 |
| Welcome to my Blog! Wander through worlds real and fictional, meet interesting people, visit exciting places and find good books to enjoy along the way! |
 |
| About the Book |
.png)
 |
| read an excerpt |
Charlotte finds the lost box of the writing she, her sisters Anne and Emily, and their brother Bramwell created when they were children
She fled to housework to soothe herself as she had always done, washing floors with the rag mop. Then she tidied the whole house, beginning with the cellar, where they kept old sketches, some childhood clothes, copies of the Illustrated London News and the Spectator. She straightened her father’s room, finding her mother’s fragile wedding bonnet in a trunk and the long-dried flowers her mother had carried at her marriage. Charlotte found cobwebs even Emily had failed to notice, a mouse hole, an empty bottle of some French brandy behind the tall clock.
She
could do nothing with her father’s study; he would not let her touch it.
She turned to her own bedroom, starting with her wardrobe. It was a slender but deep wardrobe, too tall for her to reach the top shelves. Only the sexton Brown could manage it. Still, Charlotte would not be deterred. She moved a chair to stand upon. What stuff was there! Unmendable childhood bonnets, a bottle of dried cough syrup, a tiny chemise, lesson books from schooldays. And then, behind a moth-eaten thick shawl that her aunt had worn, a heavy wooden box.
She simply could not believe it. Here was the lost box of their collected childhood writing. Because she could not manage to lift it down, she dropped it onto the bed below and climbed down after it. The box was now sideways on her quilt. She made out the faint letters printed on the side, reading Hair tonic for the gentleman, James Street, London. There was a smell of orange and oil from the original bottles it had held long ago.
So her dead aunt’s shawl had hidden their childhood work all these years. No wonder Brown had looked and reported no box was there. Her sisters and brother had been resigned that it had somehow been given to the junkman to cart away.
Charlotte lifted the lid and reached inside to lift the loose pages and small, handsewn books, laying them on the desk to look through. Here were all the stories she and her sisters had written after Papa had taken them home forever from that school for clergymen’s daughters. Bran’s prolific stories were there too.
Carefully, Charlotte sifted through the tiny handwritten pages. A whole little book, carefully stitched, was her creation. Oh, the worlds they had made up as children! On the top of the box was written in stern childish letters, Property of the Brontë children, return if found or be cursed always. Not that it could be lost then; it never left the house, and they were always adding to the papers.
How serious they had been, and what a struggle to find enough paper for their words! When they could find no more scraps, she and her sisters walked to the village shop that sold writing supplies, dry goods, and sundries. The stationer John Greenwood would stand up from his stool. His heavy whiskers were always wet from his saucer of tea. A large, dusty bottle of ink sat on the shelf. Master Greenwood would lean over the counter to ask, “And what will the little misses Brontë have this morning?”
“A dozen sheets of paper, if you please.”
“Third quality, as always?”
“Yes, sir.”
He would slide down the paper box and place it on the counter. Little Emily would raise herself on tiptoe. The quantity of paper there in the box, hundreds and hundreds of sheets, pale brown like wet, newly cut wood! Greenwood would feel for his handkerchief, find a clean place to blow his long nose, and then resume counting. “Twelve pence then,” he would say. “What will you do with all this paper?”
They would not reply. She and her two sisters would mount back up the steep hill, Emily protectively holding the rolled pages in both hands. People would call out to them; they would curtsey. They were the serious little Brontë children, terribly thin, noticing everything with their large eyes, always wary of anyone but each other.
What will we do with this paper, sir? Why, we’ll write great books. We’ll grow up and never marry but always stay together in this house.
As Charlotte stood laying out the single pages of childish writing and the little bound books on the bed, a joy filled her that had not come in months. Of course, she thought, God has shown me the way. He has not formed me to be a teacher or a governess or a headmistress. I am a writer. I was never meant to be anything other than that.
That day she took out her small portable writing desk again, found her adult poems written over the past several years, and began to revise them. All day she concentrated with such intensity that everything else in her life had a quality of unreality. I am a writer, she thought again, pressing her lips together hard. Anne is as well. This is how we will make our pathway in the world.
She felt happy that autumn the way she always did during the short periods in her life when she wrote uninterruptedly. She also dusted and ironed, singing as she worked. She floated down to dinner and, after, washed the dishes and joined the musical evenings with Emily at the piano. She was a second soprano who did her best to sing the higher notes when Anne was away.
Emily sang a rough contralto. The curate Mr. Nicholls shared a music sheet with Charlotte’s father. His voice was true bass.
The piano was still in tune.
Anne and Branwell would be home in a few months for vacation at Christmas. They’d all be together then. She and Anne would write.
But
Anne came home more than six weeks early, in November, flustered, wretched,
tearful, bonnet strings tied too tightly, dragging her carpetbag behind her.
scroll down to leave a comment
thank you!
*
 |
| New release anthology by various authors |
 |
| available from Amazon https://mybook.to/GhostEncounters |
| The story of the events that led to The Battle of Hastings in 1066 Harold the King (UK edition) I Am The Chosen King (US edition) AND 1066 Turned Upside Down an anthology of 'What If'' 1066 tales  |
(subscription reminder available)
PLEASE:
LEAVE A REVIEW
FOR YOUR FAVOURITE AUTHORS ON AMAZON!
 |
Amazon Author Page: |
Just a 4 or 5 star rating and a brief
"I thoroughly enjoyed this book!" will make such a difference!
THANK YOU!
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thank you for leaving a comment - it should appear soon. If you are having problems, contact me on author AT helenhollick DOT net and I will post your comment for you. That said ...SPAMMERS or rudeness will be composted or turned into toads.
Helen