My Plain Jane (The Lady Janies #2)(9)

She had almost passed by unnoticed when Charlotte looked up from her notebook.

“Did you say something about hurting someone?” Charlotte asked. “Tell me more.”

“Oh, Charlotte, good evening. I didn’t see you there.” Jane thought fast for a diversion. “Did you happen to notice the moon tonight?”

“Yes. Very round. Did you say something about hurting someone?” Charlotte held her pencil at the ready.

“Did you write something about hurting someone?” Jane replied.

And just like that, they seemed at an impasse in a contest of some sort, where the opponents had no idea what the contest was about.

“I do apologize, Charlotte, but I’m rather tired. I think I’ll go to bed.”

“Is that Charlotte Bront??” came Mr. Brocklehurst’s muted voice from downstairs. “Skulking about in the middle of the night? Disgraceful. She should be punished!”

Jane was glad that Charlotte couldn’t hear him.

“Did you go to the pub?” Charlotte asked. “I thought you might. It’s what I would have done, if I were allowed to leave the grounds.”

The girl apparently missed nothing.

Jane attempted to look scandalized. “Why ever would I go to a pub? A young woman of my position does not belong in such a place. So . . . no, no, I certainly did not go to a pub. I was taking a midnight stroll.”

Charlotte nodded. “Was the ghost there? Did you see the men from the Society? Did they capture the ghost? Was it very exciting?”

For a moment Jane was tempted to share her secrets with her friend, but that would definitely be breaking Rule #1, so Jane simply said, “I assure you, it was only a walk in the moonlight. You know I like walking. Well. Good night, Charlotte.”

She made her way up the stairs and to her tiny room.

Where Helen Burns was waiting. Her best friend and favorite ghost in all the world.

“Thank goodness you’re back! What happened?” Helen asked, her translucent cheeks flushed with the fever that had killed her so many years ago.

Jane dropped her face into her hands. “It was terrible. He just . . . bopped that poor ghost over the head.” And then the entire story spilled out of her in a rush.

“So the Society can do all the things the papers claim,” said Helen after Jane had finished talking.

“They can.” Jane kicked off her shoes and began to struggle out of her various layers of repressive clothing. “And they’re cruel. They didn’t even bother talking to the ghost much. They were simply intent on capturing her. And she wasn’t so very troublesome. . . .” Jane recalled the brandy glass smashing against the wall. The clock. The jar of pickled eggs. “Well, she did need help. But she didn’t deserve to be trapped in a pocket watch.”

“A pocket watch. How awful,” Helen said with a shudder. “It must be so cramped. And think of the ticking.”

Jane finished dressing and blew out the candle. The two curled up together on Jane’s small, lumpy bed, as they had always done, even though sleep was only required by one of them. For a long while Jane stared up at the dark ceiling, then suddenly said, “The Society might come tomorrow.”

Helen sat up abruptly. “Here?”

Jane sat up, too. “Yes. The agents seemed very curious about me. And one guessed that I teach at Lowood. If they come, you must stay hidden.”

“I’ll stay out of sight,” promised Helen.

Jane paused for a moment. “It’s time to leave this place. This time I’m serious.”

Helen’s lower lip trembled slightly. “You would leave me?”

“I will never leave you! I meant both of us would leave. Together, as always.”

Helen had been Jane’s first true friend, her only friend at Lowood until Charlotte had come along. Helen had stood by Jane when everyone else shamed and punished her. And despite Jane’s excessive plainness and her many other inadequacies, Helen had loved her.

But Helen died when she was fourteen. That spring a particularly nasty version of the Graveyard Disease had descended on Lowood. By May, forty-five of the eighty pupils lay in quarantine, Helen among them. One night Miss Temple helped Jane sneak past the nurses into the room where Helen lay dying.

Jane had climbed into Helen’s cot. “Helen, don’t leave me,” she whispered.

“I would never,” Helen promised. “Hold my hand.”

Jane clasped her friend’s hand tightly, trying to ignore how cold Helen’s fingers were. They fell asleep like that, and when she woke the next morning, Helen’s body was pale and still.

And standing above it was Helen’s ghost.

“Hi,” she said with a mischievous smile. “I think I get to stay.”

It was always hit-and-miss with ghosts as to which ones stayed and which ones left for some great beyond. But Helen had stayed with Jane, true to her promise. And Jane promised, in return, that they would never be parted. Helen was the closest thing to a sister Jane had ever had. She could not—would not—abandon Helen. But now she worried that the Society would storm Lowood tomorrow. And if it wasn’t tomorrow, it was only a matter of time. There were so many ghosts here, one was bound to cause a problem. Mr. Brocklehurst, probably.

“It’s not as if we have anywhere to go,” Helen was saying.