Jane Eyre: An Autobiography
“Of my final re-transformation from India-rubber back to flesh?”
“Decidedly he has had too much wine,” I thought; and I did not know
what answer to make to his queer question: how could I tell whether he
was capable of being re-transformed?
“You looked very much puzzled, Miss Eyre; and though you are not pretty
any more than I am handsome, yet a puzzled air becomes you; besides, it
is convenient, for it keeps those searching eyes of yours away from my
physiognomy, and busies them with the worsted flowers of the rug; so
puzzle on. Young lady, I am disposed to be gregarious and communicative
to-night.”
With this announcement he rose from his chair, and stood, leaning his
arm on the marble mantelpiece: in that attitude his shape was seen
plainly as well as his face; his unusual breadth of chest,
disproportionate almost to his length of limb. I am sure most people
would have thought him an ugly man; yet there was so much unconscious
pride in his port; so much ease in his demeanour; such a look of
complete indifference to his own external appearance; so haughty a
reliance on the power of other qualities, intrinsic or adventitious, to
atone for the lack of mere personal attractiveness, that, in looking at
him, one inevitably shared the indifference, and, even in a blind,
imperfect sense, put faith in the confidence.
“I am disposed to be gregarious and communicative to-night,” he
repeated, “and that is why I sent for you: the fire and the chandelier
were not sufficient company for me; nor would Pilot have been, for none
of these can talk. Adèle is a degree better, but still far below the
mark; Mrs. Fairfax ditto; you, I am persuaded, can suit me if you will:
you puzzled me the first evening I invited you down here. I have almost
forgotten you since: other ideas have driven yours from my head; but
to-night I am resolved to be at ease; to dismiss what importunes, and
recall what pleases. It would please me now to draw you out—to learn
more of you—therefore speak.”
Instead of speaking, I smiled; and not a very complacent or submissive
smile either.
“Speak,” he urged.
“What about, sir?”
“Whatever you like. I leave both the choice of subject and the manner
of treating it entirely to yourself.”
Accordingly I sat and said nothing: “If he expects me to talk for the
mere sake of talking and showing off, he will find he has addressed
himself to the wrong person,” I thought.
“You are dumb, Miss Eyre.”
I was dumb still. He bent his head a little towards me, and with a
single hasty glance seemed to dive into my eyes.
“Stubborn?” he said, “and annoyed. Ah! it is consistent. I put my
request in an absurd, almost insolent form. Miss Eyre, I beg your
pardon. The fact is, once for all, I don’t wish to treat you like an
inferior: that is” (correcting himself), “I claim only such superiority
as must result from twenty years’ difference in age and a century’s
advance in experience. This is legitimate, _et j’y tiens_, as Adèle
would say; and it is by virtue of this superiority, and this alone,
that I desire you to have the goodness to talk to me a little now, and
divert my thoughts, which are galled with dwelling on one
point—cankering as a rusty nail.”
He had deigned an explanation, almost an apology, and I did not feel
insensible to his condescension, and would not seem so.
“I am willing to amuse you, if I can, sir—quite willing; but I cannot
introduce a topic, because how do I know what will interest you? Ask me
questions, and I will do my best to answer them.”
“Then, in the first place, do you agree with me that I have a right to
be a little masterful, abrupt, perhaps exacting, sometimes, on the
grounds I stated, namely, that I am old enough to be your father, and
that I have battled through a varied experience with many men of many
nations, and roamed over half the globe, while you have lived quietly
with one set of people in one house?”
“Do as you please, sir.”
“That is no answer; or rather it is a very irritating, because a very
evasive one. Reply clearly.”
“I don’t think, sir, you have a right to command me, merely because you
are older than I, or because you have seen more of the world than I
have; your claim to superiority depends on the use you have made of
your time and experience.”
“Humph! Promptly spoken. But I won’t allow that, seeing that it would
never suit my case, as I have made an indifferent, not to say a bad,
use of both advantages. Leaving superiority out of the question, then,
you must still agree to receive my orders now and then, without being
piqued or hurt by the tone of command. Will you?”
I smiled: I thought to myself Mr. Rochester _is_ peculiar—he seems to
forget that he pays me £30 per annum for receiving his orders.
“The smile is very well,” said he, catching instantly the passing
expression; “but speak too.”
“I was thinking, sir, that very few masters would trouble themselves to
inquire whether or not their paid subordinates were piqued and hurt by
their orders.”
“Paid subordinates! What! you are my paid subordinate, are you? Oh yes,
I had forgotten the salary! Well then, on that mercenary ground, will
you agree to let me hector a little?”
“No, sir, not on that ground; but, on the ground that you did forget
it, and that you care whether or not a dependent is comfortable in his
dependency, I agree heartily.”
“And will you consent to dispense with a great many conventional forms
and phrases, without thinking that the omission arises from insolence?”
“I am sure, sir, I should never mistake informality for insolence: one
I rather like, the other nothing free-born would submit to, even for a
salary.”
“Humbug! Most things free-born will submit to anything for a salary;
therefore, keep to yourself, and don’t venture on generalities of which
you are intensely ignorant. However, I mentally shake hands with you
for your answer, despite its inaccuracy; and as much for the manner in
which it was said, as for the substance of the speech; the manner was
frank and sincere; one does not often see such a manner: no, on the
contrary, affectation, or coldness, or stupid, coarse-minded
misapprehension of one’s meaning are the usual rewards of candour. Not
three in three thousand raw school-girl-governesses would have answered
me as you have just done. But I don’t mean to flatter you: if you are
cast in a different mould to the majority, it is no merit of yours:
Nature did it. And then, after all, I go too fast in my conclusions:
for what I yet know, you may be no better than the rest; you may have
intolerable defects to counterbalance your few good points.”
“And so may you,” I thought. My eye met his as the idea crossed my
mind: he seemed to read the glance, answering as if its import had been
spoken as well as imagined—
“Yes, yes, you are right,” said he; “I have plenty of faults of my own:
I know it, and I don’t wish to palliate them, I assure you. God wot I
need not be too severe about others; I have a past existence, a series
of deeds, a colour of life to contemplate within my own breast, which
might well call my sneers and censures from my neighbours to myself. I
started, or rather (for like other defaulters, I like to lay half the
blame on ill fortune and adverse circumstances) was thrust on to a
wrong tack at the age of one-and-twenty, and have never recovered the
right course since: but I might have been very different; I might have
been as good as you—wiser—almost as stainless. I envy you your peace of
mind, your clean conscience, your unpolluted memory. Little girl, a
memory without blot or contamination must be an exquisite treasure—an
inexhaustible source of pure refreshment: is it not?”
“How was your memory when you were eighteen, sir?”
“All right then; limpid, salubrious: no gush of bilge water had turned
it to fetid puddle. I was your equal at eighteen—quite your equal.
Nature meant me to be, on the whole, a good man, Miss Eyre; one of the
better kind, and you see I am not so. You would say you don’t see it;
at least I flatter myself I read as much in your eye (beware,
by-the-bye, what you express with that organ; I am quick at
interpreting its language). Then take my word for it,—I am not a
villain: you are not to suppose that—not to attribute to me any such
bad eminence; but, owing, I verily believe, rather to circumstances
than to my natural bent, I am a trite commonplace sinner, hackneyed in
all the poor petty dissipations with which the rich and worthless try
to put on life. Do you wonder that I avow this to you? Know, that in
the course of your future life you will often find yourself elected the
involuntary confidant of your acquaintances’ secrets: people will
instinctively find out, as I have done, that it is not your forte to
tell of yourself, but to listen while others talk of themselves; they
will feel, too, that you listen with no malevolent scorn of their
indiscretion, but with a kind of innate sympathy; not the less
comforting and encouraging because it is very unobtrusive in its
manifestations.”
“How do you know?—how can you guess all this, sir?”
“I know it well; therefore I proceed almost as freely as if I were
writing my thoughts in a diary. You would say, I should have been
superior to circumstances; so I should—so I should; but you see I was
not. When fate wronged me, I had not the wisdom to remain cool: I
turned desperate; then I degenerated. Now, when any vicious simpleton
excites my disgust by his paltry ribaldry, I cannot flatter myself that
I am better than he: I am forced to confess that he and I are on a
level. I wish I had stood firm—God knows I do! Dread remorse when you
are tempted to err, Miss Eyre; remorse is the poison of life.”
“Repentance is said to be its cure, sir.”
“It is not its cure. Reformation may be its cure; and I could reform—I
have strength yet for that—if—but where is the use of thinking of it,
hampered, burdened, cursed as I am? Besides, since happiness is
irrevocably denied me, I have a right to get pleasure out of life: and
I _will_ get it, cost what it may.”
“Then you will degenerate still more, sir.”
“Possibly: yet why should I, if I can get sweet, fresh pleasure? And I
may get it as sweet and fresh as the wild honey the bee gathers on the
moor.”
“It will sting—it will taste bitter, sir.”
“How do you know?—you never tried it. How very serious—how very solemn
you look: and you are as ignorant of the matter as this cameo head”
(taking one from the mantelpiece). “You have no right to preach to me,
you neophyte, that have not passed the porch of life, and are
absolutely unacquainted with its mysteries.”
“I only remind you of your own words, sir: you said error brought
remorse, and you pronounced remorse the poison of existence.”
“And who talks of error now? I scarcely think the notion that flittered
across my brain was an error. I believe it was an inspiration rather
than a temptation: it was very genial, very soothing—I know that. Here
it comes again! It is no devil, I assure you; or if it be, it has put
on the robes of an angel of light. I think I must admit so fair a guest
when it asks entrance to my heart.”
“Distrust it, sir; it is not a true angel.”
“Once more, how do you know? By what instinct do you pretend to
distinguish between a fallen seraph of the abyss and a messenger from
the eternal throne—between a guide and a seducer?”
“I judged by your countenance, sir, which was troubled when you said
the suggestion had returned upon you. I feel sure it will work you more
misery if you listen to it.”
“Not at all—it bears the most gracious message in the world: for the
rest, you are not my conscience-keeper, so don’t make yourself uneasy.
Here, come in, bonny wanderer!”
He said this as if he spoke to a vision, viewless to any eye but his