I will be myself. Mr Rochester, you must neither expect nor exact anything celestial of me – for you will not get it, any more than I shall get it of you: which I do not at all anticipate.’
‘What do you anticipate of me?’
‘For a little while you will perhaps be as you are now – a very little while; and then you will turn cool; and then you will be capricious; and then you will be stern, and I shall have much ado to please you: but when you get well used to me, you will perhaps like me again – like me, I say, not love me. I suppose your love will effervesce in six months, or less. I have observed in books written by men, that period assigned as the furthest to which a husband’s ardour4 extends. Yet, after all, as a friend and companion, I hope never to become quite distasteful to my dear master.’
‘Distasteful! and like you again! I think I shall like you again, and yet again: and I will make you confess I do not only like, but love you – with truth, fervour, constancy.’
‘Yet are you not capricious, sir?’
‘To women who please me only by their faces, I am the very devil when I find out they have neither souls nor hearts – when they open to me a perspective of flatness, triviality, and perhaps imbecility, coarseness, and ill-temper: but to the clear eye and eloquent tongue, to the soul made of fire, and the character that bends but does not break – at once supple and stable, tractable and consistent – I am ever tender and true.’
‘Had you ever experience of such a character, sir? Did you ever love such a one?’
‘I love it now.’
‘But before me: if I, indeed, in any respect come up to your difficult standard?’
‘I never met your likeness. Jane, you please me, and you master me – you seem to submit, and I like the sense of pliancy you impart; and while I am twining the soft, silken skein round my finger, it sends a thrill up my arm to my heart. I am influenced – conquered; and the influence is sweeter than I can express; and the conquest I undergo has a witchery beyond any triumph I can win. Why do you smile, Jane? What does that inexplicable, that uncanny turn of countenance mean?’
‘I was thinking, sir (you will excuse the idea; it was involuntary), I was thinking of Hercules and Samson5 with their charmers—’
‘You were, you little elfish—’
‘Hush, sir! You don’t talk very wisely just now; any more than those gentlemen acted very wisely. However, had they been married, they would no doubt by their severity as husbands have made up for their softness as suitors; and so will you, I fear. I wonder how you will answer me a year hence, should I ask a favour it does not suit your convenience or pleasure to grant.’
‘Ask me something now, Janet – the least thing: I desire to be entreated—’
‘Indeed I will, sir; I have my petition all ready.’
‘Speak! But if you look up and smile with that countenance, I shall swear concession before I know to what, and that will make a fool of me.’
‘Not at all, sir; I ask only this: don’t send for the jewels, and don’t crown me with roses: you might as well put a border of gold lace round that plain pocket-handkerchief you have there.’
‘I might as well “gild refined gold.”6 I know it: your request is granted then – for the time. I will remand the order I despatched to my banker. But you have not yet asked for anything; you have prayed a gift to be withdrawn: try again.’
‘Well then, sir, have the goodness to gratify my curiosity, which is much piqued on one point.’
He looked disturbed. ‘What? what?’ he said hastily. ‘Curiosity is a dangerous petition: it is well I have not taken a vow to accord every request—’
‘But there can be no danger in complying with this, sir.’
‘Utter it, Jane: but I wish that instead of a mere inquiry into, perhaps, a secret, it was a wish for half my estate.’
‘Now, King Ahasuerus!7 What do I want with half your estate? Do you think I am a Jew-usurer, seeking good investment in land? I would much rather have all your confidence. You will not exclude me from your confidence if you admit me to your heart?’