CHAPTER XXII 309
motion in his presence . I will go back as soon as I can stir : I need not make an absolute fool of myself . I know another way to the house . It does not signify if I knew twenty ways ; for he has seen me .
" Hillo !" he cries ; and he puts up his book and his pencil . " There you are ! Come on , if you please ."
I suppose I do come on ; though in what fashion I know not ; being scarcely cognisant of my movements , and solicitous only to appear calm ; and , above all , to control the working muscles of my face -- which I feel rebel insolently against my will , and struggle to express what I had resolved to conceal . But I have a veil -- it is down : I may make shift yet to behave with decent composure .
" And this is Jane Eyre ? Are you coming from Millcote , and on foot ? Yes -- just one of your tricks : not to send for a carriage , and come clattering over street and road like a common mortal , but to steal into the vicinage of your home along with twilight , just as if you were a dream or a shade . What the deuce have you done with yourself this last month ?"
" I have been with my aunt , sir , who is dead ."
" A true Janian reply ! Good angels be my guard ! She comes from the other world -- from the abode of people who are dead ; and tells me so when she meets me alone here in the gloaming ! If I dared , I ' d touch you , to see if you are substance or shadow , you elf ! -- but I ' d as soon offer to take hold of a blue ignis fatuus light in a marsh . Truant ! truant !" he added , when he had paused an instant . " Absent from me a whole month , and forgetting me quite , I ' ll be sworn !"
I knew there would be pleasure in meeting my master again , even though broken by the fear that he was so soon to cease to be my master , and by the knowledge that I was nothing to him : but there was ever in Mr . Rochester ( so at least I thought ) such a wealth of the power of communicating happiness , that to taste but of the crumbs he scattered to stray and stranger birds like me , was to feast genially . His last words were balm : they seemed