第266页
《简·爱(英文版)》章节:第266页,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
smile illumined her rough face, and from that moment we were friends.
Hannah was evidently fond of talking. While I picked the fruit, and
she made the paste for the pies, she proceeded to give me sundry
details about her deceased master and mistress, and 'the childer,'
as she called the young people.
Old Mr. Rivers, she said, was a plain man enough, but a
gentleman, and of as ancient a family as could be found. Marsh End had
belonged to the Rivers ever since it was a house: and it was, she
affirmed, 'aboon two hundred year old- for all it looked but a
small, humble place, naught to compare wi' Mr. Oliver's grand hall
down i' Morton Vale. But she could remember Bill Oliver's father a
journeyman needle-maker; and th' Rivers wor gentry i' th' owd days
o' th' Henrys, as onybody might see by looking into th' registers i'
Morton Church vestry.' Still, she allowed, 'the owd maister was like
other folk- naught mich out o' th' common way: stark mad o'
shooting, and farming, and sich like.' The mistress was different. She
was a great reader, and studied a deal; and the 'bairns' had taken
after her. There was nothing like them in these parts, nor ever had
been; they had liked learning, all three, almost from the time they
could speak; and they had always been 'of a mak' of their own.' Mr.
St. John, when he grew up, would go to college and be a parson; and
the girls, as soon as they left school, would seek places as
governesses: for they had told her their father had some years ago
lost a great deal of money by a man he had trusted turning bankrupt;
and as he was now not rich enough to give them fortunes, they must
provide for themselves. They had lived very little at home for a
long while, and were only come now to stay a few weeks on account of
their father's death; but they did so like Marsh End and Morton, and
all these moors and hills about. They had been in London, and many
other grand towns; but they always said there was no place like
home; and then they were so agreeable with each other- never fell
out nor 'threaped.' She did not know where there was such a family for
being united.
Having finished my task of gooseberry picking, I asked where the
two ladies and their brother were now.
'Gone over to Morton for a walk; but they would be back in half
an hour to tea.'
They returned within the time Hannah had allotted them: they
entered by the kitchen door. Mr. St. John, when he saw me, merely
bowed and passed through; the two ladies stopped: Mary, in a few
words, kindly and calmly expressed the pleasure she felt in seeing
me well enough to be able to come down; Diana took my hand: she
shook her head at me.
'You should have waited for my leave to descend,' she said. 'You
still look very pale- and so thin! Poor child!- poor girl!'
Diana had a voice toned, to my ear, like the cooing of a dove.
She possessed eyes whose gaze I delighted to encounter. Her whole face