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CHAPTER XXVI
Sophie came at seven to dress me: she was very long indeed in accomplishing her task;
so long that Mr. Rochester, grown, I suppose, impatient of my delay, sent up to
ask why I did not come.
She was just fastening my veil (the plain square of blond after all) to my hair with
a brooch; I hurried from under her hands as soon as I could.
"Stop!" she cried in French.
"Look at yourself in the mirror: you have not taken one peep."
So I turned at the door: I saw a robed and veiled figure, so unlike my usual self that
it seemed almost the image of a stranger.
"Jane!" called a voice, and I hastened down.
I was received at the foot of the stairs by Mr. Rochester.
"Lingerer!" he said, "my brain is on fire with impatience, and you tarry so long!"
He took me into the dining-room, surveyed me keenly all over, pronounced me "fair as
a lily, and not only the pride of his life, but the desire of his eyes," and then
telling me he would give me but ten minutes to eat some breakfast, he rang the bell.
One of his lately hired servants, a footman, answered it.
"Is John getting the carriage ready?"
"Yes, sir." "Is the luggage brought down?"
"They are bringing it down, sir."
"Go you to the church: see if Mr. Wood (the clergyman) and the clerk are there: return
and tell me."
The church, as the reader knows, was but just beyond the gates; the footman soon
returned. "Mr. Wood is in the vestry, sir, putting on
his surplice."
"And the carriage?" "The horses are harnessing."
"We shall not want it to go to church; but it must be ready the moment we return: all
the boxes and luggage arranged and strapped on, and the coachman in his seat."
"Yes, sir."
"Jane, are you ready?" I rose.
There were no groomsmen, no bridesmaids, no relatives to wait for or marshal: none but
Mr. Rochester and I.
Mrs. Fairfax stood in the hall as we passed.
I would fain have spoken to her, but my hand was held by a grasp of iron: I was
hurried along by a stride I could hardly follow; and to look at Mr. Rochester's face
was to feel that not a second of delay would be tolerated for any purpose.
I wonder what other bridegroom ever looked as he did--so bent up to a purpose, so
grimly resolute: or who, under such steadfast brows, ever revealed such flaming
and flashing eyes.
I know not whether the day was fair or foul; in descending the drive, I gazed
neither on sky nor earth: my heart was with my eyes; and both seemed migrated into Mr.
Rochester's frame.
I wanted to see the invisible thing on which, as we went along, he appeared to
fasten a glance fierce and fell. I wanted to feel the thoughts whose force
he seemed breasting and resisting.
At the churchyard wicket he stopped: he discovered I was quite out of breath.
"Am I cruel in my love?" he said. "Delay an instant: lean on me, Jane."
And now I can recall the picture of the grey old house of God rising calm before
me, of a rook wheeling round the steeple, of a ruddy morning sky beyond.
I remember something, too, of the green grave-mounds; and I have not forgotten,
either, two figures of strangers straying amongst the low hillocks and reading the
mementoes graven on the few mossy head- stones.
I noticed them, because, as they saw us, they passed round to the back of the
church; and I doubted not they were going to enter by the side-aisle door and witness
the ceremony.
By Mr. Rochester they were not observed; he was earnestly looking at my face from which
the blood had, I daresay, momentarily fled: for I felt my forehead dewy, and my cheeks
and lips cold.
When I rallied, which I soon did, he walked gently with me up the path to the porch.
We entered the quiet and humble temple; the priest waited in his white surplice at the
lowly altar, the clerk beside him.
All was still: two shadows only moved in a remote corner.
My conjecture had been correct: the strangers had slipped in before us, and
they now stood by the vault of the Rochesters, their backs towards us, viewing
through the rails the old time-stained
marble tomb, where a kneeling angel guarded the remains of Damer de Rochester, slain at
Marston Moor in the time of the civil wars, and of Elizabeth, his wife.
Our place was taken at the communion rails.
Hearing a cautious step behind me, I glanced over my shoulder: one of the
strangers--a gentleman, evidently--was advancing up the chancel.
The service began.
The explanation of the intent of matrimony was gone through; and then the clergyman
came a step further forward, and, bending slightly towards Mr. Rochester, went on.
"I require and charge you both (as ye will answer at the dreadful day of judgment,
when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed), that if either of you know any
impediment why ye may not lawfully be
joined together in matrimony, ye do now confess it; for be ye well assured that so
many as are coupled together otherwise than God's Word doth allow, are not joined
together by God, neither is their matrimony lawful."
He paused, as the custom is. When is the pause after that sentence ever
broken by reply?
Not, perhaps, once in a hundred years.
And the clergyman, who had not lifted his eyes from his book, and had held his breath
but for a moment, was proceeding: his hand was already stretched towards Mr.
Rochester, as his lips unclosed to ask,
"Wilt thou have this woman for thy wedded wife?"--when a distinct and near voice
said-- "The marriage cannot go on: I declare the
existence of an impediment."
The clergyman looked up at the speaker and stood mute; the clerk did the same; Mr.
Rochester moved slightly, as if an earthquake had rolled under his feet:
taking a firmer footing, and not turning his head or eyes, he said, "Proceed."
Profound silence fell when he had uttered that word, with deep but low intonation.
Presently Mr. Wood said--
"I cannot proceed without some investigation into what has been asserted,
and evidence of its truth or falsehood." "The ceremony is quite broken off,"
subjoined the voice behind us.
"I am in a condition to prove my allegation: an insuperable impediment to
this marriage exists."
Mr. Rochester heard, but heeded not: he stood stubborn and rigid, making no
movement but to possess himself of my hand.
What a hot and strong grasp he had! and how like quarried marble was his pale, firm,
massive front at this moment! How his eye shone, still watchful, and yet
wild beneath!
Mr. Wood seemed at a loss. "What is the nature of the impediment?" he
asked. "Perhaps it may be got over--explained
away?"
"Hardly," was the answer. "I have called it insuperable, and I speak
advisedly." The speaker came forward and leaned on the
rails.
He continued, uttering each word distinctly, calmly, steadily, but not
loudly-- "It simply consists in the existence of a
previous marriage.
Mr. Rochester has a wife now living."
My nerves vibrated to those low-spoken words as they had never vibrated to
thunder--my blood felt their subtle violence as it had never felt frost or
fire; but I was collected, and in no danger of swooning.
I looked at Mr. Rochester: I made him look at me.
His whole face was colourless rock: his eye was both spark and flint.
He disavowed nothing: he seemed as if he would defy all things.
Without speaking, without smiling, without seeming to recognise in me a human being,
he only twined my waist with his arm and riveted me to his side.
"Who are you?" he asked of the intruder.
"My name is Briggs, a solicitor of --- Street, London."
"And you would thrust on me a wife?"
"I would remind you of your lady's existence, sir, which the law recognises,
if you do not." "Favour me with an account of her--with her
name, her parentage, her place of abode."
"Certainly." Mr. Briggs calmly took a paper from his
pocket, and read out in a sort of official, nasal voice:--
"'I affirm and can prove that on the 20th of October A.D.--- (a date of fifteen years
back), Edward Fairfax Rochester, of Thornfield Hall, in the county of ---, and
of Ferndean Manor, in ---shire, England,
was married to my sister, Bertha Antoinetta Mason, daughter of Jonas Mason, merchant,
and of Antoinetta his wife, a Creole, at -- - church, Spanish Town, Jamaica.
The record of the marriage will be found in the register of that church--a copy of it
is now in my possession. Signed, Richard Mason.'"
"That--if a genuine document--may prove I have been married, but it does not prove
that the woman mentioned therein as my wife is still living."
"She was living three months ago," returned the lawyer.
"How do you know?"
"I have a witness to the fact, whose testimony even you, sir, will scarcely
controvert." "Produce him--or go to hell."
"I will produce him first--he is on the spot.
Mr. Mason, have the goodness to step forward."
Mr. Rochester, on hearing the name, set his teeth; he experienced, too, a sort of
strong convulsive quiver; near to him as I was, I felt the spasmodic movement of fury
or despair run through his frame.
The second stranger, who had hitherto lingered in the background, now drew near;
a pale face looked over the solicitor's shoulder--yes, it was Mason himself.
Mr. Rochester turned and glared at him.
His eye, as I have often said, was a black eye: it had now a tawny, nay, a bloody
light in its gloom; and his face flushed-- olive cheek and hueless forehead received a
glow as from spreading, ascending heart-
fire: and he stirred, lifted his strong arm--he could have struck Mason, dashed him
on the church-floor, shocked by ruthless blow the breath from his body--but Mason
shrank away, and cried faintly, "Good God!"
Contempt fell cool on Mr. Rochester--his passion died as if a blight had shrivelled
it up: he only asked--"What have you to say?"
An inaudible reply escaped Mason's white lips.
"The devil is in it if you cannot answer distinctly.
I again demand, what have you to say?"
"Sir--sir," interrupted the clergyman, "do not forget you are in a sacred place."
Then addressing Mason, he inquired gently, "Are you aware, sir, whether or not this
gentleman's wife is still living?"
"Courage," urged the lawyer,--"speak out." "She is now living at Thornfield Hall,"
said Mason, in more articulate tones: "I saw her there last April.
I am her brother."
"At Thornfield Hall!" *** the clergyman.
"Impossible!
I am an old resident in this neighbourhood, sir, and I never heard of a Mrs. Rochester
at Thornfield Hall." I saw a grim smile contort Mr. Rochester's
lips, and he muttered--
"No, by God! I took care that none should hear of it--or of her under that name."
He mused--for ten minutes he held counsel with himself: he formed his resolve, and
announced it--
"Enough! all shall bolt out at once, like the bullet from the barrel.
Wood, close your book and take off your surplice; John Green (to the clerk), leave
the church: there will be no wedding to- day."
The man obeyed.
Mr. Rochester continued, hardily and recklessly: "Bigamy is an ugly word!--I
meant, however, to be a bigamist; but fate has out-manoeuvred me, or Providence has
checked me,--perhaps the last.
I am little better than a devil at this moment; and, as my pastor there would tell
me, deserve no doubt the sternest judgments of God, even to the quenchless fire and
deathless worm.
Gentlemen, my plan is broken up:--what this lawyer and his client say is true: I have
been married, and the woman to whom I was married lives!
You say you never heard of a Mrs. Rochester at the house up yonder, Wood; but I daresay
you have many a time inclined your ear to gossip about the mysterious lunatic kept
there under watch and ward.
Some have whispered to you that she is my *** half-sister: some, my cast-off
mistress.
I now inform you that she is my wife, whom I married fifteen years ago,--Bertha Mason
by name; sister of this resolute personage, who is now, with his quivering limbs and
white cheeks, showing you what a stout heart men may bear.
Cheer up, ***!--never fear me!--I'd almost as soon strike a woman as you.
Bertha Mason is mad; and she came of a mad family; idiots and maniacs through three
generations!
Her mother, the Creole, was both a madwoman and a drunkard!--as I found out after I had
wed the daughter: for they were silent on family secrets before.
Bertha, like a dutiful child, copied her parent in both points.
I had a charming partner--pure, wise, modest: you can fancy I was a happy man.
I went through rich scenes!
Oh! my experience has been heavenly, if you only knew it!
But I owe you no further explanation.
Briggs, Wood, Mason, I invite you all to come up to the house and visit Mrs. Poole's
patient, and my wife!
You shall see what sort of a being I was cheated into espousing, and judge whether
or not I had a right to break the compact, and seek sympathy with something at least
human.
This girl," he continued, looking at me, "knew no more than you, Wood, of the
disgusting secret: she thought all was fair and legal and never dreamt she was going to
be entrapped into a feigned union with a
defrauded wretch, already bound to a bad, mad, and embruted partner!
Come all of you--follow!" Still holding me fast, he left the church:
the three gentlemen came after.
At the front door of the hall we found the carriage.
"Take it back to the coach-house, John," said Mr. Rochester coolly; "it will not be
wanted to-day."
At our entrance, Mrs. Fairfax, Adele, Sophie, Leah, advanced to meet and greet
us. "To the right-about--every soul!" cried the
master; "away with your congratulations!
Who wants them? Not I!--they are fifteen years too late!"
He passed on and ascended the stairs, still holding my hand, and still beckoning the
gentlemen to follow him, which they did.
We mounted the first staircase, passed up the gallery, proceeded to the third storey:
the low, black door, opened by Mr. Rochester's master-key, admitted us to the
tapestried room, with its great bed and its pictorial cabinet.
"You know this place, Mason," said our guide; "she bit and stabbed you here."
He lifted the hangings from the wall, uncovering the second door: this, too, he
opened.
In a room without a window, there burnt a fire guarded by a high and strong fender,
and a lamp suspended from the ceiling by a chain.
Grace Poole bent over the fire, apparently cooking something in a saucepan.
In the deep shade, at the farther end of the room, a figure ran backwards and
forwards.
What it was, whether beast or human being, one could not, at first sight, tell: it
grovelled, seemingly, on all fours; it snatched and growled like some strange wild
animal: but it was covered with clothing,
and a quantity of dark, grizzled hair, wild as a mane, hid its head and face.
"Good-morrow, Mrs. Poole!" said Mr. Rochester.
"How are you? and how is your charge to- day?"
"We're tolerable, sir, I thank you," replied Grace, lifting the boiling mess
carefully on to the hob: "rather snappish, but not 'rageous."
A fierce cry seemed to give the lie to her favourable report: the clothed hyena rose
up, and stood tall on its hind-feet. "Ah! sir, she sees you!" exclaimed Grace:
"you'd better not stay."
"Only a few moments, Grace: you must allow me a few moments."
"Take care then, sir!--for God's sake, take care!"
The maniac bellowed: she parted her shaggy locks from her visage, and gazed wildly at
her visitors. I recognised well that purple face,--those
bloated features.
Mrs. Poole advanced. "Keep out of the way," said Mr. Rochester,
thrusting her aside: "she has no knife now, I suppose, and I'm on my guard."
"One never knows what she has, sir: she is so cunning: it is not in mortal discretion
to fathom her craft." "We had better leave her," whispered Mason.
"Go to the devil!" was his brother-in-law's recommendation.
"'Ware!" cried Grace. The three gentlemen retreated
simultaneously.
Mr. Rochester flung me behind him: the lunatic sprang and grappled his throat
viciously, and laid her teeth to his cheek: they struggled.
She was a big woman, in stature almost equalling her husband, and corpulent
besides: she showed virile force in the contest--more than once she almost
throttled him, athletic as he was.
He could have settled her with a well- planted blow; but he would not strike: he
would only wrestle.
At last he mastered her arms; Grace Poole gave him a cord, and he pinioned them
behind her: with more rope, which was at hand, he bound her to a chair.
The operation was performed amidst the fiercest yells and the most convulsive
plunges.
Mr. Rochester then turned to the spectators: he looked at them with a smile
both acrid and desolate. "That is my wife," said he.
"Such is the sole conjugal embrace I am ever to know--such are the endearments
which are to solace my leisure hours!
And this is what I wished to have" (laying his hand on my shoulder): "this
young girl, who stands so grave and quiet at the mouth of hell, looking collectedly
at the gambols of a demon, I wanted her just as a change after that fierce ragout.
Wood and Briggs, look at the difference!
Compare these clear eyes with the red balls yonder--this face with that mask--this form
with that bulk; then judge me, priest of the gospel and man of the law, and remember
with what judgment ye judge ye shall be judged!
Off with you now. I must shut up my prize."
We all withdrew.
Mr. Rochester stayed a moment behind us, to give some further order to Grace Poole.
The solicitor addressed me as he descended the stair.
"You, madam," said he, "are cleared from all blame: your uncle will be glad to hear
it--if, indeed, he should be still living-- when Mr. Mason returns to Madeira."
"My uncle!
What of him? Do you know him?"
"Mr. Mason does. Mr. Eyre has been the Funchal correspondent
of his house for some years.
When your uncle received your letter intimating the contemplated union between
yourself and Mr. Rochester, Mr. Mason, who was staying at Madeira to recruit his
health, on his way back to Jamaica, happened to be with him.
Mr. Eyre mentioned the intelligence; for he knew that my client here was acquainted
with a gentleman of the name of Rochester.
Mr. Mason, astonished and distressed as you may suppose, revealed the real state of
matters.
Your uncle, I am sorry to say, is now on a sick bed; from which, considering the
nature of his disease--decline--and the stage it has reached, it is unlikely he
will ever rise.
He could not then hasten to England himself, to extricate you from the snare
into which you had fallen, but he implored Mr. Mason to lose no time in taking steps
to prevent the false marriage.
He referred him to me for assistance. I used all despatch, and am thankful I was
not too late: as you, doubtless, must be also.
Were I not morally certain that your uncle will be dead ere you reach Madeira, I would
advise you to accompany Mr. Mason back; but as it is, I think you had better remain in
England till you can hear further, either from or of Mr. Eyre.
Have we anything else to stay for?" he inquired of Mr. Mason.
"No, no--let us be gone," was the anxious reply; and without waiting to take leave of
Mr. Rochester, they made their exit at the hall door.
The clergyman stayed to exchange a few sentences, either of admonition or reproof,
with his haughty parishioner; this duty done, he too departed.
I heard him go as I stood at the half-open door of my own room, to which I had now
withdrawn.
The house cleared, I shut myself in, fastened the bolt that none might intrude,
and proceeded--not to weep, not to mourn, I was yet too calm for that, but--
mechanically to take off the wedding dress,
and replace it by the stuff gown I had worn yesterday, as I thought, for the last time.
I then sat down: I felt weak and tired. I leaned my arms on a table, and my head
dropped on them.
And now I thought: till now I had only heard, seen, moved--followed up and down
where I was led or dragged--watched event rush on event, disclosure open beyond
disclosure: but now, I thought.
The morning had been a quiet morning enough--all except the brief scene with the
lunatic: the transaction in the church had not been noisy; there was no explosion of
passion, no loud altercation, no dispute,
no defiance or challenge, no tears, no sobs: a few words had been spoken, a calmly
pronounced objection to the marriage made; some stern, short questions put by Mr.
Rochester; answers, explanations given,
evidence adduced; an open admission of the truth had been uttered by my master; then
the living proof had been seen; the intruders were gone, and all was over.
I was in my own room as usual--just myself, without obvious change: nothing had smitten
me, or scathed me, or maimed me.
And yet where was the Jane Eyre of yesterday?--where was her life?--where were
her prospects?
Jane Eyre, who had been an ardent, expectant woman--almost a bride, was a
cold, solitary girl again: her life was pale; her prospects were desolate.
A Christmas frost had come at midsummer; a white December storm had whirled over June;
ice glazed the ripe apples, drifts crushed the blowing roses; on hayfield and
cornfield lay a frozen shroud: lanes which
last night blushed full of flowers, to-day were pathless with untrodden snow; and the
woods, which twelve hours since waved leafy and flagrant as groves between the tropics,
now spread, waste, wild, and white as pine- forests in wintry Norway.
My hopes were all dead--struck with a subtle doom, such as, in one night, fell on
all the first-born in the land of Egypt.
I looked on my cherished wishes, yesterday so blooming and glowing; they lay stark,
chill, livid corpses that could never revive.
I looked at my love: that feeling which was my master's--which he had created; it
shivered in my heart, like a suffering child in a cold cradle; sickness and
anguish had seized it; it could not seek
Mr. Rochester's arms--it could not derive warmth from his breast.
Oh, never more could it turn to him; for faith was blighted--confidence destroyed!
Mr. Rochester was not to me what he had been; for he was not what I had thought
him.
I would not ascribe vice to him; I would not say he had betrayed me; but the
attribute of stainless truth was gone from his idea, and from his presence I must go:
that I perceived well.
When--how--whither, I could not yet discern; but he himself, I doubted not,
would hurry me from Thornfield.
Real affection, it seemed, he could not have for me; it had been only fitful
passion: that was balked; he would want me no more.
I should fear even to cross his path now: my view must be hateful to him.
Oh, how blind had been my eyes! How weak my conduct!
My eyes were covered and closed: eddying darkness seemed to swim round me, and
reflection came in as black and confused a flow.
Self-abandoned, relaxed, and effortless, I seemed to have laid me down in the dried-up
bed of a great river; I heard a flood loosened in remote mountains, and felt the
torrent come: to rise I had no will, to flee I had no strength.
I lay faint, longing to be dead.
One idea only still throbbed life-like within me--a remembrance of God: it begot
an unuttered prayer: these words went wandering up and down in my rayless mind,
as something that should be whispered, but no energy was found to express them--
"Be not far from me, for trouble is near: there is none to help."
It was near: and as I had lifted no petition to Heaven to avert it--as I had
neither joined my hands, nor bent my knees, nor moved my lips--it came: in full heavy
swing the torrent poured over me.
The whole consciousness of my life lorn, my love lost, my hope quenched, my faith
death-struck, swayed full and mighty above me in one sullen mass.
That bitter hour cannot be described: in truth, "the waters came into my soul; I
sank in deep mire: I felt no standing; I came into deep waters; the floods
overflowed me."