Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë

by Laura Joh Rowland

  When the lecture ended, the people in the audience arranged themselves in two lines along the aisle. Mr. Thackeray walked down the aisle, shaking hands, accepting compliments, exchanging quips. When he reached the door, the people did not follow him out; they remained.

  “They’re waiting for you,” George gently informed me.

  Shrinking between him and his mother, I walked the gauntlet. It was an endless tunnel of faces that smiled too close to me, warm, moist hands that pressed mine, and cultured voices making enthusiastic remarks. I smiled, murmured polite replies, and tried not to faint from embarrassment. When we entered another room, in which refreshments were served, I became separated from the Smiths and cornered by a formidable group of my admirers.

  “I simply loved Jane Eyre,” exclaimed the Duchess of Sutherland. “When will your next book be published?”

  “I’m afraid I can’t say,” I replied unhappily.

  It had been nearly four years since the publication of Jane Eyre, and going on two since my second novel, Shirley, had appeared. The second had not been received as well as the first. Hence, I felt considerable pressure to produce a new work that would live up to Jane Eyre.

  “At least tell us what the book is about,” came the outcry.

  I only wished I knew. I had been unable to settle upon a subject for my next book. Thus far my publisher had been understanding and patient, but I couldn’t expect him—or the public—to wait forever. “I’m sorry,” was all I could think to say.

  I escaped, only to be accosted by other folk asking the same questions. Once I would have given my life for such avid interest in my literary works. Now I only wanted to hide. Once I could have comforted myself with the knowledge that when I went home I would describe this evening to those I loved most. But they were gone.

  My brother Branwell had died first, in 1848 September, of consumption. Too soon afterward, in December, did my sister Emily die of the same disease. I prayed to God that He would spare my youngest sister, Anne, but in the New Year she became ill with consumption. By 1849 May, she, too, was dead.

  In our youth my siblings and I had encouraged one another in our artistic pursuits, and I’d believed that we would share a brilliant future together. My prediction came partially true when Emily and Anne and I all published novels. But Emily’s Wuthering Heights and Anne’s Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall were not favored by the critics or the public. And never did I suspect that I would be the only one of us to achieve any fame and financial success, or that I would be left to experience it alone. Their deaths still haunt me; my grief is still raw. I am thankful that I still have my father, but the one other person who could have alleviated my sorrow is far away.

  That person is, of course, John Slade, the spy with whom I fell in love during my adventures in 1848. He asked me to marry him, but I refused because he was due to leave for an assignment in Russia, and we could not count on seeing each other again. I love him yet, even though I have not heard from him in all these years and do not know whether he still loves me—or even if he is still alive.

  The matter of what to call John Slade, in my mind as well as in this narrative, has required some thought. “Mr. Slade” would be most proper, but in view of our relations it seems too formal. “John” seems too familiar because we didn’t know each other long enough to progress to first names. Therefore, I think of him as “Slade,” a compromise. But no matter how I refer to him, he is always in my heart. I miss him daily, keenly.

  My longing for my lost loved ones still overcomes me at unpredictable, inconvenient times. Now, in the midst of gay society, I felt tears sting my eyes. Groping toward the door, I bumped smack into a gentleman.

  “Miss Brontë,” he said. “May I be of service?”

  His voice had a calming quality; it soothed my nerves so unexpectedly that I looked up at him instead of continuing on my way. He was not above average height, with not more than average good looks. His graying hair receded from his high forehead, and his somber air made him seem less superficial than the rest of the crowd. Concern showed in his hazel eyes. He procured a glass of wine from a nearby table and gave it to me.

  “Drink this,” he said with a quiet authority hard to resist.

  I drank, and my spirits rose somewhat. I felt oddly safer, as if the crowds around us would not trouble me while I was in his presence. “Thank you, Mr. . . . ?”

  “Dr. John Forbes,” he said. “We’ve never met, but we’ve corresponded. Perhaps you remember?”

  “Yes, of course. I wrote to you concerning my sister’s illness.” Dr. Forbes was one of Britain’s foremost experts on consumptive disease. He was also a personal friend of George Smith, who had suggested I consult him about Anne during her illness. “Please allow me to thank you in person for replying so quickly.”

  “You’re quite welcome.” Dr. Forbes’s somber air deepened. “I was sorry to hear that your sister did not recover. Please accept my condolences.”

  I did, with heartfelt gratitude. Usually, when someone mentions my sisters, I break down, but his presence was so steadying that this time I remained composed.

  “How are you?” he said. “I hope that your writing has been a comfort to you?”

  I told him that I had not been able to write. “If only I could manage to find a subject that was fascinating enough.” Then I inquired about his work.

  “I have been treating consumptive patients at Bedlam,” Dr. Forbes said.

  Bedlam. Hearing the popular name for the Bethlem Royal Hospital caused me a shiver of morbid curiosity: London’s insane asylum was notorious. But I had more than a prurient interest in madness. I had firsthand experience with it, and I eagerly questioned Dr. Forbes about the patients he treated.

  “They suffer from delusions, paranoia, mania, and dementia, among other things,” he said, and described a few cases.

  I recognized symptoms exhibited by my brother Branwell, and by a murderous villain I’d encountered during my adventures of 1848. “What causes these conditions?”

  “Most experts say they’re a result of physical defects or spiritual disturbances,” Dr. Forbes said. “But there is a new school of thought which suggests that madness originates from experiences in early life.”

  I expressed such fascination that he said, “Would you like to visit Bedlam? I’d be glad to escort you. Perhaps it would furnish a subject for your new book.”

  “Yes, I would like that very much,” I said, so eager that I forgot to be shy.

  George Smith and his mother came hurrying up to us. “Ah, Charlotte,” he said. “I see you’ve met my friend Forbes.” He and the doctor greeted one another.

  “We were just leaving,” Mrs. Smith said, tired of having so much fuss made over me in public. She turned to me and said, “It’s time to go home.”

  “I’ve just invited Miss Brontë to visit Bedlam with me,” said Dr. Forbes, “and she has accepted.”

  “Visit Bedlam?” As George looked from Dr. Forbes to me, concern flickered over his smooth features. “But you might see disturbing things.”

  “Miss Brontë has a taste for disturbing things,” Mrs. Smith said. “Her novels are full of them.” She smiled kindly at me.

  I seethed, but I could not retort: she was my hostess, and I owed her courtesy even if she didn’t deserve it. “I daresay I can cope.”

  “I won’t show Miss Brontë the parts of the asylum that an outsider shouldn’t see,” Dr. Forbes promised.

  “I still think it’s unwise,” George said with a frown.

  “I agree,” his mother said. “Miss Brontë, it might be construed as unseemly for a lady to visit such a place.” Her tone hinted that I was no lady. Her smile remained bright and kind.

  “Ladies visit Bedlam every day,” Dr. Forbes said. “The public is always welcome.”

  Mrs. Smith pretended not to hear. “If you don’t care about yourself, at least have a thought for my poor son. What if it were to distress you so much that you became unable to
write your next book?”

  She wanted me to think that my next book, and not me, was all George cared about. George exclaimed, “Never mind the book, Charlotte.” His mother winced. She disliked that he and I were on first-name terms. “My fear is that you’ll be attacked by a lunatic.”

  “That might please some people,” I couldn’t resist saying. Before his mother could think of a rejoinder, Dr. Forbes assured George, “Patients who are dangerous are kept away from the public. And I promise to protect Miss Brontë. But of course,” he said to me, “if you would like to change your mind . . . ?”

  Once I would have bowed to the will of the people to whom I felt obligated. But I am stubborn by nature, and another unexpected thing that my fame had brought me was the backbone to resist coercion.

  “I am determined to visit Bedlam,” I said. “Shall I meet you there at ten o’clock tomorrow morning?”

  “That would be fine,” Dr. Forbes said.

  George Smith looked resigned, his mother distinctly put out. None of us knew at the time that my innocent trip to the insane asylum would ultimately bring peril to us all.

  2

  LIFE ABOUNDS WITH CHANCE ENCOUNTERS. MOST LEAVE NO residue, but some have consequences that are serious and far-reaching. Such was my encounter with a woman named Isabel White, whom I met during the summer of 1848. Such was my meeting with Dr. John Forbes. Chance encounters such as these send us down one path instead of another, and we cannot know until much later that they have changed the course of our lives.

  However, I had no intimation of this on the morning I was engaged to visit Bedlam. As I sat in the parlor of the Smiths’ house at Number 76 Gloucester Terrace in Hyde Park Gardens and waited for the carriage, I thought only of the interesting material for my long-overdue book.

  I heard wheels rattle and horses’ hooves clop outside. I hurried to the door and opened it. In the sun-drenched street between the rows of elegant houses was a carriage, but not the one hired for me. Down its steps clambered Mr. Thackeray.

  “Good morning, Miss Brontë,” he said, all sardonic smiles. “I’ve come to pay you a social call.”

  Although furious at him for what he’d done to me last night, I had no choice but to usher him to the parlor.

  “How is Jane Eyre today?” His eyes twinkled mischievously behind his spectacles.

  My eyes saw red. “How dare you! After introducing me as ‘Jane Eyre’ and making a public fool of me yesterday, you mock me again!”

  Mr. Thackeray took an involuntary step backward. Astonishment raised his bushy eyebrows. “Why, Miss Brontë, were you offended by what I said?”

  “I was and am offended.”

  “I meant you no harm,” Mr. Thackeray said, stung by my criticism. His manner turned patronizing. “You are too sensitive. If you intend to survive in the cutthroat world of literary society, you must grow a thicker skin.”

  “People who think other people are too sensitive are usually as insensitive as a rhinoceros themselves,” I retorted.

  Mr. Thackeray glared indignantly; then he remembered his manners. “All right. If your feelings were hurt, I apologize.”

  “What kind of apology is that? I could just as well call you a cad and then say I’m sorry you are one!”

  “You’ve already called me a rhinoceros,” Mr. Thackeray said, nettled yet amused.

  “Only because you deserved it.”

  Baffled now, Mr. Thackeray said, “I don’t understand what all this fuss is about. What I said was just idle, harmless teasing.”

  “No, sir!” I exclaimed with a passion. “It was in poor taste at best, and cruel at worst!”

  We faced off, I all in rage and Mr. Thackeray all haughty resentment. My fists were clenched, and I know not what I would have done if George Smith hadn’t heard us arguing and rushed in from his breakfast.

  “Charlotte, you have every right to be upset,” he said, “but I’m sure that Mr. Thackeray truly didn’t mean to cause you pain. Do give him a chance to apologize properly.”

  These reasonable words served to dash cold water onto the heat of battle. “I am sorry for offending you,” Mr. Thackeray said with genuine contrition. “Will you please forgive me?”

  “Yes, of course.” I didn’t quite trust him, but felt better now that we’d had it out.

  “I’d like to make it up to you,” Mr. Thackeray said. “Please allow me to take you and a party of friends to the theater. You may choose the play.”

  The idea of another social occasion made my nerves quail, but I accepted rather than have him think me still angry. We made a date for the next evening. Then my carriage arrived, and I set out for Bedlam.

  As the carriage bore me away from the decorous streets of Hyde Park Gardens, I began to have misgivings. St. George’s Fields, in which Bedlam was located, contained some of London’s worst slums. Deteriorating tenements lined dirty, narrow streets filled with the poorest, most downtrodden of humanity. The stench of garbage and cesspits was sickening. But of course the city authorities would not have situated an insane asylum in a finer district.

  Bedlam was an imposing edifice, three stories high, crowned by a huge dome, with a classical portico and columns at the entrance, surrounded by a stone wall. Stately as a temple, it dominated the wide boulevard. Dr. Forbes was waiting for me at the gate. We exchanged pleasantries and he led me inside. A lawn bordered with flowering shrubs and shaded by tall trees seemed out of place amid the squalid slum. So did the folks who accompanied us up the wide staircase in an excited, chattering horde. Many were fashionable ladies and gentlemen, such as one might see in Pall Mall.

  “Who are all these people?” I asked.

  “Visitors,” replied Dr. Forbes. “Some are here to see family members who are patients. Most have come to tour the asylum.”

  To view the inmates as if they were wild animals in the zoo, I thought. I felt ashamed of my own curiosity, until Dr. Forbes pointed out a booth at the entrance, where an attendant was taking admission fees, and said, “The money paid by the visitors helps to defray the cost of caring for the patients.”

  Inside, the visitors’ footsteps and chatter echoed in a vast hall with high ceilings, lit by sunlight from many windows. So far Bedlam seemed a respectable institution, not the gloomy dungeon I’d imagined. It did not even smell any worse than other buildings in London, whose sewers taint the air everywhere. Dr. Forbes escorted me through a chapel, then the basement, which contained the kitchens, pantry, and laundry. There labored people I first took for servants.

  “The patients who are well enough work to earn their keep,” Dr. Forbes said.

  I took a second look at the men cutting vegetables with sharp knives and the women pressing sheets with hot irons. I was glad to see attendants standing watch over them, for I’d not forgotten George Smith’s warning about dangerous lunatics. We inspected the kitchen gardens, where patients watered neat rows of plants, and the recreation grounds where they strolled. Dr. Forbes talked about the therapeutic benefits of fresh air and exercise. The crowds of visitors lent the place a holiday air. I could almost have thought myself on tour of some great country manor, if not for the howls and shrieks that periodically emanated from the asylum.

  “Shall we proceed to the wards?” Dr. Forbes asked.

  I eagerly agreed. We went up a spacious staircase. The women’s ward had sunny corridors furnished with carpets, comfortable chairs, oil paintings, marble busts, and baskets of flowering plants. Matrons in white caps and aprons supervised the patients. These were young women and old, modestly dressed and clean. Some wandered aimlessly. One muttered to herself as she passed us; one followed us, plucking at my sleeve. Other patients welcomed visitors to a table that displayed knitted mittens, lace collars, pincushions, small baskets, and other handmade articles.

  “They’re allowed to sell the things they make,” Dr. Forbes said.

  I purchased a lace collar for my friend Ellen, and a wool muffler for John Slade. I know it is strange to buy something
for a man I might never see again, but I have stockpiled a collection of small gifts, in case he should return.

  So far the gifts were all I’d found to take with me from Bedlam. Where were the dramatic sights that would inspire a new novel? Mrs. Smith had said I have a taste for disturbing things, and I suppose she was right. Alas, my taste would not be satisfied here.

  Then Dr. Forbes said, “I can show you some things that the general public is not allowed to see, but they’re not for the fainthearted.”

  Various experiences had toughened my heart to the consistency of leather. I assured Dr. Forbes that I was ready for my tour behind the scenes at Bedlam. We watched doctors set leeches on inmates who were sick with physical as well as mental ailments, and apply hot, pungent, medicinal compresses on the shaved scalps of patients who moaned and resisted.

  “It removes turbulent spirits that are thought to disrupt the brain,” Dr. Forbes explained.

  We saw patients sitting in bathtubs of cold water, metal lids locked over their bodies, only their heads showing. Dr. Forbes said it calmed them, and indeed they seemed calm to the point of insensibility. In one room a man wearing a gag lay trussed in a “blanket gown”—a garment wrapped and tied tightly around him so that he could not move.

  “The blanket gown keeps him from hurting himself or anyone else,” Dr. Forbes said.

  I thought of Branwell, who’d suffered from violent fits due to drink and drugs. A blanket gown would have come in handy for him. The memory of him saddened me. Indeed, I found the patients more saddening than inspiring, and they were hardly a suitable subject for a novel. Critics had called Jane Eyre coarse, shocking, and vulgar. God help me if I set my next book in Bedlam!

  Leaving the treatment rooms, we met two physicians who asked Dr. Forbes for his advice about a patient. As he spoke with them, I looked around a corner and saw, at the far end of a passage, a door that was open just enough for me to see darkness on the other side. The darkness called to that which is dark in me. I approached the door, which was made of iron and had a large keyhole. I wondered why a door so obviously meant to be locked was not. What lay beyond?