Romancing Miss Bronte

by Juliet Gael

  “What on earth are you talking about, Martha?” Charlotte gasped. “Is he all right?”

  “Oh, yes, miss. He was laughin’ over some book yer father’d given him. Mother said he was stampin’ on the floor an’ clappin’ his hands so loud she thought he’d gone wrong in the head.”

  Charlotte went straight to her father. “Has Mr. Nicholls got a copy of Shirley?”

  “I gave it to him last night.”

  “Oh!” Charlotte exclaimed. She started to leave, then said, “Apparently he’s enjoying it thoroughly.”

  “Nicholls? Doesn’t surprise me a bit. Has a good Irish sense of humor.”

  “I didn’t realize,” she murmured.

  “You have to dig a little, but it’s there.”

  She got a good taste of it that week from behind closed doors. Every evening Arthur stopped by the parsonage to read his favorite passages aloud to Mr. Brontë, and Charlotte sat in the dining room with her armchair pulled up to the fire, sewing and listening to his deep, infectious laugh. Despite herself, it never failed to put a smile on her face. As long as he was there on the other side of the hall, laughing, she felt a little lighter and a bit less lonely.

  One evening as she came up from the pantry with a jar of marmalade for breakfast, she found Arthur in the entry hall on his way out. Anne’s fat little spaniel had nudged open the dining room door and now stood on his hind feet with his paws on Arthur’s leg while Arthur lavished caresses on him.

  “Flossy, get down,” Charlotte scolded.

  “Good evening, Miss Brontë,” he said as he straightened, suddenly flustered by her appearance.

  “Good evening, Mr. Nicholls.”

  Encouraged by the warmth in her voice, he blurted out, “Fine book, Miss Brontë. Delightful. I enjoyed it immensely. The Yorkshire folk are quite proud of you.” Then he blushed beet red.

  “I take that as a great compliment coming from you, Mr. Nicholls.”

  “Do you now?”

  “Indeed.”

  “That scene with the curates at tea was capital! Capital!” he said, breaking into a smile. “And the part where the dog chases Grant up the stairs … I nearly fell off my chair laughing!”

  “You mean Mr. Donne,” Charlotte corrected. “The character’s name is Donne.”

  Arthur’s grin stretched wider. “Well, it was Keeper that took a bite out of Joseph Grant’s backside, if I remember correctly.”

  “Mr. Nicholls, these characters are wrought from my imagination.”

  He belted out a full laugh. “Ah, say what you will, but you’ve got us all in there, warts and all, and I think I’m a better man for it.”

  Charlotte found herself glowing. “I doubt Mr. Grant will be quite so amused.”

  “Mr. Grant’s sulking, but he’ll get over it.”

  “Has he read it?”

  “He has. Got it before I did. His wife has it now.”

  “Oh, goodness,” Charlotte said, trying to keep a solemn face. “I suppose he knows I’m the odious Currer Bell.”

  “His wife heard it at the market in Bradford.”

  Charlotte reacted with surprise. “You didn’t tell him?”

  Arthur stiffened. “I’m no gossipmonger, Miss Brontë. I told no one.”

  Typically, he had taken offense, but she had no wish to argue with him this evening. She answered him gently, teasingly, “That’s the last thing I would fault you with. You’re as tight-lipped as they come.”

  He nodded, softening only slightly, not quite sure how to respond.

  Soothingly, she added, “I understand that my father let you in on the secret, and I would have found it perfectly normal for you to tell your friends.”

  “I knew they’d all find out soon enough.”

  “You didn’t even tell Mr. Sowden?”

  “Mr. Sowden heard it from the Merrall brothers. Not from me.”

  “My goodness,” Charlotte exclaimed, “you are a marvel.”

  “And you are being sarcastic,” he answered, his mouth twitching with a repressed grin.

  “Not a whit!”

  “Then if you’re going to flatter me, pray do it truthfully. Say something I can believe.”

  “What? That you are ‘sane and rational, diligent and charitable’?” she teased, which was how she had described him in her novel.

  Arthur laughed, and Charlotte flashed her crooked smile. The crusty irritability that had always poisoned their relationship was suddenly gone. Swept away.

  Arthur said gently, “Miss Brontë, I know how you cherish your privacy. I presume that if you kept your secret for this long, there must be a reason. Given how famous your books are, I would be ashamed to think that through any indiscretion of mine, I had caused you the least bit of discomfort.”

  Charlotte was momentarily taken aback; she immediately thought of Lewes and his rush to print everything he had discovered about her. What a different breed of man this was standing before her.

  “That’s very thoughtful of you,” she said quietly.

  They were startled by her father’s cough on the other side of the door.

  Arthur hurried to button up his greatcoat. “Good night, Miss Brontë.”

  “Good night, Mr. Nicholls,” she said. Arthur opened the door and stepped out into the cold February night.

  The following week, Charlotte’s anonymity was dealt its final blow. One morning she was in the kitchen when Martha returned from the market, red in the face from having run all the way up the lane with her heavy basket. She slung it onto the kitchen table, puffing and blowing, and cried, “Oh, miss! I’ve heard such news!”

  “Goodness, Martha! Calm down! What have you heard?”

  She collapsed onto the bench and panted, “Why, they’re sayin’ ye’ve been an’ written two books—the grandest books that ever was seen! Father heard it at Halifax and Mr. Greenwood heard it at Bradford! They’re goin’ to have a meeting at the Mechanics’ Institute to settle about orderin’ ’em!”

  They had the meeting that evening, and Martha reported back that once they received the books, the members would be required to cast lots; whoever got a volume would be allowed to keep it for only two days, and overdue fines would be calculated at the exorbitant rate of a shilling per day.

  “Oh, miss!” Martha exclaimed. “There was such a crowd o’ folk, ye wouldn’t believe! They was all pushin’ an’ shovin’ to get to the front to sign up even before we got the books!”

  “What silliness,” Charlotte said without lifting her eyes from her sewing.

  “It’s not silliness, miss,” Martha said excitedly. “Ye’re famous, miss!”

  “Don’t be a goose,” Charlotte said with a surly frown. “It’s late. Be off now. To bed.”

  At the end of the month, a notice appeared in the Bradford Observer.

  “It is understood that the only daughter of the Rev. P. Brontë, incumbent of Haworth, is the authoress of Jane Eyre and Shirley, two of the most popular novels of the day, which have appeared under the name of ‘Currer Bell.’”

  She stood in the parlor, reading the notice to her father, and her palms began to sweat.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Charlotte was helpless to hold back the swelling tide of curiosity. That spring, celebrity seekers turned up from all over the region hoping to catch a glimpse of the infamous author of Jane Eyre. Although the remoteness of Haworth and Main Street’s steep incline deterred the fainthearted, it was an indication of her novels’ popularity that so many made the journey across the rugged hills. Once at the top of the village, they would stop at the Black Bull or the White Horse Inn, hoping to draw a little information from the taciturn locals, who more often than not answered their curious questions with hostile stares. The visitors would fortify themselves with a pint of ale and then set up Church Lane to gawk at the lonely gray parsonage and wonder at the inhabitants cloistered inside.

  As Charlotte’s circle of correspondents grew, her mornings were occupied writing letters. The few attemp
ts she made to start another novel only led to depression, but letters were another thing. In her letters, she was at ease and at her best. Invisible and far away, she could engage in discussions with authors and readers who would form their impressions of her based strictly on her thoughts and her words. Her fame now extended across the ocean. She heard from Americans in remote mountainous regions and Canadian professors of literature. Unannounced callers showed up on the parsonage doorstep: a vicar from a township so obscure that Patrick couldn’t find it on the map, a Penzance cousin they had never met before.

  Arthur was appalled when, during one Sunday service, he noticed two strange young men ogling Charlotte from one of the free pews. His suspicions were confirmed when the service was over and they hung back, twisting their hats in their hands, and then made a rush toward her as she came down the aisle. Arthur barreled through the crowd and pounced on them like a hawk on a titmouse, shielding her with his voluminous snowy robes and detaining them long enough to allow her to slip behind him and escape through the south door and up the path to home.

  “Who were they?” Charlotte asked her father that afternoon at tea.

  “A couple of so-called poets from Bradford,” he said. “One of them has written a book of verse, and he had come seeking Currer Bell’s sage advice.”

  “I see. And what did my defender do?”

  “The lad tried to give the manuscript to Nicholls to give to you, but Nicholls wouldn’t take it. He was quite put out with them. Told them it was sacrilegious to come to church with such falseness in their hearts.”

  Charlotte tittered and said, “That’s our boy.”

  There were new friends to be made that year, women writers like Harriet Martineau and Elizabeth Gaskell, but making new acquaintances was a daunting challenge for Charlotte. She would resist unless literally besieged, which is precisely what Sir James Kay-Shuttleworth and his young wife did. He was a baronet, a distinguished physician renowned for social reform, and when Charlotte stubbornly rejected their repeated invitations to visit Gawthorpe Hall, their magnificent castellated seventeeth-century pile just ten miles across the moors in Lancashire, the kind lord and lady swooped down on the parsonage one spring afternoon in their grand carriage and—encouraged by her father—gently abducted her.

  Arthur disapproved, and he said as much when Patrick told him where Charlotte had gone.

  “She was very reluctant to go,” Patrick said.

  “To her credit,” Arthur stated, his jaw set.

  Patrick scowled. “Well, I heartily approved.”

  “It’s overbearing. Imposing themselves on her like that. Quite typical of their class.”

  “Sir James used to be secretary to the Council on Education. Done a tremendous amount of work on behalf of the poor. A very fine, courtly gentleman and precisely the kind of acquaintance she needs to cultivate. There’s no one here worth knowing, Nicholls. Not a single gentleman with any prospects at all.”

  Arthur wisely dropped the subject, and they turned their attention to the work at hand, their petition to the sanitation board and a new roof for the schoolhouse. Arthur thought with dismay about how prosaic this life must seem to Charlotte, and any dreams he had once entertained seemed more remote than ever.

  All that year, Charlotte’s life swung like a pendulum between the anxiety of drawing rooms full of strangers and the silent gloom of the parsonage. Both were torture. The more she struggled for some kind of balance, the higher the pendulum would swing. Every time she left Haworth to visit her new friends in London, Windermere, or Manchester, the homecoming would be so painful that she would resolve never to leave home again.

  That spring, Sir James insisted on the exclusive right to introduce her to London society at the height of the season, with its rounds of balls and soirées. “I shall have you to Hampton Court and Windsor, Miss Brontë. The royal family are great admirers of yours,” he claimed during her visit, hammering away at Charlotte’s resistance. He would send his carriage to collect her and bring her to Gawthorpe Hall; then they would leisurely travel down to London together, stopping along the way at the homes of his friends and family to show her off. Charlotte balked at the mere thought of such an ordeal, but her father wouldn’t hear of a refusal.

  “I detest that kind of thing. You know I do,” she said, standing before his desk one morning with her hands clenched at her waist. She dreaded having to defy him; it made her stomach twist in knots.

  “You will go, Charlotte. I wish it so.”

  “I shall not be lionized, Papa,” she replied with quiet firmness. “George Smith and his mother were very respectful of my wishes, and everything was done very quietly and in good taste when I stayed with them. Sir James has no intention of being half so moderate in his expectations of me.”

  “You were in mourning last fall. That was quite different. By May you’ll be out of mourning.”

  “Papa, I’d rather walk on burning coals.”

  “I won’t be contradicted, daughter,” he threatened. He took up his magnifying glass and resumed reading the newspaper. “Now leave me. I have work to do, and all this arguing is making my blood pressure rise.”

  The only bit of brightness in the picture was the prospect of a shopping expedition to Leeds with Ellen to purchase a new wardrobe. Now that she had a little money of her own and was free to wear something other than black, Charlotte quite enjoyed a day of visiting milliners and bootmakers, indulging in French kid gloves and store-bought camisoles, new fans and colorful parasols. Brussels had taught her the importance of finely tailored gowns, and she had acquired a simple, Quaker-like elegance that suited her. Even out of mourning she kept to the more somber tones, like dove-tinted mauve and moss green. Yet the small things baffled her, like the choice between a black or a white lace mantle, or whether a pink silk lining in her bonnet would seem too frivolous.

  The hairpiece was Ellen’s idea, a plait of brown merino wool that would give a little volume to her thin hair. They returned to their room at the inn in Leeds that afternoon, and Charlotte sat on a chair while Ellen wound the braid around the top of her head.

  “Your father is absolutely right to insist,” Ellen mumbled as she drew a hairpin from her mouth and jabbed it into Charlotte’s skull. “He’s doing it for your own good. You sink into depression at home. You must get away.” She held up a mirror for Charlotte to inspect the hairpiece. “There. How does that look?”

  Hesitantly, Charlotte explored the crown of hair with her fingers.

  “It’s all the fashion now,” Ellen said.

  Once Charlotte had examined her reflection from all angles, a smile swept over her broad face. “It does look rather nice, doesn’t it?”

  Ellen collapsed onto the bed. Then, with a sudden exclamation, she shot up and went to her cloak on the coat rack. Fishing in a pocket, she pulled out a packet tied with ribbon. “Here. George’s letters.”

  Charlotte took the packet from her with a quiet smile and slipped it into her skirt pocket. She had been sending George’s letters on to Ellen to read.

  “So, now you’ll stop boring me with all your silly hints,” Charlotte said. “You see in what light he views me.”

  “I see that you’re on first-name basis,” Ellen said slyly. “And I think I detect a certain undercurrent there, even if you prefer to ignore it.”

  “Ellen, I’m eight years older and without the slightest claim to beauty.”

  Ellen leaned forward and snatched the hand mirror away from Charlotte. “I wish there were no mirrors in the world. Then you’d stop going on that way about yourself.”

  “I don’t need mirrors, Nell. I see myself reflected in the eyes of others.”

  For once, fate worked in Charlotte’s favor. Just a few days before she was due to leave, the hard-driven Sir James suffered a total nervous collapse. When George learned that Charlotte’s visit to London had been canceled, he instructed his mother to invite her to stay in their grand new residence near the highly desirable Hyde Park Garde
ns. Within the week, Charlotte found herself back in the Smiths’ home, bent over books of fabric samples with Mrs. Smith and her three daughters, listening to them debate between a blue floral and a bird of paradise design for the chintz morning room curtains.

  It was May, and everything about London was different and splendid. George bent his schedule to accompany her wherever she wished to go. They took open carriage rides along Rotten Row at the fashionable hour when all London society came out to be seen. Hidden behind the deep hood of her spring bonnet, so tiny she might have been mistaken for a child, she gazed upon the scenes she had so often imagined as a little girl. Ladies in veiled riding hats and flowing green habits vied for the crowd’s attention; red-coated hussars on horseback paraded along the lanes, stealing the hearts of a score of marriageable girls up from the country. Powerful and ambitious men demonstrated their skill driving matched pairs of spirited horses. It was London’s dazzling vanity fair, and none of it was lost on her quick eye.

  George pointed out the people worth noting, discreetly whispering names in her ear, adding little anecdotes that put a smile on her face. Charlotte was cautious never to breathe a word of this in her letters to her father or Ellen; it would have shocked them to know how much these jaunts pleased her.

  That year the Royal Academy had a fine exhibit, with a Landseer portrait of her hero the Duke of Wellington and a new work by John Martin—which she did mention to her father. George teased her mercilessly about her idol worship of Wellington; especially to please her, he arranged a Sunday stroll when he knew the old man would be coming out of chapel. After walking past the duke, he spun her around and trotted her across the street, and they were able to cut back up a path and pass him again in the gardens. Then they collapsed on a bench to catch their breath, both of them laughing like childish pranksters. In George’s company, bathed in his playful attentions, Charlotte reclaimed the vivacity she had buried with Heger.

  Thackeray called one Saturday morning and stayed for two hours, and she went to his home to dine the following evening. That dinner was the only failed moment of her visit. She arrived in her chaste high-collared dress to find a room full of sophisticated society ladies, many in low-cut gowns with softly cleaved bosoms, and she was soon wishing she were at the Zoological Gardens among the lions and leopards. One particularly striking young beauty diverted George’s gaze throughout the evening, and Charlotte—who was painfully observant of these things—found herself sinking into a chilly silence, quite incapable of making conversation except with the quiet governess who was supervising Thackeray’s young daughters. The evening was a disaster—the room dim and smoky from the oil lamps, Charlotte constrained and unbrilliant, the others breathlessly expectant. As soon as Charlotte left, Thackeray took up his hat and sneaked out to his club, abandoning his disappointed guests to gossip about how poor Charlotte’s braided hairpiece was so obviously false. Years later, some would recall it as the dullest evening of their life.