Mr. Rochester by Sarah Shoemaker (30)

Richard stayed for a few more uncomfortable days before returning to Madeira, and life returned to its usual rhythm at Valley View, with me at the helm. And then, in late July, I received a letter from England. I did not recognize the hand; it was not my father’s. I took it from the girl and opened it as I walked toward my desk, but the first line of it startled me into stillness.

I stood stock-still for some moments, dumbfounded, a sound like the rush of wind in my ears. I cannot even recall the thoughts that ran through my head, and it is difficult now to say what stunned me most: that my father had died or that I was his sole heir. Where was Rowland? If something had happened to him, why had my father not informed me? And, when I got past all that: my father’s estate had fallen to me? What, exactly, did that mean for me? For my future? My God, for my whole life?

Within an hour of reading the letter from Mr. Everson, I found myself riding madly toward Spanish Town, as if to escape from—or catch up with—my own future. I had thought that my future lay forever in Jamaica; now, with this single letter, everything had changed. Over the years, the town house had become a refuge for me, and I had made it my own. There were not just law and tax books, as in my father’s day; now there were histories and travel books, novels, and even poetry. There was a globe in the study and maps on the walls. I could not be at Valley View without Bertha remaining at the back of my mind, a burden I was unable to ever fully set down. But in Spanish Town I felt more free. And now; now I needed space to think. My father dead: I still could not comprehend it. I wished, not for the first time, that Mr. Wilson were still alive, that I could go to him for advice, for the comfort of his wisdom, he who had been so much more of a father to me than my own had ever been.

At the town house, Sukey had been in her room, I suppose, but she always came at the sound of my hand on the latch, unless she was otherwise fully occupied. This time she stopped and took a step back immediately when she saw me. I must have looked wild with anguish or despair or at least confusion.

“What is it?” she asked. “Has she—”

“My father has died,” I blurted, and her face turned suddenly as still as stone. I cursed myself, for in my own shock and confusion I had momentarily forgotten her connection with him. “I am very sorry,” I said. “It has been a shock.” What else could I say?

She took another step back and put a hand to her cheek, almost as if I had slapped her. “And I am sorry for you,” she responded.

I came closer and put my hands on her shoulders, and I felt a shudder run through her, and finally a quieting and a deep breath, and she gazed up at me.

She was only a few years older than I and she had been kind to me since the day I had arrived, and at that moment I felt certain we both needed someone to hold, so I held her. We stood there together in the hall, and it would have been an easy thing to do whatever I chose, and I could have, for she was mine. But I would not. If for no other reason: she had been my father’s; I could never.

I remained in Spanish Town for nearly a week, and in that remove I was able to take a close look at my life, at what it had been and what it could become, nearly overwhelmed by what might be opening to me. I wrote to Everson immediately, requesting more information on what had happened to Rowland, and a more thorough accounting of the estate and its buildings—did it contain Thornfield-Hall? It must. And what part of it was under management? It was strange to me, to lose my father and brother at the same time, at least in the same letter, and stranger still to think that I might be able to live, again, at Thornfield one day, perhaps even soon.

Thinking back, the choice appears easy, but at the time, it was the furthest thing from obvious. I had a life in Jamaica—if one could call it that—but, yes, it was a life, and in fact a good one in many ways. I had as many responsibilities—and opportunities—on the estate as I chose to pursue, and I had the respect of my neighbors. I had a good friend and overseer in Osmon, despite that many of my equals thought he was beneath me. It was true my wife was no companion and never would be, and I could never bring her into company, but there could be worse burdens for a man to bear.

Still—was Thornfield mine? Mine? Were the fields and the woods and the moors that I had once wandered and loved now mine?

But I had made a pledge—a promise—to God, and to Jonas, to keep Bertha as my wife, never to abandon her. God knew, she was not my wife in any sense but the legal and the moral, and never would be again, but neither could I abandon her. Given that, what kind life could I have there? What kind of life could I have in either place?

On my return to Valley View, I took a walk in the orchard, the one place on the estate in which I felt true peace. In the evening breeze the avocado leaves brushed against one another in a soothing rhythm and a nearby parrot screeched into the night. The citrus scents of oranges and lemons surrounded me, and I closed my eyes and imagined myself at Thornfield—would that it were so easy to transport oneself from one place to another, with no cares and no responsibilities. After a time, I rose and went to the house and drank a mug of grog and another and another, and I finally managed to find my way to my own bed and fell into a deep sleep.

I dreamed of Bertha, of her setting the cane fields afire, of her attacking me with a machete, of her tormented screams that went on and on, until I woke and realized it truly was her screaming—as she did often enough in the night hours—and I rose, still half-drugged with sleep and overpowered with a sense of hopelessness. I could choose either Valley View or Thornfield; it made no difference: I would always be burdened with a mad wife.

I opened the jalousied window further, expecting a rush of cooler air, but it was a steamy Jamaican night, the beginning of the hurricane season. The moon was setting bloodred in the west, half-covered with clouds; mosquitoes flew into the room, surrounding me with their maddening whines. Bertha—two rooms away—still screamed curses at me, at her father, at God, at whomever or whatever she could imagine. What kind of life is this? I asked myself. It is hell. She is as sound of body as she is unsound of mind. She will live for years and years, and I will have to endure it all. I suddenly felt I could not. I could not go on living in that hell, and I wished I had not talked Richard out of a duel, wished I had stood before him and let him shoot me as many times as it would take for him to find the target and kill me. For I felt, at that moment, that only death would relieve me of a burden that had become too heavy to bear.

I pulled a little trunk from under my bed and unlocked it and took out the case with the loaded pistols. I had placed it there after Richard had left, for safekeeping. Now I lifted one, heavier than I would have thought, and I held it in my hand for a time, thinking how easy it would be. I put it to my temple. So easy.

But then a breeze came and brought with it a rainstorm. The skies opened and rain poured down, cleansing the air. I closed the window, pistol still in hand, and watched the rain pelt against the casement. As quickly as it had come, the storm was gone, moving off to the west. I opened the window again and the air felt purer, and with it came a new sensibility. I laid the pistol back into its box and locked it away.

I left the house then, my mind already working, and I strolled across the wet grass to the orchard, where I walked again among the trees. A sweet breath of wind from Europe was on my face. I could sense the thunder of the distant Atlantic against the shore and my heart swelled within me. There is a way, I thought. There has to be a way. If I must, I will take Bertha with me. She can be cared for as well at Thornfield as she is here. For England—Thornfield—pulled on me, now that I knew it could be mine, was mine.

In the morning, I doubted my decision. How could I do such a thing? Did I not have a good life at Valley View? How in God’s name would I make a life for Bertha at Thornfield? But my heart had already fled there, and I slowly came to understand it fully: Thornfield-Hall had always been my home in ways that Valley View had never, and would never, become.

In the following weeks, as I anxiously waited for Everson’s response, I shared with Osmon my situation. It was only fair that he should know, since he would have full management responsibility if I returned to England. We had often spoken of the future of Jamaica and the life we led. He was a keen reader of history. “Men wait and watch and take advantage when they can,” he said one evening. “It will be no different when the negroes finally rise.”

“Then why do you stay?” I asked him.

“Because I, too, seek my best interest,” he answered. “I am closer to the negroes than you are. I can sense the tension. But in the meantime I am saving money. When the sugar estates are gone, opportunities will come to the men who have the experience and the funds in hand.”

“How soon do you think it will be?” I asked.

He gazed absently at the cigar in his hand. “Who knows?” he said, turning away and staring out over the cane fields. “You will be lucky if it’s another eight or ten years,” he murmured.

“And what then?”

“God knows,” he said.

God knows, I thought. “Are there rumors of an uprising?”

“There are always rumors,” he responded.

“But still you stay.”

“I am a single man.”

I nodded. He was alone in the world, with no wife or children or possessions other than the savings he had accumulated. But I; I had Bertha. And Bertha would go nowhere without Molly and Molly would go nowhere without her Tiso.

He rose finally, bade me good night, and made his way to his cottage, but I sat for a time by myself on the veranda, wondering how it would come. In the distance I could smell the remainders of the cooking fires from the negro quarters. If they rose in rebellion, would it be on a quiet night like this? Or would it be later in the year, when the rains came every day and sometimes the wind whipped trees back and forth and the sea rose in a fury that damaged boats and buildings alike? Or would they wait until winter, when the weather was calm and dry and the fields would burn more easily? Or would they plan it at all—would they simply rise at the least expected moment and for no reason, like Bertha, lash out in a passion that could not be sated until all was destroyed? And perhaps not even then.