Thornfield Hall Read online

  ‘Why did Bertha suddenly attack him? It happened as soon as I said his name. She’s not the world’s best reader but she obviously recognized it on the bill. She must have heard the family name before.’

  ‘We don’t use the name much. You call him the master, most of the time. Or worse. My master. I have nothing to do with him.’ Grace tossed her head and looked very smug when she said this. It is easy for people who have a generous salary and a son to help them in their old age to act so independent and haughty.

  ‘Old John thinks there must be bad blood between her and Mr Rochester. Something shocking in the past. Has Bertha said anything?’

  ‘She has said plenty. I couldn’t stop her raving about him. It poured out of her, with plenty more choice words that a lady like you wouldn’t understand.’

  ‘What sort of thing is she saying?’

  ‘Mr Rochester kidnapped her. He locked her up on his ship. He drove her mother to her death. He stole her father’s money. According to our Bertha he’s done enough to get his neck stretched at the next assizes.’ Grace ticked each crime off on her fingers as she spoke.

  ‘But there must be a germ of truth in there. Something that stays Mr Rochester’s hand. He does not suffer fools gladly. You would expect him to have a major rage, a huge attack of temper. Something stopped him. There’s something more he wants to keep hidden than her presence in his house. That’s why he went away in a hurry. He made us swear to keep her identity secret. We call her Bertha. Bertha who? There’s one of the Rochester secrets at the heart of this. The Rochesters love secrets.’

  ‘O yes, they’ve got a secret, one great big secret.’ Grace paused to add drama to her announcement. ‘Bertha claims that she is Bertha Rochester. Says she’s married to him. That she is his wife.’

  I did a most unladylike thing. I gulped. A huge mouthful of air made its way into my mouth and down my gullet. I felt it travel like a rolling ball down inside my stays. Grace gave her harsh laugh. ‘I thought that would give you a turn.’ She appeared to enjoy my embarrassment more than was strictly necessary.

  It was some time before I found my voice. ‘Do you believe her?’

  ‘If I believed everything my patients told me…’

  ‘It’s true that the master went to Jamaica as a young man. There was never a word about his marrying.’ My voice trailed away as I recalled that news about Mr Edward had never been forthcoming from his father and brother. Enquiries about his health or his whereabouts had been abruptly discouraged. There was one slender piece of evidence to support Bertha’s claims. ‘She wears a wedding ring.’

  ‘True. So do I.’ Grace waved her left hand in my face. But you’d be hard put to it to find a Mr Poole. The Mrs is a courtesy title. I wear the ring to avoid impertinent questions. I put it on myself when I moved to Yorkshire.’

  ‘You are not from these parts?’

  ‘No. I am from further north. I came here when my son was born. That’s how I know the word “husband” has many different meanings.’

  I waited in case she would tell me more about herself; she did not take the opportunity so I returned to the subject of Bertha and her claim. ‘Just imagine for a moment that what she says is true and she is indeed Mrs Rochester. Then she is the mistress of this house. She should be in the drawing room, receiving visitors, ordering the dinners, sleeping in the big bedroom. I should be taking orders from her!’

  For a moment we were silent as we considered the alarming prospect of Bertha being in charge of us, rather than of our looking after Bertha.

  ‘In a good spell she might be able to manage.’ Grace was judicious. ‘She would need a lot of help. There’d still be work for you and me.’

  ‘It can’t be true,’ I told Grace with confidence. ‘Mr Rochester has made it clear that she is nothing to him. His father and brother never announced his marriage. That’s not the kind of thing you keep secret. The master does not admit to having a wife and he certainly does not acknowledge that Bertha is his wife. How can he keep her in the same house as if she is a stranger?’

  ‘Lots of married folk do exactly that. It’s how they manage when they dislike each other. He treats her the same way many men treat the wives they no longer want.’

  ‘Never. He has not spoken her name or acknowledged her existence. What kind of a husband does that?’

  ‘A husband who hates his wife and yet cannot be free of her. He keeps her locked away and pretends she does not exist. A man can do that with a wife. Ask my son. He knows. The law can stop a man who mistreats his maidservant or his mother but it cannot and will not stop him ill-treating his wife.’

  I did not have enough knowledge of the law to dispute with Grace but I assured her with some warmth that my brief experience of marriage had not been of obedient slavery to a capricious master. Marriage had opened the door of a cage for me. I had been glad to escape from the many rules for good behaviour imposed upon me by my mother, who was obsessed by the notion of gentility.

  ‘We do not have any proof. Just the word of a woman who is generally regarded as mad,’ Grace admitted. A broad smile broke out on her naturally stern-looking face. ‘I’ve just remembered. I saved the best till the last. Bertha claims that she had a baby.’

  ‘That does tend to happen if people get married.’ I contrived to look demure and innocent as I spoke. Although I count Grace as my closest friend I wanted to pay her back for the unladylike gulp she had shocked out of me.

  ‘Pshaw!’ She waved a dismissive hand. ‘Not just an ordinary baby. A black baby!’

  ‘Now that I do not believe. She really is making it up. And just where is this unlikely baby?’

  ‘It seems it died.’

  That silenced me.

  THE HONOURABLE BLANCHE INGRAM

  1827

  IN THE ABSENCE OF OUR MASTER TRANQUILLITY soon returned to Thornfield Hall. Our routine was strenuous – we worked long hours – but we worked with good hearts and were free from anxiety. We were all skilled in our trades and worked to a high standard. Criticisms and quarrels were few. Old John grumbled that he had too many hunters in the stables and no one to ride out on them. In truth he loved to see the heads of the bright-eyed creatures gazing out of every stall. The new grooms managed to exercise them without breaking their legs – the horses’ legs, that is. Old John had no care for the grooms’ legs. On occasions Mary cooked for us some of the delicious recipes that Monsieur Alphonse had shared with her. Just to keep her hand in, she said, in case there should be another big dinner. Leah and John were beginning to look at each other with big moony eyes and Sam was busy building a model of Nelson’s Victory no more than six inches high. All was harmony in the servants’ hall.

  Matters were as satisfactory on the third floor. Bertha had returned to her usual state of placid indifference to her surroundings. She ate her meals and went to her bed as Grace directed her. In between she gazed at the sky, smiled at Leah or me when we came to sew in the afternoons and said very little. In all she was the most undemanding presence it was possible to imagine.

  We spent companionable evenings by the fire in my room. Grace had her pint of porter and her pipe. I had my knitting. Bertha would be busy checking the sums in my accounts. This was an activity that absorbed her completely. She would crouch silently over her task, the tip of her tongue protruding through her teeth, and she would work with great concentration. She worked quickly and carefully and never made any mistakes.

  We heard no more from her about being married to our master. The name of Rochester never passed her lips and in view of the kerfuffle it had caused previously we avoided using the master’s name in her hearing. An ordinary person needs a reason to throttle a man when he is sitting quietly by his fireside. But, as Grace says, the mad do not work like that. I thrust the thought that Bertha might be Mrs Rochester to the bottom of my mind and bid it stay there.

  In this way the months ticked by happily until the autumn. The trees were bare when the letter arrived from Mr Rochester. To m
y surprise he gave warning of a visit. Perhaps Bertha’s attack on him in the library had persuaded him that arriving unannounced was a little unwise. Not only did his letter surprise me, it also caused me considerable dismay, as I foresaw much labour and many responsibilities ahead of me. He planned to hold a great ball at Thornfield Hall at Christmas and to invite the hunt to meet at Thornfield on Boxing Day. I was pretty confident that the hunt master would oblige him by accepting his invitation.

  The previous hunt dinner had set a standard that would be difficult to repeat and this time we had no Monsieur Alphonse to help us. I had set a brisk pace of work all year and so we were all on top of our routine tasks. The store cupboard was full and the house was clean and the bedding mended. Well done me, I thought, and braced myself for a busy few weeks.

  Once again I raided The George at Millcote for extra men-servants. They willingly agreed to leave their meagre festivities at home to come and wait table at Thornfield Hall; they knew they would feast royally on our leftovers. With much laughter they mimed scrubbing their fingernails and standing with their hands folded in front of them, their faces a careful blank; Monsieur Alphonse’s training had not been forgotten. With Mary’s help I wrote lists for the grocer, ordering everything from arrowroot to vinegar. The butcher, after much thought, put rings with my name on four great geese and a fine young black bullock. I felt sad as I watched him trot away unaware that his days were numbered, but I was confident about my arrangements for the food and its service.

  The table decorations caused me much heart-searching. I really missed Monsieur Alphonse. He would have found a stunning way of decorating the buffet table with the dull evergreens, the ivy, holly and branches of fir that were all that was available to us in winter. The gardener shook his head sadly when I asked for flowers. ‘Too late now,’ he told me, ‘even if we heat the glasshouse from now till Christmas.’

  My other problem was Bertha. Grace and I talked it over. Should we warn her Mr Rochester was coming? Should we say nothing? Could we turn the key in the lock and keep her on the third floor? I am ashamed to say the thought of the chain went through my mind but I quickly dismissed it. Better that Mr Rochester be savaged on his hearthrug than we should resort to restraining the poor creature with manacles. The more we struggled to find ways to keep her away from Mr Rochester the more insoluble the problem seemed.

  In the end it was Bertha who decided matters; we had underestimated both the sharpness of her ears and of her understanding. She had picked up the gist of our whispered consultations and had come to her own conclusion. When she heard me lamenting my lack of inspiration for decorating the table she announced that she would undertake the task.

  ‘I make flowers. My mother taught me.’ She mimed curling petals in her fingers and twisting them together to make a stem. With a flourish she presented me with an imaginary flower. ‘In Jamaica we wear them in our hats when we go to church. Red. Pink. Yellow. Not black like here.’

  I demurred. It felt rash to entrust such an important feature of the entertainment to a woman whose wits wandered. It was Grace who came up with the solution.

  ‘Let Bertha make one. If you like it she can make more.’

  Within the day Bertha produced a red rose bud fashioned from scraps of silk but so lifelike you wanted to put it in water to give it a chance to open. I complimented her on her handiwork and asked what materials she would need to make enough to decorate the dining tables.

  ‘Coloured silk, gold thread.’ She started to count off on her fingers the things she would need. ‘Starch, glue.’ When she came to the end of her list, she stopped and started as if there was something she wanted to say, something she found difficult. Her big hands flapped in the air as she struggled for the words. ‘These flowers. For Mr Rochester’s tables?’

  Grace and I froze at the name. Bertha’s mouth twisted and for a moment I thought she was going to spit out the words ‘my husband’. It was a relief when she went calmly on.

  ‘I hear you whisper. Sometimes I not well but my ears work.’ She cupped her hands on the sides of her head. ‘Mr Rochester come. I stay up here. He take no notice of me. I take no notice of him.’

  As Grace said afterwards, you can’t say fairer than that. On the surface it appeared our problems were over. In my heart I was not convinced. It was all too glib and easy.

  The short days of December rushed past with unaccustomed haste. All was busyness and bustle at Thornfield Hall. From the number of letters and notes that arrived from my master I realized that the Christmas ball had a special importance for him. My heart went out to the stagecoach drivers who had ploughed through the rain and snow to bring us the post from London.

  A great packet arrived with the invitations. I recognized Mr Rochester’s handwriting; he had written the names himself. I was curious to know why he had chosen to exert himself on this particular task and rifled through the envelopes in search of clues. I could see no unexpected name among them. They were all to the usual county families.

  I handed the letters out to Sam and John to be delivered. John, a farm boy, was pleased to have the chance to ride a horse, but Sam was less keen. Old John was even less eager to trust him with one of his precious horses. ‘Go gentle on his mouth,’ he told Sam. ‘Sailors’ hands,’ he muttered to me in explanation. ‘All they’s good for is heaving on ropes.’

  ‘The Ingrams are coming and the Eshtons,’ Sam announced on his return. He made a pantomime of rubbing the nether parts of his anatomy and walking stiff-legged for a bit. ‘Ingram Hall is as unfriendly as ever. You’d think they’d invite me in for a bit of a warm by the kitchen fire. Not leave me to wait in the chilly entrance hall while they write their reply.’

  I sympathized with Sam and enjoyed a moment of smugness; Thornfield Hall would always provide a better welcome to servants going about their masters’ business. They would be offered a warm by the range and food and drink.

  ‘I reckon it’s that Miss Blanche is the reason for all this Christmas party. She came and gave me a haughty stare as I waited. Word is she is just back from a London season. She is very striking on the eye.’

  ‘You don’t think…’ The thought died in my mouth. I did not finish the sentence. Sam did it for me.

  ‘That Mr Rochester has a fancy for her as a wife. Could be. It’s not unusual for a man to want a wife and he can certainly afford one. The Ingrams’ estate adjoins the Rochesters’ land. It’s entailed but you never know. Baronets don’t always make old bones. The Rochesters must’ve got most of their land by marrying their neighbours.’

  It did not take long for Sam’s speculation to travel round all the servants. It added extra spice to the preparations for the Christmas party. Grace said nothing but I knew that she was thinking the same as I did. It niggled away in my mind. What if by some amazing circumstance Bertha’s claim to be Mrs Rochester were true?

  There were nearly fifty guests at the Christmas ball. They arrived with their horses and their coachmen and their valets and their maids. They were sleeping three in a bed in the servants’ quarters. You have never seen such a quantity of food eaten. It arrived in cartloads in the morning and by evening it was all gone.

  Martha, my old bête noire, arrived under the guise of lady’s maid to the Honourable Blanche Ingram. True to form she bragged and boasted to the rest of us about her high status in the Ingram household and how wonderful it was to work for the aristocracy, people with titles. I congratulated her on her success and annoyed her by taking all the credit for myself. ‘Aren’t you pleased you took my advice and looked for better employment?’ I asked her. We were in the kitchen where the table was piled high with provisions and the air was full of busy bustle and the happy chatter of our staff. Martha gave me a scowl. I knew that matters were not so comfortable below stairs at Ingram Hall. Then the bell rang and the flag on the board went up to show someone had pulled the bell cord in the East bedroom. ‘That’s your lady,’ I told her and watched to be sure she answered the summons.
/>   As is the custom I entertained the senior upper servants to meals in my room. Baroness Ingram’s lady’s maid, a French lady with a very high opinion of herself, was quick to take me aside with what she described as a friendly word of warning. Martha, she informed me, was not really a lady’s maid. She was one of the parlour maids and therefore should not be admitted to my room but should eat in the servants’ hall with the rest of the lower orders. If the French maid thought this was the action of a friend I should not like to have her as my enemy.

  The baroness, she explained, had temporarily promoted Martha to oblige her elder daughter. The Honourable Blanche did not wish to be seen to arrive without her own maid. Martha was to pretend to be Blanche’s maid; she was to go up the stairs to Blanche’s room when the dressing bell rang. Once there she was to occupy herself by tidying the room until the French lady arrived. It was ‘absolument interdit’ for Martha to touch Blanche’s hair or her dress. ‘On pain of punishment,’ the French lady added and gave me a knowing smirk. ‘She has a rare temper on her, has the young lady Blanche. Even her mother is frightened of her. And the rage of the old baroness is something formidable.’

  For once in my life I tried to be kind to Martha. The memory of this small act comforts me when I am reminded of all the terrible things that happened to her later. I asked Leah to convince Martha that all her old friends at Thornfield Hall were eager to see her and keen to hear her news. They wanted her to dine with them in the servants’ hall, and not ‘with that hoity toity lot in the housekeeper’s room’. Martha was persuaded and so she spent a few happy evenings in praising the frosty grandeur of Ingram Park while enjoying the warmth, comfort and good food of Thornfield Hall. I envied her as I sat in my tiny room, surrounded by the so-called cream of the servant class. I soon grew weary of their talk of Sir This, Earl That and Viscount What’s-his-name. It made me grateful that my master was plain Mr Rochester.