"Jane! Jane!" he said, in such an accent of bitter sadness it
thrilled along every nerve I had; "you don't love me, then? It was
only my station, and the rank of my wife, that you valued? Now that
you think me disqualified to become your husband, you recoil from my
touch as if I were some toad or ape."
These words cut me: yet what could I do or I say? I ought probably
to have done or said nothing; but I was so tortured by a sense of
remorse at thus hurting his feelings, I could not control the wish
to drop balm where I had wounded.
"I DO love you," I said, "more than ever: but I must not show or
indulge the feeling: and this is the last time I must express it."
"The last time, Jane! What! do you think you can live with me, and
see me daily, and yet, if you still love me, be always cold and
distant?"
"No, sir; that I am certain I could not; and therefore I see there
is but one way: but you will be furious if I mention it."
"Oh, mention it! If I storm, you have the art of weeping."
"Mr. Rochester, I must leave you."
"For how long, Jane? For a few minutes, while you smooth your hair-
-which is somewhat dishevelled; and bathe your face--which looks
feverish?"
"I must leave Adele and Thornfield. I must part with you for my
whole life: I must begin a new existence among strange faces and
strange scenes."
"Of course: I told you you should. I pass over the madness about
parting from me. You mean you must become a part of me. As to the
new existence, it is all right: you shall yet be my wife: I am not
married. You shall be Mrs. Rochester--both virtually and nominally.
I shall keep only to you so long as you and I live. You shall go to
a place I have in the south of France: a whitewashed villa on the
shores of the Mediterranean. There you shall live a happy, and
guarded, and most innocent life. Never fear that I wish to lure you
into error--to make you my mistress. Why did you shake your head?
Jane, you must be reasonable, or in truth I shall again become
frantic."
His voice and hand quivered: his large nostrils dilated; his eye
blazed: still I dared to speak.
"Sir, your wife is living: that is a fact acknowledged this morning
by yourself. If I lived with you as you desire, I should then be
your mistress: to say otherwise is sophistical--is false."