The East Wind

By Laura Schiller

Based on: Bleak House

Copyright: BBC/Charles Dickens

The day they buried Tom Jarndyce was the coldest day in living memory. The east wind fluttered the curtains of Bleak House like a restless hand, moaned in the trees outside, scattered snow and hailstones through the roof and whistled through the crack in John's window until it blew out the last embers of the fire. He pulled the thin, moth-eaten blankets over his head, squeezed his eyes shut, and tried to remember some happy moment from his childhood. All he could remember, however, was his Uncle Tom's face on the day he sent John back to school for his last term: pale, shadow-eyed, flanked by two lawyers in black suits. I'm sorry, lad. Until this case of ours is settled, I cannot afford to be distracted. And then, without a prayer or song or even a word for London's most notorious suicide, the sound of earth striking the coffin.

He was twenty-one, master of a large if neglected estate, and heir to a considerable fortune. He would have gladly given it all back to see his only family alive again, and see him smiling.

Forty years later, every time the east wind blows, he thinks of it cutting across Tom Jarndyce's unconsecrated grave. He has grown so used to hearing it, he cannot sleep without opening the window. When it wakes him in the middle of the night, he has been known to take a slow, soft-slippered walk outside the servants' quarters simply to assure himself of life in the house.

He has often wondered if, should he choose to share his bed with a warm and compassionate woman, the nightmares would stop. It is an idea well worth contemplating, if he can find the right one – and if, by some miracle, she would consent to a broken-down old fool such as himself.

His preference, however, is to fill the house with as many guests as possible. When Mrs. Jellyby and her comrades are discussing their missions until midnight, when Harold Skimpole is burning candles and practicing the violin at ridiculous hours, when laughter rings and lively arguments erupt, he is at least safe from being alone.

They call him generous. They call him good. They do not understand, since he does not tell them, that all his charity is nothing but a thin disguise for fear. All they need to know is one rule: John Jarndyce never, if he can possibly help it, stays to be thanked.