查看完整版本: [FF名著欣赏二]简爱（JEAN EYRE）（中英对照）

[FF名著欣赏二]简爱（JEAN EYRE）（中英对照）

[这个贴子最后由luxiaohui2在 2004/06/06 07:02pm 第 1 次编辑]

[b][size=5]此贴禁水!![/size][/b]

THE AUTHOR';S PREFACE
　　 TO THE SECOND EDITION
　　A PREFACE to the first edition of Jane Eyre being unnecessary, I gave none: this second edition demands a few words both of acknowledgment and miscellaneous remark.
　　My thanks are due in three quarters.
　　To the Public, for the indulgent ear it has inclined to a plain tale with few pretensions.
　　To the Press, for the fair field its honest suffrage has opened to an obscure aspirant.
　　To my Publishers, for the aid their tact, their energy, their practical sense and frank liberality have afforded an unknown and unrecommended Author.
　　The Press and the Public are but vague personifications for me, and I must thank them in vague terms; but my Publishers are definite: so are certain generous critics who have encouraged me as only large-hearted and high-minded men know how to encourage a struggling stranger; to them, i.e., to my Publishers and the select Reviewers, I say cordially, Gentlemen, I thank you from my heart.
　　Having thus acknowledged what I owe those who have aided and approved me, I turn to another class; a small one, so far as I know, but not, therefore, to be overlooked. I mean the timorous or carping few who doubt the tendency of such books as Jane Eyre: in whose eyes whatever is unusual is wrong; whose ears detect in each protest against bigotry- that parent of crime- an insult to piety, that regent of God on earth. I would suggest to such doubters certain obvious distinctions; I would remind them of certain simple truths.
　　Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask from the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious hand to the Crown of Thorns.
　　These things and deeds are diametrically opposed: they are as distinct as is vice from virtue. Men too often confound them: they should not be confounded: appearance should not be mistaken for truth; narrow human doctrines, that only tend to elate and magnify a few, should not be substituted for the world-redeeming creed of Christ. There is- I repeat it- a difference; and it is a good, and not a bad action to mark broadly and clearly the line of separation between them.
　　The world may not like to see these ideas dissevered, for it has been accustomed to blend them; finding it convenient to make external show pass for sterling worth- to let white-washed walls vouch for clean shrines. It may hate him who dares to scrutinise and expose- to rase the gilding, and show base metal under it- to penetrate the sepulchre, and reveal charnel relics: but hate as it will, it is indebted to him.
　　Ahab did not like Micaiah, because he never prophesied good concerning him, but evil; probably he liked the sycophant son of Chenaanah better; yet might Ahab have escaped a bloody death, had he but stopped his ears to flattery, and opened them to faithful counsel.
　　There is a man in our own days whose words are not framed to tickle delicate ears: who, to my thinking, comes before the great ones of society, much as the son of Imlah came before the throned Kings of Judah and Israel; and who speaks truth as deep, with a power as prophet-like and as vital- a mien as dauntless and as daring. Is the satirist of Vanity Fair admired in high places? I cannot tell; but I think if some of those amongst whom he hurls the Greek fire of his sarcasm, and over whom he flashes the levin-brand of his denunciation, were to take his warnings in time- they or their seed might yet escape a fatal Ramoth-Gilead.
　　Why have I alluded to this man? I have alluded to him, Reader, because I think I see in him an intellect profounder and more unique than his contemporaries have yet recognised; because I regard him as the first social regenerator of the day- as the very master of that working corps who would restore to rectitude the warped system of things; because I think no commentator on his writings has yet found the comparison that suits him, the terms which rightly characterise his talent. They say he is like Fielding: they talk of his wit, humour, comic powers. He resembles Fielding as an eagle does a vulture: Fielding could stoop on carrion, but Thackeray never does. His wit is bright, his humour attractive, but both bear the same relation to his serious genius that the mere lambent sheet-lightning playing under the edge of the summer-cloud does to the electric death-spark hid in its womb. Finally, I have alluded to Mr. Thackeray, because to him- if he will accept the tribute of a total stranger- I have dedicated this second edition of Jane Eyre.
　　 CURRER BELL.
　　December 21st, 1847.
　　 THE AUTHOR';S NOTE
　　 TO THE THIRD EDITION
　　I AVAIL myself of the opportunity which a third edition of Jane Eyre affords me, of again addressing a word to the Public, to explain that my claim to the title of novelist rests on this one work alone. If, therefore, the authorship of other works of fiction has been attributed to me, an honour is awarded where it is not merited; and consequently, denied where it is justly due.
　　This explanation will serve to rectify mistakes which may already have been made, and to prevent future errors.
　　 CURRER BELL.
　　April 13th, 1848.
　　 JANE EYRE
　　
　　
　　CHAPTER I
　　THERE was no possibility of taking a walk that day. We had been wandering, indeed, in the leafless shrubbery[n.灌木,灌木林] an hour in the morning; but since dinner (Mrs. Reed, when there was no company, dined early) the cold winter wind had brought with it clouds so somber[a.昏暗的,阴天的,阴森的,忧郁的] ,and a rain so penetrating, that further outdoor exercise was now out of the question.
　　I was glad of it: I never liked long walks, especially on chilly afternoons: dreadful to me was the coming home in the raw twilight, with nipped fingers and toes, and a heart saddened by the chidings of Bessie, the nurse, and humbled by the consciousness of my physical inferiority to Eliza, John, and Georgiana Reed.
　　The said Eliza, John, and Georgiana were now clustered round their mama in the drawing-room: she lay reclined on a sofa by the fireside, and with her darlings about her (for the time neither quarrelling nor crying) looked perfectly happy. Me, she had dispensed from joining the group; saying, ';She regretted to be under the necessity of keeping me at a distance; but that until she heard from Bessie, and could discover by her own observation, that I was endeavouring in good earnest to acquire a more sociable and childlike disposition, a more attractive and sprightly manner- something lighter, franker, more natural, as it were- she really must exclude me from privileges intended only for contented, happy, little children.';
　　';What does Bessie say I have done?'; I asked.
　　';Jane, I don';t like cavillers or questioners; besides, there is something truly forbidding in a child taking up her elders in that manner. Be seated somewhere; and until you can speak pleasantly, remain silent.';
　　A small breakfast-room adjoined the drawing-room, I slipped in there. It contained a bookcase: I soon possessed myself of a volume, taking care that it should be one stored with pictures. I mounted into the window-seat: gathering up my feet, I sat cross-legged, like a Turk; and, having drawn the red moreen curtain nearly close, I was shrined in double retirement.
　　Folds of scarlet drapery shut in my view to the right hand; to the left were the clear panes of glass, protecting, but not separating me from the drear November day. At intervals, while turning over the leaves of my book, I studied the aspect of that winter afternoon. Afar, it offered a pale blank of mist and cloud; near a scene of wet lawn and storm-beat shrub, with ceaseless rain sweeping away wildly before a long and lamentable blast.
　　I returned to my book- Bewick';s History of British Birds: the letterpress thereof I cared little for, generally speaking; and yet there were certain introductory pages that, child as I was, I could not pass quite as a blank. They were those which treat of the haunts of sea-fowl; of ';the solitary rocks and promontories'; by them only inhabited; of the coast of Norway, studded with isles from its southern extremity, the Lindeness, or Naze, to the North Cape-
　　 ';Where the Northern Ocean, in vast whirls,
　　 Boils round the naked, melancholy isles
　　 Of farthest Thule; and the Atlantic surge
　　 Pours in among the stormy Hebrides.'; Nor could I pass unnoticed the suggestion of the bleak shores of Lapland, Siberia, Spitzbergen, Nova Zembla, Iceland, Greenland, with ';the vast sweep of the Arctic Zone, and those forlorn regions of dreary space,- that reservoir of frost and snow, where firm fields of ice, the accumulation of centuries of winters, glazed in Alpine heights above heights, surround the pole and concentre the multiplied rigours of extreme cold.'; Of these death-white realms I formed an idea of my own: shadowy, like all the half-comprehended notions that float dim through children';s brains, but strangely impressive. The words in these introductory pages connected themselves with the succeeding vignettes, and gave significance to the rock standing up alone in a sea of billow and spray; to the broken boat stranded on a desolate coast; to the cold and ghastly moon glancing through bars of cloud at a wreck just sinking.
　　I cannot tell what sentiment haunted the quite solitary churchyard, with its inscribed headstone; its gate, its two trees, its low horizon, girdled by a broken wall, and its newly-risen crescent, attesting the hour of eventide.
　　The two ships becalmed on a torpid sea, I believed to be marine phantoms.
　　The fiend pinning down the thief';s pack behind him, I passed over quickly: it was an object of terror.
　　So was the black horned thing seated aloof on a rock, surveying a distant crowd surrounding a gallows.
　　Each picture told a story; mysterious often to my undeveloped understanding and imperfect feelings, yet ever profoundly interesting: as interesting as the tales Bessie sometimes narrated on winter evenings, when she chanced to be in good humour; and when, having brought her ironing-table to the nursery hearth, she allowed us to sit about it, and while she got up Mrs. Reed';s lace frills, and crimped her nightcap borders, fed our eager attention with passages of love and adventure taken from old fairy tales and other ballads; or (as at a later period I discovered) from the pages of Pamela, and Henry, Earl of Moreland.
　　With Bewick on my knee, I was then happy: happy at least in my way. I feared nothing but interruption, and that came too soon. The breakfast-room door opened.
　　';Boh! Madam Mope!'; cried the voice of John Reed; then he paused: he found the room apparently empty.
　　';Where the dickens is she!'; he continued. ';Lizzy! Georgy! (calling to his sisters) Joan is not here: tell mama she is run out into the rain- bad animal!';
　　';It is well I drew the curtain,'; thought I; and I wished fervently he might not discover my hiding-place: nor would John Reed have found it out himself; he was not quick either of vision or conception; but Eliza just put her head in at the door, and said at once-
　　';She is in the window-seat, to be sure, Jack.';
　　And I came out immediately, for I trembled at the idea of being dragged forth by the said Jack.
　　';What do you want?'; I asked, with awkward diffidence.
　　';Say, "What do you want, Master Reed?"'; was the answer. ';I want you to come here;'; and seating himself in an armchair, he intimated by a gesture that I was to approach and stand before him.
　　John Reed was a schoolboy of fourteen years old; four years older than I, for I was but ten: large and stout for his age, with a dingy and unwholesome skin; thick lineaments in a spacious visage, heavy limbs and large extremities. He gorged himself habitually at table, which made him bilious, and gave him a dim and bleared eye and flabby cheeks. He ought now to have been at school; but his mama had taken him home for a month or two, ';on account of his delicate health.'; Mr. Miles, the master, affirmed that he would do very well if he had fewer cakes and sweetmeats sent him from home; but the mother';s heart turned from an opinion so harsh, and inclined rather to the more refined idea that John';s sallowness was owing to over-application and, perhaps, to pining after home.
　　John had not much affection for his mother and sisters, and an antipathy to me. He bullied and punished me; not two or three times in the week, nor once or twice in the day, but continually: every nerve I had feared him, and every morsel of flesh in my bones shrank when he came near. There were moments when I was bewildered by the terror he inspired, because I had no appeal whatever against either his menaces or his inflictions; the servants did not like to offend their young master by taking my part against him, and Mrs. Reed was blind and deaf on the subject: she never saw him strike or heard him abuse me, though he did both now and then in her very presence, more frequently, however, behind her back.
　　Habitually obedient to John, I came up to his chair: he spent some three minutes in thrusting out his tongue at me as far as he could without damaging the roots: I knew he would soon strike, and while dreading the blow, I mused on the disgusting and ugly appearance of him who would presently deal it. I wonder if he read that notion in my face; for, all at once, without speaking, he struck suddenly and strongly. I tottered, and on regaining my equilibrium retired back a step or two from his chair.
　　';That is for your impudence in answering mama awhile since,'; said he, ';and for your sneaking way of getting behind curtains, and for the look you had in your eyes two minutes since, you rat!';
　　Accustomed to John Reed';s abuse, I never had an idea of replying to it; my care was how to endure the blow which would certainly follow the insult.
　　';What were you doing behind the curtain?'; he asked.
　　';I was reading.';
　　';Show the book.';
　　I returned to the window and fetched it thence.
　　';You have no business to take our books; you are a dependant, mama says; you have no money; your father left you none; you ought to beg, and not to live here with gentlemen';s children like us, and eat the same meals we do, and wear clothes at our mama';s expense. Now, I';ll teach you to rummage my bookshelves: for they are mine; all the house belongs to me, or will do in a few years. Go and stand by the door, out of the way of the mirror and the windows.';
　　I did so, not at first aware what was his intention; but when I saw him lift and poise the book and stand in act to hurl it, I instinctively started aside with a cry of alarm: not soon enough, however; the volume was flung, it hit me, and I fell, striking my head against the door and cutting it. The cut bled, the pain was sharp: my terror had passed its climax; other feelings succeeded.
　　';Wicked and cruel boy!'; I said. ';You are like a murderer- you are like a slave-driver- you are like the Roman emperors!';
　　I had read Goldsmith';s History of Rome, and had formed my opinion of Nero, Caligula, etc. Also I had drawn parallels in silence, which I never thought thus to have declared aloud.
　　';What! what!'; he cried. ';Did she say that to me? Did you hear her, Eliza and Georgiana? Won';t I tell mama? but first-';
　　He ran headlong at me: I felt him grasp my hair and my shoulder: he had closed with a desperate thing. I really saw in him a tyrant, a murderer. I felt a drop or two of blood from my head trickle down my neck, and was sensible of somewhat pungent suffering: these sensations for the time predominated over fear, and I received him in frantic sort. I don';t very well know what I did with my hands, but he called me ';Rat! Rat!'; and bellowed out aloud. Aid was near him: Eliza and Georgiana had run for Mrs. Reed, who was gone upstairs: she now came upon the scene, followed by Bessie and her maid Abbot. We were parted: I heard the words-
　　';Dear! dear! What a fury to fly at Master John!';
　　';Did ever anybody see such a picture of passion!';
　　Then Mrs. Reed subjoined-
　　';Take her away to the red-room, and lock her in there.'; Four hands were immediately laid upon me, and I was borne upstairs.

第一章            
    那天，出去散步是不可能了。其实，早上我们还在光秃秃的灌木林中溜达了一个小时，
但从午饭时起（无客造访时，里德太太很早就用午饭）便刮起了冬日凛冽的寒风，随后阴云
密布，大雨滂沱，室外的活动也就只能作罢了。
    我倒是求之不得。我向来不喜欢远距离散步，尤其在冷飕飕的下午。试想，阴冷的薄暮
时分回得家来，手脚都冻僵了，还要受到保姆贝茵的数落，又自觉体格不如伊丽莎、约翰和
乔治亚娜，心里既难过又惭愧，那情形委实可怕。
    此时此刻，刚才提到的伊丽莎、约翰和乔治亚娜都在客厅里，簇拥着他们的妈妈。她则
斜倚在炉边的沙发上，身旁坐着自己的小宝贝们（眼下既未争吵也未哭叫），一副安享天伦
之乐的神态。而我呢，她恩准我不必同他们坐在一起了，说是她很遗憾，不得不让我独个儿
在一旁呆着。要是没有亲耳从贝茜那儿听到，并且亲眼看到，我确实在尽力养成一种比较单
纯随和的习性，活泼可爱的举止，也就是更开朗、更率直、更自然些，那她当真不让我享受
那些只配给予快乐知足的孩子们的特权了。
    “贝茵说我干了什么啦？”我问。
    “简，我不喜欢吹毛求疵或者刨根究底的人，更何况小孩子家这么跟大人顶嘴实在让人
讨厌。找个地方去坐着，不会和气说话就别张嘴。”
    客厅的隔壁是一间小小的餐室，我溜了进去。里面有一个书架。不一会儿，我从上面拿
下一本书来，特意挑插图多的，爬上窗台，缩起双脚，像土耳其人那样盘腿坐下，将红色的
波纹窗帘几乎完全拉拢，把自己加倍隐蔽了起来。
    在我右侧，绯红色窗幔的皱褶档住了我的视线；左侧，明亮的玻璃窗庇护着我，使我既
免受十一月阴沉天气的侵害，又不与外面的世界隔绝，在翻书的间隙，我抬头细看冬日下午
的景色。只见远方白茫茫一片云雾，近处湿漉漉一块草地和受风雨袭击的灌木。一阵持久而
凄厉的狂风，驱赶着如注的暴雨，横空归过。
    我重又低头看书，那是本比尤伊克的《英国鸟类史》。文字部份我一般不感兴趣，但有
几页导言，虽说我是孩子，却不愿当作空页随手翻过。内中写到了海鸟生息之地；写到了只
有海鸟栖居的“孤零零的岩石和海岬”；写到了自南端林纳斯尼斯，或纳斯，至北角都遍布
小岛的挪威海岸：
    那里，北冰洋掀起的巨大漩涡，咆哮在极地光秃凄凉约小岛四周。而大西洋的汹涌波
涛，泻入了狂暴的赫布里底群岛。
    还有些地方我也不能看都不看，一翻而过，那就是书中提到的拉普兰、西伯利亚、斯匹
次卑尔根群岛、新地岛、冰岛和格陵兰荒凉的海岸。“广袤无垠的北极地带和那些阴凄凄的
不毛之地，宛若冰雪的储存库。千万个寒冬所积聚成的坚冰，像阿尔卑斯山的层层高峰，光
滑晶莹，包围着地极，把与日俱增的严寒汇集于一处。”我对这些死白色的地域，已有一定
之见，但一时难以捉摸，仿佛孩子们某些似懂非懂的念头，朦朦胧胧浮现在脑际，却出奇地
生动，导言中的这几页文字，与后面的插图相配，使兀立于大海波涛中的孤岩，搁浅在荒凉
海岸上的破船，以及透过云带俯视着沉船的幽幽月光，更加含义隽永了。
    我说不清一种什么样的情调弥漫在孤寂的墓地：刻有铭文的墓碑、一扇大门、两棵树、
低低的地平线、破败的围墙。一弯初升的新月，表明时候正是黄昏。
    两艘轮船停泊在水波不兴的海面上，我以为它们是海上的鬼怪。
    魔鬼从身后按住窃贼的背包，那模样实在可怕，我赶紧翻了过去。
    一样可怕的是，那个头上长角的黑色怪物，独踞于岩石之上，远眺着一大群人围着绞
架。
    每幅画都是一个故事、由于我理解力不足，欣赏水平有限，它们往往显得神秘莫测，但
无不趣味盎然，就像某些冬夜，贝茜碰巧心情不错时讲述的故事一样。遇到这种时候，贝茵
会把烫衣桌搬到保育室的壁炉旁边，让我们围着它坐好。她一面熨里德太太的网眼饰边，把
睡帽的边沿烫出褶裥来，一面让我们迫不及待地倾听她一段段爱情和冒险故事，这些片段取
自于古老的神话传说和更古老的歌谣，或者如我后来所发现，来自《帕美拉》和《莫兰伯爵
亨利》。
    当时，我膝头摊着比尤伊克的书，心里乐滋滋的，至少是自得其乐，就怕别人来打扰。
但打扰来得很快，餐室的门开了。
    “嘘！苦恼小姐！”约翰·里德叫唤着，随后又打住了，显然发觉房间里空无一人。
    “见鬼，上哪儿去了呀？”他接着说。“丽茜！乔琪！”（喊着他的姐妹）“琼不在这
儿呐，告诉妈妈她窜到雨地里去了，这个坏畜牲！”
    “幸亏我拉好了窗帘，”我想。我真希望他发现不了我的藏身之地。约翰·里德自己是
发现不了的，他眼睛不尖，头脑不灵。可惜伊丽莎从门外一探进头来，就说：
    “她在窗台上，准没错，杰克。”
    我立即走了出来，因为一想到要被这个杰克硬拖出去，身子便直打哆嗦。
    什么事呀？”我问，既尴尬又不安。
    “该说，什么事呀，里德‘少爷？’”便是我得到的回答。“我要你到这里来，”他在
扶手椅上坐下，打了个手势，示意我走过去站到他面前。
    约翰·里德是个十四岁的小学生，比我大四岁，因为我才十岁。论年龄，他长得又大又
胖，但肤色灰暗，一付病态。脸盘阔，五官粗，四肢肥，手膨大。还喜欢暴饮暴食，落得个
肝火很旺，目光迟钝，两颊松弛。这阵子，他本该呆在学校里，可是他妈把他领了回来，住
上—、两个月，说是因为“身体虚弱”。但他老师迈尔斯先生却断言，要是家里少送些糕点
糖果去，他会什么都很好的，做母亲的心里却讨厌这么刻薄的话，而倾向于一种更随和的想
法，认为约翰是过于用功，或许还因为想家，才弄得那么面色蜡黄的。
    约翰对母亲和姐妹们没有多少感情，而对我则很厌恶。他欺侮我，虐待我，不是一周三
两次，也不是一天一两回，而是经常如此。弄得我每根神经都怕他，他一走运，我身子骨上
的每块肌肉都会收缩起来。有时我会被他吓得手足无措，因为面对他的恐吓和欺侮，我无处
哭诉。佣人们不愿站在我一边去得罪他们的少爷，而里德太太则装聋作哑，儿子打我骂我，
她熟视无睹，尽管他动不动当着她的面这样做，而背着她的时候不用说就更多了。
    我对约翰已惯于逆来顺受，因此便走到他椅子跟前。他费了大约三分钟，拼命向我伸出
舌头，就差没有绷断舌根。我明白他会马上下手，一面担心挨打，一面凝视着这个就要动手
的人那付令人厌恶的丑态。我不知道他看出了我的心思没有，反正他二话没说，猛然间狠命
揍我。我一个踉跄，从他椅子前倒退了一两步才站稳身子。
    “这是对你的教训，谁叫你刚才那么无礼跟妈妈顶嘴，”他说，“谁叫你鬼鬼祟祟躲到
窗帘后面，谁叫你两分钟之前眼光里露出那付鬼样子，你这耗子！”
    我已经习惯于约翰·里德的谩骂，从来不愿去理睬，一心只想着加何去忍受辱骂以后必
然接踪而来的殴打。
    “你躲在窗帘后面干什么？”他问。
    “在看书。”
    “把书拿来。”
    我走回窗前把书取来。
    “你没有资格动我们的书。妈妈说的，你靠别人养活你，你没有钱，你爸爸什么也没留
给你，你应当去讨饭，而不该同像我们这样体面人家的孩子一起过日子，不该同我们吃一样
的饭，穿妈妈掏钱给买的衣服。现在我要教训你，让你知道翻我们书架的好处。这些书都是
我的，连整座房子都是，要不过几年就归我了。滚，站到门边去，离镜子和窗子远些。”
    我照他的话做了，起初并不知道他的用意。但是他把书举起，拿稳当了，立起身来摆出
要扔过来的架势时，我一声惊叫，本能地往旁边一闪，可是晚了、那本书己经扔过来，正好
打中了我，我应声倒下，脑袋撞在门上，碰出了血来，疼痛难忍。我的恐惧心理已经越过了
极限，被其他情感所代替。
    “你是个恶毒残暴的孩子！”我说。“你像个杀人犯——你是个奴隶监工——你像罗马
皇帝！”
    我读过哥尔斯密的《罗马史》，时尼禄、卡利古拉等人物已有自己的看法，并暗暗作过
类比，但决没有想到会如此大声地说出口来。
    “什么！什么！”他大叫大嚷。“那是她说的吗？伊丽莎、乔治亚娜，你们可听见她说
了？我会不去告诉妈妈吗？不过我得先——”
    他向我直冲过来，我只觉得他抓住了我的头发和肩膀，他跟一个拼老命的家伙扭打在一
起了。我发现他真是个暴君，是个杀人犯。我觉得一两滴血从头上顺着脖子淌下来，感到一
阵热辣辣的剧痛。这些感觉一时占了上风，我不再畏惧，而发疯似地同他对打起来。我不太
清楚自己的双手到底干了什么，只听得他骂我“耗子！耗子！”一面杀猪似地嚎叫着。他的
帮手近在咫尺，伊丽莎和乔治亚娜早已跑出去讨救兵，里德太太上了楼梯，来到现场，后面
跟随着贝茜和女佣艾博特。她们我们拉开了，我只听见她们说：
    “哎呀！哎呀！这么大的气出在约翰少爷身上：”
    “谁见过那么火冒三丈的！”
    随后里德太太补充说：
    “带她到红房子里去，关起来。”于是马上就有两双手按住了我，把我推上楼去。

[FF名著欣赏二]简爱（JEAN EYRE）（中英对照）

CHAPTER II
　　I RESISTED all the way: a new thing for me, and a circumstance which greatly strengthened the bad opinion Bessie and Miss Abbot were disposed to entertain of me. The fact is, I was a trifle beside myself; or rather out of myself, as the French would say: I was conscious that a moment';s mutiny had already rendered me liable to strange penalties, and, like any other rebel slave, I felt resolved, in my desperation, to go all lengths.
　　';Hold her arms, Miss Abbot: she';s like a mad cat.';
　　';For shame! for shame!'; cried the lady';s-maid. ';What shocking conduct, Miss Eyre, to strike a young gentleman, your benefactress';s son! Your young master.';
　　';Master! How is he my master? Am I a servant?';
　　';No; you are less than a servant, for you do nothing for your keep. There, sit down, and think over your wickedness.';
　　They had got me by this time into the apartment indicated by Mrs. Reed, and had thrust me upon a stool: my impulse was to rise from it like a spring; their two pair of hands arrested me instantly.
　　';If you don';t sit still, you must be tied down,'; said Bessie. ';Miss Abbot, lend me your garters; she would break mine directly.';
　　Miss Abbot turned to divest a stout leg of the necessary ligature. This preparation for bonds, and the additional ignominy it inferred, took a little of the excitement out of me.
　　';Don';t take them off,'; I cried; ';I will not stir.';
　　In guarantee whereof, I attached myself to my seat by my hands.
　　';Mind you don';t,'; said Bessie; and when she had ascertained that I was really subsiding, she loosened her hold of me; then she and Miss Abbot stood with folded arms, looking darkly and doubtfully on my face, as incredulous of my sanity.
　　';She never did so before,'; at last said Bessie, turning to the Abigail.
　　';But it was always in her,'; was the reply. ';I';ve told Missis often my opinion about the child, and Missis agreed with me. She';s an underhand little thing: I never saw a girl of her age with so much cover.';
　　Bessie answered not; but ere long, addressing me, she said-
　　';You ought to be aware, Miss, that you are under obligations to Mrs. Reed: she keeps you: if she were to turn you off, you would have to go to the poorhouse.';
　　I had nothing to say to these words: they were not new to me: my very first recollections of existence included hints of the same kind. This reproach of my dependence had become a vague sing-song in my ear: very painful and crushing, but only half intelligible. Miss Abbot joined in-
　　';And you ought not to think yourself on an equality with the Misses Reed and Master Reed, because Missis kindly allows you to be brought up with them. They will have a great deal of money, and you will have none: it is your place to be humble, and to try to make yourself agreeable to them.';
　　';What we tell you is for your good,'; added Bessie, in no harsh voice; ';you should try to be useful and pleasant, then, perhaps, you would have a home here; but if you become passionate and rude, Missis will send you away, I am sure.';
　　';Besides,'; said Miss Abbot, ';God will punish her: He might strike her dead in the midst of her tantrums, and then where would she go? Come, Bessie, we will leave her: I wouldn';t have her heart for anything. Say your prayers, Miss Eyre, when you are by yourself; for if you don';t repent, something bad might be permitted to come down the chimney and fetch you away.';
　　They went, shutting the door, and locking it behind them.
　　The red-room was a square chamber, very seldom slept in, I might say never, indeed, unless when a chance influx of visitors at Gateshead Hall rendered it necessary to turn to account all the accommodation it contained: yet it was one of the largest and stateliest chambers in the mansion. A bed supported on massive pillars of mahogany, hung with curtains of deep red damask, stood out like a tabernacle in the centre; the two large windows, with their blinds always drawn down, were half shrouded in festoons and falls of similar drapery; the carpet was red; the table at the foot of the bed was covered with a crimson cloth; the walls were a soft fawn colour with a blush of pink in it; the wardrobe, the toilet-table, the chairs were of darkly polished old mahogany. Out of these deep surrounding shades rose high, and glared white, the piled-up mattresses and pillows of the bed, spread with a snowy Marseilles counterpane. Scarcely less prominent was an ample cushioned easy-chair near the head of the bed, also white, with a footstool before it; and looking, as I thought, like a pale throne.
　　This room was chill, because it seldom had a fire; it was silent, because remote from the nursery and kitchen; solemn, because it was known to be so seldom entered. The housemaid alone came here on Saturdays, to wipe from the mirrors and the furniture a week';s quiet dust: and Mrs. Reed herself, at far intervals, visited it to review the contents of a certain secret drawer in the wardrobe, where were stored divers parchments, her jewel-casket, and a miniature of her deceased husband; and in those last words lies the secret of the red-room- the spell which kept it so lonely in spite of its grandeur.
　　Mr. Reed had been dead nine years: it was in this chamber he breathed his last; here he lay in state; hence his coffin was borne by the undertaker';s men; and, since that day, a sense of dreary consecration had guarded it from frequent intrusion.
　　My seat, to which Bessie and the bitter Miss Abbot had left me riveted, was a low ottoman near the marble chimney-piece; the bed rose before me; to my right hand there was the high, dark wardrobe, with subdued, broken reflections varying the gloss of its panels; to my left were the muffled windows; a great looking-glass between them repeated the vacant majesty of the bed and room. I was not quite sure whether they had locked the door; and when I dared move, I got up and went to see. Alas! yes: no jail was ever more secure. Returning, I had to cross before the looking-glass; my fascinated glance involuntarily explored the depth it revealed. All looked colder and darker in that visionary hollow than in reality: and the strange little figure there gazing at me, with a white face and arms specking the gloom, and glittering eyes of fear moving where all else was still, had the effect of a real spirit: I thought it like one of the tiny phantoms, half fairy, half imp, Bessie';s evening stories represented as coming out of lone, ferny dells in moors, and appearing before the eyes of belated travellers. I returned to my stool.
　　Superstition was with me at that moment; but it was not yet her hour for complete victory: my blood was still warm; the mood of the revolted slave was still bracing me with its bitter vigour; I had to stem a rapid rush of retrospective thought before I quailed to the dismal present.
　　All John Reed';s violent tyrannies, all his sisters'; proud indifference, all his mother';s aversion, all the servants'; partiality, turned up in my disturbed mind like a dark deposit in a turbid well. Why was I always suffering, always browbeaten, always accused, for ever condemned? Why could I never please? Why was it useless to try to win any one';s favour? Eliza, who, was headstrong and selfish, was respected. Georgiana, who had a spoiled temper, a very acrid spite, a captious and insolent carriage, was universally indulged. Her beauty, her pink cheeks and golden curls, seemed to give delight to all who, looked at her, and to purchase indemnity for every fault. John no one thwarted, much less punished; though he twisted the necks of the pigeons, killed the little pea-chicks, set the dogs at the sheep, stripped the hothouse vines of their fruit, and broke the buds off the choicest plants in the conservatory: he called his mother ';old girl,'; too; sometimes reviled her for her dark skin, similar to his own; bluntly disregarded her wishes; not unfrequently tore and spoiled her silk attire; and he was still ';her own darling.'; I dared commit no fault: I strove to fulfil every duty; and I was termed naughty and tiresome, sullen and sneaking, from morning to noon, and from noon to night.
　　My head still ached and bled with the blow and fall I had received: no one had reproved John for wantonly striking me; and because I had turned against him to avert farther irrational violence, I was loaded with general opprobrium.
　　';Unjust!- unjust!'; said my reason, forced by the agonising stimulus into precocious though transitory power: and Resolve, equally wrought up, instigated some strange expedient to achieve escape from insupportable oppression- as running away, or, if that could not be effected, never eating or drinking more, and letting myself die.
　　What a consternation of soul was mine that dreary afternoon! How all my brain was in tumult, and all my heart in insurrection! Yet in what darkness, what dense ignorance, was the mental battle fought! I could not answer the ceaseless inward question- why I thus suffered; now, at the distance of- I will not say how many years, I see it clearly.
　　I was a discord in Gateshead Hall: I was like nobody there; I had nothing in harmony with Mrs. Reed or her children, or her chosen vassalage. If they did not love me, in fact, as little did I love them. They were not bound to regard with affection a thing that could not sympathise with one amongst them; a heterogeneous thing, opposed to them in temperament, in capacity, in propensities; a useless thing, incapable of serving their interest, or adding to their pleasure; a noxious thing, cherishing the germs of indignation at their treatment, of contempt of their judgment. I know that had I been a sanguine, brilliant, careless, exacting, handsome, romping child- though equally dependent and friendless- Mrs. Reed would have endured my presence more complacently; her children would have entertained for me more of the cordiality of fellow-feeling; the servants would have been less prone to make me the scapegoat of the nursery.
　　Daylight began to forsake the red-room; it was past four o';clock, and the beclouded afternoon was tending to drear twilight. I heard the rain still beating continuously on the staircase window, and the wind howling in the grove behind the hall; I grew by degrees cold as a stone, and then my courage sank. My habitual mood of humiliation, self-doubt, forlorn depression, fell damp on the embers of my decaying ire. All said I was wicked, and perhaps I might be so; what thought had I been but just conceiving of starving myself to death? That certainly was a crime: and was I fit to die? Or was the vault under the chancel of Gateshead Church an inviting bourne? In such vault I had been told did Mr. Reed lie buried; and led by this thought to recall his idea, I dwelt on it with gathering dread. I could not remember him; but I knew that he was my own uncle- my mother';s brother- that he had taken me when a parentless infant to his house; and that in his last moments he had required a promise of Mrs. Reed that she would rear and maintain me as one of her own children. Mrs. Reed probably considered she had kept this promise; and so she had, I dare say, as well as her nature would permit her; but how could she really like an interloper not of her race, and unconnected with her, after her husband';s death, by any tie? It must have been most irksome to find herself bound by a hard-wrung pledge to stand in the stead of a parent to a strange child she could not love, and to see an uncongenial alien permanently intruded on her own family group.
　　A singular notion dawned upon me. I doubted not- never doubted- that if Mr. Reed had been alive he would have treated me kindly; and now, as I sat looking at the white bed and overshadowed walls- occasionally also turning a fascinated eye towards the dimly gleaming mirror- I began to recall what I had heard of dead men, troubled in their graves by the violation of their last wishes, revisiting the earth to punish the perjured and avenge the oppressed; and I thought Mr. Reed';s spirit, harassed by the wrongs of his sister';s child, might quit its abode- whether in the church vault or in the unknown world of the departed- and rise before me in this chamber. I wiped my tears and hushed my sobs, fearful lest any sign of violent grief might waken a preternatural voice to comfort me, or elicit from the gloom some haloed face, bending over me with strange pity. This idea, consolatory in theory, I felt would be terrible if realised: with all my might I endeavoured to stifle it- I endeavoured to be firm. Shaking my hair from my eyes, I lifted my head and tried to look boldly round the dark room; at this moment a light gleamed on the wall. Was it, I asked myself, a ray from the moon penetrating some aperture in the blind? No; moonlight was still, and this stirred; while I gazed, it glided up to the ceiling and quivered over my head. I can now conjecture readily that this streak of light was, in all likelihood, a gleam from a lantern carried by some one across the lawn: but then, prepared as my mind was for horror, shaken as my nerves were by agitation, I thought the swift darting beam was a herald of some coming vision from another world. My heart beat thick, my head grew hot; a sound filled my ears, which I deemed the rushing of wings; something seemed near me; I was oppressed, suffocated: endurance broke down; I rushed to the door and shook the lock in desperate effort. Steps came running along the outer passage; the key turned, Bessie and Abbot entered.
　　';Miss Eyre, are you ill?'; said Bessie.
　　';What a dreadful noise! it went quite through me!'; exclaimed Abbot.
　　';Take me out! Let me go into the nursery!'; was my cry.
　　';What for? Are you hurt? Have you seen something?'; again demanded Bessie.
　　';Oh! I saw a light, and I thought a ghost would come.'; I had now got hold of Bessie';s hand, and she did not snatch it from me.
　　';She has screamed out on purpose,'; declared Abbot, in some disgust. ';And what a scream! If she had been in great pain one would have excused it, but she only wanted to bring us all here: I know her naughty tricks.';
　　';What is all this?'; demanded another voice peremptorily; and Mrs. Reed came along the corridor, her cap flying wide, her gown rustling stormily. ';Abbot and Bessie, I believe I gave orders that Jane Eyre should be left in the red-room till I came to her myself.';
　　';Miss Jane screamed so loud, ma';am,'; pleaded Bessie.
　　';Let her go,'; was the only answer. ';Loose Bessie';s hand, child: you cannot succeed in getting out by these means, be assured. I abhor artifice, particularly in children; it is my duty to show you that tricks will not answer: you will now stay here an hour longer, and it is only on condition of perfect submission and stillness that I shall liberate you then.';
　　';O aunt! have pity! forgive me! I cannot endure it- let me be punished some other way! I shall be killed if-';
　　';Silence! This violence is all most repulsive:'; and so, no doubt, she felt it. I was a precocious actress in her eyes; she sincerely. looked on me as a compound of virulent passions, mean spirit, and dangerous duplicity.
　　Bessie and Abbot having retreated, Mrs. Reed, impatient of my now frantic anguish and wild sobs, abruptly thrust me back and locked me in, without farther parley. I heard her sweeping away; and soon after she was gone, I suppose I had a species of fit: unconsciousness closed the scene.
第二章            
    我一路反抗，在我，这还是破天荒第一次。于是大大加深了贝茜和艾博特小姐对我的恶
感。我确实有点儿难以自制，或者如法国人所说，失常了。我意识到，因为一时的反抗，会
不得不遭受古怪离奇的惩罚。于是，像其他造反的奴隶一样，我横下一条心，决计不顾一切
了。
    “抓住她的胳膊，艾博特小姐，她像一只发了疯的猫。”
    “真丢脸！真丢脸！”这位女主人的侍女叫道，“多可怕的举动，爱小姐，居然打起小
少爷来了，他是你恩人的儿子：你的小主人！”
    “主人，他怎么会是我主人，难道我是仆人不成？”
    “不，你连仆人都不如。你不干事，吃白食。喂，坐下来，好好想一想你有多坏。”
    这时候她们已把我拖进了里德太太所指的房间，推操到一条矮凳上，我不由自主地像弹
簧一样跳起来，但立刻被两双手按住了。
    “要是你不安安稳稳坐着，我们可得绑住你了，”贝茜说，“艾博特小姐，把你的袜带
借给我，我那付会被她一下子绷断的。”
    艾博特小姐转而从她粗壮的腿上，解下那条必不可少的带子。捆绑前的准备工作以及由
此而额外蒙受的耻辱，略微消解了我的激动情绪。
    “别解啦，”我叫道，“我不动就是了。”
    作为保证，我让双手紧挨着凳子。
    “记住别动，”贝茜说，知道我确实已经平静下去，便松了手。随后她和艾博特小姐抱
臂而立，沉着脸，满腹狐疑地瞪着我，不相信我的神经还是正常似的。
    “她以前从来没有这样过，”末了，贝茜转身对那位艾比盖尔说。
    “不过她生性如此，”对方回答，“我经常跟太太说起我对这孩子的看法，太太也同
意。这小东西真狡猾，从来没见过像她这样年纪的小姑娘，有那么多鬼心眼的。”
    贝茜没有搭腔，但不一会便对我说：
    “小姐，你该明白，你受了里德太太的恩惠，是她养着你的。要是她把你赶走，你就得
进贫民院了。”
    对她们这番活，我无话可说，因为听起来并不新鲜。我生活的最早记忆中就包含着类似
的暗示，这些责备我赖别人过活的话，己成了意义含糊的老调，叫人痛苦，让人难受，但又
不太好懂。艾博特小姐答话了：
    “你不能因为太太好心把你同里德小姐和少爷一块抚养大，就以为自己与他们平等了。
他们将来会有很多很多钱，而你却一个子儿也不会有。你得学谦恭些，尽量顺着他们，这才
是你的本份。”
    “我们同你说的全是为了你好，”贝茜补充道，口气倒并不严厉，“你做事要巴结些，
学得乖一点，那样也许可以把这当个家住下去，要是你意气用事，粗暴无礼，我敢肯定，太
太会把你撵走。”
    “另外，”艾博特小姐说，“上帝会惩罚她，也许会在她耍啤气时，把她处死，死后她
能上哪儿呢，来，贝茜，咱们走吧，随她去。反正我是无论如何打动不了她啦。爱小姐，你
独个儿呆着的时候，祈祷吧。要是你不忏悔，说不定有个坏家伙会从烟囱进来，把你带
走。”
    她们走了，关了门，随手上了锁。
    红房子是间空余的卧房，难得有人在里面过夜。其实也许可以说，从来没有。除非盖茨
黑德府上偶而拥进一大群客人时，才有必要动用全部房间。但府里的卧室，数它最宽敞、最
堂皇了。—张红木床赫然立于房间正中，粗大的床柱上，罩着深红色锦缎帐幔，活像一个帐
篷。两扇终日窗帘紧闭的大窗，半掩在清一色织物制成的流苏之中。地毯是红的，床脚边的
桌子上铺着深红色的台布，墙呈柔和的黄褐色，略带粉红。大橱、梳妆台和椅子都是乌黑发
亮的红木做的。床上高高地叠着褥垫和枕头，上面铺着雪白的马赛布床罩，在周围深色调陈
设的映衬下，白得眩目。几乎同样显眼的是床头边一把铺着坐垫的大安乐椅，一样的白色，
前面还放着一只脚凳，在我看来，它像一个苍白的宝座。
    房子里难得生火，所以很冷；因为远离保育室和厨房，所以很静；又因为谁都知道很少
有人进去，所以显得庄严肃穆。只有女佣每逢星期六上这里来，把一周内静悄悄落在镜子上
和家具上的灰尘抹去。还有里德太太本人，隔好久才来一次，查看大橱里某个秘密抽屉里的
东西。这里存放着各类羊皮文件，她的首饰盒，以及她已故丈夫的肖像。上面提到的最后几
句话，给红房子带来了一种神秘感，一种魔力，因而它虽然富丽堂皇，却显得分外凄清。
    里德先生死去已经九年了，他就是在这间房子里咽气的，他的遗体在这里让人瞻仰，他
的棺材由殡葬工人从这里抬走。从此之后，这里便始终弥漫着一种阴森森的祭奠氛围，所以
不常有人闯进来。
    里德先生死去已经九年了，他就是在这间房子里咽气的，他的遗体在这里让人瞻仰，他
的棺材由殡葬工人从这里抬走。从此之后，这里便始终弥漫着一种阴森森的祭奠氛围，所以
不常有人闯进来。
    贝茜和刻薄的艾博特小姐让我一动不动坐着的，是一条软垫矮凳，摆在靠近大理石壁炉
的地方。我面前是高耸的床，我右面是黑漆漆的大橱，橱上柔和、斑驳的反光，使镶板的光
泽摇曳变幻。我左面是关得严严实实的窗子，两扇窗子中间有一面大镜子，映照出床和房间
的空旷和肃穆。我吃不准他们锁了门没有，等到敢于走动时，便起来看个究竟。哎呀，不
错，比牢房锁得还紧呐。返回原地时，我必须经过大镜子跟前。我的目光被吸引住了，禁不
住探究起镜中的世界来。在虚幻的映像中，一切都显得比现实中更冷落、更阴沉。那个陌生
的小家伙瞅着我，白白的脸上和胳膊上都蒙上了斑驳的阴影，在—切都凝滞时，唯有那双明
亮恐惧的眼睛在闪动，看上去真像是一个幽灵。我觉得她像那种半仙半人的小精灵，恰如贝
茵在夜晚的故事中所描绘的那样，从沼泽地带山蕨丛生的荒谷中冒出来，现身于迟归的旅行
者眼前。我回到丁我的矮凳上。
    这时候我相信起迷信来了，但并没有到了完全听凭摆布的程度，我依然热血沸腾，反叛
的奴隶那种苦涩情绪依然激励着我。往事如潮、在我脑海中奔涌，如果我不加以遏制，我就
不会对阴暗的现实屈服。
    约翰·里德的专横霸道、他姐妹的高傲冷漠、他母亲的厌恶、仆人们的偏心，像一口混
沌的水井中黑色的沉淀物，一古脑儿泛起在我烦恼不安的心头。
    为什么我总是受苦，总是遭人白眼，总是让人告状，永远受到责备呢？为什么我永远不
能讨人喜欢？为什么我尽力博取欢心，却依然无济于事呢？伊丽莎自私任性，却受到尊敬；
乔治亚娜好使性子，心肠又毒，而且强词夺理目空一切，偏偏得到所有人的纵容。她的美
貌，她红润的面颊，金色的卷发，使得她人见人爱，一俊便可遮百丑。至于约翰，没有人同
他顶撞，更不用说教训他了，虽然他什么坏事都干：捻断鸽子的头颈，弄死小孔雀，放狗去
咬羊，采摘温室中的葡萄，掐断暖房上等花木的嫩芽。有时还叫他母亲“老姑娘”，又因为
她皮肤黝黑像他自己而破口大骂。他蛮横地与母亲作对，经常撕毁她的丝绸服装，而他却依
然是“她的宝贝蛋”。而我不敢有丝毫闪失，干什么都全力以赴，人家还是骂我淘气鬼，讨
厌坯，骂我阴丝丝，贼溜溜，从早上骂到下午，从下午骂到晚上。
    我因为挨了打、跌了交，头依然疼痛，依然流着血。约翰肆无忌惮地打我，却不受责
备，而我不过为了免遭进一步无理殴打，反抗了一下，便成了众矢之的。
    “不公呵，不公！”我的理智呼喊着。在痛苦的刺激下我的理智变得早熟，化作了一种
短暂的力量。决心也同样鼓动起来，激发我去采取某种奇怪的手段，来摆脱难以忍受的压
迫，譬如逃跑，要是不能奏效，那就不吃不喝，活活饿死。
    那个阴沉的下午，我心里多么惶恐不安！我的整个脑袋如一团乱麻，我的整颗心在反
抗：然而那场内心斗争又显得多么茫然，多么无知啊！我无法回答心底那永无休止的问题—
—为什么我要如此受苦。此刻，在相隔——我不说多少年以后，我看清楚了。
    我在盖茨黑德府上格格不入。在那里我跟谁都不像。同里德太太、她的孩子、她看中的
家仆，都不融洽。他们不爱我，说实在我也一样不爱他们。他们没有必要热情对待一个与自
已合不来的家伙，一个无论是个性、地位，还是嗜好都同他们泾渭分明的异己；一个既不能
为他们效劳，也不能给他们增添欢乐的废物；一个对自己的境界心存不满而又蔑视他们想法
的讨厌家伙。我明白，如果我是一个聪明开朗、漂亮顽皮、不好侍候的孩子，即使同样是寄
人篱下，同样是无亲无故，里德太太也会对我的处境更加宽容忍让；她的孩子们也会对我亲
切热情些；佣人们也不会一再把我当作保育室的替罪羊了。
    红房子里白昼将尽。时候已是四点过后，暗沉沉的下午正转为凄凉的黄昏。我听见雨点
仍不停地敲打着楼梯的窗户，狂风在门厅后面的树丛中怒号。我渐渐地冷得像块石头，勇气
也烟消云  散。往常那种屈辱感，那种缺乏自信、孤独沮丧的情绪，浇灭了我将消未消的怒
火，谁都说我坏，也许我确实如此吧。我不是一心谋划着让自己饿死吗？这当然是一种罪
过。而且我该不该死呢？或者，盖茨黑德教堂圣坛底下的墓穴是个令人向往的归宿吗？听说
里德先生就长眠在这样的墓穴里。这一念头重又勾起了我对他的回忆，而越往下细想，就越
害怕起来。我已经不记得他了，只知道他是我舅父——我母亲的哥哥——他收养了我这个襁
褓中的孤儿，而且在弥留之际，要里德太太答应，把我当作她自己的孩子来抚养。里德太太
也许认为自己是信守诺言的。而我想就她本性而论，也确是实践了当初的许诺。可是她怎么
能真心喜欢一个不属于她家的外姓、一个在丈夫死后同她已了却一切干系的人呢？她发现自
己受这勉为其难的保证的约束，充当一个自己所无法喜爱的陌生孩子的母亲，眼睁睁看着一
位不相投合的外人永远硬挤在自己的家人中间。对她来说，这想必是件最恼人的事情了。
    红房子里白昼将尽。时候已是四点过后，暗沉沉的下午正转为凄凉的黄昏。我听见雨点
仍不停地敲打着楼梯的窗户，狂风在门厅后面的树丛中怒号。我渐渐地冷得像块石头，勇气
也烟消云  散。往常那种屈辱感，那种缺乏自信、孤独沮丧的情绪，浇灭了我将消未消的怒
火，谁都说我坏，也许我确实如此吧。我不是一心谋划着让自己饿死吗？这当然是一种罪
过。而且我该不该死呢？或者，盖茨黑德教堂圣坛底下的墓穴是个令人向往的归宿吗？听说
里德先生就长眠在这样的墓穴里。这一念头重又勾起了我对他的回忆，而越往下细想，就越
害怕起来。我已经不记得他了，只知道他是我舅父——我母亲的哥哥——他收养了我这个襁
褓中的孤儿，而且在弥留之际，要里德太太答应，把我当作她自己的孩子来抚养。里德太太
也许认为自己是信守诺言的。而我想就她本性而论，也确是实践了当初的许诺。可是她怎么
能真心喜欢一个不属于她家的外姓、一个在丈夫死后同她已了却一切干系的人呢？她发现自
己受这勉为其难的保证的约束，充当一个自己所无法喜爱的陌生孩子的母亲，眼睁睁看着一
位不相投合的外人永远硬挤在自己的家人中间。对她来说，这想必是件最恼人的事情了。
    我忽然闪过一个古怪的念头。我不怀疑—一也从来没有怀疑过——里德先生要是在世，
一定会待我很好。此刻，我坐着，一面打量着白白的床和影影绰绰的墙，不时还用经不住诱
惑的目光，瞟一眼泛着微光的镜子，不由得忆起了关于死人的种种传闻。据说由于人们违背
了他们临终的嘱托，他们在坟墓里非常不安，于是便重访人间，严惩发假誓的人，并为受压
者报仇。我思忖，里德先生的幽灵为外甥女的冤屈所动，会走出居所，不管那是教堂的墓
穴，还是死者无人知晓的世界，来到这间房子，站在我面前。我抹去眼泪，忍住哭泣，担心
嚎啕大哭会惊动什么不可知的声音来抚慰我，或者在昏暗中召来某些带光环的面孔，露出奇
异怜悯的神色，俯身对着我。这念头听起来很令人欣慰，不过要是真的做起来，想必会非常
可怕。我使劲不去想它，抬起头来，大着胆子环顾了一下暗洞洞的房间。就在这时，墙上闪
过一道亮光。我问自己，会不会是一缕月光，透过百叶窗的缝隙照了进来？不，月光是静止
的，而这透光却是流动的。停晴一看，这光线滑到了天花板上，在我头顶上抖动起来。现在
我会很自然地联想到，那很可能是有人提着灯笼穿过草地时射进来的光。但那会儿，我脑子
里尽往恐怖处去想，我的神经也由于激动而非常紧张，我认为那道飞快掠过的光，是某个幽
灵从另一个世界到来的先兆。我的心怦怦乱跳，头脑又热又胀，耳朵里呼呼作响，以为那是
翅膀拍击声，好像什么东西已经逼近我了。我感到压抑，感到窒息，我的忍耐力崩溃了，禁
不住发疯似地大叫了一声，冲向大门，拼命摇着门锁。外面们廊上响起了飞跑而来的脚步
声，钥匙转动了，贝茜和艾博特走进房间。
    “啊！我看到了一道光，想必是鬼来了。”这时，我拉住了贝茜的手，而她并没有抽回
去。
    “她是故意乱叫乱嚷的，”艾博特厌烦地当着我的面说，“而且叫得那么凶！要是真痛
得厉害，倒还可以原谅，可她只不过要把我们骗到这里来，我知道她的诡计。”
    “到底是怎么回事？”一个咄咄逼人的声音问道。随后，里德太太从走廊里走过来，帽
子飘忽着被风鼓得大大的，睡袍悉悉簌簌响个不停。“艾博特，贝茜，我想我吩咐过，让
简·爱呆在红房子里，由我亲自来过问。”
    “简小姐叫得那么响，夫人，”贝茵恳求着。
    “放开她，”这是唯一的回答。“松开贝茵的手，孩子。你尽可放心，靠这些办法，是
出不去的，我讨厌耍花招，尤其是小孩子，我有责任让你知道，鬼把戏不管用。现在你要在
这里多呆一个小时，而且只有服服贴贴，一动不动，才放你出来。”
    “啊，舅妈，可怜可怜我吧：饶恕我吧！我实在受不了啦，用别的办法惩罚我吧！我会
憋死的，要是——”
    “住嘴！这么闹闹嚷嚷讨厌透了。”她无疑就是这么感觉的。在她眼里我是个早熟的演
员，她打心底里认为，我是个本性恶毒、灵魂卑劣、为人阴险的货色。
    贝茜和艾博特退了出去。里德太太对我疯也似的痛苦嚎叫很不耐烦，无意再往下谈了，
蓦地把我往后一推，锁上了门。我听见她堂而皇之地走了。她走后不久，我猜想我便一阵痉
挛，昏了过去，结束了这场吵闹。

[FF名著欣赏二]简爱（JEAN EYRE）（中英对照）

CHAPTER III
　　THE next thing I remember is, waking up with a feeling as if I had had a frightful nightmare, and seeing before me a terrible red glare, crossed with thick black bars. I heard voices, too, speaking with a hollow sound, and as if muffled by a rush of wind or water: agitation, uncertainty, and an all-predominating sense of terror confused my faculties. Ere long, I became aware that some one was handling me; lifting me up and supporting me in a sitting posture, and that more tenderly than I had ever been raised or upheld before. I rested my head against a pillow or an arm, and felt easy.
　　In five minutes more the cloud of bewilderment dissolved: I knew quite well that I was in my own bed, and that the red glare was the nursery fire. It was night: a candle burnt on the table; Bessie stood at the bed-foot with a basin in her hand, and a gentleman sat in a chair near my pillow, leaning over me.
　　I felt an inexpressible relief, a soothing conviction of protection and security, when I knew that there was a stranger in the room, an individual not belonging to Gateshead, and not related to Mrs. Reed. Turning from Bessie (though her presence was far less obnoxious to me than that of Abbot, for instance, would have been), I scrutinised the face of the gentleman: I knew him; it was Mr. Lloyd, an apothecary, sometimes called in by Mrs. Reed when the servants were ailing: for herself and the children she employed a physician.
　　';Well, who am I?'; he asked.
　　I pronounced his name, offering him at the same time my hand: he took it, smiling and saying, ';We shall do very well by and by.'; Then he laid me down, and addressing Bessie, charged her to be very careful that I was not disturbed during the night. Having given some further directions, and intimated that he should call again the next day, he departed; to my grief: I felt so sheltered and befriended while he sat in the chair near my pillow; and as he closed the door after him, all the room darkened and my heart again sank: inexpressible sadness weighed it down.
　　';Do you feel as if you should sleep, Miss?'; asked Bessie, rather softly.
　　Scarcely dared I answer her; for I feared the next sentence might be rough. ';I will try.';
　　';Would you like to drink, or could you eat anything?';
　　';No, thank you, Bessie.';
　　';Then I think I shall go to bed, for it is past twelve o';clock; but you may call me if you want anything in the night.';
　　Wonderful civility this! It emboldened me to ask a question.
　　';Bessie, what is the matter with me? Am I ill?';
　　';You fell sick, I suppose, in the red-room with crying; you';ll be better soon, no doubt.';
　　Bessie went into the housemaid';s apartment, which was near. I heard her say-
　　';Sarah, come and sleep with me in the nursery; I daren';t for my life be alone with that poor child tonight: she might die; it';s such a strange thing she should have that fit: I wonder if she saw anything. Missis was rather too hard.';
　　Sarah came back with her; they both went to bed; they were whispering together for half an hour before they fell asleep. I caught scraps of their conversation, from which I was able only too distinctly to infer the main subject discussed.
　　';Something passed her, all dressed in white, and vanished';- ';A great black dog behind him';- ';Three loud raps on the chamber door';- ';A light in the churchyard just over his grave,'; etc., etc.
　　At last both slept: the fire and the candle went out. For me, the watches of that long night passed in ghastly wakefulness; ear, eye, and mind were alike strained by dread: such dread as children only can feel.
　　No severe or prolonged bodily illness followed this incident of the red-room; it only gave my nerves a shock of which I feel the reverberation to this day. Yes, Mrs. Reed, to you I owe some fearful pangs of mental suffering, but I ought to forgive you, for you knew not what you did: while rending my heart-strings, you thought you were only uprooting my bad propensities.
　　Next day, by noon, I was up and dressed, and sat wrapped in a shawl by the nursery hearth. I felt physically weak and broken down: but my worse ailment was an unutterable wretchedness of mind: a wretchedness which kept drawing from me silent tears; no sooner had I wiped one salt drop from my cheek than another followed. Yet, I thought, I ought to have been happy, for none of the Reeds were there, they were all gone out in the carriage with their mama. Abbot, too, was sewing in another room, and Bessie, as she moved hither and thither, putting away toys and arranging drawers, addressed to me every now and then a word of unwonted kindness. This state of things should have been to me a paradise of peace, accustomed as I was to a life of ceaseless reprimand and thankless fagging; but, in fact, my racked nerves were now in such a state that no calm could soothe, and no pleasure excite them agreeably.
　　Bessie had been down into the kitchen, and she brought up with her a tart on a certain brightly painted china plate, whose bird of paradise, nestling in a wreath of convolvuli and rosebuds, had been wont to stir in me a most enthusiastic sense of admiration; and which plate I had often petitioned to be allowed to take in my hand in order to examine it more closely, but had always hitherto been deemed unworthy of such a privilege. This precious vessel was now placed on my knee, and I was cordially invited to eat the circlet of delicate pastry upon it. Vain favour! coming, like most other favours long deferred and often wished for, too late! I could not eat the tart; and the plumage of the bird, the tints of the flowers, seemed strangely faded: I put both plate and tart away. Bessie asked if I would have a book: the word book acted as a transient stimulus, and I begged her to fetch Gulliver';s Travels from the library. This book I had again and again perused with delight. I considered it a narrative of facts, and discovered in it a vein of interest deeper than what I found in fairy tales: for as to the elves, having sought them in vain among fox-glove leaves and bells, under mushrooms and beneath the ground-ivy mantling old wall-nooks, I had at length made up my mind to the sad truth, that they were all gone out of England to some savage country where the woods were wilder and thicker, and the population more scant; whereas, Lilliput and Brobdingnag being, in my creed, solid parts of the earth';s surface, I doubted not that I might one day, by taking a long voyage, see with my own eyes the little fields, houses, and trees, the diminutive people, the tiny cows, sheep, and birds of the one realm; and the corn-fields, forest-high, the mighty mastiffs, the monster cats, the tower-like men and women, of the other. Yet, when this cherished volume was now placed in my hand- when I turned over its leaves, and sought in its marvellous pictures the charm I had, till now, never failed to find- all was eerie and dreary; the giants were gaunt goblins, the pigmies malevolent and fearful imps, Gulliver a most desolate wanderer in most dread and dangerous regions. I closed the book, which I dared no longer peruse, and put it on the table, beside the untasted tart.
　　Bessie had now finished dusting and tidying the room, and having washed her hands, she opened a certain little drawer, full of splendid shreds of silk and satin, and began making a new bonnet for Georgiana';s doll. Meantime she sang: her song was-
　　 ';In the days when we were gipsying,
　　 A long time ago.';
　　I had often heard the song before, and always with lively delight; for Bessie had a sweet voice,- at least, I thought so. But now, though her voice was still sweet, I found in its melody an indescribable sadness. Sometimes, preoccupied with her work, she sang the refrain very low, very lingeringly; ';A long time ago'; came out like the saddest cadence of a funeral hymn. She passed into another ballad, this time a really doleful one.
　　';My feet they are sore, and my limbs they are weary;
　　 Long is the way, and the mountains are wild;
　　Soon will the twilight close moonless and dreary
　　 Over the path of the poor orphan child.
　　Why did they send me so far and so lonely,
　　 Up where the moors spread and grey rocks are piled?
　　Men are hard-hearted, and kind angels only
　　 Watch o';er the steps of a poor orphan child.
　　Yet distant and soft the night breeze is blowing,
　　 Clouds there are none, and clear stars beam mild,
　　God, in His mercy, protection is showing,
　　 Comfort and hope to the poor orphan child.
　　Ev';n should I fall o';er the broken bridge passing,
　　 Or stray in the marshes, by false lights beguiled,
　　Still will my Father, with promise and blessing,
　　 Take to His bosom the poor orphan child.
　　There is a thought that for strength should avail me,
　　 Though both of shelter and kindred despoiled;
　　Heaven is a home, and a rest will not fail me;
　　 God is a friend to the poor orphan child.';
　　';Come, Miss Jane, don';t cry,'; said Bessie as she finished. She might as well have said to the fire, ';don';t burn!'; but how could she divine the morbid suffering to which I was a prey? In the course of the morning Mr. Lloyd came again.
　　';What, already up!'; said he, as he entered the nursery. ';Well, nurse, how is she?';
　　Bessie answered that I was doing very well.
　　';Then she ought to look more cheerful. Come here, Mis Jane: your name is Jane, is it not?';
　　';Yes, sir, Jane Eyre.';
　　';Well, you have been crying, Miss Jane Eyre; can you tell me what about? Have you any pain?';
　　';No, sir.';
　　';Oh! I daresay she is crying because she could not go out with Missis in the carriage,'; interposed Bessie.
　　';Surely not! why, she is too old for such pettishness.';
　　I thought so too; and my self-esteem being wounded by the false charge, I answered promptly, ';I never cried for such a thing in my life: I hate going out in the carriage. I cry because I am miserable.';
　　';Oh fie, Miss!'; said Bessie.
　　The good apothecary appeared a little puzzled. I was standing before him; he fixed his eyes on me very steadily: his eyes were small and grey; not very bright, but I daresay I should think them shrewd now: he had a hard-featured yet good-natured looking face. Having considered me at leisure, he said-
　　';What made you ill yesterday?';
　　';She had a fall,'; said Bessie, again putting in her word.
　　';Fall! why, that is like a baby again! Can';t she manage to walk at her age? She must be eight or nine years old.';
　　';I was knocked down,'; was the blunt explanation, jerked out of me by another pang of mortified pride; ';but that did not make me ill,'; I added; while Mr. Lloyd helped himself to a pinch of snuff.
　　As he was returning the box to his waistcoat pocket, a loud bell rang for the servants'; dinner; he knew what it was. ';That';s for you, nurse,'; said he; ';you can go down; I';ll give Miss Jane a lecture till you come back.';
　　Bessie would rather have stayed, but she was obliged to go, because punctuality at meals was rigidly enforced at Gates-head Hall.
　　';The fall did not make you ill; what did, then?'; pursued Mr. Lloyd when Bessie was gone.
　　';I was shut up in a room where there is a ghost till after dark.';
　　I saw Mr. Lloyd smile and frown at the same time. ';Ghost! What, you are a baby after all! You are afraid of ghosts?';
　　';Of Mr. Reed';s ghost I am: he died in that room, and was laid out there. Neither Bessie nor any one else will go into it at night, if they can help it; and it was cruel to shut me up alone without a candle,- so cruel that I think I shall never forget it.';
　　';Nonsense! And is it that makes you so miserable? Are you afraid now in daylight?';
　　';No: but night will come again before long: and besides,- I am unhappy,- very unhappy, for other things.';
　　';What other things? Can you tell me some of them?';
　　How much I wished to reply fully to this question! How difficult it was to frame any answer! Children can feel, but they cannot analyse their feelings; and if the analysis is partially effected in thought, they know not how to express the result of the process in words. Fearful, however, of losing this first and only opportunity of relieving my grief by imparting it, I, after a disturbed pause, contrived to frame a meagre, though, as far as it went, true response.
　　';For one thing, I have no father or mother, brothers or sisters.';
　　';You have a kind aunt and cousins.';
　　Again I paused; then bunglingly enounced-
　　';But John Reed knocked me down, and my aunt shut me up in the red-room.';
　　Mr. Lloyd a second time produced his snuff-box.
　　';Don';t you think Gateshead Hall a very beautiful house?'; asked he. ';Are you not very thankful to have such a fine place to live at?';
　　';It is not my house, sir; and Abbot says I have less right to be here than a servant.';
　　';Pooh! you can';t be silly enough to wish to leave such a splendid place?';
　　';If I had anywhere else to go, I should be glad to leave it; but I can never get away from Gateshead till I am a woman.';
　　';Perhaps you may- who knows? Have you any relations besides Mrs. Reed?';
　　';I think not, sir.';
　　';None belonging to your father?';
　　';I don';t know: I asked Aunt Reed once, and she said possibly I might have some poor, low relations called Eyre, but she knew nothing about them.';
　　';If you had such, would you like to go to them?';
　　I reflected. Poverty looks grim to grown people; still more so to children: they have not much idea of industrious, working, respectable poverty; they think of the word only as connected with ragged clothes, scanty food, fireless grates, rude manners, and debasing vices: poverty for me was synonymous with degradation.
　　';No; I should not like to belong to poor people,'; was my reply.
　　';Not even if they were kind to you?';
　　I shook my head: I could not see how poor people had the means of being kind; and then to learn to speak like them, to adopt their manners, to be uneducated, to grow up like one of the poor women I saw sometimes nursing their children or washing their clothes at the cottage doors of the village of Gateshead: no, I was not heroic enough to purchase liberty at the price of caste.
　　';But are your relatives so very poor? Are they working people?';
　　';I cannot tell; Aunt Reed says if I have any, they must be a beggarly set: I should not like to go a-begging.';
　　';Would you like to go to school?';
　　Again I reflected: I scarcely knew what school was: Bessie sometimes spoke of it as a place where young ladies sat in the stocks, wore backboards, and were expected to be exceedingly genteel and precise: John Reed hated his school, and abused his master; but John Reed';s tastes were no rule for mine, and if Bessie';s accounts of school-discipline (gathered from the young ladies of a family where she had lived before coming to Gateshead) were somewhat appalling, her details of certain accomplishments attained by these same young ladies were, I thought, equally attractive. She boasted of beautiful paintings of landscapes and flowers by them executed; of songs they could sing and pieces they could play, of purses they could net, of French books they could translate; till my spirit was moved to emulation as I listened. Besides, school would be a complete change: it implied a long journey, an entire separation from Gateshead, an entrance into a new life.
　　';I should indeed like to go to school,'; was the audible conclusion of my musings.
　　';Well, well! who knows what may happen?'; said Mr. Lloyd, as he got up. ';The child ought to have change of air and scene,'; he added, speaking to himself; ';nerves not in a good state.';
　　Bessie now returned; at the same moment the carriage was heard rolling up the gravel-walk.
　　';Is that your mistress, nurse?'; asked Mr. Lloyd. ';I should like to speak to her before I go.';
　　Bessie invited him to walk into the breakfast-room, and led the way out. In the interview which followed between him and Mrs. Reed, I presume, from after-occurrences, that the apothecary ventured to recommend my being sent to school; and the recommendation was no doubt readily enough adopted; for as Abbot said, in discussing the subject with Bessie when both sat sewing in the nursery one night, after I was in bed, and, as they thought, asleep, ';Missis was, she dared say, glad enough to get rid of such a tiresome, ill-conditioned child, who always looked as if she were watching everybody, and scheming plots underhand.'; Abbot, I think, gave me credit for being a sort of infantine Guy Fawkes.
　　On that same occasion I learned, for the first time, from Miss Abbot';s communications to Bessie, that my father had been a poor clergyman; that my mother had married him against the wishes of her friends, who considered the match beneath her; that my grandfather Reed was so irritated at her disobedience, he cut her off without a shilling; that after my mother and father had been married a year, the latter caught the typhus fever while visiting among the poor of a large manufacturing town where his curacy was situated, and where that disease was then prevalent: that my mother took the infection from him, and both died within a month of each other.
　　Bessie, when she heard this narrative, sighed and said, ';Poor Miss Jane is to be pitied too, Abbot.';
　　';Yes,'; responded Abbot; ';if she were a nice, pretty child, one might compassionate her forlornness; but one really cannot care for such a little toad as that.';
　　';Not a great deal, to be sure,'; agreed Bessie: ';at any rate, a beauty like Miss Georgiana would be more moving in the same condition.';
　　';Yes, I doat on Miss Georgiana!'; cried the fervent Abbot. ';Little darling!- with her long curls and her blue eyes, and such a sweet colour as she has; just as if she were painted!- Bessie, I could fancy a Welsh rabbit for supper.';
　　';So could I- with a roast onion. Come, we';ll go down.'; They went.
第三章            
    我随后记得，醒过来时仿佛做了一场可怕的恶梦，看到眼前闪烁着骇人的红光，被一根
根又粗又黑的条子所隔断。我还听到了沉闷的说话声，仿佛被一阵风声或水声盖住了似的。
激动不安以及压倒一切的恐怖感，使我神智模糊了。不久，我明白有人在摆弄我，把我扶起
来，让我靠着他坐着。我觉得以前从来没有被人这么轻乎轻脚地抱起过，我把头倚在一个枕
头上或是一条胳膊上，感到很舒服。
    五分钟后，心头的疑云消散了。我完全明白我在自己的床上，那红光是保育室的炉火。
时候是夜间，桌上燃着蜡烛。贝茵端着脸盆站在床脚边，一位老先生坐在我枕边的椅子上，
俯身向着我。
    我知道房间里有一个生人，一个不属于盖茨黑德府、也不与里德太太拈亲带故的人。这
时，我感到了一种难以言表的宽慰，一种确信受到庇护而觉得安全的欣慰之情。我的目光离
开贝茜（尽管她在身边远没有艾博特那么讨厌），细细端详这位先生的面容。我认识他，他
是芳埃德先生，是个药剂师，有时里德太太请他来给佣人们看病。但她自己和孩子们不舒服
时，请的是位内科医生。
    “瞧，我是谁？”他问。
    我说出了他的名字，同时把手伸给他，他握住了我的手、微微一笑说：“慢慢会好起来
的。”随后他扶我躺下，并吩咐贝茜千万小心，在夜里别让我受到打扰。他又叮嘱了一番，
说了声第二天再来后，便走了。我非常难过。有他坐在我枕边的椅子上，我感到既温暖又亲
近，而他一走，门一关上，整个房间便暗了下来，我的心再次沉重起来，一种无可名状的哀
伤威压着我。
    “你觉得该睡了吗，小姐？”贝茜问，口气相当温存。
    我几乎不敢回答她，害怕接着的话粗鲁不中听。“我试试。”
    “你想喝什么，或者能吃点什么吗？”
    “不啦，谢谢，贝茜。”
    “那我去睡了，已经过了十二点啦，不过要是夜里需要什么，你尽管叫我。”
    多么彬彬有礼啊！于是我大着胆子问了个问题。
    “贝茜，我怎啦？病了吗？”
    “你是病了，猜想是在红房子里哭出病来的，肯定很快就会好的。”
    贝茵走进了附近佣人的卧房。我听见她说：
    “萨拉，过来同我一起睡在保育室吧，今儿晚上，就是要我命，我也不敢同那个可怜孩
子单独过夜了。她说不定会死的。真奇怪她竟会昏过去。不知道她看见了什么没有。里德太
太也太狠心了。”
    萨拉跟着她回来了，两人都上了床，嘁嘁喳喳讲了半个小时才睡着。我只听到了片言只
语，但我可以清楚地推断出她们讨论的主题。
    “有个东西从她身边经过，一身素装，转眼就不见了”——“一条大黑狗跟在后面”—
—“在房门上砰砰砰”敲了三下——“墓地里一道白光正好掠过他坟墓”等等等等。
    最后，两人都睡着了，炉火和烛光也都熄灭。我就这么可怕地醒着挨过了漫漫长夜，害
怕得耳朵、眼睛和头脑都紧张起来，这种恐俱是只有儿童才能感受到的，
    红房子事件并没有给我身体留下严重或慢性的后遗症，它不过使我的神经受了惊吓，对
此我至今记忆犹新。是的，里德太太，你让我领受了可怕的精神创伤，但我应当原谅你、因
为你并不明白自己干了些什么，明明是在割断我的心弦，却自以为无非是要根除我的恶习。
    第二天中午，我起来穿好衣服，裹了块浴巾，坐在保育室壁炉旁边。我身体虚弱，几乎
要垮下来。但最大的痛楚却是内心难以言传的苦恼，弄得我不断地暗暗落泪。才从脸颊上抹
去一滴带咸味的泪水，另一滴又滚落下来。不过，我想我应当高兴，因为里德一家人都不
在，他们都坐了车随妈妈出去了。艾博特也在另一间屋里做针线活。而贝茵呢，来回忙碌
着，一面把玩具收拾起来，将抽屉整理好，一面还不时地同我说两句少有的体贴话。对我来
说，过惯了那种成天挨骂、辛辛苦苦吃力不讨好的日子后，这光景该好比是平静的乐园。然
而，我的神经己被折磨得痛苦不堪，终于连平静也抚慰不了我，欢乐也难以使我兴奋了。
    贝茜下楼去了一趟厨房，端上来一个小烘饼，放在一个图案鲜艳的瓷盘里，图案上画的
是一只极乐鸟，偎依在一圈旋花和玫瑰花苞上。这幅画曾激起我热切的羡慕之情。我常常恳
求让我端一端这只盘子，好仔细看个究竟，但总是被认为不配享受这样的特权。此刻，这只
珍贵的器皿就搁在我膝头上，我还受到热诚邀请，品尝器皿里一小圈精美的糕点。徒有虚名
的垂爱啊！跟其他久拖不予而又始终期待着的宠爱一样，来得太晚了！我已无意光顾这烘
饼，而且那鸟的羽毛和花卉的色泽也奇怪地黯然无光了。我把盘子和烘饼挪开。贝茜问我是
否想要一本书。“书”字产生了瞬间的刺激，我求她去图书室取来一本《格列佛游记》。我
曾兴致勃动地反复细读过这本书，认为书中叙述的都实有其事，因而觉得比童话中写的有
趣。至于那些小精灵们，我在毛地黄叶子与花冠之间，在蘑菇底下和爬满老墙角落的长春藤
下遍寻无着之后，终于承认这悲哀的事实：他们都己逃离英国到某个原始的乡间去了，那儿
树林更荒凉茂密，人口更为稀少。而我虔信，小人国和大人国都是地球表面实实在在的一部
份。我毫不怀疑有朝一日我会去远航，亲眼看一看一个王国里小小的田野、小小的房子、小
小的树木；看一看那里的小人、小牛、小羊和小鸟们；目睹一下另一个王国里如森林一般高
耸的玉米地、硕大的猛犬、巨大无比的猫以及高塔一般的男男女女。然而，此刻当我手里捧
着这本珍爱的书，一页页翻过去，从精妙的插图中寻觅以前每试必爽的魅力时，我找到的只
是怪异和凄凉。巨人成了憔悴的妖怪，矮子沦为恶毒可怖的小鬼，而格列佛则已是陷身于险
境的孤独的流浪者了。我不敢往下看了，合上书，把它放在桌上一口未尝的小烘饼旁边。
    我以前常听这首歌，而且总觉得它欢快悦耳，因为贝茜的嗓子很甜，至少我认为如此。
而此刻，虽然她甜蜜的嗓子依旧，但歌里透出了一种难以言喻的悲哀。有时，她干活出了
神，把迭句唱得很低沉，拖得很长。一句“很久很久以前”唱出来，如同挽歌中最哀伤的调
子。她接着又唱起一首民谣来，这回可是真的哀怨凄恻了。
    我的双脚酸痛啊四肢乏力，前路漫漫啊大山荒芜。没有月光啊天色阴凄，暮霭沉沉啊笼
罩着可怜孤儿的旅途。
    为什么要让我孤苦伶丁远走他乡，流落在荒野连绵峭岩重叠的异地。人心狠毒啊，唯有
天使善良，关注着可怜孤儿的足迹。
    从远处吹来了柔和的夜风，晴空中繁星闪烁着温煦的光芒。仁慈的上帝啊，你赐福于万
众，可怜的孤儿得到了保护、安慰和希望。
    哪怕我走过断桥失足坠落，或是在迷茫恍惚中误入泥淖。天父啊，你带着祝福与许诺，
把可怜的孤儿搂入你怀抱。
    哪怕我无家可归无亲无故，一个给人力量的信念在我心头。天堂啊，永远是归宿和安息
之所，上帝是可怜孤儿的朋友。
    “来吧，简小姐，别哭了，”贝茜唱完了说。其实，她无异于对火说“你别燃烧！”不
过，她怎么能揣度出我被极度的痛苦所折磨？早上劳埃德先生又来了。
    “怎么，己经起来了！”他一进保育室就说，“嗨，保姆、她怎么样了？”
    贝茜回答说我情况很好。
    “那她应该高兴才是。过来、简小姐，你的名字叫简，是不是？”
    “是，先生，叫简·爱。”
    “瞧，你一直在哭，简·爱小姐，你能告诉我为什么吗？哪儿疼吗？”
    “不疼，先生。”
    “啊，我想是因为不能跟小姐们一起坐马车出去才哭的，”贝茜插嘴说。
    “当然不是罗！她那么大了，不会为这点小事闹别扭的。”
    这恰恰也是我的想法。而她这么冤枉我伤了我的自尊，所以我当即回答，“我长得这么
大从来没有为这种事哭过，而且我又讨厌乘马车出去。我是因为心里难受才哭的。”
    “嘿，去去，小姐！”贝茜说。
    好心的药剂师似乎有些莫明其妙。我站在他面前，他目不转睛地看着我。他灰色的小眼
睛并不明亮，但现在想来也许应当说是非常锐利的。他的面相既严厉而又温厚，他从从容容
地打量了我一番后说：
    “昨天你怎么得病的呢？”
    “她跌了一跤。”贝茜又插嘴了。
    “跌交：又耍娃娃脾气了！她这样年纪还不会走路？八九岁总有了吧。”
    “我是被人给打倒的，”我脱口而出。由于自尊心再次受到伤害，引起了一阵痛楚，我
冒昧地作了这样的辩解。“但光那样也不会生病。”我趁劳埃德先生取了一撮鼻烟吸起来时
说。
    他把烟盒放入背心口袋。这时，铃声大作，叫佣人们去吃饭。他明白是怎么回事。“那
是叫你的，保姆，”他说，“你可以下去啦，我来开导开导简小姐，等着你回来，”
    贝茜本想留着，但又不得不走，准时吃饭是盖茨黑德府的一条成规。
    “你不是以为跌了跤才生病吧？那么因为什么呢？”贝茜一走，劳埃德先生便追问道。
    “他们把我关在一间闹鬼的房子里，直到天黑。”
    我看到劳埃德先生微微一笑，同时又皱起眉头来，“鬼？瞧，你毕竟还是个娃娃！你怕
鬼吗？”
    里德先生的鬼魂我是怕的，他就死在那同房子里，还在那里停过棂。无论贝茜，还是别
人，能不进去，是不在夜里进那房间的。多狠心呀，把我一个人关在里面，连支蜡烛也不
点。心肠那么狠，我一辈子都忘不了。”
    “瞎说！就因为这个使你心里难受，现在大白天你还怕吗？”
    “现在不怕，不过马上又要到夜里了。另外，我不愉快，很不愉快，为的是其他事
情。”
    “其他什么事？能说些给我听听吗？”
    我多么希望能原原本本回答这个问题！要作出回答又何其困难：孩子们能够感觉，但无
法分析自己的情感，即使部分分折能够意会，分析的过程也难以言传。但是我又担心失去这
第一次也是唯一一次吐苦水的机会。所以局促不安地停了一停之后，便琢磨出一个虽不详尽
却相当真实的回答。
    “一方面是因为我没有父母，没有兄弟姐妹的缘故。”
    “可是你有一位和蔼可亲的舅母，还有表兄妹们。”
    我又顿了顿，随后便笨嘴笨舌地说：
    “可是约翰·里德把我打倒了，而舅妈又把我关在红房子里。”
    劳埃德先生再次掏出了鼻烟盒。
    “你不觉得盖茨黑德府是座漂亮的房子吗？”他问，“让你住那么好一个地方，你难道
不感激？”
    “这又不是我的房子，先生。艾博特还说我比这儿的佣人还不如呢。”
    “去！你总不至于傻得想离开这个好地方吧。”
    “要是我有地方去，我是乐意走的。可是不等到长大成人我休想摆脱盖茨黑德。”
    “也许可以——谁知道？除了里德太太，你还有别的亲戚吗？”
    “我想没有了，先生。”
    “你父亲那头也没有了吗？”
    “我不知道，有一回我问过舅妈，她说可能有些姓爱的亲戚，人又穷，地位又低，她对
他们的情况一无所知。”
    “要是有这样的亲戚，你愿意去吗？”
    我陷入了沉思，在成年人看来贫困显得冷酷无情，孩子则尤其如此。至于勤劳刻苦、令
人钦敬的贫困，孩子们不甚了了。在他们心目中，这个字眼始终与衣衫槛褴褛、食品匿乏、
壁炉无火、行为粗鲁以及低贱的恶习联系在一起。对我来说，贫困就是堕落的别名。
    “不，我不愿与穷人为伍，”这就是我的回答。
    “即使他们待你很好也不愿意？”
    我摇了摇头，不明白穷人怎么会有条件对人仁慈，更不说我还得学他们的言谈举止，同
他们一样没有文化，长大了像有时见到的那种贫苦女人一样，坐在盖茨黑德府茅屋门口，奶
孩子或者搓洗衣服。不，我可没有那样英雄气概，宁愿抛却身份来换取自由。
    “但是你的亲戚就那么穷，都是靠干活过日子的么？”
    “我说不上来。里德舅妈说，要是我有亲戚，也准是一群要饭的，我可不愿去要饭。”
    “你想上学吗？”
    我再次沉思起来。我几乎不知道学校是什么样子。光听贝茜有时说起过，那个地方，年
轻女子带足枷坐着，戴着脊骨矫正板，还非得要十分文雅和规矩才行。约翰·里德对学校恨
之入骨，还大骂教师。不过他的感受不足为凭。如果贝茜关于校纪的说法（她来盖茨黑德之
前，从她主人家一些年轻小姐那儿收集来的）有些骇人听闻，那么她细说的关于那些小姐所
学得的才艺，我想也同样令人神往。她绘声绘色地谈起了她们制作的风景画和花卉画；谈起
了她们能唱的歌，能弹的曲，能编织的钱包，能翻译的法文书，一直谈得我听着听着就为之
心动，跃跃欲试。更何况上学也是彻底变换环境，意味着一次远行，意味着同盖茨黑德完全
决裂，意味着踏上新的生活旅程。
    “我真的愿意去上学，”这是我三思之后轻声说出的结论。
    “唉，唉，谁知道会发生什么呢？”劳埃德先生立起身来说。“这孩子应当换换空气，
换换地方，”他自言自语地补充说，“神经不很好。”
    这时，贝茜回来了，同时听得见砂石路上响起了滚滚而来的马车声。
    “是你们太太吗，保姆？”劳埃德先生问道。“走之前我得跟她谈一谈。”
    贝茜请他进早餐室，并且领了路。从以后发生的情况推测，药剂师在随后与里德太太的
会见中，大胆建议送我进学校。无疑，这个建议被欣然采纳了。一天夜里，艾博特和贝茜坐
在保育室里，做着针钱活儿，谈起了这件事。那时，我已经上床，她们以为我睡着了。艾博
特说：“我想太太一定巴不得摆脱这样一个既讨厌、品质又不好的孩子，她那样子就好像眼
睛老盯着每个人，暗地里在搞什么阴谋似的。”我想艾博特准相信我是幼年的盖伊·福克斯
式人物了。
    就是这一回，我从艾博特与贝茜的文谈中第一次获悉，我父亲生前是个牧师，我母亲违
背了朋友们的意愿嫁给了他，他们认为这桩婚事有失她的身份。我的外祖父里德，因为我母
亲不听话而勃然大怒，一气之下同她断绝了关系，没留给她一个子儿。我父母亲结婚才一
年，父亲染上了斑疹伤寒，因为他奔走于副牧师供职地区、一个大工业城镇的穷人中间，而
当时该地流行着斑疹伤寒。我母亲从父亲那儿染上了同一疾病，结果父母双双故去，前后相
距下到一个月。
    贝茜听了这番话便长叹一声说：“可怜的简小姐也是值得同情呐，艾博特。”
    “是呀，”艾博特回答，“她若是漂亮可爱，人家倒也会可怜她那么孤苦伶仃的，可是
像她那样的小东西，实在不讨人喜欢。”
    “确实不大讨人喜欢，”贝茜表示同意，“至少在同样处境下，乔治亚娜这样的美人儿
会更惹人喜爱。”
    “是呀，我就是喜欢乔治亚娜小姐!”狂热的艾博特嚷道，“真是个小宝贝——长长的
卷发，蓝蓝的眼睛，还有那么可爱的肤色，简直像画出来的一股！——贝茜，晚餐我真想吃
威尔士兔子。”
    “我也一样——外加烤洋葱。来吧，我们下楼去。”她们走了。

[FF名著欣赏二]简爱（JEAN EYRE）（中英对照）

CHAPTER IV
　　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 uttering 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.
　　';What would Uncle Reed say to you, if he were alive?'; was my scarcely voluntary demand. I say scarcely voluntary, for it seemed as if my tongue pronounced words, without my will consenting to their utterance: something spoke out of me over which I had no control.
　　';What?'; said Mrs. Reed under her breath: her usually cold composed grey eye became troubled with a look like fear; she took her hand from my arm, and gazed at me as if she really did not know whether I were child or fiend. I was now in for it.
　　';My Uncle Reed is in heaven, and can see all you do and think; and so can papa and mama: they know how you shut me up all day long, and how you wish me dead.';
　　Mrs. Reed soon rallied her spirits: she shook me most soundly, she boxed both my ears, and then left me without a word. Bessie supplied the hiatus by a homily of an hour';s length, in which she proved beyond a doubt that I was the most wicked and abandoned child ever reared under a roof. I half believed her; for I felt indeed only bad feelings surging in my breast.
　　November, December, and half of January passed away. Christmas and the New Year had been celebrated at Gateshead with the usual festive cheer; presents had been interchanged, dinners and evening parties given. From every enjoyment I was, of course, excluded: my share of the gaiety consisted in witnessing the daily apparelling of Eliza and Georgiana, and seeing them descend to the drawing-room, dressed out in thin muslin frocks and scarlet sashes, with hair elaborately ringleted; and afterwards, in listening to the sound of the piano or the harp played below, to the passing to and fro of the butler and footman, to the jingling of glass and china as refreshments were handed, to the broken hum of conversation as the drawing-room door opened and closed. When tired of this occupation, I would retire from the stair-head to the solitary and silent nursery: there, though somewhat sad, I was not miserable. To speak truth, I had not the least wish to go into company, for in company I was very rarely noticed; and if Bessie had but been kind and companionable, I should have deemed it a treat to spend the evenings quietly with her, instead of passing them under the formidable eye of Mrs. Reed, in 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 having orders from Mrs. Reed to buy of his young lady all the products of her parterre she wished to sell: and Eliza would have sold the hair off her head if she could have made a handsome profit thereby. As to her money, she first secreted it in odd corners, wrapped in a rag or an old curl-paper; but some of these hoards having been discovered by the housemaid, Eliza, fearful of one day losing her valued treasure, consented to intrust it to her mother, at a usurious rate of interest- fifty or sixty per cent.; which interest she exacted every quarter, keeping her accounts in a little book with anxious accuracy.
　　Georgiana sat on a high stool, dressing her hair at the glass, and interweaving her curls with artificial flowers and faded feathers, of which she had found a store in a drawer in the attic. I was making my bed, having received strict orders from Bessie to get it arranged before she returned, (for Bessie now frequently employed me as a sort of under-nurserymaid, to tidy the room, dust the chairs, etc.). Having spread the quilt and folded my night-dress, I went to the window-seat to put in order some picture-books and doll';s house furniture scattered there; an abrupt command from Georgiana to let her playthings alone (for the tiny chairs and mirrors, the fairy plates and cups, were her property) stopped my proceedings; and then, for lack of other occupation, I fell to breathing on the frost-flowers with which the window was fretted, and thus clearing a space in the glass through which I might look out on the grounds, where all was still and petrified under the influence of a hard frost.
　　From this window were visible the porter';s lodge and the carriage-road, and just as I had dissolved so much of the silver-white foliage veiling the panes as left room to look out, I saw the gates thrown open and a carriage roll through. I watched it ascending the drive with indifference; carriages often came to Gateshead, but none ever brought visitors in whom I was interested; it stopped in front of the house, the door-bell rang loudly, the new-comer was admitted. All this being nothing to me, my vacant attention soon found livelier attraction in the spectacle of a little hungry robin, which came and chirruped on the twigs of the leafless cherry-tree nailed against the wall near the casement. The remains of my breakfast of bread and milk stood on the table, and having crumbled a morsel of roll, I was tugging at the sash to put out the crumbs on the window-sill, when Bessie came running upstairs into the nursery.
　　';Miss Jane, take off your pinafore; what are you doing there? Have you washed your hands and face this morning?'; I gave another tug before I answered, for I wanted the bird to be secure of its bread: the sash yielded; I scattered the crumbs, some on the stone sill, some on the cherry-tree bough, then, closing the window, I replied-
　　';No, Bessie; I have only just finished dusting.';
　　';Troublesome, careless child! and what are you doing now? You look quite red, as if you have been about some mischief: what were you opening the window for?';
　　I was spared the trouble of answering, for Bessie seemed in too great a hurry to listen to explanations; she hauled me to the washstand, inflicted a merciless, but happily brief scrub on my face and hands with soap, water, and a coarse towel; disciplined my head with a bristly brush, denuded me of my pinafore, and then hurrying me to the top of the stairs, bid me go down directly, as I was wanted in the breakfast-room.
　　I would have asked who wanted me: I would have demanded if Mrs. Reed was there; but Bessie was already gone, and had closed the nursery-door upon me. I slowly descended. For nearly three months, I had never been called to Mrs. Reed';s presence; restricted so long to the nursery, the breakfast, dining, and drawing-rooms were become for me awful regions, on which it dismayed me to intrude.
　　I now stood in the empty hall; before me was the breakfast-room door, and I stopped, intimidated and trembling. What a miserable little poltroon had fear, engendered of unjust punishment, made of me in those days! I feared to return to the nursery, and feared to go forward to the parlour; ten minutes I stood in agitated hesitation; the vehement ringing of the breakfast-room bell decided me; I must enter.
　　';Who could want me?'; I asked inwardly, as with both hands I turned the stiff door-handle, which, for a second or two, resisted my efforts. ';What should I see besides Aunt Reed in the apartment?- a man or a woman?'; The handle turned, the door unclosed, and passing through and curtseying low, I looked up at- a black pillar!- such, at least, appeared to me, at first sight, the straight, narrow, sable-clad shape standing erect on the rug: the grim face at the top was like a carved mask, placed above the shaft by way of capital.
　　Mrs. Reed occupied her usual seat by the fireside; she made a signal to me to approach; I did so, and she introduced me to the stony stranger with the words: ';This is the little girl respecting whom I applied to you.';
　　He, for it was a man, turned his head slowly towards where I stood, and having examined me with the two inquisitive-looking grey eyes which twinkled under a pair of bushy brows, said solemnly, and in a bass voice, ';Her size is small: what is her age?';
　　';Ten years.';
　　';So much?'; was the doubtful answer; and he prolonged his scrutiny for some minutes. Presently he addressed me-
　　';Your name, little girl?';
　　';Jane Eyre, sir.';
　　In uttering these words I looked up: he seemed to me a tall gentleman; but then I was very little; his features were large, and they and all the lines of his frame were equally harsh and prim.
　　';Well, Jane Eyre, and are you a good child?';
　　Impossible to reply to this in the affirmative: my little world held a contrary opinion: I was silent. Mrs. Reed answered for me by an expressive shake of the head, adding soon, ';Perhaps the less said on that subject the better, Mr. Brocklehurst.';
　　';Sorry indeed to hear it! she and I must have some talk;'; and bending from the perpendicular, he installed his person in the arm-chair opposite Mrs. Reed';s. ';Come here,'; he said.
　　I stepped across the rug; he placed me square and straight before him. What a face he had, now that it was almost on a level with mine! what a great nose! and what a mouth! and what large prominent teeth!
　　';No sight so sad as that of a naughty child,'; he began, ';especially a naughty little girl. Do you know where the wicked go after death?';
　　';They go to hell,'; was my ready and orthodox answer.
　　';And what is hell? Can you tell me that?';
　　';A pit full of fire.';
　　';And should you like to fall into that pit, and to be burning there for ever?';
　　';No, sir.';
　　';What must you do to avoid it?';
　　I deliberated a moment; my answer, when it did come, was objectionable: ';I must keep in good health, and not die.';
　　';How can you keep in good health? Children younger than you die daily. I buried a little child of five years old only a day or two since,- a good little child, whose soul is now in heaven. It is to be feared the same could not be said of you were you to be called hence.';
　　Not being in a condition to remove his doubt, I only cast my eyes down on the two large feet planted on the rug, and sighed, wishing myself far enough away.
　　';I hope that sigh is from the heart, and that you repent of ever having been the occasion of discomfort to your excellent benefactress.';
　　';Benefactress! benefactress!'; said I inwardly: ';they all call Mrs. Reed my benefactress; if so, a benefactress is a disagreeable thing.';
　　';Do you say your prayers night and morning?'; continued my interrogator.
　　';Yes, sir.';
　　';Do you read your Bible?';
　　';Sometimes.';
　　';With pleasure? Are you fond of it?';
　　';I like Revelations, and the book of Daniel, and Genesis and Samuel, and a little bit of Exodus, and some parts of Kings and Chronicles, and Job and Jonah.';
　　';And the Psalms? I hope you like them?';
　　';No, sir.';
　　';No? oh, shocking! I have a little boy, younger than you, who knows six Psalms by heart: and when you ask him which he would rather have, a gingerbread-nut to eat or a verse of a Psalm to learn, he says: "Oh! the verse of a Psalm! angels sing Psalms;" says he, "I wish to be a little angel here below;" he then gets two nuts in recompense for his infant piety.';
　　';Psalms are not interesting,'; I remarked.
　　';That proves you have a wicked heart; and you must pray to God to change it: to give you a new and clean one: to take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.';
　　I was about to propound a question, touching the manner in which that operation of changing my heart was to be performed, when Mrs. Reed interposed, telling me to sit down; she then proceeded to carry on the conversation herself.
　　';Mr. Brocklehurst, I believe I intimated in the letter which I wrote to you three weeks ago, that this little girl has not quite the character and disposition I could wish: should you admit her into Lowood school, I should be glad if the superintendent and teachers were requested to keep a strict eye on her, and, above all, to guard against her worst fault, a tendency to deceit. I mention this in your hearing, Jane, that you may not attempt to impose on Mr. Brocklehurst.';
　　Well might I dread, well might I dislike Mrs. Reed; for it was her nature to wound me cruelly; never was I happy in her presence; however carefully I obeyed, however strenuously I strove to please her, my efforts were still repulsed and repaid by such sentences as the above. Now, uttered before a stranger, the accusation cut me to the heart; I dimly perceived that she was already obliterating hope from the new phase of existence which she destined me to enter; I felt, though I could not have expressed the feeling, that she was sowing aversion and unkindness along my future path; I saw myself transformed under Mr. Brocklehurst';s eye into an artful, noxious child, and what could I do to remedy the injury?
　　';Nothing, indeed,'; thought I, as I struggled to repress a sob, and hastily wiped away some tears, the impotent evidences of my anguish.
　　';Deceit is, indeed, a sad fault in a child,'; said Mr. Brocklehurst; ';it is akin to falsehood, and all liars will have their portion in the lake burning with fire and brimstone; she shall, however, be watched, Mrs. Reed. I will speak to Miss Temple and the teachers.';
　　';I should wish her to be brought up in a manner suiting her prospects,'; continued my benefactress; ';to be made useful, to be kept humble: as for the vacations, she will, with your permission, spend them always at Lowood.';
　　';Your decisions are perfectly judicious, madam,'; returned Mr. Brocklehurst. ';Humility is a Christian grace, and one peculiarly appropriate to the pupils of Lowood; I, therefore, direct that especial care shall be bestowed on its cultivation amongst them. I have studied how best to mortify in them the worldly sentiment of pride; and, only the other day, I had a pleasing proof of my success. My second daughter, Augusta, went with her mama to visit the school, and on her return she exclaimed: "Oh, dear papa, how quiet and plain all the girls at Lowood look, with their hair combed behind their ears, and their long pinafores, and those little holland pockets outside their frocks- they are almost like poor people';s children! and," said she, "they looked at my dress and mama';s, as if they had never seen a silk gown before."';
　　';This is the state of things I quite approve,'; returned Mrs. Reed; ';had I sought all England over, I could scarcely have found a system more exactly fitting a child like Jane Eyre. Consistency, my dear Mr. Brocklehurst; I advocate consistency in all things.';
　　';Consistency, madam, is the first of Christian duties; and it has been observed in every arrangement connected with the establishment of Lowood: plain fare, simple attire, unsophisticated accommodations, hardy and active habits; such is the order of the day in the house and its inhabitants.';
　　';Quite right, sir. I may then depend upon this child being received as a pupil at Lowood, and there being trained in conformity to her position and prospects?';
　　';Madam, you may: she shall be placed in that nursery of chosen plants, and I trust she will show herself grateful for the inestimable privilege of her election.';
　　';I will send her, then, as soon as possible, Mr. Brocklehurst; for, I assure you, I feel anxious to be relieved of a responsibility that was becoming too irksome.';
　　';No doubt, no doubt, madam; and now I wish you good morning. I shall return to Brocklehurst Hall in the course of a week or two: my good friend, the Archdeacon, will not permit me to leave him sooner. I shall send Miss Temple notice that she is to expect a new girl, so that there will be no difficulty about receiving her. Good-bye.';
　　';Good-bye, Mr. Brocklehurst; remember me to Mrs. and Miss Brocklehurst, and to Augusta and Theodore, and Master Broughton Brocklehurst.';
　　';I will, madam. Little girl, here is a book entitled the Child';s Guide; read it with prayer, especially that part containing "An addicted to falsehood and deceit."';
　　With these words Mr. Brocklehurst put into my hand a thin pamphlet sewn in a cover, and having rung for his carriage, he departed.
　　Mrs. Reed and I were left alone: some minutes passed in silence; she was sewing, I was watching her. Mrs. Reed might be at that time some six or seven and thirty; she was a woman of robust frame, square-shouldered and strong-limbed, not tall, and, though stout, not obese: she had a somewhat large face, the under jaw being much developed and very solid; her brow was low, her chin large and prominent, mouth and nose sufficiently regular; under her light eyebrows glimmered an eye devoid of ruth; her skin was dark and opaque, her hair nearly flaxen; her constitution was sound as a bell- illness never came near her; she was an exact, clever manager; her household and tenantry were thoroughly under her control; her children only at times defied her authority and laughed it to scorn; she dressed well, and had a presence and port calculated to set off handsome attire.
　　Sitting on a low stool, a few yards from her arm-chair, I examined her figure; I perused her features. In my hand I held the tract containing the sudden death of the Liar, to which narrative my attention had been pointed as to an appropriate warning. What had just passed; what Mrs. Reed had said concerning me to Mr. Brocklehurst; the whole tenor of their conversation, was recent, raw, and stinging in my mind; I had felt every word as acutely as I had heard it plainly, and a passion of resentment fomented now within me.
　　Mrs. Reed looked up from her work; her eye settled on mine, her fingers at the same time suspended their nimble movements.
　　';Go out of the room; return to the nursery,'; was her mandate. My look or something else must have struck her as offensive, for she spoke with extreme though suppressed irritation. I got up, I went to the door; I came back again; I walked to the window, across the room, then close up to her.
　　Speak I must: I had been trodden on severely, and must turn: but how? What strength had I to dart retaliation at my antagonist? I gathered my energies and launched them in this blunt sentence-
　　';I am not deceitful: if I were, I should say I loved you; but I declare I do not love you: I dislike you the worst of anybody in the world except John Reed; and this book about the liar, you may give to your girl, Georgiana, for it is she who tells lies, and not I.';
　　Mrs. Reed';s hands still lay on her work inactive: her eye of ice continued to dwell freezingly on mine.
　　';What more have you to say?'; she asked, rather in the tone in which a person might address an opponent of adult age than such as is ordinarily used to a child.
　　That eye of hers, that voice stirred every antipathy I had. Shaking from head to foot, thrilled with ungovernable excitement, I continued-
　　';I am glad you are no relation of mine: I will never call you aunt again so long as I live. I will never come to see you when I am grown up; and if any one asks me how I liked you, and how you treated me, I will say the very thought of you makes me sick, and that you treated me with miserable cruelty.';
　　';How dare you affirm that, Jane Eyre?';
　　';How dare I, Mrs. Reed? How dare I? Because it is the truth. You think I have no feelings, and that I can do without one bit of love or kindness; but I cannot live so: and you have no pity. I shall remember how you thrust me back- roughly and violently thrust me back- into the red-room, and locked me up there, to my dying day; though I was in agony; though I cried out, while suffocating with distress, "Have mercy! Have mercy, Aunt Reed!" And that punishment you made me suffer because your wicked boy struck me- knocked me down for nothing. I will tell anybody who asks me questions, this exact tale. People think you a good woman, but you are bad, hard-hearted. You are deceitful!';
　　Ere I had finished this reply, my soul began to expand, to exult, with the strangest sense of freedom, of triumph, I ever felt. It seemed as if an invisible bond had burst, and that I had struggled out into unhoped-for liberty. Not without cause was this sentiment: Mrs. Reed looked frightened; her work had slipped from her knee; she was lifting up her hands, rocking herself to and fro, and even twisting her face as if she would cry.
　　';Jane, you are under a mistake: what is the matter with you? Why do you tremble so violently? Would you like to drink some water?';
　　';No, Mrs. Reed.';
　　';Is there anything else you wish for, Jane? I assure you, I desire to be your friend.';
　　';Not you. You told Mr. Brocklehurst I had a bad character, a deceitful disposition; and I';ll let everybody at Lowood know what you are, and what you have done.';
　　';Jane, you don';t understand these things: children must be corrected for their faults.';
　　';Deceit is not my fault!'; I cried out in a savage, high voice.
　　';But you are passionate, Jane, that you must allow: and now return to the nursery- there';s a dear- and lie down a little.';
　　';I am not your dear; I cannot lie down: send me to school soon, Mrs. Reed, for I hate to live here.';
　　';I will indeed send her to school soon,'; murmured Mrs. Reed sotto voce; and gathering up her work, she abruptly quitted the apartment.
　　I was left there alone- winner of the field. It was the hardest battle I had fought, and the first victory I had gained: I stood awhile on the rug, where Mr. Brocklehurst had stood, and I enjoyed my conqueror';s solitude. First, I smiled to myself and felt elate; but this fierce pleasure subsided in me as fast as did the accelerated throb of my pulses. A child cannot quarrel with its elders, as I had done; cannot give its furious feelings uncontrolled play, as I had given mine, without experiencing afterwards the pang of remorse and the chill of reaction. A ridge of lighted heath, alive, glancing, devouring, would have been a meet emblem of my mind when I accused and menaced Mrs. Reed: the same ridge, black and blasted after the flames are dead, would have represented as meetly my subsequent condition, when half an hour';s silence and reflection had shown me the madness of my conduct, and the dreariness of my hated and hating position.
　　Something of vengeance I had tasted for the first time; as aromatic wine it seemed, on swallowing, warm and racy: its after-flavour, metallic and corroding, gave me a sensation as if I had been poisoned. Willingly would I now have gone and asked Mrs. Reed';s pardon; but I knew, partly from experience and partly from instinct, that was the way to make her repulse me with double scorn, thereby re-exciting every turbulent impulse of my nature.
　　I would fain exercise some better faculty than that of fierce speaking; fain find nourishment for some less fiendish feeling than that of sombre indignation. I took a book- some Arabian tales; I sat down and endeavoured to read. I could make no sense of the subject; my own thoughts swam always between me and the page I had usually found fascinating. I opened the glass-door in the breakfast-room: the shrubbery was quite still: the black frost reigned, unbroken by sun or breeze, through the grounds. I covered my head and arms with the skirt of my frock, and went out to walk in a part of the plantation which was quite sequestered; but I found no pleasure in the silent trees, the falling fir-cones, the congealed relics of autumn, russet leaves, swept by past winds in heaps, and now stiffened together. I leaned against a gate, and looked into an empty field where no sheep were feeding, where the short grass was nipped and blanched. It was a very grey day; a most opaque sky, ';onding on snaw,'; canopied all; thence flakes fell at intervals, which settled on the hard path and on the hoary lea without melting. I stood, a wretched child enough, whispering to myself over and over again, ';What shall I do?- what shall I do?';
　　All at once I heard a clear voice call, ';Miss Jane! where are you? Come to lunch!';
　　It was Bessie, I knew well enough; but I did not stir; her light step came tripping down the path.
　　';You naughty little thing!'; she said. ';Why don';t you come when you are called?';
　　Bessie';s presence, compared with the thoughts over which I had been brooding, seemed cheerful; even though, as usual, she was somewhat cross. The fact is, after my conflict with and victory over Mrs. Reed, I was not disposed to care much for the nursemaid';s transitory anger; and I was disposed to bask in her youthful lightness of heart. I just put my two arms round her and said, ';Come, Bessie! don';t scold.';
　　The action was more frank and fearless than any I was habituated to indulge in: somehow it pleased her.
　　';You are a strange child, Miss Jane,'; she said, as she looked down at me; ';a little roving, solitary thing: and you are going to school, I suppose?';
　　I nodded.
　　';And won';t you be sorry to leave poor Bessie?';
　　';What does Bessie care for me? She is always scolding me.';
　　';Because you';re such a queer, frightened, shy little thing. You should be bolder.';
　　';What! to get more knocks?';
　　';Nonsense! But you are rather put upon, that';s certain. My mother said, when she came to see me last week, that she would not like a little one of her own to be in your place.- Now, come in, and I';ve some good news for you.';
　　';I don';t think you have, Bessie.';
　　';Child! what do you mean? What sorrowful eyes you fix on me! Well, but Missis and the young ladies and Master John are going out to tea this afternoon, and you shall have tea with me. I';ll ask cook to bake you a little cake, and then you shall help me to look over your drawers; for I am soon to pack your trunk. Missis intends you to leave Gateshead in a day or two, and you shall choose what toys you like to take with you.';
　　';Bessie, you must promise not to scold me any more till I go.';
　　';Well, I will; but mind you are a very good girl, and don';t be afraid of me. Don';t start when I chance to speak rather sharply; it';s so provoking.';
　　';I don';t think I shall ever be afraid of you again, Bessie, because I have got used to you, and I shall soon have another set of people to dread.';
　　';If you dread them they';ll dislike you.';
　　';As you do, Bessie?';
　　';I don';t dislike you, Miss: I believe I am fonder of you than of all the others.';
　　';You don';t show it.';
　　';You little sharp thing! you';ve got quite a new way of talking. What makes you so venturesome and hardy?';
　　';Why, I shall soon be away from you, and besides';- I was going to say something about what had passed between me and Mrs. Reed, but on second thoughts I considered it better to remain silent on that head.
　　';And so you';re glad to leave me?';
　　';Not at all, Bessie; indeed, just now I';m rather sorry.';
　　';Just now! and rather! How coolly my little lady says it! I daresay now if I were to ask you for a kiss you wouldn';t give it me: you';d say you';d rather not.';
　　';I';ll kiss you and welcome: bend your head down.'; Bessie stooped; we mutually embraced, and I followed her into the house quite comforted. That afternoon lapsed in peace and harmony; and in the evening Bessie told me some of her most enchaining stories, and sang me some of her sweetest songs. Even for me life had its gleams of sunshine.
第四章            
    我同劳埃德先生的一番交谈，以及上回所述贝茜和艾博特之间的议论，使我信心倍增，
动力十足，盼着自己快些好起来。看来，某种变动已近在眼前，我默默地期待着。然而，它
迟迟未来。一天天、一周周过去了、我已体健如旧，但我朝思暮想的那件事，却并没有重新
提起。里德太太有时恶狠狠地打量我，但很少理睬我。自我生病以来，她已把我同她的孩子
截然分开，指定我独自睡一个小房间，罚我单独用餐，整天呆在保育室里，而我的表兄妹们
却经常在客厅玩耍。她没有丝毫暗示要送我上学，但我有一种很有把握的直觉，她不会长期
容忍我与她同在一个屋檐下生活。因为她把目光投向我时，眼神里越来越表露出一种无法摆
脱、根深蒂固的厌恶。
    伊丽莎和乔治亚娜分明是按吩咐行事，尽量少同我搭讪。而约翰一见我就装鬼脸，有—
回竟还想对我动武。像上次一样，我怒不可遏、忍无可忍，激起了一种犯罪的本性，顿时扑
了上去。他一想还是住手的好，便逃离了我，一边破口大骂，诬赖我撕裂了他的鼻子。我的
拳头确实瞄准了那个隆起的器官，出足力气狠狠一击。当我看到这一招或是我的目光使他吓
破了胆时，我真想乘胜追击，达到目的，可是他已经逃到他妈妈那里了。我听他哭哭啼啼，
开始讲述“那个讨厌的简·爱”如何像疯猫一样扑向他的故事。但他的哭诉立即被厉声喝住
了。
    别跟我提起她了，约翰。我同你说过不要与她接近，她不值得理睬。我不愿意你或者你
妹妹同她来往，”
    这时，我扑出栏杆，突然不假思索地大叫了一声：
    “他们还不配同我交往呢。”
    尽管里德太太的体态有些臃肿，但—听见我这不可思议的大胆宣告，便利索地登登登跑
上楼梯，一阵风似地把我拖进保育室，按倒在小床的床沿上，气势汹汹地说，谅我那天再也
不敢从那里爬起来，或是再吭一声了。
    “要是里德先生还活着，他会同你说什么？”我几乎无意中问了这个问题。我说几乎无
意，是因为我的舌头仿佛不由自主地吐出了这句话，完全是随意倾泻，不受控制。
    “什么，”里德太太咕哝着说。她平日冷漠平静的灰色眸子显得惶惶不安，露出了近乎
恐惧的神色。她从我的胳膊中抽回手，死死盯着我，仿佛真的弄不明白我究竟是个孩童还是
魔鬼。这时，我骑虎难下了。
    “里德舅舅在天堂里，你做的和想的，他都看得清清楚楚。我爸爸妈妈也看得清清楚
楚。他们知道你把我关了一整天，还巴不得我死掉。”
    里德太太很快便定下神来，狠命推搡我，扇我耳光，随后二话没说扔下我就走。在留下
的空隙里，贝茜喋喋不休进行了长达一个小时的说教，证实我无疑是家里养大的最坏、最放
任的孩子，弄得我也有些半信半疑。因为我确实觉得，在我胸膛里翻腾的只有恶感。
    十一月、十二月和一月的上半月转眼已逝去。在盖茨黑德，圣诞节和元旦照例喜气洋洋
地庆祝一番，相互交换礼物，举行圣诞晚餐和晚会，当然，这些享受一概与我无缘，我的那
份乐趣是每天眼睁睁瞧着伊丽莎和乔治亚娜的装束，看她们着薄纱上衣，系大红腰带，披着
精心制作的卷发下楼到客厅去。随后倾听楼下弹奏钢琴和竖琴的声音，管家和仆人来来往往
的脚步声，上点心时杯盘磕碰的叮咚声，随着客厅门启闭时断时续传来的谈话声，听腻了。
我会离开楼梯口，走进孤寂的保育室。那里尽管也有些许  悲哀，但心里并不难受，说实
话，我绝对无意去凑热闹，因为就是去了，也很少有人理我，要是贝茜肯好好陪我，我觉得
与她相守，安静地度过多夜晚倒也一种享受，强似在满屋少爷小姐、太太先生中间、里德太
太令人生畏的目光下，挨过那些时刻，但是，贝茜往往把小姐们一打扮停当，便抽身上厨
房、女管家室等热闹场所去了，还总把蜡烛也带走。随后，我把玩偶放在膝头枯坐着，直至
炉火渐渐暗淡，还不时东张西望，弄清楚除了我没有更可怕的东西光顾这昏暗的房间，待到
余烬褪为暗红色，我便急急忙忙、拿出吃奶的劲来，宽衣解带，钻进小床，躲避寒冷与黑
暗，我常把玩偶随身带到床上，人总得爱点什么，在缺乏更值得爱的东西的时候，我便设想
以珍爱一个褪了色的布偶来获得愉快，尽管这个玩偶已经破烂不堪，活像个小小的稻草人，
此刻忆起这件往事，也令我迷惑不解，当时，我是带着何等荒谬的虔诚来溺爱这小玩具的
呀！我还有点相信它有血有肉有感觉，只有把它裹进了睡袍我才能入睡，一旦它暖融融安然
无恙地躺在那里，我便觉得愉快多了，而且这玩偶也有同感。
    我似乎要等很久很久客人们才散去，才候着贝茜上楼的脚步声，有时她会在中间上楼
来，找顶针或剪刀，或者端上一个小面包、奶酪饼什么的当作我的晚餐。她会坐在床上看我
吃。我一吃完，她会替我把被子塞好，亲了我两下，说：“晚安，简小姐。”贝茜和颜悦色
的时候，我就觉得她是人世间最好、最漂亮、最善良的人，我热切希望她会总是那么讨人喜
欢，那么和蔼可亲，不要老是支使我，骂我，无理责备我，我现在想来，贝茜·李一定是位
很有天赋的姑娘，因为她干什么都在行，还有善讲故事的惊人诀窍，至少保育室故事留给我
的印象，让我可以作出这样的判断。如果我对她的脸蛋和身材没有记错，那她还长得很漂
亮。在我的记忆中，她是个身材苗条的少妇，有着墨色的头发，乌黑的眸子，端正的五官和
光洁的皮肤，但她任性急躁，缺乏原则性和正义感。尽管加此，在盖茨黑德府的人中、我最
喜欢她。
    那是一月十五日早上九点。贝茜已下楼去用早餐，我的表兄妹们还没有被叫唤到他们妈
妈身边。伊丽莎正戴上宽边帽，穿上暖和的园艺服，出喂她的家禽。这活儿她百做不厌，并
不逊于把鸡鱼类给女管家，把所得钱藏匿起来，她有做买卖的才干，有突出的聚财癖，不仅
表现在兜售鸡蛋和鸡方面，而且也在跟园艺工就花茎、花籽和插枝而拼命讨价还价上显露出
来，里德太太曾吩咐园艺工，凡是伊丽莎想卖掉的花圃产品，他都得统统买下。而要是能赚
大钱，伊丽莎连出售自己的头发也心甘情愿。至于所得的钱，起初她用破布或陈旧的卷发纸
包好，藏在偏僻的角落里。但后来其中一些秘藏物被女佣所发现，她深怕有一天丢失她值钱
的宝藏，同意由她母亲托管，收取近乎高利贷的利息——百分之五十或六十，一个季度索讨
一次。她还把帐记在一个小本子上，算得分毫不差。
    乔治亚娜坐在一条高脚凳上，对镜梳理着自己的头发。她把一朵朵人造花和一根根褪色
的羽毛插到卷发上，这些东西是她在阁楼上的一个抽屉里找到的。我正在铺床，因为根据贝
茜的严格指令，我得在她回来之前把一切都收拾停当（贝茜现在常常把我当作保育室女佣下
手来使唤，吩咐我整理房间、擦掉椅子上的灰尘等等），我摊开被子，叠好睡衣后，便走向
窗台，正把散乱的图画书和玩偶家具放好，却突然传来了乔治亚娜指手划脚的吆喝不许我动
她的玩具（因为这些椅子、镜子、小盘子和小杯子都是她的财产），于是只好歇手。一时无
所事事，便开始往凝结在窗上的霜花哈气，在玻璃上化开了一小块地方，透过它可以眺望外
面  的院落，那里的一切在严霜的威力之下，仿佛凝固了似的寂然不动。
    从这扇窗子后得清门房和马车道。我在蒙着—簇簇银白色霜花的窗玻璃上，正哈出—块
可以往外窥视的地方时，只见大门开了，一辆马车驶了进来，我毫不在意地看着它爬上小
道，因为尽管马车经常光临盖茨黑德府，却从未进来一位我所感兴趣的客人。这辆车在房子
前面停下，门铃大作，来客被请进了门，既然这种事情与我无关，百无聊赖之中，我便被一
种更有生气的景象所吸引了。那是一只小小的、饿坏了的知更鸟，从什么地方飞来，落  在
紧贴靠窗的墙上一棵光秃秃的樱桃树枝头，叽叽喳喳叫个不停。这时，桌上放着我早饭吃剩
的牛奶和面包，我把一小块面包弄碎，并正推窗把它放到窗沿上时，贝茜奔上楼梯，走进了
保育室。
    “简小姐、把围涎脱掉。你在那儿干什么呀？今天早上抹了脸，洗了手了吗？”
    我先没有回答，顾自又推了一下窗子，因为我要让这鸟儿万无一失地吃到面包。窗子终
于松动了，我撒出了面包屑，有的落在石头窗沿上，有的落在樱桃树枝上。随后我关好窗，
一面回答说：
    “没有呢，贝茜，我才掸好灰尘。”
    “你这个粗心大意的淘气鬼！这会儿在干什么呀？你的脸通红通红，好像干了什么坏事
似的，你开窗干啥？”
    贝茜似乎很匆忙，已等不及听我解释，省却了我回答的麻烦。她将我一把拖到洗脸架
前，不由分说往我脸上、手上擦了肥皂，抹上水，用一块粗糙的毛巾一揩，虽然重手重脚，
倒也干脆爽快。她又用一把粗毛刷子，把我的头清理了一番，脱下我的围涎，急急忙忙把我
带到楼梯口，嘱我径直下楼去，说是早餐室有人找我。
    我本想问她是谁在找我，打听一下里德太太是不是在那里。可是贝茜己经走了，还在我
身后关上了保育室的门，我慢吞吞地走下楼梯。近三个月来，我从未被叫到里德太太跟前。
由于在保育室里禁锢了那么久，早餐室、餐室和客厅都成了令我心寒的地方，一跨进去便惶
惶不安。
    此刻，我站在空空荡荡的大厅里，面前就是餐室的门。我停住了脚步，吓得直打哆嗦，
可怜的胆小鬼，那时候不公的惩罚竟使她怕成了这付样子！我既不敢退后返回保育室，又怕
往前走向客厅。我焦虑不安、犹犹豫豫地站了十来分钟，直到早餐室一阵喧闹的铃声使我横
下了心来：我非进去不可了。
    “谁会找我呢？”我心里有些纳闷，一面用两只手去转动僵硬的门把手，足有一两秒
钟，那把手纹丝不动，“除了里德舅妈之外，我还会在客厅里见到谁呢？——男人还是女
人？”把手转动了一下，门开了。我进去行了一个低低的屈膝礼，抬起来头竟看见了一根黑
色的柱子！至少猛一看来是这样。那笔直、狭小裹着貂皮的东西直挺挺立在地毯上，那张凶
神恶煞般的脸，像是雕刻成的假面，置于柱子顶端当作柱顶似的。
    里德太太坐在壁炉旁往常所坐的位置上，她示意我走近她。我照着做了。她用这样的话
把我介绍给那个毫无表情的陌生人：“这就是我跟你谈起过的小女孩。”
    他——因为是个男人——缓缓地把头转向我站立的地方，用他那双浓眉下闪着好奇的目
光的灰色眼睛审视着我，随后响起了他严肃的男低音：
    “她个子很小，几岁了？”
    “十岁。”
    “这么大了，”他满腹狐疑地问道。随后又细细打量了我几分钟，马上跟我说起话来。
    “你叫什么名字，小姑娘？”
    “简·爱，先生。”
    说完，我抬起头来，我觉得他是位身材高大的斗士，不过，那时我