Anne Brontë Nightwalker

Chapter 18

Hours before sunset I wake, slip into my robe and ascend the stairs. I am regimented with my time. When you live for centuries you must be, or else the years will slip like water down a drain, sucking your intellect and discipline dry with it.

When I'm not reading, my predawn hours consist of painting in my turret studio. My art once helped support me, but as the 20th century marched on, romantic landscapes and somber portraits became increasingly less popular. Although I've painted for two centuries and studied with masters, for some impenetrable reason I'm unable to break free from the styles of my youth and evolve as an artist.

Manet said I must let go, step into the void of uncertainty and feel free to fall. But what if letting go means death?

After the first Boer War, I made my way to Paris and was stunned to view the sensually vigorous renderings of battle by Meissonier. He alone captured the chaos and degenerate eroticism of war. How I longed to find expression for the carnage I'd seen! To turn the horror into something meaningful, beautiful even. Yet despite my time with him, the images failed me and when they did come, as soon as my brush touched the canvas, they vanished like a wisp of smoke. It seemed there was an iron curtain draped across my memory between each war and every time I pulled back the veil, my mind thrust it down again.

I make my way to the living room, lighting lanterns as I go. Although I no longer write fiction, my Dickensian desk is covered in notebooks and scribbled pieces of paper. Instead of writing narrative, I take extensive notes on what I read. Quotes and ideas. Words. Just because I no longer write doesn't mean I no longer think.

How can I part with my notebooks? They are enough to fill two great trunks. And what will I do with my desk and my bed? I should be making arrangements for my move, listing the house as is, looking for another job, but I am overcome with lethargy. I must feed. The boy warded off starvation for a night, but it's back with a vengeance, growing inside me like a wild beast. I'm desperate to see what tonight brings. I pray it will be busy and that I'll have no common calls with Santos. Perhaps passions have died down and William has convinced him I'm not a demon.

Santos appears in my mind with that look of his—hostile and direct—and I stumble upon the edge of a rug, which unnerves me even further. If one quality defines me now, it is fluid grace. Santos threatens to take even that from me.

My thoughts are broken by the sight of a broad, thick envelope slid through the front door's mail slot. I bring it to my nose and my stomach tightens. William's scent is on the paper. In amazement, I turn it over in my hands knowing the heft and shape before I even open it.

A manuscript.

Inside there is a handwritten note on heavy ivory paper. With trembling hands, I read.

Dear Anne,

This is my manuscript. Today, in a fit of despair, I almost threw it in the fire, but at the last instant decided to place it in your hands instead. Before I lose courage, I shall run it over and slip it through your door. If I hesitate, it is the fire for sure.

I have lost all reference to my story's worth. I am like a child lost in the forest, unsure which way to turn or whom to trust. In a blind act of faith, I turn to you.

Please do me the great honor of throwing this manuscript in the fire if you think it unworthy of life. Your courage will protect me from a greater injury. As a member of academia, I am well versed in having my work incinerated by superior minds, and I entreat you, Anne, to grant me your honesty no matter how fierce it may be. I promise that in the end, it will spare me a far greater humiliation.

Yours,

William

Butterflies flutter in my belly. William has offered me a glimpse of his soul, an honor I have not been granted since I was a human being. No one knows more than I the fear that comes in sharing one's creation with another burning mind to see if they divine any meaning within its pages.

The memory of my work's reception turns my face hot. My hand presses my cheek and I squeeze my eyes closed, trying to blot out the embarrassment, but ancient accusations slip through my fingers, whispering across time. My writing was immoral, coarse, and brutal. Morbid manifestations of a degenerate mind. Even Charlotte, my own sister, claimed it was a "mistake" and endeavored to erase Wildfell Hall from public consciousness and forbid its reprint. But the truth is coarse and brutal. Hurt and fury rise like a wolf in my chest, contracting, looking for a place to lunge. I reach out with an arm to brace myself against the door, take a long ragged breath and force my feelings down. Despite Charlotte's betrayal, I won't stop loving her. She, with all her success, suffered more than any of us, for she had to go on utterly alone.

Suddenly, I'm afraid for William. What if I hate his novel? What if it is terrible? How can I possibly deliver this news? All my family were writers. We shared our work with one another and we all had talent. I, less than my sisters, but not so bad as to warrant the fire. Time and again, Emily saved my words from destruction. She alone understood them and saw their worth. When she died, I could not write another word.

A hand flies over my mouth, stifling a sob. Her absence pains me more than the night.

Oh, to be separated from my dearest loves for so long is the harshest punishment I've ever known. What I would give to hold a single hand once more, to feel a warm breath on my cheek, to hear a soft, familiar voice in my ear. I would burn for all eternity if I could see but one of my family for a single moment and say, "I love you always and I will never forget."

Through a veil of tears, I look down at the manuscript and tremble from all the memories it has wrenched loose. All the love it has let fly into the heavens like a wave of shining darkness.

My shift does not begin for hours. In the spirit of my brother and sisters, I place a kettle upon the stove for tea and build a bright, roaring fire before which I will sit and read William Hardcastle's manuscript.