“Sit there,” she said, placing me on the sofa, “while we take our things off and get the tea ready. It is another privilege we exercise in our little moorland home—to prepare our own meals when we are so inclined, or when Hannah is baking, brewing, washing, or ironing.”
She closed the door, leaving me solus with Mr St. John, who sat opposite, a book or newspaper in his hand. I examined first, the parlour, and then its occupant.
The parlour was rather a small room, very plainly furnished, yet comfortable, because clean and neat. The old-fashioned chairs were very bright, and the walnut-wood table was like a looking-glass. A few strange, antique portraits of the men and women of other days decorated the stained walls; a cupboard with glass doors contained some books and an ancient set of china. There was no superfluous ornament in the room—not one modern piece of furniture, save a brace of workboxes and a lady’s desk in rosewood, which stood on a side-table. Everything—including the carpet and curtains—looked at once well worn and well saved.
Mr St. John—sitting as still as one of the dusty pictures on the walls, keeping his eyes fixed on the page he perused, and his lips mutely sealed—was easy enough to examine. Had he been a statue instead of a man, he could not have been easier. He was young—perhaps from twenty-eight to thirty—tall, slender; his face riveted the eye. It was like a Greek face, very pure in outline, quite a straight, classic nose; quite an Athenian mouth and chin. It is seldom, indeed, an English face comes so near the antique models as did his. He might well be a little shocked at the irregularity of my lineaments, his own being so harmonious. His eyes were large and blue, with brown lashes, his high forehead, colourless as ivory, was partially streaked over by careless locks of fair hair.
This is a gentle delineation, is it not, reader? Yet he whom it describes scarcely impressed one with the idea of a gentle, a yielding, an impressible, or even of a placid nature. Quiescent as he now sat, there was something about his nostril, his mouth, his brow, which, to my perceptions, indicated elements within either restless, or hard, or eager. He did not speak to me one word, nor even direct to me one glance, till his sisters returned. Diana, as she passed in and out, in the course of preparing tea, brought me a little cake, baked on the top of the oven.
“Eat that now,” she said, “you must be hungry. Hannah says you have had nothing but some gruel since breakfast.”
I did not refuse it, for my appetite was awakened and keen. Mr Rivers now closed his book, approached the table, and, as he took a seat, fixed his blue pictorial-looking eyes full on me. There was an unceremonious directness, a searching, decided steadfastness in his gaze now, which told that intention, and not diffidence, had hitherto kept it averted from the stranger.
“You are very hungry,” he said.
“I am, sir.” It is my way—it always was my way, by instinct—ever to meet the brief with brevity, the direct with plainness.
“It is well for you that a low fever has forced you to abstain for the last three days, there would have been danger in yielding to the cravings of your appetite at first. Now you may eat, though still not immoderately.”
“I trust I shall not eat long at your expense, sir,” was my very clumsily-contrived, unpolished answer.
“No,” he said coolly, “when you have indicated to us the residence of your friends, we can write to them, and you may be restored to home.”
“That, I must plainly tell you, is out of my power to do; being absolutely without home and friends.”
The three looked at me, but not distrustfully. I felt there was no suspicion in their glances, there was more of curiosity. I speak particularly of the young ladies. St. John’s eyes, though clear enough in a literal sense, in a figurative one were difficult to fathom. He seemed to use them rather as instruments to search other people’s thoughts, than as agents to reveal his own, the which combination of keenness and reserve was considerably more calculated to embarrass than to encourage.
“Do you mean to say,” he asked, “that you are completely isolated from every connection?”
“I do. Not a tie links me to any living thing, not a claim do I possess to admittance under any roof in England.”
“A most singular position at your age!”
Here I saw his glance directed to my hands, which were folded on the table before me. I wondered what he sought there, his words soon explained the quest.
“You have never been married? You are a spinster?”
Diana laughed. “Why, she can’t be above seventeen or eighteen years old, St. John,” said she.
“I am near nineteen, but I am not married. No.”
I felt a burning glow mount to my face, for bitter and agitating recollections were awakened by the allusion to marriage. They all saw the embarrassment and the emotion. Diana and Mary relieved me by turning their eyes elsewhere than to my crimsoned visage, but the colder and sterner brother continued to gaze, till the trouble he had excited forced out tears as well as colour.
“Where did you last reside?” he now asked.
“You are too inquisitive, St. John,” murmured Mary in a low voice, but he leaned over the table and required an answer by a second firm and piercing look.
“The name of the place where, and of the person with whom I lived, is my secret,” I replied concisely.
“Which, if you like, you have, in my opinion, a right to keep, both from St. John and every other questioner,” remarked Diana.
“Yet if I know nothing about you or your history, I cannot help you,” he said. “And you need help, do you not?”
“I need it, and I seek it so far, sir, that some true philanthropist will put me in the way of getting work which I can do, and the remuneration for which will keep me, if but in the barest necessaries of life.”
“I know not whether I am a true philanthropist; yet I am willing to aid you to the utmost of my power in a purpose so honest. First, then, tell me what you have been accustomed to do, and what you can do.”
I had now swallowed my tea. I was mightily refreshed by the beverage, as much so as a giant with wine. It gave new tone to my unstrung nerves, and enabled me to address this penetrating young judge steadily.
“Mr Rivers,” I said, turning to him, and looking at him, as he looked at me, openly and without diffidence, “you and your sisters have done me a great service—the greatest man can do his fellow-being; you have rescued me, by your noble hospitality, from death. This benefit conferred gives you an unlimited claim on my gratitude, and a claim, to a certain extent, on my confidence. I will tell you as much of the history of the wanderer you have harboured, as I can tell without compromising my own peace of mind—my own security, moral and physical, and that of others.
“I am an orphan, the daughter of a clergyman. My parents died before I could know them. I was brought up a dependant; educated in a charitable institution. I will even tell you the name of the establishment, where I passed six years as a pupil, and two as a teacher—Lowood Orphan Asylum, Yorkshire, you will have heard of it, Mr Rivers?—the Rev. Robert Brocklehurst is the treasurer.”
“I have heard of Mr Brocklehurst, and I have seen the school.”
“I left Lowood nearly a year since to become a private governess. I obtained a good situation, and was happy. This place I was obliged to leave four days before I came here. The reason of my departure I cannot and ought not to explain. It would be useless, dangerous, and would sound incredible. No blame attached to me. I am as free from culpability as anyone of you three. Miserable I am, and must be for a time; for the catastrophe which drove me from a house I had found a paradise was of a strange and direful nature. I observed but two points in planning my departure—speed, secrecy. To secure these, I had to leave behind me everything I possessed except a small parcel, which, in my hurry and trouble of mind, I forgot to take out of the coach that brought me to Whitcross. To this neighbourhood, then, I came, quite destitute. I slept two nights in the open air, and wandered about two days without crossing a threshold. B
ut twice in that space of time did I taste food and it was when brought by hunger, exhaustion, and despair almost to the last gasp, that you, Mr Rivers, forbade me to perish of want at your door, and took me under the shelter of your roof. I know all your sisters have done for me since—for I have not been insensible during my seeming torpor—and I owe to their spontaneous, genuine, genial compassion as large a debt as to your evangelical charity.”
“Don’t make her talk any more now, St. John,” said Diana, as I paused, “she is evidently not yet fit for excitement. Come to the sofa and sit down now, Miss Elliott.”
I gave an involuntary half start at hearing the alias, I had forgotten my new name. Mr Rivers, whom nothing seemed to escape, noticed it at once.
“You said your name was Jane Elliott?” he observed.
“I did say so and it is the name by which I think it expedient to be called at present, but it is not my real name, and when I hear it, it sounds strange to me.”
“Your real name you will not give?”
“No, I fear discovery above all things and whatever disclosure would lead to it, I avoid.”
“You are quite right, I am sure,” said Diana. “Now do, brother, let her be at peace a while.”
But when St. John had mused a few moments he recommenced as imperturbably and with as much acumen as ever.
“You would not like to be long dependent on our hospitality—you would wish, I see, to dispense as soon as may be with my sisters’ compassion, and, above all, with my charity—I am quite sensible of the distinction drawn, nor do I resent it—it is just—you desire to be independent of us?”
“I do. I have already said so. Show me how to work, or how to seek work, that is all I now ask; then let me go, if it be but to the meanest cottage, but till then, allow me to stay here. I dread another essay of the horrors of homeless destitution.”
“Indeed you shall stay here,” said Diana, putting her white hand on my head. “You shall,” repeated Mary, in the tone of undemonstrative sincerity which seemed natural to her.
“My sisters, you see, have a pleasure in keeping you,” said Mr St. John, “as they would have a pleasure in keeping and cherishing a half-frozen bird, some wintry wind might have driven through their casement. I feel more inclination to put you in the way of keeping yourself, and shall endeavour to do so, but observe, my sphere is narrow. I am but the incumbent of a poor country parish, my aid must be of the humblest sort. And if you are inclined to despise the day of small things, seek some more efficient succour than such as I can offer.”
“She has already said that she is willing to do anything honest she can do,” answered Diana for me, “and you know, St. John, she has no choice of helpers, she is forced to put up with such crusty people as you.”
“I will be a dressmaker. I will be a plain-workwoman. I will be a servant, a nurse-girl, if I can be no better,” I answered.
“Right,” said Mr St. John, quite coolly. “If such is your spirit, I promise to aid you, in my own time and way.”
He now resumed the book with which he had been occupied before tea. I soon withdrew, for I had talked as much, and sat up as long, as my present strength would permit.
Chapter Thirty
The more I knew of the inmates of Moor House, the better I liked them. In a few days I had so far recovered my health that I could sit up all day, and walk out sometimes. I could join with Diana and Mary in all their occupations, converse with them as much as they wished, and aid them when and where they would allow me. There was a reviving pleasure in this intercourse, of a kind now tasted by me for the first time—the pleasure arising from perfect congeniality of tastes, sentiments, and principles.
I liked to read what they liked to read, what they enjoyed, delighted me; what they approved, I reverenced. They loved their sequestered home. I, too, in the grey, small, antique structure, with its low roof, its latticed casements, its mouldering walls, its avenue of aged firs—all grown aslant under the stress of mountain winds. Its garden, dark with yew and holly—and where no flowers but of the hardiest species would bloom—found a charm both potent and permanent. They clung to the purple moors behind and around their dwelling—to the hollow vale into which the pebbly bridle-path leading from their gate descended, and which wound between fern-banks first, and then amongst a few of the wildest little pasture-fields that ever bordered a wilderness of heath, or gave sustenance to a flock of grey moorland sheep, with their little mossy-faced lambs—they clung to this scene, I say, with a perfect enthusiasm of attachment. I could comprehend the feeling, and share both its strength and truth. I saw the fascination of the locality. I felt the consecration of its loneliness, my eye feasted on the outline of swell and sweep—on the wild colouring communicated to ridge and dell by moss, by heath-bell, by flower-sprinkled turf, by brilliant bracken, and mellow granite crag. These details were just to me what they were to them—so many pure and sweet sources of pleasure. The strong blast and the soft breeze; the rough and the halcyon day; the hours of sunrise and sunset, the moonlight and the clouded night, developed for me, in these regions, the same attraction as for them—wound round my faculties the same spell that entranced theirs.
Indoors we agreed equally well. They were both more accomplished and better read than I was, but with eagerness I followed in the path of knowledge they had trodden before me. I devoured the books they lent me, then it was full satisfaction to discuss with them in the evening what I had perused during the day. Thought fitted thought; opinion met opinion, we coincided, in short, perfectly. For my soul, I found solace here. My heart, I feared it would never find solace. No matter where I was, memories haunted like a spectre, no matter how valiantly I encouraged them to flee.
If in our trio there was a superior and a leader, it was Diana. Physically, she far excelled me, she was handsome; she was vigorous. In her animal spirits there was an affluence of life and certainty of flow, such as excited my wonder, while it baffled my comprehension. I could talk a while when the evening commenced, but the first gush of vivacity and fluency gone, I was fain to sit on a stool at Diana’s feet, to rest my head on her knee, and listen alternately to her and Mary, while they sounded thoroughly the topic on which I had but touched. With great determination, I forced my mind away from the remembrance of sitting so at Mr Rochester’s feet.
Diana offered to teach me German. I liked to learn of her. I saw the part of instructress pleased and suited her; that of scholar pleased and suited me no less. Our natures dovetailed, mutual affection—of the strongest kind—was the result. They discovered I could draw, their pencils and colour-boxes were immediately at my service. My skill, greater in this one point than theirs, surprised and charmed them. Mary would sit and watch me by the hour together, then she would take lessons and a docile, intelligent, assiduous pupil she made. Thus occupied, and mutually entertained, days passed like hours, and weeks like days.
As to Mr St John, the intimacy which had arisen so naturally and rapidly between me and his sisters did not extend to him. One reason of the distance yet observed between us was, that he was comparatively seldom at home. A large proportion of his time appeared devoted to visiting the sick and poor among the scattered population of his parish.
No weather seemed to hinder him in these pastoral excursions, rain or fair, he would, when his hours of morning study were over, take his hat, and, followed by his father’s old pointer, Carlo, go out on his mission of love or duty—I scarcely know in which light he regarded it. Sometimes, when the day was very unfavourable, his sisters would expostulate. He would then say, with a peculiar smile, more solemn than cheerful.
“And if I let a gust of wind or a sprinkling of rain turn me aside from these easy tasks, what preparation would such sloth be for the future I propose to myself?”
Diana and Mary’s general answer to this question was a sigh, and some minutes of apparently mournful meditation.
But besides his frequent absences, there was another barrier to friendship with him, he seeme
d of a reserved, an abstracted, and even of a brooding nature. Zealous in his ministerial labours, blameless in his life and habits, he yet did not appear to enjoy that mental serenity, that inward content, which should be the reward of every sincere Christian and practical philanthropist. Often, of an evening, when he sat at the window, his desk and papers before him, he would cease reading or writing, rest his chin on his hand, and deliver himself up to I know not what course of thought, but that it was perturbed and exciting might be seen in the frequent flash and changeful dilation of his eye.
I think, moreover, that Nature was not to him that treasury of delight it was to his sisters. He expressed once, and but once in my hearing, a strong sense of the rugged charm of the hills, and an inborn affection for the dark roof and hoary walls he called his home, but there was more of gloom than pleasure in the tone and words in which the sentiment was manifested and never did he seem to roam the moors for the sake of their soothing silence—never seek out or dwell upon the thousand peaceful delights they could yield.
Incommunicative as he was, some time elapsed before I had an opportunity of gauging his mind. I first got an idea of its calibre when I heard him preach in his own church at Morton. I wish I could describe that sermon, but it is past my power. I cannot even render faithfully the effect it produced on me.
It began calm—and indeed, as far as delivery and pitch of voice went, it was calm to the end, an earnestly felt, yet strictly restrained zeal breathed soon in the distinct accents, and prompted the nervous language. This grew to force—compressed, condensed, controlled. The heart was thrilled, the mind astonished, by the power of the preacher, neither were softened. Throughout there was a strange bitterness; an absence of consolatory gentleness; stern allusions to Calvinistic doctrines—election, predestination, reprobation—were frequent and each reference to these points sounded like a sentence pronounced for doom. When he had done, instead of feeling better, calmer, more enlightened by his discourse. I experienced an inexpressible sadness, for it seemed to me—I know not whether equally so to others—that the eloquence to which I had been listening had sprung from a depth where lay turbid dregs of disappointment—where moved troubling impulses of insatiate yearnings and disquieting aspirations. I was sure St. John Rivers—pure-lived, conscientious, zealous as he was—had not yet found that peace of God which passeth all understanding. He had no more found it, I thought, than had I with my concealed and racking regrets for my broken idol and lost elysium—regrets to which I have latterly avoided referring, but which possessed me and tyrannised over me ruthlessly.
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