Free The Crimes of Charlotte Bronte by James Tully Page A

but when he was not – which was most of the time – he could not help dropping a word or two to his friends about his part in the book.
    It did not take Miss Emily very long to realize that the promise of secrecy that he had made to her was almost as worthless as all his other promises, because he really was in a bad way for most of the time. He had fits of the drunken shakes in the Talbot and the Old Cock taverns in Halifax, and went weeks without proper sleep or food. Then he became even more desperate for money when Mr Nicholson, the landlord of the Old Cock, told him that he would have him arrested for debt, and Mrs Sugden at the Talbot began to complain about the great amount that he owed to her.
    Father seemed very put out by Master Branwell’s troubles at that time, but I never knew the full story until Mr Nicholls told me. All I knew then was that I had overheard Father saying that Master Branwell was telling all his friends that he felt wretched and weak, and was nearly worn out.
    I got some idea of what this meant when Master Branwell gave me a note one day and begged me to take it posthaste and secretly to my Father. It was only a folded piece of paper, and I never could stop myself from sticking my nose into where it should not be, and so I read it as I made my way to Father’s barn. The writing was very bad, and there were many blots of ink. At this distance of time I can no longer recall all the words, but what
does
stick in my mind is that he asked Father to get him ‘Fivepenceworth of Gin’, and promised to pay him back out of a shilling which Mr Brontë was due to give him on the morrow.
    Father was pleased to see me, but his manner changed when he read the note, and he pursed his lips in the way he had when he was cross. I knew that he was far too busy to be bothered in such a fashion because he was not even going home for his midday meal. Instead, he contented himself with taking bread and some cheese or meat with him when he went off in the morning. Sometimes my Mother or one of my sisters carried some hot broth down to him at noon, but usually he made do for the whole day with what he had.
    Anyway, knowing me better than I knew myself, he looked at me straight and asked whether I had read the note and, as I could hardly ever lie to Father, I told him I had. He nodded, and then, pledging me to silence, he placed a sixpenny piece in my hand and told me to go to the back door of the house part of the Black Bull and get the Gin, saying that it was for him.
    I scurried off and did as I was bid, and then took the Gin to Master Branwell, who was shaking so much he was like to have dropped it, but was very thankful for it.
    I have gone on at some length about this because the happenings of that day are so printed on my mind for 2 reasons in particular.
    The first is that, whilst I had kept the bottle hidden, and had managed to get it up to Master Branwell without being seen, I was stopped by Miss Charlotte when I came back down the stairs. She gave me a right telling off, saying that she had been looking for me for nigh on a half-hour, and asked where I had been and what I had been doing upstairs at that time of day.
    I was so taken aback by the way she spoke to me that all I could do was stutter that I had been on an errand for Master Branwell, and I was thankful that she did not ask what the errand was. Instead, she gave me another good scolding and told me that going errands for Master Branwell was not one of my duties, and that if he asked me to do anything else for him I should seek leave from her or one of her sisters first. Of course, I bit my tongue whilst she was ranting on, but my mind was going pell-mell. I thought how ugly she looked, with her little red face all twisted up, and how much I disliked her voice. Above all, I hated even more the airs and graces which she had always taken upon herself. In that very instance, I wondered who she thought she was. She and her sisters