professed to offer honourable marriage to this young girl, and that at
the very altar she discovered he had a wife yet alive, though a
lunatic. What his subsequent conduct and proposals were is a matter of
pure conjecture; but when an event transpired which rendered inquiry
after the governess necessary, it was discovered she was gone- no
one could tell when, where, or how. She had left Thornfield Hall in
the night; every research after her course had been vain: the
country had been scoured far and wide; no vestige of information could
be gathered respecting her. Yet that she should be found is become a
matter of serious urgency: advertisements have been put in all the
papers; I myself have received a letter from one Mr. Briggs, a
solicitor, communicating the details I have just imparted. Is it not
an odd tale?'
'Just tell me this,' said I, 'and since you know so much, you
surely can tell it me- what of Mr. Rochester? How and where is he?
What is he doing? Is he well?'
'I am ignorant of all concerning Mr. Rochester: the letter never
mentions him but to narrate the fraudulent and illegal attempt I
have adverted to. You should rather ask the name of the governess- the
nature of the event which requires her appearance.'
'Did no one go to Thornfield Hall, then? Did no one see Mr.
Rochester?'
'I suppose not.'
'But they wrote to him?'
'Of course.'
'And what did he say? Who has his letters?'
'Mr. Briggs intimates that the answer to his application was not
from Mr. Rochester, but from a lady: it is signed "Alice Fairfax."'
I felt cold and dismayed: my worst fears then were probably true:
he had in all probability left England and rushed in reckless
desperation to some former haunt on the Continent. And what opiate for
his severe sufferings- what object for his strong passions- had he
sought there? I dared not answer the question. Oh, my poor master-
once almost my husband- whom I had often called 'my dear Edward!'
'He must have been a bad man,' observed Mr. Rivers.
'You don't know him- don't pronounce an opinion upon him,' I
said, with warmth.
'Very well,' he answered quietly: 'and indeed my head is
otherwise occupied than with him: I have my tale to finish. Since
you won't ask the governess's name, I must tell it of my own accord.
Stay! I have it here- it is always more satisfactory to see
important points written down, fairly committed to black and white.'
And the pocket-book was again deliberately produced, opened, sought
through; from one of its compartments was extracted a shabby slip of
paper, hastily torn off: I recognised in its texture and its stains of
ultra-marine, and lake, and vermilion, the ravished margin of the
portrait-cover. He got up, held it close to my eyes: and I read,
traced in Indian ink, in my own handwriting, the words 'JANE EYRE'-
the work doubtless of some moment of abstraction.
'Briggs wrote to me of a Jane Eyre:' he said, 'the advertisements
demanded a Jane Eyre: I knew a Jane Elliott.- I confess I had my
suspicions, but it was only yesterday afternoon they were at once
resolved into certainty. You own the name and renounce the alias?'
'Yes- yes; but where is Mr. Briggs? He perhaps knows more of Mr.
Rochester than you do.'
'Briggs is in London. I should doubt his knowing anything at all
about Mr. Rochester; it is not in Mr. Rochester he is interested.
Meantime, you forget essential points in pursuing trifles: you do
not inquire why Mr. Briggs sought after you- what he wanted with you.'
'Well, what did he want?'
'Merely to tell you that your uncle, Mr. Eyre of Madeira, is
dead; that he has left you all his property, and that you are now
rich- merely that- nothing more.'
'I!- rich?'
'Yes, you, rich- quite an heiress.'
Silence succeeded.
'You must prove your identity of course,' resumed St. John
presently: 'a step which will offer no difficulties; you can then
enter on immediate possession. Your fortune is vested in the English
funds; Briggs has the will and the necessary documents.'
Here was a new card turned up! It is a fine thing, reader, to be
lifted in a moment from indigence to wealth- a very fine thing; but
not a matter one can comprehend or consequently enjoy, all at once.
And then there are other chances in life far more thrilling and
rapture-giving: this is solid, an affair of the actual world,
nothing ideal about it: all its associations are solid and sober,
and its manifestations are the same. One does not jump, and spring,
and shout hurrah! at hearing one has got a fortune; one begins to
consider responsibilities, and to ponder business; on a base of steady
satisfaction rise certain grave cares, and we contain ourselves, and
brood over our bliss with a solemn brow.
Besides, the words Legacy, Bequest, go side by side with the words,
Death, Funeral. My uncle I had heard was dead- my only relative;
ever since being made aware of his existence, I had cherished the hope
of one day seeing him: now, I never should. And then this money came
only to me: not to me and a rejoicing family, but to my isolated self.
It was a grand boon doubtless; and independence would be glorious-
yes, I felt that- that thought swelled my heart.
'You unbend your forehead at last,' said Mr. Rivers. 'I thought
Medusa had looked at you, and that you were turning to stone.
Perhaps now you will ask how much you are worth?'
'How much am I worth?'
'Oh, a trifle! Nothing of course to speak of- twenty thousand
pounds, I think they say- but what is that?'
'Twenty thousand pounds?'
Here was a new stunner- I had been calculating on four or five
thousand. This news actually took my breath for a moment: Mr. St.
John, whom I had never heard laugh before, laughed now.
'Well,' said he, 'if you had committed a murder, and I had told you
your crime was discovered, you could scarcely look more aghast.'
'It is a large sum- don't you think there is a mistake?'
'No mistake at all.'
'Perhaps you have read the figures wrong- it may be two thousand!'
'It is written in letters, not figures,- twenty thousand.'
I again felt rather like an individual of but average gastronomical
powers sitting down to feast alone at a table spread with provisions
for a hundred. Mr. Rivers rose now and put his cloak on.
'If it were not such a very wild night,' he said, 'I would send
Hannah down to keep you company: you look too desperately miserable to
be left alone. But Hannah, poor woman! could not stride the drifts
so well as I: her legs are not quite so long: so I must e'en leave you
to your sorrows. Good-night.'
He was lifting the latch: a sudden thought occurred to me.
'Stop one minute!' I cried.
'Well?'
'It puzzles me to know why Mr. Briggs wrote to you about me; or how
he knew you, or could fancy that you, living in such an out-of-the-way
place, had the power to aid in my discovery.'
'Oh! I am a clergyman,' he said; 'and the clergy are often appealed
to about odd matters.' Again the latch rattled.
'No; that does not satisfy me!' I exclaimed: and indeed there was
something in the hasty and unexplanatory reply which, instead of
allaying, piqued my curiosity more than ever.
'It is a very strange piece of business,' I added; 'I must know
more about it.'
'Another time.'
'No; to-night!- to-night!' and as he turned from the door, I placed
myself between it and him. He looked rather embarrassed.
'You certainly shall not go till you have told me all,' I said.
'I would rather not just now.'
'You shall!- you must!'
'I would rather Diana or Mary informed you.'
Of course these objections wrought my eagerness to a climax:
gratified it must be, and that without delay; and I told him so.
'But I apprised you that I was a hard man,' said he, 'difficult
to persuade.'
'And I am a hard woman,- impossible to put off.'
'And then,' he pursued, 'I am cold: no fervour infects me.'
'Whereas I am hot, and fire dissolves ice. The blaze there has
thawed all the snow from your cloak; by the same token, it has
streamed on to my floor, and made it like a trampled street. As you
hope ever to be forgiven, Mr. Rivers, the high crime and
misdemeanour of spoiling a sanded kitchen, tell me what I wish to
know.'
'Well, then,' he said, 'I yield; if not to your earnestness, to
your perseverance: as stone is worn by continual dropping. Besides,
you must know some day,- as well now as later. Your name is Jane
Eyre?'
'Of course: that was all settled before.'
'You are not, perhaps, aware that I am your namesake?- that I was
christened St. John Eyre Rivers?'
'No, indeed! I remember now seeing the letter E. comprised in
your initials written in books you have at different times lent me;
but I never asked for what name it stood. But what then? Surely-'
I stopped: I could not trust myself to entertain, much less to
express, the thought that rushed upon me- that embodied itself,- that,
in a second, stood out a strong, solid probability. Circumstances knit
themselves, fitted themselves, shot into order: the chain that had
been lying hitherto a formless lump of links was drawn out
straight,- every ring was perfect, the connection complete. I knew, by
instinct, how the matter stood, before St. John had said another word;
but I cannot expect the reader to have the same intuitive
perception, so I must repeat his explanation.
'My mother's name was Eyre; she had two brothers; one a
clergyman, who married Miss Jane Reed, of Gateshead; the other, John
Eyre, Esq., merchant, late of Funchal, Madeira. Mr. Briggs, being
Mr. Eyre's solicitor, wrote to us last August to inform us of our
uncle's death, and to say that he had left his property to his brother
the clergyman's orphan daughter, overlooking us, in consequence of a
quarrel, never forgiven, between him and my father. He wrote again a
few weeks since, to intimate that the heiress was lost, and asking
if we knew anything of her. A name casually written on a slip of paper
has enabled me to find her out. You know the rest.' Again he was
going, but I set my back against the door.
'Do let me speak,' I said; 'let me have one moment to draw breath
and reflect.' I paused- he stood before me, hat in hand, looking
composed enough. I resumed-
'Your mother was my father's sister?'
'Yes.'
'My aunt, consequently?'
He bowed.
'My uncle John was your uncle John? You, Diana, and Mary are his
sister's children, as I am his brother's child?'
'Undeniably.'
'You three, then, are my cousins; half our blood on each side flows
from the same source?'
'We are cousins; yes.'
I surveyed him. It seemed I had found a brother: one I could be
proud of,- one I could love; and two sisters, whose qualities were
such, that, when I knew them but as mere strangers, they had
inspired me with genuine affection and admiration. The two girls, on
whom, kneeling down on the wet ground, and looking through the low,
latticed window of Moor House kitchen, I had gazed with so bitter a
mixture of interest and despair, were my near kinswomen; and the young
and stately gentleman who had found me almost dying at his threshold
was my blood relation. Glorious discovery to a lonely wretch! This was
wealth indeed!- wealth to the heart!- a mine of pure, genial
affections. This was a blessing, bright, vivid, and exhilarating;- not
like the ponderous gift of gold: rich and welcome enough in its way,
but sobering from its weight. I now clapped my hands in sudden joy- my
pulse bounded, my veins thrilled.
'Oh, I am glad!- I am glad!' I exclaimed.
St. John smiled. 'Did I not say you neglected essential points to
pursue trifles?' he asked. 'You were serious when I told you you had
got a fortune; and now, for a matter of no moment, you are excited.'
'What can you mean? It may be of no moment to you; you have sisters
and don't care for a cousin; but I had nobody; and now three
relations,- or two, if you don't choose to be counted,- are born
into my world full-grown. I say again, I am glad!'
I walked fast through the room: I stopped, half suffocated with the
thoughts that rose faster than I could receive, comprehend, settle
them:- thoughts of what might, could, would, and should be, and that
ere long. I looked at the blank wall: it seemed a sky thick with
ascending stars,- every one lit me to a purpose or delight. Those
who had saved my life, whom, till this hour, I had loved barrenly, I
could now benefit. They were under a yoke,- I could free them: they
were scattered,- I could reunite them: the independence, the affluence
which was mine, might be theirs too. Were we not four? Twenty thousand
pounds shared equally, would be five thousand each,- enough and to
spare: justice would be done,- mutual happiness secured. Now the
wealth did not weigh on me: now it was not a mere bequest of coin,- it
was a legacy of life, hope, enjoyment.
How I looked while these ideas were taking my spirit by storm, I
