Jane Eyre (1847)

Chapter XX

And so, by dint of alternate coaxing and commanding, he contrived to get them all once more enclosed in their separate dormitories.  I did not wait to be ordered back to mine, but retreated unnoticed, as unnoticed I had left it.

Not, however, to go to bed: on the contrary, I began and dressed myself carefully.  The sounds I had heard after the scream, and the words that had been uttered, had probably been heard only by me; for they had proceeded from the room above mine: but they assured me that it was not a servant’s dream which had thus struck horror through the house; and that the explanation Mr. Rochester had given was merely an invention framed to pacify his guests.  I dressed, then, to be ready for emergencies.  When dressed, I sat a long time by the window looking out over the silent grounds and silvered fields and waiting for I knew not what.  It seemed to me that some event must follow the strange cry, struggle, and call.

No: stillness returned: each murmur and movement ceased gradually, and in about an hour Thornfield Hall was again as hushed as a desert.  It seemed that sleep and night had resumed their empire.  Meantime the moon declined: she was about to set.  Not liking to sit in the cold and darkness, I thought I would lie down on my bed, dressed as I was.  I left the window, and moved with little noise across the carpet; as I stooped to take off my shoes, a cautious hand tapped low at the door.

“Am I wanted?” I asked.

“Are you up?” asked the voice I expected to hear, viz., my master’s.

“Yes, sir.”

“And dressed?”

“Yes.”

“Come out, then, quietly.”

I obeyed.  Mr. Rochester stood in the gallery holding a light.

“I want you,” he said: “come this way: take your time, and make no noise.”

My slippers were thin: I could walk the matted floor as softly as a cat.  He glided up the gallery and up the stairs, and stopped in the dark, low corridor of the fateful third storey: I had followed and stood at his side.

“Have you a sponge in your room?” he asked in a whisper.

“Yes, sir.”

“Have you any salts—volatile salts?”

“Yes.”

“Go back and fetch both.”

I returned, sought the sponge on the washstand, the salts in my drawer, and once more retraced my steps.  He still waited; he held a key in his hand: approaching one of the small, black doors, he put it in the lock; he paused, and addressed me again.

“You don’t turn sick at the sight of blood?”

“I think I shall not: I have never been tried yet.”

I felt a thrill while I answered him; but no coldness, and no faintness.

“Just give me your hand,” he said: “it will not do to risk a fainting fit.”

I put my fingers into his.  “Warm and steady,” was his remark: he turned the key and opened the door.

I saw a room I remembered to have seen before, the day Mrs. Fairfax showed me over the house: it was hung with tapestry; but the tapestry was now looped up in one part, and there was a door apparent, which had then been concealed.  This door was open; a light shone out of the room within: I heard thence a snarling, snatching sound, almost like a dog quarrelling.  Mr. Rochester, putting down his candle, said to me, “Wait a minute,” and he went forward to the inner apartment.  A shout of laughter greeted his entrance; noisy at first, and terminating in Grace Poole’s own goblin ha! ha!  She then was there.  He made some sort of arrangement without speaking, though I heard a low voice address him: he came out and closed the door behind him.