Mr. Rochester

by Sarah Shoemaker

  Suddenly my chest felt pressed with a great weight. I remained rooted in place, though at the last moment, before they entered the apartment, I thought to reach through the open window and draw the curtain across it, with just the barest of openings, that I might view and hear their assignation. Annick came in first—I had not even heard her return, so enamored was I of the evening—and she lit a lamp, then withdrew. A moment later the couple entered, laughing softly at some joke. There she was, in all her glory—in a rose-colored silken dress and jewels I had given her—and he in his officer’s uniform. I recognized him as a young roué—someone I knew to be beneath her. Céline saw the card I had left, and she pointed at it and laughed, deriding my personal defects, she who had over and over told me she found me handsome and charming, but now I heard that I was as ugly as a stray dog, and just as graceless. All the love I had thought I felt for Céline fled in those few moments, and my new sentiment was confirmed as their mindless chatter continued: frivolous, stupid, mercenary.

  I could not bear to hear more, and I stepped through the window and without preamble freed Céline from any obligation to me and gave her notice to vacate the apartment as soon as possible. I threw down a few francs for any immediate need and made to leave, disregarding her screams and protestations, as she was suddenly intent on revealing to me that she did truly love me after all and was sorry, etcetera, etcetera. At the door, I turned and told the chevalier that I expected him the next morning at the Bois de Boulogne, and then I closed the door on Céline’s continued hysterics.

  In the morning, though it was the first duel I had ever fought, I made quick work of the fellow, wounding him in the arm. His shot went far wide of the mark, a good example of the state of the French military.

  One might forgive a single night’s mistake, but it is quite another to hear your lover belittle you to another in the crudest of language. I was finished forever with Céline, and I vowed I would never again give a woman power over me as I had done with Céline.

  Chapter 7

  Leaving Paris as quickly as I could, I traveled: Rome, Naples, Florence, Saint Petersburg, even Baden-Baden, where I spent hours—no, days—at the gaming tables, as if winning or losing were an antidote. I cared little which city I was in, or with whom I spent my time. I was in those days a very changed man from the one who had first left England at the age of twenty-one. Then, I had been a child, seeing things in black and white, assuming there must be a satisfactory moral solution to any problem, assuming that what one saw on the surface was all there was to see. I marveled at my past self: what had become of that naïve, softhearted boy who had wanted to believe the best of everyone?

  Though the angry wound of Céline’s betrayal never fully healed, as time went on and my bed grew cold I did occasionally find in my travels a woman who at first I thought could be a partner for me, but each time I was disappointed. There was an Italian who was charming and beautiful and alive with verve. I enjoyed her company, her passion, her very Italian sense of humor, and she struck me as the sort of woman Bertha might have become, with a different family history. But the more time I spent with her, the more disturbed I became, for while Giacinta was not mad, she had a violent and unprincipled side that disturbed me. I also dallied for a time in Saint Petersburg with the daughter of a German merchant there, an innocent young girl not yet into her twentieth year, who stirred in me the same sympathies as Alma had, back in Maysbeck. But as time passed, I saw that what I had taken for quietude and calm was really ignorance and mindlessness. I left her with a gentleness I had not bestowed on Giacinta, and I gave her enough money to open a shop of her own. There were others, to be sure, but we never seemed to fit together as I imagined a man and his wife should, although God knows I had little enough experience in what that would mean.

  At the same time, events were roiling in Jamaica. Six months after I quit Paris, disappointed that their demands for more freedom had been rejected, tens of thousands of Jamaican slaves rose in revolt. The rebellion was short-lived and the subsequent punishment brutal, but it was the beginning of the end. Two years later, while I was romancing Clara, slavery ended for good. I was late in hearing the news, for such information was not welcomed in Russia, where the serfs were inclined to believe in freedom themselves. But Osmon managed to get word to me, and I remained confident he was doing his best under the circumstances, so I went back to the gambling tables, for, indeed, what could I have done from so far away, and what point was there in returning to Jamaica?

  * * *

  Some years later, I drifted through Paris again. I happened to be sitting at table with Monsieur Roget at the Café d’Or when Céline arrived, holding a little girl by the hand. It was far too late for such a young child to be about, but the whole table made over her as if she were a princess, and in fact she was remarkable looking—fairylike in a shimmering pink dress with a large pink bow in her blond curls. She moved her hands as she spoke, as a dancer would, and it was clear that she delighted in being the center of attention. Céline nodded meaningfully at me, but I stared stonily back, for, I thought, if she meant to claim that this creature was mine, it must certainly be clear to all that she was not.

  As I made my excuses to leave, attempting not to create a scene, Céline held her hand out to mine and I could do nothing but take it, and she slipped me her card. To my regret, I accepted her invitation.

  She greeted me the next day with kisses and embraces, and the child, whose name was Adèle, was well trained in the art of coquetry. She climbed into my lap and held my face in both her little hands and planted kisses on my cheeks. I had brought a doll for her, and I suppose she was thanking me, but I was repulsed by such a forward manner in one so young. I stayed at Céline’s apartment as short a time as I could, determined not to give the impression that I had forgiven her. She tried to imply that Adèle was my own, but she must have known I could easily deny it—there was nothing at all about me in that little face. I fled the apartment, insistent that both mother and daughter were gone from my life forever.

  From there I continued my travels, my gambling, my liaisons with unsuitable women. I am not proud of that rootless life. But even so, changed as I was, more cynical about human nature, more hard-hearted—more, perhaps, like my father than I had ever wished to be—the boy I had once been lived on in one undeniable way: I continued to yearn for Thornfield. Not as it had become, barren and warped in secrecy, but the Thornfield of my childhood imagination.

  My self-imposed exile was not without comfort, however. Once, in Baden-Baden, I picked up a companion who has, so many times since, warmed me with his presence. One day, having grown tired of casino games, I set out for a change of pace and caught a coach going toward the Badener Höhe, where I aimed to take a long walk in the Schwarzwald. And quite a walk it turned out to be, for I lost my way, and God knows what would have become of me if a scruffy-looking, half-grown dog hadn’t appeared as I leaned against a fallen log to tear into my lunch. The animal gazed at me with such intelligence that I was moved to offer him the rest of my bun. He stood at my knee, chewing with gusto, and when he had finished, he looked expectantly at me again, as if I could conjure more, which made me laugh. When I rose to try to find my way back, though my food was gone, he followed. But he must have judged me an inferior guide, for after an hour of wandering in the darkening forest he suddenly set out ahead of me, glancing back now and then as if to make sure I was still there, until we had reached civilization. The next morning he was waiting for me outside my hotel, and he has been my constant comrade ever since. I named him Pilot, for he surely led me back that first day, and has often given me succor when no one else could.

  I seemed to have little luck in quitting troublesome women, however, for a few years later, when I was again in Paris and passing an evening with Monsieur Roget, Céline’s name came up. “Ah yes,” he said, nodding. “Céline: what a pity.”

  “Pity?” I repeated.

  “She ran off with some Italian. A person of litt
le account, unfortunately; she did not always have the best taste in men.”

  I said nothing, choosing not to include myself in that slight, and he went on: “A musician, I think. He sometimes performed with the opera. He took her to Italy.”

  His terminology suddenly struck me. “Did not have the best taste? Is she…”

  “Well, yes, I understand she went only a year after she left for Italy. Consumption: she ignored it for months before she left.”

  I was stunned. Céline, so full of life: dead? “And the child?” I asked, unthinking.

  He laughed then. “If you were to run off with Varens, would you take her child along?” His face suddenly went serious. “The little girl—Adèle is her name, is it not?—she can’t be yours—?”

  “She is not.”

  “Ahh.” He nodded. “Perhaps the Chevalier du Bellay.”

  “I would believe that,” I responded, a certain bitterness resurfacing.

  “So,” he went on, “Varens left her with Madame Frédéric. Do you know her?”

  Oh yes, I knew her. She had been a neighbor of Céline’s, a former courtesan turned sometime procurer. What had Céline been thinking, leaving a child with that woman? “Does she still live on rue Favart?” I asked.

  “Yes, but she is now in reduced circumstances, I am afraid. Varens left little enough money for the girl’s care. The madame”—he said the word with an ironic tone—“is in a tiny flat now.”

  I turned away and left, compelled to find the child, if only to assuage my conscience.

  Madame Frédéric’s rooms were on the top floor of the building. Pilot waited for me on the street, and as I climbed the stairs I reminded myself that I had no responsibility for this child. I had not seen myself in her, and neither had Monsieur Roget, and certainly there was no place in my life for a child, a living reminder of the second biggest mistake I had ever made.

  When I knocked on the apartment door, there was no answer for so long that I was just making to leave as the door opened and a woman peered up at me. The thick powder and rouge on her face failed to hide the tangle of lines that webbed it. “Madame Frédéric,” I said.

  She looked at me, nodding. “I knew you would come,” she said.

  “You have Varens’ child,” I said. “Where is she?”

  “Where? Where do you think, at this hour of night? In bed.”

  Only then did I realize how late it was. “Ah,” I said. “I should have waited until morning. I only just learned—”

  She smiled a nearly toothless smile. “And you are so anxious to see your daughter.”

  No, I was not. I still did not believe she was mine. Perhaps the only reason I was there at all was to prove it to myself, once and for all. “Excuse the disturbance,” I said, backing away. “I didn’t think of the time. I will return in the morning.” I made a fast retreat, with the old woman calling after me. She was, I am sure, afraid I would not return at all.

  But I did, and the next morning Adèle was there to greet me, dressed in a pink frock that seemed a size or two too small, a tattered pink ribbon in her curls. She had been prompted, it was clear, and she smiled, and I saw again the dimples in her cheeks, her fair skin, her flaxen hair, her hazel eyes, and the curve of her chin. She was definitely Céline’s child, but just as definitely not mine. I had seen those eyes before, large and wide-set, and that nose as well, but not in my mirror. They were those of the secret lover. But her little lips were moving already, silently forming the word by which she had been instructed to know me: Papa.

  “She is yours,” the old woman croaked, reading my thoughts on my face. “Her mother always said so, and I have no reason to doubt. And as her father—”

  I shook my head. “She is not mine,” I whispered. “You must know that.”

  “Do you not find her beautiful?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.

  A chill ran through me, and I leaned closer to her. “I can see what will become of her if she remains with you.”

  She shook her head slowly.

  “You know it will,” I said. “How did you find that life, eh? How does any woman find that life? Because it is all she has, is that not the truth? And is that what will become of Adèle?” I had no interest in adding to my responsibilities. But how could I leave Adèle to the fate I could foresee? “Is this what you have been waiting for?” I continued. “For me—or anyone else—to come and claim her? Or is it”—the thought was still dawning as I spoke—“just that you have not yet found a man who will pay your price?”

  “You threaten me?” she asked, defiant.

  “How much?”

  She smiled cautiously. “You will take her?”

  “How much?”

  She named a figure. It was far too much, but I was in no mood to bargain over the life of a child I did not even want. “I will return in three hours. Be ready to bring her to a solicitor’s and we will make it legal.”

  “She is to be your child?”

  “She is to be my ward. I will house her and feed and clothe her and make sure she is educated to be a proper kind of young lady.” And that would be all.

  * * *

  By the end of the day, Adèle was mine, though I had no idea what to do with her, or even how to speak to her. As unused to children as I was, I did, thank God, have the wisdom not to immediately disrupt Adèle’s life any more than it had been already, and so I determined we should stay on in Paris for some time. I found an apartment with two bedrooms and moved her there. The very first thing I did was go to a convent school and make arrangements for a nurse for Adèle, as it was clear that I could not bring up a child on my own. And the second thing was to inform her, as gently as possible, that I was not her papa, which would have been a great trauma for her if it hadn’t been for the presence of Pilot, whom she petted and fondled as if he himself had been her parent. That great beast had grown to a massive adulthood with a patience with Adèle that outlasted any human’s. Even so, and despite the nurse’s capable, loving presence, Adèle so desperately clung to me if I tried to leave the hotel without her that I made sure to bring new clothes and toys and books when I returned. It was the only way I could think of to get her to allow me to leave.

  Finally, after a few weeks, when I felt Adèle and the nurse and I were more comfortable with one another, I arranged for our departure to England.

  Chapter 8

  We stopped for a few days in London, where I thought Adèle would feel at home, having lived in a city all her life, but she found it disagreeable—filthy and common—and she was not afraid to say so. Having just come from Paris, I had to admit I felt the same, and therefore as soon as I had completed my business, I hurried her on to Thornfield, accompanied by Sophie, the nurse. I had high hopes that Adèle would find the Hall as warm and inviting as I had as a child, and indeed she did. She ran from room to room when we first arrived, enthralled and impressed by the size of the place and by its furnishings. Adèle was, in so many ways, her mother’s daughter.

  As soon as we arrived in England I tried teaching Adèle rudimentary English, for this was to be her language, but she said she found it “difficile et détonné,” and she refused even to try. Nevertheless, I went on speaking to her in English, which she sometimes pretended not to hear or understand, and she carried on her conversations almost totally with Sophie. I felt sorry for the child but also on occasion found her as aggravatingly silly as her mother had sometimes been. The sooner she made the best of her new situation, the better, and I tried to impress this on her as firmly as I could. It is possible that, on occasion, I was too gruff—as yet I had so little experience with children. Fortunately, once Adèle was at Thornfield, Mrs. Fairfax’s unassuming gentleness won first Sophie and then Adèle herself. And it did not hurt that Pilot was always ready for a retrieving game or a belly rub.

  Mrs. Fairfax had the good sense to say nothing until we were alone, when she asked after Adèle’s provenance. “She is the daughter of a friend of mine, now recently deceased,” I respond
ed. I reassured the widow that I expected to put Adèle into a school as soon as I found one suitable.

  Mrs. Fairfax raised her eyebrows. “Is it indeed wise to send her off to school when she is so recently removed from all she knew, and where she does not even speak the language?”

  I was not used to being questioned, and I am afraid I was rather harsh with my response. “It will be good for her, and God knows I cannot imagine having her here all the time.”

  “If you will pardon my saying so—”

  “I will not, as a matter of fact,” I snapped, and turned on my heel. I had thought, when I took Adèle on as my ward, that it would be merely a legality, a charitable act to keep her out of the clutches of anyone who would make her into a miniature strumpet. Why should she not be sent off to school? That was what my father had done with me, when I was not much older than Adèle was now, and that experience had turned out well enough.

  The very next day, I paid a call on Everson for recommendations of a suitable school for Adèle, but he frowned when he heard that she spoke only French, and when I explained that she had been brought up in Paris and had some distinctly Parisian ways, he frowned further and suggested a governess instead.

  A governess! What a terrible idea, I thought. Adèle at Thornfield, and Bertha upstairs? I remembered Tiso’s escaping Bertha’s chamber, exploring the attic storerooms—I remembered myself doing the same. Bertha’s chamber only yards away from where Adèle might innocently wander. Absolutely not! But when I visited several schools for young girls in the county, at each one I saw prim and neatly uniformed children, two to a desk, heads bent over their lessons. Much as I wished to see Adèle ensconced in such an ambience, it was plainly impossible to drop her into such a place now. I returned to Thornfield disappointed, and I called Mrs. Fairfax into my library that evening and allowed that it would indeed seem best for her to find a governess as soon as possible.