The Prince Consort summons their attendants and mounts a search of the castle and grounds, but we are nowhere to be found. The Queen inspects my room, where she discovers my outdoor clothes missing. There is but one terrible conclusion for her to draw.
I do know what happened next, because Mr. Slade later told me. He and Lord Unwin came riding up to the castle in a carriage intended to take Mr. Slade and me to the train station. Lord Unwin meant to go along and ensure that we departed. The Queen and Prince Consort rushed outside to meet them.
“Miss Bronte has kidnapped Bertie and Vicky!” the Queen announced in distraught rage.
“That cannot be!” Mr. Slade said.
“She and the children are gone,” said the Prince Consort. “What else are we to believe?”
“This is all your doing,” the Queen fumed at Mr. Slade and Lord Unwin. “Had you not convinced me to go along with your outrageous scheme and bring Miss Bronte here, this would never have occurred!”
As she burst into hysterical tears and the Prince Consort tried to calm her, Lord Unwin hastened to say, “It was Mr. Slade’s idea.”
“Miss Bronte is a woman of good moral character,” Mr. Slade said. “She would never harm the children.”
I know Mr. Slade was sorely vexed by Lord Unwin’s attempt to put all the blame on him, and even more upset on my account. Did he wonder if Kuan had suborned me into carrying out the kidnapping after all?
“I never trusted Miss Bronte,” said Lord Unwin. “Now she’s proven herself a criminal.”
“Well, I don’t give a damn which of you is at fault!” the Queen shouted. “I order you to get my children back. And find Miss Bronte, that I may have her hanged for treason!”
Lord Unwin turned to Mr. Slade. “You’d best hurry up.”
“You discharged me yesterday,” Mr. Slade reminded him.
“You’re reinstated,” Lord Unwin said grudgingly.
As to events that transpired farther afield, I learned them from another source. Into my tale I insert pages from a letter written by Branwell to Francis Grundy, an engineer he had met while working for the Leeds and Manchester Railway, a letter he never sent. My dear Francis, Since we last met, I have had a most astounding, incredible experience. I hesitate to write of it, for fear that you will not believe me. As you know, I have been in quite a bad state. Daily I grow weaker and more wretched. I must drink liquor and laudanum or suffer the worst, blackest despair. When their blessed sedative effects wear off, then come the chills, the trembling, the nauseous stomach, the pounding headache, the intolerable bodily misery. Worst of all, I am plagued by regrets for what I might have been-a great artist, writer, and hero in my own life story. That was my condition on what I believe was 10 September, when I found myself without a drop of either remedy at hand. Nearly insane with desire for relief, I ransacked the room and oh! Good fortune smiled upon me, villain that I was! I found money in Father’s drawer! I hastened to the village and bought a vial of laudanum, which I tucked in my pocket; I then stumbled into the Black Bull Inn. A boxing match was in progress. Two country lads were throwing fists at each other. Spectators roared, laughed, drank their pints, and flung down coins. They welcomed me, and soon the wine was flowing like fire through my veins. I felt like a candle burned down to its end, the wick sputtering in a pool of wax. My head whirled. I remember nothing of the hours that ensued, until I awoke in an upstairs room. A maid from the inn came and told me I’d slept all day and it was time to go home. Dizzy and nauseated, I staggered through the village. It was the dead of night; the streets were deserted. Stars shone like evil eyes in the black sky. The wind howled from the moors. Having laboriously scaled the hill, I fell against the door of the parsonage. It was locked. I banged loudly, calling for someone to let me in. It was opened by a big, brutish man I’d never seen before. “Who are you?” the stranger said. Surprised and disturbed, I said, “I am Branwell Bronte. I live here. What are you doing in my house?” He hauled me inside, then slammed and bolted the door. I fell to my knees. Terror kindled in me, for even though my senses were still befuddled by drink, I knew something was seriously wrong. “Where are my father and sisters?” I said. “What have you done with them?” Two more men materialized in the hall. I blinked, unsure if they were real or my vision had multiplied the image of the first man. He said, “It’s the son. I couldn’t leave him outside to make noise and attract attention. What should we do with him?” Another of the men said, “Put him down with the others.” The third man opened the cellar door. They forced me towards the stairs. How I shrieked and fought! Since childhood I have always been afraid of the cellar; I cannot shake my notion that it is haunted by goblins. But I was too feeble to resist. I tumbled down the stairs into the black pit. The door slammed and locked. The cold miasma of the grave enclosed me. “Let me out!” I shrieked in terror. “I beg of you!” I tried to crawl up the stairs, but I was trembling so violently that my efforts failed. Whimpering, I curled up on the floor. I heard whispers and rustling movements. “No!” I cried, thinking that the goblins were coming to pull me down into hell. “Go away!” “Branwell, is that you?” said a voice near me. “Leave me alone!” I pleaded. Cold fingers touched my cheek. I screamed and writhed until the being that I’d taken for a goblin said, “It’s Anne.” Now I recognized her voice, and the murmuring voices of Emily and my father. Such relief overwhelmed me that I wept. We embraced in the darkness. “What has happened?” I asked her. “Why are those men holding us prisoners?” Anne told me a fantastic tale of murders, of Charlotte and a Foreign Office spy and the Queen, and a pursuit of a villainous madman. I did not understand most of it; nor could I believe it. But the fact remained that we were locked in the cellar, at the mercy of strangers. “What are we going to do?” I asked. Father said, “We must trust in God to deliver us.” Anne clasped my hand. “Help will come,” she said. I was suddenly overcome by sickness. My stomach convulsed and heaved as if there were a wild beast inside me trying to get out. I vomited time and again, while tremors wracked me. Oh, what pain, what mortal suffering! “O, death, take me now!” I begged. “Release me from this misery!” Anne stroked my forehead and spoke soothing words. Emily said, “Enough! You’re only making things worse for the rest of us!” With such scorn and hatred did she speak! It stabbed me to the heart. I began to sob. But Emily cared not for my feelings. She said, “If you were the man you should be, you wouldn’t have let those men throw you into the cellar. You would have fought them and rescued us. At the very least, you could have run for help.” She berated me with accusations that I was weak, wretched, selfish, stupid. I knew she was right. Such woeful shame did I feel! Such a poor excuse for a brother and son was I! “You’re no good to anyone including yourself,” Emily said in a tone so cruel that it withered my spirit. “You might as well die.” But though I prayed for an end to my sorrows and humiliations, there leapt within me a contradictory desire almost as strong. Emily’s harsh words had awakened some long-dormant part of me that wanted to live. It urged me to rise up and prove her criticism undeserved, to fend off the shadow of death that encroached upon me. I realized that I might have but one more chance to atone for my evils, to show some small degree of the heroism I had craved all my life, before I died. Beneath my sickness and tremors, a force hardened like a steel tendon inside me. It was my will, which I had thought long gone. “I’m going to save us all,” I declared. But my voice was as weak as my body. Anne and Papa said nothing; Emily uttered a disdainful laugh and said, “Just how shall you do that?”
40
A rhythmic creaking noise pierced the veil of sleep that enshrouded me. I became aware of the hard surface upon which I lay, a rocking motion, and a sensation of nausea. My head ached; my tongue felt furry inside my parched mouth. Rough, thick fabric covered my body, which was stiff and sore. I heard splashing noises. Above me was the night sky, filled with stars that wheeled, like lanterns on a carousel, around a full moon. A cold, reviving breeze swept my face; I inhaled the scent of the ocean. My memory was a blank. More puzzled than afraid, I sat up, and the world rocked; my stomach slid to and fro inside me. I saw that I was in a boat-a small, open craft. A man sat not far from me, rowing. His oars splashed in the ocean, which spread all around us, its black waves shimmering with reflections from the moon and stars. For one frightful moment I imagined that I had died and that the man was Charon, ferrying me along the River Styx. Then I recognized him. It was Nick, the mute servant of Kuan.