Mrs. Greenway, who, I learned, was fearful that “the people from across the sea,” as she called them, would make unreasonable demands of her. “It is only that I am suddenly a widow with no savings and no other source of income that I am here,” she confided to me. “I have no idea what West Indian people eat. And the black ones—do they speak English?”

  “Yes—they are servants to the white woman, and I imagine they are as afraid of you as you are of them,” I told her. “The white woman is not well. Did you know that?”

  “Yes, sir, I did, sir. But in what way unwell I was not told.”

  “She is, to put it bluntly, a bit mad.”

  “A bit mad?” She took a step back, looking around as she did so, as if searching for the nearest escape route.

  “Not dangerous—she sleeps much of the day and keeps mostly to herself at night.” I hoped that description could be made true. “The two servants”—I could not bring myself to use the word slaves in England, and, indeed, in England they were not slaves—“will need to learn English food and how to prepare it, and of course how and where to get it. They are used to gardens supplying most of what they eat.”

  “We have gardens,” she said stoutly, as if I could not know that.

  “Yes, but here gardens are seasonal. In Jamaica, crops grow all year round.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Will they eat eggs?”

  “Yes, and bacon as well. They are used to big breakfasts.”

  “Porridge?”

  “Not so much porridge. But they will eat soup.”

  “For breakfast?”

  It was just then that Tiso peered into the kitchen, and Mrs. Greenway, seeing her, gave a start. Tiso slipped back out of sight. “Tiso,” I said, “come here. Meet Mrs. Greenway.”

  Accustomed to doing as she was told, Tiso stepped back into view, but not into the kitchen.

  “Mrs. Gr
eenway,” I said, “this is Tiso. She is a good child, well behaved.”

  Mrs. Greenway smiled cautiously, but for a moment she hardly knew what to say or do. Then she recovered herself and said, “Good morning, Tiso.”

  “Tiso,” I said, “are you hungry?”

  The child was startled: she had never been asked such a question by a white person before.

  “I am sure Mrs. Greenway can fry up some eggs for us both,” I offered.

  Tiso stood stock-still, staring at her feet. A white man had offered her food; a white woman was to cook it for her. She had no idea what she was to do.

  The next day, having assured myself that Mrs. Greenway was capable and sensitive to the situation, I sent for a hired horse and set out for Thornfield. It would have to be a short visit, I knew, but I could wait no longer. This was what I had worked toward for the last six months; indeed, it had been my greatest dream from the moment I was sent away three days after my eighth birthday. I had not known it as a child, but now I did: there had never been another home for me, only way stations on a homeward journey that I had somehow always dreamed of making.

  And now I was taking the final leg of that journey, riding across the meadows and fields and woods, seeing that dark shape in the distance that was again to be my home, then—coming closer—the outlines of it: the chimneys at its four corners, the stonework balustrade defining its roof, the wide, plain front, even the stables and outbuildings. Suddenly I spurred my mount, dashing headlong toward Thornfield; I could not reach it soon enough. And when I did, and tied the horse and lifted the latch and opened the door, a flood of emotion overwhelmed me, and I stood just inside the door in awe, as if I had entered a cathedral, and I wept.

  Chapter 2

  I was not inside the door more than a minute before a man appeared, whom I took to be the newly hired butler. “Munroe, is it?” I asked him.

  “Yes, sir,” he said. “I am sorry, sir. I did have knowledge from Mr. Everson that you could be arriving one of these days, and I apologize that I was not at the door to greet you.”

  “Never mind, Munroe,” I said. “In fact, I was pleased to be able to open the door for myself, to step on my own inside a place that is so special to me. And if you do not mind, I will take my time, on my own, renewing my acquaintance.”

  “Of course, sir.” He stepped back, excused himself, and left.

  I stood there, taking in the familiar scene: the portraits and the pendant bronze lamp, the great clock standing sentinel—at the sight of which my fingers felt again the childish urge to trace its carvings. Then into the dining room, and the drawing room with its same ivory-colored rug bordered with flowers. I glanced above the fireplace, but the only painting that hung there was the same hunting scene that had tormented my days as a motherless child. I paused in that room, memories flooding my mind, nearly overwhelming me. And slowly I climbed the broad, curved staircase to the second floor. To the right was a guest bedroom, and another, and another, until, at the end of the hall, the nursery and the schoolroom, and then I turned the other way and strolled down the hall. To the left of the staircase was the room that had been my father’s, and afterwards, I supposed, my brother’s, when Rowland came of age and my father moved permanently to Liverpool. It was the room that now would be mine.

  But when I opened the door, the world stilled. There it was: the portrait I had so hoped to recover, hung above the bed as if it had never been anywhere else. I walked closer, almost unbelieving. My mother, whose memory to me was only in this portrait, gazed back. Rowland must have brought it back from Jamaica and hung it here above his bed—for she was his mother too, and he was the one who could remember her.

  I stood before that painting, my mind numb, then moved closer and took it from its place above the bed. I carried it out of the chamber and down the stairs and into the drawing room, where I removed the hunting scene and hung my mother’s portrait there, where it belonged. In that moment I came to fully realize not only how much I had always loved Thornfield, but also how much I had lost: Carrot and Touch, dead. My father and my brother—and my mother—all dead. Even Mr. Wilson and Jonas, dead. Now Bertha—my pitiful, hateful bride—was all the family I had in the world.

  * * *

  Back in the entrance hall, I returned to Munroe, who stood silently in a corner, awaiting my orders. “If I may,” I said, “a light lunch. Nothing heavy.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said, and disappeared.

  As I waited in the dining room, the new steward stopped in to greet me. His father had been my father’s longtime steward, and this younger Ames had worked side by side with him for some time, taking over fully two years earlier, when his father passed away. We talked of my concerns and his, and I was pleased to find that he seemed as competent as his father had no doubt been. Afterwards, I took a walk into the fields—now that I was not in Jamaica, it did not seem an extraordinary thing to do. The haying had started, and I watched the workers, their scythes swinging in rhythm. I almost envied their simple, backbreaking labor. The sweet, grassy scent of new-cut hay hung in the air, and I closed my eyes and listened to a lark as it rose high in the sky, and, from a distance, the call of the cuckoo. I stopped in to the little church at the gates to Thornfield Park and strolled through the graveyard there, the last resting place of my ancestors—and of my father and my mother. Even Rowland’s body had somehow been brought back from Scotland. Rowland. When I saw his gravestone, when I thought of him, I felt neither sadness nor joy, just an emptiness.

  That night I slept in the room that had once been my father’s. I felt strange in that place, as if I were an interloper, for the only bed I had known before at Thornfield had been in the nursery. When I awoke, the sun was still low in the sky, but I could not force myself back to sleep. I knew I must return to Ferndean and take care of my responsibilities there, so I rose and threw on my clothes and pulled up my boots, and, unshaven, I hurried down the broad front stairs. I had not even reached the ground floor when Munroe appeared.

  “Mr. Rochester, sir,” he said, striding forward, nodding a bow.

  “Is it likely that Mrs. Keen has bread and jam in the kitchen?” I asked.

  “I am sure she is preparing a proper breakfast. If you will allow me—”

  “Please…I will just go into the kitchen myself and see what she has there.”

  “Sir…” He looked at me in puzzlement.

  “We will sort it all out, I am sure, Munroe, but for now I must hasten back to Ferndean.” I was already walking away from him.

  “Yes, sir,” he said.

  Hearing the note in his voice, I turned back to him. He looked quite forlorn, as if bereft of all responsibilities. “I apologize if I seem abrupt,” I said. “I shall just take a bit of breakfast in the kitchen and then be off.”

  “In the kitchen, sir?” He had no way of knowing it was for me one of the most comfortable places at Thornfield.

  “Yes.” I nodded.

  I found Mrs. Keen in the kitchen, where she was already frying up bacon and cooking eggs. After I had turned down her offer to send them to the dining room, she studiously avoided any more discussion, surely thinking her new employer strange. So be it. She was thinner than the only cook I had known at Thornfield, which had seemed to me a bad sign, but her tea the night before had been very tasty, and the breakfast turned out to be perfectly cooked.

  When I made to leave, Munroe appeared at the door to see me off, as a good butler should. “When shall you be returning, sir?” he asked.

  “I am not sure,” I responded. “But I will send word.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  I wished I could stay. I wished Ferndean did not weigh so heavily on my mind. I wished I had a better plan. I wished I had a choice.

  * * *

  At Ferndean I found a silent house, except for Mrs. Greenway working quietly, with Tiso lingering uncertainly in the doorway. I took a seat at the table.

  “Is your mother with Bertha?” I asked her.

&
nbsp; Tiso mumbled something.

  “And Madame Antoinetta?”

  “She sick,” she whispered.

  I sprang from my chair. I had completely forgotten about the laudanum; Bertha would be suffering grievously from the lack of it. I ran up the stairs, but the door was locked. I pounded on it until Molly opened it. Beyond her, I saw Bertha lying on the bed, bedclothes and rugs mounded on top of her as if she were trapped in an ice cave in January instead of a comfortable room in the middle of June. I could see that she was shivering and hear her anguished moans.

  “Get coffee,” I said to Molly. She darted from the room as if she knew where coffee was to be found.

  I sat on the bed beside Bertha, reached my hand beneath all her coverings, and found her arm and her shoulder, and I stroked them gently. “It will be all right,” I said to her. “I will make it right.” I talked like that, as if I could make well again everything that had gone wrong in her life and mine, with words alone. Would that I could.

  When Molly returned I dropped just a bit, but almost all I had left, of the laudanum into the cup and urged Bertha to sit and drink, and afterwards, she stared at me as if I were a stranger and then blessedly slipped back into her own world. I turned away and caught Molly watching me. “We will have to make her right again,” I said.

  * * *

  I asked Mrs. Greenway to send for Mr. Carter, but she insisted on going herself. Perhaps she was just as happy as I for an excuse to leave Ferndean. Meanwhile, I sat with Bertha and pondered our situation: how long it would take to wean her from the laudanum, if indeed it could be done. What if it had permanently worsened her condition, and she remained ill—or, worse, became even more unmanageable? Back at Valley View, I had imagined the worst would be the ocean journey. It had not occurred to me that that was only the beginning.