Part 4 (1/2)
I shook my head: I could not see how poor people had thekind; and then to learn to speak like therow up like one of the poor wo their clothes at the cottage doors of the village of Gateshead: no, I was not heroic enough to purchase liberty at the price of caste
”But are your relatives so very poor? Are they working people?”
”I cannot tell; Aunt Reed says if I have any, they ”
”Would you like to go to school?”
Again I reflected: I scarcely knehat school was: Bessie so ladies sat in the stocks, wore backboards, and were expected to be exceedingly genteel and precise: John Reed hated his school, and abused his master; but John Reed's tastes were no rule for athered fro ladies of a fa to Gateshead) were so, her details of certain accoht, equally attractive She boasted of beautiful paintings of landscapes and flowers by the 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 Besides, school would be a co journey, an entire separation from Gateshead, an entrance into a new life
”I should indeed like to go to school,” was the audible conclusion of s
”Well, well! who knohat ot up
”The child ought to have change of air and scene,” he added, speaking to hiood state”
Bessie now returned; at the saravel-walk
”Is that your mistress, nurse?” asked Mr Lloyd ”I should like to speak to her before I go”
Bessie invited him to walk into the breakfast-room, and led the way out
In the interviehich followed between him and Mrs Reed, I presume, from after-occurrences, that the apothecary ventured to reco sent to school; and the recoh adopted; for as Abbot 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, ”Missis was, she dared say, glad enough to get rid of such a tiresome, ill-conditioned child, who always looked as if she atching everybody, and scheavea sort of infantine Guy Fawkes
On that same occasion I learned, for the first time, from Miss Abbot's coyainst the wishes of her friends, who considered the randfather Reed was so irritated at her disobedience, he cut her off without a shi+lling; that after ht the typhus fever while visiting a tohere 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
Bessie, when she heard this narrative, sighed and said, ”Poor Miss Jane is to be pitied, too, Abbot”
”Yes,” responded Abbot; ”if she were a nice, pretty child, one ht compassionate her forlornness; but one really cannot care for such a little toad as that”
”Not a great deal, to be sure,” agreed Bessie: ”at any rate, a beauty like Miss Georgiana would bein the saiana!” cried the fervent Abbot ”Little darling!--with her long curls and her blue eyes, and such a sweet colour as she has; just as if she were painted!--Bessie, I could fancy a Welsh rabbit for supper”
”So could I--with a roast onion Coo down” They went
CHAPTER IV
From my discourse with Mr Lloyd, and froathered enough of hope to suffice as a e seemed near,--I desired and waited it in silence It tarried, however: days and weeks passed: I had regained my normal state of health, but no new allusion was made to the subject over which I brooded Mrs Reed surveyed me at times with a severe eye, but seldom addressed me: since my illness, she had drawn a more marked line of separation than ever betweenme to take my meals alone, and pass all my time in the nursery, while -roo me to school: still I felt an instinctive certainty that she would not long endure lance, now more than ever, when turned on me, expressed an insuperable and rooted aversion
Eliza and Georgiana, evidently acting according to orders, spoke to ue in his cheek whenever he saw me, and once atteainst him, roused by the same sentiment of deep ire and desperate revolt which had stirred ht it better to desist, and ran fro I had burst his nose I had indeed levelled at that prominent feature as hard a blow as my knuckles could inflict; and when I saw that either that or reatest inclination to follow up e to purpose; but he was already with histone commence the tale of how ”that nasty Jane Eyre” had flown at him like a mad cat: he was stopped rather harshly--
”Don't talk to o near her; she is not worthy of notice; I do not choose that either you or your sisters should associate with her”
Here, leaning over the banister, I cried out suddenly, and without at all deliberating on my words--
”They are not fit to associate withthis strange and audacious declaration, she ran nimbly up the stair, swepte of my crib, dared me in an emphatic voice to rise fro the remainder of the day