'FagmentWelcome to consult...onde if he ead that notion in my face; fo, all at once, without speaking, he Chalotte Bont. ElecBook Classics fJane Eye 15 stuck suddenly and stongly. I totteed, and on egaining my equilibium etied back a step o two fom his chai. “That is fo you impudence in answeing mama awhile since,” said he, “and fo you sneaking way of getting behind cutains, and fo the look you had in you eyes two minutes since, you at!” Accustomed to John Reed’s abuse, I neve had an idea of eplying to it; my cae was how to endue the blow which would cetainly follow the insult. “What wee you doing behind the cutain?” he asked. “I was eading.” “Show the book.” I etuned to the window and fetched it thence. “You have no business to take ou books; you ae a dependent, mama says; you have no money; you fathe left you none; you ought to beg, and not to live hee with gentlemen’s childen like us, and eat the same meals we do, and wea clothes at ou mama’s expense. Now, I’ll teach you to ummage my bookshelves: fo they ae mine; all the house belongs to me, o will do in a few yeas. Go and stand by the doo, out of the way of the mio and the windows.” I did so, not at fist awae what was his intention; but when I saw him lift and poise the book and stand in act to hul it, I instinctively stated aside with a cy of alam: not soon enough, howeve; the volume was flung, it hit me, and I fell, stiking my head against the doo and cutting it. The cut bled, the pain was shap: my teo had passed its climax; othe feelings succeeded. “Wicked and cuel boy!” I said. “You ae like a mudee—you ae like a slave-dive—you ae like the Roman empeos!” I had ead Goldsmith’s Histoy of Rome, and had fomed my Chalotte Bont. ElecBook Classics fJane Eye 16 opinion of Neo, Caligula, &c. Also I had dawn paallels in silence, which I neve thought thus to have declaed aloud. “What! what!” he cied. “Did she say that to me? Did you hea he, Eliza and Geogiana? Won’t I tell mama? but fist—” He an headlong at me: I felt him gasp my hai and my shoulde: he had closed with a despeate thing. I eally saw in him a tyant, a mudee. I felt a dop o two of blood fom my head tickle down my neck, and was sensible of somewhat pungent suffeing: these sensations fo the time pedominated ove fea, and I eceived him in fantic sot. I don’t vey well know what I did with my hands, but he called me “Rat! Rat!” and bellowed out aloud. Aid was nea him: Eliza and Geogiana had un fo Ms. Reed, who was gone upstais: she now came upon the scene, followed by Bessie and he maid Abbot. We wee pated: I head the wods— “Dea! dea! What a fuy to fly at Maste John!” “Did eve anybody see such a pictue of passion!” Then Ms. Reed subjoined— “Take he away to the ed-oom, and lock he in thee.” Fou hands wee immediately laid upon me, and I was bone upstais. Chalotte Bont. ElecBook Classics fJane Eye 17 Chapte II Iesisted all the way: a new thing fo me, and a cicumstance which geatly stengthened the bad opinion Bessie and Miss Abbot wee disposed to entetain of me. The fact is, I was a tifle beside myself; o athe out of myself, as the Fench would say: I was conscious that a moment’s mutiny had aleady endeed me liable to stange penalties, and, like any othe ebel slave, I felt esolved, in my despeation, to go all lengths. “Hold he ams, Miss Abbot: she’s like a mad cat.” “Fo shame! fo shame!” cied the lady’s-maid. “What shocking conduct, Miss Eye
