第5页
《简·爱(英文版)》章节:第5页,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
'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.'