Free Romancing Miss Bronte by Juliet Gael Page A

only to exchange pages and offer advice, some of which was taken, some not. Their habit of pacing round and round the dining table helped to loosen their imaginations as well as their limbs. When visions came to them they would settle back down a their writing desks, pick up their pencils, and get on with telling their tales.
    The first copies of
Poems
by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell—a slender volume bound in green cloth—arrived at the parsonage one morning early in May. The parcel, addressed to C. Brontë, Esquire, had been opened—the brown wrapping paper torn and the books loosely tied back up with string. If the culprit had been their brother, he showed no signs of being wise to their little undertaking. Nevertheless, it was a baffling incident, and they thought it best to hide the volumes in case Branwell got hold of one of them and recognized their poetry, which he was sure to do. So even in their own home their small claim to glory was concealed from public view, stored away beneath a stack of chemises in a drawer or locked in a small trunk, places where women were apt to conceal the secrets in their lives.
    For all his failings, Patrick Brontë’s son was greatly loved in the village. His boisterous presence always enlivened any company, and he never condescended to the lower sorts. So that summer when the news reached Haworth that Lydia Robinson’s husband had finally died, Branwell became the object of great excitement and speculation. The poor fellow was beside himself with anticipation. On many an afternoon he stumbled down to the Bull and collapsed into his favorite chair, where he hoped to find a sympathetic ear—there being none to find at home.
    “My legs have turned to jelly,” he’d cry out with a weak laugh. “And look,” he’d say, holding out a trembling hand for all to see, “look at that.Damn, look at the state I’m in.” Then he’d lift his glass with that same shaking hand and sink his mouth into the froth.
    “Hasn’t slept or eaten a bite for days,” William Thomas murmured to the wheelwright as he mopped up a spill on his mahogany countertop. “Waitin’ to hear his fate.”
    “Ye think she’ll marry him?”
    The innkeeper only shrugged philosophically.
    On other days he came down to the Bull with a bounce in his step, brimming with optimism: “I’ll hear from her today. I know it. Feel it in my bones. My fortune’s about to change, gentlemen.” He’d run a hand through his limp red curls and groan, “And damn it, it’s about time, isn’t it? I’m overdue on that score. But I don’t have long to wait now. I wager you a year from now I’ll be master of Thorp Green!” He’d raise his glass in a toast to his own future, and his eyes would flash brightly; William the innkeeper thought he looked a little mad. “When I think of how my poor lady suffered all those years with that eunuch of a husband. She was so starved for affection. Now, what does that say about the man? Does he think a woman like her can be neglected without consequence? It was damn criminal. If she turned to me for consolation, he only had himself to blame.” His face would soften. “She was my muse. Ah, William”—or John or Hartley, whoever was there to listen and nod—“if you’d seen the effect my poetry had on her.” Then a rapturous smile would bleed across his haggard face. “Good God, what a sweet woman she was. It broke her heart to have to part from me. But I’ll hear from her now, and things will all be put right soon enough.”
    If he had an attentive audience, he would dig into his jacket pocket. “See that?” he would say as he unclenched his fist to reveal a pale ring of woven hair. “I had it made from a lock of her hair. I’d wear it, but I’m afraid I’ll lose it.” He would touch the pale trinket to his lips and slip it back into his pocket with the bundle of her letters.
    Tabby remarked on the matter one day while Charlotte was at the kitchen table, going over