The Complete Works: Charlotte, Emily, Anne, Patrick & Branwell Brontë. Anne Bronte

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СКАЧАТЬ am no better than the old lightning-struck chestnut-tree in Thornfield orchard,” he remarked ere long. “And what right would that ruin have to bid a budding woodbine cover its decay with freshness?”

      “You are no ruin, sir — no lightning-struck tree: you are green and vigorous. Plants will grow about your roots, whether you ask them or not, because they take delight in your bountiful shadow; and as they grow they will lean towards you, and wind round you, because your strength offers them so safe a prop.”

      Again he smiled: I gave him comfort.

      “You speak of friends, Jane?” he asked.

      “Yes, of friends,” I answered rather hesitatingly: for I knew I meant more than friends, but could not tell what other word to employ. He helped me.

      “Ah! Jane. But I want a wife.”

      “Do you, sir?”

      “Yes: is it news to you?”

      “Of course: you said nothing about it before.”

      “Is it unwelcome news?”

      “That depends on circumstances, sir — on your choice.”

      “Which you shall make for me, Jane. I will abide by your decision.”

      “Choose then, sir — her who loves you best.”

      “I will at least choose — her I love best. Jane, will you marry me?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      “A poor blind man, whom you will have to lead about by the hand?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      “A crippled man, twenty years older than you, whom you will have to wait on?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      “Truly, Jane?”

      “Most truly, sir.”

      “Oh! my darling! God bless you and reward you!”

      “Mr. Rochester, if ever I did a good deed in my life — if ever I thought a good thought — if ever I prayed a sincere and blameless prayer — if ever I wished a righteous wish, — I am rewarded now. To be your wife is, for me, to be as happy as I can be on earth.”

      “Because you delight in sacrifice.”

      “Sacrifice! What do I sacrifice? Famine for food, expectation for content. To be privileged to put my arms round what I value — to press my lips to what I love — to repose on what I trust: is that to make a sacrifice? If so, then certainly I delight in sacrifice.”

      “And to bear with my infirmities, Jane: to overlook my deficiencies.”

      “Which are none, sir, to me. I love you better now, when I can really be useful to you, than I did in your state of proud independence, when you disdained every part but that of the giver and protector.”

      “Hitherto I have hated to be helped — to be led: henceforth, I feel I shall hate it no more. I did not like to put my hand into a hireling’s, but it is pleasant to feel it circled by Jane’s little fingers. I preferred utter loneliness to the constant attendance of servants; but Jane’s soft ministry will be a perpetual joy. Jane suits me: do I suit her?”

      “To the finest fibre of my nature, sir.”

      “The case being so, we have nothing in the world to wait for: we must be married instantly.”

      He looked and spoke with eagerness: his old impetuosity was rising.

      “We must become one flesh without any delay, Jane: there is but the licence to get — then we marry.”

      “Mr. Rochester, I have just discovered the sun is far declined from its meridian, and Pilot is actually gone home to his dinner. Let me look at your watch.”

      “Fasten it into your girdle, Janet, and keep it henceforward: I have no use for it.”

      “It is nearly four o’clock in the afternoon, sir. Don’t you feel hungry?”

      “The third day from this must be our wedding-day, Jane. Never mind fine clothes and jewels, now: all that is not worth a fillip.”

      “The sun has dried up all the raindrops, sir. The breeze is still: it is quite hot.”

      “Do you know, Jane, I have your little pearl necklace at this moment fastened round my bronze scrag under my cravat? I have worn it since the day I lost my only treasure, as a memento of her.”

      “We will go home through the wood: that will be the shadiest way.”

      He pursued his own thoughts without heeding me.

      “Jane! you think me, I daresay, an irreligious dog: but my heart swells with gratitude to the beneficent God of this earth just now. He sees not as man sees, but far clearer: judges not as man judges, but far more wisely. I did wrong: I would have sullied my innocent flower — breathed guilt on its purity: the Omnipotent snatched it from me. I, in my stiff-necked rebellion, almost cursed the dispensation: instead of bending to the decree, I defied it. Divine justice pursued its course; disasters came thick on me: I was forced to pass through the valley of the shadow of death. His chastisements are mighty; and one smote me which has humbled me for ever. You know I was proud of my strength: but what is it now, when I must give it over to foreign guidance, as a child does its weakness? Of late, Jane — only — only of late — I began to see and acknowledge the hand of God in my doom. I began to experience remorse, repentance; the wish for reconcilement to my Maker. I began sometimes to pray: very brief prayers they were, but very sincere.

      “Some days since: nay, I can number them — four; it was last Monday night, a singular mood came over me: one in which grief replaced frenzy — sorrow, sullenness. I had long had the impression that since I could nowhere find you, you must be dead. Late that night — perhaps it might be between eleven and twelve o’clock — ere I retired to my dreary rest, I supplicated God, that, if it seemed good to Him, I might soon be taken from this life, and admitted to that world to come, where there was still hope of rejoining Jane.

      “I was in my own room, and sitting by the window, which was open: it soothed me to feel the balmy night-air; though I could see no stars and only by a vague, luminous haze, knew the presence of a moon. I longed for thee, Janet! Oh, I longed for thee both with soul and flesh! I asked of God, at once in anguish and humility, if I had not been long enough desolate, afflicted, tormented; and might not soon taste bliss and peace once more. That I merited all I endured, I acknowledged — that I could scarcely endure more, I pleaded; and the alpha and omega of my heart’s wishes broke involuntarily from my lips in the words — ‘Jane! Jane! Jane!’”

      “Did you speak these words aloud?”

      “I did, Jane. If any listener had heard me, he would have thought me mad: I pronounced them with such frantic energy.”

      “And it was last Monday night, somewhere near midnight?”

      “Yes; but the time is of no consequence: what followed is the strange СКАЧАТЬ