Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition Chapter 22.

Mr. Rochester had given me but one week's leave of absence: yet
a month elapsed before I quitted Gateshead. I wished to leave
immediately after the funeral, but Georgiana entreated me to stay
till she could get off to London, whither she was now at last
invited by her uncle, Mr. Gibson, who had come down to direct his
sister's interment and settle the family affairs. Georgiana said
she dreaded being left alone with Eliza; from her she got neither
sympathy in her dejection, support in her fears, nor aid in her
preparations; so I bore with her feebleminded wailings and selfish
lamentations as well as I could, and did my best in sewing for
her and packing her dresses.

It is true, that while I worked, she would idle; and I thought to
myself, "If you and I were destined to live always together, cousin,
we would commence matters on a different footing. I should not
settle tamely down into being the forbearing party; I should assign
you your share of labour, and compel you to accomplish it, or else it
should be left undone: I should insist, also, on your keeping some
of those drawling, halfinsincere complaints hushed in your own
breast. It is only because our connection happens to be very
transitory, and comes at a peculiarly mournful season, that I
consent thus to render it so patient and compliant on my part."

At last I saw Georgiana off; but now it was Eliza's turn to
request me to stay another week. Her plans required all her time
and attention, she said; she was about to depart for some unknown
bourne; and all day long she stayed in her own room, her door
bolted within, filling trunks, emptying drawers, burning papers,
and holding no communication with any one. She wished me to look
after the house, to see callers, and answer notes of condolence.

One morning she told me I was at liberty. "And," she added, "I
am obliged to you for your valuable services and discreet conduct!
There is some difference between living with such an one as you
and with Georgiana: you perform your own part in life and burden
no one. Tomorrow," she continued, "I set out for the Continent.
I shall take up my abode in a religious house near Lisle a
nunnery you would call it; there I shall be quiet and unmolested.
I shall devote myself for a time to the examination of the Roman
Catholic dogmas, and to a careful study of the workings of their
system: if I find it to be, as I half suspect it is, the one best
calculated to ensure the doing of all things decently and in order,
I shall embrace the tenets of Rome and probably take the veil."

I neither expressed surprise at this resolution nor attempted to
dissuade her from it. "The vocation will fit you to a hair," I
thought: "much good may it do you!" When we parted, she said:
"Goodbye, cousin Jane Eyre; I wish you well: you have some sense."
I then returned: "You are not without sense, cousin Eliza; but
what you have, I suppose, in another year will be walled up alive
in a French convent. However, it is not my business, and so it
suits you, I don't much care."

"You are in the right," said she; and with these words we each went
our separate way. As I shall not have occasion to refer either to
her or her sister again, I may as well mention here, that Georgiana
made an advantageous match with a wealthy wornout man of fashion,
and that Eliza actually took the veil, and is at this day superior
of the convent where she passed the period of her novitiate, and
which she endowed with her fortune.

How people feel when they are returning home from an absence, long
or short, I did not know: I had never experienced the sensation.
I had known what it was to come back to Gateshead when a child after
a long walk, to be scolded for looking cold or gloomy; and later,
what it was to come back from church to Lowood, to long for
a plenteous meal and a good fire, and to be unable to get either.
Neither of these returnings was very pleasant or desirable: no
magnet drew me to a given point, increasing in its strength of
attraction the nearer I came. The return to Thornfield was yet to
be tried.

My journey seemed tedious very tedious: fifty miles one day, a
night spent at an inn; fifty miles the next day. During the first
twelve hours I thought of Mrs. Reed in her last moments; I saw her
disfigured and discoloured face, and heard her strangely altered
voice. I mused on the funeral day, the coffin, the hearse, the black
train of tenants and servants few was the number of relatives
the gaping vault, the silent church, the solemn service. Then
I thought of Eliza and Georgiana; I beheld one the cynosure of a
ballroom, the other the inmate of a convent cell; and I dwelt on
and analysed their separate peculiarities of person and character.
The evening arrival at the great town of scattered these thoughts;
night gave them quite another turn: laid down on my traveller's
bed, I left reminiscence for anticipation.

I was going back to Thornfield: but how long was I to stay there?
Not long; of that I was sure. I had heard from Mrs. Fairfax in
the interim of my absence: the party at the hall was dispersed;
Mr. Rochester had left for London three weeks ago, but he was then
expected to return in a fortnight. Mrs. Fairfax surmised that he
was gone to make arrangements for his wedding, as he had talked of
purchasing a new carriage: she said the idea of his marrying Miss
Ingram still seemed strange to her; but from what everybody said,
and from what she had herself seen, she could no longer doubt
that the event would shortly take place. "You would be strangely
incredulous if you did doubt it," was my mental comment. "I don't
doubt it."

The question followed, "Where was I to go?" I dreamt of Miss
Ingram all the night: in a vivid morning dream I saw her closing
the gates of Thornfield against me and pointing me out another
road; and Mr. Rochester looked on with his arms folded smiling
sardonically, as it seemed, at both her and me.

I had not notified to Mrs. Fairfax the exact day of my return; for
I did not wish either car or carriage to meet me at Millcote. I
proposed to walk the distance quietly by myself; and very quietly,
after leaving my box in the ostler's care, did I slip away from
the George Inn, about six o'clock of a June evening, and take the
old road to Thornfield: a road which lay chiefly through fields,
and was now little frequented.

It was not a bright or splendid summer evening, though fair and soft:
the haymakers were at work all along the road; and the sky, though
far from cloudless, was such as promised well for the future: its
blue where blue was visible was mild and settled, and its
cloud strata high and thin. The west, too, was warm: no watery
gleam chilled it it seemed as if there was a fire lit, an altar
burning behind its screen of marbled vapour, and out of apertures
shone a golden redness.

I felt glad as the road shortened before me: so glad that I stopped
once to ask myself what that joy meant: and to remind reason that
it was not to my home I was going, or to a permanent restingplace,
or to a place where fond friends looked out for me and waited my
arrival. "Mrs. Fairfax will smile you a calm welcome, to be sure,"
said I; "and little Adele will clap her hands and jump to see you:
but you know very well you are thinking of another than they, and
that he is not thinking of you."

But what is so headstrong as youth? What so blind as inexperience?
These affirmed that it was pleasure enough to have the privilege
of again looking on Mr. Rochester, whether he looked on me or not;
and they added "Hasten! hasten! be with him while you may:
but a few more days or weeks, at most, and you are parted from him
for ever!" And then I strangled a newborn agony a deformed thing
which I could not persuade myself to own and rear and ran on.

They are making hay, too, in Thornfield meadows: or rather, the
labourers are just quitting their work, and returning home with
their rakes on their shoulders, now, at the hour I arrive. I have
but a field or two to traverse, and then I shall cross the road and
reach the gates. How full the hedges are of roses! But I have no
time to gather any; I want to be at the house. I passed a tall
briar, shooting leafy and flowery branches across the path; I
see the narrow stile with stone steps; and I see Mr. Rochester
sitting there, a book and a pencil in his hand; he is writing.

Well, he is not a ghost; yet every nerve I have is unstrung: for
a moment I am beyond my own mastery. What does it mean? I did
not think I should tremble in this way when I saw him, or lose my
voice or the power of motion in his presence. I will go back as
soon as I can stir: I need not make an absolute fool of myself.
I know another way to the house. It does not signify if I knew
twenty ways; for he has seen me. "Hillo!" he cries; and he puts
up his book and his pencil. "There you are! Come on, if you please."

I suppose I do come on; though in what fashion I know not; being
scarcely cognisant of my movements, and solicitous only to appear
calm; and, above all, to control the working muscles of my face
which I feel rebel insolently against my will, and struggle to
express what I had resolved to conceal. But I have a veil it
is down: I may make shift yet to behave with decent composure.

"And this is Jane Eyre? Are you coming from Millcote, and on foot?
Yes just one of your tricks: not to send for a carriage, and
come clattering over street and road like a common mortal, but to
steal into the vicinage of your home along with twilight, just as
if you were a dream or a shade. What the deuce have you done with
yourself this last month?" "I have been with my aunt, sir, who is dead."

"A true Janian reply! Good angels be my guard! She comes from the
other world from the abode of people who are dead; and tells me
so when she meets me alone here in the gloaming! If I dared, I'd
touch you, to see if you are substance or shadow, you elf! But
I'd as soon offer to take hold of a blue ignis fatuus light in a
marsh. Truant! truant!" he added, when he had paused an instant.
"Absent from me a whole month, and forgetting me quite, I'll be
sworn!"

I knew there would be pleasure in meeting my master again, even
though broken by the fear that he was so soon to cease to be my
master, and by the knowledge that I was nothing to him: but there
was ever in Mr. Rochester (so at least I thought) such a wealth
of the power of communicating happiness, that to taste but of the
crumbs he scattered to stray and stranger birds like me, was to
feast genially. his last words were balm: they seemed to imply
that it imported something to him whether I forgot him or not.
And he had spoken of Thornfield as my home would that it were
my home!

He did not leave the stile, and I hardly liked to ask to go by. I
inquired soon if he had not been to London. "Yes; I suppose
you found that out by secondsight." "Mrs. Fairfax told me
in a letter." "And did she inform you what I went to do?"
"Oh, yes, sir! Everybody knew your errand."

"You must see the carriage, Jane, and tell me if you don't think it
will suit Mrs. Rochester exactly; and whether she won't look like
Queen Boadicea, leaning back against those purple cushions. I wish,
Jane, I were a trifle better adapted to match with her externally.
Tell me now, fairy as you are can't you give me a charm, or a
philter, or something of that sort, to make me a handsome man?"
"It would be past the power of magic, sir;" and, in thought, I added,
"A loving eye is all the charm needed: to such you are handsome
enough; or rather your sternness has a power beyond beauty."

Mr. Rochester had sometimes read my unspoken thoughts with an
acumen to me incomprehensible: in the present instance he took no
notice of my abrupt vocal response; but he smiled at me with a certain
smile he had of his own, and which he used but on rare occasions.
He seemed to think it too good for common purposes: it was the
real sunshine of feeling he shed it over me now. "Pass, Janet,"
said he, making room for me to cross the stile: "go up home,
and stay your weary little wandering feet at a friend's threshold."

All I had now to do was to obey him in silence: no need for me
to colloquise further. I got over the stile without a word, and
meant to leave him calmly. An impulse held me fast a force turned
me round. I said or something in me said for me, and in spite of me
"Thank you, Mr. Rochester, for your great kindness. I am strangely
glad to get back again to you: and wherever you are is my home
my only home."

I walked on so fast that even he could hardly have overtaken me
had he tried. Little Adele was half wild with delight when she saw
me. Mrs. Fairfax received me with her usual plain friendliness.
Leah smiled, and even Sophie bid me "bon soir" with glee. This
was very pleasant; there is no happiness like that of being loved
by your fellowcreatures, and feeling that your presence is an
addition to their comfort.

I that evening shut my eyes resolutely against the future: I stopped
my cars against the voice that kept warning me of near separation
and coming grief. When tea was over and Mrs. Fairfax had taken
her knitting, and I had assumed a low seat near her, and Adele,
kneeling on the carpet, had nestled close up to me, and a sense of
mutual affection seemed to surround us with a ring of golden peace,
I uttered a silent prayer that we might not be parted far or soon;
but when, as we thus sat, Mr. Rochester entered, unannounced, and
looking at us, seemed to take pleasure in the spectacle of a group
so amicable when he said he supposed the old lady was all right
now that she had got her adopted daughter back again, and added
that he saw Adele was "prete e croquer sa petite maman Anglaise"
I half ventured to hope that he would, even after his marriage,
keep us together somewhere under the shelter of his protection,
and not quite exiled from the sunshine of his presence.

A fortnight of dubious calm succeeded my return to Thornfield Hall.
Nothing was said of the master's marriage, and I saw no preparation
going on for such an event. Almost every day I asked Mrs. Fairfax
if she had yet heard anything decided: her answer was always in
the negative. Once she said she had actually put the question to
Mr. Rochester as to when he was going to bring his bride home; but
he had answered her only by a joke and one of his queer looks, and
she could not tell what to make of him.

One thing specially surprised me, and that was, there were no
journeyings backward and forward, no visits to Ingram Park: to
be sure it was twenty miles off, on the borders of another county;
but what was that distance to an ardent lover? To so practised
and indefatigable a horseman as Mr. Rochester, it would be but a
morning's ride. I began to cherish hopes I had no right to conceive:
that the match was broken off; that rumour had been mistaken; that
one or both parties had changed their minds. I used to look at
my master's face to see if it were sad or fierce; but I could not
remember the time when it had been so uniformly clear of clouds or
evil feelings. If, in the moments I and my pupil spent with him, I
lacked spirits and sank into inevitable dejection, he became even
gay. Never had he called me more frequently to his presence; never
been kinder to me when there and, alas! Never had I loved him so well.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte Deluxe Edition Chapter 23.>