“Your regard: and if I give you mine in return, that debt will be quit.”
“Well,” I responded, “for cool native impudence, and pure innate pride, you haven’t your equal.” I shall say this for her: certainly, unlike some women, her view of marriage was not dictated by the fanciful romantic vision of a Jane Austen novel.
As we were approaching Thornfield, I asked her to dine with me that evening, for she had not yet done so in all the past months. But she declined, for, as she insisted, she had come to Thornfield a governess and she was determined to remain so until the day of our wedding.
I gazed at her, sitting primly beside me, her hands folded in her lap.She is a puzzle,I thought;she is a puzzle to be unwrapped one piece at a time until she is completely revealed. Well, then, so be it,I said to myself.I will have the rest of my life to discover my Jane.Difficult, contradictory, maddening as she might be, she was my whole world, almost my hope of heaven.
But if she could be difficult, so could I; and as soon as I had a chance, I ordered the finest wedding veil to be had to grace Jane’s head.
Chapter 21
Ihad not seen Gerald for some time after our fight, and I can’t say it disappointed me, for I didn’t care if I never saw him again. In less than four weeks’ time I would have my annulment, and Gerald would press his case to have the courts declare him Thornfield’s legal heir. And Jane and I? Jane and I would find ourselves in an entirely different life. We would be without Thornfield, but we would have each other, and I believed it would be bliss. Perhaps I would buy her a school while I had the means, for I knew she had always wanted her own school. It would not be one like Mr. Lincoln’s, but it would be a place where young ladies would be educated to be independent. In the meantime, my time at Thornfield was bittersweet. At least, I realized, it was not necessary now to move Bertha, for with Gerald taking over at Thornfield, she could remain in the only place she had known for years.
Shortly before the wedding, I went to Millcote for a meeting with Everson on some other business, but while I was there Everson brought up the question of the inheritance, urging me to protect myself. He did not understand that I could upend Gerald’s case if I chose but had chosen to keep silent and let it go forward, and by the time I left his chambers, he could barely find the words to say farewell to me.
I left Everson’s office in a sour mood, and as I walked through the town I heard insistent footsteps behind me. Turning, I saw it was Gerald. It was an effort to give him a civil greeting.
“I want to see my mother,” he announced.
“Oh no. You have done that once. You can see her all you want when Thornfield is yours.”
“I insist!” he demanded. “I insist! She is my mother!” He was shouting now, and passersby were turning to watch.
Bertha had been relatively quiet since her previous attack on him. And she was his mother. Still, I refused, not feeling inclined to humor him for the absurd, ungentlemanly scene he was making.
Gerald’s face grew dark and, angry beyond words, he spewed out a torrent of invective at me, and I again saw that familiar dark fury in his eyes. In a moment, I understood too clearly:He is going to become like her,I thought.He will become her.I feared he might try fisticuffs, right there on the street, but he did not. Instead, he continued to yell at me: “She is not my mother! What have you done with my mother?”
“She is your mother if your mother was Bertha Antoinetta Mason,” I said as calmly as I could manage. “I have had her in my care for fifteen years.”
“Then you are a madman yourself! No one in his right mind keeps an animal like that in his home.”
“It was her wish. And her father’s. I made promises.”
“Then you are a fool. When you leave, you may take her with you, you who are so ready to make promises.Youtake care of her, or I will put her where she belongs.”
I stared at him in horror. I, whose life had been ruined for the sake of my family reputation, for the sake of my brother—I had given years to this woman, whose own son, at first so anxious to see her, was now just as anxious to throw her away. A son who, as I was seeing before my very eyes, would no doubt grow to be as mad as she was. I turned and walked swiftly away from him, and he chased me and struck me from behind. I was tempted to respond in kind, but I ignored his provocations and left the scene. He did not follow.
I stewed over that for a night and a day, barely able to contain myself, even in Jane’s presence. She noticed my mood but I told her it was nothing, just a troublesome cottager on my land. But it was not nothing; it was a madman set to take control of Thornfield, and I could not bear it. I knew that when Jane discovered the truth—for at some point she would—she would hate that I had done such a thing. It was six and two threes: whatever I did would be wrong. But I knew what Jane would want me to do.
***
The next day I told her I would be gone for some time, perhaps overnight, but not to worry, and I rode back to Millcote and told Everson of my business. He sat at his desk in silence until I almost thought he had not understood; finally he said to me, “They are examining the letters tomorrow morning, I believe.”
With that, I rose, but Everson stayed me. “I will accompany you, but we must let Ramsdell and Gerald Rochester know, for they have a legal right to be there.” After that, I could not wait, and I was off, trailing Everson, and I am sure Ramsdell and Gerald as well, behind me.
I slept poorly at an inn that night, and in the morning the magistrates were angry when I barged into their session, demanding a hearing, pulling out my proof while the chief magistrate pounded his gavel. I emptied onto their tables the letters I had found in the desk in the library: a total of nineteen of them. I straightened each one so they could see it well, the judges sitting in dour and mystified silence all this time. “Look at the letters you hold in your hands, and look at these that come from my father’s desk. A guinea for the man who sees the difference first.” Two of the three almost smiled, and they set to their task.
Everson stepped in just at that moment and stood in amazement, not knowing whether to upbraid me or praise me. The judges took longer than my patience lasted, and so I gave them a hint: “Notice the dates.” As these letters made clear, my father, for whatever reason, was in the habit of including only the day and the month—in all of the letters I had provided, but not the two that Gerald had presented as evidence. “What say you?” I asked, pulling out a guinea coin.
“Forgery,” said one judge.
“He took the genuine letters and added a year,” admitted another.
“Indeed,” I said.
“Indeed, he did,” Everson said. “But when—”
“Never mind,” I silenced him. “The annulment cannot stand.”
