CHAPTER XXVII 402
" Little Jane ' s love would have been my best reward ," he answered ; " without it , my heart is broken . But Jane will give me her love : yes -- nobly , generously ."
Up the blood rushed to his face ; forth flashed the fire from his eyes ; erect he sprang ; he held his arms out ; but I evaded the embrace , and at once quitted the room .
" Farewell !" was the cry of my heart as I left him . Despair added , " Farewell for ever !"
That night I never thought to sleep ; but a slumber fell on me as soon as I lay down in bed . I was transported in thought to the scenes of childhood : I dreamt I lay in the red-room at Gateshead ; that the night was dark , and my mind impressed with strange fears . The light that long ago had struck me into syncope , recalled in this vision , seemed glidingly to mount the wall , and tremblingly to pause in the centre of the obscured ceiling . I lifted up my head to look : the roof resolved to clouds , high and dim ; the gleam was such as the moon imparts to vapours she is about to sever . I watched her come -- watched with the strangest anticipation ; as though some word of doom were to be written on her disk . She broke forth as never moon yet burst from cloud : a hand first penetrated the sable folds and waved them away ; then , not a moon , but a white human form shone in the azure , inclining a glorious brow earthward . It gazed and gazed on me . It spoke to my spirit : immeasurably distant was the tone , yet so near , it whispered in my heart -
" My daughter , flee temptation ." " Mother , I will ."
So I answered after I had waked from the trance-like dream . It was yet night , but July nights are short : soon after midnight , dawn comes . " It cannot be too early to commence the task I have to fulfil ," thought I . I rose : I was dressed ; for I had taken off nothing but my shoes . I knew where to find in my drawers some linen , a locket , a ring . In seeking these articles , I