I rose up suddenly, terror-struck at the solitude which so ruthless a judge haunted, —­ at the silence which so awful a voice filled.  My head swam as I stood erect.  I perceived that I was sickening from excitement and inanition; neither meat nor drink had passed my lips that day, for I had taken no breakfast.  And, with a strange pang, I now reflected that, long as I had been shut up here, no message had been sent to ask how I was, or to invite me to come down:  not even little Adele had tapped at the door; not even Mrs. Fairfax had sought me.  “Friends always forget those whom fortune forsakes,” I murmured, as I undrew the bolt and passed out.  I stumbled over an obstacle:  my head was still dizzy, my sight was dim, and my limbs were feeble.  I could not soon recover myself.  I fell, but not on to the ground:  an outstretched arm caught me.  I looked up —­ I was supported by Mr. Rochester, who sat in a chair across my chamber threshold.

“You come out at last,” he said.  “Well, I have been waiting for you long, and listening:  yet not one movement have I heard, nor one sob:  five minutes more of that death-like hush, and I should have forced the lock like a burglar.  So you shun me? —­ you shut yourself up and grieve alone!  I would rather you had come and upbraided me with vehemence.  You are passionate.  I expected a scene of some kind.  I was prepared for the hot rain of tears; only I wanted them to be shed on my breast:  now a senseless floor has received them, or your drenched handkerchief.  But I err:  you have not wept at all!  I see a white cheek and a faded eye, but no trace of tears.  I suppose, then, your heart has been weeping blood?”

“Well, Jane! not a word of reproach?  Nothing bitter —­ nothing poignant?  Nothing to cut a feeling or sting a passion?  You sit quietly where I have placed you, and regard me with a weary, passive look.”

“Jane, I never meant to wound you thus.  If the man who had but one little ewe lamb that was dear to him as a daughter, that ate of his bread and drank of his cup, and lay in his bosom, had by some mistake slaughtered it at the shambles, he would not have rued his bloody blunder more than I now rue mine.  Will you ever forgive me?”

Reader, I forgave him at the moment and on the spot.  There was such deep remorse in his eye, such true pity in his tone, such manly energy in his manner; and besides, there was such unchanged love in his whole look and mien —­ I forgave him all:  yet not in words, not outwardly; only at my heart’s core.

“You know I am a scoundrel, Jane?” ere long he inquired wistfully —­ wondering, I suppose, at my continued silence and tameness, the result rather of weakness than of will.

“Yes, sir.”

“Then tell me so roundly and sharply —­ don’t spare me.”