Free The Lost Bee by L. K. Rigel Page A

tears when you get back your grade.”
    “But it was stupid, Ms. Blakemore,” David said. “Why didn’t he just divorce her?”
    “He had morals,” Mona said. “In those days people believed in the sanctity of marriage.”
    Poor Mona. All year she’d been the object of a brutal custody fight in her parents’ divorce.
    There’s a special hell for those who divorce. Dad’s voice popped into Sara’s brain uninvited.
    “But they tricked Rochester into marrying her!” David said.
    “Show of hands.” Sara glanced at the clock. She didn’t want to waste precious minutes on how Rochester was tricked into his marriage. “Who thinks he pushed Bertha off the roof during the fire?”
    Hands shot up from all the boys plus Mona, all stabbing the air with certainty. In the same instant, a chill crawled over the back of Sara’s neck. She felt dizzy and leaned against her desk for support.
    “No?” She raised an eyebrow at the doubting girls, trying to focus on he discussion. “He had motive, and here was his chance. In those days, until death us do part was more than morality—it was the law. Divorce was possible, but so expensive only the very rich could afford it.”
    Her stomach turned with a twinge of nausea, and for only a second she saw Mr. Rochester— her Mr. Rochester—standing in the corner at the back of the room.
    “Rochester was rich,” David said. “He could afford it.”
    “But Bertha was insane.” Sara blinked, and the vision was gone. “And there’s the rub. An insane person couldn’t be divorced. She didn’t have mental capacity to understand the proceedings so Rochester was stuck with her. The fire at Thornfield Hall offered the perfect opportunity to be rid of the wretch who ruined his life.”
    “But Mr. Rochester is the hero,” David said.
    “He was going to save her, but something inside him clicked,” Mona said. “Bertha tried to kill him before. She’d try again. No one would know. He pushed her.”
    “That’s more believable than the other thing,” David said. “No way Jane Eyre could imagine Mr. Rochester calling her name at the exact moment he’s actually calling her name hundreds of miles away.”
    Sara looked at the corner, but there was nothing there. Yet he’d looked so real—and distressed.
    “Maybe Jane Eyre didn’t imaginethose cries,” she said. “Maybe she actually heard them. Her soul connection to Mr. Rochester and to Thornfield Hall is one of the great stories in fiction.”
    Sara understood Jane completely. She felt spiritually connected to a big old gothic house herself. She longed to see Turtledove Hill again, her great aunt’s mansion on the northern California coast. She’d been there once, when she was fourteen, the same age as her students. Only once, but the place had captured her imagination.
    Until now she’d forgotten the other thing—or repressed it. She’d caught a glimpse of Aunt Amelia’s lover in the kitchen. He’d reminded fourteen-year-old Sara of the hero in Jane Eyre , the book she’d just been reading. He was the same man twenty-eight-year-old Sara had just imagined was standing in the corner of her freshman English classroom.
    The so-called bell blasted, as caustic as a penalty buzzer on a game show, and the kids leapt up from the desks with their books and backpacks. “Great discussion today,” Sara said. “I look forward to reading your essays.”
    Across the hall another teacher leaned against her door, a dazed look on her face. Her kids poured out of her room into the hall, and she moved mechanically with the flow of students.
    Sara caught up with her. “Marie, what is it?”
    “Did you check your mail yesterday?” Marie said.
    “Dammit,” Sara said under her breath. She’d forgotten yesterday was the 15th.
    In the teachers’ room, Marie sank into a chair. “I got my final notice.”
    This year everyone in the district with less than five years’ seniority had received Reduction in Forces notices. RIFing