Emily's Secret

by Jill Jones

  “A Gypsy!” Alex’s mind flashed to Selena’s images of the organ grinder with his monkey and the black horse rearing before the campfire. He recalled the woman in the art gallery mumbling something about fortune-tellers. “I didn’t know there were…such people, at least not in this day and age.”

  “Oh, they’ve lived ‘round here for years, but y’ know, they come and go. I can’t recall seein’ any in these parts for a long time. And I don’t think Selena was a real Gypsy. She lived in a house, just like all the rest of us.”

  Alex tried to conceal his astonishment. He reached into his pocket and retrieved the card the shopkeeper had given him. “Do you know where this is?” he asked, handing it to the man.

  “Bridgeton Lane? Sure. It’s just there, down the hillside.” He pointed to the northwest. “See tha’ house, way down the valley there? Tha’d likely be it. Why?”

  “That’s where she has her studio, I think.”

  “Y’ don’t say. Selena Wood turned out to be an artist, eh? Doesn’t surprise me none. She was always drawin’ things on her work. She was pretty good, too, now’t I think of it. Well, I’d best be off.” He gave the card back to Alex. “Nice chattin’ with you. And sorry about the scare.”

  “No harm done.” Alex stared after the figure of the bike rider, watching the fragile-looking cycle, incongruous in its surroundings, bounce over the rough pathway.

  Alex turned and resumed his hike up the path, which at this point had been paved with large slabs of the local sandstone to protect against erosion and further destruction caused by hikers like himself. Gray clouds had begun to overpower the earlier white ones, and a brisk breeze brushed against his face. By the time he reached the ruin at Top Withens, the golden day had turned into a damp shroud of mist and fog, and clouds had slunk into the valley below, obscuring the farmhouse.

  He hoisted himself onto a stone wall, opting to ignore the deteriorating weather at least for a little while. The climb had been exhilarating, and for the first time since he’d arrived in England, he felt as if he’d had a good workout. He wanted to allow his muscles a brief respite, then he’d give them another round as he headed back toward town.

  Alex peered into the gathering gloom, his curiosity wending down the hill and into the valley below. The woman who lived there was as enshrouded in mystery as her house was in mist. He was alarmed that he seemed to be so drawn to her, for he sensed she was exactly the kind of female he wanted to avoid. Although he knew little about her, he perceived from her artwork and the success of her showing in London that she was a woman with passion in her heart and depth to her soul. She was obviously intelligent and talented as well as beautiful, and when she’d entered the gallery, he’d noted she strode past him with an air of self-confidence and independence. She was the kind of woman he was attracted to, and the kind who could destroy him. The kind who, like his ex-wife, could walk up to him after six years of marriage and say, “I’ve had enough. I’m tired of taking second place in your life, especially behind a bunch of dead poets. I’ve found someone who will put me first, and I’m leaving you.”

  Alex realized he was sweating. He brushed a sheen of dampness from his brow and jumped to the ground, heading through the mist in the direction of Haworth. It seemed there was more that he found familiar about Selena than long, dark hair.

  July 7, 1845

  Today Mikel attempted to take a few steps, and although it looks as if his leg is mending well, it will be a few more weeks before he will be able to put his weight fully upon it. Until then I shall be his strength. I will gladly bear the weight of his body as I did today when he put his arm across my shoulder for support. I feared my heart would burst with this unknown feeling of tenderness I have for him. Is this love? Could it be? My inexperienced heart does not know. All I know is that I want to care for him and protect him until he is well enough once again to be on his own. I also know that there are times when I am with him (nay, even times when I am not!) that my entire body feels as if it is deprived of something precious that only he could grant. I am unsure exactly what this is, but it must be the most important thing in the world! Important, and frightening, for I feel overpowered and out of control when I am with him. I want him to get well, and at the same time I dread the day when he no longer needs me, but I know it would be best if he left. I have so far managed to bring him sufficient food without arousing the suspicion of the others, but I do not know how long I will be able to protect my secret. My sisters have noticed a change in my being they tell me, saying that I seem to look healthier and prettier than I used to. Do they suspect the reason for my long and private tours on the moors? I long to share my happiness with them, but what would they say? I wish I could read the future, for a part of me is terrified of losing Mikel, and another part is terrified of exposure of our liaison. At times I feel almost sick with anxiety. Whatever will become of all of this?

  It was past midnight when Selena finally turned out the light in her studio and descended the stairs seeking a bite to eat, glad to leave the brushes and the frustration behind for a while. The fresh white canvas that had beckoned earlier that afternoon had, by evening, been filled with the beginning of still another painting, much like the others, this one different only in that the figures were twisted, as if revealing her inner torment.

  The rider was in the act of being thrown from his horse, the rose hung wilted from its stem, the monkey cried. In all, it was hugely depressing, and Selena vowed to trash it tomorrow.

  Chapter 7

  July 10, 1845

  What a feckless fool I have been, pining away for this stranger who has taken his leave with not even so much as a faretheewell. Yesterday we laughed together and he taught me a gipsie song, and today he is gone. My face burns with shame when I think of how I hastened into the sunshine this morning, my heart bursting with my desire to see him. I even spoke harshly to poor Anne, who only asked if she could go with me. But when I reached his camp, I knew at once he was gone. The fire was cold and he was nowhere in sight. At first I was worried that he might have fallen into the ravine, but a search quickly proved me wrong. Then I wondered if someone found him, or if he met with foul play. But in my heart I know he has left for good, to return to Wales and his family, although I do not know how he managed, for his leg was still lame. I don’t blame him for going. I knew he would leave when he was healed. If only he had left a note or some short message of good-bye. Instead he just disappeared. A crude farewell, but one I should have expected. He is, after all, just a gipsie. But his kiss burns still on my lips, alas a lasting impression, I fear. It is just as well he is gone, for my weakness and my foolish romantic notions would surely have led me astray. Let me learn from this. In Gondal only shall I allow myself to feel the passions of the flesh, for there, in words, I can assure a safe passage for my unwanted but insistent desire.

  Alex stepped down from the bus at the end of the line, just short of the Old Silent Inn on the far side of Stanbury. It was Saturday, and he was too restless to face another day in the library, so he’d donned his hiking gear and set out for Ponden Hall, an old manor house many believed to be Emily’s model for Thrushcross Grange in Wuthering Heights. Now a privately owned inn, the old country home was nestled in the valley on the lower slope of Haworth Moor, just above the reservoir. If the weather held, he planned to climb the moor behind the inn and reach Ponden Kirk, a high outcropping of rock known to Emily’s readers as Penistone Crag, a favorite trysting place of Heathcliff and Cathy.

  Or…

  Standing alone in the tranquil morning after the noisy bus disappeared around the bend on its return trip to Haworth, Alex reached into the pocket of his jeans and retrieved the slightly crumpled card he’d brought along, the one the woman at the local gallery had given him. Selena. Bridgeton Lane. Stanbury. A quick look at a map had let him know that Bridgeton Lane was scarcely two miles past the entrance to Ponden Hall. He thought of the paintings and the tiny Brontëlike handwritten messages. He thought of the art
ist in black and magenta.

  He thought, pocketing the card once again, of the options for the day.

  Around him the Yorkshire landscape rose and fell in acres of green. The clouds and wind played with the sun, which was high in the sky by now, casting cloud shadows that raced across the pastures, creating an ever-changing scene before his eyes. He set off at a brisk pace, wondering how Selena would react if he just showed up at her doorstep. What reason would he give for being there? To learn more about the fragments of a letter painted onto her canvases? True, he was curious about them, but he was aware that his interest likely amounted to nothing more than an excuse for meeting up with the artist who’d painted them. What was he thinking! He knew better than to pursue a woman like Selena, for all the reasons that he’d gone over a million times in his head. And yet, when he reached the entrance to the Ponden Mill store and the turnoff to Ponden Hall, he hesitated only briefly, then kept to the main roadway.

  About a mile farther on he came to an intersection where a small, unpaved lane crossed the highway. The signpost read Bridgeton Lane.

  The clouds thickened, and a few cold raindrops struck his cheek. Damn it, he’d thought he was prepared for the changeable weather, but he’d forgotten the umbrella. He pulled his collar up but turned into the lane undaunted.

  Alex had walked about three-quarters of a mile from the intersection when he came upon an old farmhouse, but it was so dilapidated, he decided he’d taken the wrong road. The house appeared deserted. Like many of the other old farmhouses he’d seen on the moors, the wind and rain had taken their toll on this structure. Slates were missing from the roof, and the panes in several of the narrow windows were cracked. The house was not large, but because it was built on a steep slope, the front half was two-storied.

  He approached the wall that once prevented sheep from wandering into the garden but now had crumbled into piles of scattered rocks, and he saw that behind the house there was a barn. Oddly, the barn appeared to be in better shape than the house. New windows lined the north side on the second floor, and the roof had been retiled. It had, Alex thought, the yuppie look of those restored agrarian buildings seen in American homes and gardens magazines. An old blue Land Rover was parked next to the barn.

  Suddenly, the fierce frenzy of a dog’s barking shattered the hushed silence of the mist-veiled scene. Adrenaline surged through him as a black and white dog bolted out of a doorway on the left side of the barn. Alex scrambled onto a heap of rubble from the stone fence, then realized that although the animal was yelping excitedly, it wasn’t baring its teeth or showing an intent of actually attacking him.

  “Here. Here boy. It’s okay,” he said, coaxing the animal to calm down.

  Alex heard the sound of metal scraping against metal, and he looked up to see a figure flinging open one of the windows of the upper floor of the barn.

  “Domino! Stop it! Domino! Come here!” The voice was strong, commanding, but at the same time feminine. It belonged to a woman with hair as black as a raven’s wings, and Alex wasn’t surprised to find himself staring at the alluring artist he’d seen at the gallery in London.

  But it was certain from her expression that she was surprised to see him, or anyone, in her drive. The dog obeyed its mistress inasmuch as it stopped barking, but it continued to eye Alex with distrust.

  The woman’s voice was no less trusting. “What do you want?”

  Alex brushed beads of rain from the sleeves of his windbreaker. “I’m here to see Selena Wood,” he called up to her.

  The woman gazed at him steadily. “Who are you?”

  “The name’s Hightower. Alexander Hightower. Look,” he said, pointing to the dog. “Can we talk? I mean, can you—”

  His question was answered with a shrill whistle, and it was a command that meant something to the animal. It turned tail and edged toward the barn, not going back into the doorway from which it came.

  “What do you want?” the woman called again from the window.

  “I came to…to discuss some paintings of yours which I’ve seen. You see, I…represent an interested party…from the States.” Alex was surprised at his instantaneous ingenuity. Of course she’d see him, if she thought he was here to buy some of her work. He hadn’t really meant to mislead her, but somehow the words just sort of took care of themselves.

  It was immaterial, however, because his words were cut off with the metallic slam of the upstairs window. Alex continued to look up at the now-vacant window for a moment. So he’d been wrong. She obviously wasn’t interested in a drop-in buyer, and it had been a mistake to come. He shrugged and was about to leave when the door opened and she stood framed in the dark shadows behind her.

  She wore a high-necked tunic of rich amethyst, which reached to just above her knees. Her legs were clad in black leggings, like before. Despite the chill, she appeared to be wearing only heavy black socks on her feet. Over the sweater, a loose smock flowed the length of her slender figure, stained with paint of every color.

  Her face appeared strained and her hair was in disarray, but Alex was transfixed by her dark, exotic beauty. It was natural and untamed, as wild and free as the images she painted. He tried to neutralize the effect her loveliness had on him by reminding himself that it was Maggie’s flaming good looks that had gotten him into trouble the last time.

  But his body, he realized, wasn’t listening.

  She looked at him for a long moment, frowning, suspicious caution in her eyes. Then she said, “Come in. It’s raining.”

  Alex gratefully followed her up the narrow stairs. At least he’d have the chance to warm up a little, and if necessary, he could explain that the interested party he represented was himself. He watched the shapely legs ahead of him, ascending the stairs just at his eye level.

  Oh, sweet Jesus!

  At the landing, a window on the left looked out upon the driveway and the Land Rover. On the right was an open door with glass panes in the top half. She motioned him through the door and shut it behind him quickly in an attempt to hold the chill weather at bay.

  Alex entered a large open room with windows extending the length of the north side. The other three walls rose to the rafters and were hung with paintings, all of which resembled one another in style and imagery, imagery he was becoming increasingly intrigued with. A fire crackled in a grate to his left, and two cats eyed him with disinterest.

  He turned to face Selena. She had taken off her smock and was staring at him expectantly, obviously awaiting an explanation for this unannounced intrusion.

  “Nice place,” he managed at last, running his fingers through his damp, disheveled hair. “Sorry for the mess,” he said, looking down at his wet jeans and muddy boots, thinking how ridiculous it was for him to expect her to believe he was some kind of art collector’s representative. What kind of agent paid a call dressed like this?

  “You are an American, I take it?” She handed him a small towel, and Alex noted that her hands were shaking. He realized suddenly and with regret that he must have frightened her.

  Alex wiped the rain from his face and grinned, hoping to dispel her fear. “I guess my accent kind of stands out around here, doesn’t it? My name’s Alexander Hightower.” He extended his hand, but she kept her distance, motioning to a straight-backed chair.

  “You can hang your coat over there if you’d like. You look cold. Would you care for tea?”

  Happy to have something for his extended hand to do, Alex took off his windbreaker and hung it up to dry. “Yes, thank you very much,” he replied to her offer of tea. He turned and watched as she went to a small hot plate in the corner of the kitchenette and poured bottled water into a tea kettle. She reached into the cupboard for mugs, stretching her arms over her head, and the deep purple tunic rose just to the curve of her rounded bottom. Alex let his eyes follow the soft fabric upward to where it fell against the full curve of her breasts. Her long dark hair shone in the warmth of the lamplight, and despite her air of aloof independence, sh
e appeared softly feminine, vulnerable.

  The kettle whistled, and Selena poured a little of the hot water into the pot to warm it. “Do you take milk?”

  Alex had to bring himself back into the moment. “No. No thanks.” He was disturbed by the overwhelming urge he felt to protect her, but then he laughed silently, realizing the only thing she needed protection from was himself.

  She emptied the pot again, opened a box of Darjeeling and placed two tea bags in the warmed vessel, then refilled it with hot water. It was a simple thing, sharing tea together, but intimate nonetheless. Alex was reminded unexpectedly of another kitchen, another dark-haired woman, another lifetime. A frown furrowed his brow. He mustn’t let that happen again.

  But when Selena spoke, her voice resonated somewhere dangerously close to his heart.

  “I don’t get many business callers out here, Mr. Hightower,” she said, cocking her head skeptically to one side. “I work strictly through my dealer in London, Tom Perkins.”

  “I’m aware of that. I saw your exhibit at the Perkins Galleries in London,” he said, thinking fast. “Or at least the last of it. I didn’t have much time to get a good look at your work, however, because you were already taking it down.” Alex thought he saw the woman’s eyes narrow ever so slightly.

  “You were with the red-haired woman.”

  The comment caught him squarely in the solar plexus. “Uh, yes. That was my…colleague, Maggie Flynn.”

  He could tell by her expression that she didn’t believe for a moment that Maggie was a “colleague,” but she didn’t ask further. “How did you find me?”

  “I’m staying in Haworth. I saw one of your works in a gallery there. They gave me your address.”

  At that, Selena seemed to relax a little. She even gave him a small smile. “The woman whose daughter owns that gallery is a friend of my grandmother’s,” she said. “Tom doesn’t like it that I’ve put a painting on consignment there, but that’s his problem.”