Джейн Эйр / Jane Eyre

She is qualified to teach the usual branches of a good English education, together with French, Drawing, and Music’ (in those days, reader, this now narrow catalogue of accomplishments, would have been held tolerably comprehensive). �Address, J.E., Post-office, Lowton, – shire.’

This document remained locked in my drawer all day. After tea, I asked leave of the new superintendent to go to Lowton, in order to perform some small commissions for myself and one or two of my fellow teachers; permission was readily granted; I went.

The succeeding week seemed long; it came to an end at last, however, like all sublunary things, and once more, towards the close of a pleasant autumn day, I found myself afoot on the road to Lowton. A picturesque track it was, by the way; lying along the side of the beck and through the sweetest curves of the dale; but that day I thought more of the letters, that might or might not be awaiting me at the little burgh whither I was bound, than of the charms of lea and water.

My ostensible errand on this occasion was to get measured for a pair of shoes; so I discharged that business first, and when it was done, I stepped across the clean and quiet little street from the shoemaker’s to the post-office; it was kept by an old dame, who wore horn spectacles on her nose, and black mittens on her hands.

�Are there any letters for J.E.?’ I asked.

She peered at me over her spectacles, and then she opened a drawer and fumbled among its contents for a long time, so long that my hopes began to falter. At last, having held a document before her glasses for nearly five minutes, she presented it across the counter, accompanying the act by another inquisitive and mistrustful glance – it was for J.

�Is there only one?’ I demanded.

�There are no more,’ said she; and I put it in my pocket and turned my face homeward. I could not open it then; rules obliged me to be back by eight, and it was already half-past seven.

Various duties awaited me on my arrival. I had to sit with the girls during their hour of study; then it was my turn to read prayers; to see them to bed; afterwards I supped with the other teachers.