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divine the morbid suffering to which I was a prey? In the course of 
the morning Mr。 Lloyd came again。 
   'What; already up!' said he; as he entered the nursery。 'Well; 
nurse; how is she?' 
   Bessie answered that I was doing very well。 
   'Then she ought to look more cheerful。 Come here; Mis Jane: your 
name is Jane; is it not?' 
   'Yes; sir; Jane Eyre。' 
   'Well; you have been crying; Miss Jane Eyre; can you tell me what 
about? Have you any pain?' 
   'No; sir。' 
   'Oh! I daresay she is crying because she could not go out with 
Missis in the carriage;' interposed Bessie。 
   'Surely not! why; she is too old for such pettishness。' 
   I thought so too; and my self…esteem being wounded by the false 
charge; I answered promptly; 'I never cried for such a thing in my 
life: I hate going out in the carriage。 I cry because I am miserable。' 
   'Oh fie; Miss!' said Bessie。 
   The good apothecary appeared a little puzzled。 I was standing 
before him; he fixed his eyes on me very steadily: his eyes were small 
and grey; not very bright; but I daresay I should think them shrewd 
now: he had a hard…featured yet good…natured looking face。 Having 
considered me at leisure; he said… 
   'What made you ill yesterday?' 
   'She had a fall;' said Bessie; again putting in her word。 
   'Fall! why; that is like a baby again! Can't she manage to walk 
at her age? She must be eight or nine years old。' 
   'I was knocked down;' was the blunt explanation; jerked out of me 
by another pang of mortified pride; 'but that did not make me ill;' 
I added; while Mr。 Lloyd helped himself to a pinch of snuff。 
   As he was returning the box to his waistcoat pocket; a loud bell 
rang for the servants' dinner; he knew what it was。 'That's for you; 
nurse;' said he; 'you can go down; I'll give Miss Jane a lecture 
till you come back。' 
   Bessie would rather have stayed; but she was obliged to go; because 
punctuality at meals was rigidly enforced at Gates…head Hall。 
   'The fall did not make you ill; what did; then?' pursued Mr。 
Lloyd when Bessie was gone。 
   'I was shut up in a room where there is a ghost till after dark。' 
   I saw Mr。 Lloyd smile and frown at the same time。 'Ghost! What; you 
are a baby after all! You are afraid of ghosts?' 
   'Of Mr。 Reed's ghost I am: he died in that room; and was laid out 
there。 Neither Bessie nor any one else will go into it at night; if 
they can help it; and it was cruel to shut me up alone without a 
candle;… so cruel that I think I shall never forget it。' 
   'Nonsense! And is it that makes you so miserable? Are you afraid 
now in daylight?' 
   'No: but night will come again before long: and besides;… I am 
unhappy;… very unhappy; for other things。' 
   'What other things? Can you tell me some of them?' 
   How much I wished to reply fully to this question! How difficult it 
was to frame any answer! Children can feel; but they cannot analyse 
their feelings; and if the analysis is partially effected in 
thought; they know not how to express the result of the process in 
words。 Fearful; however; of losing this first and only opportunity 
of relieving my grief by imparting it; I; after a disturbed pause; 
contrived to frame a meagre; though; as far as it went; true response。 
   'For one thing; I have no father or mother; brothers or sisters。' 
   'You have a kind aunt and cousins。' 
   Again I paused; then bunglingly enounced… 
   'But John Reed knocked me down; and my aunt shut me up in the 
red…room。' 
   Mr。 Lloyd a second time produced his snuff…box。 
   'Don't you think Gateshead Hall a very beautiful house?' asked 
he。 'Are you not very thankful to have such a fine place to live at?' 
   'It is not my house; sir; and Abbot says I have less right to be 
here than a servant。' 
   'Pooh! you can't be silly enough to wish to leave such a splendid 
place?' 
   'If I had anywhere else to go; I should be glad to leave it; but 
I can never get away from Gateshead till I am a woman。' 
   'Perhaps you may… who knows? Have you any relations besides Mrs。 
Reed?' 
   'I think not; sir。' 
   'None belonging to your father?' 
   'I don't know: I asked Aunt Reed once; and she said possibly I 
might have some poor; low relations called Eyre; but she knew 
nothing about them。' 
   'If you had such; would you like to go to them?' 
   I reflected。 Poverty looks grim to grown people; still more so to 
children: they have not much idea of industrious; working; respectable 
poverty; they think of the word only as connected with ragged clothes; 
scanty food; fireless grates; rude manners; and debasing vices: 
poverty for me was synonymous with degradation。 
   'No; I should not like to belong to poor people;' was my reply。 
   'Not even if they were kind to you?' 
   I shook my head: I could not see how poor people had the means of 
being kind; and then to learn to speak like them; to adopt their 
manners; to be uneducated; to grow up like one of the poor women I saw 
sometimes nursing their children or washing 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 must be a 
beggarly set: I should not like to go a…begging。' 
   'Would you like to go to school?' 
   Again I reflected: I scarcely knew what school was: Bessie 
sometimes spoke of it as a place where young 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 mine; and if Bessie's accounts of 
school…discipline (gathered from the young ladies of a family where 
she had lived before coming to Gateshead) were somewhat appalling; her 
details of certain accomplishments attained by these same young ladies 
were; I thought; equally attractive。 She boasted of beautiful 
paintings of landscapes and flowers by them executed; of songs they 
could sing 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 complete change: 
it implied a long 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 my musings。 
   'Well; well! who knows what may happen?' said Mr。 Lloyd; as he 
got up。 'The child ought to have change of air and scene;' he added; 
speaking to himself; 'nerves not in a good state。' 
   Bessie now returned; at the same moment the carriage was heard 
rolling up the gravel…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 interview which followed between him and Mrs。 Reed; I 
presume; from after…occurrences; that the apothecary ventured to 
recommend my being sent to school; and the recommendation was no doubt 
readily enough 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 were watching everybody; and scheming plots 
underhand。' Abbot; I think; gave me credit for being a sort of 
infantine Guy Fawkes。 
   On that same occasion I learned; for the first time; from Miss 
Abbot's communications to Bessie; that my father had been a poor 
clergyman; that my mother had married him against the wishes of her 
friends; who considered the match beneath her; that my grandfather 
Reed was so irritated at her disobedience; he cut her off without a 
shilling; that after my mother and father had been married a year; the 
latter caught the typhus fever while visiting among the poor of a 
large manufacturing town where 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 
might 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 be more moving in the same 
condition。' 
   'Yes; I doat on Miss Georgiana!' 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。 Come; we'll go down。' They went。 


                          CHAPTER IV 


   FROM my discourse with Mr。 Lloyd; and from the above reported 
conference between Bessie and Abbot; I gathered enough of hope to 
suffice as a motive for wishing to get well: a change 

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