Page 351 - jane-eyre

I had taken a journey of a hundred miles to see my aunt,
and I must stay with her till she was better—or dead: as to
her daughters’ pride or folly, I must put it on one side, make
myself independent of it. So I addressed the housekeeper;
asked her to show me a room, told her I should probably be
a visitor here for a week or two, had my trunk conveyed to
my chamber, and followed it thither myself: I met Bessie on
the landing.
‘Missis is awake,’ said she; ‘I have told her you are here:
come and let us see if she will know you.’
I did not need to be guided to the well-known room, to
which I had so often been summoned for chastisement or
reprimand in former days. I hastened before Bessie; I soft-
ly opened the door: a shaded light stood on the table, for
it was now getting dark. There was the great four-post bed
with amber hangings as of old; there the toilet- table, the
armchair, and the footstool, at which I had a hundred times
been sentenced to kneel, to ask pardon for offences by me
uncommitted. I looked into a certain corner near, half-ex-
pecting to see the slim outline of a once dreaded switch
which used to lurk there, waiting to leap out imp-like and
lace my quivering palm or shrinking neck. I approached
the bed; I opened the curtains and leant over the high-piled
pillows.
Well did I remember Mrs. Reed’s face, and I eagerly
sought the familiar image. It is a happy thing that time
quells the longings of vengeance and hushes the prompt-
ings of rage and aversion. I had left this woman in bitterness
and hate, and I came back to her now with no other emo-

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