第18页
《简·爱(英文版)》章节:第18页,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
a room full of ladies and gentlemen. But Bessie, as soon as she had
dressed her young ladies, used to take herself off to the lively
regions of the kitchen and housekeeper's room, generally bearing the
candle along with her. I then sat with my doll on my knee till the
fire got low, glancing round occasionally to make sure that nothing
worse than myself haunted the shadowy room; and when the embers sank
to a dull red, I undressed hastily, tugging at knots and strings as
I best might, and sought shelter from cold and darkness in my crib. To
this crib I always took my doll; human beings must love something,
and, in the dearth of worthier objects of affection, I contrived to
find a pleasure in loving and cherishing a faded graven image,
shabby as a miniature scarecrow. It puzzles me now to remember with
what absurd sincerity I doated on this little toy, half fancying it
alive and capable of sensation. I could not sleep unless it was folded
in my night-gown; and when it lay there safe and warm, I was
comparatively happy, believing it to be happy likewise.
Long did the hours seem while I waited the departure of the
company, and listened for the sound of Bessie's step on the stairs:
sometimes she would come up in the interval to seek her thimble or her
scissors, or perhaps to bring me something by way of supper- a bun
or a cheese-cake- then she would sit on the bed while I ate it, and
when I had finished, she would tuck the clothes round me, and twice
she kissed me, and said, 'Good night, Miss Jane.' When thus gentle,
Bessie seemed to me the best, prettiest, kindest being in the world;
and I wished most intensely that she would always be so pleasant and
amiable, and never push me about, or scold, or task me unreasonably,
as she was too often wont to do. Bessie, Lee must, I think, have
been a girl of good natural capacity, for she was smart in all she
did, and had a remarkable knack of narrative; so, at least, I judge
from the impression made on me by her nursery tales. She was pretty
too, if my recollections of her face and person are correct. I
remember her as a slim young woman, with black hair, dark eyes, very
nice features, and good, clear complexion; but she had a capricious
and hasty temper, and indifferent ideas of principle or justice:
still, such as she was, I preferred her to any one else at Gateshead
Hall.
It was the fifteenth of January, about nine o'clock in the morning:
Bessie was gone down to breakfast; my cousins had not yet been
summoned to their mama; Eliza was putting on her bonnet and warm
garden-coat to go and feed her poultry, an occupation of which she was
fond: and not less so of selling the eggs to the housekeeper and
hoarding up the money she thus obtained. She had a turn for traffic,
and a marked propensity for saving; shown not only in the vending of
eggs and chickens, but also in driving hard bargains with the gardener
about flower-roots, seeds, and slips of plants; that functionary