CHAPTER XVI 193
crime she wished to perpetrate. I was amazed-- confounded. She looked up, while I still gazed at her: no start, no increase or failure of colour betrayed emotion, consciousness of guilt, or fear of detection. She said " Good morning, Miss," in her usual phlegmatic and brief manner; and taking up another ring and more tape, went on with her sewing.
" I will put her to some test," thought I: " such absolute impenetrability is past comprehension."
" Good morning, Grace," I said. " Has anything happened here? I thought I heard the servants all talking together a while ago."
" Only master had been reading in his bed last night; he fell asleep with his candle lit, and the curtains got on fire; but, fortunately, he awoke before the bed-clothes or the wood-work caught, and contrived to quench the flames with the water in the ewer."
" A strange affair!" I said, in a low voice: then, looking at her fixedly-- " Did Mr. Rochester wake nobody? Did no one hear him move?"
She again raised her eyes to me, and this time there was something of consciousness in their expression. She seemed to examine me warily; then she answered-
" The servants sleep so far off, you know, Miss, they would not be likely to hear. Mrs. Fairfax ' s room and yours are the nearest to master ' s; but Mrs. Fairfax said she heard nothing: when people get elderly, they often sleep heavy." She paused, and then added, with a sort of assumed indifference, but still in a marked and significant tone-- " But you are young, Miss; and I should say a light sleeper: perhaps you may have heard a noise?"
" I did," said I, dropping my voice, so that Leah, who was still polishing the panes, could not hear me, " and at first I thought it was Pilot: but Pilot cannot laugh; and I am certain I heard a laugh, and a strange one."