My Mr. Rochester (6 page)

We sat down together, and I put my napkin over my lap. As she cut a piece of bread for me, I set her mind at ease. “I’m very glad to have come to Lowood. I never thought I’d be allowed to go to school.”

“Why do you want to go to school, Jane?” Miss Temple ladled out a lamb stew with potatoes and carrots and leeks and a wonderful spice I didn’t recognize. There was butter and honey for the bread and a big glass of milk.

There was no point in telling her how unhappy I was at Gateshead, about the Red Room, John Reed’s bullying, that I couldn’t bear to live there another day. Bishop Brocklehurst must have already told the people at Lowood I was an ungrateful child, so why would she believe me? My complaints would only reinforce such an indictment.

“I want to be a teacher,” I said. “I want to be an independent woman.”

Miss Temple’s eyes twinkled a little. “That’s an achievable goal. If you study hard and pass your exams, you could become a licensed governess.”

“Oh.” I stared at my bowl. That’s not what I meant. Not a governess. The opposite of independence. Georgiana and Eliza had been horrid to our governess. Mrs. Reed never would defend the poor woman.

“Or you might stay on here,” Miss Temple added. “Many of Lowood’s teachers are former pupils. For instance, Miss Miller who greeted you came to Lowood when she was eleven years old.”

“That’s exactly what I would like, Miss Temple.”

Her smile, still tinged with sadness, faded. “How old are you, Jane?”

“Fourteen,” I answered—with a start. I had forgotten it was my birthday.

I glanced at the lovely slouch hat and scarf on my trunk. Bessie must have made them as a birthday present. If so, she’d likely purchased the yarn from her own savings.

My heart ached. I would miss Bessie. I regretted not being kinder to her, and it was a novel sensation. I always felt so abused and downtrodden, so often falsely accused of wickedness—it never occurred to me I might have actual faults. I vowed to be a better person from then on.

I was ravenous, and everything tasted like heaven, but I didn’t get to finish my meal for at that point we were interrupted by another person.

“Bishop Brocklehurst. I thought you’d left, sir.” Miss Temple rose hurriedly to her feet, and I followed her lead.

“I had.”

At the sight of my nemesis my spirits sank. His expression was as sour as I remembered. I knew his opinion of me, and I didn’t want him to share it with Miss Temple.

“I saw the cart boy on the road. He told me he’d just delivered this girl.” He turned his eye on me.

Against my will, I shivered.

“I spoke with your benefactor not three hours ago, Jane Eyre. I was afraid of this.” He rubbed my velvet collar between his fingers. “Mrs. Reed no doubt meant a kindness, outfitting you thusly. It’s no kindness to encourage a girl to put herself above her station. Is that not so, Miss Temple?”

“Most certainly, bishop.” Miss Temple answered out of duty, but not with the bishop’s fervor. “A girl or any person.”

“Remove the dress.”

I gasped, and my hand flew to my throat. I must have heard him incorrectly, for Miss Temple showed no sign of anything being out of order.

“You have a uniform,” he said to her.

“Yes, bishop.” Miss Temple retrieved the dress and pinafore she’d laid aside.

“Take off that dress, Jane Eyre. I’ll return it to Mrs. Reed.”

“Sir, perhaps she could change in my—”

“Miss Temple, I have no time for false modesty or girlish pride. Jane Eyre, do as I say. You were there when your good aunt pleaded with me to teach you humility. From the pride you now take in material frippery, I can see she was right.”

My face went hot with embarrassment and fury. How dare he! My fingers trembled as I unfastened the top button at my collar. Miss Temple stared at her hands, her expression indecipherable.

I faltered at the second button, and the bishop brushed my hands away and began to do the work for me. I trembled with rage as he proceeded to undress me—rage and some fear, I admit. He fumbled with the buttons at my sternum, and the knuckles of his hands pressed against my breasts. When he’d opened the garment past my waist, he pushed it back over my shoulders. His gaze lingered at the swell of my breasts at the top of my chemise. For a horrible moment, I thought he was going to touch me.

He stepped away. “You may complete the task. Those boots too. Far too unsuitable.” He addressed Miss Temple. “The box?”

I handed Bishop Brocklehurst my dress and quickly bent down to unlace my boots. Miss Temple dropped a box of secondhand shoes at my feet. I kept my head down to hide my tears. I’d give him no satisfaction. I tossed my boots in Brocklehurst’s direction and turned away toward the fire, surreptitiously wiping my eyes.

Miss Temple was at me in a flash with the uniform. She gently wrapped it around me and found the hole for its inset belt. “It’s a little big now, Jane,” she murmured, “but you’ll grow into it.”

There were no buttons, no hooks, not even a zipper. The dress was made for no one in particular, designed to wrap and tie in order to expand or contract to a wearer’s growing frame. Miss Temple helped me with the pinafore. It felt like she was a dresser in a theater, and I’d been cast the part of a ten-year-old child in a play.

I was the little princess who’d lost everything—except I’d had no father, no protector, to begin with.

Bishop Brocklehurst added my lovely hat and scarf to his plunder. When he’d gone for good, Miss Temple called for Miss Miller and instructed her to show me to my bed in a dormitory in one of the large buildings.

I don’t remember if the wind howled through the trees that night or the rain raged against the dormitory’s window pane. I don’t remember if I was awakened several times by girls crying softly in their beds. I don’t remember if my teeth chattered with cold because my blanket was so thin. All those details are part of the memory mosaic contained in my brain, labeled
Lowood.
None set the first night apart from any night I spent there.

But I will never forget Bishop Brocklehurst’s assault on me, an experience distinct and fixed. He had risen to the top of my list. I hated him then more than I hated Mrs. Reed and more even than John Reed. I believed it was impossible to hate him more.

I was wrong.

« Chapter 7 »
Helen

Lowood was electrified in ways that made me loathe the invention. When the Great Secession restored a slower, simpler life more suited to human dignity, someone forgot to tell Lowood’s administrators. If electricity was used like this in the heathen old country, it’s no wonder the old country cracked up.

A caustic unceasing bell drove me from sleep, and the dormitory glared with unnatural fluorescent light. Other girls were out of bed, putting on uniforms like the one given me the night before. The nightmarish bell stopped when I was halfway through tying on my pinafore, but it echoed on in my brain.

It was bitter cold. I washed at the end of a line of six girls and held out my hands for inspection. The bell rang us down to the dining hall where we sat, ranked according to age, on long hardwood benches at tables arranged in two rows with a wide aisle between the rows.

Breakfast came out in two big pots which the servers placed on a high bench before the head table. The teachers there immediately wrinkled their noses, and their hands flew to faces.

“Disgusting!”

“The porridge is burnt again!”

“Shhh!”

We said grace, a variation of the prayer said at Gateshead:

Bless, O Lord, this food to our bodies,
And make us grateful to thy bounty.
Keep us ever fit for your service,
And mindful of the needs of others.

The stench of the burnt porridge reached my nostrils and wiped out all thought of the needs of others. At the end of the prayer, one of the older girls stood and recited the eleventh psalm.

I suppressed a smile and looked down at my hands. I told Bishop Brocklehurst I didn’t like the psalms, but it didn’t mean I didn’t know them. Psalm 11 was my nemesis. It had made me bitter and turned me away from God. I still loved Jesus, but in my book God could suck eggs.

The girl finished:

“
Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire, and brimstone,
and an horrible tempest:
This shall be the portion of their cup.
For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness;
His countenance doth behold the upright.”

Right. Not at Gateshead. There the Lord rewarded wicked John Reed on a daily basis, and not with snares and brimstone.

A young girl from another table stood to recite Psalm 12.

“We hear ten psalms every morning,” the girl beside me whispered in a serious, no-nonsense manner. Like all of us, her hair was hidden behind a white scarf tied in a knot at the nape of her neck, but a few red curls had escaped. “They’ll give you one to learn.”

“Burns!” A teacher charged through the tables toward us. She was about the age of Miss Miller, thin and hard-looking, with round wire-rimmed glasses and a furrow between her eyes.

The girl stood up and bent her head forward. She clasped her hands behind her back, as if she was used to some solemn ritual about to be carried out.

The teacher wore the same uniform as the other teachers, a plain black Jersey dress, calf-length, with three-quarter-length sleeves. A white lace collar draped over her shoulders came down in two points over her breasts. She raised an instrument above her head that looked like John Reed’s riding crop and brought it down over the girl’s shoulders.

Outrageous! I started to protest, but the girl’s sharp look stopped me.

“Return to your seat, Burns,” the teacher said.

“Thank you, Miss Scatcherd,” the girl said.

“And maintain silence.”

Miss Scatcherd returned to her place at the head of the teachers’ table, and Burns—if that was her name—returned silently to her seat beside me. The sting of the injustice was maddening. She’d only meant to be nice.

After eight more girls recited a psalm, we lined up in two rows holding our bowls. My stomach alternated between growls of hunger and revolt against the smell. I sat down again amidst stifled moans of complaint from every table.

My stomach turned while my nose twitched.
O, for yesterday’s eggs and cheese on the train
! I hazarded a spoonful of the gruel, retched at the taste, and a chorus gave harmony to my retching.

“Silence!” From the head table, Miss Scatcherd gave us all the evil eye. Miss Miller was there, but I didn’t see Miss Temple.

Miss Miller left the dining hall just before the damn bell rang again to send us off to our first class. Yes. Already, I could spew swears to rival John Reed. We’d lined up to be let out when Miss Temple came in with Miss Miller following. Everyone went quiet as Miss Temple walked straight to the pot, picked up a spoon, and tasted the creamed rice.

“Ugh!” She grimaced. “Disgusting!”

In the teachers’ murmuring I heard the words Brocklehurst and bishop uttered in disapproving tones. Miss Temple frowned and shook her head at them, but she made no effort to check their general wrath. I was glad to know my disdain for the man was shared.

“Never mind.” Miss Temple addressed us all. “It’s a lovely morning. The girls may spend an hour in the garden. You may draw or sew or hear a story from Miss Miller. I’ll have bread and cheese sent in for you to take outside.

“Hurray!” A general cheer went up.

“Silence!” Miss Scatcherd said. “Keep to your lines!”

Discipline prevailed, and why not? Miss Temple had saved us.

Seen now in the light of day she was pretty, with a sweetness I could never maintain in her position. Her thick hair was again bound in a simple but elegant tight French braid. Her dark purple dress trimmed with a draping collar of black lace gave her an air of handsome competence.

My heart surged with fellow feeling. One day I wanted to be like Miss Temple.

We waited in our lines for the bread and cheese then each took her portion outside. I looked for Burns, but she had disappeared.

In the garden between the two large buildings, I ate my little share in small bites to make it last. I wandered from group to group, lighting on none, and moved on to several rows of miniature garden plots, each assigned to a girl for cultivation. Green seedlings were beginning to emerge from the earth, but it was too soon to tell if they were vegetables or flowers.

No one took notice of me. I felt lonely, but I’d been lonely all my life. It didn’t signify. I drew my grey mantle close about me and tried to ignore the cold and my lingering hunger. I turned a corner and found Burns on a stone bench near a cluster of rose bushes.

She was absorbed in a book by Samuel Johnson called
Rasselas.
She turned a page and, brushing another wayward curl out of her eyes, she happened to look up at me.

“I’m sorry I got you in trouble,” I said.

“It wasn’t your fault,” she said. “I spoke when I shouldn’t have.”