第329页
《简·爱(英文版)》章节:第329页,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
had been privileged to make, independent of the cumbrous body.
'Ere many days,' I said, as I terminated my musings, 'I will know
something of him whose voice seemed last night to summon me. Letters
have proved of no avail- personal inquiry shall replace them.'
At breakfast I announced to Diana and Mary that I was going a
journey, and should be absent at least four days.
'Alone, Jane?' they asked.
'Yes; it was to see or hear news of a friend about whom I had for
some time been uneasy.'
They might have said, as I have no doubt they thought, that they
had believed me to be without any friends save them: for, indeed, I
had often said so; but, with their true natural delicacy, they
abstained from comment, except that Diana asked me if I was sure I was
well enough to travel. I looked very pale, she observed. I replied,
that nothing ailed me save anxiety of mind, which I hoped soon to
alleviate.
It was easy to make my further arrangements; for I was troubled
with no inquiries- no surmises. Having once explained to them that I
could not now be explicit about my plans, they kindly and wisely
acquiesced in the silence with which I pursued them, according to me
the privilege of free action I should under similar circumstances have
accorded them.
I left Moor House at three o'clock P.M., and soon after four I
stood at the foot of the sign-post of Whitcross, waiting the arrival
of the coach which was to take me to distant Thornfield. Amidst the
silence of those solitary roads and desert hills, I heard it
approach from a great distance. It was the same vehicle whence, a year
ago, I had alighted one summer evening on this very spot- how
desolate, and hopeless, and objectless! It stopped as I beckoned. I
entered- not now obliged to part with my whole fortune as the price of
its accommodation. Once more on the road to Thornfield, I felt like
the messenger-pigeon flying home.
It was a journey of six-and-thirty hours. I had set out from
Whitcross on a Tuesday afternoon, and early on the succeeding Thursday
morning the coach stopped to water the horses at a wayside inn,
situated in the midst of scenery whose green hedges and large fields
and low pastoral hills (how mild of feature and verdant of hue
compared with the stern North-Midland moors of Morton!) met my eye
like the lineaments of a once familiar face. Yes, I knew the character
of this landscape: I was sure we were near my bourne.
'How far is Thornfield Hall from here?' I asked of the ostler.
'Just two miles, ma'am, across the fields.'
'My journey is closed,' I thought to myself. I got out of the
coach, gave a box I had into the ostler's charge, to be kept till I
called for it; paid my fare; satisfied the coachman, and was going:
the brightening day gleamed on the sign of the inn, and I read in gilt
letters, 'The Rochester Arms.' My heart leapt up: I was already on
my master's very lands. It fell again: the thought struck it:-