A pause.
“Why are you silent, Jane?”
I was experiencing an ordeal: a hand of fiery iron grasped my vitals. Terrible moment: full of struggle, blackness, burning! Not a human being that ever lived could wish to be loved better than I was loved; and him who thus loved me I absolutely worshipped: and I must renounce love and idol. One drear word comprised my intolerable duty—“Depart!”
“Jane, you understand what I want of you? Just this promise—‘I will be yours, Mr. Rochester.’ ”
“ Mr. Rochester, I will not be yours.”
Another long silence.
“Jane!” recommenced he, with a gentleness that broke me down with grief, and turned me stone-cold with ominous terror—for this still voice was the pant of a lion rising—“Jane, do you mean to go one way in the world, and to let me go another?”
“I do.”
“Jane” (bending towards and embracing me), “do you mean it now?”
“I do.”
“And now?” softly kissing my forehead and cheek.
“I do,” extricating myself from restraint rapidly and completely.