CHAPTER I
There was no possibility of taking a walk
that day. We had been wandering, indeed, in the leafless shrubbery
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 sombre, and a rain so penetrating, that further out door
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.
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