“It would make no difference. He has never let me know what he has in mind until it is about to come to fruition.”
“And you are content with that? Rochester, you have shown great maturity in recent months. Surely you have a right to know what lies ahead for you.” He took his hat from the rack and put his hand on the door latch, then turned back to me. “Still, it would be good for you to get away for a time—even a short time—from what are really quite heavy responsibilities for someone of your age. If not to your father in Liverpool, might there be anywhere else you would like to go?”
I paused before responding. Thornfield-Hall came into my mind. But my father’s words came as well: Thornfield is not for you. Thornfield is Rowland’s. I could count neither on Rowland’s being absent another time, nor on his welcome if he were home. And yet—yes—the thought stole into my mind: there was another visit I longed to make. I tried my best to hesitate, as if I needed to think, but I was suddenly so excited I could not have fooled him in the least. “Indeed,” I said, “there is a place—an old school friend who lives near Napier has been urging me to visit, and it has never seemed a possibility. I could be there and back in two or three days.”
“Two or three days? Surely that isn’t enough. You would barely get there before you had to turn back.”
Of course it wasn’t enough, not nearly enough. But it was better than nothing. “I think I can manage it,” I said.
“Well, then, arrange it,” he said. “But give me warning enough that I can work out a plan to oversee both mills.”
I wrote to Carrot that very evening and posted the letter as soon as I could. A few days afterwards, the response came, brief and direct: I was to come at my earliest convenience. If I could manage to get myself to the village of Napier, Carrot would send a conveyance for me.
I would see my oldest friend again, at last—I felt as if I were suddenly living in a dream. Mrs. Wilson seemed full of trepidation over my leaving, but she still encouraged me to go. Mr. Wilson simply nodded slowly and peered up at me as if he half feared that I should never return. Probably too effusively, I made a point of saying that I would be gone only two days or at the most three, and I assured him as well that Mr. Landes would be stopping by the house each day to report on work at the mill.
I managed to talk a tailor into quickly putting together a pair of pantaloons, which he assured me were all the fashion, though they felt quite uncomfortable; but I could not bring myself to order a new waistcoat as well. And there was no time to order a pair of the slim, stylish pumps that the cobbler had in his window. There was no real rush, of course, but once it became possible for me to leave, I could hardly bear to wait. Somehow, the prospect of being with Carrot again almost seemed like going home.
Chapter 12
On the stagecoach, I began having second thoughts. It had been years since I had last seen Carrot. We had been boys then, playing at soldiers in the fields and woods around Black Hill; now we were older, he an earl, no less, and I— What was I? To the world, I was the young manager of a successful worsted mill, but most days I felt like a boy still, trying to give the appearance of a man, capable and dependable—and terrified of being found out. I was convinced I was the only young man in all the world who felt like a charlatan.
More than once on that journey I thought of Touch, he with his quiet and warm presence, his prodigious imagination. Would that the three of us could be once more together, I thought, and I wondered, suddenly, if Carrot knew yet that he had passed on. I laid my head back and closed my eyes and tried to imagine what Carrot would look like, what he would be like. I did not even know what one calls an earl when he is a friend, but I was certain that it would not be “Carrot.” Still, anxious as I was, I could barely contain my excitement.
For many years after that trip, travel excited my spirits—bringing me back to that bright, early September day, the sky a cloudless blue, the fields of oats and barley blowing in the wind, the workers bending to their tasks, swinging their scythes; heather still rosy purple on the moors; and the delicious anticipation of seeing Carrot again.
We were in Napier by late afternoon—the trip as easy as it could have been; a good sign, I hoped. And Carrot’s man was already waiting for me with what seemed like a brand-new tilbury. He tipped his hat and stowed away my luggage while I climbed aboard.
Lanham-Hall was a large country house, slightly bigger than Thornfield-Hall, and more graceful in appearance. Coming up the drive, I was struck by the great gables at the front of the house, and as we arrived, I noted the delicate stonework of the pediment above the massive oak door. The scene carved there was—I recognized immediately—a stylized version of a drawing from an edition of Herodotus on the Battle of Thermopylae that had been Carrot’s favorite at Black Hill. He had always insisted on being Leonidas to my Xerxes. I smiled to myself: Carrot was, apparently, still Carrot.
His butler opened the door. “His lordship is still out riding, sir,” he told me. “He asks that you excuse him this indulgence. He will be with you immediately when he returns.”
“Of course,” I said, a bit put out at that lack of a grand welcome. When I stepped inside, I paused, taking in the blue-gray entrance hall, the gently curving staircase, the rose and white Turkey carpet. It seemed restful and pleasing to the eye, not at all what I would have expected of Carrot.
The butler, who introduced himself as Matthews, offered to show me to my chamber, and he led me up the broad stairs and down a short hallway to a room that overlooked the front of the house. From the windows, I could see the long, curved drive, lime trees arching gracefully over it, and, beyond, the rolling fields of Lanham. It reminded me something of Thornfield, though it is hard to say why. At Lanham there was no tangled wood of hawthorn approaching the house, nor was there any moor in the distance. It was no wonder that the place was decorated in pale colors: this was a thoroughly domesticated countryside.
“Make yourself at home, please, sir,” Matthews said, “and when you are ready, the dining room is just at the bottom of the stairs, to the left. I’ll have something put out there for you.”