Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë (35 page)

Slade drew me forward. “May I introduce Captain Francis Arnold. He and I served together in the East India Company army.”

“He saved my life during a brawl in a tavern in Lisbon.” Captain Arnold touched his scarred cheek. He bowed to me, said, “It's an honor to make your acquaintance, um—?” and looked questioningly at Slade.

Slade swallowed. “This is my wife, Charlotte.” He seemed as abashed as I felt. To appear before strangers as a married couple was one thing; to lie to a friend was embarrassing; but the truth about our lack of a legal relationship would have disgraced me worse.

“Your wife, eh?” Captain Arnold punched Slade's shoulder. “Well done, man! My congratulations. I never thought you'd settle down. You did right to wait. You've found yourself a lovely woman.” He smiled at me.

I blushed hotly.

“What brings you here, Slade?” Captain Arnold said. “Are you taking your bride on a tour of your old comrades in hell-raising?”

“I need a favor,” Slade said.

“Just ask.”

“We need to go to Cherbourg. Can you take us?”

“I'd be glad to, but why not take the packet? It would be much more comfortable for your wife.”

“We've run into some trouble. We can't leave England in the usual manner.”

Captain Arnold asked no questions. “I can get you to Cherbourg.” Later Slade told me that Arnold had a sideline: he smuggled people out of countries in which they had enemies after them or were wanted by the law. “There's just one problem. Business hasn't been good lately. The big ships undercut the small operators like me. I don't have the money to take my ship out without payment up front.”

He and Slade put their heads together and figured the cost of the journey. The price they settled on would use up almost all the money Lord Palmerston had given me. How Slade and I would manage later, I knew not; but we paid, gladly. We were on our way to France, and that was all that mattered.

C
APTAIN ARNOLD LED US UP THE
GIPSY
'S GANGPLANK. THE Jamaican carried our bags aboard. He and the lascar crewmen wore sharp knives. They were alien and frightening. As we went below deck, Captain Arnold said, “You'll have to hide down here while we travel out of England. I apologize for the accommodations. They aren't very pleasant.”

That was the understatement of the century. The room was a compartment inside the empty cargo hold, its door a panel cleverly designed to look like part of a solid wall. Not much larger than a closet, it smelled of the tea, spices, coffee, and wool that the ship had carried. It contained a washstand and basin, a chamber pot—and a single mattress covered with an old blanket. I tried to hide my dismay.

“I've slept in worse places,” Slade said, affecting a light tone. “And my wife can put up with it for a short time.”

“I'll leave you to settle in, then,” Captain Arnold said, “while I get the ship ready for the journey.”

Alone, we stood in awkward silence on either side of the bed, which nearly covered the grimy floor. Slade said, “We'll take turns sleeping. You can have yours first. I'll go up and help Captain Arnold.”

Hidden behind the sliding panel, I felt as if I'd been sealed into my coffin. I examined the bed, which smelled stale, as if it had been used by people who didn't wash. I spread the shawl Kate had lent me over it before I lay down. Exhausted, I promptly fell asleep.

I dreamed that I was hurrying through the criminal lunatics' ward in Bedlam. I carried the dying Oliver Heald cradled in my arms. Drenched with blood, he looked up at me, smiled a ghastly smile, and said, “Anything for my favorite author.” Ellen Nussey and Arthur Nicholls trailed us, arguing about whether I had gone mad and should be committed. Julia Garrs stood by an open door and beckoned me. Entering, I found Niall Kavanagh's secret laboratory. The mutilated corpses of three women hung from hooks like sides of beef. They sizzled in the fire that Lord Eastbourne had set. I lay strapped to a table. Gas hissed as Wilhelm Stieber bent over me, fixed clamps around my head, and turned the crank on his torture machine. A jolt of lightning seared my mind and ignited the gas in a white, thunderous, rattling explosion.

I awakened with a scream caught in my throat. I sat up, and the nightmare faded, but the rattling continued. The panel opened, and Slade entered the compartment. He carried a tray laden with bread, cold meat, and cheese, a teapot and cup. “I've brought your dinner.”

“What's that noise?” I said.

“They're hauling up the anchor.” Slade set down the tray and crouched beside me. “What's the matter?”

“Just a bad dream. What time is it?”

“About ten o'clock at night.”

I'd slept the whole day. Now I heard the
Gipsy
's steam engines roar. The ship began to move, plowing through the river. In spite of my nightmare, I felt refreshed and alert; dreaming often purges the emotions. I realized, more clearly than before, what had happened.

I was no longer Charlotte Brontë, the respectable spinster daughter of Haworth's vicar, or Currer Bell, the toast of literary London. I was a fugitive on the run, a criminal in the eyes of the law. Cut off from society, from my friends and family, I was leaving my homeland, perhaps for good. Surely I would never write another book. My name would sink into infamy, then obscurity. Yet I didn't collapse into tears and sickness and utter helplessness as I had at other times when disaster struck. I felt as if a storm had swept through my life, cleared everything away, and left me calm. If the worst had already happened, what more had I to fear?

I didn't foresee the dangers that lay ahead. I had a sense of lightness, a great relief despite my sorrow. I felt more alive than I ever had. Suddenly I was famished. I gobbled the food that Slade had brought. It seemed the best I'd ever tasted. But when I'd finished eating, how alarmed I was by Slade's appearance! He was unshaven, his clothes dirty from working on the ship, the skin under his eyes shadowed. He looked tired to death.

“When will we be at sea?” I asked.

“Early tomorrow morning.”

“Then you'd better sit down. You'll be more comfortable.”

Slade reluctantly eased himself onto the bed and sat beside me. Neither of us spoke as the paddlewheels churned and the ship steamed down the Thames. After a while I felt him relax: he'd fallen asleep.

When one is in love, each new discovery about the beloved is miraculous. I'd never seen Slade sleeping, and I gazed upon him with fascination. Slumber erased his usual guarded expression, drained the tension from his muscles. He looked young, innocent, and vulnerable. My desire to touch his face had nothing to do with lust. I felt a new, purer affection toward Slade. Yet it was wrong for me to be in bed with a man to whom I wasn't married.

That undercut my happiness only for an instant. Ideas I'd never entertained before argued with my sense of propriety. Who said I was doing wrong? Society did. But society had already turned against me because it believed I'd broken the rules. Why should I be obligated to obey them any longer? Why hold myself to society's standards of honor? I experienced an elating sensation of recklessness. Perhaps I was now free to live as I pleased.

During our journey down the river, troops stopped and boarded the
Gipsy
. I remained calm as they tramped through the ship. Slade slept on, and I didn't wake him when I heard them outside our compartment. I fancied myself his protector. When they were gone, I congratulated myself on my newfound bravery. Little did I know how severely it would soon be tested.

Hours passed. The engines began to roar at full throttle. A rapping on the panel awakened Slade. Captain Arnold called, “You can come out now.”

As we emerged up on the deck, my eyes were dazzled by the sun, a brilliant beacon that had just risen above the horizon where sky met ocean. The sea was calm, colored violet, rippled like shirred silk. The coast of England was a mere smudge behind us, France not yet visible in the distance. Other ships rode the waters, but none near. The
Gipsy
blazed a steady course, paddlewheels splashing, smoke billowing from her stacks. The light had a strange, animated quality; it glinted and danced; whatever it touched shimmered with radiance. I was conscious of each breath of fresh salt air that swelled my lungs, of my heart's rhythm, of the blood swiftly flowing in my veins—and of Slade, who stood in the bow beside me.

I exclaimed, “We've lived to see another day, and I am truly thankful!”

“As am I,” Slade said. “Better alive than dead, has always been my philosophy.” Sleep had knit the raveled fabric of his health; his color was good. But the eyes he turned to me were clouded by dark thoughts. “Now that we have a moment's leisure, I must tell you how sorry I am for involving you in such bad business.”

I couldn't let him shoulder the entire weight of guilt. “It was my own choice to become involved.” I could have walked away from him in Bedlam, and I had not. That I had pursued him was wholly my fault.

“I'm not talking about what's happened these past two weeks,” Slade said. “I mean the first time I saw you three years ago, when I struck up an acquaintance with you to further the investigation I was conducting. It was selfish of me. I should have left you alone.”

“Do you regret knowing me?” I said, hurt by the idea.

Slade said with passion, “Never! My only regret is that you must regret knowing me, and that I have destroyed your love for me and ruined your life. I promise to make things right for you and set you free of me.”

“But I don't!” My passion more than equaled his. “You haven't! To be free of you is not what I want!”

Incomprehension rendered his face blank. “But when we were at the laboratory, you indicated that you didn't want anything to do with me except to find Niall Kavanagh and get us out of trouble.”

“I didn't mean to.” Now was the time to correct his mistake under which I'd allowed him to labor because I couldn't express myself honestly. “I'm in love with you still. That's why I'm here.” Slade's company was as important to me as finding Niall Kavanagh and saving England. “I wanted to be with you then. I do now.”

Slade shook his head. Gladness tugged his mouth into a smile even as he frowned in disbelief. “Can this be true? Surely I hear you wrong.”

I hurried to sweep away his conviction that he was a pariah and that I thought myself too good for him. “I didn't declare my feelings for you because they seemed so hopeless. But things have changed.”

“Not all things. There's still blood on my hands. I'm still a fugitive.”

“So am I.” I endeavored to share the thoughts I'd had while he was sleeping. “We've gone beyond ordinary law and morality. The past is over; we can only go forward. And if I am to be alone in the world but for one companion, I thank Heaven that my companion is you.” This was the most fervent, unguarded, and audacious speech I'd ever made to a man; yet I felt neither hesitation nor shame. Some force within me had overpowered the shy, convention-bound woman I once was. I flung my arms open wide. “I will be with you on any terms.”

Slade leaned back from me, alarmed. “You are too generous.”

“It isn't generosity that compels me, it is pure selfishness. I want you. I mean to have you if you still want me.” Even though my brazenness astonished me, I said, “Whatever time I have left on this earth, I want us to live it to the fullest together, and if you refuse me this, then God damn you, John Slade!”

I was shocked by my profanity, and further shocked when Slade threw back his head and let loose a boisterous laugh that carried across the water. “Well spoken for a parson's daughter, Charlotte Brontë! You've just made me the happiest man alive!”

He lifted me off my feet and spun around. I laughed, too, with the same joyous, reckless abandon. Sea and sky whirled past me. Giddy and lightheaded, I exulted. Then Slade's expression sobered. He stopped whirling and lowered me to the deck. I felt the smile vanish from my face. The sun struck his at an angle so that all the light of the day seemed to emanate from his eyes. Never had I so wanted him to kiss me; but he did not. Instead, we gazed at each other in full, awed realization of the pact we'd made. I heard myself utter words I'd never imagined speaking.

“I don't care if we can't marry. I'll be your wife in fact if not in name or law.”

I was dizzied by the thought of the physical intimacy that my proposition implied. Slade was visibly shaken by the heat that flared between us. Then his eyes crinkled with sly humor. “I'm pleased to tell you that the sacrifice of your virtue won't be necessary.”