The Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë

by Laura Joh Rowland

  “Trust you to find a drink, even at a time like this,” Emily said with a sneer in her voice.

  “I’m not going to drink the whisky,” I said.

  Blind luck favored me. My hands found the large, square stone I remembered. I tugged it loose and dropped it to the floor. I reached into the void that I’d dug and that the stone had concealed.

  “Then why do you want it?” Anne said.

  My fingers touched smooth, cool glass. I pulled out the bottle and shook it. The whisky sloshed inside. “To buy our freedom.”

  This provoked exclamations of surprise and confusion. Father said, “What are you talking about?”

  “Pay him no mind,” Emily said. “He has gone completely insane at last.”

  Clutching the bottle, I staggered around the cellar, bumping into walls, until I stubbed my foot against the stairs. I crawled slowly, laboriously, up them.

  “What are you doing?” Anne said.

  If I told them my intentions, they would surely try to dissuade me; coward that I am, I would just as surely let them. Upon reaching the top of the stairs, I thumped on the door and called loudly, “Hello! May I please speak with you gentlemen?”

  Father and Anne tried to hush me for fear that I would make the men angry. Emily said, “It’s no use. They won’t let us out.”

  But I kept calling and thumping. After some time I heard footsteps in the passage outside. “Be quiet!” called a man’s irate voice.

  “Forgive me for annoying you, good sir, but I’ve got something that I think you would like to have,” I said in the polite, ingratiating tone that I’d often used to wheedle my way into company and out of trouble.

  No immediate reply came, but I felt the man’s presence still on the other side of the door. Would his curiosity work in my favor? At last he said, “What is it?”

  “Open the door,” I said, “and I’ll show you.”

  I felt him hesitate. I hoped he was bored with sitting in the parsonage and wanted diversion. To my delight, I heard him unbolt the door, which then opened a few inches. I saw the man, his figure lit from the lamps in the passage behind him. I hastily backed down a few stairs, out of his reach.

  “Well?” he demanded. “What have you got?”

  From my vantage point I could discern little about him except that he was much bigger than myself. Fortunately, my plan did not require brute strength of me as much as cunning. I held up the bottle so that the lamplight glinted on it.

  “This is the finest-quality Irish whisky,” I said. “May I offer you a taste?”

  The man opened the door wider. Two other men appeared behind him. The light was now sufficient that I got a good view of them. The man who’d answered my call had narrow, hostile eyes deep-set in a fleshy face, and a complexion like raw meat.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” demanded the man at his right, who looked enough like him to be his brother.

  The other man ordered, “Shut that door.” He was fair of hair and sharp-featured. Although he and his comrades all wore dark coats and trousers, his looked tailored to fit him. His speech suggested higher society than theirs. Surely he was their leader.

  “But he’s got whisky,” said the first man.

  A person recognizes in others the desires that he himself possesses. I could sense their thirst for the liquor; I could see it in the way they looked at the bottle. The leader thrust his hand through the doorway and said, “Give me that.”

  I held it out of his reach. My family made not a sound; yet I felt them waiting fearfully. “If you let me come up,” I said, “I’ll serve you all a drink.”

  He and his comrades studied me. On their faces I read suspicion mixed with disgust at my decrepit appearance. Once I would have been ashamed that my fellow humans beheld me thus, but now their low opinion of me was to my advantage. I smiled at them, striving for the charm that had won me many friends and lovers in my youth. Their faces assumed another expression that I’d seen too often of late. It said, Here’s a harmless buffoon who can help us while away the time. They shrugged and grinned at one another.

  “Come on, then,” the leader invited me.

  Up the stairs I scrambled. I felt like a soul risen from the depths of hell. But Father, Emily, and Anne were still trapped in abysmal darkness below me. The men barred the cellar door. They hovered around me as I faltered into the dining room. Playing cards lay strewn across the table amidst burning candles, and tobacco smoke tainted the air. The windows were dark with night, and the wind keened outside. I estimated that I’d spent some twenty-four hours in the cellar, but how much longer these men had held Father, Anne, and Emily captive, I knew not. If anyone had come to the parsonage to see us, they must have gone away believing we were not home. The men must have kept themselves well hidden so as not to arouse suspicion. No rescue would come from outside quarters. All was up to me. My legs quaked under the burden of responsibility.

  But I hid my thoughts behind an idiotic smile as I fetched four glasses. My hands shook as I poured whisky. I said, “A toast to new friends!”

  The men raised their glasses and drank. I only pretended to follow suit, for although I desperately craved the whisky, I must keep sober. There was a slackening of tension in the atmosphere, and the men’s faces relaxed; already the liquor was doing its work. Now I cast about for a way to keep my companions occupied for as long as I needed.

  I said, “May I join your game?”

  “How much money have you?” the leader asked, his eyes alight at the prospect of enriching himself at a fool’s expense.

  “None, alas,” I said, “but for every hand I lose, I’ll recite you a verse.”

  “That suits me,” said one of the leader’s comrades.

  “What better fun have we got?” said the other.

  We sat down and played, and I lost every round. While I recited poetry, my captors cheered and egged me on. I felt myself once again to be the Branwell Brontë who had entertained audiences in taverns all over England. That I refilled the men’s glasses time after time probably accounted for their enjoyment of my verse. If only I had ever won such an enthusiastic reception from publishers! But never had my poetry served such a serious purpose as now. Soon we were on first-name terms. The leader was Cecil; the two brothers, Jim and Bill. Soon they were quite tipsy.

  “Tell me,” I said, “what brought you here?”

  “We were sent by the chap we work for,” Cecil answered. “He’s kidnapping the Queen’s children. Your sister’s supposed to help him. We’re here to make sure she does. She’s been told that if she doesn’t, her family will die.”

  He uttered this astounding explanation in a tone as matter-of-fact as if he were talking about the weather. My first reaction was shock; the second, disbelief. Had my fevered brain dreamed up these men? But they seemed as real as I. Their story explained why Charlotte was absent and seemed as creditable a reason as any for the imprisonment of our family.

  “When is this kidnapping to take place?” I said.

  “It should have happened yesterday,” Cecil said while Jim dealt the cards again. “We’re waiting for word.”

  “What are your employer and Charlotte going to do with the children?” I asked as casually as I could.

  “Take them to China,” came the reply. “They should be aboard his ship off the coast of Aberdeen as we speak.”

  Horror seized me as I realized that whatever was really going on, these men would never free my family and myself. Surely they knew that as soon as they did, we would set the police after them and their employer. They must have orders from him to murder us and thereby ensure our silence. Cecil didn’t care if I knew about this kidnapping because I would be dead and unable to interfere.

  Sweat broke out on my forehead and tremors shivered through me, but I hid my terror behind loud, careless laughter, as though I thought kidnapping and treason to be the best prank in the world. “Let’s have another drink!”

  I took the glasses to the sideboard and
poured out the last of the whisky. While the men were busy looking at their cards, I dipped my hand into my pocket and brought out the vial of laudanum that I’d bought before I came home, before my drunken revel at the Black Bull Inn an eternity ago. For a moment I held it in my fist, resisting my desire for it. Then I quickly apportioned the laudanum among three glasses. I pocketed the empty vial and set the glasses before the men. They drank without noticing that I abstained. I sat down, endured another game, and waited.

  Eventually they began to yawn as the combined effects of whisky and laudanum took hold. Jim canted backward in his chair and dozed off. Bill dropped his head onto the table and fell asleep amidst the cards. Cecil stared at me, the only person still alert. Suspicion and anger battled drowsiness in his gaze as it moved to his empty glass then back to me.

  “What did you put in that last drink?” he demanded.

  Rising clumsily from his chair, he lurched towards me. His knees buckled; his eyes rolled up inside his head. He crashed to the floor and lay unconscious. Never had any venture of mine succeeded so brilliantly. I staggered to the cellar door, unbarred it, and flung it open.

  “Father! Anne! Emily!” I cried.

  Thus ends Branwell’s letter. His writing is shaky and almost illegible on the last page, as though he’d lost the strength to write. Let an extract from Emily’s diary complete his story.

  The Journal of Emily Brontë

  I sat on the cold floor of the dark cellar, deep in despair. A great distance seemed to separate me from Father and Anne, who prayed in low voices together. I was silently pining for sunlight, for the fresh wind on the moors, when I heard someone calling.

  “Come upstairs! Hurry!” Branwell shouted.

  Light shone at the top of the stairs. In it stood Branwell’s thin, frail figure. Sobs of joy erupted from me as I bounded up the stairs. Anne and Father were close behind me. We burst into the passage.

  “What has happened?” Papa asked Branwell.

  “Where are those men?” Anne said.

  “I gave them whisky and laudanum,” Branwell said, breathless with excitement. “They’re out cold.”

  We all hurried to the dining room. There, two men slumbered at the table; the third lay sprawled asleep on the floor.

  “Help me tie them up,” Branwell said.

  Anne fetched a ball of stout twine and a knife. She and Papa bound the sleeping men’s wrists and ankles. Papa said, “I’ll fetch the constable.”

  “Wait,” Branwell said urgently.

  “But we must have these criminals arrested,” Anne said.

  “Charlotte is in trouble,” Branwell said. “These men told me that she has been forced into kidnapping the Queen’s children. She’s been taken with them aboard a ship that’s soon leaving for China.” Anne and Father exclaimed in horror. “The ship is presently anchored off the coast of Aberdeen. Before we do anything else, we must rescue her.”

  “We must tell Mr. Slade,” Papa said. “He’ll know what to do.”

  “But Mr. Slade is at Balmoral Castle in Scotland,” Anne said. “We can’t travel so far in time for him to save Charlotte and the children.”

  “We need only get as far as the railway station at Luddenden Foot,” Branwell said. “It has a telegraph. My friend Francis Grundy can communicate instantaneously with any other station in the kingdom.”

  “The telegraph is truly a modern miracle,” Papa proclaimed.

  “We’ll ask Mr. Grundy to send an urgent message to the station nearest Balmoral,” Anne said.

  “Let’s be on our way,” Branwell said, but a violent fit of coughing sank him to his knees.

  Papa knelt beside him and held him close. “My son, you have demonstrated great courage tonight,” Papa said, his voice roughened by emotion. “Your actions have more than atoned for all your sins.”

  “It was the courage of the damned, Father,” Branwell rasped. “I had nothing to lose.”

  “You could have lost your life trying to save us,” Papa said.

  “My life is almost done. It was but a small stake to gamble.” Branwell laughed weakly. “At least perhaps I’ll die a hero even if I never lived as one.”

  Papa and Anne were both weeping. Anne said to Branwell, “You’ve done your part. Now you must stay home and rest.”

  “But who will go to Luddenden Foot?” Branwell said.

  I spoke aloud: “I’ll go.”

  Papa, Anne and Branwell regarded me with surprise. Papa said, “Very well, Emily; but I will go with you. On our way we’ll send the constable to rid us of these criminals. Anne, you stay and help Branwell guard them.” He fetched his pistol and put it in her hands, then said, “Let us make haste, Emily.”

  “I may be gone when you return. Let me bid you goodbye now,” Branwell said.

  42

  THE WIND QUICKENED, SLAPPING WAVES HIGHER AGAINST THE SHIP, which rocked fitfully and nauseously; I heard the masts and rigging creaking, and the sails flapping, all through the night. When at last the rising sun spread a crimson sheen across the ocean, I wondered how many more mornings I would live to see.

  The children and I spent an awful day together. Hitchman brought us food that none of us had the appetite to eat. Bertie alternately raged and pouted. Vicky said, “It’s going to be all right, isn’t it, Miss Brontë?” I did my best to calm her growing anxiety, even though I was loath to give her false hope.

  Afternoon had lapsed into a cloudy, blustery twilight when there began a commotion above us. Voices called in English and Chinese. We heard thuds and scrambling noises as cargo and persons came aboard. With much consternation I deduced that the rest of Kuan’s retinue had arrived by boat. Next there was a cacophonous metallic racket of the anchor being hauled up from the water. A loud rumbling began in the depths of the ship. I smelled smoke and heard steam hissing. The engine roared to life; its mighty pulse throbbed. The ship began to move.

  Bertie shouted, “No!”

  He pounded and kicked the door; he sobbed with rage. Vicky uttered not a sound, but tears trickled down her face. The ship gathered speed, its great wheels churning the water. I experienced the wrenching sensation of being torn from all that was familiar and dear. An invisible, impenetrable barrier slammed down behind me, sealing me off from my past life, its joys and woes. Papa, Emily, Anne, Branwell, and Mr. Slade were lost to me, as were all dreams for the future. My unfinished book would remain unfinished; I would never write another. The voice that I had labored to make heard by the world would be silenced forever.

  Vicky huddled tight against my side. When Bertie realized that his hysterics were futile, he quieted and came to sit by me. I put my arms around the children and mutely prayed for the ship to reach China safely even with myself no longer on it. I beseeched God to let the Crown negotiate the return of Vicky and Bertie even if I perished. They embodied not only generations of royal ancestry; they, like all children, represented mankind’s hope for the future. That they should die for offenses committed by their elder was a sin most grievous.

  The sea and the horizon flowed past our window, their emptiness relieved only by occasional, faraway ships, until darkness fell. I knew not how many miles we traveled. Silver lights from the moon and stars flecked the choppy waves. The engine roared and the wheels churned without cessation. I had the opportunity to realize that there was even more to be lost than I’d initially thought.

  The family Brontë had never had much in the way of worldly possessions or status. But we had taken a quiet pride in knowing that our name was respectable. Our personal honor had conferred upon us a sense of value. But when the world learned that I had been party to the kidnapping, I would be forever reviled. Even if my family survived their imprisonment, they would forever be tainted by their association with me, the name Brontë ruined. They would live out their lives beneath a cloud of shame. Furthermore, they were not the only ones who would suffer on my account. With myself dead and beyond punishment, Mr. Slade would take the blame for our mission’s disastrou
s conclusion. He, whom I also loved, would surely hang.

  Suddenly Vicky tensed beside me and said, “What’s that sound?”

  “I don’t hear anything,” I said.

  But Vicky’s face brightened with hope. “I hear ships.”

  “So do I!” Bertie said. “They’re coming for us.”

  Now I heard what their acute young ears had discerned first: a distant thunder carrying across the ocean. We grouped around the window. Clusters of lights came into view. As they neared, they became four steamships lit by lanterns, puffing smoke. Their noise grew louder. Shouts erupted on our ship’s upper deck: The crew had sighted the fleet. The engine roared louder and throbbed harder; the paddlewheels plowed a bumpy, accelerating swath across the water, but our pursuers gradually gained on us. Our ship tilted off course, throwing me and the children sideways. Again and again this happened while Kuan tried to maneuver away from the fleet. My stomach lurched with every roll. Vicky and Bertie shrieked as we tumbled onto the floor. For an instant I thought the ship might keel over and sink.

  The engine’s noise dwindled; the ship slowed, regaining balance. The racket from the wheels stopped. We glided to a halt, rocking and tossing upon the waves. The children and I peered out the window. Two ships were standing afloat near us. Their idle engines rumbled like tigers ready to pounce. Armed soldiers stood on their decks; guns protruded from their hulls. Banners fluttering on their masts bore the insignia of the Royal Navy.