Chapter 03 (Jane Eyre (Full Cast))

01Chapter 3 of Jane Eyre.

02The next thing I remember is waking up with a feeling as if I had had a frightful nightmare, and seeing before me a terrible red glare crossed with thick black bars.

03I heard voices, too, speaking with a hollow sound, and as if muffled by a rush of wind or water.

04Agitation, uncertainty, and an all-predominating sense of terror confused my faculties.

05Ere long I became aware that someone was handling me, lifting me up and supporting me in a sitting posture, and that more tenderly than I had ever been raised or upheld before.

06I rested my head against a pillow or an arm, and felt easy.

07In five minutes more the cloud of bewilderment dissolved.

08I knew quite well that I was in my own bed, and that the red glare was the nursery fire.

09It was night.

10A candle burnt on the table.

11Bessie stood at the bed-foot with a basin in her hand, and a gentleman sat in a chair near my pillow, leaning over me.

12I felt an inexpressible relief, a soothing conviction of protection and security, when I knew that there was a stranger in the room, an individual not belonging to Gateshead, and not related to Mrs.

13Reed.

14Turning from Bessie, though her presence was far less obnoxious to me than that of Abbott, for instance, would have been, I scrutinized the face of the gentleman.

15I knew him.

16It was Mr.

17Lloyd, an apothecary, sometimes called in by Mrs.

18Reed when the servants were ailing.

19For herself and the children, she employed a physician.

20Well, who am I?

21he asked.

22I pronounced his name, offering him at the same time my hand.

23He took it, smiling, and saying, We shall do very well by and by.

24Then he laid me down, and, addressing Bessie, charged her to be very careful that I was not disturbed during the night.

25Having given some further directions, and intimates that he should call again the next day, he departed, to my grief.

26I felt so sheltered and befriended while he sat in the chair near my pillow, and as he closed the door after him, all the room darkened and my heart again sank.

27Inexpressible sadness weighed it down.

28Do you feel as if you should sleep, miss?

29asked Bessie, rather softly.

30Scarcely dared I answer her, for I feared the next sentence might be rough.

31I will try.

32Would you like a drink, or could you eat anything?

33No, thank you, Bessie.

34Then I think I shall go to bed, for it is past twelve o'clock.

35But you may call me if you want anything in the night.

36Wonderful civility, this.

37It emboldened me to ask a question.

38Bessie, what is the matter with me?

39Am I ill?

40You fell sick, I suppose, in the red room with crying.

41You'll be better soon, no doubt.

42Bessie went into the housemaid's apartment, which was near.

43I heard her say, Sarah, come and sleep with me in the nursery.

44I daren't for my life be alone with that poor child tonight.

45She might die.

46It's such a strange thing she should have that fit.

47I wonder if she saw anything.

48Mrs.

49was rather too hard.

50Sarah came back with her.

51They both went to bed.

52They were whispering together for half an hour before they fell asleep.

53I caught scraps of their conversation, from which I was able only too distinctly to infer the main subject discussed.

54Something past her, all dressed in white, and vanished.

55A great black job behind him.

56Three loud raps on the chamber door.

57Alight in a churchyard, as over his grave.

58Et cetera, et cetera.

59At last both slept.

60The fire and the candle went out.

61For me, the watches of that long night passed in ghastly wakefulness, strained by dread.

62Such dread as children only can feel.

63No severe or prolonged bodily illness followed this incident of the Red Room.

64It only gave my nerves a shock of which I feel the reverberation to this day.

65Yes, Mrs.

66Reed, to you I owe some fearful pangs of mental suffering.

67But I ought to forgive you, for you knew not what you did.

68While rending my heart-strings, you thought you were only uprooting my bad propensities.

69Next day by noon I was up and dressed, and sat wrapped in a shawl by the nursery hearth.

70I felt physically weak and broken down, but my worse ailment was an unutterable wretchedness of mind.

71A wretchedness which kept drawing from me silent tears.

72No sooner had I wiped one salt-drop for my cheek than another followed.

73Yet, I thought, I ought to have been happy, for none of the reeds were there.

74They were all gone out in the carriage with their mamma.

75Abbott, too, was sewing in another room, and Bessie, as she moved hither and thither, putting away toys and arranging drawers, addressed to me every now and then a word of unwanted kindness.

76This state of things should have been to me a paradise of peace, accustomed, as I was, to a life of ceaseless reprimand and thankless fagging.

77But, in fact, my racked nerves were now in such a state that no calm could soothe, and no pleasure excite them agreeably.

78Bessie had been down into the kitchen, and she brought up with her a tart on a certain brightly painted china plate, whose bird of paradise, nestling in a wreath of convulvuli and rose-buds, had been wont to stir in me a most enthusiastic sense of admiration, and which plate I had often petitioned to be allowed to take in my hand in order to examine it more closely, but had always hitherto been deemed unworthy of such a privilege.

79This precious vessel was now placed on my knee, and I was cordially invited to eat the circlet of delicate pastry upon it.

80Vain favour!

81Coming, like most other favours long deferred and often wished for, too late.

82I could not eat the tart, and the plumage of the bird, the tints of the flowers, seemed strangely faded.

83I put both plate and tart away.

84Bessie asked if I would have a book.

85The word book acted as a transient stimulus, and I begged her to fetch Gulliver's travels from the library.

86This book I had again and again perused with delight.

87I considered it a narrative of facts, and discovered in it a vein of interest deeper than what I found in fairy-tales.

88For as to the elves, having sought them in vain among foxglove leaves and bells, under mushrooms and beneath the ground-ivy mantling old walnuts, I had at length made up my mind to the sad truth that they were all gone out of England to some savage country where the woods were wilder and thicker, and the population more scant.

89Whereas, Lilliput and Brobdingnag being, in my creed, solid parts of the earth's surface, I doubted not that I might one day, by taking a long voyage, see with my own eyes the little fields, houses, and trees, the diminutive people, the tiny cows, sheeps, and birds of the one realm, and the corn-fields forest-high, the mighty mastiffs, the monster-cats, the tower-like men and women of the other.

90Yet when this cherished volume was now placed in my hand, when I turned over its leaves and sought in its marvellous pictures the charm I had till now never failed to find.

91All was eerie and dreary.

92The giants were gaunt goblins, the pygmies malevolent and fearful imps, Gulliver, most desolate wanderer, and most dread and dangerous regions.

93I closed the book, which I dared no longer peruse, and put it on the table, beside the untasted tart.

94Bessie had now finished dusting and tidying the room, and having washed her hands, she opened a certain little drawer full of splendid shreds of silk and satin, and began making a new bonnet for Georgiana's doll.

95Meantime she sang.

96Her song was...

97In the days when we went gypsying, a long time ago...

98I had often heard the song before, and always with lively delight, for Bessie had a sweet voice, at least I thought so.

99But now, though her voice was still sweet, I found in its melody an indescribable sadness.

100Sometimes, preoccupied with her work, she sang the refrain very low, very lingeringly.

101A long time ago...

102Came out like the saddest cadence of a funeral hymn.

103She passed into another ballad, this time a really doleful one.

104My feet they are sore, and my limbs they are weary.

105Long is the way, and the mountains are wild.

106Soon will the twilight close, moonless and dreary, over the path of the poor orphan child.

107Why did they send me so far, and so lonely, up where the moors spread, and gray rocks are piled?

108Men are hard-hearted, and kind angels only, watch o'er the steps of a poor orphan child.

109Yet distant and soft the night-breeze is blowing.

110Clouds there are none, and clear stars beam mild.

111God in his mercy protection is showing.

112Carpet and hope to the poor orphan child.

113E'en should I fall o'er the broken bridge passing, or strain the marshes by false lights beguiled.

114Still will my father, with promise and blessing, take to his bosom the poor orphan child, whose thought that for strength should avail me, though both of shelter and kindred despoiled.

115Heaven is a home, and a rest will not fail me.

116God is a friend to the poor orphan child.

117Come, Miss Jane, don't cry, said Bessie, as she finished.

118She might as well have said to the fire, don't burn!

119But how could she divine the morbid suffering to which I was a prey?

120In the course of the morning Mr.

121Lloyd came again.

122What?

123Already up?

124said he, as he entered the nursery.

125Well, nurse, how is she?

126Bessie answered that I was doing very well.

127Then she ought to look more cheerful.

128Come here, Miss Jane.

129Your name is Jane, is it not?

130Yes, sir, Jane Eyre.

131Well, you have been crying, Miss Jane Eyre.

132Can you tell me what about?

133Have you any pain?

134No, sir.

135Oh, I dare say she is crying because she could not go out with Mrs.

136in the carriage, interposed Bessie.

137Surely not.

138Why, she is too old for such pettishness.

139I thought so, too, and my self-esteem being wounded by the false charge, I answered promptly, I never cried for such a thing in my life.

140I hate going out in the carriage.

141I cry because I am miserable.

142Oh, fie, Miss, said Bessie.

143The good apothecary appeared a little puzzled.

144I was standing before him.

145He fixed his eyes on me very steadily.

146His eyes were small and grey, not very bright, but I dare say I should think them shrewd now.

147He had a hard-featured yet good-natured looking face.

148Having considered me at leisure, he said, What made you ill yesterday?

149She had a fall, said Bessie, again putting in her word.

150Fall?

151Why, that is like a baby again.

152Can't she manage to walk at her age?

153She must be eight or nine years old.

154I was knocked down, was the blunt explanation, jerked out of me by another pang of mortified pride.

155But that did not make me ill, I added, while Mr.

156Lloyd helped himself to a pinch of snuff.

157As he was returning the box to his waistcoat pocket, a loud bell rang for the servant's dinner.

158He knew what it was.

159That's for you, nurse, said he.

160You can go down.

161I'll give Miss Jane a lecture till you come back.

162Bessie would rather have stayed, but she was obliged to go, because punctuality at meals was rigidly enforced at Gateshead Hall.

163The fall did not make you ill.

164What did, then?

165Pursued Mr.

166Lloyd, when Bessie was gone.

167I was shut up in a room where there is a ghost, till after dark.

168I saw Mr.

169Lloyd smile and frown at the same time.

170Ghost!

171What, you are a baby after all?

172You are afraid of ghosts?

173Of Mr.

174Reed's ghost I am.

175He died in that room and was laid out there.

176Neither Bessie nor anyone else will go into it at night if they can help it.

177And it was cruel to shut me up alone without a candle.

178So cruel that I think I shall never forget it.

179Nonsense!

180And is it that makes you so miserable?

181Are you afraid now in daylight?

182No, but night will come again before long.

183And besides, I am unhappy, very unhappy, for other things.

184What other things?

185Can you tell me some of them?

186How much I wish to reply fully to this question.

187How difficult it was to frame any answer.

188Children can feel, but they cannot analyse their feelings.

189And if the analysis is partially effected in thought, they know not how to express the result of the process in words.

190Fearful, however, of losing this first and only opportunity of relieving my grief by imparting it, I, after a disturbed pause, contrive to frame a meagre, though as far as it went, true response.

191For one thing, I have no father or mother, brothers or sisters.

192You have a kind aunt and cousins.

193Again I paused, then bunglingly announced, But John Reed knocked me down, and my aunt shut me up in the red room.

194Mr.

195Lloyd a second time produced his snuff-box.

196Don't you think Gateshead Hall a very beautiful house?

197Asked he.

198Are you not very thankful to have such a fine place to live at?

199It is not my house, sir, and Abbott says I have less right to be here than a servant.

200You can't be silly enough to wish to leave such a splendid place.

201If I had anywhere else to go I should be glad to leave it, but I can never get away from Gateshead till I am a woman.

202Perhaps you may.

203Who knows?

204Have you any relations besides Mrs.

205Reed?

206I think not, sir.

207None belonging to your father?

208I don't know.

209I asked Aunt Reed once, and she said possibly I might have some poor, low relations called air, but she knew nothing about them.

210If you had such, would you like to go to them?

211I reflected.

212Poverty looks grim to grown people, still more so to children.

213They have not much idea of industrious, working, respectable poverty.

214They think of the word only as connected with ragged clothes, scanty food, fireless greats, rude manners, and debasing vices.

215Poverty for me was synonymous with degradation.

216No, I should not like to belong to poor people, was my reply.

217Not even if they were kind to you?

218I shook my head.

219I could not see how poor people had the means of being kind.

220And then to learn to speak like them, to adopt their manners, to be uneducated, to grow up like one of the poor women I saw sometimes nursing their children or washing their clothes at the cottage doors of the village of Gateshead.

221No, I was not heroic enough to purchase liberty at the price of caste.

222But are your relatives so very poor?

223Are they working people?

224I cannot tell.

225Aunt Reed says if I have any, they must be a beggarly set.

226I should not like to go a-begging.

227Would you like to go to school?

228Again I reflected.

229I scarcely knew what school was.

230Bessie sometimes spoke of it as a place where young ladies sat in the stocks, wore backboards, and were expected to be exceedingly genteel and precise.

231John Reed hated his school and abused his master, but John Reed's tastes were no rule for mine, and if Bessie's accounts of school discipline, gathered from the young ladies of a family where she had lived before coming to Gateshead, were somewhat appalling, her details of certain accomplishments attained by these same young ladies were, I thought, equally attractive.

232She boasted of beautiful paintings of landscapes and flowers by them executed, of songs they could sing and pieces they could play, of purses they could net, of French books they could translate, till my spirit was moved to emulation as I listened.

233Besides, school would be a complete change.

234It implied a long journey, an entire separation from Gateshead, an entrance into a new life.

235I should indeed like to go to school, was the audible conclusion of my musings.

236Well, well, who knows what may happen, said Mr.

237Lloyd as he got up.

238The child ought to have change of air and scene, he added, speaking to himself.

239Nerves not in a good state.

240Bessie now returned.

241At the same moment, the carriage was heard rolling up the gravel walk.

242Is that your mistress, nurse?

243Asked Mr.

244Lloyd.

245I should like to speak to her before I go.

246Bessie invited him to walk into the breakfast room and led the way out.

247In the interview which followed between him and Mrs.

248Reed, I presume, from after occurrences, that the apothecary ventured to recommend my being sent to school, and the recommendation was no doubt readily enough adopted, for, as Abbott said in discussing the subject with Bessie when both sat sewing in the nursery one night after I was in bed and, as they thought, asleep, Mrs.

249Wors, she dared say, glad enough to get rid of such a tiresome, ill-conditioned child who always looked as if she were watching everybody and scheming plots underhand.

250Abbott, I think, gave me credit for being a sort of infantine guy, Fawkes.

251On that same occasion I learned for the first time from Miss Abbott's communications to Bessie, that my father had been a poor clergyman, that my mother had married him against the wishes of her friends who considered the match beneath her, that my grandfather Reed was so irritated at her disobedience he cut her off without a shilling, that after my mother and father had been married a year the latter caught the typhus fever while visiting among the poor of a large manufacturing town where his curacy was situated, and where that disease was then prevalent, that my mother took the infection from him and both died within a month of each other.

252Bessie, when she heard this narrative, sighed and said, Poor Miss Jane was to be pitied too, Abbott.

253Yes?

254responded Abbott.

255If she were a nice, pretty child, one might compassionate her forlornness.

256But one really cannot care for such a little toad as that.

257Not a great deal, to be sure, agreed Bessie.

258At any rate, a beauty like Miss Georgiana would be more moving in the same condition.

259Yes, I doad on Miss Georgiana, cried the fervent abbot.

260Little darling, with her long curls and her blue eyes and such a sweet colour as she has, just as if she were painted.

261Bessie, I could fancy a Welsh rabbit for supper.

262So could I, with the roast onion.

263Come, we'll go down.

264They went.

265End of chapter 3 and then we'll go down.

266We'll go down.

267We'll go down.