CHAPTER XXIV 341
bear being dressed like a doll by Mr. Rochester, or sitting like a second Danae with the golden shower falling daily round me. I will write to Madeira the moment I get home, and tell my uncle John I am going to be married, and to whom: if I had but a prospect of one day bringing Mr. Rochester an accession of fortune, I could better endure to be kept by him now." And somewhat relieved by this idea( which I failed not to execute that day), I ventured once more to meet my master ' s and lover ' s eye, which most pertinaciously sought mine, though I averted both face and gaze. He smiled; and I thought his smile was such as a sultan might, in a blissful and fond moment, bestow on a slave his gold and gems had enriched: I crushed his hand, which was ever hunting mine, vigorously, and thrust it back to him red with the passionate pressure.
" You need not look in that way," I said; " if you do, I ' ll wear nothing but my old Lowood frocks to the end of the chapter. I ' ll be married in this lilac gingham: you may make a dressing-gown for yourself out of the pearl-grey silk, and an infinite series of waistcoats out of the black satin."
He chuckled; he rubbed his hands. " Oh, it is rich to see and hear her?" he exclaimed. " Is she original? Is she piquant? I would not exchange this one little English girl for the Grand Turk ' s whole seraglio, gazelle-eyes, houri forms, and all!"
The Eastern allusion bit me again. " I ' ll not stand you an inch in the stead of a seraglio," I said; " so don ' t consider me an equivalent for one. If you have a fancy for anything in that line, away with you, sir, to the bazaars of Stamboul without delay, and lay out in extensive slave-purchases some of that spare cash you seem at a loss to spend satisfactorily here."
" And what will you do, Janet, while I am bargaining for so many tons of flesh and such an assortment of black eyes?"
" I ' ll be preparing myself to go out as a missionary to preach liberty to them that are enslaved-- your harem inmates amongst the rest. I ' ll get admitted there, and I ' ll stir up mutiny; and you, three-tailed bashaw as you are, sir, shall in a trice find yourself fettered amongst our hands: nor will I, for one,