No More Learning

We entered the quiet and humble temple; the priest waited in his white
surplice at the lowly altar, the clerk beside him. All was still: two
shadows only moved in a remote corner. My conjecture had been correct:
the strangers had slipped in before us, and they now stood by the vault
of the Rochesters, their backs towards us, viewing through the rails the
old time-stained marble tomb, where a kneeling angel guarded the remains
of Damer de Rochester, slain at Marston Moor in the time of the civil
wars, and of Elizabeth, his wife.

Our place was taken at the communion rails. Hearing a cautious step
behind me, I glanced over my shoulder: one of the strangers--a gentleman,
evidently--was advancing up the chancel. The service began. The
explanation of the intent of matrimony was gone through; and then the
clergyman came a step further forward, and, bending slightly towards Mr.
Rochester, went on.

"I require and charge you both (as ye will answer at the dreadful day of
judgment, when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed), that if
either of you know any impediment why ye may not lawfully be joined
together in matrimony, ye do now confess it; for be ye well assured that
so many as are coupled together otherwise than God's Word doth allow, are
not joined together by God, neither is their matrimony lawful. "

He paused, as the custom is. When is the pause after that sentence ever
broken by reply? Not, perhaps, once in a hundred years. And the
clergyman, who had not lifted his eyes from his book, and had held his
breath but for a moment, was proceeding: his hand was already stretched
towards Mr. Rochester, as his lips unclosed to ask, "Wilt thou have this
woman for thy wedded wife? "--when a distinct and near voice said--

"The marriage cannot go on: I declare the existence of an impediment. "

The clergyman looked up at the speaker and stood mute; the clerk did the
same; Mr. Rochester moved slightly, as if an earthquake had rolled under
his feet: taking a firmer footing, and not turning his head or eyes, he
said, "Proceed. "

Profound silence fell when he had uttered that word, with deep but low
intonation. Presently Mr. Wood said--

"I cannot proceed without some investigation into what has been asserted,
and evidence of its truth or falsehood. "

"The ceremony is quite broken off," subjoined the voice behind us. "I am
in a condition to prove my allegation: an insuperable impediment to this
marriage exists. "

Mr. Rochester heard, but heeded not: he stood stubborn and rigid, making
no movement but to possess himself of my hand. What a hot and strong
grasp he had! and how like quarried marble was his pale, firm, massive
front at this moment! How his eye shone, still watchful, and yet wild
beneath!

Mr. Wood seemed at a loss. "What is the nature of the impediment? " he
asked. "Perhaps it may be got over--explained away? "

"Hardly," was the answer. "I have called it insuperable, and I speak
advisedly. "

The speaker came forward and leaned on the rails. He continued, uttering
each word distinctly, calmly, steadily, but not loudly--

"It simply consists in the existence of a previous marriage. Mr.
Rochester has a wife now living. "

My nerves vibrated to those low-spoken words as they had never vibrated
to thunder--my blood felt their subtle violence as it had never felt
frost or fire; but I was collected, and in no danger of swooning. I
looked at Mr. Rochester: I made him look at me. His whole face was
colourless rock: his eye was both spark and flint. He disavowed nothing:
he seemed as if he would defy all things. Without speaking, without
smiling, without seeming to recognise in me a human being, he only twined
my waist with his arm and riveted me to his side.

"Who are you? " he asked of the intruder.

"My name is Briggs, a solicitor of --- Street, London. "

"And you would thrust on me a wife? "

"I would remind you of your lady's existence, sir, which the law
recognises, if you do not. "

"Favour me with an account of her--with her name, her parentage, her
place of abode. "

"Certainly. " Mr. Briggs calmly took a paper from his pocket, and read
out in a sort of official, nasal voice:--

"'I affirm and can prove that on the 20th of October A. D. --- (a date of
fifteen years back), Edward Fairfax Rochester, of Thornfield Hall, in the
county of ---, and of Ferndean Manor, in ---shire, England, was married
to my sister, Bertha Antoinetta Mason, daughter of Jonas Mason, merchant,
and of Antoinetta his wife, a Creole, at --- church, Spanish Town,
Jamaica. The record of the marriage will be found in the register of
that church--a copy of it is now in my possession. Signed, Richard
Mason. '"

"That--if a genuine document--may prove I have been married, but it does
not prove that the woman mentioned therein as my wife is still living. "

"She was living three months ago," returned the lawyer.

"How do you know? "

"I have a witness to the fact, whose testimony even you, sir, will
scarcely controvert. "

"Produce him--or go to hell. "

"I will produce him first--he is on the spot. Mr. Mason, have the
goodness to step forward. "

Mr. Rochester, on hearing the name, set his teeth; he experienced, too, a
sort of strong convulsive quiver; near to him as I was, I felt the
spasmodic movement of fury or despair run through his frame. The second
stranger, who had hitherto lingered in the background, now drew near; a
pale face looked over the solicitor's shoulder--yes, it was Mason
himself. Mr. Rochester turned and glared at him. His eye, as I have
often said, was a black eye: it had now a tawny, nay, a bloody light in
its gloom; and his face flushed--olive cheek and hueless forehead
received a glow as from spreading, ascending heart-fire: and he stirred,
lifted his strong arm--he could have struck Mason, dashed him on the
church-floor, shocked by ruthless blow the breath from his body--but
Mason shrank away, and cried faintly, "Good God! " Contempt fell cool on
Mr. Rochester--his passion died as if a blight had shrivelled it up: he
only asked--"What have _you_ to say? "

An inaudible reply escaped Mason's white lips.

"The devil is in it if you cannot answer distinctly. I again demand,
what have you to say? "

"Sir--sir," interrupted the clergyman, "do not forget you are in a sacred
place. " Then addressing Mason, he inquired gently, "Are you aware, sir,
whether or not this gentleman's wife is still living? "

"Courage," urged the lawyer,--"speak out. "

"She is now living at Thornfield Hall," said Mason, in more articulate
tones: "I saw her there last April. I am her brother. "

"At Thornfield Hall! " ejaculated the clergyman. "Impossible! I am an
old resident in this neighbourhood, sir, and I never heard of a Mrs.
Rochester at Thornfield Hall. "

I saw a grim smile contort Mr. Rochester's lips, and he muttered--

"No, by God! I took care that none should hear of it--or of her under
that name. " He mused--for ten minutes he held counsel with himself: he
formed his resolve, and announced it--

"Enough! all shall bolt out at once, like the bullet from the barrel.
Wood, close your book and take off your surplice; John Green (to the
clerk), leave the church: there will be no wedding to-day. " The man
obeyed.

Mr. Rochester continued, hardily and recklessly: "Bigamy is an ugly
word! --I meant, however, to be a bigamist; but fate has out-manoeuvred
me, or Providence has checked me,--perhaps the last. I am little better
than a devil at this moment; and, as my pastor there would tell me,
deserve no doubt the sternest judgments of God, even to the quenchless
fire and deathless worm. Gentlemen, my plan is broken up:--what this
lawyer and his client say is true: I have been married, and the woman to
whom I was married lives! You say you never heard of a Mrs. Rochester at
the house up yonder, Wood; but I daresay you have many a time inclined
your ear to gossip about the mysterious lunatic kept there under watch
and ward. Some have whispered to you that she is my bastard half-sister:
some, my cast-off mistress. I now inform you that she is my wife, whom I
married fifteen years ago,--Bertha Mason by name; sister of this resolute
personage, who is now, with his quivering limbs and white cheeks, showing
you what a stout heart men may bear. Cheer up, Dick! --never fear me! --I'd
almost as soon strike a woman as you. Bertha Mason is mad; and she came
of a mad family; idiots and maniacs through three generations! Her
mother, the Creole, was both a madwoman and a drunkard! --as I found out
after I had wed the daughter: for they were silent on family secrets
before. Bertha, like a dutiful child, copied her parent in both points.
I had a charming partner--pure, wise, modest: you can fancy I was a happy
man. I went through rich scenes! Oh! my experience has been heavenly,
if you only knew it! But I owe you no further explanation. Briggs,
Wood, Mason, I invite you all to come up to the house and visit Mrs.
Poole's patient, and _my wife_! You shall see what sort of a being I was
cheated into espousing, and judge whether or not I had a right to break
the compact, and seek sympathy with something at least human. This
girl," he continued, looking at me, "knew no more than you, Wood, of the
disgusting secret: she thought all was fair and legal and never dreamt
she was going to be entrapped into a feigned union with a defrauded
wretch, already bound to a bad, mad, and embruted partner! Come all of
you--follow! "

Still holding me fast, he left the church: the three gentlemen came
after. At the front door of the hall we found the carriage.

"Take it back to the coach-house, John," said Mr. Rochester coolly; "it
will not be wanted to-day. "

At our entrance, Mrs. Fairfax, Adele, Sophie, Leah, advanced to meet and
greet us.

"To the right-about--every soul! " cried the master; "away with your
congratulations! Who wants them? Not I! --they are fifteen years too
late! "

He passed on and ascended the stairs, still holding my hand, and still
beckoning the gentlemen to follow him, which they did. We mounted the
first staircase, passed up the gallery, proceeded to the third storey:
the low, black door, opened by Mr. Rochester's master-key, admitted us to
the tapestried room, with its great bed and its pictorial cabinet.

"You know this place, Mason," said our guide; "she bit and stabbed you
here. "

He lifted the hangings from the wall, uncovering the second door: this,
too, he opened. In a room without a window, there burnt a fire guarded
by a high and strong fender, and a lamp suspended from the ceiling by a
chain. Grace Poole bent over the fire, apparently cooking something in a
saucepan. In the deep shade, at the farther end of the room, a figure
ran backwards and forwards. What it was, whether beast or human being,
one could not, at first sight, tell: it grovelled, seemingly, on all
fours; it snatched and growled like some strange wild animal: but it was
covered with clothing, and a quantity of dark, grizzled hair, wild as a
mane, hid its head and face.

"Good-morrow, Mrs. Poole! " said Mr. Rochester. "How are you? and how is
your charge to-day? "

"We're tolerable, sir, I thank you," replied Grace, lifting the boiling
mess carefully on to the hob: "rather snappish, but not 'rageous. "

A fierce cry seemed to give the lie to her favourable report: the clothed
hyena rose up, and stood tall on its hind-feet.

"Ah! sir, she sees you! " exclaimed Grace: "you'd better not stay. "

"Only a few moments, Grace: you must allow me a few moments. "

"Take care then, sir! --for God's sake, take care! "

The maniac bellowed: she parted her shaggy locks from her visage, and
gazed wildly at her visitors. I recognised well that purple face,--those
bloated features. Mrs. Poole advanced.

"Keep out of the way," said Mr. Rochester, thrusting her aside: "she has
no knife now, I suppose, and I'm on my guard. "

"One never knows what she has, sir: she is so cunning: it is not in
mortal discretion to fathom her craft. "

"We had better leave her," whispered Mason.

"Go to the devil! " was his brother-in-law's recommendation.

"'Ware! " cried Grace. The three gentlemen retreated simultaneously. Mr.
Rochester flung me behind him: the lunatic sprang and grappled his throat
viciously, and laid her teeth to his cheek: they struggled. She was a
big woman, in stature almost equalling her husband, and corpulent
besides: she showed virile force in the contest--more than once she
almost throttled him, athletic as he was. He could have settled her with
a well-planted blow; but he would not strike: he would only wrestle. At
last he mastered her arms; Grace Poole gave him a cord, and he pinioned
them behind her: with more rope, which was at hand, he bound her to a
chair. The operation was performed amidst the fiercest yells and the
most convulsive plunges. Mr. Rochester then turned to the spectators: he
looked at them with a smile both acrid and desolate.

"That is _my wife_," said he. "Such is the sole conjugal embrace I am
ever to know--such are the endearments which are to solace my leisure
hours! And _this_ is what I wished to have" (laying his hand on my
shoulder): "this young girl, who stands so grave and quiet at the mouth
of hell, looking collectedly at the gambols of a demon, I wanted her just
as a change after that fierce ragout. Wood and Briggs, look at the
difference! Compare these clear eyes with the red balls yonder--this
face with that mask--this form with that bulk; then judge me, priest of
the gospel and man of the law, and remember with what judgment ye judge
ye shall be judged! Off with you now. I must shut up my prize. "

We all withdrew. Mr. Rochester stayed a moment behind us, to give some
further order to Grace Poole. The solicitor addressed me as he descended
the stair.

"You, madam," said he, "are cleared from all blame: your uncle will be
glad to hear it--if, indeed, he should be still living--when Mr. Mason
returns to Madeira. "

"My uncle! What of him? Do you know him? "

"Mr. Mason does. Mr. Eyre has been the Funchal correspondent of his
house for some years. When your uncle received your letter intimating
the contemplated union between yourself and Mr. Rochester, Mr. Mason, who
was staying at Madeira to recruit his health, on his way back to Jamaica,
happened to be with him. Mr. Eyre mentioned the intelligence; for he
knew that my client here was acquainted with a gentleman of the name of
Rochester. Mr.
Mason, astonished and distressed as you may suppose,
revealed the real state of matters. Your uncle, I am sorry to say, is
now on a sick bed; from which, considering the nature of his
disease--decline--and the stage it has reached, it is unlikely he will
ever rise. He could not then hasten to England himself, to extricate you
from the snare into which you had fallen, but he implored Mr. Mason to
lose no time in taking steps to prevent the false marriage. He referred
him to me for assistance. I used all despatch, and am thankful I was not
too late: as you, doubtless, must be also. Were I not morally certain
that your uncle will be dead ere you reach Madeira, I would advise you to
accompany Mr. Mason back; but as it is, I think you had better remain in
England till you can hear further, either from or of Mr. Eyre. Have we
anything else to stay for? " he inquired of Mr. Mason.

"No, no--let us be gone," was the anxious reply; and without waiting to
take leave of Mr. Rochester, they made their exit at the hall door. The
clergyman stayed to exchange a few sentences, either of admonition or
reproof, with his haughty parishioner; this duty done, he too departed.

I heard him go as I stood at the half-open door of my own room, to which
I had now withdrawn. The house cleared, I shut myself in, fastened the
bolt that none might intrude, and proceeded--not to weep, not to mourn, I
was yet too calm for that, but--mechanically to take off the wedding
dress, and replace it by the stuff gown I had worn yesterday, as I
thought, for the last time. I then sat down: I felt weak and tired. I
leaned my arms on a table, and my head dropped on them. And now I
thought: till now I had only heard, seen, moved--followed up and down
where I was led or dragged--watched event rush on event, disclosure open
beyond disclosure: but _now_, _I thought_.

The morning had been a quiet morning enough--all except the brief scene
with the lunatic: the transaction in the church had not been noisy; there
was no explosion of passion, no loud altercation, no dispute, no defiance
or challenge, no tears, no sobs: a few words had been spoken, a calmly
pronounced objection to the marriage made; some stern, short questions
put by Mr. Rochester; answers, explanations given, evidence adduced; an
open admission of the truth had been uttered by my master; then the
living proof had been seen; the intruders were gone, and all was over.

I was in my own room as usual--just myself, without obvious change:
nothing had smitten me, or scathed me, or maimed me. And yet where was
the Jane Eyre of yesterday? --where was her life? --where were her
prospects?

Jane Eyre, who had been an ardent, expectant woman--almost a bride, was a
cold, solitary girl again: her life was pale; her prospects were
desolate. A Christmas frost had come at midsummer; a white December
storm had whirled over June; ice glazed the ripe apples, drifts crushed
the blowing roses; on hayfield and cornfield lay a frozen shroud: lanes
which last night blushed full of flowers, to-day were pathless with
untrodden snow; and the woods, which twelve hours since waved leafy and
flagrant as groves between the tropics, now spread, waste, wild, and
white as pine-forests in wintry Norway. My hopes were all dead--struck
with a subtle doom, such as, in one night, fell on all the first-born in
the land of Egypt. I looked on my cherished wishes, yesterday so
blooming and glowing; they lay stark, chill, livid corpses that could
never revive. I looked at my love: that feeling which was my
master's--which he had created; it shivered in my heart, like a suffering
child in a cold cradle; sickness and anguish had seized it; it could not
seek Mr. Rochester's arms--it could not derive warmth from his breast.
Oh, never more could it turn to him; for faith was blighted--confidence
destroyed! Mr. Rochester was not to me what he had been; for he was not
what I had thought him. I would not ascribe vice to him; I would not say
he had betrayed me; but the attribute of stainless truth was gone from
his idea, and from his presence I must go: _that_ I perceived well.
When--how--whither, I could not yet discern; but he himself, I doubted
not, would hurry me from Thornfield. Real affection, it seemed, he could
not have for me; it had been only fitful passion: that was balked; he
would want me no more. I should fear even to cross his path now: my view
must be hateful to him. Oh, how blind had been my eyes! How weak my
conduct!

My eyes were covered and closed: eddying darkness seemed to swim round
me, and reflection came in as black and confused a flow. Self-abandoned,
relaxed, and effortless, I seemed to have laid me down in the dried-up
bed of a great river; I heard a flood loosened in remote mountains, and
felt the torrent come: to rise I had no will, to flee I had no strength.
I lay faint, longing to be dead. One idea only still throbbed life-like
within me--a remembrance of God: it begot an unuttered prayer: these
words went wandering up and down in my rayless mind, as something that
should be whispered, but no energy was found to express them--

"Be not far from me, for trouble is near: there is none to help. "

It was near: and as I had lifted no petition to Heaven to avert it--as I
had neither joined my hands, nor bent my knees, nor moved my lips--it
came: in full heavy swing the torrent poured over me. The whole
consciousness of my life lorn, my love lost, my hope quenched, my faith
death-struck, swayed full and mighty above me in one sullen mass. That
bitter hour cannot be described: in truth, "the waters came into my soul;
I sank in deep mire: I felt no standing; I came into deep waters; the
floods overflowed me. "




CHAPTER XXVII


Some time in the afternoon I raised my head, and looking round and seeing
the western sun gilding the sign of its decline on the wall, I asked,
"What am I to do? "

But the answer my mind gave--"Leave Thornfield at once"--was so prompt,
so dread, that I stopped my ears. I said I could not bear such words
now. "That I am not Edward Rochester's bride is the least part of my
woe," I alleged: "that I have wakened out of most glorious dreams, and
found them all void and vain, is a horror I could bear and master; but
that I must leave him decidedly, instantly, entirely, is intolerable. I
cannot do it. "

But, then, a voice within me averred that I could do it and foretold that
I should do it. I wrestled with my own resolution: I wanted to be weak
that I might avoid the awful passage of further suffering I saw laid out
for me; and Conscience, turned tyrant, held Passion by the throat, told
her tauntingly, she had yet but dipped her dainty foot in the slough, and
swore that with that arm of iron he would thrust her down to unsounded
depths of agony.

"Let me be torn away," then I cried. "Let another help me! "

"No; you shall tear yourself away, none shall help you: you shall
yourself pluck out your right eye; yourself cut off your right hand: your
heart shall be the victim, and you the priest to transfix it. "

I rose up suddenly, terror-struck at the solitude which so ruthless a
judge haunted,--at the silence which so awful a voice filled. My head
swam as I stood erect. I perceived that I was sickening from excitement
and inanition; neither meat nor drink had passed my lips that day, for I
had taken no breakfast. And, with a strange pang, I now reflected that,
long as I had been shut up here, no message had been sent to ask how I
was, or to invite me to come down: not even little Adele had tapped at
the door; not even Mrs. Fairfax had sought me. "Friends always forget
those whom fortune forsakes," I murmured, as I undrew the bolt and passed
out. I stumbled over an obstacle: my head was still dizzy, my sight was
dim, and my limbs were feeble. I could not soon recover myself. I fell,
but not on to the ground: an outstretched arm caught me. I looked up--I
was supported by Mr. Rochester, who sat in a chair across my chamber
threshold.

"You come out at last," he said. "Well, I have been waiting for you
long, and listening: yet not one movement have I heard, nor one sob: five
minutes more of that death-like hush, and I should have forced the lock
like a burglar. So you shun me? --you shut yourself up and grieve alone!
I would rather you had come and upbraided me with vehemence. You are
passionate. I expected a scene of some kind. I was prepared for the hot
rain of tears; only I wanted them to be shed on my breast: now a
senseless floor has received them, or your drenched handkerchief. But I
err: you have not wept at all! I see a white cheek and a faded eye, but
no trace of tears. I suppose, then, your heart has been weeping blood? "

"Well, Jane! not a word of reproach? Nothing bitter--nothing poignant?
Nothing to cut a feeling or sting a passion? You sit quietly where I
have placed you, and regard me with a weary, passive look. "

"Jane, I never meant to wound you thus. If the man who had but one
little ewe lamb that was dear to him as a daughter, that ate of his bread
and drank of his cup, and lay in his bosom, had by some mistake
slaughtered it at the shambles, he would not have rued his bloody blunder
more than I now rue mine. Will you ever forgive me? "

Reader, I forgave him at the moment and on the spot. There was such deep
remorse in his eye, such true pity in his tone, such manly energy in his
manner; and besides, there was such unchanged love in his whole look and
mien--I forgave him all: yet not in words, not outwardly; only at my
heart's core.

"You know I am a scoundrel, Jane? " ere long he inquired
wistfully--wondering, I suppose, at my continued silence and tameness,
the result rather of weakness than of will.

"Yes, sir. "

"Then tell me so roundly and sharply--don't spare me. "

"I cannot: I am tired and sick. I want some water. " He heaved a sort of
shuddering sigh, and taking me in his arms, carried me downstairs. At
first I did not know to what room he had borne me; all was cloudy to my
glazed sight: presently I felt the reviving warmth of a fire; for, summer
as it was, I had become icy cold in my chamber. He put wine to my lips;
I tasted it and revived; then I ate something he offered me, and was soon
myself. I was in the library--sitting in his chair--he was quite near.
"If I could go out of life now, without too sharp a pang, it would be
well for me," I thought; "then I should not have to make the effort of
cracking my heart-strings in rending them from among Mr. Rochester's. I
must leave him, it appears. I do not want to leave him--I cannot leave
him. "

"How are you now, Jane? "

"Much better, sir; I shall be well soon. "

"Taste the wine again, Jane. "

I obeyed him; then he put the glass on the table, stood before me, and
looked at me attentively. Suddenly he turned away, with an inarticulate
exclamation, full of passionate emotion of some kind; he walked fast
through the room and came back; he stooped towards me as if to kiss me;
but I remembered caresses were now forbidden. I turned my face away and
put his aside.

"What! --How is this? " he exclaimed hastily. "Oh, I know! you won't kiss
the husband of Bertha Mason? You consider my arms filled and my embraces
appropriated? "

"At any rate, there is neither room nor claim for me, sir. "

"Why, Jane? I will spare you the trouble of much talking; I will answer
for you--Because I have a wife already, you would reply. --I guess
rightly? "

"Yes. "

"If you think so, you must have a strange opinion of me; you must regard
me as a plotting profligate--a base and low rake who has been simulating
disinterested love in order to draw you into a snare deliberately laid,
and strip you of honour and rob you of self-respect. What do you say to
that? I see you can say nothing in the first place, you are faint still,
and have enough to do to draw your breath; in the second place, you
cannot yet accustom yourself to accuse and revile me, and besides, the
flood-gates of tears are opened, and they would rush out if you spoke
much; and you have no desire to expostulate, to upbraid, to make a scene:
you are thinking how _to act_--_talking_ you consider is of no use. I
know you--I am on my guard. "

"Sir, I do not wish to act against you," I said; and my unsteady voice
warned me to curtail my sentence.

"Not in your sense of the word, but in mine you are scheming to destroy
me. You have as good as said that I am a married man--as a married man
you will shun me, keep out of my way: just now you have refused to kiss
me. You intend to make yourself a complete stranger to me: to live under
this roof only as Adele's governess; if ever I say a friendly word to
you, if ever a friendly feeling inclines you again to me, you will
say,--'That man had nearly made me his mistress: I must be ice and rock
to him;' and ice and rock you will accordingly become. "

I cleared and steadied my voice to reply: "All is changed about me, sir;
I must change too--there is no doubt of that; and to avoid fluctuations
of feeling, and continual combats with recollections and associations,
there is only one way--Adele must have a new governess, sir. "

"Oh, Adele will go to school--I have settled that already; nor do I mean
to torment you with the hideous associations and recollections of
Thornfield Hall--this accursed place--this tent of Achan--this insolent
vault, offering the ghastliness of living death to the light of the open
sky--this narrow stone hell, with its one real fiend, worse than a legion
of such as we imagine. Jane, you shall not stay here, nor will I. I was
wrong ever to bring you to Thornfield Hall, knowing as I did how it was
haunted. I charged them to conceal from you, before I ever saw you, all
knowledge of the curse of the place; merely because I feared Adele never
would have a governess to stay if she knew with what inmate she was
housed, and my plans would not permit me to remove the maniac
elsewhere--though I possess an old house, Ferndean Manor, even more
retired and hidden than this, where I could have lodged her safely
enough, had not a scruple about the unhealthiness of the situation, in
the heart of a wood, made my conscience recoil from the arrangement.
Probably those damp walls would soon have eased me of her charge: but to
each villain his own vice; and mine is not a tendency to indirect
assassination, even of what I most hate.

"Concealing the mad-woman's neighbourhood from you, however, was
something like covering a child with a cloak and laying it down near a
upas-tree: that demon's vicinage is poisoned, and always was. But I'll
shut up Thornfield Hall: I'll nail up the front door and board the lower
windows: I'll give Mrs. Poole two hundred a year to live here with _my
wife_, as you term that fearful hag: Grace will do much for money, and
she shall have her son, the keeper at Grimsby Retreat, to bear her
company and be at hand to give her aid in the paroxysms, when _my wife_
is prompted by her familiar to burn people in their beds at night, to
stab them, to bite their flesh from their bones, and so on--"

"Sir," I interrupted him, "you are inexorable for that unfortunate lady:
you speak of her with hate--with vindictive antipathy. It is cruel--she
cannot help being mad. "

"Jane, my little darling (so I will call you, for so you are), you don't
know what you are talking about; you misjudge me again: it is not because
she is mad I hate her. If you were mad, do you think I should hate you? "

"I do indeed, sir. "

"Then you are mistaken, and you know nothing about me, and nothing about
the sort of love of which I am capable. Every atom of your flesh is as
dear to me as my own: in pain and sickness it would still be dear. Your
mind is my treasure, and if it were broken, it would be my treasure
still: if you raved, my arms should confine you, and not a strait
waistcoat--your grasp, even in fury, would have a charm for me: if you
flew at me as wildly as that woman did this morning, I should receive you
in an embrace, at least as fond as it would be restrictive. I should not
shrink from you with disgust as I did from her: in your quiet moments you
should have no watcher and no nurse but me; and I could hang over you
with untiring tenderness, though you gave me no smile in return; and
never weary of gazing into your eyes, though they had no longer a ray of
recognition for me. --But why do I follow that train of ideas? I was
talking of removing you from Thornfield. All, you know, is prepared for
prompt departure: to-morrow you shall go. I only ask you to endure one
more night under this roof, Jane; and then, farewell to its miseries and
terrors for ever! I have a place to repair to, which will be a secure
sanctuary from hateful reminiscences, from unwelcome intrusion--even from
falsehood and slander. "

"And take Adele with you, sir," I interrupted; "she will be a companion
for you. "

"What do you mean, Jane? I told you I would send Adele to school; and
what do I want with a child for a companion, and not my own child,--a
French dancer's bastard? Why do you importune me about her! I say, why
do you assign Adele to me for a companion? "

"You spoke of a retirement, sir; and retirement and solitude are dull:
too dull for you. "

"Solitude! solitude! " he reiterated with irritation. "I see I must come
to an explanation. I don't know what sphynx-like expression is forming
in your countenance. You are to share my solitude. Do you understand? "

I shook my head: it required a degree of courage, excited as he was
becoming, even to risk that mute sign of dissent. He had been walking
fast about the room, and he stopped, as if suddenly rooted to one spot.
He looked at me long and hard: I turned my eyes from him, fixed them on
the fire, and tried to assume and maintain a quiet, collected aspect.

"Now for the hitch in Jane's character," he said at last, speaking more
calmly than from his look I had expected him to speak. "The reel of silk
has run smoothly enough so far; but I always knew there would come a knot
and a puzzle: here it is. Now for vexation, and exasperation, and
endless trouble! By God! I long to exert a fraction of Samson's
strength, and break the entanglement like tow! "

He recommenced his walk, but soon again stopped, and this time just
before me.

"Jane! will you hear reason? " (he stooped and approached his lips to my
ear); "because, if you won't, I'll try violence. " His voice was hoarse;
his look that of a man who is just about to burst an insufferable bond
and plunge headlong into wild license. I saw that in another moment, and
with one impetus of frenzy more, I should be able to do nothing with him.
The present--the passing second of time--was all I had in which to
control and restrain him--a movement of repulsion, flight, fear would
have sealed my doom,--and his. But I was not afraid: not in the least. I
felt an inward power; a sense of influence, which supported me. The
crisis was perilous; but not without its charm: such as the Indian,
perhaps, feels when he slips over the rapid in his canoe. I took hold of
his clenched hand, loosened the contorted fingers, and said to him,
soothingly--

"Sit down; I'll talk to you as long as you like, and hear all you have to
say, whether reasonable or unreasonable. "

He sat down: but he did not get leave to speak directly. I had been
struggling with tears for some time: I had taken great pains to repress
them, because I knew he would not like to see me weep. Now, however, I
considered it well to let them flow as freely and as long as they liked.
If the flood annoyed him, so much the better. So I gave way and cried
heartily.

Soon I heard him earnestly entreating me to be composed. I said I could
not while he was in such a passion.

"But I am not angry, Jane: I only love you too well; and you had steeled
your little pale face with such a resolute, frozen look, I could not
endure it. Hush, now, and wipe your eyes. "

His softened voice announced that he was subdued; so I, in my turn,
became calm. Now he made an effort to rest his head on my shoulder, but
I would not permit it. Then he would draw me to him: no.

"Jane! Jane! " he said, in such an accent of bitter sadness it thrilled
along every nerve I had; "you don't love me, then? It was only my
station, and the rank of my wife, that you valued? Now that you think me
disqualified to become your husband, you recoil from my touch as if I
were some toad or ape. "

These words cut me: yet what could I do or I say?