he wicket leading to the shrubbery, and I see Mr. Rochester
entering. I step aside into the ivy recess; he will not stay long: he
will soon return whence he came, and if I sit still he will never see me.

But no--eventide is as pleasant to him as to me, and this antique garden
as attractive; and he strolls on, now lifting the gooseberry-tree
branches to look at the fruit, large as plums, with which they are laden;
now taking a ripe cherry from the wall; now stooping towards a knot of
flowers, either to inhale their fragrance or to admire the dew-beads on
their petals. A great moth goes humming by me; it alights on a plant at
Mr. Rochester's foot: he sees it, and bends to examine it.

"Now, he has his back towards me," thought I, "and he is occupied too;
perhaps, if I walk softly, I can slip away unnoticed."

I trode on an edging of turf that the crackle of the pebbly gravel might
not betray me: he was standing among the beds at a yard or two distant
from where I had to pass; the moth apparently engaged him. "I shall get
by very well," I meditated. As I crossed his shadow, thrown long over
the garden by the moon, not yet risen high, he said quietly, without
turning--

"Jane, come and look at this fellow."

I had made no noise: he had not eyes behind--could his shadow feel? I
started at first, and then I approached him.

"Look at his wings," said he, "he reminds me rather of a West Indian
insect; one does not often see so large and gay a night-rover in England;
there! he is flown."

The moth roamed away. I was sheepishly retreating also; but Mr.
Rochester followed me, and when we reached the wicket, he said--

"Turn back: on so lovely a night it is a shame to sit in the house; and
surely no one can wish to go to bed while sunset is thus at meeting with
moonrise."

It is one of my faults, that though my tongue is sometimes prompt enough
at an answer, there are times when it sadly fails me in framing an
excuse; and always the lapse occurs at some crisis, when a facile word or
plausible pretext is specially wanted to get me out of painful
embarrassment. I did not like to walk at this hour alone with Mr.
Rochester in the shadowy orchard; but I could not find a reason to allege
for leaving him. I followed with lagging step, and thoughts busily bent
on discovering a means of extrication; but he himself looked so composed
and so grave also, I became ashamed of feeling any confusion: the evil--if
evil existent o