ANNE EYRE (Wounded: chapter Sixteen) #Jane Eyre Retelling

Chapter Sixteen    

Wounded

    Days and nights continued in a strange pattern as the house guests came and went. Sophie and I tried to maintain our learning routine (her spoken English was nearly perfect), but most evenings there was extra noise and the atmosphere of a party; I didn’t mind this. In fact, I enjoyed falling asleep knowing that Sophie had learnt all that was required of her, and more. The atmosphere of the house was often enhanced by these merry parties. It was only occasionally, during dinner, that I was quick to retreat.

     The following night, Nicola was making more pointed comments about her dreadful childhood nannies and how they were all, miserable women with few prospects, calling them, dowdy and plain in the nicest possible way. I began to shift uncomfortably in my seat. I felt her comments were directed at me, even though her brother interrupted her and contradicted her. Nicola’s opinions were loudly vocalised; enough was enough.  

    When I slipped out of the room, I heard footsteps following behind me.

    ‘Anne, what’s the matter? You look unhappy.’ Nathanial said.

    ‘I’m tired. I’m going to bed.’

    ‘Since I returned with The Eatons you haven’t been the same.’

     Was he trying to make me admit jealousy or was he just not perceptive enough to care?

    ‘Really?’ I said, playing cool. ‘Perhaps it’s since you played that stupid trick pretending to be a fortune teller - as if I would pour all of my thoughts onto your table.’

     In his presence, it felt as if my own feelings were a mystery, even to me. Turning at the top of the staircase, I challenged him.

     ‘These days of merriment have been frivolous but mostly fun.’

      He smiled approvingly.

      I didn’t tell him about the previous afternoon when I had tried unsuccessfully to unbolt the door that led to the highest floor of Thornton Hall.

      Instead, I blurted out, ‘As if the dinner conversation wasn’t humiliation enough, I have heard screams in the night. Last night, again, I heard a woman’s laughter. It was not Mrs Poole who was in the village having dinner with friends.’

    ‘The house is full of guests, Anne. The rooms are packed; sometimes there are hangers on in the music business; I cannot be responsible for every stranger that friends drag in here. It’s all a bit of a joke, a bit of summer fun. It will all be over soon,’ he shrugged, ‘and then everyone will return to their normal life. I doubt the band will last beyond this contract. It’s their final album and the others didn’t exactly set the world on fire. I’m sorry if they are annoying. The walls are paper thin in these old places; I’ve been intending to get proper insulation for years. If it’s a problem, you could move to a cottage on the estate until my guests leave.’

    ‘Sure,’ I said, turning from him. ‘In fact, maybe Sophie should come with me,’ I said sarcastically, adding, ‘since we are both so unwanted.’

     He went to take my arm but I shook it free. In truth I was less worried about things that went bump in the night than I was about Nicola Ingram. I wasn’t sure how long I could cope with a changed household where I would soon be superfluous. I had no intention of moving to an isolated cottage on the estate, as he well knew. When we reached my room, I said, ‘Goodnight.’ Turning, I shut the door.

      That night I was again woken from my sleep; not by Sophie or Mrs Fairfax but by Rochester.

     ‘What is it?’ I whispered. The look on his face was intense and troubled.

     ‘Anne? Wake up, Anne! Didn’t you do some sort of first aid course?’

     ‘Yes, I had to, to work with children,’ I said groggily.

     ‘I need your help, Anne. Would you help me? Please come with me, now?’

     I grabbed my coat and pulled on my socks; my feet were freezing. The heating was turned off in the summer evenings but the house was so large and icy in the night. We went to one of the upstairs sitting rooms where I was surprised to see Christopher Mason lying on the sofa curled up in some sort of obvious pain.

     ‘I’m warning you Christopher, don’t tell her anything.’

     ‘And Anne? If he talks, don’t listen to him.’

     I was left hovering by the door. The light was low as Rochester went to grab a first aid kit from the kitchen two floors below us. He came running back a few minutes later. I stood mute as he handed it to me.

    ‘Can you manage this, Anne? Help him?’

    I was already pressing a bundled up t-shirt onto the gash in Christopher’s stomach.

    I put on some gloves while Rochester took over. I cleaned the wound, just as I’d been shown to and got some hot water from the bathroom and generally did anything I could, including wrapping a bandage around Christopher’s stomach. This was only temporary help. The man needed stitches, badly, and probably a tetanus shot. There were knife wounds and puncture marks the size of pencil dots across his veins in some sort of pattern I couldn’t begin to make out.

       Typically, once I looked like I had it under control, Rochester had disappeared.  When he returned, ten minutes later, looking stressed out, Christopher was doubled up in pain as I applied pressure to the bandage.

     It was no use.

    ‘We need help,’ I said.

    ‘I know,’ he replied.

     Our house guest lay limp, moaning in pain as Rochester hoisted Christopher Mason over his shoulders and carried him downstairs via the scullery. Outside, there was a waiting car.  

     I was left shaking my head. I could not have imagined what fight had caused Christopher’s wounds or how they had been inflicted. I sat on a couch in the dark of the drawing room and finally fell asleep, crumpled under an old coat, still wondering.    

     ‘Anne, Anne, wake up.’ Rochester shook me awake. It was six in the morning and the sun had barely risen. The house was quiet. A hush had settled over it like mist.

    ‘Come with me.’

     I grabbed my coat and hastily pulled it on over my pyjamas.

     We walked together outside to the stables in the cool morning air.

     ‘I didn’t want to talk in the house. Our voices might wake everyone up.’

     ‘How is he?’

     ‘He’ll live.’

     ‘Who… who did that to him?’

    Rochester took my arm as if he wanted to tell me something but was weighing up the cost of speaking aloud. He shook his head as he spoke.

    ‘I can’t tell you.’

     I turned to leave but his voice stopped me.

     ‘When I was your age I made a mistake. Its consequences have marked me for life.  But recently…’ He leant towards me as we spoke, ‘I have met someone who might understand, who might want to… be with me if only I could tell them the truth; with her I feel I could reform myself and learn to live again.’

     He was clearly describing his feelings for Nicola Ingram.

     ‘Anne?’

    ‘Nathanial?’

    ‘Do you think love justifies telling a lie?’

    ‘I think you are talking in riddles. But if I’m to treat your words as if they are meant in all seriousness, I would say that love should not need a lie but that sometimes the truth is less kind.’

    He slumped up against a stone wall, centuries old.

    ‘What do you mean, Anne?’

    ‘When we lie, if we do so to save a person we love from hurt, that’s understandable. When you wore a riding jacket that didn’t suit you as well as your velvet one, I didn’t tell you because you were already saddled up and ready to ride out when you asked my opinion.’

    He paused.

    ‘Ah,’ then he laughed. Nathanial reached over and took my hand. ‘Just your presence here makes the day better. I do not know what I shall do without you.’

    ‘Am I leaving?’

    ‘I fear that you will… someday.’

     So, he was already planning for the time when I would leave, when he would ask me to go because Sophie was going to school and Nicola would be her stepmother. Poor child, I thought, but there seemed no point in vocalising my feelings. The man had clearly made up his mind to go through with the marriage that all of the household staff whispered about behind closed doors. Nicola Ingram was the sort of woman who was only nice to children and underlings when others (particularly the man she’d set her sights on) noticed.

    Of course, in front of Nathanial, she was all smiles. Like most men in love, he couldn’t see through her and he would resent me for pointing out her faults, so I stayed silent on the matter of the beautiful Nicola Ingram.

    I wondered how he could think so little of my feelings, how he could imagine I had none. He had trusted me with last night’s secrets and told me about Nicola so easily, as if I was now more than an employee but less than a girlfriend; a friend, of sorts, was how he had begun to treat me.

    I did not want to think about Nicola Ingram and turned away. There was still a secret in this house that intrigued me. I wondered why, after all these months of friendship (if indeed we were friends), he did not trust me enough to share it.

    ‘I still don’t understand about last night.’ I ventured. ‘Were you and Christopher fighting over a woman?’

    ‘You could say that.’

    ‘Does he… does he like Nicola too?’

     Nathanial laughed. I changed tack.

    ‘Did you… it looked like someone stabbed him with a pen or worse.’

     ‘I cannot explain further, Anne. I must entrust you only with my silence.  I value your opinion Anne. I need to know if I’m justified in not telling the woman I love everything about me.’

    ‘You mean, about this, about whatever has occurred here tonight with Christopher?’

    ‘Sort of…’

    I shrugged, annoyed that he would never offer me a straight answer but always asked my opinions as if they should be freely supplied. I had nothing to lose any more so I told him exactly what I thought.

    ‘I think true love should overcome all obstacles. Just because the woman in question doesn’t have as big a fortune as you, it doesn’t necessarily mean she’s a total gold digger… I guess, well, she is attractive, beautiful even, that’s if you go for trashy blondes. Her father is also a lord or whatever and I mean, clearly, you are an appealing alliance. Both families will be thrilled.’

    Nate’s face went blank.

   ‘Anne? Who do you think I’m talking about?’

    I looked him square in the eyes.

    ‘Nicola Ingram.’ 

    ‘I’m not talking about her. I’m asking you what you would do to secure your own happiness? What lengths would you go to for true love?’

    He reached over and wound his scarf around my shoulders as I began to shiver. He leant into me, closely; I wanted to touch him but I held back; I didn’t want to be bought with riddles, rhymes and lies.

    ‘I would do anything within the limits of my own conscience.’

    ‘Yet I cannot risk telling you everything,’ he looked away. 

    ‘Nor I you,’ I whispered, half turning from him. 

    ‘You are an unusual person, Anne. You see things from an unconventional angle.’

   ‘Well, I’ve had an unconventional life, so far.’

   ‘Do you ever want a conventional one? Are you too young to think about marriage and children?’

    ‘Of course, unless I met the right person.’

    ‘I think in the end, most of us want the normal things: love, security, protection. Am I right, Anne? Is that what you want from life?’

     ‘At the moment, I’m planning to go to university,’ I laughed. ‘But it is true that for someone who studied hard at school, I have no great desire to continue studying. I might get a job instead or as well. I want to see more of the world after I leave here.’

     ‘Yes, of course. I suppose what I’m asking is, if it took a lie to get to a greater good, would you be prepared to be involved in something like that?

    ‘I’ve often thought that people who never tell lies have never had to; but sometimes I wonder if anything good can come from bad. If there is something you haven’t told the woman you wish to be your wife, then maybe you should tell her.’

    ‘Even if telling her means she’ll probably leave me?’

    ‘You must be the judge of that, Nate.’

    ‘You called me Nate,’ he smiled. ‘I liked it.’

    I turned from him, shivering,  fed up with his egotistical flirting and the constant talking about this other woman as if I was just a teenage girl with no feelings of my own. I moved towards the house.

    ‘Where are you going?’

     ‘I don’t think this conversation is going anywhere. I’m cold, I’m going inside; Sophie has her riding lesson and I need to get her clothes ready.’   

    I walked down the driveway, my head reeling with questions. His words were loaded, like a gun. 

ANNE EYRE (Leaving: chapter Seventeen) #Jane Eyre Retelling

Chapter Seventeen

Leaving

    The telephone rang again the next afternoon. Leah picked it up. The voice on the other end of the line was asking for me; Anne Eyre. Nobody ever rang Thornton Hall asking after me.

  ‘Perhaps it is your aunt?’ Mrs Fairfax offered.

   I shook my head.

   More likely someone from Social Services, doing a survey about my progress since leaving the system, I thought, inwardly cringing. Then I remembered the system was overcrowded, so that was unlikely. I shook my head again yet Leah persisted until I got up from my seat and went to the door of the kitchen.

    ‘Anne, it’s some lawyer in London by the name of Price. He says he got your address from Social Services. It must be important.’

     I took the phone.

     ‘You can take the call in the study, Anne. It’s private in there,’ Mrs Fairfax said.

     The study was one of the most imposing rooms in the entire mansion, yet it was designed to be the most comfortable with large brown leather lounge chairs and Rochester’s relatives dotted in paintings all over the walls, staring out at me, judging me.

      ‘Is this Anne Elizabeth Eyre?’ the voice on the line said. He repeated my full name, date and place of birth.

      ‘Yes, who is this?’

      ‘This is Louis Price from Price & Sons. We’re a legal firm based in London. Anne, I have some news for you. Your aunt is failing and she has instructed me to ask you to come and see her. It is her one and only desire, her final wish to set things right with you. She has something of legal importance to tell you and she asked me to make a formal request for you to come and see her.’

     ‘I… I’m in Cornwall.’

     ‘Yes, I know.’

    ‘Since she threw me out of her house when I was small, I have no idea why she would wish to speak to me now.’

    ‘She asked me to appeal to your good nature, Anne, your intelligence. It’s very important and would be to your advantage if you speak with her and not on the telephone; she wishes to do this in person.’

     Minutes later, I stood with the telephone receiver in my hand. I had not really thought about going into London again so soon, but something inside me, some family instinct, told me I should go. I could not deny her this final wish, although she had been cruel to me when I was younger. Two wrongs did not seem to make a right in my world. I needed to hear what the woman had to say.

    I threw some overnight belongings into a bag along with my sketches and realized I had no money, no wages for the month. I would have to ask Rochester for a cash-in-hand payment, something I didn’t wish to do, but I had no choice.

     I walked outside in my shirt, which was rolled up, along with my jeans, and a cardigan wrapped around my shoulders to shield me from the light, summer breeze.  

     Rochester was playing water polo with Nicola, (who was dressed in a revealing bikini), Nicola’s brother and Sophie. Sophie kept shouting in French which made me smile. They made a fine family in the sun, all of the intruders (as I thought of them), so blonde and pale, unlike me, soon to be sun-kissed. I hovered near the edge of the rippled, blue water.

    Nicola scowled at me. ‘What do you want?’ she said speaking to me as if she was in no doubt that I was merely the help. ‘If you want Sophie, we’re in the middle of a game,’ she added.

     I ignored her and looked at Nathanial Rochester.

     ‘I need to speak with you. It can’t wait.’

     He paused, nodded and got out of the pool.

     Can I just say that the sight of a man as hot as Rochester, emerging wet and dripping from the water on a sunny day, was one I would literally engrave in the final pages of my teenage diary? Nicola and I and even Mrs Fairfax, who was seated in the corner, couldn’t stop staring. Mrs Fairfax, who was reading a magazine, actually pulled down her sunglasses slightly to get a proper look at his muscular chest. Apart from Sophie, we all literally stopped and stared at him; his beautiful face and body in the warmth of sun on his skin.

     Nicola swam over to Nate as he was picking up his towel and leaned up to peck him on the cheek. He smiled in return, playfully, appearing to respond. Sophie frowned because the game had halted.

     ‘I’ll just be a minute,’ he said to her.

     Sophie huffed and gave a slight smile when she realised it was me creating the interruption.

      My employer and I walked together in the sun, my hair trailing down my back as I hadn’t bothered to tie it up. My faded jeans were rolled up into shorter ones as my one concession to summer. I had bare feet. It was the weekend and on my days off, I’d turned one of the bathrooms into an old-fashioned darkroom and had been developing photos of Sophie and the surrounding areas of Cornwall. There was also a picture perfect image of the estate cottage which was situated by the sea.

     Nathanial Rochester had wrapped a towel around his waist and pulled on his crumpled t-shirt over his wet chest. I’d noticed the T-shirt, the old rock band one, was his favourite. He started to dry his thick, wet hair with a hand towel as we walked. It was endearing; this lack of interest in fashion, this need he had for a woman (not a girl, like me, I supposed) to look after him. Nicola was twenty-one and certainly seemed to display the confidence that announced she was up to the job of looking after this lonely young man.

     ‘What is it Anne?’ He asked.

     ‘I just spoke to a lawyer. I need to return to London to visit my aunt who is ill and not expected to recover. She has something to tell me, apparently, that cannot be said over the phone.’

    He paused for a minute, taking in my words and what they meant.

   ‘So, you are leaving?’ He looked at me incredulously. ‘How will Sophie and I cope without you?’

   ‘I am sure you will both be fine. You appear to be otherwise engaged.’

    I tried to hide my jealousy, telling myself I had no right to feel it. I could see Nicola fussing over Sophie in the distance and then she took off her towel, spread it on the lawn and lay out in brightest light, displaying her perfect body in the sun. Meanwhile, Rochester was studying my face intently.

    He raised his eyebrows.

   ‘Isn’t this the aunt who was cruel to you? Who practically threw you out onto the street?’

    ‘Yes, but she is the only family member I have. I cannot ignore her final wish.’

    ‘Well you’re a better person than I am… When are you coming back?’ he asked me directly.

    Rochester was surprisingly anxious about my proposed return. He realized he would have to find a new nanny - if that is what I was - one who could also speak French. Not an easy task, late in the summer, and very impractical for him. Although his relationship with Sophie had appeared to have improved since I’d arrived at Thornton, he was generally distracted by work and horses. He had not intended to be his child’s hand maid as he sarcastically worded it.

     I shrugged.

    ‘It all began, when she called Social Services after I held an iron to my aunt’s boyfriend’s hand.’

    Rochester winced.  

   ‘Why did you do that?’

    I looked away.

    ‘He tried to get too close. ’

     He looked a little disconcerted. Apparently, I didn’t need to draw a picture.

     I continued… ‘My aunt felt I was partly to blame for ruining her relationship with her boyfriend  and in retrospect, if I’d known how much trouble my accusation would cause, I probably should have kept quiet. Had I been older… ’

   Rochester sighed ‘How old were you Anne?’

   I paused.

   ‘About Sophie’s age,’ I replied, aware the more he knew about me the less he would like me. It was always this way with me. That was why I’d stopped sharing my upbringing with strangers. At first, they pretended to have empathy, even a little sympathy, but then they started distancing themselves from me. They would treat me as if I was damaged goods and not worth knowing.

     ‘Anne, listen to me. You were not to blame and I don’t think you owe this aunt of yours anything. She should have stood up for you - I would have.’

    ‘I can stand up for myself,’ I whispered.

    ‘I know,’ he smiled.

    ‘I need to go to London.’

    ‘Of course.’

    ‘And I need to borrow some money since I haven’t been paid this….’

   ‘No problem.’

    I didn’t want to tell him that last month’s pay had gone on the novels I needed for my reading list at university and the camera. I’d purchased an expensive one because I’d wanted the best. All would have been unnecessary trinkets in my aunt’s eyes. Recently, my life had been so amazing and for the first time, I wanted to record it. I wanted to remember everything. However, I didn’t want to tell Rochester about the purchase of the camera which was none of his business anyway. He’d have told me I could use his movie camera, and I wanted my own; something that I knew could never be taken from me.

   He scribbled his signature on a cheque and went to hand it to me. I was shocked at the amount of zeros at the end. This was way too much.

   ‘It needs to be cash, Rochester. I cannot pay for my train ticket with a cheque.’

  ‘Of course,’ he said without hesitation. We had walked all the way to his office. He handed me some cash from a locked drawer in his desk.

   I took it and said, ‘thank you.’

   ‘So, it’s Rochester now?’

   ‘You are… officially my employer.’

   ‘I am your friend, Anne, as you are mine. Please come back to me… and Sophie… and this place. We need you.’

   I squeezed the large bundle of money, surprised he would think that I’d be dishonest about my intentions. Well, not surprised, really. I mean, what did he expect? He’d allowed me to become close to him and Sophie only to flaunt his girlfriend in my face. Still, he owed me nothing except my wages and his kindness had been extremely unexpected. I turned from him with the notes in my hand then I realised, as I went to stuff them in my purse, that they made a larger bundle than I’d earned.

    I hesitated at the door.

    ‘But this is next month’s wages also…’

    ‘I want you to return,’ he said.

    ‘I have promised that I will… in a week.’

    ‘It’s a bonus. Added incentive,’ he said.

     Why? I wondered… I had nowhere else I wanted to be, except by his side. Yet I used all of my strength at that moment to leave him without a backward glance. My own survival depended on my detachment. Without a touch, I left, lest he should realize how much he now meant to me.  

ANNE EYRE (Aunt Tessa: chapter Eighteen) #Jane Eyre Retelling

Chapter Eighteen

Aunt Tessa

    The train journey was long, and I thought of his face, his body, his expressions, playing the images in my head like the schoolgirl I’d been. I put these thoughts of love out of my mind. I knew he was so far out of my reach that these images of unrequited love were both imaginary and laughable. A girl can dream.

     And let’s face it, Rochester made all other men seem pale in comparison. The boys I’d met casually, at school mixers arranged between the boys’ and girls’ schools and even at the train station on those afternoons where I travelled to wherever home was, could never compete, even in my schoolgirl memory.

    I pulled out the novel I’d begun from my reading list, one of the classics, Persuasion, and began to read. I checked my texts intermittently (there were none from him but one from Sophie wishing me Bon Chance!) Her pretty French words made me smile. I had tried to give Sophie the safe and secure upbringing in those few months I’d been with her that I’d never properly experienced myself. I hoped I’d succeeded but my influence was limited in many ways. Sophie, like most children, craved approval from her father. I suppose I had no measure of success except her smiles and the happiness I’d felt when we learnt new things together, like the map of the United States, which was new to me and I’d had to teach myself before I could teach her.  

    I knew when I was forced to leave Sophie and Nate (as I persistently thought of him), I’d miss them both. I should never have let either of them into my heart, I thought, as I snapped my mobile into its cover, folded Persuasion into the scarf in my bag (it was a wonderful story about love lost and found) and shut my eyes. The train chugged into the industrial heartland of central London as I slept.

     When I woke, there was an apprehensive feeling in my stomach that I’d carried with me all through the journey. The flutters were the opposite of the anticipation I’d felt the first time I went to Thornton and arrived near the estate cottage which overlooked the ocean. This feeling was one of dread.

    I took the tube to my aunt’s house in South London. You couldn’t see your surroundings on the tube as it fed like a snake through all of central London, but you felt covered up, literally unseen in the grey and the dark. I remembered the streets without having to check the A-Z directory. My Aunt Tessa’s house was particularly familiar. It was a cold and drab summer’s day. The temperature felt more like autumn. The summer sky began to spit down rain as I reached the steps of Tessa’s house in the expensive enclave of real estate that was Knightsbridge. I walked to the door and rang the bell. Her nurse opened the door and led me, gratefully almost, to my aunt’s sitting room.

     She was seated by the fire with a checked rug wrapped around her knees and the television on. Aunt Tessa looked up as I entered the room. Her hair was greying and she looked older than her years and thinner. Her face was soft in the firelight. There were dark shadows under her eyes.

     ‘Hello Anne,’ she said softly.

     ‘Hello,’ I replied, formally.

     ‘Thank you for coming.’

      We made small talk about the journey then she eyed me up and down and spoke of her real reason for wishing to see me after all these years.

    ‘I brought you here to let you know that when you went away, after you were in foster care, your schooling was paid for by me. It was my financial advisor’s signature on those cheques.’

     I looked at her incredulously.

     ‘Why?’

     ‘It is not what you think, Anne.  I did not do it for your good, just out of my own guilt. I wouldn’t see the truth before my eyes. When you fought with my ex-boyfriend, I knew he was in the wrong, but I didn’t want to admit it. I am sorry for that alone. As you know, I didn’t warm to you, as a child. You were too inquisitive, too knowing and the truth is, I just didn’t like you.’ She paused before speaking again.  ‘Is it wrong to be envious of a child?’

    ‘Yes.’

   ‘Do you forgive me, Anne? It’s just that I feel I want your forgiveness before…’

   ‘Yes. I forgive you,’ I said, wanting her to stop speaking so I could leave.

   ‘Then you must hear the rest of this story…’

    I knew she would not have dragged me all the way to her house without spilling more bile.

    ‘I knew your father. The reason that I paid for your schooling was that he left me, gave me, the money that was supposed to be for your upbringing and your future.’

   I was shocked.

   ‘He lived in America after you were born and when he and your mother separated he remarried. After a few months, he wanted to see you and I told him a terrible lie which he never bothered to fully check. I told him you had died in the time during which we’d had no contact. I told them something plausibly tragic and as I was your legal guardian their signatures were never required. Your mother was out to it by then anyway and your father - absent father that he was - he’d only been eighteen when you were born; his name wasn’t even on your birth certificate. He never bothered to check; that is how much he cared about you Anne. By then, I’d sent you away. You see, I was in love with him and I was jealous of your mother.

    Envious, even though she has spent her life going in and out of psychiatric clinics.   It is true she has never wished to see you. I was jealous that she had something of your father’s that I did not; you. So I made up the terrible lie to keep you away from them and him, away from us. The money was in my hands by then and your father did not ask for it to be returned. Out of guilt, I paid for your schooling but that was it. I invested the rest, wisely, I might add.’

     Did she expect me to congratulate her? I was shocked and stood up. I’d feared she’d use these last moments of her existence to hurt me.

    ‘I brought you here, Anne, because you also have an uncle. The letter is there, on the coffee table. He has asked after you; he lost touch with your father when they too, were infants; he only recently heard of your birth; but not the lie of your death. He has a small fortune, apparently, made it in the City last decade. He wants to leave it to you so that you can inherit his wealth. He has no children of his own, nor is he likely to.’

    She coughed, making her face look more pinched in and unappealing than ever.

    ‘He asks you to write to him; you must do so, Anne. I have gone through the money your father left, but you will surely be looked after by this uncle. He has made that promise in the letter. This goes some way to my atonement, to making up for all my lies.’

    I looked at her, speechless. I gathered she’d been jealous of my mother, me… the world… and had seemingly endless psychological issues of her own. Talk was pointless. I just wanted to leave her room and never see the woman again.

    I took the letter and gathered my coat as I left.  I let her have the final words.

     ‘Anne, you have cursed me. I always knew you’d be the death of me.’

     As I left the house, sometimes I thought my whole family must have been mad, that my only hope in life was forging a new path, finding new people, creating my own way. I was not reduced to tears as I walked along the footpath; I was calm, controlled.

     I felt some inner comfort and distant nourishment as I looked at the name of my uncle on the paper and read his welcoming letter. I resolved to contact him as I ordered tea at the Berkeley, one of the nicest hotels in town. I’d earnt it. It was almost a relief to know that my parents had not intentionally abandoned me to a system which had nearly destroyed me; that they’d been victims themselves, something I was determined not to be. And what of my aunt? She was the saddest victim of all. I had only pity for her.

    I shed a tear for my lost upbringing in the bathrooms of that posh hotel and afterwards resolved not to cry over it again, to save my tears for something good, some future happiness. I believed I’d finally earned some tears of joy.

    I stayed in a nice hotel that night. I had more than enough money to pay for the room with a sunken bath and cable television. The next day, before I was due to start my return journey to Devon and then on to Cornwall, I decided to go shopping in the street I’d read about in society magazines, Pont Street. Then I went to Harvey Nichols and realised how much Sophie would love the beautiful counters and lush shop windows. I dreamt of what was good as I wandered through the departments. I bought a gift for the maids and Mrs Fairfax and afterwards I caught a double decker bus and treated myself to an afternoon in Oxford Street. I walked along to Regent Street, to a famous toy store, where I selected a doll to add to Sophie’s collection, one that looked a little bit like her and one I thought she would love.

     After her father married and she was sent to boarding school, she would need all the strength, creativity and imaginary friends she could muster. I, of course, would have to start afresh.  I did not envisage returning to the place I grew up in; I wasn’t sure what I’d do after September but resolved to finalize my university scholarship applications. Then, if all went as planned, perhaps enrolling in a few subjects would be a start; I could study at night and work during the day… that was the plan of escape once all the preparations for Nicola Ingram’s wedding were underway.

ANNE EYRE (Engagement: chapter Nineteen) #Jane Eyre Retelling

Chapter Nineteen

Engagement

   After I’d travelled from Devon to Cornwall, I took a taxi from the bus stop in the village to Hay Lane. I wanted to re-live the extraordinary sight of the estate in what was left of the summer sun. It was afternoon by then and Thornton Hall in the sunset was truly memorable. I took a photograph to add to my collection. All of the angles of the old mansion swept up into the fading light. The image of pink and gold took my breath away as I snapped a few more photographs. Sophie had texted me and had ridden to the gate with her father on her horse, Xavier, to greet me. I was very surprised, but I shouldn’t have been. Sophie and her father were excellent riders.

   My heart sank when I saw Nathanial’s handsome, smiling face. ‘If you had telephoned earlier, Anne, we would have driven to the station to collect you. It was Sophie’s biggest wish to greet you in the twilight,’ he said enthusiastically.

   I smiled again.

  ‘I wanted to make my own way to Thornton. I wanted to take some photographs. These moments in the summer light won’t come again for a long time.’

    It had been a privilege to see the faces of Sophie and Nate waiting for me at the gate, even more exciting than any photographs I could take.

   ‘Bienvenue!  Anne! You’ve returned to us!’ Sophie squealed as she slid off her saddle and ran into my arms to give me a welcome hug. Nathanial led the horse up the track as Sophie spoke to me in a rush of tumbling over sentences while the three of us walked towards Thornton Hall.

   ‘… and I know all the words you left for me to learn and we got Mrs Fairfax to prepare dinner especially in your honour – she made apricot chicken.’ I must admit, just the thought of my favourite dish excited me. Apricot chicken consisted of chicken pieces mixed with onions, apricots, nectar and spices then baked in a casserole dish until the sauce simmered and reduced in the oven. The chicken would be served with rice or my favourite creamy potatoes. Sophie talked on excitedly as my mouth watered. Even with a delicious meal, I wondered how I could endure another dinner with the Ingrams. I could always plead exhaustion after my lengthy day’s travel.

    Before dinner, I spoke with Mrs Fairfax in the kitchen. She was showing me how to make bread and butter pudding, a recipe I’d always wanted to make. I’d looked it up on the web but Mrs Fairfax had cooking skills passed down through generations of women in her family, skills that couldn’t be taught online and I’d resolved to learn some of them.

     For this delicious recipe, I was spreading the fruit bread with strawberry jam as Mrs Fairfax stirred the milk, eggs, sugar and vanilla all the while chatting to me like a close relative. I’d changed into an evening skirt, one I’d bought from the most fashionable shop in London and wore a cream antique blouse and bracelets I’d bought from a market store in Notting Hill.  I’d even curled my hair in an effort to look my best. It was as if, knowledge of my family and the wrong that had been done to me, was a weight from my shoulders. It was no hardship to dress up tonight. Deep inside, I knew I wanted to look my most desirable, to make it harder for him to say our inevitable goodbyes.

     I’d already bought a jobs magazine from the train station and had started looking for employment on the internet. I’d told Mrs Fairfax that I’d be ready to leave when summer ended and had started looking for work closer to Cambridge, where I intended to start my classes.

   ‘I’m so proud of you, Anne,’ she said. ‘You are such a smart girl; it’s no wonder you have been accepted into one of the best universities in the world.’

   ‘Thank you,’ I replied.

    I hoped, although my academic record was flawless, that I hadn’t just been accepted because I’d fitted a slot that was marked underprivileged. Still, my interviews had gone well and I’d had excellent references from my teachers and youth workers. That same day, I’d found a letter waiting for me, confirming my scholarship, but I’d still need extra money.

   ‘I think I may have found some jobs to apply for in Cambridge…’

   ‘Oh, no need to look, Anne. Mr Rochester has a company there and he will give you an excellent reference. All it will take is one phone call from him and I’m sure he can arrange suitable employment for you while you complete your studies. I don’t think we’ve ever had a staff member that was going on to Cambridge! Even Rochester went to university in the States after Oxford… oh, of course it was a top college, but then he’s never had anything to prove since he was born. His family gave him everything,’ and here Edwina Fairfax leaned closer, ‘which makes your achievement that much bigger but don’t tell him I said that,’ she laughed. ‘And guess what? He’s made preparations to travel to Europe. He’s ordered engagement rings from London for Nicola to choose from. They arrived in a parcel by express delivery and with a guard who travelled with them all the way from Paris!’

    I tried to smile but I felt gutted.

    We talked on as we cooked, then Sophie came into the kitchen reciting the poem I had taught her and announcing her intentions to sing me her new songs (the ones she’d been learning from her latest CD collection) after dinner.

    The house was alive that evening. The Masons, the Ingrams, and some other neighbours were at the table. I found I was off colour, though, after another half an hour of listening to the irritating Nicola describing all the reality TV shows where she’d been offered a guest spot back in LA.

     ‘Of course, I wasn’t tempted to take any of them since….’ And then she looked at Nathanial, pawing him after the entrée, ‘my heart belongs here.’

     After the main course, I excused myself, suddenly feeling nauseous. I didn’t know why but I suspected it had something to do with the casual way Nicola gave me dagger eyes, then brushed some lint off Nathanial’s jacket. He was speaking animatedly with Matthew Eaton when she leant over to take his hand and I was glad to notice their fingers did not linger together for more than a moment.

    Even so, it was time for me to leave and I excused myself and took a torch with me again to navigate the long hallway, at the end of which, the lights were almost too low to see in the dark shadows.  When I reached the door of my bedroom I heard footsteps rushing behind me.

    ‘Anne, why did you leave early?’

    ‘I’m tired from my journey. Um… you’re right, I should have congratulated you.’

    ‘Why?’

    ‘You’ve obviously done a great job with Sophie while I was away. She is looking wonderfully happy today.’

    ‘She’s happy because you’ve returned to Thornton Hall.’

    ‘Oh well, of course. I should also congratulate you on your engagement.’

    I felt faint. Perhaps it was from exhaustion or emotion but I opened the door to my large bedroom, thinking he’d leave pretty quickly.

   ‘What engagement?’

   ‘The whole house is talking about your marriage to Nicola. They say you’ve made preparations to travel to Europe, after Sophie goes away to school, for your honeymoon. Mrs Fairfax…’

    He smiled incredulously, ‘What?’ he asked, quite rudely, I thought.

    ‘Mrs Fairfax says while I was away she’d never seen you look so happy. That you’ve been constantly with the Ingram’s and have been singing with Nicola and her brother in the drawing room playing piano and guitar with them every evening until late.’

    ‘I’ve been managing their band, Anne. I probably demonstrated a few chord progressions! You know they are trying out the new songs in the local pubs in the village. It’s true that suddenly I feel like listening to music again.’

    ‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Nevertheless, it’s time for me to go.’

    He shrugged regretfully.

    ‘Well, congratulations on Cambridge. It’s quite an achievement.’

    ‘You mean, coming from my background.’

    ‘I mean, coming from any background.’

    ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I know.’ I wished I was more excited about going.

    ‘Modesty never became you.’

    ‘I’m not sure what you mean.’

    ‘You are a modest person, Anne, but I suspect your talents far exceed your current situation so I must let you leave. You are worth more than being stifled in this place.’

     I looked around at my beautiful room; the view at night, through my window, of a garden lit with lights that led to the ocean, was perfect.  This view was a glimpse of freedom, a better world than the one from which I’d fled. I didn’t know how I’d have the strength to leave this place - and Sophie - and him.

     Suddenly there was a loud thump on the roof of my bedroom.

      I jumped and turned to the wall.

     ‘What was that?’

     ‘Nothing. Just a squirrel, perhaps. They get into the roof at night.’

    For some reason I associated squirrels with winter; the frozen St James’ Park I’d walked through many times on my way to the West End when I lived in London. I’d never seen any squirrels in the grounds of the estate but then I’d never looked very hard, either.

    I reached for my dressing gown and threw it on the bed.

    ‘What is to become of your daughter?’

    ‘You have prepared her well. She is to go to school, Anne. But I’m sending her to the best one I know; it’s new, modern and with a progressive education ethos. It will not be anything like the way we were brought up.’

    ‘Good,’ I said. ‘I shall stay in touch with Sophie to make sure that happens,’ I smiled, feeling, in my nineteenth year, very grown up, almost my own person, finally. I was adult enough to know that the minute I left Thornton Hall, Sophie would no longer be my responsibility and she would forget me. She would grow up and move on as all children do; just as some adults, like her father, already had.

   I opened the door to my sitting room and went inside, expecting Nathanial to leave.     He lingered at the threshold.

  ‘I shall miss you, Anne.’

  ‘And I you,’ I said matter of factly. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I’m tired. I want to go to bed.’

   He was clearly reluctant to leave.

  ‘You have guests.’

   Nathanial paused.

   ‘Why do you have to leave?’ he asked.

   ‘Because you are getting married.’

   ‘Who told you this?’

   ‘The servants, Mrs Fairfax and everyone in the village says an announcement is imminent. They say traditionally your family places a notice in a London newspaper. I am staying until everything is settled with Sophie and then I’m leaving. I have applied for another job, closer to where I’m studying.’

   ‘But I don’t want you to leave.’

   ‘Well, I don’t care what you want. This is about what I want and I intend to go.’

   ‘Why Anne?’

    I was becoming frustrated, exhausted with all of these word games.

   ‘Because I don’t want to stay here, in the place where I have been happiest, in the place where I have felt loved only to become a shadow in the light of that vacuous woman.’

   ‘You mean Nicola Ingram?’

   ‘Yes, your fiancée.’

   ‘She is not my fiancée.’

   ‘Well, not yet.’

   ‘Not ever. Anne, if you were to leave me now, I don’t know if I’d survive. You have become as normal to me as every breath I take.’

   ‘Oh please, Nate. Those are the words to an old song I don’t wish to hear.’

    I walked over to my door.

    ‘Please leave now.’

    ‘Why?’

    ‘I am about to pack my things.’

    ‘Where are you going to go?’

    ‘I told you, I’m going to university. I aim to change my fate.’

   ‘Your fate is with me, I feel sure of it.’

   ‘As far as I know, the last time I read my employment contract, you didn’t own me. I have my own mind, obviously, and my own desires and I’ve decided to leave Thornton - earlier than I’d anticipated, it seems,’ I added, under my breath.

   I turned from him, knelt on the floor, pulled my suitcase out from under my bed and flung it open, just as he reached for me and also found himself kneeling beside me.

    He touched my face and turned it towards his own. There was a loud noise as the band started to rehearse in the drawing room downstairs. The sound of the drums and base made a heavy beat and the raucous, drink-fuelled conversations became louder, drowning out our muffled voices which were raised louder causing even more commotion. He held my shoulders in his hands and I was aware of the strength in his grasp. This did not dissuade me.

    ‘You are right, Anne. It is up to you to decide your destiny yet I feel if I say what I am about to, you will reject me; if I were to let you leave this house tonight  you would just as easily forget me.’

    ‘Forget you? Forget Sophie and this place I have called my home? You must be joking! I will never forget you.’

    This led to an unexpected moment.  

   He pulled me into him so that my thin, unloved body and his were breathing almost in the same moment, and he kissed me. A kiss as soft and sweet as a summer’s day, a kiss I’d long remember and one I’d thought about since the afternoon I’d met him in Hay Lane. It was a kiss I never thought I’d get. For the first time, I felt what I could only describe as, unearthly.

    My hands moved into his hair and his into mine. Before I knew it, I had completely lost control; lost control with a man who thought only enough of me to hide away with me in my room, to keep me a secret from his rich friends and the entire world. Suddenly I pushed him, gently, but he took no notice, leaning into me again, wanting me and I him.

   ‘Stop,’ I whispered, not knowing if this was the right step to take with him.

   ‘No,’ he said in return, ‘Not until you promise me something…’

   ‘Anything,’ I laughed.

   ‘Now you really can’t refuse,’ he moved off me so that we were separated for the first time in minutes. ‘Marry me, Anne. It is you I want. I know you are young but I want only you to be with me forever and for us to be a family.’

    I stopped smiling. He may as well have been speaking Italian. His words seemed to make almost zero sense.

   ‘Marry you? But... You want me as your wife? Have you thought about this? Have you honestly compared me to Nicola?’

    ‘Yes, and there is no comparison.’

    ‘Exactly. I have no money, I am not beautiful and I’ve never appeared in any of those society magazines that are flung all over your house.’

   ‘You are beautiful to me. Your face is the only one I want to see when I wake up in the morning. Besides, I don’t care, Anne. That stuff is not important. It is inconsequential.’

   ‘Inconsequential? In your world everyone is status obsessed.’

   ‘But I am not. All I want is you. And you are more than my equal, Anne; you are my better, in so many ways. I want to be worthy of you.’

   ‘I disagree,’ I said. ‘We are equals.’

   ‘Okay,’ he agreed, ‘equals.’

    ‘You would say anything just to sleep with a new girl.’

    ‘Anne, if that is all I wanted, I could pick up a girl in the village pub any night of the week.’

    It was true. A guy as hot and rich as him, was prey to many local women, to almost any woman. How did he know I was different? It was as if he could see into my mind. I could never marry a man, be with any man, just for money. I’d been broke before and I wasn’t afraid of it.

    What he said, in essence, was what I’d longed to hear. His words were more perfect to me than the music I’d constantly listened to in my many walks along Hay Lane. I looked at him in the near dark, loving him, totally. 

   ‘I’ve wanted to make it official for a long time but I thought you were too young to get involved with me. This decision decides your destiny; one that will make you a young mother; that will require you to stay with me and Sophie and be a family.’

    A family... I longed to be part of one; my own, although I’d never put my feelings into words; I longed to be part of his world; I was speechless; this moment had to be a farce.

    ‘But what of Nicola?’ I asked, almost trancelike.

    ‘Nicola is nothing to me, she’s a girl I’ve known for years; we got together a few times at her instigation and she’s dated half of London as well. She’s more interested in becoming famous and being in magazines than me. And could you imagine her influence on Sophie? She likes children even less than I do,’ he joked. ‘Besides, neither of us are together for the right reasons. Her family want us to form a property alliance; that is all. She’ll forget me and move on. I heard she already has her eye on some guy in the village. Nicola is no hindrance to our union.’

    Those words should have given me a clue, but I did not want to listen to my head.

    ‘I want to marry you, Anne. I love you. I want us to be what we lack. Together we would be a family. Together we would know love.’

   Know love? It sounded deeply seductive, almost as seductive as the look in his eyes.

   ‘Are you serious? Is this a joke?’

   ‘Of course, I mean, of course I am serious. To prove it we should not sleep together until its official.

    ‘Oh, so you’re assuming I’d let you stay tonight?’

    ‘Not at all, I just want you to know I’m completely serious.’

     Still, I could not believe him.

    ‘This is not a joke. I love you Anne Eyre. Will you marry me?’   

    ‘Yes,’ I said quietly, ‘I will marry you Nathanial Rochester.’

    He covered me with kisses until I kissed him in return and I would not have stopped but for the fact that he did. I looked up, following his gaze. There was a shadow at my partially closed door and before Rochester left the room, I heard a creak in the floorboards and saw movement in the distance.