Mrs Rochester

by Hilary Bailey

  The heat of the fire was making me drowsy and St. John, concerned, came and felt my hot brow with a cool hand.

  ‘Jane, you have a fever,’ he said in alarm. ‘You must go to bed. Which is your room? I will light the fire and you must go up as soon as it is warm.’

  I had no choice but to comply, for I was, indeed, now ill. St. John, patient and tender as a woman, lit the fire in my bedroom, warmed the bed, carried me upstairs to retire and, later, brought me a soothing drink. Then he asked for instructions on how to get to the church, saying he would appeal to Mr. Todd for assistance. ‘My horse is weary, though,’ he said. ‘May I ride your mare?’

  ‘No,’ I said in alarm, ‘do not ride Ruby, for yesterday she bolted and threw me.’

  He was shocked. ‘No wonder you are ill. Well, I will take my own horse. He’s good for another mile or so. Now, you must rest. I shall be back within the hour.’

  And so he left me and, through fatigue and illness and the ease of knowing St. John was with me, and strong in support, I fell asleep. The next I knew I was summoned for dinner – that is to say, I professed myself much better and arose, not wanting St. John to sit alone at table, and found Mr. Todd’s housekeeper, Mrs. Willows, in charge and a young woman and her brother, relatives of Mrs. Willows and fully vouched for by her, already installed, she upstairs, he in Jeremy’s old quarters in the stable-yard.

  ‘You have worked miracles,’ said I to St. John as I sat down at a well-laid table. ‘I will never be able to thank you enough.’

  ‘I thank God I came in time to stop you from struggling through the snow to Mr. Todd’s,’ replied St. John. ‘Todd is no zealot, that’s plain to see, but he proved staunch in this emergency, which is to his credit.’ He broke off at that point and I guessed Mr. Todd had told him something of what had been happening at Thornfield. Mr. Todd probably knew, also, that Grace Poole was residing at Old House. What else St. John had been told I could not tell, but perhaps it was a great deal for, though not an energetic clergyman, Mr. Todd knew all that happened in the neighbourhood.

  My situation was difficult. Loyalty to Edward, that loyalty a wife owes to her husband, was paramount. And, though St. John’s manner towards me had been all along frank and free, as though that long-ago proposal of marriage had never been made, I felt that memory to be another constraint on speaking too candidly. Yet he and Mr. Todd must have spoken of events at Thornfield, so I thought it foolish to pretend naught was amiss. Moreover, I owed St. John some candour, for had he not come with help when it was most sorely needed?

  ‘Mr. Todd may have told you of some difficulties we have had,’ said I. ‘You will know now that the servants leaving is the least of it.’

  ‘I confess I am at a loss to understand precisely what is happening,’ he told me gravely. ‘Mr. Todd tells me the late Mrs. Rochester’s sister is making grave allegations publicly against your husband. You must forgive me, Jane, if I am blunt but I speak as your friend and also, it must be said, as your only male relative and natural protector – after your husband, of course.

  ‘It seems you are living in a cloud of rumour and doubt, and unspoken suspicions and allegations made but not answered. Such things are more damaging than any truth – to you, in particular, I believe, for knowing you as I do I am certain yours is a nature which requires straight paths and the open light of day to satisfy it. You have ever been happier facing a truth, however hard, than doubts, uncertainty and obscurity.’

  ‘It is all the fault of that dreadful, wicked woman Madame Roland and her accomplice, Grace Poole,’ I declared.

  ‘Perhaps,’ he answered. ‘But, Jane, may I be direct? You have ever been ready to meet your challenges, confront things as they are. This is one of the reasons you are so dear to us, me, and Diana and Mary. You must remember that, because you are our cousin, and so dear, we will never fail you. You are not alone, Jane.’

  I gazed at him, my heart so full of gratitude I could scarcely reply. ‘St. John…’ I stammered.

  ‘Will you hear me out, though, Jane, for I must come to the point. Madame Roland is damaging your name, and more particularly Mr. Rochester’s. I gather there is also a difficulty with a sum of money, a dowry, not returned. That is not so important, though the world, I have to say, does not look kindly on such oversights. But more serious by far is the gossip she is spreading hinting that Mr. Rochester contrived his first wife’s death.’

  It was profoundly shocking for me to hear those words spoken aloud by my cousin, whose life had been straightforward, guided always by duty. ‘St. John,’ I appealed, ‘please do not speak of this matter. These things have been said by a dreadful woman, whose family history is full of corruption and madness. Edward, by an early and imprudent marriage, became part of all this. His life was warped and almost ruined by his involvement with the Masons. He should have been freed by Bertha Mason’s death, yet still that family haunts him.’

  ‘Please believe, Jane, that I do not wish to upset you by speaking of these matters. But Madame Roland will not keep silent. The poison will spread. I believe Mr. Rochester must silence her once and for all, if necessary by taking an action against her to clear his name, for, if he does not, I am afraid it will be believed there is some particle of truth in her story.

  ‘Alas, there are those whose chief pleasure lies in always believing the worst. Mr. Rochester may consider the matter best dealt with by ignoring it, treating it with contempt. Such a view is not unreasonable but my own opinion is that it may be time for stronger action. This rumour may not die down. It may need stamping on with some vigour. I speak for your sake, Jane, for you are involved, and so, indirectly, is your son. I am telling you this, my dear, for you should know I intend to speak to this effect to your husband on his return.’

  I feared it was probable this would anger Edward and said, ‘I wish you would not, St. John, for I am not sure Edward will thank you for your intervention.’

  ‘Interference, you mean, little diplomatist,’ he said with a smile. ‘Well, I know that in Mr. Rochester’s shoes I should not welcome comment from a man whom I had never met, who returned after ten years away, claiming to be your cousin, and who immediately took the opportunity to tell him his business in an affair of such delicacy. No, I should not appreciate such an intervention, nor do I relish the prospect of making it. But, Jane – if I do not speak, who will?’

  I gazed at him wordlessly. The prospect of this confrontation made me almost afraid. I could all too easily imagine Edward’s anger, either cold and contemptuous or openly expressed. And yet I could not help wondering if the course suggested by St. John, an open challenge to Madame Roland, ending doubtless in her humiliation, might not prove effective. Once defeated she would be forced to leave the neighbourhood, would probably return to France, silenced for ever. It was Edward’s way – the way of the Rochesters of old, no doubt – to treat with contempt the gossip and speculation of others about him.

  The Rochesters had always been their own men, resolute and hardy, taking a pride in their indifference to what others might say of them. ‘They say – let them say’ might have been their family motto. And so my husband had treated Madame Roland’s words with contempt. And such a man, too, will know well what action to take when impugned by another man, but not so well how to deal with a woman.

  ‘Do not worry too much, Jane,’ St. John said, seeing my thoughtful face. ‘You must eat now. You have scarcely touched this good food Mrs. Willows has provided for us. Eat – and will you play for me after dinner?’

  ‘Gladly,’ said I, and duly, as St. John made himself comfortable by the drawing-room fire, I played for him the tunes I remembered he loved.

  It was long since I had played and doing so gave me great joy. I had just completed the final bars of that dear old country song ‘Barbara Allen’, which St. John had, from his chair, sung with me, and all was peace and tranquillity when, seated still at the piano I heard a scratching noise from the window nearby. I ignored it but it came again.


  This time my cousin, too, heard it. ‘What’s that?’ he cried, leaping from his chair, and going to the window. He peered out. I followed him and saw, outside in the darkness, a figure I recognised and a face, pale, fearful and desperate, a little dirty, which I knew well.

  ‘Jeremy!’ I cried, and to St. John said, ‘It is Jeremy, our coachman.’

  ‘Do you wish to let him in?’ questioned St. John.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ said I, going to the drawing-room door.

  St. John followed me, warning, ‘He may have been drinking.’

  ‘If so, that is the first time. Jeremy does not drink.’

  St. John may have doubted this confident assertion, but he followed me to the front door. Jeremy was standing some distance away, as if ready to flee, when St. John opened it. Seeing us both, he evidently took a decision and hesitantly came towards us, a finger to his lips. When he stood below us on the steps I saw him to be in a very bad way, shaking with cold, his clothes unbrushed, his hair dishevelled.

  ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘may I please speak to you? – But no one must hear.’ He looked doubtfully at St. John. ‘It must be private, madam – I beg you.’

  ‘I am Mr. Rivers, Mrs. Rochester’s cousin,’ said St. John. ‘What have you to say?’

  ‘Be kind to him,’ I said. ‘He has worked for us from boyhood on. His parents are our old servants from Ferndean. Jeremy, come in.’

  He shook his head. ‘I dare not. The master has dismissed me. Then, when I came back with Ruby, Mrs. Poole sent me off and said I would be found and arrested if I dared come back again.’

  ‘The master is away, and what he did I am sure he did hastily. He may reconsider. And Mrs. Poole is gone. Come inside.’

  Jeremy, hesitantly, did come in, still shaking with cold.

  St. John was still doubtful and confronted the desolate figure in the hall. ‘Speak up, man,’ he ordered.

  ‘Come, Jeremy,’ said I, ‘you must eat,’ and I compelled him into the warmth of the kitchen. I bade him sit down and I gave him bread and cheese and hot milk; he began to look more easy.

  ‘So you found Ruby and brought her back?’ said I encouragingly. ‘And that after you were dismissed.’

  ‘I could not leave her straying,’ he told me. ‘I was ten miles from Thornfield when she came galloping past me on the road. I was bound for Ferndean, having spent the night in a barn after I was turned out, for it was too dark and cold to travel. I was up early and on my way when I saw her race past, unsaddled, but with her bridle swinging down. But by that time she was a little calmer, I suppose, and when I called after her, knowing my voice she slowed and then came back to me. Seeing no saddle on her, madam, but only a bridle, I was alarmed for you so I led her back along the road towards Thornfield, looking for you as I went.

  ‘There was no sign of you, but some miles along I found a lady’s saddle in the road. When I picked it up I was sorely afraid, for it was yours, madam, and the girths were broken.

  ‘And so I reached Thornfield. I was obliged to stop outside, for, though I had the horse and dearly wanted news that you were safe, I was turned off and Mr. Rochester was in a great rage when he discharged me. I feared to approach the house, yet how could I go back to my parents with the tale that I thought you had been thrown from your horse but had done nothing to discover if you had got home safe and well?’

  ‘I was coming after you when Ruby bolted,’ I told him.

  ‘I did hope that, madam, anxious as I was. I did hope you had come after me.’

  St. John was now, I think, convinced that Jeremy was an honest man. Nevertheless, he asked, ‘If you were turned off, who, that morning early, saddled Mrs. Rochester’s horse? Mrs. Rochester will not mind my saying she is no great horsewoman, but this accident would not have happened if the saddle had been properly attended to.’

  ‘That’s just it, sir,’ he said. ‘The matter grows worse. Of course, I should have saddled if I had been here, but I had left the stables in the early hours of the morning, so I do not know who did it. But while I was waiting with Ruby just outside the drive at Thornfield, contemplating the wrath of Mr. Rochester if I returned to the house and whether he would forgive me – for, if you will allow me to say so, madam, though hasty, Mr. Rochester is just – I looked more closely at the saddle. Madam,’ he told me gravely, ‘the girths of the saddle had been half sliced through. The signs are plain, on both.’

  ‘That cannot be,’ I said, but at the same moment St. John said, ‘Where is it? You had better show me.’

  ‘I cannot be sure, sir. I brought the saddle to the back of the house, and Mrs. Poole sent me packing. She told me you had been brought back safe, but she would not listen to my story. She told me to take the horse and hand her to the lad and then be off before Mr. Rochester came back and found me still here.

  ‘I left the saddle in the tack-room and set off again for Ferndean, but before I had gone far I thought I must inform you, madam, of the cut girths. But there is worse to tell. On Ruby’s back, where the saddle rested, is a wound, an inch or so long, as if something, perhaps a nail, had been placed there under the saddle. Of course, as soon as the rider, yourself, madam, placed her weight on the saddle the pressure of the nail began to cause the horse pain until in the end she bolted. And with the girths half cut through, the saddle would sooner or later start to slip – and the rider be thrown. It was maliciously done, madam.

  ‘I crept up to the house and concealed myself, hoping to be able to find you alone in the drawing-room after dinner to tell you – warn you, indeed.’ Earnestly he said, with a nervous glance at St. John, ‘You know me well, madam. I am not an excitable man, nor given to extravagant ideas. But events here at Thornfield become stranger by the day.’

  I reflected that the previous night I had overheard Mrs. Poole whispering to Madame Roland, ‘She will not be told; I have sent him packing again,’ and knew it was of Jeremy and his tale of the severed girths that she had spoken.

  At St. John’s instigation we went straight to the tack-room. I would not be left behind, though that was what he urged. There we discovered the young man brought by Mrs. Willows still at work by the light of a lamp. He looked up, startled, at our arrival.

  ‘We’ve come to examine the lady’s saddle – Mrs. Rochester’s,’ St. John announced without ceremony. The lad said he had cleaned it and put it with the others but told us, ‘The girths are snapped, both of them, and need mending, but I believe they were cut half through, and that was why they broke. I hope no one will blame me.’

  ‘Indeed we shall not’, St. John assured him. He and I looked at the saddle. Jeremy was right. The girths had been neatly sliced through and then they had torn asunder: the marks were plain to see.

  Next, we went to see Ruby in her stall. The mark on her back was there as Jeremy had described.

  St. John was convinced now and deeply shocked. He said, ‘The facts are plain. There has been an attempt to harm you, if not kill you, Jane. And the answer lies with whoever saddled the horse.’

  I could say nothing. I was too shaken, knowing that somewhere in the world was an individual who hated me so much as to wish to kill me.

  With a sigh, St. John turned to Jeremy. ‘You had better share your old quarters with the new man for tonight. Come with me into the house and I will get extra bedding and aught else you need. Turned off you may be, but you cannot leave at this hour. Come, Jane, let us go in.’

  I went with him. He led me into the drawing-room, retrieved my shawl, put it round me and sat me down by the fire. Then he went off with Jeremy to get what he required.

  I was so preoccupied by what we had just learned that I heard, but did not hear, the sounds of a carriage approaching the house. It was not until St. John, his business with Jeremy done, returned to the drawing-room, saying, ‘Jane, someone is here,’ that I understood what I had heard and by that time came the sound of an angry voice outside the house, then the stamp of feet coming through the hall and a figure appeared in the
drawing-room doorway. There stood Edward, muffled in a heavy travelling-cloak, his face furious. Adèle stood timidly behind him.

  He took in St. John’s presence and said to me with cold anger, ‘Ah – I see you have been arranging matters for yourself, Jane, in my absence. In the stableyard I find Jeremy, whom I dismissed, going up to his old quarters, bearing fresh blankets, in case the night is too chilly for him, no doubt. And here by my fireside at midnight is a gentleman with whom I am not, I think, acquainted. I see,’ he added, with a glance at the piano, which stood open with some music upon it, ‘that you enjoyed some music earlier. I hope you find my wife’s playing agreeable to you, sir,’ he said to St. John. He advanced into the room.

  ‘I have always found my cousin’s playing agreeable, sir,’ replied St. John. ‘May I introduce myself? My name is St. John Rivers. Mr. Rochester, there are matters about which you must hear immediately—’

  ‘Must? Must?’ Edward said angrily. ‘Do not presume to tell me what I must hear. You are in my house, Mr. Rivers; you may not command me. I should like the opportunity to speak to my wife alone. Adèle, you will go to bed. You, sir, will oblige me by doing the same. Where is Mrs. Poole?’

  Mrs. Willows appeared in the doorway. Edward swung round. ‘Who is this woman?’

  I stood up. ‘Mrs. Poole has left the house, Edward,’ I said. ‘There is much that you should be told. Perhaps you will let me inform you.’

  He said, ‘I have returned from a hard journey, having recovered Adèle on the road to London, she having been rendered desperate enough to leave the house. Here, servants are apparently coming and going at will and this gentleman, a stranger, is enjoying my hospitality without my knowledge. Yes, Jane, I should very much like you to inform me.’

  St. John said, ‘Mr. Rochester. There are very good reasons for what is taking place here. I mean no discourtesy, but I must urge you for your own sake to moderate your tone until you know all.’