Villette (5 page)

Lucy’s deliberate invisibility in this scene seems parallel to the inexplicable and fantasy-driven tone of the end of the novel. After setting Lucy up with a lovely house and school of her own, M. Paul finally declares his feelings, “Lucy, take my love. One day share my life. Be my dearest, first on earth” (p. 551). He leaves for Antigua and the narrator tells her readers, “Let them picture union and a happy succeeding life” (p. 555). Yet, in the now famously ambiguous ending, it seems clear that M. Paul drowns at sea but not at all certain what becomes of Lucy Snowe. It is as if M. Paul sees what Lucy desires and constructs a life for her, and then she lives on as a projection of his imagination. Lucy, the bodiless narrator, who gives flesh and blood to the past, is stuck when the past meets the present. The young version of Lucy vanishes along with the realism of her narrative, and the older phantom Lucy emerges in her place.

In a rarely cited letter to W. S. Williams, Brontë offers some advice on being a female celebrity for one of his daughters, Fanny, who was considering becoming a singer. She writes, “An inferior artist, I am sure you would not wish your daughter to be, and if she is to stand in the foremost rank, only her own courage and resolve can place her there; so, at least, the case appears to me. Fanny probably looks on publicity as degrading, and I believe that for a woman it is degrading if it is not glorious” (Shorter,
Charlotte Brontë and Her Circle,
p. 416). For Brontë, it was not worth being famous unless she could be superior. Lucy’s constant desire to manipulate her self-presentation echoes Brontë’s own wish to carefully shape her image as a visible literary figure and a dignified woman.

In the public world of the novel, Lucy is fiercely protective of her private thoughts and feelings. Yet behind the scenes she reveals her secrets to her readers through an intensely personal narrative. In these moments Brontë creates for Lucy a descriptive language for the inexpressible. In doing so, she explores the uncanny realm of being—the material reality of the body that competes with the desire for immortality, the intensity of memory versus the awareness of what will always be lost, the starkness of fact against the sensuality of what can only be imagined. While Lucy may be remembered as Brontë’s most autobiographical creation, she is, ultimately, Brontë’s map for female literary genius, an intangible authorial presence that remains perplexing, dynamic, and vividly invisible.

 

Laura Engel
received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr College and her M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University. She is an assistant professor in the English Department at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, where she specializes in eighteenth-century British literature and drama. Her previous publications include essays on the novelists A. S. Byatt and Edna O’Brien. She is currently working on a book that explores the connections between women and celebrity in eighteenth-century culture. Engel also wrote the Introduction and Notes for the Barnes & Noble Classics edition of Jane Austen’s
Sense and Sensibility.

 

 

 

 

M
y godmother lived in a handsome house in the clean and ancient town of Bretton. Her husband’s family had been residents there for generations, and bore, indeed, the name of their birthplace—Bretton of Bretton: whether by coincidence, or because some remote ancestor had been a personage of sufficient importance to leave his name to his neighbourhood, I know not.

When I was a girl I went to Bretton about twice a year, and well I liked the visit. The house and its inmates specially suited me. The large peaceful rooms, the well-arranged furniture, the clear wide windows, the balcony outside, looking down on a fine antique street, where Sundays and holidays seemed always to abide—so quiet was its atmosphere, so clean its pavement—these things pleased me well.

One child in a household of grown people is usually made very much of, and in a quiet way I was a good deal taken notice of by Mrs. Bretton, who had been left a widow, with one son, before I knew her; her husband, a physician, having died while she was yet a young and handsome woman.

She was not young, as I remember her, but she was still handsome, tall, well-made, and though dark for an Englishwoman, yet wearing always the clearness of health in her brunette cheeks, and its vivacity in a pair of fine, cheerful black eyes. People esteemed it a grievous pity that she had not conferred her complexion on her son, whose eyes were blue—though, even in boyhood, very piercing—and the colour of his long hair such as friends did not venture to specify, except as the sun shone on it, when they called it golden. He inherited the lines of his mother’s features, however; also her good teeth, her stature (or the promise of her stature, for he was not yet full-grown), and, what was better, her health without flaw, and her spirits of that tone and equality which are better than a fortune to the possessor.

In the autumn of the year—I was staying at Bretton; my godmother having come in person to claim me of the kinsfolk with whom was at that time fixed my permanent residence. I believe she then plainly saw events coming, whose very shadow I scarce guessed; yet of which the faint suspicion sufficed to impart unsettled sadness, and made me glad to change scene and society.

Time always flowed smoothly for me at my godmother’s side; not with tumultuous swiftness, but blandly, like the gliding of a full river through a plain. My visits to her resembled the sojourn of Christian and Hopeful
¹
beside a certain pleasant stream, with ‘green trees on each bank, and meadows beautified with lilies all the year round.’ The charm of variety there was not, nor the excitement of incident; but I liked peace so well, and sought stimulus so little, that when the latter came I almost felt it a disturbance, and wished rather it had still held aloof.

One day a letter was received of which the contents evidently caused Mrs. Bretton surprise and some concern. I thought at first it was from home, and trembled, expecting I know not what disastrous communication; to me, however, no reference was made, and the cloud seemed to pass.

The next day, on my return from a long walk, I found, as I entered my bed-room, an unexpected change. In addition to my own French bed
^a
in its shady recess, appeared in a corner a small crib, draped with white; and in addition to my mahogany chest of drawers, I saw a tiny rosewood chest. I stood still, gazed, and considered.

‘Of what are these things the signs and tokens?’ I asked. The answer was obvious. ‘A second guest is coming: Mrs. Bretton expects other visitors.’

On descending to dinner, explanations ensued. A little girl, I was told, would shortly be my companion: the daughter of a friend and distant relation of the late Dr. Bretton’s. This little girl, it was added, had recently lost her mother; though indeed, Mrs. Bretton ere long subjoined, the loss was not so great as might at first appear. Mrs. Home (Home it seems was the name) had been a very pretty, but a giddy, careless woman, who had neglected her child, and disappointed and disheartened her husband. So far from congenial had the union proved, that separation at last ensued—separation by mutual consent, not after any legal process. Soon after this event, the lady having over-exerted herself at a ball, caught cold, took a fever, and died after a very brief illness. Her husband, naturally a man of very sensitive feelings, and shocked inexpressibly by too sudden communication of the news, could hardly, it seems, now be persuaded but that some over-severity on his part—some deficiency in patience and indulgence—had contributed to hasten her end. He had brooded over this idea till his spirits were seriously affected; the medical men insisted on travelling being tried as a remedy, and meanwhile Mrs. Bretton had offered to take charge of his little girl. ‘And I hope,’ added my godmother in conclusion, ‘the child will not be like her mama; as silly and frivolous a little flirt as ever sensible man was weak enough to marry. For,’ said she, ‘Mr. Home
is
a sensible man in his way, though not very practical: he is fond of science, and lives half his life in a laboratory trying experiments—a thing his butterfly wife could neither comprehend nor endure; and indeed,’ confessed my godmother, ‘I should not have liked it myself.’

In answer to a question of mine, she further informed me that her late husband used to say, Mr. Home had derived this scientific turn from a maternal uncle, a French savant; for he came, it seems, of mixed French and Scottish origin, and had connections now living in France, of whom more than one wrote
de
before his name,
^b
and called himself noble.

That same evening at nine o’clock, a servant was despatched to meet the coach by which our little visitor was expected. Mrs. Bretton and I sat alone in the drawing-room waiting her coming; John Graham Bretton being absent on a visit to one of his school-fellows who lived in the country. My godmother read the evening paper while she waited; I sewed. It was a wet night; the rain lashed the panes, and the wind sounded angry and restless.

‘Poor child!’ said Mrs. Bretton from time to time. ‘What weather for her journey! I wish she were safe here.’

A little before ten the door-bell announced Warren’s return. No sooner was the door opened than I ran down into the hall: there lay a trunk and some band-boxes,
^c
beside them stood a person like a nurse-girl, and at the foot of the staircase was Warren with a shawled bundle in his arms.

‘Is that the child?’ I asked.

‘Yes, miss.’

I would have opened the shawl, and tried to get a peep at the face, but it was hastily turned from me to Warren’s shoulder.

‘Put me down, please,’ said a small voice when Warren opened the drawing-room door, ‘and take off this shawl,’ continued the speaker, extracting with its minute hand the pin, and with a sort of fastidious haste doffing the clumsy wrapping. The creature which now appeared made a deft attempt to fold the shawl; but the drapery was much too heavy and large to be sustained or wielded by those hands and arms. ‘Give it to Harriet, please,’ was then the direction, ‘and she can put it away.’ This said, it turned and fixed its eyes on Mrs. Bretton.

‘Come here, little dear,’ said that lady. ‘Come and let me see if you are cold and damp: come and let me warm you at the fire.’

The child advanced promptly. Relieved of her wrapping, she appeared exceedingly tiny; but was a neat, completely-fashioned little figure, light, slight, and straight. Seated on my godmother’s ample lap, she looked a mere doll; her neck, delicate as wax, her head of silky curls, increased, I thought, the resemblance.

Mrs. Bretton talked in little fond phrases as she chafed the child’s hands, arms, and feet; first she was considered with a wistful gaze, but soon a smile answered her. Mrs. Bretton was not generally a caressing woman: even with her deeply-cherished son, her manner was rarely sentimental, often the reverse; but when this small stranger smiled at her, she kissed it, asking—

‘What is my little one’s name?’

‘Missy.’

‘But besides Missy?’

‘Polly, papa calls her.’

‘Will Polly be content to live with me?’

‘Not
always;
but till papa comes home. Papa is gone away.’ She shook her head expressively.

‘He will return to Polly, or send for her.’

‘Will he, ma’am? Do you know he will?’

‘I think so.’

‘But Harriet thinks not: at least not for a long while. He is ill.’

Her eyes filled. She drew her hands from Mrs. Bretton’s, and made a movement to leave her lap; it was at first resisted, but she said—

‘Please, I wish to go: I can sit on a stool.’

She was allowed to slip down from the knee, and taking a foot-stool, she carried it to a corner where the shade was deep, and there seated herself. Mrs. Bretton, though a commanding, and in grave matters even a peremptory woman, was often passive in trifles: she allowed the child her way. She said to me, ‘Take no notice at present.’ But I did take notice: I watched Polly rest her small elbow on her small knee, her head on her hand; I observed her draw a square-inch or two of pocket handkerchief from the doll-pocket of her doll-skirt, and then I heard her weep. Other children in grief or pain cry aloud, without shame or restraint; but this being wept: the tiniest occasional sniff testified to her emotion. Mrs. Bretton did not hear it: which was quite as well. Ere long, a voice, issuing from the corner, demanded—