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 and so dread, that I stopped my ears. I could not bear such words now. But then, a voice within me averred that I could do it and foretold that I should do it.
I rose up suddenly, terror-struck at the thought. My head swam as I stood erect and I perceived that I was sickening from excitement and inanition since 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 as 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.
I undrew the bolt of my door to pass out, but stumbled over an obstacle outside. Weak as I was, I could not soon recover myself and I fell, but an outstretched arm caught me. I looked up and I saw that I was supported by Mr. Rochester, who sat in a chair across my chamber threshold.
“You come out at last,” he said. “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. 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.” he paused. “Well, Jane! Not a word of reproach? You sit quietly where I have placed you and regard me with a weary, passive look?” Still I said nothing.
“Jane, I never meant to wound you thus. 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?”
“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, but presently I felt the warmth of a fire for, summer as it was, I had become icy cold in my chamber. He put wine to my lips and it revived me, then I ate something he offered and was soon myself. I was in the library, sitting in his chair and he was quite near.
“How are you now, Jane?”
“Much better, sir. I shall be well soon.”
He bent his head to kiss me, but I turned away; an act I thought that I would never perform.
“Adele must have a new governess, sir.”
“Oh, Adele will go to school—I have settled that already. 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 devil inmate she was housed. All is prepared for your prompt departure to-morrow. 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 and—”
“Then take Adele with you, sir,” I interrupted, “she will be a companion for you.”
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 and I turned my eyes from him and fixed them on the fire instead.
“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. I ought probably to have done or said nothing, but I was so tortured by a sense of remorse at thus hurting his feelings, I could not control the wish to drop balm where I had wounded.
“I do love you,” I said, “more than ever. But I must not show or indulge the feeling and this is the last time I must express it. Mr. Rochester, I must leave you.”
“For how long, Jane?”
“I must leave Adele and Thornfield. I must part with you for my whole life. I must begin a new existence among strange faces and strange scenes.”
“No, you must become Mrs. Rochester!”
“How can I, sir? You are married!”
“I am a fool!” cried Mr. Rochester suddenly. “I keep telling you I am not married and do not explain why. I forget you know nothing of the character of that woman or of the circumstances attending my infernal union with her. I will in a few words show you the real state of the case. Can you listen to me?”
“Yes, sir,” I replied, for I dearly wished what he said to be true.
“Jane, did you ever hear or know that I was not the eldest son of my house, that I had once a brother older than I?”
“I remember Mrs. Fairfax told me so once.”
“Well, Jane, it was my father’s resolution to keep the property together for he could not bear the idea of dividing his estate and leaving me a fair portion. All, he resolved, should go to my brother, Rowland. Yet as little could he endure that a son of his should be a poor man and he felt I must be provided for by a wealthy marriage. He sought me a partner betimes and a Mr. Mason, a West India planter and merchant, was an old acquaintance of his. Mr. Mason, he found, had a son and daughter and he learned that he could give a fortune of thirty thousand pounds for the latter. When I left college, I was sent out to Jamaica, to espouse a bride already courted for me. My father said nothing about her money, but he told me Miss Mason was the boast of Spanish Town for her beauty and this was no lie. I found her a fine woman in the style of Blanche Ingram: tall, dark, and majestic. Her family wished to secure me because I was of a good race and so did she. They showed her to me in parties, splendidly dressed. I seldom saw her alone and had very little private conversation with her. She flattered me and lavishly displayed for my pleasure her charms and accomplishments. All the men in her circle seemed to admire her and envy me. I was dazzled, stimulated, and my senses which were inexperienced, were excited. I thought I loved her. Her relatives encouraged me and a foolish marriage was achieved almost before I knew where I was. I did not even know her. Blockhead that I was, I married her.
“My bride’s mother I had never seen and I understood she was dead. The honeymoon over, I learned my mistake for she was not dead but mad and shut up in a lunatic asylum. There was a younger brother, too—a complete dumb idiot. The elder one, whom you have seen, will probably be in the same state one day. My father and my brother knew all this, but they thought only of the thirty thousand pounds, and joined in the plot against me.
“I lived with that woman upstairs four years and before that time she had tried me indeed. Her character ripened and developed with frightful rapidity; her vices sprang up fast and rank and they were so strong, only cruelty could check them, but I would not use cruelty. Bertha Mason, the true daughter of an infamous mother, dragged me through all the hideous and degrading agonies which must attend a man bound to a wife at once intemperate and unchaste.
“My brother in the interval died, and at the end of the four years my father died too. I was rich enough now yet poor to hideous indigence. I could not rid myself of Bertha by any legal proceedings for the doctors now discovered that she was mad. Jane, you don’t like my narrative and you look almost sick—shall I defer the rest to another day?”
“No, sir, finish it now. What did you do when you found she was mad?”
“I approached the verge of despair. At the age of twenty-six, I was hopeless. My reputation was tainted and so I took my mad wife to England with me, where no one would know of her and I placed her at Thornfield. Grace Poole and the surgeon Carter (who dressed Mason’s wounds that night he was stabbed and worried), are the only two I have ever admitted to my confidence. Mrs. Fairfax may indeed have suspected something, but she could have gained no precise knowledge as to facts.”
“And what next, sir? How did you proceed?”
“For ten long years I roved about, living first in various countries with a series of mistresses. Then I came back and I was bewitched by a creature on the causeway. I have thought of no one since. I am truly in love with her.”
I thought of his “series” of mistresses and knew that I did not want to be one of them. I did not want to be like Adele’s mama.
“Jane, promise just this—’I will be yours, Mr. Rochester.’“
“Mr. Rochester, I will not be yours.” A long silence.
“Jane, do you mean to go one way in the world, and to let me go another?” he asked in a low, dangerous voice.
“I do.”
“Do you mean it now?” he asked, running his fingers down my neck.
“I do.”
He softly kissed my forehead and cheek.
“And now?”
“I do!” I cried, extricating myself from him completely.
“Then you snatch love and innocence from me? You fling me back to my dark, lonely world?”
“Mr. Rochester, you will forget me before I forget you.”
“You make me a liar by such language and you sully my honour!”
As he said this, he released me from his clutches and only looked at me. The look was far worse to resist than the frantic strain. Only an idiot, however, would have succumbed now. I had dared and baffled his fury and I must elude his sorrow. I retired to the door.
“You are going, Jane?”
“I am going, sir.”
“You are leaving me?”
“Yes.”
“Withdraw then, I consent, but remember that you leave me here in anguish. Go up to your own room and think overall I have said. Jane, think of me.” He turned away.
I reached the door but, Reader, I walked back. I walked back as determinedly as I had retreated and I knelt down by him. I turned his face from the cushion to me and I kissed his cheek and I smoothed his hair with my hand.
“Farewell,” I whispered, standing again. Despair added, “Farewell for ever!”
That evening I never thought to sleep, but a slumber fell on me as soon as I lay down in bed. I awoke in the night after troubled dreams and knew I must leave now. In a trance-like state, I rose, dressed, took my purse containing twenty shillings and stole from my room. Wishing a farewell to all, I crept out of Thornfield Hall and fled into the night.