Page 80 of John Eyre

He took a step toward me, menacing me with his glare. “You will do as you’re told. If you disobey me, I’ll—”

“You’ll what? Strike me? Throttle me? It will be no worse than what you’ve already done.” To my shame, I felt tears burning in my eyes. I couldn’t help but ask, “Why did you ever marry me?”

He continued to regard my locket with impotent fury. I was beginning to think he wouldn’t answer when, at last, he said, rather sullenly, “You had something of what I required.”

“Money?”

“That,” he admitted, “and a certain vulnerability.”

I took immediate exception to this. “I wasn’t vulnerable.”

“All women are. Only some are too stupid to realize it.”

“But why me?” I pressed him. “There must have been others. Women of wealth and property. I can’t have been the only one worth marrying.”

He lowered his hand from his mouth with a wince. In the dim light, his lips appeared red as blood. Seared as if by a burning brand. “There were others. Of course there were. Women of a trivial nature, possessing neither souls nor hearts. And then I saw you in Cairo. A woman with an affect of strength. With a clear eye and a soul made of fire. A woman without protection.”

I swallowed hard. “You were attracted to me.”

He had the temerity to shrug. “It was, as much is in life, a matter of timing. Your English laws have harmed my investments. War has damaged my homeland. And the tomb in Thebes—empty. A perfect storm, isn’t that what you call it in your language? And there you were, alone and so deeply, pathetically needy. Fancying yourself different from other women, but in every way the same. You made it quite easy, my love.”

His words skewered my heart with ruthless precision. I thought of how assiduously he’d courted me, when all the while he’d been so cold. So calculating. And I, his willing victim. “And now?” I asked. “You’ll abandon all this—your home, your people—for England?”

“This is not my home,” he said. “The war with Russia has seen to that. And these are not my people. They’re the creatures who arrived when my own people fled. A nomadic race, always eager to attach themselves to a powerful nobleman. They fear me enough to serve me, but they aren’t of my blood. I have no connection to this place any longer. I shall be glad to start again in your country.”

“With another woman?” I asked.

He seemed amused by the question. “What need have I of another woman? I am wed to you, Bertha.” At that, he came closer—close enough to see me shrink back against the wall. His eyes flicked from my face to my locket and back again. “No, my dear. Your country has something superior to women. It holds the British Museum, and therein lies the book that I seek.”

“I thought you said it was owned by another collector? That you were going to make an offer for it?”

“So I did,” he said. “But the fool has refused it. It seems he’d rather the book end its days in a museum. I’ve had word of it from my man in Wallachia. And now my course is set.”

“The British Museum will never sell it to you. They’re not in the habit of giving up their treasures.”

“I don’t mean to buy it from them,” he said. “I need only to read it. To learn its secrets.”

It had been some time since my husband spoke to me in such a frank manner. No doubt he was only doing so because he’d already decided my fate. There was, after all, no danger in confiding in a dead woman. “What secrets do you believe it contains?” I asked.

“A cure for my illness,” he said. “A recipe of old, the consumption of which will enable me to do what I have not done in an age.”

“Which is?”

His mouth curled into a fiendish smile. “To walk in the sunlight, my dear.”

25 April, later that day. — God help me, my hand is shaking so horribly I can hardly write down what I have seen. I’m back in my room again after having once more ventured through the wardrobe. But I must record every detail in order, as fantastic as it is.

After a night spent doing who knows what outside the walls of Nosht-Vŭlk, Edward returned at sunrise and retreated to his room. I waited an hour before I followed after him, with my satchel, lantern, and pistol. This time, I let neither the debris, nor the smell deter me. I descended into the darkness down the stone steps, through the wooden door, and into the underground chamber, navigating my way past the rotted clothing and stinking soil.

Beyond lay great piles of earth, heaped next to shallow holes in the ground. The sort that appeared as though made by a digging animal. But these weren’t gopher holes dug in an English garden. These were as wide and long as graves. My teeth chattered with fear as I passed them, shining my light into each one, and anticipating the absolute worst.

Anticipation did nothing to dull the horror of what I found. It was the body of a young woman. Or what had once been a young woman. Agnes, in fact. Tears stung at my eyes, bile rising in my throat, as I held the light over what was left of her. I paused to be sick.

But there was nothing I could do for Agnes. Not anymore. I continued on, suppressing the panic that built in my chest, as I found another body, and then another. They appeared to have been there for a long while, their remains consisting of little more than scraps of women’s clothing clinging to desiccated bones. However, as I pressed forward, the ceiling slanting lower and lower, obliging me to bend at the waist, I saw a sight that I will remember until my dying day.

It was my husband—Edward Rochester—lying comfortably in a shallow grave. He hadn’t the pallor of death. His face was in full color. Almost rosy with blood. His eyes were closed, his left arm resting across his waist, as if he were sleeping. Kneeling down next to him, I touched him lightly on the shoulder. He didn’t move.

Was he dead? He must be so, for why else was he here? I pressed my fingers to his throat, seeking his pulse. And there was movement beneath my fingertips. A rushing feeling, like a mighty river. Such did I imagine his blood flowing through his veins. Not dead, then. But what of his heart? Why was it not beating?