This is SDHudsonMagic Jane Eyre Chapter 15 On one fine afternoon,
Mr.
Rochester chanced to meet me and Adele in the grounds.
And while she played with pineapples,
Mr.
Rochester,
And I,
And I,
And I,
And I,
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And I,
Passing strange that you should listen to me quietly,
As if it were the most usual thing in the world for a man like me to tell stories of his opera mistress to a quaint,
Inexperienced girl like you.
But the last singularity explains the first,
As I intimated once before.
You,
With your gravity,
Considerateness,
And caution,
Were made to be the recipient of secrets.
Besides,
I know what sort of a mind I have placed in communication with my own.
I know it's not one liable to take infection.
It is a peculiar mind.
It is a unique one.
Happily,
I do not mean to harm it,
But if I did,
It would not take harm from me.
The more you and I converse,
Jane Eyre,
The better,
For while I cannot blight you,
You may refresh me.
After this digression,
He proceeded to tell me what had happened.
I remained in the balcony.
They will come to her boudoir,
No doubt,
Thought I.
Let me prepare an ambush.
So,
Putting my hand in through the open window,
I drew the curtain over it,
Leaving only an opening through which I could take observations.
Then I closed the casement.
All but a chink,
Just wide enough to furnish an outlet to lovers' whispered vows.
Then I stole back to my chair,
And as I resumed it,
The pair came in.
My eye was quickly at the aperture.
Selene's chambermaid entered,
Lit a lamp,
Left it on the table,
And withdrew.
The couple were thus revealed to me clearly.
Both removed their cloaks,
And there was the Varon shining in satin and jewels,
My gifts,
Of course,
And there was her companion in an officer's uniform.
I knew him for a young roué of a vicomte,
A brainless and vicious youth,
Who I had sometimes met in society and never thought of hating him,
Because I despised him so absolutely.
On recognising him,
Jealousy was instantly broken,
Because at the same moment,
My love for Selene sank.
A woman who could betray me of such a rival was not worth contending for.
She deserved only scorn.
They began to talk,
And their conversation eased me completely.
It was frivolous,
Mercenary,
Heartless,
And senseless.
It was rather calculated to weary than to enrage a listener.
A card of mine laid on the table.
This being perceived,
It brought my name under discussion.
Neither of them possessed energy or wit to belabour me soundly,
But they insulted me as coarsely as they could in a little way,
Especially Selene,
Who even waxed rather brilliant on my personal defects.
Deformities,
She termed them.
Now it had been her custom to launch out into fervent admiration of what she called my beauté mâle,
Wherein she differed diametrically from you,
Who told me point-blank at the second interview,
You did not think me handsome.
The contrast struck me at the time.
Here,
Adèle came running up once again.
Monsieur,
John has just been to say your agent's called and wishes to see you.
Ah,
In that case I must abridge.
Opening the window,
I walked in on them,
Liberated Selene from my protection,
Gave her notice to vacate her hotel,
Offered her a small purse,
Disregarded her screams,
Hysterics,
Prayers,
Protestations and convulsions,
Then made an appointment with Viscount for a meeting at the Bois du Boulogne.
Next morning I had the pleasure of encountering him,
Left a bullet in one of his poor,
Feeble arms,
And then thought I'd done with it.
But unluckily they were wrong.
Six months before I had given me this fillet Adèle,
Whom she affirmed was my daughter.
Perhaps she may be,
Though I see no proofs of such grim paternity written in her countenance.
Pilate is more like me than she.
Some years after I'd broken with a mother,
She abandoned her child and ran away to Italy with a musician.
I acknowledge no natural claim on Adèle's part to be supported by me.
Nor now do I acknowledge any,
For I am not her father.
But hearing she was quite destitute,
I took the poor thing out of the slime and mud of Paris and transported her here to grow up clean in the wholesome soil of an English country garden.
Mrs.
Fairfax found you to train her,
But now you know it's the illegitimate offspring of a French opera girl,
You will perhaps think differently of your post and protégée.
You will be coming to me some day with notice you found another place,
That you begged me to look for a new governess,
Etc.
No?
I said.
Adèle is not answerable for either her mother's fault or yours.
I have a regard for her,
And now I know that,
She is in a sense parentless,
Forsaken by her mother and disowned by you,
Sir,
I shall cling closer to her than before.
How could I possibly prefer the spalt pet of a wealthy family,
Who would hate her governess as a nuisance,
To a lonely little orphan who leans towards her as a friend?
Oh,
That is the light in which you blew it.
Well,
I must go in now,
And you too.
It's getting dark.
But I stayed out a few minutes longer with Adèle and Pilate.
I ran a race with her and played a game of battle door and shuttlecock.
And when we went in,
I had removed her bonnet and coat.
I took her on my knee.
I kept her there an hour,
Allowing her to prattle as she liked,
Not rebuking even some little freedoms and trivialities into which she was apt to stray when much noticed,
And which betrayed her a superficiality of character inherited probably from her mother,
Hardly congenial to an English mind.
But Adèle had her merits,
And I was disposed to appreciate what was good in her to the utmost.
I sought in her countenance and features a likeness to Mr.
Rochester,
But I found none.
No trait,
No turn of expression.
It was a pity.
If she could but have been proved to resemble him,
He would have thought more of her.
