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 seemed near,-

-I desired and waited it in silence. It tarried, however: days and

weeks passed: I had regained my normal state of health, but no new

allusion was made to the subject over which I brooded. Mrs. Reed

surveyed me at times with a severe eye, but seldom addressed me:

since my illness, she had drawn a more marked line of separation

than ever between me and her own children; appointing me a small

closet to sleep in by myself, condemning me to take my meals alone,

and pass all my time in the nursery, while my cousins were

constantly in the drawing-room. Not a hint, however, did she drop

about sending me to school: still I felt an instinctive certainty

that she would not long endure me under the same roof with her; for

her glance, now more than ever, when turned on me, expressed an

insuperable and rooted aversion.

Eliza and Georgiana, evidently acting according to orders, spoke to

me as little as possible: John thrust his tongue in his cheek

whenever he saw me, and once attempted chastisement; but as I

instantly turned against him, roused by the same sentiment of deep

ire and desperate revolt which had stirred my corruption before, he

thought it better to desist, and ran from me tittering execrations,

and vowing I had burst his nose. I had indeed levelled at that

prominent feature as hard a blow as my knuckles could inflict; and

when I saw that either that or my look daunted him, I had the

greatest inclination to follow up my advantage to purpose; but he

was already with his mama. I heard him in a blubbering tone

commence the tale of how "that nasty Jane Eyre" had flown at him

like a mad cat: he was stopped rather harshly "Don't talk to me about her, John: I told you not to go near her;

she is not worthy of notice; I do not choose that either you or your

sisters should associate with her."

Here, leaning over the banister, I cried out suddenly, and without

at all deliberating on my words "They are not fit to associate with me."

Mrs. Reed was rather a stout woman; but, on hearing this strange and

audacious declaration, she ran nimbly up the stair, swept me like a

whirlwind into the nursery, and crushing me down on the edge of my

crib, dared me in an emphatic voice to rise from that place, or

utter one syllable during the remainder of the day.




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