Reader, I married him. A quiet wedding we had: he and I, the
parson and clerk, were alone present. When we got back from church,
I went into the kitchen of the manor-house, where Mary was cooking
the dinner and John cleaning the knives, and I said "Mary, I have been married to Mr. Rochester this morning." The
housekeeper and her husband were both of that decent phlegmatic
order of people, to whom one may at any time safely communicate a
remarkable piece of news without incurring the danger of having
one's ears pierced by some shrill ejaculation, and subsequently
stunned by a torrent of wordy wonderment. Mary did look up, and she
did stare at me: the ladle with which she was basting a pair of
chickens roasting at the fire, did for some three minutes hang
suspended in air; and for the same space of time John's knives also
had rest from the polishing process: but Mary, bending again over
the roast, said only "Have you, Miss? Well, for sure!"
A short time after she pursued--"I seed you go out with the master,
but I didn't know you were gone to church to be wed;" and she basted
away. John, when I turned to him, was grinning from ear to ear.
"I telled Mary how it would be," he said: "I knew what Mr. Edward"
(John was an old servant, and had known his master when he was the
cadet of the house, therefore, he often gave him his Christian
name)--"I knew what Mr. Edward would do; and I was certain he would
not wait long neither: and he's done right, for aught I know. I
wish you joy, Miss!" and he politely pulled his forelock.
"Thank you, John. Mr. Rochester told me to give you and Mary this."
I put into his hand a five-pound note. Without waiting to hear
more, I left the kitchen. In passing the door of that sanctum some
time after, I caught the words "She'll happen do better for him nor ony o't' grand ladies." And
again, "If she ben't one o' th' handsomest, she's noan faal and
varry good-natured; and i' his een she's fair beautiful, onybody may
see that."
I wrote to Moor House and to Cambridge immediately, to say what I
had done: fully explaining also why I had thus acted. Diana and
Mary approved the step unreservedly. Diana announced that she would
just give me time to get over the honeymoon, and then she would come
and see me.