I know not whether the day was fair or foul; in descending the
drive, I gazed neither on sky nor earth: my heart was with my eyes;
and both seemed migrated into Mr. Rochester's frame. I wanted to
see the invisible thing on which, as we went along, he appeared to
fasten a glance fierce and fell. I wanted to feel the thoughts
whose force he seemed breasting and resisting.
At the churchyard wicket he stopped: he discovered I was quite out
of breath. "Am I cruel in my love?" he said. "Delay an instant:
lean on me, Jane."
And now I can recall the picture of the grey old house of God rising
calm before me, of a rook wheeling round the steeple, of a ruddy
morning sky beyond. I remember something, too, of the green grave-
mounds; and I have not forgotten, either, two figures of strangers
straying amongst the low hillocks and reading the mementoes graven
on the few mossy head-stones. I noticed them, because, as they saw
us, they passed round to the back of the church; and I doubted not
they were going to enter by the side-aisle door and witness the
ceremony. By Mr. Rochester they were not observed; he was earnestly
looking at my face from which the blood had, I daresay, momentarily
fled: for I felt my forehead dewy, and my cheeks and lips cold.
When I rallied, which I soon did, he walked gently with me up the
path to the porch.
We entered the quiet and humble temple; the priest waited in his
white surplice at the lowly altar, the clerk beside him. All was
still: two shadows only moved in a remote corner. My conjecture
had been correct: the strangers had slipped in before us, and they
now stood by the vault of the Rochesters, their backs towards us,
viewing through the rails the old time-stained marble tomb, where a
kneeling angel guarded the remains of Damer de Rochester, slain at
Marston Moor in the time of the civil wars, and of Elizabeth, his
wife.
Our place was taken at the communion rails. Hearing a cautious step
behind me, I glanced over my shoulder: one of the strangers--a
gentleman, evidently--was advancing up the chancel. The service
began. The explanation of the intent of matrimony was gone through;
and then the clergyman came a step further forward, and, bending
slightly towards Mr. Rochester, went on.
"I require and charge you both (as ye will answer at the dreadful
day of judgment, when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed),
that if either of you know any impediment why ye may not lawfully be
joined together in matrimony, ye do now confess it; for be ye well
assured that so many as are coupled together otherwise than God's
Word doth allow, are not joined together by God, neither is their
matrimony lawful."