Once in the carriage, Miss Miller shrank so far back into the shadows that I could only discern the outline of her fingers pressed against her mouth. The clop-clop-clop of horse hooves drummed us away from the Brayton home. Over the course of the day, my muscles had stiffened, and each bump and bounce along the cobblestones sent lightning bolts of pain through my body. After one particularly rough jolt, I gasped in pain.
“Does it hurt much?” asked Miss Miller.
“I shall be fine.”
“I hope we both shall be.”
Another carriage passed by, its coach lights illuminating our cabin and highlighting an anxiety in Miss Miller’s eyes.
“I rarely ride in coaches.” She ran her hands over the horsehair seat covers. “My, my.”
My heart softened toward her. “You have done right to tell us about your fears, and therefore, you have done your duty to Alderton House.”
“And what of you? Surely taking Adela home would have been a simpler solution. Your husband would applaud your good sense, and you could rest easily at night with his ward under your roof again. It’s not too late, Mrs. Rochester. The driver could wait outside Alderton House. You could take Adela and leave.”
The thick landscape of the park presented an impenetrable fortress. Tree leaves moved against a sky of gray, a ceiling that pressed heavily upon us. I moved restlessly, feeling closed in and panicky. My thumb rubbed the spot where my wedding band had been. Miss Miller was right: It would be easier to take Adèle and go home. No one would blame me. Besides, I had a husband and son to consider. My life was not mine alone anymore. Their own lives and well-being depended upon my safe return. My scheme threatened those sacred obligations.
But as Bruce Douglas had pointed out, how could I live with myself if I did nothing to aid the girls at Alderton House?
I straightened my shoulders. “My course of action is set. Perhaps we should turn our efforts toward making me a credible German teacher, even if my hire is temporary.”
“You do possess the necessary language skills, don’t you?”
I sighed. Why were we going over old ground? Was she that fearful that our plot would be discovered?
I bit back my impatience and said, “I have studied German. I can read and write in that language. As for conversation, I have mastered enough to teach other beginners. Before we met, my husband traveled through Europe, spending time in all the capitals. He has a good ear for languages. He corrected my pronunciation of simple words.”
“‘My husband traveled through Europe.’” Miss Miller echoed what I had said in a tone of wonder. “How different your world is these days! Well, you should feel at home at Alderton House. At Lowood, we were trained to serve others. At Alderton, we train girls to be served by others. There is merit to both ways of life. In truth, the more I learn about the expectations visited upon these children of privilege, the sadder it makes me. They have less freedom than one might suppose. Mrs. Webster, our former superintendent, once compared a hothouse orchid to a common thistle. Both may be delicate and luminous in their beauty. But one can only survive under the constant, tender care of a gardener, while the other can scratch out an existence in the most meager of soils.”
Miss Miller fingered her skirt thoughtfully and said, “Mrs. Webster would then ask us, ‘Which flower is to be envied?’”
“I have no doubt. I know I am the thistle, and glad to be so.” I sat deep into the well-worn carriage seat. The day had tired me, and my eyelids begged to close. The end of day had the opposite effect on Miss Miller. The darkening gloom and the rhythmic swaying of our carriage rendered her garrulous.
“I concur. The plant is useful, sturdy, and distinctive.”
Suddenly her voice sounded just like our old superintendent, a woman we had both known and admired, Maria Temple. Miss Temple had challenged us to use our minds, finding rote repetition and mimicry offensive. “A split-tongue rook can be trained to repeat words,” said she back then, “even if they be nonsensical. But God has granted you the gift of reasoning. Use His gifts wisely!”
I wondered: If Miss Temple were here, would she applaud our scheme?
I fervently hoped so.
The carriage lurched to a stop. A storm of emotions assailed me. Could I follow through with this charade? Would my masquerade fool Mrs. Thurston and, possibly, a killer? If I learned that someone had murdered Selina Biltmore, what might I do with that knowledge?
Williams rapped on the carriage door, and before he could send water cascading over me for the second time in one day, I quickly rose to exit. He gravely handed me my pillowcase full of clothing. Miss Miller and I made our way to the curb, waving him on.
My colleague and I stood side by side, watching the light of Williams’s receding coach lamps glint and skip along in the running rainwater. Neither of us spoke. The task ahead loomed large before us, a steep hill, a Sisyphean ordeal far too arduous for two tired women. Silently, we turned and started to trudge toward Alderton House.
“I assume he is much older than you?”
She did not need to specify whom she was speaking of. “Edward is twenty years my senior.”
“Then he is old enough to be your father! Although that is not unusual, is it?”
“I scarcely gave the matter any thought. Edward is my ideal match; the two decades between us mean nothing to him or me.”
“We can use the age difference to your advantage. I suggest you emphasize your innocence,” Miss Miller said. “If Mrs. Thurston questions you about the rumors she heard, tell her of your lack of experience with the opposite sex. Proclaim how little you knew about Squire Rochester and his designs on you.”
“Is that truly necessary? The circumstances were extraordinary.” A catch in my chest squeezed hard, and I found it difficult to speak. This was the first time that I fully realized how at Alderton House, I would need to adopt a far different relationship to the man I loved! Why, Nan Miller did not even know that I was a mother! During my first visit, she and I had focused on Adèle’s welfare. On this second visit, we had concentrated on the safekeeping of the Alderton House students. Suddenly I realized how little I had told my old friend all about my new life. I gasped slightly, and she reached out to steady me, thinking I had stumbled upon a rock.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
“Fine. Just momentarily overcome with homesickness,” I said. Seeing her expression and recalling the scandalous gossip she’d heard, I gave Miss Miller the brief—correct—details of my past three years, concluding with the news of my baby.
She stopped. The rain punished us, but Miss Miller stood there, soaking it up. “You have a child? Of your own?”
“Yes,” I said, and a smile came to my face. “He is six months old, and his name is Edward Rivers Rochester. We call him Ned, and he is beautiful.”
“A happy ending,” said Miss Miller.
“Yes.”
We walked a bit without conversation. I asked, “What of yourself? What has happened in the years since we last met?”
“After you were successful with your advertisement, I placed a similar note in the paper. A school in Liverpool required a headmistress. I served there for a year and a half.”
We both wiped water from our faces, as the rain showed no signs of slowing and the droplets hit hard with venom. “And then?” I encouraged her.
A hesitation, a catch in her voice, warned me that she was fighting a strong emotion. “Circumstances changed. I came to London, and then Miss Gryce—do you remember her from Lowood?—mentioned in a letter that Lady Kingsley needed a headmistress.”
I sensed there was more, but a fresh gust of wind sent a shiver down my spine. My injuries cried out in protest. I gritted my teeth and struggled to keep pace with Miss Miller, whose legs were longer than mine and presumably not stiff with pain.
“What sort of woman was Mrs. Webster?” I asked at last.
“In temperament, she was Mrs. Thurston’s opposite. Quiet. Unassuming. We had hoped she would not retire for years to come. Unfortunately, her health took a turn for the worse. You would have liked her. We all did. I miss her. Which brings me to the situation ahead. Mrs. Thurston must hold you blameless in regards to the machinations of Edward Rochester. You must appear to be without guile or she will reject you out of hand immediately.” To this bald indictment, Miss Miller added a harsh gesture, a chopping sweep of the fingers that signaled she would brook no discussion.
Swallowing hard, I nodded. “I was but an innocent.”
This much was true, but our story did not end there, thank God!
“You must warn Adela not to talk about your abortive wedding,” said Miss Miller. “If she does, we are lost.”
“But we did, indeed, marry!”
“Yes, and you know that Mrs. Thurston would not hire a married woman. No superintendent would.”
The enormity of my duplicity was beginning to weigh on me. “Leave Adèle to me,” I said. “Are any of the others fluent in French?”
“Un peu,” said Miss Miller. “Mrs. Thurston purports to speak French. Indeed, she styles herself as our French teacher. But I can assure you that she is far, far from fluent. If you and Adela need to converse, you are correct, it would be well for you to talk in her native tongue.”
So I had surmised. Knowing we could converse freely without fear of being understood could prove useful.
We came closer to Alderton House. Its neighboring mansions hunkered over us, dwarfing and crowding us as we traveled by foot. Two-story colonnades fronting stucco villas surrounded us on every side. Back in the safety of Lucy Brayton’s parlor, courage guided my decision. Here on the wet sidewalks of London, a creeping fear nibbled at my bravado. What had I done? Why had I agreed to this foolhardy venture?
I gritted my teeth. My temples ached. Despite the rain soaking my clothing, I stopped walking and tried to massage the tight muscles. But my ministrations did not help. They only made matters worse.
“Jane? Have you changed your mind?” Miss Miller’s voice prodded me.
“No,” I said firmly. “Just a pain in my heart. That is all.”
It was truer than she would ever know.