Page 30 of John Eyre

She cast him a wry look. “I understand you haven’t yet gone to church.”

“No,” he admitted. “Mr. Fairfax said you preferred the children be kept away from services for the time being.”

“A rare case of your abiding by my wishes.” She swung her crop. “But I don’t ask about the children. I ask about yourself. Why do you not attend?”

John returned her glance. There seemed no reason to dissemble. She already knew of his laudanum use. He doubted whether her opinion of him could get any worse. “I’ve lately lost my faith.”

“In God?”

“In most everything.” He bent his head, regretting the words as soon as he uttered them. “Forgive me. That’s not entirely true. I still have faith in my teaching. In the good that can be done with the boys.”

“You value your skill as a tutor very highly.”

“I hope I have good cause.”

“Oh, Stephen and Peter are much improved, I’ll grant you. They look almost human now.”

He inwardly flinched. It was no more than what he’d thought himself, but to hear her give voice to the sentiment made his heart hurt on the boys’ behalf. “I’m pleased you recognize it.”

“I’m not blind, Mr. Eyre. Indeed, I see more than a man like you could ever comprehend. Besides, it isn’t their improved appearance I object to, only the means by which you went about achieving that improvement.”

“My methods were nothing very extreme. Healthy food, intelligent occupation, and outdoor exercise when the weather permitted.”

“And a cessation of their tonic.”

“Yes. That too.”

“I expect you’ve been on tenterhooks this week, waiting for me to dismiss you. Or has our last conversation quite slipped your mind?”

John had the suspicion that she’d delayed their conversation to achieve that precise effect. To keep him in a perpetual state of anxiety—dreading the moment he’d lose his position. Was such a fear likely to slip his mind? It bloody well wasn’t. “It could hardly do that. The vice I admitted to you then isn’t one I’m particularly proud of.”

“A vice, you call it.”

“As well as a necessity. I had legitimate cause to use the laudanum prescribed to me, but I’m the first to confess that I’d come to rely on it a bit too heavily. You were right to be upset about it.”

She shot him an alert glance. “You speak of it in the past tense. Why? You haven’t stopped using the drug, have you?”

“I have, actually.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I didn’t take you for a fool, Mr. Eyre.”

“I’m sorry?”

“To stop taking it altogether? Even I know that such a course would cause a person to become ill.”

“Not ill. Only, a little…” He exhaled heavily. “I don’t know. Fanciful, I guess. Imagining things that aren’t there.”

Something passed over her face. An emotion he couldn’t identify. It might have been concern. Possibly even alarm. “Such as?”

“Last night, the panel of my box bed became stuck. I was briefly trapped inside, and for a moment I…” He ran a hand through his hair, giving a short laugh. “I fancied someone was in my room. Stupid, I know. The panel opened easily enough in the morning. Mr. Fairfax thinks it was likely due to the wood swelling.”

“Does he.”

“As for the rest of it…” John shrugged. “One hears things in old houses.”

Mrs. Rochester’s pace quickened. She stared straight ahead, her jaw set. John had to lengthen his stride to keep up with her.

Up ahead, the stable emerged through the mist—a formidable structure of gray stone with strong, wood-fenced paddocks running out at either side.