Finally! Edward finally tells Jane everything!
If you are familiar with the novel you will notice that interspersed in Edward's speeches are some words and sentences that are either paraphrased or lifted directly from Chapters 23, 24 and 27. I can't improve on perfection!
Chapter 9 – The Truth
Several long moments of silence passed as Jane struggled to understand. "Mr. Mason had a sister? And she was your wife? So, instead of marrying Blanche Ingram last year you married Mr. Mason's sister?"
Edward looked straight at Jane, took a deep breath and slowly replied in a flat voice. "I have been married to Bertha Mason for fifteen years. I met and married Bertha Mason in Jamaica fifteen years ago. I have been married all this time."
Jane just stared at Edward, speechless. Unable to bear the deepening look of confusion and horror on Jane's face as the full import of his words sank in, Edward looked down at his hands. He sighed deeply and shook his head. Finally, he looked up at Jane again, a look of grim determination on his face.
"Yes, Jane, I have been married all these years. But I kept it a secret. Only my father and my brother knew of my marriage. Actually, it was my father who arranged my marriage." Edward paused briefly, then continued in a rush, his voice full of bitterness and hatred. "Yes, my father, damn him, arranged it all. All he ever cared about was money, so he refused to divide the estate between me and my older brother, Rowland. However, since he also could not endure that a son of his should be penniless, his solution was to marry me off to an heiress. So what if she came from a mad family? So what if it destroyed my happiness? So what if it destroyed my life?"
Edward suddenly rose from his seat and quickly paced back and forth several times, struggling to regain control of his emotions. When he had succeeded, he stopped and stood directly in front of Jane.
"Jane, will you please allow me to tell you the story of my marriage?" he pleaded. "I want you to understand what I've done and why." Jane briefly nodded. Encouraged, Edward pulled the chair closer to Jane, and sat down again, but before he could begin Hannah bustled into the room with a large, heavily laden tray.
"Here you are, Miss Jane, Mr. Rochester. Besides the tea, I've brought you some small scones I baked just this morning, and some butter and jam. I thought you might both be wanting a little something to eat, seeing as how it's been a few hours since breakfast."
Although food was now the last thing on Jane's mind, somehow she managed to recover enough composure to thank Hannah for her thoughtfulness.
Completely oblivious of the tension between Jane and Edward, Hannah cheerfully chided, "Oh, it's no trouble at all, Miss Jane. Now, if you'll be wanting anything else, I'll be in the kitchen." She beamed at both of them and then left.
There were several minutes of awkward silence as Jane silently poured herself a cup of tea, more from a need to do something to help her focus her mind and control her racing thoughts than from a desire for tea. As she stirred in some milk and sugar, Edward noticed that she did not offer to pour him a cup. In fact, she now seemed to be ignoring him, carefully avoiding making eye contact as she slowly sipped the hot, fragrant liquid. Beginning to feel desperate and increasingly afraid of Jane's reaction, Edward abruptly broke the silence.
"Thank you, Jane, for giving me the opportunity to explain myself. First, please understand that I never meant to hurt you with my deceit, but I could think of no way out of the hell I was living in."
Edward paused. Jane was finally looking at him again, but she just stared blankly and waited for him to continue. He looked at her carefully. Her face was pale and she was trembling slightly, but otherwise she seemed composed. He continued.
"As I told you, my father arranged my marriage to Bertha Mason, the daughter of an old acquaintance of his. Mr. Mason was a West India planter and merchant and was said to be very wealthy. My father made inquiries and learned that Mr. Mason's possessions were real and vast, that he had only two children, a son and a daughter, and that he could and would give his daughter a fortune of thirty thousand pounds. So, when I left college, I was sent out to Jamaica, to marry a bride already courted for me. My father said nothing about her money, but did tell me that Miss Mason was the boast of Spanish Town for her beauty. It was no lie. She was beautiful then – tall, dark, majestic."
He paused, closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead with his right hand. Jane remained silent and waited for him to continue. After a few moments he went on.
"Yes, she was beautiful. The most beautiful woman I had ever seen. I was eager to be with her, to spend as much time as possible in her presence. She flattered me, and being ignorant, raw and inexperienced I believed I loved her and that she loved me. It wasn't until much later, after we married, that I realized that I had seldom seen her alone, that I had only seen Bertha at parties, and that I had spent very little time in private conversation with her. If I had spent time with her, I might have realized that I could never be happy with her. But her relatives encouraged me, competitors piqued me (all the men in her circle seemed to admire her), she allured me and so a marriage was achieved almost before I knew where I was. Oh, I have no respect for myself when I think of that act! – an agony of inward contempt masters me. I never loved, I never esteemed, I did not even know her. I was not sure of the existence of one virtue in her nature. I had marked neither modesty nor benevolence, nor candor, nor refinement in her mind or manners – and I married her. What a mole-eyed blockhead I was!
"As for the family – the bride's mother I had never seen. I understood she was dead and it was only after the honeymoon that I learned the truth, that she was shut up in a lunatic asylum. There was a younger brother, whose existence they had kept secret, who was a complete dumb idiot, and an older brother, Richard, who will probably be in the same state one day. My father and brother knew all this, but they thought only of the thirty thousand pounds I would receive on marrying Bertha and joined in the plot against me.
"Married, I discovered too late that her nature was totally alien to mine. Her tastes were obnoxious to me, her cast of mind common, low, narrow, so much so that we could not spend even an hour in pleasant conversation, because whatever topic I started immediately received from her a turn at once coarse and trite, perverse and imbecile. I saw that I would never have a quiet or settled household because she was violent and unreasonable and we could not keep servants because they refused to tolerate her outbursts, her contradictory, exacting and absurd demands.
"But her violent temper was the least of it. Hers was a nature the most gross, impure, depraved, I ever saw. It had soon become obvious that Bertha was unchaste as well as intemperate, and she dragged me and my name through one degrading episode after another. Desperate, disgusted, I decided to divorce her, but found that I could not, because the doctors now determined that she was mad. Apparently her excesses had prematurely developed the germs of insanity that ran in her blood, that ran in the blood of everyone in that accursed family. To my horror, I realized that I was well and truly trapped since she was as strong in body as she was feeble in mind, and would in all likelihood live as long as I. As there was now no legal way that I could rid myself of her, I realized that I could never hope to marry another woman, a woman I could truly love, a woman I could share my life with, have a family with. Thus, at the age of twenty-six, I was hopeless."
Edward looked closely at Jane and alarmed by her pallid face interrupted himself, "Jane, you look positively ill. Please forgive me. I'll stop for a few minutes to allow you to compose yourself."
"No, sir, I'm fine. Please continue."
"Are you sure, Jane? Yes? Well, then, I'll try to be brief. Jane, I lived with Bertha for four long years, the four longest and worst years of my life. Than, one fiery hot night, as my wife shrieked out curses at me – and although two rooms off, I heard every word as the walls of houses in the West Indies are paper thin – I actually, in a moment of extreme despair, contemplated suicide. But only for a moment, as I am not mad. Then a tremendous storm broke; the air became pure, clear, refreshing, and as I walked in my garden after the storm passed, I formed a resolution. Since I had been deceived and had been tricked into marrying Bertha, I told myself that she was not my true wife, nor was I her husband. As it was, no one outside of Jamaica even knew of my marriage because in my letter to my father to inform him of it, I – already experiencing extreme disgust of its consequences, and from the family character and constitution seeing a hideous future opening to me – had added an urgent charge to keep it secret. Very soon her infamous conduct made him as anxious to conceal the fact of my marriage as I was. Now I determined that no one ever would know. I decided to return home to England, to confine Bertha with due attendance and precautions at Thornfield, then travel and form what new tie I liked since I considered myself free to do so."
Jane interrupted, "Thornfield? You brought her to Thornfield?"
"Yes, I brought her to Thornfield. As bitter as I was, I wanted her to have the best care possible, which I knew she would not receive in an asylum. So I placed her in a secure room and hired someone to watch her. You've met her keeper – Grace Poole."
"Grace Poole? Then … the strange laughter, and …" Jane paused, frowned, then continued, "the fire in your bedroom – was that Bertha? And it was she who attacked Mr. Mason? And did no one, Mrs. Fairfax, Leah, John, anyone, know who she was?"
"Yes, both incidents were Bertha's doing. And no, no one knew Bertha was my wife. They knew there was a madwoman at Thornfield, of course, but they were all completely ignorant of her tie to me. Before you ever came to Thornfield, I ordered them to keep all knowledge of her from you, fearing that no governess would stay if she knew with what inmate she was housed. And now you know why I refused to dismiss Grace after the fire. Of course I knew it was Bertha, but there was no way I could tell you the truth – that Bertha had stolen the key from Grace, who had had too much to drink and had fallen asleep, and escaped from her room and set the fire because she hated me so much she wanted to burn me alive. And it was Bertha who attacked Mason, who was foolish enough to go alone to see her, even though I had emphatically warned him not to. And it was Bertha who set the fire that destroyed Thornfield and killed her."
Edward paused for a moment, to give Jane an opportunity to respond, but she had fallen silent again, so he resumed speaking.
"Well. To continue. After installing Bertha at Thornfield, I traveled extensively, determined to find the love and happiness that had been denied me with my marriage to Bertha. For ten long years I searched the world for a woman I could love, but I was unsuccessful. As you already know, I was involved with Céline, and you know how badly that ended. There were some other women, but those relationships also ended in disappointment. As the years passed I became very bitter; I hated my useless, roving, lonely life, but could find no way out of it. Finally, one night last January I returned to England to attend to business. And then I met you. In Hay Lane. And my life changed forever.
"Janet, you intrigued me from the very moment we met. The way you insisted on helping me mount Mesrour, even though I was abrupt, surly, rude even – from the moment I leaned on you, I realized that you were like no one else I had ever met, and I wanted, no, wanted is a weak word, I needed to speak to you, I needed to know you. How relieved I was when you told me that you belonged at Thornfield and that I was your master and that you were not about to just disappear from my life! Now I was assured that I could see you, speak with you, on a daily basis. Well, as I said, I was determined to know you better; to that end I called you into my presence every evening to converse with me. I wanted to draw you out, to discover what was in your mind, to learn what was in your heart. Soon, very soon, I found myself growing more and more attached to you. Now I did not just need to speak with you, I needed to be with you. I needed to be with you and I would wait impatiently all day until I could call you into my presence in the evening. But, I played the master and hid my growing affection for you, and continued to be abrupt and changeable. I don't suppose you ever suspected that my feelings for you were changing, did you Jane?"
Jane slowly shook her head. "No, sir, I did not. I had no idea how you felt."
"No, of course you had no idea. I hid my feelings so well, there was no way you could have discerned how much I had come to care for you. But then there was the fire in my bedroom – and that night I made my plans. The way you saved my life, Jane – I can never forget what a debt I owe you. That night as we stood there alone, your little hand in mine, I realized that what I felt for you was a profound love. I had never loved anyone the way I loved you; I hadn't even known it was possible to love anyone the way I loved you. You were all I could think about – but what about you? Did you ever think about me at all? I loved you with all my heart – but did you love me at all? Or did you just see me as your employer? I had no idea how you felt about me. And I was desperate to know. That's when I thought to have that awful house party, and invite Blanche. I am now ashamed to say that it was all a ploy to get you to notice me. I intended to render you as madly in love with me as I was with you, and I felt that jealousy would be the best ally I could call in for the furtherance of that end. In short, I feigned courtship of Blanche to make you love me."
Perplexed, Jane asked, "But sir, if you were married, what could it matter to you how I felt about you? And why on earth would you try to make me love you knowing full well that we could never be married?"
"I wanted to make you love me because I intended to marry you."
Shocked, Jane exclaimed, "You intended to marry me? How would that be possible?"
"I already told you – as far as I was concerned Bertha was not my true wife, so I was free to be with whomever I wanted. I never meant to deceive you Jane, but … I knew how you had been raised. I knew that you would never consent to live with me, unmarried, so I determined to marry you in a church, then take you to Europe, where we could lose ourselves and no one would know my past or who we were. You would be my wife and I would devote myself to you and your happiness. Well, I intended to propose to you when you returned from Gateshead, but then you were offered that damned job and you did not return home. When I received your letter of resignation … God, I nearly went mad. How could you leave me in that way? As soon as I could I went to Gateshead with the intention of begging you to marry me, but Wilson told me you were in London to receive your inheritance. It was at that moment that I began to realize the full import of what I had planned. If I married you now that you were an heiress, there was a strong possibility that Richard Mason would hear about our wedding, track us down and have me charged with bigamy. I could not bear to think of exposing you to such infamy and I knew you would never forgive me for doing so. See, Jane, when you were with me at Thornfield, you were an orphan, alone and unloved, and I had convinced myself that by marrying you I was doing something good, noble even, because you were alone in the world and as your husband I would love you, provide for you, be your protector. However, now you had found family and friends and you were wealthy as well, so you no longer needed my protection, and I realized just how destructive and wrong my plans were. So I left you at Gateshead, sent Adele to school and then left England forever. I intended on spending the rest of my life at a little villa I have in the south of France, trying to somehow live without you, my love. But then Bertha killed herself burning down Thornfield and freed me once and for all. Now I can marry you Jane; now we can be married openly and legally."
Edward reached out and took Jane's hands in both of his and tried to look into her eyes, but Jane averted her face. Speaking tenderly, he said, "Jane, my sweet darling girl, I love you more than words can express. How can I explain how I feel so that you will understand … well, I have a curious feeling with regard to you, when I'm with you as I am now. It's as if my heart were tied to yours with an invisible cord. When you left Thornfield, when I believed I had lost you forever, I felt that cord begin to break and I felt as if my heart was literally being ripped apart. All these months that we have been apart … how I have longed for you, my darling Jane, how my heart has ached for you.
"Jane, I was very wrong to try to deceive you, but I love you so much that I became desperate and came up with a desperate plan . Can you ever forgive me, Jane? Can you ever love me?"
Visibly trembling, Jane remained silent, her eyes cast downwards.
As Jane still refused to look at him, Edward released her hands and cupping her face in his made her look at him. In a whisper he pleaded with her, "Please answer me, Jane. Can you ever forgive me for deceiving you?"
Jane pulled herself from him and, in a firm, angry voice replied, "Sir, I hardly know what to say. I cannot believe that you plotted to marry me knowing that it was not legal. I just want you to leave me now. Please, please leave."
Alarmed by her anger, Edward quickly begged, "Please Jane, please tell me you can forgive me. And please stop calling me "sir," call me by my name, call me Edward."
Ignoring his request, Jane rose, walked to the door of the parlor, opened it and with both her hands on the doorknob for support, leaned her forehead against the door. "Sir, please do as I asked and leave now."
Edward quickly rose from his chair, frantic at Jane's refusal to speak to him. "Jane, talk to me, just for a moment, just answer me, then I'll go if you still wish me to. Tell me how you feel, if you even care for me at all. Or do you hate me now that you know the truth?" He paused, and when Jane failed to respond or even look at him, he continued even more desperately. "I don't expect you to love me or to accept me now, but if you could at least think about my proposal Jane. I love you so very much; I'll wait for as long as it takes for you to grow to love me, only please tell me that you will at least think about what I have said."
"Sir, I want you to leave now, right now," Jane coldly replied, again ignoring his request.
"Jane, please," Edward pleaded. He then paused for several moments, breathing deeply in an effort to control himself, his fists clenched tightly. When he finally spoke again his voice was flat and unemotional. "Yes, I understand. I've shocked you with the disgusting details of my marriage to Bertha and how I plotted to ensnare you in a fraudulent union. You must think I'm some profligate rake who roams the world searching for young, innocent girls to debauch, not a man who has searched his whole life for someone to love, a man who sincerely and deeply loves you. Well, I'm not going to trouble you any further. I'm staying at the inn in the village. If you want to see me, please send a message to me there. I swear that I will not come back here to bother you with my demands. I'll come only if you ask me to. If I don't hear from you by tomorrow evening, I'll assume that you don't want to see me again and I will return to London."
Edward picked up his hat and coat, walked to the door and stopping before her looked down at Jane, an anguished expression on his face. Jane finally looked up at him and as their eyes met he saw that she was crying. Stifling her sobs, Jane remained silent. After a few moments Edward finally broke the silence and speaking softly said, "I'll see myself out Jane. Goodbye, my …." Unable to finish, he quickly strode out of the room. A few moments later Jane heard the front door open, then firmly close.