Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition

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 Chapter 15


Mr. Rochester did, on a future occasion, explain it.  It was one
afternoon, when he chanced to meet me and Adele in the grounds:
and while she played with Pilot and her shuttlecock, he asked me
to walk up and down a long beech avenue within sight of her.

He then said that she was the daughter of a French opera_dancer,
Celine Varens, towards whom he had once cherished what he called
a "grande passion."  This passion Celine had professed to return
with even superior ardour.  He thought himself her idol, ugly as
he was:  he believed, as he said, that she preferred his "taille
d'athlete" to the elegance of the Apollo Belvidere.

"And, Miss Eyre, so much was I flattered by this preference of
the Gallic sylph for her British gnome, that I installed her in an
hotel; gave her a complete establishment of servants, a carriage,
cashmeres, diamonds, dentelles, &c.  In short, I began the process
of ruining myself in the received style, like any other spoony.  I
had not, it seems, the originality to chalk out a new road to shame
and destruction, but trode the old track with stupid exactness not
to deviate an inch from the beaten centre.  I had __ as I deserved
to have __ the fate of all other spoonies.  Happening to call one
evening when Celine did not expect me, I found her out; but it was
a warm night, and I was tired with strolling through Paris, so I
sat down in her boudoir; happy to breathe the air consecrated so
lately by her presence.  No, __ I exaggerate; I never thought there
was any consecrating virtue about her:  it was rather a sort of
pastille perfume she had left; a scent of musk and amber, than an
odour of sanctity.  I was just beginning to stifle with the fumes
of conservatory flowers and sprinkled essences, when I bethought
myself to open the window and step out on to the balcony.  It was
moonlight and gaslight besides, and very still and serene.  The
balcony was furnished with a chair or two; I sat down, and took
out a cigar, __ I will take one now, if you will excuse me."

Here ensued a pause, filled up by the producing and lighting
of a cigar; having placed it to his lips and breathed a trail
of Havannah incense on the freezing and sunless air, he went on _

"I liked bonbons too in those days, Miss Eyre, and I was croquant
__ (overlook the barbarism) __ croquant chocolate comfits, and
smoking alternately, watching meantime the equipages that rolled
along the fashionable streets towards the neighbouring opera_house,
when in an elegant close carriage drawn by a beautiful pair of
English horses, and distinctly seen in the brilliant city_night,
I recognised the 'voiture' I had given Celine.  She was returning:
of course my heart thumped with impatience against the iron rails
I leant upon.  The carriage stopped, as I had expected, at the
hotel door; my flame (that is the very word for an opera inamorata)
alighted:  though muffed in a cloak __ an unnecessary encumbrance,
by_the_bye, on so warm a June evening __ I knew her instantly by
her little foot, seen peeping from the skirt of her dress, as she
skipped from the carriage_step.  Bending over the balcony, I was
about to murmur 'Mon ange' __ in a tone, of course, which should
be audible to the ear of love alone __ when a figure jumped from
the carriage after her; cloaked also; but that was a spurred heel
which had rung on the pavement, and that was a hatted head which
now passed under the arched porte cochere of the hotel.

"You never felt jealousy, did you, Miss Eyre?  Of course not:  I
need not ask you; because you never felt love.  You have both
sentiments yet to experience:  your soul sleeps; the shock is yet
to be given which shall waken it.  You think all existence lapses
in as quiet a flow as that in which your youth has hitherto slid
away.  Floating on with closed eyes and muffled ears, you neither
see the rocks bristling not far off in the bed of the flood, nor
hear the breakers boil at their base.  But I tell you __ and you
may mark my words __ you will come some day to a craggy pass in the
channel, where the whole of life's stream will be broken up into
whirl and tumult, foam and noise:  either you will be dashed to
atoms on crag points, or lifted up and borne on by some master_wave
into a calmer current __ as I am now.

"I like this day; I like that sky of steel; I like the sternness
and stillness of the world under this frost.  I like Thornfield,
its antiquity, its retirement, its old crow_trees and thorn_trees,
its grey facade, and lines of dark windows reflecting that metal
welkin:  and yet how long have I abhorred the very thought of it,
shunned it like a great plague_house?  How I do still abhor _"

He ground his teeth and was silent:  he arrested his step and struck
his boot against the hard ground.  Some hated thought seemed to
have him in its grip, and to hold him so tightly that he could not
advance.

We were ascending the avenue when he thus paused; the hall was before
us.  Lifting his eye to its battlements, he cast over them a glare
such as I never saw before or since.  Pain, shame, ire, impatience,
disgust, detestation, seemed momentarily to hold a quivering conflict
in the large pupil dilating under his ebon eyebrow.  Wild was the
wrestle which should be paramount; but another feeling rose and
triumphed:  something hard and cynical:  self_willed and resolute:
it settled his passion and petrified his countenance:  he went on _

"During the moment I was silent, Miss Eyre, I was arranging a point
with my destiny.  She stood there, by that beech_trunk __ a hag
like one of those who appeared to Macbeth on the heath of Forres.
'You like Thornfield?'  she said, lifting her finger; and then she
wrote in the air a memento, which ran in lurid hieroglyphics all
along the house_front, between the upper and lower row of windows,
'Like it if you can!  Like it if you dare!'

"'I will like it,' said I; 'I dare like it;' and" (he subjoined
moodily) "I will keep my word; I will break obstacles to happiness,
to goodness __ yes, goodness.  I wish to be a better man than I
have been, than I am; as Job's leviathan broke the spear, the dart,
and the habergeon, hindrances which others count as iron and brass,
I will esteem but straw and rotten wood."

Adele here ran before him with her shuttlecock.  "Away!"  he cried
harshly; "keep at a distance, child; or go in to Sophie!"  Continuing
then to pursue his walk in silence, I ventured to recall
him to the point whence he had abruptly diverged _

"Did you leave the balcony, sir," I asked, "when Mdlle. Varens
entered?"

I almost expected a rebuff for this hardly well_timed question,
but, on the contrary, waking out of his scowling abstraction, he
turned his eyes towards me, and the shade seemed to clear off his
brow.  "Oh, I had forgotten Celine!  Well, to resume.  When I saw
my charmer thus come in accompanied by a cavalier, I seemed to
hear a hiss, and the green snake of jealousy, rising on undulating
coils from the moonlit balcony, glided within my waistcoat, and ate
its way in two minutes to my heart's core.  Strange!"  he exclaimed,
suddenly starting again from the point.  "Strange that I should
choose you for the confidant of all this, young lady; passing
strange that you should listen to me quietly, as if it were the most
usual thing in the world for a man like me to tell stories of his
opera_mistresses to a quaint, inexperienced girl like you!  But the
last singularity explains the first, as I intimated once before:
you, with your gravity, considerateness, and caution were made to
be the recipient of secrets.  Besides, I know what sort of a mind
I have placed in communication with my own:  I know it is one not
liable to take infection:  it is a peculiar mind:  it is a unique
one.  Happily I do not mean to harm it:  but, if I did, it would
not take harm from me.  The more you and I converse, the better;
for while I cannot blight you, you may refresh me."  After
this digression he proceeded _

"I remained in the balcony.  'They will come to her boudoir, no
doubt,' thought I: 'let me prepare an ambush.'  So putting my hand
in through the open window, I drew the curtain over it, leaving only
an opening through which I could take observations; then I closed
the casement, all but a chink just wide enough to furnish an outlet
to lovers' whispered vows:  then I stole back to my chair; and as
I resumed it the pair came in.  My eye was quickly at the aperture.
Celine's chamber_maid entered, lit a lamp, left it on the table,
and withdrew.  The couple were thus revealed to me clearly:  both
removed their cloaks, and there was 'the Varens,' shining in satin
and jewels, __ my gifts of course, __ and there was her companion
in an officer's uniform; and I knew him for a young roue of a
vicomte __ a brainless and vicious youth whom I had sometimes met
in society, and had never thought of hating because I despised him
so absolutely.  On recognising him, the fang of the snake Jealousy
was instantly broken; because at the same moment my love for Celine
sank under an extinguisher.  A woman who could betray me for such
a rival was not worth contending for; she deserved only scorn;
less, however, than I, who had been her dupe.

"They began to talk; their conversation eased me completely:  frivolous,
mercenary, heartless, and senseless, it was rather calculated to
weary than enrage a listener.  A card of mine lay on the table;
this being perceived, brought my name under discussion.  Neither
of them possessed energy or wit to belabour me soundly, but they
insulted me as coarsely as they could in their little way:  especially
Celine, who even waxed rather brilliant on my personal defects __
deformities she termed them.  Now it had been her custom to launch
out into fervent admiration of what she called my 'beaute male:'
wherein she differed diametrically from you, who told me point_blank,
at the second interview, that you did not think me handsome.  The
contrast struck me at the time and __ "

Adele here came running up again.

"Monsieur, John has just been to say that your agent has called
and wishes to see you."

"Ah!  in that case I must abridge.  Opening the window, I walked
in upon them; liberated Celine from my protection; gave her notice
to vacate her hotel; offered her a purse for immediate exigencies;
disregarded screams, hysterics, prayers, protestations, convulsions;
made an appointment with the vicomte for a meeting at the Bois de
Boulogne.  Next morning I had the pleasure of encountering him; left
a bullet in one of his poor etiolated arms, feeble as the wing of
a chicken in the pip, and then thought I had done with the whole
crew.  But unluckily the Varens, six months before, had given me
this filette Adele, who, she affirmed, was my daughter; and perhaps
she may be, though I see no proofs of such grim paternity written
in her countenance:  Pilot is more like me than she.  Some years
after I had broken with the mother, she abandoned her child, and
ran away to Italy with a musician or singer.  I acknowledged no
natural claim on Adele's part to be supported by me, nor do I now
acknowledge any, for I am not her father; but hearing that she was
quite destitute, I e'en took the poor thing out of the slime and
mud of Paris, and transplanted it here, to grow up clean in the
wholesome soil of an English country garden.  Mrs. Fairfax found
you to train it; but now you know that it is the illegitimate
offspring of a French opera_ girl, you will perhaps think differently
of your post and protegee:  you will be coming to me some day with
notice that you have found another place __ that you beg me to look
out for a new governess, &c. __ Eh?"

"No:  Adele is not answerable for either her mother's faults or
yours:  I have a regard for her; and now that I know she is, in a
sense, parentless __ forsaken by her mother and disowned by you, sir
__ I shall cling closer to her than before.  How could I possibly
prefer the spoilt pet of a wealthy family, who would hate her governess
as a nuisance, to a lonely little orphan, who leans towards her as
a friend?"

"Oh, that is the light in which you view it!  Well, I must go in
now; and you too:  it darkens."

But I stayed out a few minutes longer with Adele and Pilot __ ran
a race with her, and played a game of battledore and shuttlecock.
When we went in, and I had removed her bonnet and coat, I took her
on my knee; kept her there an hour, allowing her to prattle as she
liked:  not rebuking even some little freedoms and trivialities into
which she was apt to stray when much noticed, and which betrayed
in her a superficiality of character, inherited probably from her
mother, hardly congenial to an English mind.  Still she had her
merits; and I was disposed to appreciate all that was good in her
to the utmost.  I sought in her countenance and features a likeness
to Mr. Rochester, but found none:  no trait, no turn of expression
announced relationship.  It was a pity:  if she could but have been
proved to resemble him, he would have thought more of her.

It was not till after I had withdrawn to my own chamber for the
night, that I steadily reviewed the tale Mr. Rochester had told me.
As he had said, there was probably nothing at all extraordinary
in the substance of the narrative itself:  a wealthy Englishman's
passion for a French dancer, and her treachery to him, were everyday
matters enough, no doubt, in society; but there was something decidedly
strange in the paroxysm of emotion which had suddenly seized him
when he was in the act of expressing the present contentment of
his mood, and his newly revived pleasure in the old hall and its
environs.  I meditated wonderingly on this incident; but gradually
quitting it, as I found it for the present inexplicable, I turned to
the consideration of my master's manner to myself.  The confidence
he had thought fit to repose in me seemed a tribute to my discretion:  I
regarded and accepted it as such.  His deportment had now for some
weeks been more uniform towards me than at the first.  I never seemed
in his way; he did not take fits of chilling hauteur:  when he met
me unexpectedly, the encounter seemed welcome; he had always a word
and sometimes a smile for me:  when summoned by formal invitation
to his presence, I was honoured by a cordiality of reception that
made me feel I really possessed the power to amuse him, and that
these evening conferences were sought as much for his pleasure as
for my benefit.

I, indeed, talked comparatively little, but I heard him talk with
relish.  It was his nature to be communicative; he liked to open
to a mind unacquainted with the world glimpses of its scenes and
ways (I do not mean its corrupt scenes and wicked ways, but such
as derived their interest from the great scale on which they were
acted, the strange novelty by which they were characterised);
and I had a keen delight in receiving the new ideas he offered,
in imagining the new pictures he portrayed, and following him in
thought through the new regions he disclosed, never startled or
troubled by one noxious allusion.

The ease of his manner freed me from painful restraint:  the friendly
frankness, as correct as cordial, with which he treated me, drew
me to him.  I felt at times as if he were my relation rather than
my master:  yet he was imperious sometimes still; but I did not mind
that; I saw it was his way.  So happy, so gratified did I become
with this new interest added to life, that I ceased to pine after
kindred:  my thin crescent_destiny seemed to enlarge; the blanks
of existence were filled up; my bodily health improved; I gathered
flesh and strength.

And was Mr. Rochester now ugly in my eyes?  No, reader:  gratitude,
and many associations, all pleasurable and genial, made his face
the object I best liked to see; his presence in a room was more
cheering than the brightest fire.  Yet I had not forgotten his faults;
indeed, I could not, for he brought them frequently before me.  He
was proud, sardonic, harsh to inferiority of every description:
in my secret soul I knew that his great kindness to me was balanced
by unjust severity to many others.  He was moody, too; unaccountably
so; I more than once, when sent for to read to him, found him sitting
in his library alone, with his head bent on his folded arms; and,
when he looked up, a morose, almost a malignant, scowl blackened
his features.  But I believed that his moodiness, his harshness,
and his former faults of morality (I say FORMER, for now he seemed
corrected of them) had their source in some cruel cross of fate.
I believed he was naturally a man of better tendencies, higher
principles, and purer tastes than such as circumstances had developed,
education instilled, or destiny encouraged.  I thought there were
excellent materials in him; though for the present they hung together
somewhat spoiled and tangled.  I cannot deny that I grieved for his
grief, whatever that was, and would have given much to assuage it.

Though I had now extinguished my candle and was laid down in bed,
I could not sleep for thinking of his look when he paused in the
avenue, and told how his destiny had risen up before him, and dared
him to be happy at Thornfield.

"Why not?"  I asked myself.  "What alienates him from the house?
Will he leave it again soon?  Mrs. Fairfax said he seldom stayed
here longer than a fortnight at a time; and he has now been resident
eight weeks.  If he does go, the change will be doleful.  Suppose
he should be absent spring, summer, and autumn:  how joyless sunshine
and fine days will seem!"

I hardly know whether I had slept or not after this musing; at any
rate, I started wide awake on hearing a vague murmur, peculiar and
lugubrious, which sounded, I thought, just above me.  I wished I
had kept my candle burning:  the night was drearily dark; my spirits
were depressed.  I rose and sat up in bed, listening.  The sound
was hushed.

I tried again to sleep; but my heart beat anxiously:  my inward
tranquillity was broken.  The clock, far down in the hall, struck two.
Just then it seemed my chamber_door was touched; as if fingers had
swept the panels in groping a way along the dark gallery outside.
I said, "Who is there?"  Nothing answered.  I was chilled with
fear.

All at once I remembered that it might be Pilot, who, when the
kitchen_door chanced to be left open, not unfrequently found his
way up to the threshold of Mr. Rochester's chamber:  I had seen him
lying there myself in the mornings.  The idea calmed me somewhat:
I lay down.  Silence composes the nerves; and as an unbroken hush
now reigned again through the whole house, I began to feel the return
of slumber.  But it was not fated that I should sleep that night.
A dream had scarcely approached my ear, when it fled affrighted,
scared by a marrow_freezing incident enough.

This was a demoniac laugh __ low, suppressed, and deep __ uttered,
as it seemed, at the very keyhole of my chamber door.  The head of
my bed was near the door, and I thought at first the goblin_laugher
stood at my bedside __ or rather, crouched by my pillow:  but I
rose, looked round, and could see nothing; while, as I still gazed,
the unnatural sound was reiterated:  and I knew it came from behind
the panels.  My first impulse was to rise and fasten the bolt; my
next, again to cry out, "Who is there?"

Something gurgled and moaned.  Ere long, steps retreated up the
gallery towards the third_storey staircase:  a door had lately been
made to shut in that staircase; I heard it open and close, and all
was still.

"Was that Grace Poole?  and is she possessed with a devil?"  thought
I. Impossible now to remain longer by myself:  I must go to Mrs.
Fairfax.  I hurried on my frock and a shawl; I withdrew the bolt
and opened the door with a trembling hand.  There was a candle
burning just outside, and on the matting in the gallery.  I was
surprised at this circumstance:  but still more was I amazed to
perceive the air quite dim, as if filled with smoke; and, while
looking to the right hand and left, to find whence these blue
wreaths issued, I became further aware of a strong smell of burning.

Something creaked:  it was a door ajar; and that door was Mr.
Rochester's, and the smoke rushed in a cloud from thence.  I thought
no more of Mrs. Fairfax; I thought no more of Grace Poole, or the
laugh:  in an instant, I was within the chamber.  Tongues of flame
darted round the bed:  the curtains were on fire.  In the midst of
blaze and vapour, Mr. Rochester lay stretched motionless, in deep
sleep.

"Wake!  wake!"  I cried.  I shook him, but he only murmured and
turned:  the smoke had stupefied him.  Not a moment could be lost:
the very sheets were kindling, I rushed to his basin and ewer;
fortunately, one was wide and the other deep, and both were filled
with water.  I heaved them up, deluged the bed and its occupant,
flew back to my own room, brought my own water_jug, baptized the
couch afresh, and, by God's aid, succeeded in extinguishing the
flames which were devouring it.

The hiss of the quenched element, the breakage of a pitcher which
I flung from my hand when I had emptied it, and, above all, the
splash of the shower_bath I had liberally bestowed, roused Mr.
Rochester at last.  Though it was now dark, I knew he was awake;
because I heard him fulminating strange anathemas at finding himself
lying in a pool of water.

"Is there a flood?"  he cried.

"No, sir," I answered; "but there has been a fire:  get up, do;
you are quenched now; I will fetch you a candle."

"In the name of all the elves in Christendom, is that Jane Eyre?"
he demanded.  "What have you done with me, witch, sorceress?  Who
is in the room besides you?  Have you plotted to drown me?"

"I will fetch you a candle, sir; and, in Heaven's name, get up.
Somebody has plotted something:  you cannot too soon find out who
and what it is."

"There!  I am up now; but at your peril you fetch a candle yet:
wait two minutes till I get into some dry garments, if any dry
there be __ yes, here is my dressing_gown.  Now run!"

I did run; I brought the candle which still remained in the
gallery.  He took it from my hand, held it up, and surveyed the
bed, all blackened and scorched, the sheets drenched, the carpet
round swimming in water.

"What is it?  and who did it?"  he asked.  I briefly related to him
what had transpired:  the strange laugh I had heard in the gallery:
the step ascending to the third storey; the smoke, __ the smell of
fire which had conducted me to his room; in what state I had found
matters there, and how I had deluged him with all the water I could
lay hands on.

He listened very gravely; his face, as I went on, expressed more
concern than astonishment; he did not immediately speak when I had
concluded.

"Shall I call Mrs. Fairfax?"  I asked.

"Mrs. Fairfax?  No; what the deuce would you call her for?  What
can she do?  Let her sleep unmolested."

"Then I will fetch Leah, and wake John and his wife."

"Not at all:  just be still.  You have a shawl on.  If you are not
warm enough, you may take my cloak yonder; wrap it about you, and
sit down in the arm_chair:  there, __ I will put it on.  Now place
your feet on the stool, to keep them out of the wet.  I am going
to leave you a few minutes.  I shall take the candle.  Remain where
you are till I return; be as still as a mouse.  I must pay a visit
to the second storey.  Don't move, remember, or call any one."

He went:  I watched the light withdraw.  He passed up the gallery
very softly, unclosed the staircase door with as little noise as
possible, shut it after him, and the last ray vanished.  I was left
in total darkness.  I listened for some noise, but heard nothing.
A very long time elapsed.  I grew weary:  it was cold, in spite of
the cloak; and then I did not see the use of staying, as I was not
to rouse the house.  I was on the point of risking Mr. Rochester's
displeasure by disobeying his orders, when the light once more
gleamed dimly on the gallery wall, and I heard his unshod feet
tread the matting.  "I hope it is he," thought I, "and not something
worse."

He re_entered, pale and very gloomy.  "I have found it all out,"
said he, setting his candle down on the washstand; "it is as I
thought."

"How, sir?"

He made no reply, but stood with his arms folded, looking on the
ground.  At the end of a few minutes he inquired in rather
a peculiar tone _

"I forget whether you said you saw anything when you opened your
chamber door."

"No, sir, only the candlestick on the ground."

"But you heard an odd laugh?  You have heard that laugh before, I
should think, or something like it?"

"Yes, sir:  there is a woman who sews here, called Grace Poole, __
she laughs in that way.  She is a singular person."

"Just so.  Grace Poole __ you have guessed it.  She is, as you say,
singular __ very.  Well, I shall reflect on the subject.  Meantime,
I am glad that you are the only person, besides myself, acquainted
with the precise details of to_night's incident.  You are no talking
fool:  say nothing about it.  I will account for this state of
affairs" (pointing to the bed):  "and now return to your own room.
I shall do very well on the sofa in the library for the rest of the
night.  It is near four:_ in two hours the servants will be up."

"Good_night, then, sir," said I, departing.

He seemed surprised __ very inconsistently so, as he had just told
me to go.

"What!"  he exclaimed, "are you quitting me already, and in that
way?"

"You said I might go, sir."

"But not without taking leave; not without a word or two of
acknowledgment and good_will:  not, in short, in that brief, dry
fashion.  Why, you have saved my life! __ snatched me from a horrible
and excruciating death!  and you walk past me as if we were mutual
strangers!  At least shake hands."

He held out his hand; I gave him mine:  he took it first in one,
them in both his own.

"You have saved my life:  I have a pleasure in owing you so immense a
debt.  I cannot say more.  Nothing else that has being would have
been tolerable to me in the character of creditor for such an
obligation:  but you:  it is different; __ I feel your benefits no
burden, Jane."

He paused; gazed at me:  words almost visible trembled on his lips,_
_but his voice was checked.

"Good_night again, sir.  There is no debt, benefit, burden,
obligation, in the case."

"I knew," he continued, "you would do me good in some way, at some
time; __ I saw it in your eyes when I first beheld you:  their
expression and smile did not" __ (again he stopped) __ "did not"
(he proceeded hastily) "strike delight to my very inmost heart so
for nothing.  People talk of natural sympathies; I have heard of
good genii:  there are grains of truth in the wildest fable.  My
cherished preserver, goodnight!"

Strange energy was in his voice, strange fire in his look.

"I am glad I happened to be awake," I said:  and then I was going.

"What!  you WILL go?"

"I am cold, sir."

"Cold?  Yes, __ and standing in a pool!  Go, then, Jane; go!"  But
he still retained my hand, and I could not free it.  I bethought
myself of an expedient.

"I think I hear Mrs. Fairfax move, sir," said I.

"Well, leave me:"  he relaxed his fingers, and I was gone.

I regained my couch, but never thought of sleep.  Till morning
dawned I was tossed on a buoyant but unquiet sea, where billows
of trouble rolled under surges of joy.  I thought sometimes I saw
beyond its wild waters a shore, sweet as the hills of Beulah; and
now and then a freshening gale, wakened by hope, bore my spirit
triumphantly towards the bourne:  but I could not reach it, even
in fancy __ a counteracting breeze blew off land, and continually
drove me back.  Sense would resist delirium:  judgment would warn
passion.  Too feverish to rest, I rose as soon as day dawned.



Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition Chapter 16


I both wished and feared to see Mr. Rochester on the day which
followed this sleepless night:  I wanted to hear his voice again,
yet feared to meet his eye.  During the early part of the morning,
I momentarily expected his coming; he was not in the frequent habit
of entering the schoolroom, but he did step in for a few minutes
sometimes, and I had the impression that he was sure to visit it
that day.

But the morning passed just as usual:  nothing happened to interrupt
the quiet course of Adele's studies; only soon after breakfast, I
heard some bustle in the neighbourhood of Mr. Rochester's chamber,
Mrs. Fairfax's voice, and Leah's, and the cook's __ that is, John's
wife __ and even John's own gruff tones.  There were exclamations
of "What a mercy master was not burnt in his bed!"  "It is always
dangerous to keep a candle lit at night."  "How providential that
he had presence of mind to think of the water_jug!"  "I wonder
he waked nobody!"  "It is to be hoped he will not take cold with
sleeping on the library sofa," &c.

To much confabulation succeeded a sound of scrubbing and setting to
rights; and when I passed the room, in going downstairs to dinner,
I saw through the open door that all was again restored to complete
order; only the bed was stripped of its hangings.  Leah stood up
in the window_seat, rubbing the panes of glass dimmed with smoke.
I was about to address her, for I wished to know what account had
been given of the affair:  but, on advancing, I saw a second person
in the chamber __ a woman sitting on a chair by the bedside, and
sewing rings to new curtains.  That woman was no other than Grace
Poole.

There she sat, staid and taciturn_looking, as usual, in her brown
stuff gown, her check apron, white handkerchief, and cap.  She was
intent on her work, in which her whole thoughts seemed absorbed:
on her hard forehead, and in her commonplace features, was nothing
either of the paleness or desperation one would have expected to
see marking the countenance of a woman who had attempted murder, and
whose intended victim had followed her last night to her lair, and
(as I believed), charged her with the crime she wished to perpetrate.
I was amazed __ confounded.  She looked up, while I still gazed at
her:  no start, no increase or failure of colour betrayed emotion,
consciousness of guilt, or fear of detection.  She said "Good
morning, Miss," in her usual phlegmatic and brief manner; and taking
up another ring and more tape, went on with her sewing.

"I will put her to some test," thought I: "such absolute impenetrability
is past comprehension."

"Good morning, Grace," I said.  "Has anything happened here?  I
thought I heard the servants all talking together a while ago."

"Only master had been reading in his bed last night; he fell asleep
with his candle lit, and the curtains got on fire; but, fortunately,
he awoke before the bed_clothes or the wood_work caught, and
contrived to quench the flames with the water in the ewer."

"A strange affair!"  I said, in a low voice:  then, looking at her
fixedly __ "Did Mr. Rochester wake nobody?  Did no one hear him
move?"

She again raised her eyes to me, and this time there was something
of consciousness in their expression.  She seemed to examine
me warily; then she answered _

"The servants sleep so far off, you know, Miss, they would not be
likely to hear.  Mrs. Fairfax's room and yours are the nearest to
master's; but Mrs. Fairfax said she heard nothing:  when people
get elderly, they often sleep heavy."  She paused, and then added,
with a sort of assumed indifference, but still in a marked and
significant tone __ "But you are young, Miss; and I should say a
light sleeper:  perhaps you may have heard a noise?"

"I did," said I, dropping my voice, so that Leah, who was still
polishing the panes, could not hear me, "and at first I thought
it was Pilot:  but Pilot cannot laugh; and I am certain I heard a
laugh, and a strange one."

She took a new needleful of thread, waxed it carefully, threaded her
needle with a steady hand, and then observed, with perfect composure _

"It is hardly likely master would laugh, I should think, Miss, when
he was in such danger:  You must have been dreaming."

"I was not dreaming," I said, with some warmth, for her brazen
coolness provoked me.  Again she looked at me; and with the same
scrutinising and conscious eye.

"Have you told master that you heard a laugh?"  she inquired.

"I have not had the opportunity of speaking to him this morning."

"You did not think of opening your door and looking out into the
gallery?"  she further asked.

She appeared to be cross_questioning me, attempting to draw from
me information unawares.  The idea struck me that if she discovered
I knew or suspected her guilt, she would be playing of some of her
malignant pranks on me; I thought it advisable to be on my guard.

"On the contrary," said I, "I bolted my door."

"Then you are not in the habit of bolting your door every night
before you get into bed?"

"Fiend!  she wants to know my habits, that she may lay her plans
accordingly!"  Indignation again prevailed over prudence:  I replied
sharply, "Hitherto I have often omitted to fasten the bolt:  I did
not think it necessary.  I was not aware any danger or annoyance
was to be dreaded at Thornfield Hall:  but in future" (and I laid
marked stress on the words) "I shall take good care to make all
secure before I venture to lie down."

"It will be wise so to do," was her answer:  "this neighbourhood
is as quiet as any I know, and I never heard of the hall being
attempted by robbers since it was a house; though there are hundreds
of pounds' worth of plate in the plate_closet, as is well known.
And you see, for such a large house, there are very few servants,
because master has never lived here much; and when he does come,
being a bachelor, he needs little waiting on:  but I always think
it best to err on the safe side; a door is soon fastened, and it
is as well to have a drawn bolt between one and any mischief that
may be about.  A deal of people, Miss, are for trusting all to
Providence; but I say Providence will not dispense with the means,
though He often blesses them when they are used discreetly."  And
here she closed her harangue:  a long one for her, and uttered with
the demureness of a Quakeress.

I still stood absolutely dumfoundered at what appeared to me her
miraculous self_possession and most inscrutable hypocrisy, when
the cook entered.

"Mrs. Poole," said she, addressing Grace, "the servants' dinner
will soon be ready:  will you come down?"

"No; just put my pint of porter and bit of pudding on a tray, and
I'll carry it upstairs."

"You'll have some meat?"

"Just a morsel, and a taste of cheese, that's all."

"And the sago?"

"Never mind it at present:  I shall be coming down before teatime:
I'll make it myself."

The cook here turned to me, saying that Mrs. Fairfax was waiting
for me:  so I departed.

I hardly heard Mrs. Fairfax's account of the curtain conflagration
during dinner, so much was I occupied in puzzling my brains over the
enigmatical character of Grace Poole, and still more in pondering
the problem of her position at Thornfield and questioning why
she had not been given into custody that morning, or, at the very
least, dismissed from her master's service.  He had almost as much
as declared his conviction of her criminality last night:  what
mysterious cause withheld him from accusing her?  Why had he
enjoined me, too, to secrecy?  It was strange:  a bold, vindictive,
and haughty gentleman seemed somehow in the power of one of the
meanest of his dependants; so much in her power, that even when
she lifted her hand against his life, he dared not openly charge
her with the attempt, much less punish her for it.

Had Grace been young and handsome, I should have been tempted to
think that tenderer feelings than prudence or fear influenced Mr.
Rochester in her behalf; but, hard_favoured and matronly as she
was, the idea could not be admitted.  "Yet," I reflected, "she has
been young once; her youth would be contemporary with her master's:
Mrs. Fairfax told me once, she had lived here many years.  I don't
think she can ever have been pretty; but, for aught I know, she
may possess originality and strength of character to compensate
for the want of personal advantages.  Mr. Rochester is an amateur
of the decided and eccentric:  Grace is eccentric at least.  What
if a former caprice (a freak very possible to a nature so sudden and
headstrong as his) has delivered him into her power, and she now
exercises over his actions a secret influence, the result of his own
indiscretion, which he cannot shake off, and dare not disregard?"
But, having reached this point of conjecture, Mrs. Poole's square,
flat figure, and uncomely, dry, even coarse face, recurred so
distinctly to my mind's eye, that I thought, "No; impossible!  my
supposition cannot be correct.  Yet," suggested the secret voice
which talks to us in our own hearts, "you are not beautiful either,
and perhaps Mr. Rochester approves you:  at any rate, you have often
felt as if he did; and last night __ remember his words; remember
his look; remember his voice!"

I well remembered all; language, glance, and tone seemed at the
moment vividly renewed.  I was now in the schoolroom; Adele was
drawing; I bent over her and directed her pencil.  She looked up
with a sort of start.

"Qu' avez_vous, mademoiselle?"  said she.  "Vos doigts tremblent
comme la feuille, et vos joues sont rouges:  mais, rouges comme
des cerises!"

"I am hot, Adele, with stooping!"  She went on sketching; I went
on thinking.

I hastened to drive from my mind the hateful notion I had been
conceiving respecting Grace Poole; it disgusted me.  I compared
myself with her, and found we were different.  Bessie Leaven had
said I was quite a lady; and she spoke truth __ I was a lady.  And
now I looked much better than I did when Bessie saw me; I had more
colour and more flesh, more life, more vivacity, because I had
brighter hopes and keener enjoyments.

"Evening approaches," said I, as I looked towards the window.  "I
have never heard Mr. Rochester's voice or step in the house to_day;
but surely I shall see him before night:  I feared the meeting in
the morning; now I desire it, because expectation has been so long
baffled that it is grown impatient."

When dusk actually closed, and when Adele left me to go and play in
the nursery with Sophie, I did most keenly desire it.  I listened
for the bell to ring below; I listened for Leah coming up with
a message; I fancied sometimes I heard Mr. Rochester's own tread,
and I turned to the door, expecting it to open and admit him.
The door remained shut; darkness only came in through the window.
Still it was not late; he often sent for me at seven and eight
o'clock, and it was yet but six.  Surely I should not be wholly
disappointed to_ night, when I had so many things to say to him!  I
wanted again to introduce the subject of Grace Poole, and to hear
what he would answer; I wanted to ask him plainly if he really
believed it was she who had made last night's hideous attempt; and
if so, why he kept her wickedness a secret.  It little mattered
whether my curiosity irritated him; I knew the pleasure of vexing
and soothing him by turns; it was one I chiefly delighted in, and
a sure instinct always prevented me from going too far; beyond
the verge of provocation I never ventured; on the extreme brink I
liked well to try my skill.  Retaining every minute form of respect,
every propriety of my station, I could still meet him in argument
without fear or uneasy restraint; this suited both him and me.

A tread creaked on the stairs at last.  Leah made her appearance;
but it was only to intimate that tea was ready in Mrs. Fairfax's
room.  Thither I repaired, glad at least to go downstairs; for that
brought me, I imagined, nearer to Mr. Rochester's presence.

"You must want your tea," said the good lady, as I joined her;
"you ate so little at dinner.  I am afraid," she continued, "you
are not well to_day:  you look flushed and feverish."

"Oh, quite well!  I never felt better."

"Then you must prove it by evincing a good appetite; will you fill
the teapot while I knit off this needle?"  Having completed her
task, she rose to draw down the blind, which she had hitherto kept
up, by way, I suppose, of making the most of daylight, though dusk
was now fast deepening into total obscurity.

"It is fair to_night," said she, as she looked through the panes,
"though not starlight; Mr. Rochester has, on the whole, had a
favourable day for his journey."

"Journey! __ Is Mr. Rochester gone anywhere?  I did not know he
was out."

"Oh, he set off the moment he had breakfasted!  He is gone to the
Leas, Mr. Eshton's place, ten miles on the other side Millcote.  I
believe there is quite a party assembled there; Lord Ingram, Sir
George Lynn, Colonel Dent, and others."

"Do you expect him back to_night?"

"No __ nor to_morrow either; I should think he is very likely to stay
a week or more:  when these fine, fashionable people get together,
they are so surrounded by elegance and gaiety, so well provided with
all that can please and entertain, they are in no hurry to separate.
Gentlemen especially are often in request on such occasions; and Mr.
Rochester is so talented and so lively in society, that I believe he
is a general favourite:  the ladies are very fond of him; though
you would not think his appearance calculated to recommend him
particularly in their eyes:  but I suppose his acquirements and
abilities, perhaps his wealth and good blood, make amends for any
little fault of look."

"Are there ladies at the Leas?"

"There are Mrs. Eshton and her three daughters __ very elegant young
ladies indeed; and there are the Honourable Blanche and Mary Ingram,
most beautiful women, I suppose:  indeed I have seen Blanche, six
or seven years since, when she was a girl of eighteen.  She came
here to a Christmas ball and party Mr. Rochester gave.  You should
have seen the dining_room that day __ how richly it was decorated,
how brilliantly lit up!  I should think there were fifty ladies
and gentlemen present __ all of the first county families; and Miss
Ingram was considered the belle of the evening."

"You saw her, you say, Mrs. Fairfax:  what was she like?"

"Yes, I saw her.  The dining_room doors were thrown open; and, as
it was Christmas_time, the servants were allowed to assemble in
the hall, to hear some of the ladies sing and play.  Mr. Rochester
would have me to come in, and I sat down in a quiet corner and
watched them.  I never saw a more splendid scene:  the ladies were
magnificently dressed; most of them __ at least most of the younger
ones __ looked handsome; but Miss Ingram was certainly the queen."

"And what was she like?"

"Tall, fine bust, sloping shoulders; long, graceful neck:  olive
complexion, dark and clear; noble features; eyes rather like Mr.
Rochester's:  large and black, and as brilliant as her jewels.  And
then she had such a fine head of hair; raven_black and so becomingly
arranged:  a crown of thick plaits behind, and in front the longest,
the glossiest curls I ever saw.  She was dressed in pure white; an
amber_coloured scarf was passed over her shoulder and across her
breast, tied at the side, and descending in long, fringed ends
below her knee.  She wore an amber_coloured flower, too, in her
hair:  it contrasted well with the jetty mass of her curls."

"She was greatly admired, of course?"

"Yes, indeed:  and not only for her beauty, but for her accomplishments.
She was one of the ladies who sang:  a gentleman accompanied her
on the piano.  She and Mr. Rochester sang a duet."

"Mr. Rochester?  I was not aware he could sing."

"Oh!  he has a fine bass voice, and an excellent taste for music."

"And Miss Ingram:  what sort of a voice had she?"

"A very rich and powerful one:  she sang delightfully; it was a treat
to listen to her; __ and she played afterwards.  I am no judge of
music, but Mr. Rochester is; and I heard him say her execution was
remarkably good."

"And this beautiful and accomplished lady, she is not yet married?"

"It appears not:  I fancy neither she nor her sister have very
large fortunes.  Old Lord Ingram's estates were chiefly entailed,
and the eldest son came in for everything almost."

"But I wonder no wealthy nobleman or gentleman has taken a fancy
to her:  Mr. Rochester, for instance.  He is rich, is he not?"

"Oh!  yes.  But you see there is a considerable difference in age:
Mr. Rochester is nearly forty; she is but twenty_five."

"What of that?  More unequal matches are made every day."

"True:  yet I should scarcely fancy Mr. Rochester would entertain
an idea of the sort.  But you eat nothing:  you have scarcely tasted
since you began tea."

"No:  I am too thirsty to eat.  Will you let me have another cup?"

I was about again to revert to the probability of a union between
Mr. Rochester and the beautiful Blanche; but Adele came in, and
the conversation was turned into another channel.

When once more alone, I reviewed the information I had got; looked
into my heart, examined its thoughts and feelings, and endeavoured
to bring back with a strict hand such as had been straying through
imagination's boundless and trackless waste, into the safe fold of
common sense.

Arraigned at my own bar, Memory having given her evidence of the
hopes, wishes, sentiments I had been cherishing since last night
__ of the general state of mind in which I had indulged for nearly
a fortnight past; Reason having come forward and told, in her own
quiet way a plain, unvarnished tale, showing how I had rejected the
real, and rabidly devoured the ideal; __ I pronounced judgment to
this effect:_

That a greater fool than Jane Eyre had never breathed the breath
of life; that a more fantastic idiot had never surfeited herself
on sweet lies, and swallowed poison as if it were nectar.

"YOU," I said, "a favourite with Mr. Rochester?  YOU gifted with the
power of pleasing him?  YOU of importance to him in any way?  Go!
your folly sickens me.  And you have derived pleasure from occasional
tokens of preference __ equivocal tokens shown by a gentleman of
family and a man of the world to a dependent and a novice.  How
dared you?  Poor stupid dupe! __ Could not even self_interest make
you wiser?  You repeated to yourself this morning the brief scene
of last night? __ Cover your face and be ashamed!  He said something
in praise of your eyes, did he?  Blind puppy!  Open their bleared
lids and look on your own accursed senselessness!  It does good
to no woman to be flattered by her superior, who cannot possibly
intend to marry her; and it is madness in all women to let a secret
love kindle within them, which, if unreturned and unknown, must
devour the life that feeds it; and, if discovered and responded
to, must lead, ignis_fatus_like, into miry wilds whence there is
no extrication.

"Listen, then, Jane Eyre, to your sentence:  tomorrow, place the
glass before you, and draw in chalk your own picture, faithfully,
without softening one defect; omit no harsh line, smooth away no
displeasing irregularity; write under it, 'Portrait of a Governess,
disconnected, poor, and plain.'

"Afterwards, take a piece of smooth ivory __ you have one prepared
in your drawing_box:  take your palette, mix your freshest, finest,
clearest tints; choose your most delicate camel_hair pencils;
delineate carefully the loveliest face you can imagine; paint
it in your softest shades and sweetest lines, according to the
description given by Mrs. Fairfax of Blanche Ingram; remember the
raven ringlets, the oriental eye; __ What!  you revert to Mr. Rochester
as a model!  Order!  No snivel! __ no sentiment! __ no regret!  I
will endure only sense and resolution.  Recall the august yet
harmonious lineaments, the Grecian neck and bust; let the round
and dazzling arm be visible, and the delicate hand; omit neither
diamond ring nor gold bracelet; portray faithfully the attire,
aerial lace and glistening satin, graceful scarf and golden rose;
call it 'Blanche, an accomplished lady of rank.'

"Whenever, in future, you should chance to fancy Mr. Rochester
thinks well of you, take out these two pictures and compare them:
say, 'Mr. Rochester might probably win that noble lady's love, if
he chose to strive for it; is it likely he would waste a serious
thought on this indigent and insignificant plebeian?'"

"I'll do it," I resolved:  and having framed this determination,
I grew calm, and fell asleep.

I kept my word.  An hour or two sufficed to sketch my own portrait
in crayons; and in less than a fortnight I had completed an ivory
miniature of an imaginary Blanche Ingram.  It looked a lovely face
enough, and when compared with the real head in chalk, the contrast
was as great as self_control could desire.  I derived benefit from
the task:  it had kept my head and hands employed, and had given
force and fixedness to the new impressions I wished to stamp
indelibly on my heart.

Ere long, I had reason to congratulate myself on the course
of wholesome discipline to which I had thus forced my feelings to
submit.  Thanks to it, I was able to meet subsequent occurrences
with a decent calm, which, had they found me unprepared, I should
probably have been unequal to maintain, even externally.



Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition Chapter 17


A week passed, and no news arrived of Mr. Rochester:  ten days,
and still he did not come.  Mrs. Fairfax said she should not be
surprised if he were to go straight from the Leas to London, and
thence to the Continent, and not show his face again at Thornfield
for a year to come; he had not unfrequently quitted it in a manner
quite as abrupt and unexpected.  When I heard this, I was beginning
to feel a strange chill and failing at the heart.  I was actually
permitting myself to experience a sickening sense of disappointment;
but rallying my wits, and recollecting my principles, I at once
called my sensations to order; and it was wonderful how I got over
the temporary blunder __ how I cleared up the mistake of supposing
Mr. Rochester's movements a matter in which I had any cause to take
a vital interest.  Not that I humbled myself by a slavish
notion of inferiority:  on the contrary, I just said _

"You have nothing to do with the master of Thornfield, further than
to receive the salary he gives you for teaching his protegee, and
to be grateful for such respectful and kind treatment as, if you do
your duty, you have a right to expect at his hands.  Be sure that
is the only tie he seriously acknowledges between you and him; so
don't make him the object of your fine feelings, your raptures,
agonies, and so forth.  He is not of your order:  keep to your
caste, and be too self_respecting to lavish the love of the whole
heart, soul, and strength, where such a gift is not wanted and
would be despised."

I went on with my day's business tranquilly; but ever and anon
vague suggestions kept wandering across my brain of reasons why I
should quit Thornfield; and I kept involuntarily framing advertisements
and pondering conjectures about new situations:  these thoughts I
did not think to check; they might germinate and bear fruit if they
could.

Mr. Rochester had been absent upwards of a fortnight, when the post
brought Mrs. Fairfax a letter.

"It is from the master," said she, as she looked at the direction.
"Now I suppose we shall know whether we are to expect his return
or not."

And while she broke the seal and perused the document, I went on
taking my coffee (we were at breakfast):  it was hot, and I attributed
to that circumstance a fiery glow which suddenly rose to my face.
Why my hand shook, and why I involuntarily spilt half the contents
of my cup into my saucer, I did not choose to consider.

"Well, I sometimes think we are too quiet; but we run a chance of
being busy enough now:  for a little while at least," said Mrs.
Fairfax, still holding the note before her spectacles.

Ere I permitted myself to request an explanation, I tied the string
of Adele's pinafore, which happened to be loose:  having helped her
also to another bun and refilled her mug with milk, I said, nonchalantly _

"Mr. Rochester is not likely to return soon, I suppose?"

"Indeed he is __ in three days, he says:  that will be next Thursday;
and not alone either.  I don't know how many of the fine people
at the Leas are coming with him:  he sends directions for all the
best bedrooms to be prepared; and the library and drawing_rooms are
to be cleaned out; I am to get more kitchen hands from the George
Inn, at Millcote, and from wherever else I can; and the ladies will
bring their maids and the gentlemen their valets:  so we shall have
a full house of it."  And Mrs. Fairfax swallowed her breakfast and
hastened away to commence operations.

The three days were, as she had foretold, busy enough.  I had thought
all the rooms at Thornfield beautifully clean and well arranged;
but it appears I was mistaken.  Three women were got to help; and
such scrubbing, such brushing, such washing of paint and beating of
carpets, such taking down and putting up of pictures, such polishing
of mirrors and lustres, such lighting of fires in bedrooms, such
airing of sheets and feather_beds on hearths, I never beheld,
either before or since.  Adele ran quite wild in the midst of it:
the preparations for company and the prospect of their arrival,
seemed to throw her into ecstasies.  She would have Sophie to look
over all her "toilettes," as she called frocks; to furbish up any
that were "passees," and to air and arrange the new.  For herself,
she did nothing but caper about in the front chambers, jump on and
off the bedsteads, and lie on the mattresses and piled_up bolsters
and pillows before the enormous fires roaring in the chimneys.
From school duties she was exonerated:  Mrs. Fairfax had pressed
me into her service, and I was all day in the storeroom, helping
(or hindering) her and the cook; learning to make custards and
cheese_cakes and French pastry, to truss game and garnish desert_dishes.

The party were expected to arrive on Thursday afternoon, in time
for dinner at six.  During the intervening period I had no time to
nurse chimeras; and I believe I was as active and gay as anybody
__ Adele excepted.  Still, now and then, I received a damping check
to my cheerfulness; and was, in spite of myself, thrown back on
the region of doubts and portents, and dark conjectures.  This was
when I chanced to see the third_storey staircase door (which of
late had always been kept locked) open slowly, and give passage to
the form of Grace Poole, in prim cap, white apron, and handkerchief; when
I watched her glide along the gallery, her quiet tread muffled in
a list slipper; when I saw her look into the bustling, topsy_turvy
bedrooms, __ just say a word, perhaps, to the charwoman about the
proper way to polish a grate, or clean a marble mantelpiece, or
take stains from papered walls, and then pass on.  She would thus
descend to the kitchen once a day, eat her dinner, smoke a moderate
pipe on the hearth, and go back, carrying her pot of porter with
her, for her private solace, in her own gloomy, upper haunt.  Only
one hour in the twenty_four did she pass with her fellow_servants
below; all the rest of her time was spent in some low_ceiled,
oaken chamber of the second storey:  there she sat and sewed __
and probably laughed drearily to herself, __ as companionless as
a prisoner in his dungeon.

The strangest thing of all was, that not a soul in the house,
except me, noticed her habits, or seemed to marvel at them:  no one
discussed her position or employment; no one pitied her solitude
or isolation.  I once, indeed, overheard part of a dialogue between
Leah and one of the charwomen, of which Grace formed the subject.
Leah had been saying something I had not caught, and the
charwoman remarked _

"She gets good wages, I guess?"

"Yes," said Leah; "I wish I had as good; not that mine are to
complain of, __ there's no stinginess at Thornfield; but they're
not one fifth of the sum Mrs. Poole receives.  And she is laying
by:  she goes every quarter to the bank at Millcote.  I should
not wonder but she has saved enough to keep her independent if she
liked to leave; but I suppose she's got used to the place; and then
she's not forty yet, and strong and able for anything.  It is too
soon for her to give up business."

"She is a good hand, I daresay," said the charwoman.

"Ah! __ she understands what she has to do, __ nobody better,"
rejoined Leah significantly; "and it is not every one could fill
her shoes __ not for all the money she gets."

"That it is not!"  was the reply.  "I wonder whether the master __ "

The charwoman was going on; but here Leah turned and perceived me,
and she instantly gave her companion a nudge.

"Doesn't she know?"  I heard the woman whisper.

Leah shook her head, and the conversation was of course dropped.
All I had gathered from it amounted to this, __ that there was a
mystery at Thornfield; and that from participation in that mystery
I was purposely excluded.

Thursday came:  all work had been completed the previous evening;
carpets were laid down, bed_hangings festooned, radiant white
counterpanes spread, toilet tables arranged, furniture rubbed,
flowers piled in vases:  both chambers and saloons looked as fresh
and bright as hands could make them.  The hall, too, was scoured;
and the great carved clock, as well as the steps and banisters of
the staircase, were polished to the brightness of glass; in the
dining_room, the sideboard flashed resplendent with plate; in the
drawing_room and boudoir, vases of exotics bloomed on all sides.

Afternoon arrived:  Mrs. Fairfax assumed her best black satin gown,
her gloves, and her gold watch; for it was her part to receive the
company, __ to conduct the ladies to their rooms, &c.  Adele, too,
would be dressed:  though I thought she had little chance of being
introduced to the party that day at least.  However, to please her,
I allowed Sophie to apparel her in one of her short, full muslin
frocks.  For myself, I had no need to make any change; I should not
be called upon to quit my sanctum of the schoolroom; for a sanctum
it was now become to me, __ "a very pleasant refuge in time of
trouble."

It had been a mild, serene spring day __ one of those days which,
towards the end of March or the beginning of April, rise shining
over the earth as heralds of summer.  It was drawing to an end now;
but the evening was even warm, and I sat at work in the schoolroom
with the window open.

"It gets late," said Mrs. Fairfax, entering in rustling state.
"I am glad I ordered dinner an hour after the time Mr. Rochester
mentioned; for it is past six now.  I have sent John down to the
gates to see if there is anything on the road:  one can see a long
way from thence in the direction of Millcote."  She went to the
window.  "Here he is!"  said she.  "Well, John" (leaning out), "any
news?"

"They're coming, ma'am," was the answer.  "They'll be here in ten
minutes."

Adele flew to the window.  I followed, taking care to stand on one
side, so that, screened by the curtain, I could see without being
seen.

The ten minutes John had given seemed very long, but at last wheels
were heard; four equestrians galloped up the drive, and after them
came two open carriages.  Fluttering veils and waving plumes filled
the vehicles; two of the cavaliers were young, dashing_looking
gentlemen; the third was Mr. Rochester, on his black horse, Mesrour,
Pilot bounding before him; at his side rode a lady, and he and she
were the first of the party.  Her purple riding_habit almost swept
the ground, her veil streamed long on the breeze; mingling with
its transparent folds, and gleaming through them, shone rich raven
ringlets.

"Miss Ingram!"  exclaimed Mrs. Fairfax, and away she hurried to
her post below.

The cavalcade, following the sweep of the drive, quickly turned the
angle of the house, and I lost sight of it.  Adele now petitioned
to go down; but I took her on my knee, and gave her to understand
that she must not on any account think of venturing in sight of
the ladies, either now or at any other time, unless expressly sent
for:  that Mr. Rochester would be very angry, &c.  "Some natural
tears she shed" on being told this; but as I began to look very
grave, she consented at last to wipe them.

A joyous stir was now audible in the hall:  gentlemen's deep
tones and ladies' silvery accents blent harmoniously together, and
distinguishable above all, though not loud, was the sonorous voice
of the master of Thornfield Hall, welcoming his fair and gallant
guests under its roof.  Then light steps ascended the stairs; and
there was a tripping through the gallery, and soft cheerful laughs,
and opening and closing doors, and, for a time, a hush.

"Elles changent de toilettes," said Adele; who, listening attentively,
had followed every movement; and she sighed.

"Chez maman," said she, "quand il y avait du monde, je le suivais
partout, au salon et e leurs chambres; souvent je regardais les
femmes de chambre coiffer et habiller les dames, et c'etait si
amusant:  comme cela on apprend."

"Don't you feel hungry, Adele?"

"Mais oui, mademoiselle:  voile cinq ou six heures que nous n'avons
pas mange."

"Well now, while the ladies are in their rooms, I will venture down
and get you something to eat."

And issuing from my asylum with precaution, I sought a back_stairs
which conducted directly to the kitchen.  All in that region was
fire and commotion; the soup and fish were in the last stage of
projection, and the cook hung over her crucibles in a frame of mind
and body threatening spontaneous combustion.  In the servants' hall
two coachmen and three gentlemen's gentlemen stood or sat round the
fire; the abigails, I suppose, were upstairs with their mistresses;
the new servants, that had been hired from Millcote, were bustling
about everywhere.  Threading this chaos, I at last reached the
larder; there I took possession of a cold chicken, a roll of bread,
some tarts, a plate or two and a knife and fork:  with this booty
I made a hasty retreat.  I had regained the gallery, and was just
shutting the back_door behind me, when an accelerated hum warned me
that the ladies were about to issue from their chambers.  I could
not proceed to the schoolroom without passing some of their doors,
and running the risk of being surprised with my cargo of victualage;
so I stood still at this end, which, being windowless, was dark:
quite dark now, for the sun was set and twilight gathering.

Presently the chambers gave up their fair tenants one after another:
each came out gaily and airily, with dress that gleamed lustrous
through the dusk.  For a moment they stood grouped together at
the other extremity of the gallery, conversing in a key of sweet
subdued vivacity:  they then descended the staircase almost as
noiselessly as a bright mist rolls down a hill.  Their collective
appearance had left on me an impression of high_born elegance, such
as I had never before received.

I found Adele peeping through the schoolroom door, which she held
ajar.  "What beautiful ladies!"  cried she in English.  "Oh, I wish
I might go to them!  Do you think Mr. Rochester will send for us
by_and_bye, after dinner?"

"No, indeed, I don't; Mr. Rochester has something else to think
about.  Never mind the ladies to_night; perhaps you will see them
to_morrow:  here is your dinner."

She was really hungry, so the chicken and tarts served to divert
her attention for a time.  It was well I secured this forage, or
both she, I, and Sophie, to whom I conveyed a share of our repast,
would have run a chance of getting no dinner at all:  every one
downstairs was too much engaged to think of us.  The dessert was not
carried out till after nine and at ten footmen were still running
to and fro with trays and coffee_cups.  I allowed Adele to sit up
much later than usual; for she declared she could not possibly go
to sleep while the doors kept opening and shutting below, and people
bustling about.  Besides, she added, a message might possibly come
from Mr. Rochester when she was undressed; "et alors quel dommage!"

I told her stories as long as she would listen to them; and then
for a change I took her out into the gallery.  The hall lamp was
now lit, and it amused her to look over the balustrade and watch
the servants passing backwards and forwards.  When the evening
was far advanced, a sound of music issued from the drawing_room,
whither the piano had been removed; Adele and I sat down on the
top step of the stairs to listen.  Presently a voice blent with
the rich tones of the instrument; it was a lady who sang, and very
sweet her notes were.  The solo over, a duet followed, and then a
glee:  a joyous conversational murmur filled up the intervals.  I
listened long:  suddenly I discovered that my ear was wholly intent
on analysing the mingled sounds, and trying to discriminate amidst
the confusion of accents those of Mr. Rochester; and when it caught
them, which it soon did, it found a further task in framing the
tones, rendered by distance inarticulate, into words.

The clock struck eleven.  I looked at Adele, whose head leant
against my shoulder; her eyes were waxing heavy, so I took her up
in my arms and carried her off to bed.  It was near one before the
gentlemen and ladies sought their chambers.

The next day was as fine as its predecessor:  it was devoted by
the party to an excursion to some site in the neighbourhood.  They
set out early in the forenoon, some on horseback, the rest in
carriages; I witnessed both the departure and the return.  Miss
Ingram, as before, was the only lady equestrian; and, as before,
Mr. Rochester galloped at her side; the two rode a little apart from
the rest.  I pointed out this circumstance to Mrs. Fairfax,
who was standing at the window with me _

"You said it was not likely they should think of being married,"
said I, "but you see Mr. Rochester evidently prefers her to any of
the other ladies."

"Yes, I daresay:  no doubt he admires her."

"And she him," I added; "look how she leans her head towards him
as if she were conversing confidentially; I wish I could see her
face; I have never had a glimpse of it yet."

"You will see her this evening," answered Mrs. Fairfax.  "I happened
to remark to Mr. Rochester how much Adele wished to be introduced
to the ladies, and he said:  'Oh!  let her come into the drawing_room
after dinner; and request Miss Eyre to accompany her.'"

"Yes; he said that from mere politeness:  I need not go, I am sure,"
I answered.

"Well, I observed to him that as you were unused to company, I did
not think you would like appearing before so gay a party __ all
strangers; and he replied, in his quick way __ 'Nonsense!  If she
objects, tell her it is my particular wish; and if she resists,
say I shall come and fetch her in case of contumacy.'"

"I will not give him that trouble," I answered.  "I will go, if
no better may be; but I don't like it.  Shall you be there, Mrs.
Fairfax?"

"No; I pleaded off, and he admitted my plea.  I'll tell you how to
manage so as to avoid the embarrassment of making a formal entrance,
which is the most disagreeable part of the business.  You must go
into the drawing_room while it is empty, before the ladies leave
the dinner_table; choose your seat in any quiet nook you like; you
need not stay long after the gentlemen come in, unless you please:
just let Mr. Rochester see you are there and then slip away __
nobody will notice you."

"Will these people remain long, do you think?"

"Perhaps two or three weeks, certainly not more.  After the
Easter recess, Sir George Lynn, who was lately elected member for
Millcote, will have to go up to town and take his seat; I daresay
Mr. Rochester will accompany him:  it surprises me that he has
already made so protracted a stay at Thornfield."

It was with some trepidation that I perceived the hour approach
when I was to repair with my charge to the drawing_room.  Adele
had been in a state of ecstasy all day, after hearing she was to be
presented to the ladies in the evening; and it was not till Sophie
commenced the operation of dressing her that she sobered down.  Then
the importance of the process quickly steadied her, and by the time
she had her curls arranged in well_smoothed, drooping clusters, her
pink satin frock put on, her long sash tied, and her lace mittens
adjusted, she looked as grave as any judge.  No need to warn her not
to disarrange her attire:  when she was dressed, she sat demurely
down in her little chair, taking care previously to lift up the
satin skirt for fear she should crease it, and assured me she would
not stir thence till I was ready.  This I quickly was:  my best
dress (the silver_grey one, purchased for Miss Temple's wedding,
and never worn since) was soon put on; my hair was soon smoothed;
my sole ornament, the pearl brooch, soon assumed.  We descended.

Fortunately there was another entrance to the drawing_room than
that through the saloon where they were all seated at dinner.  We
found the apartment vacant; a large fire burning silently on the
marble hearth, and wax candles shining in bright solitude, amid the
exquisite flowers with which the tables were adorned.  The crimson
curtain hung before the arch:  slight as was the separation
this drapery formed from the party in the adjoining saloon, they
spoke in so low a key that nothing of their conversation could be
distinguished beyond a soothing murmur.

Adele, who appeared to be still under the influence of a most
solemnising impression, sat down, without a word, on the footstool I
pointed out to her.  I retired to a window_seat, and taking a book
from a table near, endeavoured to read.  Adele brought her stool
to my feet; ere long she touched my knee.

"What is it, Adele?"

"Est_ce que je ne puis pas prendrie une seule de ces fleurs
magnifiques, mademoiselle?  Seulement pour completer ma toilette."

"You think too much of your 'toilette,' Adele:  but you may have
a flower."  And I took a rose from a vase and fastened it in her
sash.  She sighed a sigh of ineffable satisfaction, as if her cup
of happiness were now full.  I turned my face away to conceal a
smile I could not suppress:  there was something ludicrous as well
as painful in the little Parisienne's earnest and innate devotion
to matters of dress.

A soft sound of rising now became audible; the curtain was swept
back from the arch; through it appeared the dining_room, with its
lit lustre pouring down light on the silver and glass of a magnificent
dessert_service covering a long table; a band of ladies stood in
the opening; they entered, and the curtain fell behind them.

There were but eight; yet, somehow, as they flocked in, they gave
the impression of a much larger number.  Some of them were very
tall; many were dressed in white; and all had a sweeping amplitude
of array that seemed to magnify their persons as a mist magnifies
the moon.  I rose and curtseyed to them:  one or two bent their
heads in return, the others only stared at me.

They dispersed about the room, reminding me, by the lightness and
buoyancy of their movements, of a flock of white plumy birds.  Some
of them threw themselves in half_reclining positions on the sofas
and ottomans:  some bent over the tables and examined the flowers
and books:  the rest gathered in a group round the fire:  all
talked in a low but clear tone which seemed habitual to them.  I
knew their names afterwards, and may as well mention them now.

First, there was Mrs. Eshton and two of her daughters.  She had
evidently been a handsome woman, and was well preserved still.
Of her daughters, the eldest, Amy, was rather little:  naive,
and child_like in face and manner, and piquant in form; her white
muslin dress and blue sash became her well.  The second, Louisa,
was taller and more elegant in figure; with a very pretty face,
of that order the French term minois chiffone:  both sisters were
fair as lilies.

Lady Lynn was a large and stout personage of about forty, very erect,
very haughty_looking, richly dressed in a satin robe of changeful
sheen:  her dark hair shone glossily under the shade of an azure
plume, and within the circlet of a band of gems.

Mrs. Colonel Dent was less showy; but, I thought, more lady_like.
She had a slight figure, a pale, gentle face, and fair hair.  Her
black satin dress, her scarf of rich foreign lace, and her pearl
ornaments, pleased me better than the rainbow radiance of the titled
dame.

But the three most distinguished __ partly, perhaps, because the
tallest figures of the band __ were the Dowager Lady Ingram and her
daughters, Blanche and Mary.  They were all three of the loftiest
stature of women.  The Dowager might be between forty and fifty:
her shape was still fine; her hair (by candle_light at least) still
black; her teeth, too, were still apparently perfect.  Most people
would have termed her a splendid woman of her age:  and so she was,
no doubt, physically speaking; but then there was an expression of
almost insupportable haughtiness in her bearing and countenance.
She had Roman features and a double chin, disappearing into a throat
like a pillar:  these features appeared to me not only inflated and
darkened, but even furrowed with pride; and the chin was sustained
by the same principle, in a position of almost preternatural
erectness.  She had, likewise, a fierce and a hard eye:  it reminded
me of Mrs. Reed's; she mouthed her words in speaking; her voice
was deep, its inflections very pompous, very dogmatical, __ very
intolerable, in short.  A crimson velvet robe, and a shawl turban
of some gold_wrought Indian fabric, invested her (I suppose she
thought) with a truly imperial dignity.

Blanche and Mary were of equal stature, __ straight and tall as
poplars.  Mary was too slim for her height, but Blanche was moulded
like a Dian.  I regarded her, of course, with special interest.
First, I wished to see whether her appearance accorded with
Mrs. Fairfax's description; secondly, whether it at all resembled
the fancy miniature I had painted of her; and thirdly __ it will
out! __ whether it were such as I should fancy likely to suit Mr.
Rochester's taste.

As far as person went, she answered point for point, both to my
picture and Mrs. Fairfax's description.  The noble bust, the sloping
shoulders, the graceful neck, the dark eyes and black ringlets
were all there; __ but her face?  Her face was like her mother's;
a youthful unfurrowed likeness:  the same low brow, the same high
features, the same pride.  It was not, however, so saturnine a
pride!  she laughed continually; her laugh was satirical, and so
was the habitual expression of her arched and haughty lip.

Genius is said to be self_conscious.  I cannot tell whether Miss
Ingram was a genius, but she was self_conscious __ remarkably self_
conscious indeed.  She entered into a discourse on botany with the
gentle Mrs. Dent.  It seemed Mrs. Dent had not studied that science:
though, as she said, she liked flowers, "especially wild ones;"
Miss Ingram had, and she ran over its vocabulary with an air.  I
presently perceived she was (what is vernacularly termed) TRAILING
Mrs. Dent; that is, playing on her ignorance __ her TRAIL might be
clever, but it was decidedly not good_natured.  She played:  her
execution was brilliant; she sang:  her voice was fine; she talked
French apart to her mamma; and she talked it well, with fluency
and with a good accent.

Mary had a milder and more open countenance than Blanche; softer
features too, and a skin some shades fairer (Miss Ingram was dark
as a Spaniard) __ but Mary was deficient in life:  her face lacked
expression, her eye lustre; she had nothing to say, and having once
taken her seat, remained fixed like a statue in its niche.  The
sisters were both attired in spotless white.

And did I now think Miss Ingram such a choice as Mr. Rochester
would be likely to make?  I could not tell __ I did not know his
taste in female beauty.  If he liked the majestic, she was the
very type of majesty:  then she was accomplished, sprightly.  Most
gentlemen would admire her, I thought; and that he DID admire her,
I already seemed to have obtained proof:  to remove the last shade
of doubt, it remained but to see them together.

You are not to suppose, reader, that Adele has all this time been
sitting motionless on the stool at my feet:  no; when the ladies
entered, she rose, advanced to meet them, made a stately
reverence, and said with gravity _

"Bon jour, mesdames."

And Miss Ingram had looked down at her with a mocking air, and
exclaimed, "Oh, what a little puppet!"

Lady Lynn had remarked, "It is Mr. Rochester's ward, I suppose __
the little French girl he was speaking of."

Mrs. Dent had kindly taken her hand, and given her a kiss.

Amy and Louisa Eshton had cried out simultaneously __ "What a love
of a child!"

And then they had called her to a sofa, where she now sat, ensconced
between them, chattering alternately in French and broken English;
absorbing not only the young ladies' attention, but that of Mrs.
Eshton and Lady Lynn, and getting spoilt to her heart's content.

At last coffee is brought in, and the gentlemen are summoned.  I
sit in the shade __ if any shade there be in this brilliantly_lit
apartment; the window_curtain half hides me.  Again the arch yawns;
they come.  The collective appearance of the gentlemen, like that
of the ladies, is very imposing:  they are all costumed in black;
most of them are tall, some young.  Henry and Frederick Lynn are
very dashing sparks indeed; and Colonel Dent is a fine soldierly
man.  Mr. Eshton, the magistrate of the district, is gentleman_like:
his hair is quite white, his eyebrows and whiskers still dark,
which gives him something of the appearance of a "pere noble de
theatre."  Lord Ingram, like his sisters, is very tall; like them,
also, he is handsome; but he shares Mary's apathetic and listless
look:  he seems to have more length of limb than vivacity of blood
or vigour of brain.

And where is Mr. Rochester?

He comes in last:  I am not looking at the arch, yet I see him
enter.  I try to concentrate my attention on those netting_needles,
on the meshes of the purse I am forming __ I wish to think only
of the work I have in my hands, to see only the silver beads and
silk threads that lie in my lap; whereas, I distinctly behold his
figure, and I inevitably recall the moment when I last saw it; just
after I had rendered him, what he deemed, an essential service, and
he, holding my hand, and looking down on my face, surveyed me with
eyes that revealed a heart full and eager to overflow; in whose
emotions I had a part.  How near had I approached him at that moment!
What had occurred since, calculated to change his and my relative
positions?  Yet now, how distant, how far estranged we were!  So
far estranged, that I did not expect him to come and speak to me.
I did not wonder, when, without looking at me, he took a seat at
the other side of the room, and began conversing with some of the
ladies.

No sooner did I see that his attention was riveted on them, and
that I might gaze without being observed, than my eyes were drawn
involuntarily to his face; I could not keep their lids under control:
they would rise, and the irids would fix on him.  I looked, and had
an acute pleasure in looking, __ a precious yet poignant pleasure;
pure gold, with a steely point of agony:  a pleasure like what the
thirst_perishing man might feel who knows the well to which he has
crept is poisoned, yet stoops and drinks divine draughts nevertheless.

Most true is it that "beauty is in the eye of the gazer."  My
master's colourless, olive face, square, massive brow, broad and
jetty eyebrows, deep eyes, strong features, firm, grim mouth, __ all
energy, decision, will, __ were not beautiful, according to rule;
but they were more than beautiful to me; they were full of an interest,
an influence that quite mastered me, __ that took my feelings from
my own power and fettered them in his.  I had not intended to love
him; the reader knows I had wrought hard to extirpate from my soul
the germs of love there detected; and now, at the first renewed view
of him, they spontaneously arrived, green and strong!  He made me
love him without looking at me.

I compared him with his guests.  What was the gallant grace of the
Lynns, the languid elegance of Lord Ingram, __ even the military
distinction of Colonel Dent, contrasted with his look of native
pith and genuine power?  I had no sympathy in their appearance,
their expression:  yet I could imagine that most observers would
call them attractive, handsome, imposing; while they would pronounce
Mr. Rochester at once harsh_featured and melancholy_looking.  I
saw them smile, laugh __ it was nothing; the light of the candles
had as much soul in it as their smile; the tinkle of the bell as
much significance as their laugh.  I saw Mr. Rochester smile:_ his
stern features softened; his eye grew both brilliant and gentle,
its ray both searching and sweet.  He was talking, at the moment,
to Louisa and Amy Eshton.  I wondered to see them receive with
calm that look which seemed to me so penetrating:  I expected their
eyes to fall, their colour to rise under it; yet I was glad when I
found they were in no sense moved.  "He is not to them what he is
to me," I thought:  "he is not of their kind.  I believe he is of
mine; __ I am sure he is __ I feel akin to him __ I understand the
language of his countenance and movements:  though rank and wealth
sever us widely, I have something in my brain and heart, in my
blood and nerves, that assimilates me mentally to him.  Did I say,
a few days since, that I had nothing to do with him but to receive
my salary at his hands?  Did I forbid myself to think of him in any
other light than as a paymaster?  Blasphemy against nature!  Every
good, true, vigorous feeling I have gathers impulsively round him.
I know I must conceal my sentiments:  I must smother hope; I must
remember that he cannot care much for me.  For when I say that I
am of his kind, I do not mean that I have his force to influence,
and his spell to attract; I mean only that I have certain tastes
and feelings in common with him.  I must, then, repeat continually
that we are for ever sundered:_ and yet, while I breathe and think,
I must love him."

Coffee is handed.  The ladies, since the gentlemen entered, have
become lively as larks; conversation waxes brisk and merry.  Colonel
Dent and Mr. Eshton argue on politics; their wives listen.  The two
proud dowagers, Lady Lynn and Lady Ingram, confabulate together.
Sir George __ whom, by_the_bye, I have forgotten to describe, __ a
very big, and very fresh_looking country gentleman, stands before
their sofa, coffee_cup in hand, and occasionally puts in a word.
Mr. Frederick Lynn has taken a seat beside Mary Ingram, and is
showing her the engravings of a splendid volume:  she looks, smiles
now and then, but apparently says little.  The tall and phlegmatic
Lord Ingram leans with folded arms on the chair_back of the little
and lively Amy Eshton; she glances up at him, and chatters like
a wren:  she likes him better than she does Mr. Rochester.  Henry
Lynn has taken possession of an ottoman at the feet of Louisa:
Adele shares it with him:  he is trying to talk French with her,
and Louisa laughs at his blunders.  With whom will Blanche Ingram
pair?  She is standing alone at the table, bending gracefully over
an album.  She seems waiting to be sought; but she will not wait
too long:  she herself selects a mate.

Mr. Rochester, having quitted the Eshtons, stands on the hearth
as solitary as she stands by the table:  she confronts him, taking
her station on the opposite side of the mantelpiece.

"Mr. Rochester, I thought you were not fond of children?"

"Nor am I."

"Then, what induced you to take charge of such a little doll as
that?"  (pointing to Adele).  "Where did you pick her up?"

"I did not pick her up; she was left on my hands."

"You should have sent her to school."

"I could not afford it:  schools are so dear."

"Why, I suppose you have a governess for her:  I saw a person with
her just now __ is she gone?  Oh, no!  there she is still, behind
the window_curtain.  You pay her, of course; I should think it
quite as expensive, __ more so; for you have them both to keep in
addition."

I feared __ or should I say, hoped? __ the allusion to me would
make Mr. Rochester glance my way; and I involuntarily shrank farther
into the shade:  but he never turned his eyes.

"I have not considered the subject," said he indifferently, looking
straight before him.

"No, you men never do consider economy and common sense.  You should
hear mama on the chapter of governesses:  Mary and I have had, I
should think, a dozen at least in our day; half of them detestable
and the rest ridiculous, and all incubi __ were they not, mama?"

"Did you speak, my own?"

The young lady thus claimed as the dowager's special property,
reiterated her question with an explanation.

"My dearest, don't mention governesses; the word makes me nervous.
I have suffered a martyrdom from their incompetency and caprice.
I thank Heaven I have now done with them!"

Mrs. Dent here bent over to the pious lady and whispered something
in her ear; I suppose, from the answer elicited, it was a reminder
that one of the anathematised race was present.

"Tant pis!"  said her Ladyship, "I hope it may do her good!"  Then,
in a lower tone, but still loud enough for me to hear, "I noticed
her; I am a judge of physiognomy, and in hers I see all the faults
of her class."

"What are they, madam?"  inquired Mr. Rochester aloud.

"I will tell you in your private ear," replied she, wagging her
turban three times with portentous significancy.

"But my curiosity will be past its appetite; it craves food now."

"Ask Blanche; she is nearer you than I."

"Oh, don't refer him to me, mama!  I have just one word to say of
the whole tribe; they are a nuisance.  Not that I ever suffered much
from them; I took care to turn the tables.  What tricks Theodore
and I used to play on our Miss Wilsons, and Mrs. Greys, and Madame
Jouberts!  Mary was always too sleepy to join in a plot with
spirit.  The best fun was with Madame Joubert:  Miss Wilson was
a poor sickly thing, lachrymose and low_spirited, not worth the
trouble of vanquishing, in short; and Mrs. Grey was coarse and
insensible; no blow took effect on her.  But poor Madame Joubert!
I see her yet in her raging passions, when we had driven her to
extremities __ spilt our tea, crumbled our bread and butter, tossed
our books up to the ceiling, and played a charivari with the ruler
and desk, the fender and fire_irons.  Theodore, do you remember
those merry days?"

"Yaas, to be sure I do," drawled Lord Ingram; "and the poor old
stick used to cry out 'Oh you villains childs!' __ and then we
sermonised her on the presumption of attempting to teach such clever
blades as we were, when she was herself so ignorant."

"We did; and, Tedo, you know, I helped you in prosecuting (or
persecuting) your tutor, whey_faced Mr. Vining __ the parson in the
pip, as we used to call him.  He and Miss Wilson took the liberty
of falling in love with each other __ at least Tedo and I thought
so; we surprised sundry tender glances and sighs which we interpreted
as tokens of 'la belle passion,' and I promise you the public soon
had the benefit of our discovery; we employed it as a sort of lever
to hoist our dead_weights from the house.  Dear mama, there, as
soon as she got an inkling of the business, found out that it was
of an immoral tendency.  Did you not, my lady_mother?"

"Certainly, my best.  And I was quite right:  depend on that:
there are a thousand reasons why liaisons between governesses and
tutors should never be tolerated a moment in any well_regulated
house; firstly __ "

"Oh, gracious, mama!  Spare us the enumeration!  Au reste, we
all know them:  danger of bad example to innocence of childhood;
distractions and consequent neglect of duty on the part of the attached
__ mutual alliance and reliance; confidence thence resulting __
insolence accompanying __ mutiny and general blow_up.  Am I right,
Baroness Ingram, of Ingram Park?"

"My lily_flower, you are right now, as always."

"Then no more need be said:  change the subject."

Amy Eshton, not hearing or not heeding this dictum, joined in with
her soft, infantine tone:  "Louisa and I used to quiz our governess
too; but she was such a good creature, she would bear anything:
nothing put her out.  She was never cross with us; was she, Louisa?"

"No, never:  we might do what we pleased; ransack her desk and
her workbox, and turn her drawers inside out; and she was so good_
natured, she would give us anything we asked for."

"I suppose, now," said Miss Ingram, curling her lip sarcastically,
"we shall have an abstract of the memoirs of all the governesses
extant:  in order to avert such a visitation, I again move
the introduction of a new topic.  Mr. Rochester, do you second my
motion?"

"Madam, I support you on this point, as on every other."

"Then on me be the onus of bringing it forward.  Signior Eduardo,
are you in voice to_night?"

"Donna Bianca, if you command it, I will be."

"Then, signior, I lay on you my sovereign behest to furbish up your
lungs and other vocal organs, as they will be wanted on my royal
service."

"Who would not be the Rizzio of so divine a Mary?"

"A fig for Rizzio!"  cried she, tossing her head with all its
curls, as she moved to the piano.  "It is my opinion the fiddler
David must have been an insipid sort of fellow; I like black Bothwell
better:  to my mind a man is nothing without a spice of the devil
in him; and history may say what it will of James Hepburn, but I
have a notion, he was just the sort of wild, fierce, bandit hero
whom I could have consented to gift with my hand."

"Gentlemen, you hear!  Now which of you most resembles Bothwell?"
cried Mr. Rochester.

"I should say the preference lies with you," responded Colonel
Dent.

"On my honour, I am much obliged to you," was the reply.

Miss Ingram, who had now seated herself with proud grace at the
piano, spreading out her snowy robes in queenly amplitude, commenced
a brilliant prelude; talking meantime.  She appeared to be on her
high horse to_night; both her words and her air seemed intended to
excite not only the admiration, but the amazement of her auditors:
she was evidently bent on striking them as something very dashing
and daring indeed.

"Oh, I am so sick of the young men of the present day!"  exclaimed
she, rattling away at the instrument.  "Poor, puny things, not fit
to stir a step beyond papa's park gates:  nor to go even so far
without mama's permission and guardianship!  Creatures so absorbed
in care about their pretty faces, and their white hands, and
their small feet; as if a man had anything to do with beauty!  As
if loveliness were not the special prerogative of woman __ her
legitimate appanage and heritage!  I grant an ugly WOMAN is a blot
on the fair face of creation; but as to the GENTLEMEN, let them be
solicitous to possess only strength and valour:  let their motto
be:_ Hunt, shoot, and fight:  the rest is not worth a fillip.  Such
should be my device, were I a man."

"Whenever I marry," she continued after a pause which none interrupted,
"I am resolved my husband shall not be a rival, but a foil to me.
I will suffer no competitor near the throne; I shall exact an
undivided homage:  his devotions shall not be shared between me
and the shape he sees in his mirror.  Mr. Rochester, now sing, and
I will play for you."

"I am all obedience," was the response.

"Here then is a Corsair_song.  Know that I doat on Corsairs; and
for that reason, sing it con spirito."

"Commands from Miss Ingram's lips would put spirit into a mug of
milk and water."

"Take care, then:  if you don't please me, I will shame you by
showing how such things SHOULD be done."

"That is offering a premium on incapacity:  I shall now endeavour
to fail."

"Gardez_vous en bien!  If you err wilfully, I shall devise a
proportionate punishment."

"Miss Ingram ought to be clement, for she has it in her power to
inflict a chastisement beyond mortal endurance."

"Ha!  explain!"  commanded the lady.

"Pardon me, madam:  no need of explanation; your own fine sense must
inform you that one of your frowns would be a sufficient substitute
for capital punishment."

"Sing!"  said she, and again touching the piano, she commenced an
accompaniment in spirited style.

"Now is my time to slip away," thought I: but the tones that then
severed the air arrested me.  Mrs. Fairfax had said Mr. Rochester
possessed a fine voice:  he did __ a mellow, powerful bass, into
which he threw his own feeling, his own force; finding a way through
the ear to the heart, and there waking sensation strangely.  I
waited till the last deep and full vibration had expired __ till
the tide of talk, checked an instant, had resumed its flow; I then
quitted my sheltered corner and made my exit by the side_door,
which was fortunately near.  Thence a narrow passage led into the
hall:  in crossing it, I perceived my sandal was loose; I stopped
to tie it, kneeling down for that purpose on the mat at the foot of
the staircase.  I heard the dining_room door unclose; a gentleman
came out; rising hastily, I stood face to face with him:  it was
Mr. Rochester.

"How do you do?"  he asked.

"I am very well, sir."

"Why did you not come and speak to me in the room?"

I thought I might have retorted the question on him who
put it:  but I would not take that freedom.  I answered _

"I did not wish to disturb you, as you seemed engaged, sir."

"What have you been doing during my absence?"

"Nothing particular; teaching Adele as usual."

"And getting a good deal paler than you were __ as I saw at first
sight.  What is the matter?"

"Nothing at all, sir."

"Did you take any cold that night you half drowned me?"

"Not the least."

"Return to the drawing_room:  you are deserting too early."

"I am tired, sir."

He looked at me for a minute.

"And a little depressed," he said.  "What about?  Tell me."

"Nothing __ nothing, sir.  I am not depressed."

"But I affirm that you are:  so much depressed that a few more
words would bring tears to your eyes __ indeed, they are there
now, shining and swimming; and a bead has slipped from the lash
and fallen on to the flag.  If I had time, and was not in mortal
dread of some prating prig of a servant passing, I would know what
all this means.  Well, to_night I excuse you; but understand that
so long as my visitors stay, I expect you to appear in the drawing_room
every evening; it is my wish; don't neglect it.  Now go, and send
Sophie for Adele.  Good_night, my __ " He stopped, bit his lip,
and abruptly left me.



Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition Chapter 18


Merry days were these at Thornfield Hall; and busy days too:  how
different from the first three months of stillness, monotony, and
solitude I had passed beneath its roof!  All sad feelings seemed
now driven from the house, all gloomy associations forgotten:  there
was life everywhere, movement all day long.  You could not now
traverse the gallery, once so hushed, nor enter the front chambers,
once so tenantless, without encountering a smart lady's_maid or a
dandy valet.

The kitchen, the butler's pantry, the servants' hall, the entrance
hall, were equally alive; and the saloons were only left void and
still when the blue sky and halcyon sunshine of the genial spring
weather called their occupants out into the grounds.  Even when
that weather was broken, and continuous rain set in for some days,
no damp seemed cast over enjoyment:  indoor amusements only became
more lively and varied, in consequence of the stop put to outdoor
gaiety.

I wondered what they were going to do the first evening a change
of entertainment was proposed:  they spoke of "playing charades,"
but in my ignorance I did not understand the term.  The servants
were called in, the dining_room tables wheeled away, the lights
otherwise disposed, the chairs placed in a semicircle opposite the
arch.  While Mr. Rochester and the other gentlemen directed these
alterations, the ladies were running up and down stairs ringing
for their maids.  Mrs. Fairfax was summoned to give information
respecting the resources of the house in shawls, dresses, draperies of
any kind; and certain wardrobes of the third storey were ransacked,
and their contents, in the shape of brocaded and hooped petticoats,
satin sacques, black modes, lace lappets, &c., were brought down in
armfuls by the abigails; then a selection was made, and such things
as were chosen were carried to the boudoir within the drawing_room.

Meantime, Mr. Rochester had again summoned the ladies round him,
and was selecting certain of their number to be of his party.  "Miss
Ingram is mine, of course," said he:  afterwards he named the two
Misses Eshton, and Mrs. Dent.  He looked at me:  I happened to be
near him, as I had been fastening the clasp of Mrs. Dent's bracelet,
which had got loose.

"Will you play?"  he asked.  I shook my head.  He did not insist,
which I rather feared he would have done; he allowed me to return
quietly to my usual seat.

He and his aids now withdrew behind the curtain:  the other party,
which was headed by Colonel Dent, sat down on the crescent of chairs.
One of the gentlemen, Mr. Eshton, observing me, seemed to propose
that I should be asked to join them; but Lady Ingram instantly
negatived the notion.

"No," I heard her say:  "she looks too stupid for any game of the
sort."

Ere long a bell tinkled, and the curtain drew up.  Within the arch,
the bulky figure of Sir George Lynn, whom Mr. Rochester had likewise
chosen, was seen enveloped in a white sheet:  before him, on
a table, lay open a large book; and at his side stood Amy Eshton,
draped in Mr. Rochester's cloak, and holding a book in her hand.
Somebody, unseen, rang the bell merrily; then Adele (who had insisted
on being one of her guardian's party), bounded forward, scattering
round her the contents of a basket of flowers she carried on her
arm.  Then appeared the magnificent figure of Miss Ingram, clad
in white, a long veil on her head, and a wreath of roses round her
brow; by her side walked Mr. Rochester, and together they drew near
the table.  They knelt; while Mrs. Dent and Louisa Eshton, dressed
also in white, took up their stations behind them.  A ceremony
followed, in dumb show, in which it was easy to recognise the
pantomime of a marriage.  At its termination, Colonel Dent and his
party consulted in whispers for two minutes, then the Colonel called out _

"Bride!"  Mr. Rochester bowed, and the curtain fell.

A considerable interval elapsed before it again rose.  Its second
rising displayed a more elaborately prepared scene than the last.
The drawing_room, as I have before observed, was raised two steps
above the dining_room, and on the top of the upper step, placed a
yard or two back within the room, appeared a large marble basin __
which I recognised as an ornament of the conservatory __ where it
usually stood, surrounded by exotics, and tenanted by gold fish
__ and whence it must have been transported with some trouble, on
account of its size and weight.

Seated on the carpet, by the side of this basin, was seen Mr.
Rochester, costumed in shawls, with a turban on his head.  His
dark eyes and swarthy skin and Paynim features suited the costume
exactly:  he looked the very model of an Eastern emir, an agent
or a victim of the bowstring.  Presently advanced into view Miss
Ingram.  She, too, was attired in oriental fashion:  a crimson
scarf tied sash_like round the waist:  an embroidered handkerchief
knotted about her temples; her beautifully_moulded arms bare, one
of them upraised in the act of supporting a pitcher, poised gracefully
on her head.  Both her cast of form and feature, her complexion and
her general air, suggested the idea of some Israelitish princess
of the patriarchal days; and such was doubtless the character she
intended to represent.

She approached the basin, and bent over it as if to fill her pitcher;
she again lifted it to her head.  The personage on the well_brink
now seemed to accost her; to make some request:_ "She hasted, let
down her pitcher on her hand, and gave him to drink."  From the
bosom of his robe he then produced a casket, opened it and showed
magnificent bracelets and earrings; she acted astonishment and
admiration; kneeling, he laid the treasure at her feet; incredulity
and delight were expressed by her looks and gestures; the stranger
fastened the bracelets on her arms and the rings in her ears.  It
was Eliezer and Rebecca:  the camels only were wanting.

The divining party again laid their heads together:  apparently they
could not agree about the word or syllable the scene illustrated.
Colonel Dent, their spokesman, demanded "the tableau of the whole;"
whereupon the curtain again descended.

On its third rising only a portion of the drawing_room was disclosed;
the rest being concealed by a screen, hung with some sort of dark
and coarse drapery.  The marble basin was removed; in its place,
stood a deal table and a kitchen chair:  these objects were visible
by a very dim light proceeding from a horn lantern, the wax candles
being all extinguished.

Amidst this sordid scene, sat a man with his clenched hands resting
on his knees, and his eyes bent on the ground.  I knew Mr. Rochester;
though the begrimed face, the disordered dress (his coat hanging
loose from one arm, as if it had been almost torn from his back
in a scuffle), the desperate and scowling countenance, the rough,
bristling hair might well have disguised him.  As he moved, a chain
clanked; to his wrists were attached fetters.

"Bridewell!"  exclaimed Colonel Dent, and the charade was solved.

A sufficient interval having elapsed for the performers to resume
their ordinary costume, they re_entered the dining_room.  Mr. Rochester
led in Miss Ingram; she was complimenting him on his acting.

"Do you know," said she, "that, of the three characters, I liked
you in the last best?  Oh, had you but lived a few years earlier,
what a gallant gentleman_highwayman you would have made!"

"Is all the soot washed from my face?"  he asked, turning it towards
her.

"Alas!  yes:  the more's the pity!  Nothing could be more becoming
to your complexion than that ruffian's rouge."

"You would like a hero of the road then?"

"An English hero of the road would be the next best thing to an
Italian bandit; and that could only be surpassed by a Levantine
pirate."

"Well, whatever I am, remember you are my wife; we were married an
hour since, in the presence of all these witnesses."  She giggled,
and her colour rose.

"Now, Dent," continued Mr. Rochester, "it is your turn."  And as
the other party withdrew, he and his band took the vacated seats.
Miss Ingram placed herself at her leader's right hand; the other
diviners filled the chairs on each side of him and her.  I did
not now watch the actors; I no longer waited with interest for the
curtain to rise; my attention was absorbed by the spectators; my
eyes, erewhile fixed on the arch, were now irresistibly attracted
to the semicircle of chairs.  What charade Colonel Dent and his party
played, what word they chose, how they acquitted themselves, I no
longer remember; but I still see the consultation which followed
each scene:  I see Mr. Rochester turn to Miss Ingram, and Miss
Ingram to him; I see her incline her head towards him, till the
jetty curls almost touch his shoulder and wave against his cheek;
I hear their mutual whisperings; I recall their interchanged glances;
and something even of the feeling roused by the spectacle returns
in memory at this moment.

I have told you, reader, that I had learnt to love Mr. Rochester:
I could not unlove him now, merely because I found that he had
ceased to notice me __ because I might pass hours in his presence,
and he would never once turn his eyes in my direction __ because
I saw all his attentions appropriated by a great lady, who scorned
to touch me with the hem of her robes as she passed; who, if ever
her dark and imperious eye fell on me by chance, would withdraw
it instantly as from an object too mean to merit observation.  I
could not unlove him, because I felt sure he would soon marry this
very lady __ because I read daily in her a proud security in his
intentions respecting her __ because I witnessed hourly in him
a style of courtship which, if careless and choosing rather to be
sought than to seek, was yet, in its very carelessness, captivating,
and in its very pride, irresistible.

There was nothing to cool or banish love in these circumstances,
though much to create despair.  Much too, you will think, reader,
to engender jealousy:  if a woman, in my position, could presume
to be jealous of a woman in Miss Ingram's.  But I was not jealous:
or very rarely; __ the nature of the pain I suffered could not be
explained by that word.  Miss Ingram was a mark beneath jealousy:
she was too inferior to excite the feeling.  Pardon the seeming
paradox; I mean what I say.  She was very showy, but she was not
genuine:  she had a fine person, many brilliant attainments; but
her mind was poor, her heart barren by nature:  nothing bloomed
spontaneously on that soil; no unforced natural fruit delighted by
its freshness.  She was not good; she was not original:  she used
to repeat sounding phrases from books:  she never offered, nor had,
an opinion of her own.  She advocated a high tone of sentiment; but
she did not know the sensations of sympathy and pity; tenderness and
truth were not in her.  Too often she betrayed this, by the undue
vent she gave to a spiteful antipathy she had conceived against
little Adele:  pushing her away with some contumelious epithet if
she happened to approach her; sometimes ordering her from the room,
and always treating her with coldness and acrimony.  Other eyes
besides mine watched these manifestations of character __ watched
them closely, keenly, shrewdly.  Yes; the future bridegroom,
Mr. Rochester himself, exercised over his intended a ceaseless
surveillance; and it was from this sagacity __ this guardedness of
his __ this perfect, clear consciousness of his fair one's defects
__ this obvious absence of passion in his sentiments towards her,
that my ever_torturing pain arose.

I saw he was going to marry her, for family, perhaps political
reasons, because her rank and connections suited him; I felt he
had not given her his love, and that her qualifications were ill
adapted to win from him that treasure.  This was the point __ this
was where the nerve was touched and teased __ this was where the
fever was sustained and fed:  SHE COULD NOT CHARM HIM.

If she had managed the victory at once, and he had yielded and
sincerely laid his heart at her feet, I should have covered my face,
turned to the wall, and (figuratively) have died to them.  If Miss
Ingram had been a good and noble woman, endowed with force, fervour,
kindness, sense, I should have had one vital struggle with two tigers
__ jealousy and despair:  then, my heart torn out and devoured, I
should have admired her __ acknowledged her excellence, and been
quiet for the rest of my days:  and the more absolute her superiority,
the deeper would have been my admiration __ the more truly tranquil
my quiescence.  But as matters really stood, to watch Miss Ingram's
efforts at fascinating Mr. Rochester, to witness their repeated
failure __ herself unconscious that they did fail; vainly fancying
that each shaft launched hit the mark, and infatuatedly pluming
herself on success, when her pride and self_complacency repelled
further and further what she wished to allure __ to witness THIS,
was to be at once under ceaseless excitation and ruthless restraint.

Because, when she failed, I saw how she might have succeeded.  Arrows
that continually glanced off from Mr. Rochester's breast and fell
harmless at his feet, might, I knew, if shot by a surer hand,
have quivered keen in his proud heart __ have called love into his
stern eye, and softness into his sardonic face; or, better still,
without weapons a silent conquest might have been won.

"Why can she not influence him more, when she is privileged to draw
so near to him?"  I asked myself.  "Surely she cannot truly like
him, or not like him with true affection!  If she did, she need not
coin her smiles so lavishly, flash her glances so unremittingly,
manufacture airs so elaborate, graces so multitudinous.  It seems
to me that she might, by merely sitting quietly at his side, saying
little and looking less, get nigher his heart.  I have seen in his
face a far different expression from that which hardens it now while
she is so vivaciously accosting him; but then it came of itself:
it was not elicited by meretricious arts and calculated manoeuvres;
and one had but to accept it __ to answer what he asked without
pretension, to address him when needful without grimace __ and
it increased and grew kinder and more genial, and warmed one like
a fostering sunbeam.  How will she manage to please him when they
are married?  I do not think she will manage it; and yet it might
be managed; and his wife might, I verily believe, be the very
happiest woman the sun shines on."

I have not yet said anything condemnatory of Mr. Rochester's project
of marrying for interest and connections.  It surprised me when I
first discovered that such was his intention:  I had thought him a
man unlikely to be influenced by motives so commonplace in his choice
of a wife; but the longer I considered the position, education, &c.,
of the parties, the less I felt justified in judging and blaming
either him or Miss Ingram for acting in conformity to ideas and
principles instilled into them, doubtless, from their childhood.
All their class held these principles:  I supposed, then, they had
reasons for holding them such as I could not fathom.  It seemed
to me that, were I a gentleman like him, I would take to my bosom
only such a wife as I could love; but the very obviousness of the
advantages to the husband's own happiness offered by this plan
convinced me that there must be arguments against its general
adoption of which I was quite ignorant:  otherwise I felt sure all
the world would act as I wished to act.

But in other points, as well as this, I was growing very lenient to
my master:  I was forgetting all his faults, for which I had once
kept a sharp look_out.  It had formerly been my endeavour to study
all sides of his character:  to take the bad with the good; and
from the just weighing of both, to form an equitable judgment.  Now
I saw no bad.  The sarcasm that had repelled, the harshness that
had startled me once, were only like keen condiments in a choice
dish:  their presence was pungent, but their absence would be felt
as comparatively insipid.  And as for the vague something __ was it
a sinister or a sorrowful, a designing or a desponding expression?
__ that opened upon a careful observer, now and then, in his eye,
and closed again before one could fathom the strange depth partially
disclosed; that something which used to make me fear and shrink,
as if I had been wandering amongst volcanic_looking hills, and had
suddenly felt the ground quiver and seen it gape:  that something,
I, at intervals, beheld still; and with throbbing heart, but not
with palsied nerves.  Instead of wishing to shun, I longed only
to dare __ to divine it; and I thought Miss Ingram happy, because
one day she might look into the abyss at her leisure, explore its
secrets and analyse their nature.

Meantime, while I thought only of my master and his future bride
__ saw only them, heard only their discourse, and considered only
their movements of importance __ the rest of the party were occupied
with their own separate interests and pleasures.  The Ladies Lynn
and Ingram continued to consort in solemn conferences, where they
nodded their two turbans at each other, and held up their four
hands in confronting gestures of surprise, or mystery, or horror,
according to the theme on which their gossip ran, like a pair of
magnified puppets.  Mild Mrs. Dent talked with good_natured Mrs.
Eshton; and the two sometimes bestowed a courteous word or smile
on me.  Sir George Lynn, Colonel Dent, and Mr. Eshton discussed
politics, or county affairs, or justice business.  Lord Ingram
flirted with Amy Eshton; Louisa played and sang to and with one
of the Messrs.  Lynn; and Mary Ingram listened languidly to the
gallant speeches of the other.  Sometimes all, as with one consent,
suspended their by_play to observe and listen to the principal actors:
for, after all, Mr. Rochester and __ because closely connected
with him __ Miss Ingram were the life and soul of the party.  If
he was absent from the room an hour, a perceptible dulness seemed
to steal over the spirits of his guests; and his re_entrance was
sure to give a fresh impulse to the vivacity of conversation.

The want of his animating influence appeared to be peculiarly felt
one day that he had been summoned to Millcote on business, and was
not likely to return till late.  The afternoon was wet:  a walk
the party had proposed to take to see a gipsy camp, lately pitched
on a common beyond Hay, was consequently deferred.  Some of the
gentlemen were gone to the stables:  the younger ones, together with
the younger ladies, were playing billiards in the billiard_room.
The dowagers Ingram and Lynn sought solace in a quiet game at cards.
Blanche Ingram, after having repelled, by supercilious taciturnity,
some efforts of Mrs. Dent and Mrs. Eshton to draw her into
conversation, had first murmured over some sentimental tunes and
airs on the piano, and then, having fetched a novel from the library,
had flung herself in haughty listlessness on a sofa, and prepared
to beguile, by the spell of fiction, the tedious hours of absence.
The room and the house were silent:  only now and then the merriment
of the billiard_players was heard from above.

It was verging on dusk, and the clock had already given warning of
the hour to dress for dinner, when little Adele, who knelt
by me in the drawing_room window_seat, suddenly exclaimed _

"Voile, Monsieur Rochester, qui revient!"

I turned, and Miss Ingram darted forwards from her sofa:  the
others, too, looked up from their several occupations; for at the
same time a crunching of wheels and a splashing tramp of horse_hoofs
became audible on the wet gravel.  A post_chaise was approaching.

"What can possess him to come home in that style?"  said Miss Ingram.
"He rode Mesrour (the black horse), did he not, when he went out?
and Pilot was with him:_ what has he done with the animals?"

As she said this, she approached her tall person and ample garments
so near the window, that I was obliged to bend back almost to the
breaking of my spine:  in her eagerness she did not observe me at
first, but when she did, she curled her lip and moved to another
casement.  The post_chaise stopped; the driver rang the door_bell,
and a gentleman alighted attired in travelling garb; but it was not
Mr. Rochester; it was a tall, fashionable_looking man, a stranger.

"How provoking!"  exclaimed Miss Ingram:  "you tiresome monkey!"
(apostrophising Adele), "who perched you up in the window to give
false intelligence?"  and she cast on me an angry glance, as if I
were in fault.

Some parleying was audible in the hall, and soon the new_comer
entered.  He bowed to Lady Ingram, as deeming her the eldest lady
present.

"It appears I come at an inopportune time, madam," said he, "when
my friend, Mr. Rochester, is from home; but I arrive from a very
long journey, and I think I may presume so far on old and intimate
acquaintance as to instal myself here till he returns."

His manner was polite; his accent, in speaking, struck me as being
somewhat unusual, __ not precisely foreign, but still not altogether
English:  his age might be about Mr. Rochester's, __ between thirty
and forty; his complexion was singularly sallow:  otherwise he was
a fine_looking man, at first sight especially.  On closer examination,
you detected something in his face that displeased, or rather that
failed to please.  His features were regular, but too relaxed:  his
eye was large and well cut, but the life looking out of it was a
tame, vacant life __ at least so I thought.

The sound of the dressing_bell dispersed the party.  It was not
till after dinner that I saw him again:  he then seemed quite at
his ease.  But I liked his physiognomy even less than before:  it
struck me as being at the same time unsettled and inanimate.  His
eye wandered, and had no meaning in its wandering:  this gave him
an odd look, such as I never remembered to have seen.  For a handsome
and not an unamiable_looking man, he repelled me exceedingly:  there
was no power in that smooth_skinned face of a full oval shape:  no
firmness in that aquiline nose and small cherry mouth; there was
no thought on the low, even forehead; no command in that blank,
brown eye.

As I sat in my usual nook, and looked at him with the light of
the girandoles on the mantelpiece beaming full over him __ for he
occupied an arm_chair drawn close to the fire, and kept shrinking
still nearer, as if he were cold, I compared him with Mr. Rochester.
I think (with deference be it spoken) the contrast could not be
much greater between a sleek gander and a fierce falcon:  between
a meek sheep and the rough_coated keen_eyed dog, its guardian.

He had spoken of Mr. Rochester as an old friend.  A curious friendship
theirs must have been:  a pointed illustration, indeed, of the old
adage that "extremes meet."

Two or three of the gentlemen sat near him, and I caught at times
scraps of their conversation across the room.  At first I could
not make much sense of what I heard; for the discourse of Louisa
Eshton and Mary Ingram, who sat nearer to me, confused the fragmentary
sentences that reached me at intervals.  These last were discussing
the stranger; they both called him "a beautiful man."  Louisa
said he was "a love of a creature," and she "adored him;" and Mary
instanced his "pretty little mouth, and nice nose," as her ideal
of the charming.

"And what a sweet_tempered forehead he has!"  cried Louisa, __ "so
smooth __ none of those frowning irregularities I dislike so much;
and such a placid eye and smile!"

And then, to my great relief, Mr. Henry Lynn summoned them to the
other side of the room, to settle some point about the deferred
excursion to Hay Common.

I was now able to concentrate my attention on the group by the fire,
and I presently gathered that the new_comer was called Mr. Mason;
then I learned that he was but just arrived in England, and that
he came from some hot country:  which was the reason, doubtless,
his face was so sallow, and that he sat so near the hearth, and
wore a surtout in the house.  Presently the words Jamaica, Kingston,
Spanish Town, indicated the West Indies as his residence; and it
was with no little surprise I gathered, ere long, that he had there
first seen and become acquainted with Mr. Rochester.  He spoke
of his friend's dislike of the burning heats, the hurricanes, and
rainy seasons of that region.  I knew Mr. Rochester had been a
traveller:  Mrs. Fairfax had said so; but I thought the continent
of Europe had bounded his wanderings; till now I had never heard
a hint given of visits to more distant shores.

I was pondering these things, when an incident, and a somewhat
unexpected one, broke the thread of my musings.  Mr. Mason, shivering
as some one chanced to open the door, asked for more coal to be
put on the fire, which had burnt out its flame, though its mass of
cinder still shone hot and red.  The footman who brought the coal,
in going out, stopped near Mr. Eshton's chair, and said something
to him in a low voice, of which I heard only the words, "old woman,"
__ "quite troublesome."

"Tell her she shall be put in the stocks if she does not take
herself off," replied the magistrate.

"No __ stop!"  interrupted Colonel Dent.  "Don't send her away,
Eshton; we might turn the thing to account; better consult the
ladies."  And speaking aloud, he continued __ "Ladies, you talked
of going to Hay Common to visit the gipsy camp; Sam here says that
one of the old Mother Bunches is in the servants' hall at this
moment, and insists upon being brought in before 'the quality,' to
tell them their fortunes.  Would you like to see her?"

"Surely, colonel," cried Lady Ingram, "you would not encourage such
a low impostor?  Dismiss her, by all means, at once!"

"But I cannot persuade her to go away, my lady," said the footman;
"nor can any of the servants:  Mrs. Fairfax is with her just now,
entreating her to be gone; but she has taken a chair in the chimney_
comer, and says nothing shall stir her from it till she gets leave
to come in here."

"What does she want?"  asked Mrs. Eshton.

"'To tell the gentry their fortunes,' she says, ma'am; and she
swears she must and will do it."

"What is she like?"  inquired the Misses Eshton, in a breath.

"A shockingly ugly old creature, miss; almost as black as a crock."

"Why, she's a real sorceress!"  cried Frederick Lynn.  "Let us have
her in, of course."

"To be sure," rejoined his brother; "it would be a thousand pities
to throw away such a chance of fun."

"My dear boys, what are you thinking about?"  exclaimed Mrs. Lynn.

"I cannot possibly countenance any such inconsistent proceeding,"
chimed in the Dowager Ingram.

"Indeed, mama, but you can __ and will," pronounced the haughty
voice of Blanche, as she turned round on the piano_stool; where
till now she had sat silent, apparently examining sundry sheets of
music.  "I have a curiosity to hear my fortune told:  therefore,
Sam, order the beldame forward."

"My darling Blanche!  recollect __ "

"I do __ I recollect all you can suggest; and I must have my will
__ quick, Sam!"

"Yes __ yes __ yes!"  cried all the juveniles, both ladies and
gentlemen.  "Let her come __ it will be excellent sport!"

The footman still lingered.  "She looks such a rough one," said
he.

"Go!"  ejaculated Miss Ingram, and the man went.

Excitement instantly seized the whole party:  a running fire of
raillery and jests was proceeding when Sam returned.

"She won't come now," said he.  "She says it's not her mission to
appear before the 'vulgar herd' (them's her words).  I must show
her into a room by herself, and then those who wish to consult her
must go to her one by one."

"You see now, my queenly Blanche," began Lady Ingram, "she
encroaches.  Be advised, my angel girl __ and __ "

"Show her into the library, of course," cut in the "angel girl."  "It
is not my mission to listen to her before the vulgar herd either:
I mean to have her all to myself.  Is there a fire in the library?"

"Yes, ma'am __ but she looks such a tinkler."

"Cease that chatter, blockhead!  and do my bidding."

Again Sam vanished; and mystery, animation, expectation rose to
full flow once more.

"She's ready now," said the footman, as he reappeared.  "She wishes
to know who will be her first visitor."

"I think I had better just look in upon her before any of the ladies
go," said Colonel Dent.

"Tell her, Sam, a gentleman is coming."

Sam went and returned.

"She says, sir, that she'll have no gentlemen; they need not
trouble themselves to come near her; nor," he added, with difficulty
suppressing a titter, "any ladies either, except the young, and
single."

"By Jove, she has taste!"  exclaimed Henry Lynn.

Miss Ingram rose solemnly:  "I go first," she said, in a tone which
might have befitted the leader of a forlorn hope, mounting a breach
in the van of his men.

"Oh, my best!  oh, my dearest!  pause __ reflect!"  was her mama's
cry; but she swept past her in stately silence, passed through
the door which Colonel Dent held open, and we heard her enter the
library.

A comparative silence ensued.  Lady Ingram thought it "le cas" to
wring her hands:  which she did accordingly.  Miss Mary declared
she felt, for her part, she never dared venture.  Amy and Louisa
Eshton tittered under their breath, and looked a little frightened.

The minutes passed very slowly:  fifteen were counted before the
library_door again opened.  Miss Ingram returned to us through the
arch.

Would she laugh?  Would she take it as a joke?  All eyes met her
with a glance of eager curiosity, and she met all eyes with one of
rebuff and coldness; she looked neither flurried nor merry:  she
walked stiffly to her seat, and took it in silence.

"Well, Blanche?"  said Lord Ingram.

"What did she say, sister?"  asked Mary.

"What did you think?  How do you feel? __ Is she a real fortune_teller?"
demanded the Misses Eshton.

"Now, now, good people," returned Miss Ingram, "don't press upon
me.  Really your organs of wonder and credulity are easily excited:
you seem, by the importance of you all __ my good mama included
__ ascribe to this matter, absolutely to believe we have a genuine
witch in the house, who is in close alliance with the old gentleman.
I have seen a gipsy vagabond; she has practised in hackneyed fashion
the science of palmistry and told me what such people usually tell.
My whim is gratified; and now I think Mr. Eshton will do well to
put the hag in the stocks to_morrow morning, as he threatened."

Miss Ingram took a book, leant back in her chair, and so declined
further conversation.  I watched her for nearly half_an_hour:  during
all that time she never turned a page, and her face grew momently
darker, more dissatisfied, and more sourly expressive of disappointment.
She had obviously not heard anything to her advantage:  and it
seemed to me, from her prolonged fit of gloom and taciturnity, that
she herself, notwithstanding her professed indifference, attached
undue importance to whatever revelations had been made her.

Meantime, Mary Ingram, Amy and Louisa Eshton, declared they dared
not go alone; and yet they all wished to go.  A negotiation was opened
through the medium of the ambassador, Sam; and after much pacing
to and fro, till, I think, the said Sam's calves must have ached
with the exercise, permission was at last, with great difficulty,
extorted from the rigorous Sibyl, for the three to wait upon her
in a body.

Their visit was not so still as Miss Ingram's had been:  we heard
hysterical giggling and little shrieks proceeding from the library;
and at the end of about twenty minutes they burst the door open,
and came running across the hall, as if they were half_scared out
of their wits.

"I am sure she is something not right!"  they cried, one and all.
"She told us such things!  She knows all about us!"  and they sank
breathless into the various seats the gentlemen hastened to bring
them.

Pressed for further explanation, they declared she had told them
of things they had said and done when they were mere children;
described books and ornaments they had in their boudoirs at home:
keepsakes that different relations had presented to them.  They
affirmed that she had even divined their thoughts, and had whispered
in the ear of each the name of the person she liked best in the
world, and informed them of what they most wished for.

Here the gentlemen interposed with earnest petitions to be further
enlightened on these two last_named points; but they got only
blushes, ejaculations, tremors, and titters, in return for their
importunity.  The matrons, meantime, offered vinaigrettes and
wielded fans; and again and again reiterated the expression of
their concern that their warning had not been taken in time; and
the elder gentlemen laughed, and the younger urged their services
on the agitated fair ones.

In the midst of the tumult, and while my eyes and ears were fully
engaged in the scene before me, I heard a hem close at my elbow:
I turned, and saw Sam.

"If you please, miss, the gipsy declares that there is another
young single lady in the room who has not been to her yet, and she
swears she will not go till she has seen all.  I thought it must
be you:  there is no one else for it.  What shall I tell her?"

"Oh, I will go by all means," I answered:  and I was glad of the
unexpected opportunity to gratify my much_excited curiosity.  I
slipped out of the room, unobserved by any eye __ for the company
were gathered in one mass about the trembling trio just returned
__ and I closed the door quietly behind me.

"If you like, miss," said Sam, "I'll wait in the hall for you; and
if she frightens you, just call and I'll come in."

"No, Sam, return to the kitchen:  I am not in the least afraid."
Nor was I; but I was a good deal interested and excited.



Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition Chapter 19


The library looked tranquil enough as I entered it, and the Sibyl
__ if Sibyl she were __ was seated snugly enough in an easy_chair
at the chimney_corner.  She had on a red cloak and a black bonnet:
or rather, a broad_brimmed gipsy hat, tied down with a striped
handkerchief under her chin.  An extinguished candle stood on
the table; she was bending over the fire, and seemed reading in a
little black book, like a prayer_book, by the light of the blaze:
she muttered the words to herself, as most old women do, while she
read; she did not desist immediately on my entrance:  it appeared
she wished to finish a paragraph.

I stood on the rug and warmed my hands, which were rather cold with
sitting at a distance from the drawing_room fire.  I felt now as
composed as ever I did in my life:  there was nothing indeed in
the gipsy's appearance to trouble one's calm.  She shut her book
and slowly looked up; her hat_brim partially shaded her face, yet
I could see, as she raised it, that it was a strange one.  It looked
all brown and black:  elf_locks bristled out from beneath a white
band which passed under her chin, and came half over her cheeks,
or rather jaws:  her eye confronted me at once, with a bold and
direct gaze.

"Well, and you want your fortune told?"  she said, in a voice as
decided as her glance, as harsh as her features.

"I don't care about it, mother; you may please yourself:  but I
ought to warn you, I have no faith."

"It's like your impudence to say so:  I expected it of you; I heard
it in your step as you crossed the threshold."

"Did you?  You've a quick ear."

"I have; and a quick eye and a quick brain."

"You need them all in your trade."

"I do; especially when I've customers like you to deal with.  Why
don't you tremble?"

"I'm not cold."

"Why don't you turn pale?"

"I am not sick."

"Why don't you consult my art?"

"I'm not silly."

The old crone "nichered" a laugh under her bonnet and bandage; she
then drew out a short black pipe, and lighting it began to smoke.
Having indulged a while in this sedative, she raised her bent body,
took the pipe from her lips, and while gazing steadily at the fire,
said very deliberately __ "You are cold; you are sick; and you are
silly."

"Prove it," I rejoined.

"I will, in few words.  You are cold, because you are alone:  no
contact strikes the fire from you that is in you.  You are sick;
because the best of feelings, the highest and the sweetest given
to man, keeps far away from you.  You are silly, because, suffer
as you may, you will not beckon it to approach, nor will you stir
one step to meet it where it waits you."

She again put her short black pipe to her lips, and renewed her
smoking with vigour.

"You might say all that to almost any one who you knew lived as a
solitary dependent in a great house."

"I might say it to almost any one:  but would it be true of almost
any one?"

"In my circumstances."

"Yes; just so, in YOUR circumstances:  but find me another precisely
placed as you are."

"It would be easy to find you thousands."

"You could scarcely find me one.  If you knew it, you are peculiarly
situated:  very near happiness; yes, within reach of it.  The
materials are all prepared; there only wants a movement to combine
them.  Chance laid them somewhat apart; let them be once approached
and bliss results."

"I don't understand enigmas.  I never could guess a riddle in my
life."

"If you wish me to speak more plainly, show me your palm."

"And I must cross it with silver, I suppose?"

"To be sure."

I gave her a shilling:  she put it into an old stocking_foot which
she took out of her pocket, and having tied it round and returned
it, she told me to hold out my hand.  I did.  She arched her face
to the palm, and pored over it without touching it.

"It is too fine," said she.  "I can make nothing of such a hand as
that; almost without lines:  besides, what is in a palm?  Destiny
is not written there."

"I believe you," said I.

"No," she continued, "it is in the face:  on the forehead, about
the eyes, in the lines of the mouth.  Kneel, and lift up your head."

"Ah!  now you are coming to reality," I said, as I obeyed her.  "I
shall begin to put some faith in you presently."

I knelt within half a yard of her.  She stirred the fire, so
that a ripple of light broke from the disturbed coal:  the glare,
however, as she sat, only threw her face into deeper shadow:  mine,
it illumined.

"I wonder with what feelings you came to me to_night," she said,
when she had examined me a while.  "I wonder what thoughts are busy
in your heart during all the hours you sit in yonder room with the
fine people flitting before you like shapes in a magic_lantern:
just as little sympathetic communion passing between you and them
as if they were really mere shadows of human forms, and not the
actual substance."

"I feel tired often, sleepy sometimes, but seldom sad."

"Then you have some secret hope to buoy you up and please you with
whispers of the future?"

"Not I. The utmost I hope is, to save money enough out of my earnings
to set up a school some day in a little house rented by myself."

"A mean nutriment for the spirit to exist on:  and sitting
in that window_seat (you see I know your habits ) __ "

"You have learned them from the servants."

"Ah!  you think yourself sharp.  Well, perhaps I have:  to speak
truth, I have an acquaintance with one of them, Mrs. Poole __ "

I started to my feet when I heard the name.

"You have __ have you?"  thought I; "there is diablerie in the
business after all, then!"

"Don't be alarmed," continued the strange being; "she's a safe
hand is Mrs. Poole:  close and quiet; any one may repose confidence
in her.  But, as I was saying:  sitting in that window_seat, do
you think of nothing but your future school?  Have you no present
interest in any of the company who occupy the sofas and chairs
before you?  Is there not one face you study?  one figure whose
movements you follow with at least curiosity?"

"I like to observe all the faces and all the figures."

"But do you never single one from the rest __ or it may be, two?"

"I do frequently; when the gestures or looks of a pair seem telling
a tale:  it amuses me to watch them."

"What tale do you like best to hear?"

"Oh, I have not much choice!  They generally run on the same theme
__ courtship; and promise to end in the same catastrophe __ marriage."

"And do you like that monotonous theme?"

"Positively, I don't care about it:  it is nothing to me."

"Nothing to you?  When a lady, young and full of life and
health, charming with beauty and endowed with the gifts of rank
and fortune, sits and smiles in the eyes of a gentleman you __ "

"I what?"

"You know __ and perhaps think well of."

"I don't know the gentlemen here.  I have scarcely interchanged
a syllable with one of them; and as to thinking well of them, I
consider some respectable, and stately, and middle_aged, and others
young, dashing, handsome, and lively:  but certainly they are all
at liberty to be the recipients of whose smiles they please, without
my feeling disposed to consider the transaction of any moment to
me."

"You don't know the gentlemen here?  You have not exchanged a
syllable with one of them?  Will you say that of the master of the
house!"

"He is not at home."

"A profound remark!  A most ingenious quibble!  He went to Millcote
this morning, and will be back here to_night or to_morrow:  does
that circumstance exclude him from the list of your acquaintance
__ blot him, as it were, out of existence?"

"No; but I can scarcely see what Mr. Rochester has to do with the
theme you had introduced."

"I was talking of ladies smiling in the eyes of gentlemen; and of
late so many smiles have been shed into Mr. Rochester's eyes that
they overflow like two cups filled above the brim:  have you never
remarked that?"

"Mr. Rochester has a right to enjoy the society of his guests."

"No question about his right:  but have you never observed that,
of all the tales told here about matrimony, Mr. Rochester has been
favoured with the most lively and the most continuous?"

"The eagerness of a listener quickens the tongue of a narrator."  I
said this rather to myself than to the gipsy, whose strange talk,
voice, manner, had by this time wrapped me in a kind of dream.  One
unexpected sentence came from her lips after another, till I got
involved in a web of mystification; and wondered what unseen spirit
had been sitting for weeks by my heart watching its workings and
taking record of every pulse.

"Eagerness of a listener!"  repeated she:  "yes; Mr. Rochester has
sat by the hour, his ear inclined to the fascinating lips that took
such delight in their task of communicating; and Mr. Rochester was
so willing to receive and looked so grateful for the pastime given
him; you have noticed this?"

"Grateful!  I cannot remember detecting gratitude in his face."

"Detecting!  You have analysed, then.  And what did you detect, if
not gratitude?"

I said nothing.

"You have seen love:  have you not? __ and, looking forward, you
have seen him married, and beheld his bride happy?"

"Humph!  Not exactly.  Your witch's skill is rather at fault
sometimes."

"What the devil have you seen, then?"

"Never mind:  I came here to inquire, not to confess.  Is it known
that Mr. Rochester is to be married?"

"Yes; and to the beautiful Miss Ingram."

"Shortly?"

"Appearances would warrant that conclusion:  and, no doubt (though,
with an audacity that wants chastising out of you, you seem to
question it), they will be a superlatively happy pair.  He must
love such a handsome, noble, witty, accomplished lady; and probably
she loves him, or, if not his person, at least his purse.  I know
she considers the Rochester estate eligible to the last degree;
though (God pardon me!) I told her something on that point about
an hour ago which made her look wondrous grave:  the corners of her
mouth fell half an inch.  I would advise her blackaviced suitor to
look out:  if another comes, with a longer or clearer rent_roll,
__ he's dished __ "

"But, mother, I did not come to hear Mr. Rochester's fortune:  I
came to hear my own; and you have told me nothing of it."

"Your fortune is yet doubtful:  when I examined your face, one trait
contradicted another.  Chance has meted you a measure of happiness:
that I know.  I knew it before I came here this evening.  She has
laid it carefully on one side for you.  I saw her do it.  It depends
on yourself to stretch out your hand, and take it up:  but whether
you will do so, is the problem I study.  Kneel again on the rug."

"Don't keep me long; the fire scorches me."

I knelt.  She did not stoop towards me, but only gazed,
leaning back in her chair.  She began muttering, _

"The flame flickers in the eye; the eye shines like dew; it looks
soft and full of feeling; it smiles at my jargon:  it is susceptible;
impression follows impression through its clear sphere; where it
ceases to smile, it is sad; an unconscious lassitude weighs on the
lid:  that signifies melancholy resulting from loneliness.  It turns
from me; it will not suffer further scrutiny; it seems to deny,
by a mocking glance, the truth of the discoveries I have already
made, __ to disown the charge both of sensibility and chagrin:
its pride and reserve only confirm me in my opinion.  The eye is
favourable.

"As to the mouth, it delights at times in laughter; it is disposed
to impart all that the brain conceives; though I daresay it would
be silent on much the heart experiences.  Mobile and flexible,
it was never intended to be compressed in the eternal silence of
solitude:  it is a mouth which should speak much and smile often,
and have human affection for its interlocutor.  That feature too
is propitious.

"I see no enemy to a fortunate issue but in the brow; and that
brow professes to say, __ 'I can live alone, if self_respect, and
circumstances require me so to do.  I need not sell my soul to buy
bliss.  I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me
alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld, or offered
only at a price I cannot afford to give.'  The forehead declares,
'Reason sits firm and holds the reins, and she will not let the
feelings burst away and hurry her to wild chasms.  The passions may
rage furiously, like true heathens, as they are; and the desires
may imagine all sorts of vain things:  but judgment shall still
have the last word in every argument, and the casting vote in
every decision.  Strong wind, earthquake_shock, and fire may pass
by:  but I shall follow the guiding of that still small voice which
interprets the dictates of conscience.'

"Well said, forehead; your declaration shall be respected.  I have
formed my plans __ right plans I deem them __ and in them I have
attended to the claims of conscience, the counsels of reason.  I
know how soon youth would fade and bloom perish, if, in the cup
of bliss offered, but one dreg of shame, or one flavour of remorse
were detected; and I do not want sacrifice, sorrow, dissolution __
such is not my taste.  I wish to foster, not to blight __ to earn
gratitude, not to wring tears of blood __ no, nor of brine:  my
harvest must be in smiles, in endearments, in sweet __ That will
do.  I think I rave in a kind of exquisite delirium.  I should wish
now to protract this moment ad infinitum; but I dare not.  So far
I have governed myself thoroughly.  I have acted as I inwardly swore
I would act; but further might try me beyond my strength.  Rise,
Miss Eyre:  leave me; the play is played out'."

Where was I? Did I wake or sleep?  Had I been dreaming?  Did I
dream still?  The old woman's voice had changed:  her accent, her
gesture, and all were familiar to me as my own face in a glass
__ as the speech of my own tongue.  I got up, but did not go.  I
looked; I stirred the fire, and I looked again:  but she drew her
bonnet and her bandage closer about her face, and again beckoned me
to depart.  The flame illuminated her hand stretched out:  roused
now, and on the alert for discoveries, I at once noticed that
hand.  It was no more the withered limb of eld than my own; it was
a rounded supple member, with smooth fingers, symmetrically turned;
a broad ring flashed on the little finger, and stooping forward,
I looked at it, and saw a gem I had seen a hundred times before.
Again I looked at the face; which was no longer turned from me __
on the contrary, the bonnet was doffed, the bandage displaced, the
head advanced.

"Well, Jane, do you know me?"  asked the familiar voice.

"Only take off the red cloak, sir, and then __ "

"But the string is in a knot __ help me."

"Break it, sir."

"There, then __ 'Off, ye lendings!'"  And Mr. Rochester stepped
out of his disguise.

"Now, sir, what a strange idea!"

"But well carried out, eh?  Don't you think so?"

"With the ladies you must have managed well."

"But not with you?"

"You did not act the character of a gipsy with me."

"What character did I act?  My own?"

"No; some unaccountable one.  In short, I believe you have been
trying to draw me out __ or in; you have been talking nonsense to
make me talk nonsense.  It is scarcely fair, sir."

"Do you forgive me, Jane?"

"I cannot tell till I have thought it all over.  If, on reflection,
I find I have fallen into no great absurdity, I shall try to forgive
you; but it was not right."

"Oh, you have been very correct __ very careful, very sensible."

I reflected, and thought, on the whole, I had.  It was a comfort;
but, indeed, I had been on my guard almost from the beginning of
the interview.  Something of masquerade I suspected.  I knew gipsies
and fortune_tellers did not express themselves as this seeming old
woman had expressed herself; besides I had noted her feigned voice,
her anxiety to conceal her features.  But my mind had been running
on Grace Poole __ that living enigma, that mystery of mysteries,
as I considered her.  I had never thought of Mr. Rochester.

"Well," said he, "what are you musing about?  What does that grave
smile signify?"

"Wonder and self_congratulation, sir.  I have your permission to
retire now, I suppose?"

"No; stay a moment; and tell me what the people in the drawing_room
yonder are doing."

"Discussing the gipsy, I daresay."

"Sit down! __ Let me hear what they said about me."

"I had better not stay long, sir; it must be near eleven o'clock.
Oh, are you aware, Mr. Rochester, that a stranger has arrived here
since you left this morning?"

"A stranger! __ no; who can it be?  I expected no one; is he gone?"

"No; he said he had known you long, and that he could take the
liberty of installing himself here till you returned."

"The devil he did!  Did he give his name?"

"His name is Mason, sir; and he comes from the West Indies; from
Spanish Town, in Jamaica, I think."

Mr. Rochester was standing near me; he had taken my hand, as if
to lead me to a chair.  As I spoke he gave my wrist a convulsive
grip; the smile on his lips froze:  apparently a spasm caught his
breath.

"Mason! __ the West Indies!"  he said, in the tone one might fancy
a speaking automaton to enounce its single words; "Mason! __ the
West Indies!"  he reiterated; and he went over the syllables three
times, growing, in the intervals of speaking, whiter than ashes:
he hardly seemed to know what he was doing.

"Do you feel ill, sir?"  I inquired.

"Jane, I've got a blow; I've got a blow, Jane!"  He staggered.

"Oh, lean on me, sir."

"Jane, you offered me your shoulder once before; let me have it
now."

"Yes, sir, yes; and my arm."

He sat down, and made me sit beside him.  Holding my hand in both
his own, he chafed it; gazing on me, at the same time, with the
most troubled and dreary look.

"My little friend!"  said he, "I wish I were in a quiet island
with only you; and trouble, and danger, and hideous recollections
removed from me."

"Can I help you, sir? __ I'd give my life to serve you."

"Jane, if aid is wanted, I'll seek it at your hands; I promise you
that."

"Thank you, sir.  Tell me what to do, __ I'll try, at least, to do
it."

"Fetch me now, Jane, a glass of wine from the dining_room:  they
will be at supper there; and tell me if Mason is with them, and
what he is doing."

I went.  I found all the party in the dining_room at supper, as Mr.
Rochester had said; they were not seated at table, __ the supper was
arranged on the sideboard; each had taken what he chose, and they
stood about here and there in groups, their plates and glasses in
their hands.  Every one seemed in high glee; laughter and conversation
were general and animated.  Mr. Mason stood near the fire, talking
to Colonel and Mrs. Dent, and appeared as merry as any of them.  I
filled a wine_glass (I saw Miss Ingram watch me frowningly as I did
so:  she thought I was taking a liberty, I daresay), and I returned
to the library.

Mr. Rochester's extreme pallor had disappeared, and he looked once
more firm and stern.  He took the glass from my hand.

"Here is to your health, ministrant spirit!"  he said.  He swallowed
the contents and returned it to me.  "What are they doing, Jane?"

"Laughing and talking, sir."

"They don't look grave and mysterious, as if they had heard something
strange?"

"Not at all:  they are full of jests and gaiety."

"And Mason?"

"He was laughing too."

"If all these people came in a body and spat at me, what would you
do, Jane?"

"Turn them out of the room, sir, if I could."

He half smiled.  "But if I were to go to them, and they only looked
at me coldly, and whispered sneeringly amongst each other, and then
dropped off and left me one by one, what then?  Would you go with
them?"

"I rather think not, sir:  I should have more pleasure in staying
with you."

"To comfort me?"

"Yes, sir, to comfort you, as well as I could."

"And if they laid you under a ban for adhering to me?"

"I, probably, should know nothing about their ban; and if I did,
I should care nothing about it."

"Then, you could dare censure for my sake?"

"I could dare it for the sake of any friend who deserved my adherence;
as you, I am sure, do."

"Go back now into the room; step quietly up to Mason, and whisper
in his ear that Mr. Rochester is come and wishes to see him:  show
him in here and then leave me."

"Yes, sir."

I did his behest.  The company all stared at me as I passed straight
among them.  I sought Mr. Mason, delivered the message, and preceded
him from the room:  I ushered him into the library, and then I went
upstairs.

At a late hour, after I had been in bed some time, I heard the
visitors repair to their chambers:  I distinguished Mr. Rochester's
voice, and heard him say, "This way, Mason; this is your room."

He spoke cheerfully:  the gay tones set my heart at ease.  I was
soon asleep.