Volume One begins rather cryptically. The reader meets a first-person narrator, but practically nothing about the person telling the story is imparted. Everything must be drawn from context.

Lucy Snowe, we learn, is a twelve- or thirteen-year-old girl whose godmother has a "handsome house in the clean and ancient town of Bretton." Lucy Snowe visits this godmother twice a year, staying with her alone, without any of her own family. Only later is it clear that this town of Bretton is actually in England. This godmother, whose name is the same as the town in which she lives, has a teenaged son.

Lucy likes staying in the house of the Brettons well enough, but she does not seem to expect love or general favor from the family, just to be tolerated in a genteel way. While Lucy is there on a visit, a letter arrives for Mrs. Bretton which upsets that lady. When Lucy returns to her room, there is a new small, white crib in it.

A little girl who is to be Lucy's roommate is a relative of Mrs. Bretton's dead husband, Dr. Bretton. Her name is Paulina Mary (Polly) Home, and she is to stay with the Brettons while her widowed father makes arrangements abroad. Mrs. Home had been a pretty and vain woman who had neglected Polly. Mrs. Home separated from Mr. Home and, having gotten a fever after a ball, died. This child, Polly, the product of neglect and a broken home, is hoped by Mrs. Bretton "not to be like her mama." Her devastated father is prescribed travel by his doctor to heal his frayed nerves and, it is said, his blameless but still guilty conscience.

The child arrives late at night and immediately shows her imperious nature by ordering servants around. She is tiny, very neat, and has the appearance of a doll. It becomes clear that she is to live for a time at the Brettons until Mr. Home can send for her. Polly does not seem to take a liking to Lucy, apparently because she does not like her appearance and Lucy appears to have no gaiety or frivolity. The little girl, understandably, weeps and does not sleep, and in the morning she orders about her nursemaid quite tyrannically. She again voices her dislike of Lucy. Polly cries out to her nurse that she is aching in her heart for her absent Papa. The child does not eat at breakfast, and Mrs. Bretton and Lucy confer about what is to be done for her. Lucy counsels time and kindness, and Mrs. Bretton replies that all will be well when little Polly takes to someone in the house.

In Chapter II, Polly continues to mope, and she is shown to have the most unusual combination of a tiny and childlike appearance and many of the affectations of a grown person. She is very still, rather than active like many children of six, and a girl who stays up at night praying. Lucy immediately begins to think that this little girl's mind cannot be completely healthy. Polly, not surprisingly, has a monomaniacal fascination and yearning for the return of her father.

Lucy observes Polly looking out the window and makes the judgment that Polly's nature is "sudden, dangerous," or "sensitive," because she witnesses the moment when Polly sees her much-awaited father approaching the Bretton house. Polly's rapt attention and frantic rush to meet her father show her single-minded personality.

When Mr. Home arrives at the Brettons, Polly does not avert her attention from him even for a minute. Mr. Graham Bretton, Mrs. Bretton's only son, arrives. Throughout this time, little Polly sits doll-like and unnatural, earnestly hemming (while repeatedly pricking herself with the needle) a little handkerchief she is making for her father. Lucy finds Polly's behavior to be exceedingly strange and almost unnervingly adult in a child so small and young. Because of her possessiveness of her father, Lucy thinks Polly is a busybody.

Graham is described by Lucy as "handsome, faithless-looking." He is sixteen, auburn-haired, and well-grown. He is somewhat spoiled by his mother and is a bit of a tyrant with his friends. He teases Polly a little bit, and they are introduced to each other as "Mr. Bretton" and "Miss Home" and bow and curtsey with the utmost formality. Graham engages in a bit of bantering flirtation with Polly, which the little girl counters with amazingly womanly skill. Lucy watches, mutely. Graham, before the little girl goes off to bed, asserts that he will be Polly's favorite soon, and he has the effrontery to say that Polly will favor him over her own father.

In Chapter III, "The Playmates,” Mr. Home leaves his little Polly, who is devastated at his departure. There are assurances that, when a house for them is settled, she will be called for. While Mr. Home is still at the Brettons', Polly has only haughty disdain for the playful overtures of Graham's attentions. At his departure, Mr. Home instructs Polly to be strong and not mope about, but as they have their final embrace Mr. Home weeps. Lucy notes that Polly, surprisingly, does not. When he is finally gone, Lucy watches Polly have a silent and intense paroxysm of grief, and Lucy thinks that, since Polly's nature is so sensitive, she will have many such extremes of emotion in her future life.

After a few days of silent grief, Graham (whom Polly calls "Mr. Graham") makes a tender overture to her, and it appears that he will become the person to whom her affections will be transferred. They become very close, and they continue their flirtatious playing during the rest of Polly's stay, with Graham alternating between the admiring suitor and the teasing young man, and Polly alternating between solicitous womanly attentions to him and coquettish disdain. Lucy observes that Polly's sole object is to monopolize the attention of Graham—to the extent that she, while still maintaining some dignity, seems to live solely for his regard. Graham, while vacillating between giving her attention and being busy with his own pursuits and friends, declares her an "oddity," but also determines that she amuses him a great deal more than his mother or Lucy Snowe does.

At the end of two months, Polly's father sends word that she is to come to live with him in Europe. Paulina's affections have been transferred to Graham to such an extent that she is very aggrieved to be leaving him. Graham has no such compunction and rather insensitively makes little of their farewell. Lucy, who is kind to Polly although the child has no semblance of affection for her, brings Polly out from bed to say another goodbye to Graham, whom, she cries, "cares nothing for her." Lucy, who is of a philosophical turn of mind, explains that Polly cannot expect the same kind of regard from Graham as she has for him: not only is he a boy and she a girl, but he is sixteen and she is only six. Graham has a nature of strength and gaiety, and Polly's nature is sensitive and can be melancholic. Polly is assured that, if Graham has any favorite child that he knows, it is Polly, and she must be content with that. Polly, who is wakeful with grief, this one night sleeps in the same bed as Lucy, feeling somewhat comforted. Polly asks Lucy if she is a wise person to give such advice, and Lucy says that she means to try to be wise. Polly finally goes to sleep, and she leaves the house early the next morning.

Analysis

From a modern perspective, the habits of the people in this book in regard to their children seem odd. Lucy, still a young girl, is sent for long periods to live with her godmother, who, though kindly, seems to have no particular affection for her. Polly, who was neglected by her mother after her parents separated and therefore had already experienced significant trauma even before her mother's death, is shunted off to live at the Brettons' for two months while her father travels for his health. That the child, neglected and grief-stricken, would need the constant, immediate companionship of her sole surviving parent seems to occur to no one. The fact that Polly seems to be a very strange child is not surprising given her circumstances.

But Lucy, though a philosophical and thoughtful narrator, is not an impartial one, and the reader learns later that she is not always a reliable narrator either. Lucy draws the conclusion that some of the extreme oddities of the temperament of Paulina Mary (Polly) are in her nature rather than the product of her tragic young life. That a child so young and small could be so composed, so repressed, and so emotionally needy takes Lucy, the self-sufficient one, by surprise. Never does Lucy explain Polly's monomaniacal tendencies as the product of fear of neglect and abandonment, which has been her lot for her entire young life. While the modern reader perceives this, Polly is still not a sympathetic character. Polly is too often described as less or different than human: "pygmy," "doll-like," "elfish,” "tiny," and "Mousie" are applied to her, and the child is too peremptory to servants and needlessly unkind to Lucy to be likeable.

Polly, for no good reason (or at least not any reason that Lucy is willing to tell us), seems to dislike Lucy. Perhaps Lucy is unattractive to her (some children have definite likes and dislikes when it comes to a person's appearance), but also Lucy appears to have no power in the Bretton household. She is not a man (like Polly's father is, and Graham is almost a man), and Lucy is nothing but a visiting goddaughter of Mrs. Bretton. The fact that Lucy is closer to Polly in age, and of the same sex, does not occur to Polly as being the beginning of a basis for friendship. Polly, after the departure of her father, transfers her affections almost immediately to the nearest man (Graham) and the most physically attractive, spoiled, and charismatic person in the household. Polly's taste in friendships, spurred by her deep-seated need for attention and affection, is surprisingly adult. It is based far less on play and shared interests than on status and emotional need.

The interaction between Graham and Polly has a disturbing sexual subtext. There is always a coquettish interplay between them, involving attention and servitude (Polly performs little services for him, for which he praises her) and power. Graham asserts, after Polly brings him tea and breakfast, that he will make her his housekeeper and cook when he has a house of his own. She procures little treats, like marmalade and sweet cake, for him. He exacts "payment" from her when he wins their little games—in the form of a kiss. The whole interaction has a flavor of adult flirtation, with the attendant false disdain and clever wordplay. Polly, we are led to believe, has learned feminine wiles early from her faithless and empty-headed beauty of a mother, and perhaps this is the only way Polly knows how to deal with the opposite sex. This idea is buttressed by revelations that, as a child of only six, Polly has already decided that she does not like pinafores and prefers aprons. That a child this young would be not only set in her ways about her clothing, but also allowed to have such leeway in her choices, shows her very feminine and very spoiled nature. Brontë continues this idea when she refers to Polly, when she is sitting unnaturally still, as a "little Odalisque." The message of the ultra-feminine, the intentionally alluring, and the foreign and unnaturalness of Polly are apparent from the start.

The description of Polly's all-consuming devotion to Graham, and Lucy's admonishment to her to suppress it, is descriptive of much of the nineteenth century's ideas of womanhood: the virtues of servitude and devotion were admired, but a woman was not often allowed to make overt demands for anything, especially the attention of a man. Polly has learned quickly what a woman must do to survive and be successful in the society of her day, and Lucy, in a more philosophical rather than flirtatious way, has learned the same.

The remarkable thing about these opening chapters is how very little the reader knows about Lucy. We know nothing of her parents or her family, or even from what part of England she comes. The reader does not know her age exactly, but it is assumed to be somewhere between Polly's extreme youth and Graham's near-adulthood. No one seems to talk to her, to take any notice of her, or to give her any thought whatsoever. What is known about her character is usually learned through a negative communication: we know that she does not possess Polly's emotional, sensitive nature because Lucy describes it as different and difficult to bear in this harsh world. Seldom does Lucy speak out loud, but she serves almost entirely as the mute witness and describer of events and people. It is known only that she is quiet, thoughtful, and of a philosophical—and possibly self-abnegating—turn of mind.

Chapter IV, "Miss Marchmont," takes an abrupt leap forward in time. There is a strange monologue at the beginning of the chapter, alluding to the literary convention that heroines in novels live happy childhoods, or at least have long stretches of protected and easy domesticity. But in the most general of terms–without naming any specific people, places, or events–Lucy Snowe intimates that, since her girlhood visits to the house of the Brettons, her life has been difficult, sad, and even tragic. It is not known whom she lived with (or whether either of her parents was alive in her childhood) or in what circumstances they lived, other than the fact that Lucy is of the educated classes and not the daughter of servants or laborers. Lucy urges the reader to imagine her "basking" in the happiness of a good childhood, but she makes clear that this was not the case. The narrator is at pains to reveal nothing other than that Lucy has suffered.

When or how Lucy’s parents (or the guardians whom she lived with, for it is not clear) died or, perhaps, disowned her, leaving her with little or no money, is not explained. The reader knows only that Lucy has suffered at least one family death, for she wears a mourning dress. It is known, however vaguely and obliquely, that before that death and Lucy’s current status as a poor, genteel young woman with no family or friends, there was some sort of emotional suffering or neglect in her life. But Lucy is cagey and reveals nothing, and the reader can only imagine what might have happened.

The Brettons have fallen upon harder times, too. The property Mrs. Bretton held in trust for her son has fallen to a fraction of its value, and the mother and son now live in London. Lucy knows that she cannot appeal to them for any kind of help.

Miss Marchmont is introduced. She is a "woman of fortune" who lives in the neighborhood where Lucy is now destitute. She is a paralyzed invalid who cannot stir from her sickroom. She offers Lucy the position of nurse-companion, a hard job but one that is at least socially acceptable for an educated young lady. Lucy is loath to accept it at first, though she desperately needs a job, because she understands how limiting it would be both emotionally and physically for her. Lucy thinks perhaps that she may find some other employment to suit her better. For the next few days Miss Marchmont requests that Lucy come to visit her, and during that time Lucy forms respect for and attachment to the invalid’s patient suffering. The respect is such that Lucy decides to take Miss Marchmont’s offer.

One night there is a terrible storm, which Lucy thinks portends death or change. That night Miss Marchmont is excitable and tells Lucy the tragic story of her youth. She was engaged to be married to a man she deeply loved. This man, Frank, was riding to see her one Christmas Eve, but he fell from his horse and was dragged to her door. Frank died in Miss Marchmont’s arms. She says that she hopes soon to be reunited with Frank, and that night Miss Marchmont dies. Lucy is very affected by the story of Frank's death, and she mourns Miss Marchmont bitterly, for she was her only friend on earth.

The reader is now led to believe, through her dying words, that Miss Marchmont may have left a fortune for Lucy upon her death. But Miss Marchmont had not made any such provision before she died, so Lucy, after having experienced another death of a person dear to her, will be thrust again on the world in much the same state of poverty as before.

The next chapter finds Lucy nearing the end of her stay at Miss Marchmont’s. The heir to her estate (which may have become Lucy’s had Miss Marchmont lived a little longer), Miss Marchmont’s second cousin, pays Lucy her wages, and Lucy is to find her way in the world as the possessor of fifteen pounds (a few months’ wages in Brontë’s time, but only enough to live on for a short time). Lucy is worn but still has intact health, and she is now in need of employment and a place to live.

Lucy goes to visit an old servant of her family, a housekeeper who is working at a large estate nearby. During the interview Lucy catches sight of a daughter of the house, an old school friend of hers. She does not speak to the woman, but she notes that this woman retains a French nurse for her child. The housekeeper informs Lucy that English governesses, too, are in demand abroad, where they are quite well-paid and well-treated. During this passage it becomes clear that Lucy was a good student. But in a moment of unreliability, Lucy makes us think that at this point in the narrative her command of French is good, for she critiques her old school friend's French. (We will learn later that Lucy speaks no French.)

Lucy resolves to go to London, which is not far distant. She stays at an old, respectable inn that had been used by her uncles. Upon arriving in the metropolis, Lucy is a bit bewildered, but she endeavors to keep a calm and quiet demeanor. Her shabby clothing, worn looks, and insignificant presence do not impress the smart-looking servants at this hotel, but she eventually persuades them by her speech and ladylike words to sufficiently provide for her needs. Then she goes to her own room and cries herself to sleep, wondering what she will do and how she will make her way in this world.

Chapter VI, "London," finds Lucy strangely elated. In the morning, she walks about London and takes in the city, finding it exciting and exhilarating. She returns to her inn. The waiter, who remembers Lucy’s uncles when they stayed there in past days, advises her how to go abroad. Lucy has made the decision all of a sudden, perhaps prompted by the sight of the French nurse-governess in the home where she visited Mrs. Barrett. A ship, The Vivid, is leaving port the next morning, and aided by the kindly waiter, Lucy takes a berth and prepares to embark.

She sails for Boue-Marine (a made-up Continental port, its name meaning literally "sea-mud") in the fictional kingdom of Labassecour ("barnyard"). She knows nothing of these places, but she has "nothing to lose." She arrives at The Vivid, cheated by the boatmen and porters on her way, and boards the ship. She is looked down upon by the ladies’ cabin stewardess, and she awaits the arrival of the other passengers.

Her fellow passengers include a wealthy family of four, the Watsons, among them a pretty young woman married to a much older, ugly, rich man. A young plainly-dressed lady, Miss Ginevra Fanshawe, is also aboard. She is on her way to school in Villette. The two young women strike up a conversation, and Ginevra lets slip her relationship to a M. de Bassompierre, who is her uncle, godfather, and benefactor.

The passengers are seasick for the last part of the voyage, and Ginevra shows herself to be selfish and given to complaining. Lucy rebukes her gently but is not disliked for it. Upon arriving in port, Lucy tips the stewardess well and asks for directions to a respectable inn. She is taken there, and there is some confusion because her money is English money and the porter and innkeeper do not want to take it. She exchanges a sovereign (a British coin equaling one pound) and goes to bed exhausted and still ill from seasickness, worrying what she will do tomorrow to find a way to earn a living.

Analysis

Chapter IV’s story is a tragedy in miniature, with the lifelong tragedy of Miss Marchmont’s lost love and Lucy’s short and so far cheerless life compared. Miss Marchmont, who had a chance at love but had it snatched away, as she thinks, by God’s hand, has had a life of sickness and suffering ever since. But Miss Marchmont, we learn, has also had the memory of her beloved Frank to cherish for the thirty years between his death and her own. (Also, the story of Frank is blunt foreshadowing.) Lucy has had only her grim childhood behind her—and her bleak adulthood stretching out before her. Lucy also has formed an attachment to Miss Marchmont, which has, like Miss Marchmont’s fiancé, been snatched away too soon. Lucy, though severely limited by her post as nurse-companion, had been willing to nurse and serve Miss Marchmont for the next twenty years, if that was how long it took her to die. But just when things were comfortable and Lucy had started to like and be liked by a kindly lady, the illness took Miss Marchmont, and any possible monetary legacy, away from Lucy. The irony is real, for not only had Lucy had trepidations about taking the job in the first place, but she soon lost her only real friend in the world.

The philosophical bent of Lucy’s mind seems both very fortunate and very sad. A person exposed to much suffering does well to become philosophically stoic, regarding her suffering as inevitable and caring less about it than would perhaps be warranted. But it appears that Lucy, even as a child, has had this capacity and a sort of fatalism to go along with it. She seems to expect suffering and not to look for joy in life. If joy were to happen to her, the reader might believe, Lucy would embrace it; but it is clear that Lucy does not expect much happiness from life.

There is some evidence that the model for Lucy’s desolate childhood was Charlotte Brontë’s own childhood. The character of Lucy is an odd one for her time: utterly unattached and unloved but utterly free. Even if not autobiographical, the idea of the young adult—and even more fantastically the young, educated, respectable woman—cut off by death and suffering, free and with myriad possibilities ahead of her, was generally foreign and unknown to Brontë’s readers. Lucy is not in debt despite her poverty and has no children, no parents to take care of her, no opinion of the community to keep up, no husband to direct her. This state of affairs for any young woman in Brontë’s day must have been wonderfully exciting to readers (especially female readers) in the sense that the novel became something of an adventure story, not just a social novel. This could be seen as excitement about a forbidden circumstance; the radical idea of a free woman, apart from the family, was seen as threatening to society. Governesses, while respected, were not looked on very favorably in England, and the single woman or spinster have traditionally been seen as both threatening to society and burdens. Women’s roles were specifically envisioned as parts of a web of relationships with other people; independence was the province of men. Women alone, setting out in the world to decide their own fortunes and directions in life, were few and probably looked on as subjects of curiosity. As characters in novels, they would be subjects for readers’ vicarious adventuring.

Lucy is also set apart from most people in her ability to face of death—not only her own, for she has experienced the deaths of people close to her. Her monologue about how death holds no terror for her separates Lucy from the world and from the rest of life. In many ways she is like an adventurous, reckless man without a care for his life (what might be termed in modern times an adrenaline junkie), or conversely like a nun whose whole existence is in the spiritual realm, with much less than the natural care for her own health and life.

The name of Lucy’s ship The Vivid, compared to the mythological and historical names of the other ships on nearby anchor, is perhaps a foreshadowing of what this trip will mean to Lucy. The word "vivid" means brightly colored, easily visible, and full of life (such as the buxom and vibrant stewardess in the ladies’ cabin). But it also implies that this voyage will be real and true-to-life, not a fairy tale or a story fated to have a happy ending. The Vivid is going to carry Lucy into her real future, complete with all the happiness and sorrows that will entail.

The name de Bassompierre, vaguely mentioned in connection with Polly’s father’s Continental relations, is mentioned by Ginevra Fanshawe. This selfish girl is the niece of some grand de Bassompierre who pays her school bills. The reader will learn later that this is an important family name.

Lucy makes judgments about people based on their supposed “natures" as well as their appearances. The episode on the ship reinforces Lucy’s habit of moral judgment about everyone around her, which will persist throughout the book. She notes Ginevra’s weakness for selfishness and her inability to endure suffering (something that Lucy has proven herself able to do already in her young life), and Lucy chalks it up to "nature" and her "particular style of fair and fragile beauty." Lucy had made a similar pronouncement about Polly’s nature upon observing Polly’s megalomaniacal tendencies and her supreme, intractable femininity. While probably correct about many of her judgments, Lucy is not particularly charitable or indulgent in her analyses of her fellow human beings. Since she has been the recipient of such an (unspecified) amount of bad fortune so far in her life, however, one might not be surprised that she finds it difficult to be charitable in her judgments, even if she can be charitable out of respect for someone like Miss Marchmont.

Chapter VII, "Villette," finds Lucy in her hotel in Boue-Marine, utterly unsure of what to do next. She remembers the conversation she had with Ginevra Fanshawe aboard The Vivid. Ginevra had told Lucy that Madame Beck, the proprietress of the school that Ginevra attends in the town of Villette, wants to hire an English governess.

On this slim recommendation, and with nowhere else to go, Lucy boards a stagecoach for Villette, forty miles distant. Though the day is humid, gray, and rainy, Lucy feels exultant and enjoys the journey. She arrives at night.

The driver has left Lucy's trunk in Boue-Marine, but Lucy cannot speak French to find out where it is. A fellow English passenger, a handsome young man, assists Lucy and finds out the necessary information. He also sends her toward of a quiet inn, walking with her part of the way. As she walks, two men follow her with nefarious intent. Lucy walks faster, and in her fear she misses the proper staircase and goes on until she passes a guard patrol. This foils the blackguards, but she realizes she has passed the inn. After continuing a short way, she sees the sign that says "Madame Beck’s." She bravely rings the bell.

She is brought in, chiefly because she speaks English. After she waits fifteen minutes in the parlor, Madame Beck comes in to see her. She speaks no English, and Lucy speaks no French, so a housemaid acts as interpreter. Madame Beck seems to want to hire Lucy as an English teacher (governaunte) or nurse for her children, but Madame is unsure, for Lucy has no references. Madame wants to send Lucy back out into the night, telling her to come back tomorrow. At that moment Monsieur Paul, Madame Beck’s cousin, comes in. He is an expert in physiognomy, the study of facial features as a guide to character. Madame Beck asks M. Paul to look at Lucy’s face and make a judgment. He says that Lucy is partially good and partially bad, and that if things go well with Madame Beck, Lucy’s good nature will predominate. Madame Beck hires her, and Lucy stays.

The next chapter tells of Lucy’s meteoric rise from being a homeless, unemployed young woman to being an English teacher at Madame Beck’s. The night she arrives, after being fed well, Lucy is conducted up to the nursery. Lucy notes that the present nursery maid, Mrs. Sweeney (also called "Svini") is a drunkard. After Lucy falls asleep, Madame creeps into the room and examines all of Lucy’s clothing and her few possessions. Lucy awakens but feigns sleep and watches her. Madame also takes an impression of the keys to Lucy’s trunk and boxes, so that she can open them should she want to in the future. This is the first of the instances by which Lucy learns that Madame runs her boarding school by spying on her employees, students, and teachers.

In the morning Mrs. Sweeney is dismissed. She is a drinker, and she has clothes far above her station (thinks Lucy) that were probably stolen from someone else. Her English, an Irish brogue with an overlay of Cockney, is not the kind of English that Lucy thinks should be taught to the children anyway. Lucy is to be the nursery-governess to Madame’s three children. She is to teach them English, care for them, teach them nursery lessons and prayers, look after their clothing, and so on.

Lucy finds the arrangements suitable, and things go along smoothly for a time. She and Madame talk in the evenings, and Lucy finds her to be sensible and very effective, if morally deficient. Lucy finds that Madame Beck, while possessing a "rational benevolence," is entirely heartless, only doing things for rational motives and particularly out of her own self-interest. Still, she runs a very good school, where the pupils learn lessons easily (although never with any great progress) and are well treated. Lucy admires Madame’s self-possession and firmness, but she knows her to have no disinterested compassion for anyone else.

Throughout this time of discovery, Lucy contrasts the customs of Madame Beck’s school with those of England. Overall, Madame Beck’s has more strict restraint of the students, for, according to Madame, the "continental" girl has more need of restraint than the sweet, innocent girls of England. The food and amusements and overall treatment of the students also seem better than many English schools, Lucy finds, with the learning of lessons made to be as easy and pleasant as possible. Yet, Lucy maintains that almost everything about English schools and students is still superior.

One day as Lucy is sewing, Madame calls her to teach the English class of sixty students since the English master, Mr. Wilson, is late. Lucy, abhorring silently her own habit of "sloth" and inaction, tries to avoid it, but she is propelled forward by Madame’s urging and resolves to act as a substitute teacher. She is terrified, and Madame, on the way to the classroom, questions her closely about how she will manage the students and whether she has enough courage. Lucy speaks a little French now, but she is not confident or fluent enough in it to feel totally at ease teaching sixty unruly girls. Nevertheless, the hardness in Madame’s face spurs Lucy to action, and she goes in to teach the class.

She immediately goes about humiliating and reprimanding—by tearing a copy-book and locking one student in a closet—the worst offenders in the class. This makes the girls quiet, and the class goes well. Madame Beck has listened at the door, and she considers Lucy’s conduct favorable. At the end of class Mr. Wilson is dismissed, and Lucy is promoted to English teacher—and her salary is raised.

In the ninth chapter, "Isidore," readers learn that Ginevra, now Lucy’s friend, has friends in Villette who take her to parties. For these parties she must have appropriately elegant clothing. Mrs. Cholmondeley, her "chaperon," an English friend living in Villette, has bought her some dresses, but under relentless requests from the shameless Ginevra, she has cut off her charity in this regard. Ginevra, though sent to school by her rich de Bassompierre uncle, has only a tiny allowance and cannot buy more finery for herself. She has bought things on credit from the dressmaker and sent the bills to her uncle, but before one particularly important party she shows Lucy a parure (a jeweled ornament) that could not possibly have come from either Mrs. Cholmondeley or have been bought on credit. After close questioning, Lucy learns that Ginevra has accepted it from a Monsieur Isidore.

M. Isidore, a handsome young man whose name is not Isidore (it is a nickname from silly, prattling Ginevra), is deeply in love with Ginevra and hopes to marry her. Ginevra toys with his affections, blowing hot and cold, and although M. Isidore is handsome, Ginevra is not in love with him. She cannot bring herself to be so, she says, even though other girls are, because Isidore requires so much of her and wants her to be serious and make a commitment. Ginevra just wants to "enjoy youth"—but she took his gift. Lucy asks whether M. Isidore is a suitor acceptable to Ginevra’s parents and learns that he is not. She concludes that Ginevra is using M. Isidore, so she rebukes Ginevra for her shallowness and thoughtless treatment of him. In this conversation we learn something of Lucy’s strict moral code and her admirable lack of vanity and coquettishness. Ginevra takes Lucy’s "sermonizing" well and remains Lucy’s friend, though she does not change.

Lucy has excelled in teaching, getting her students to apply themselves somewhat and even earning the regard of some of the more intelligent students. She roundly criticizes the girls’ sloth, ignorance, and unwillingness to work hard. The moral character of these Labassecourian girls, too, is considered shocking to Lucy: these girls, and even Madame Beck, consider it a trifle to tell a lie. It is thought, says Lucy, in this Catholic country to be a more serious offense to read a novel or to miss Mass on a Sunday than to tell a lie. As a consequence of Lucy making it plain that she will not allow girls to lie and that she considers it a grave offense, the surveillance of her by other teachers and Madame Beck increases.

Analysis

Madame Beck, through Lucy’s eyes, is not led by her emotions. This is something of a stereotype of the calculating French person of business, which was current in England in Brontë’s time—suggesting that the French were less moral and more self-serving than the English. Madame Beck’s willingness to hire Lucy on the strength only of M. Paul’s physiognomic analysis of her is meant to show that Madame would not hire Lucy out of pity or sympathy but to satisfy her own interests. As in earlier chapters, Lucy makes sweeping judgments about people during her first or early encounters with them.

Lucy’s extreme courage in the face of very difficult circumstances leads the reader to admire her and hope that she finds safety and good employment. But the almost foolhardy adventuring of a young woman with little money, no references, and no friends or prospects also gives the impression that Lucy remains young and naïve. Nevertheless, the story of Lucy traveling, within the space a very few days, from her native town to London, to Boue-Marine, and thence to the doorstep of Madame Beck’s in the town of Villette is a thrilling and well-told tale.

The coincidences may seem a bit thick to the modern reader. How lucky was it that Lucy, wandering blindly about an unknown town, would end up on the very street of Madame Beck’s school? How fortuitous was it that there was a kind young English gentleman to assist her at the stagecoach bureau? And, most of all, how incredibly fortunate was it for Lucy that she would hear of a job from a young student she met only in passing on her sea voyage? Brontë’s penchant for coincidence as a way to propel the plot is apparent. Even so, it is so skillfully and believably done that the reader can suspend disbelief quite easily. The fact that only through coincidence and luck could a young lady such as Lucy end up in following this series of events, after all, adds verisimilitude.

The French or Belgians (Labassecourians), the Irish, the English cockneys, and the Catalonians (residents of Northern Spain) are all shown to be inferior to the English gentry and its educated classes in Lucy’s eyes. The comic figure of Mrs. Sweeney, whom Lucy snobbishly takes to be only a hanger-on in an Irish family, such as a washer-woman, is looked down upon not only for her drinking, but also for her low-class Irish speech and showy dress. It is particularly ironic that Charlotte Brontë writes critically of an Irishwoman, for her father was of Irish birth. The Labassecourians (Madame and her servants) are said to have hired Mrs. Sweeney only on the strength of her cashmere shawl. Even Madame, whom Lucy respects greatly for her organizational abilities and perfect rational calm, is portrayed as vain and easily fooled by trifles. The overall degraded nature of the residents of this country (Lucy says, regarding the girls of noble Labassecourian families, "as far as nobility goes in this country") is clear in Lucy’s mind. She is happy to have a position of respectable work, but it is made abundantly clear that Lucy firmly believes that English people and culture are inherently better and morally superior to anything in Villette. Madame herself, though a wonderfully capable lady, is definitely heartless. She has no feelings to be persuaded, Lucy says, and in this case this wonderfully drawn character seems to the reader to be either psychotic or unreal. It seems unlikely that anyone not pathological would have the complete absence of feeling beyond self-interest that is attributed to Madame Beck. But her school is remarkably well-run, and Lucy, while being employed in a comfortable manner, can go on feeling morally superior.

The gradations of character and class in Brontë’s time were very complex and rigid, and they largely are not analogous to today’s cultural stratifications. An English gentlewoman or lady was to follow a rigid set of moral, financial, and behavioral requirements, most of which no longer apply. Lucy, born into a family of some wealth, we are to assume, and with some pretensions to gentility, holds herself firmly in one kind of class. This class, while broadly defined economically as women being entirely supported by their families and educated well, has less to do with money than with education, speech, bearing, and physical and moral conduct. The idea of class prescribing objectively defined traits, such as working only at certain kinds of jobs, speaking a certain way, or adhering to a rigid moral and religious code of conduct, defined the worth of a human being in ways that are anathema to modern ideas of diversity and social mobility. An English gentlewoman, for example, could only do certain kinds of work (being a nursery-governess or English teacher, rather than a lady’s maid, for example) and behave a certain way (abhorring the very effective spy techniques of Madame Beck, having zero tolerance for lying of any kind), and these traits were considered to be at the core of such women’s existence, part of what defined them as a particular kind of human being. Maintaining dignity was of utmost importance, and it influenced everything these women did. In this light, it becomes clear why Lucy, who had a poor command of French, would take the chance of teaching sixty unruly girls in an English class. Not only was the job of teacher of higher status than nursery-maid (and with a higher salary), but Lucy, raised to be a lady or at the very least an educated and moral gentlewoman, saw herself as more fitted by her birth and upbringing to be a teacher rather than one who would care for small children. Also, Brontë writes in such a fashion that it seems that Madame, despite her moral laxity and her strange Continental ways, is able to shrewdly perceive Lucy’s worth and station, even though she is not able to ascertain the same things about Mrs. Sweeney.

In Chapter IX, Lucy engages in extremely harsh criticism of the whole Labassecourian race. She calls their blood "marsh-phlegm" and, when describing how some of the titled girls have French mixed in their pedigrees, says that it only serves to increase their sneakiness, slyness, and overall moral degradation. The laxity of attitude toward lies, admittedly, would have been truly shocking to many English readers of Brontë’s time, especially for schoolgirls. Brontë is once again trumpeting the superiority of the English race, customs, morals, and schooling, by contrasting what she considers the "Continental" customs of spying (by Madame Beck), lying (by everyone), and coquettishness (by the Continentally corrupted English girl, Ginevra) with the austerity of the English Protestant culture from which she came. She skewers Catholicism particular in her conversation with Isabelle. If this is also Brontë’s perspective, she seems to have considered this religion a major source of evil in non-English societies.

The comments about her students, with their "thick glossy hair" and large ears, can be puzzling to today’s readers. That a teacher would look upon her pupils, however foreign, in the way one might look at an unusual or curious species of animal makes the reader believe that any sort of moral superiority on Lucy’s part must be false. This attitude, especially toward the French (and the Labassecourians are but literary stand-ins for the French or the Belgians in this book) by the English of that time, was current and well accepted. The English, for reasons of trade, politics, and especially religion, considered their culture the most morally developed on Earth and infinitely superior to the Continental tradition of Catholicism. Though Brontë’s words are bitingly satirical, they would not have been considered particularly damning or unusual to the English readership of her day.

Brontë’s writing employs a very high use of adverbs, and in these three chapters, her powers of description are shown in their best light. She creates, in a very few lines, a wonderfully clear picture of the school and the customs of the teachers and students. She brings the reader into the sun-drenched world of the schoolrooms and courtyard, where French-speaking students flit through the pages with their silliness and charms. Lucy, the staid and drab Protestant bird amid these brightly-colored (exotic, nearly tropical) fowl, is shown to be the epitome of English sense, severity, and moral rectitude. That she remains likable is due to the skill of Brontë’s writing, but Lucy's degraded position and lack of any champion or friend in her world also make the reader sympathetic. Lucy is also desperately courageous, able to weather storms that might have sent lesser women to the workhouse.

Ginevra’s friendship, while as real and as sincere as she can give, does not give Lucy any kind of help or support other than passing companionship. Ginevra’s lack of morality, her coquettishness, and her youth disappoint Lucy. This character of Lucy, perhaps one of the most curious and unknowable in nineteenth-century literature, is slowly building for the reader a picture of her world and her own character. In later chapters, however, it will become clear how little of Lucy is yet known to us.

The tenth chapter, "Dr. John," begins with a discussion of Madame Beck's character. She is described by Lucy as passionless and particularly without a love for her own children. She is kind and looks out for their welfare, but she seems to have no personal attachment to them. She does not give them the kind of attention and affection that Lucy feels that children need.

The two eldest children, Desiree and Fifine, are introduced. Desiree, the eldest, is cruel, vindictive, and destructive. She is spied on relentlessly by Madame Beck, which is the only way Madame has of controlling her. Madame does not reprimand Desiree or or correct her faults; she merely says that Desiree needs particularly strict watching.

Fifine, on the other hand, is said to resemble her dead father. She is healthy, active, and of a sweet and honest disposition. Lucy naturally finds this child charming. The youngest child is only described as "puny and delicate."

One day Fifine falls and breaks her arm. The doctor is called, but Dr. Pillule is unable to come, and a young Dr. John is sent instead. He sets Fifine's arm (Madame Beck is able to assist him ably without trembling, while Lucy shakes too much to be of use) and makes a good impression on Madame Beck. It appears that Madame is setting her cap for Dr. John. Fifine rapidly heals under the doctor's daily visits, and Desiree, who decides that it would be fun to be sick, pretends to have an illness so that he must continue to return to the Rue Fossette each day.

The young doctor is English, and Lucy eventually recalls that it was he who helped her at the station when her luggage was lost. He is tall and fair, and Lucy describes him in such terms that lead the reader to believe that she finds him handsome. She is not impressed with him entirely, however, for she notes his perhaps too-eager desire to please and impress people. He is cold to Lucy and takes no more notice of her than of a piece of furniture. One day he finds her watching him and rebukes her with a veiled insult. Lucy does not give him the satisfaction of explaining herself, and she makes it a point never to speak to him. The perpetually misunderstood and neglected outsider, Lucy takes a perverse pleasure in not giving those who consider themselves her "betters" any explanation or defense of herself or her motives.

Chapter XI opens with Madame Beck's youngest child, Georgette, contracting a fever. The two elder girls, Desiree and Fifine, are then sent away to their grandmother (bonne-maman) in the country in order to avoid infection. Georgette's illness necessitates even more visits from Dr. John.

There is some talk among the servants that Madame will marry Dr. John. Lucy is convinced that, as far as the heartless Madame Beck can have affection for anyone, she has it for Dr. John. While this may be due to no more than social climbing and personal vanity rather than actual love on Madame's part, when it becomes clear to Madame that Dr. John does not love her, she is quite obviously wounded. She realizes that she is older than Dr. John–near forty, perhaps—and while handsome she is certainly not sufficiently young, beautiful, or socially prominent enough for Dr. John. The truth hurts her, but she continues on as if nothing has occurred.

One day Dr. John arrives at the door of Rue Fossette. Lucy waits a long time and, curious, she descends and finds that he is in the small room kept for the use of the female door-keeper (the "portresse"). Lucy spies him from behind the door and overhears a conversation that is heated and passionate. Dr. John leaves the room without seeing Lucy but looking upset.

The next chapter, "The Casket," opens with a reference to a horrible medieval legend of a nun shut up alive in an underground vault in the garden when Madame Beck's house was a convent. Lucy, hardly a believer in supernatural tales, thinks she can detect the smooth stone under an old tree that is said to cover this grave.

Lucy goes along well enough in her job as English teacher, but she is occasionally gripped by the fierce desire to be free of all the strictures on her life. One night during a fearful storm, all the Catholic girls lie awake praying, but Lucy climbs out onto a windowsill to enjoy the wet and wind of the tempest. She endeavors in her daily life, however, to keep hopes for the future at bay; for she believes that they will only lead to disappointment.

In the evenings Lucy walks in the garden, especially down one secluded alley (l'allée défendue)that she has cleaned up and called her own. One night she intercepts a small ivory box flung from a window onto the ground. It is addressed to someone with a "grey dress"—which Lucy coincidentally is wearing at that moment. But Lucy is not expecting a love letter. The ivory casket contains violets and a love letter, but Lucy cannot determine to whom it is addressed or who the writer is.

At that moment Dr. John inexplicably arrives and is let in by Rosine the portresse. Lucy notes, too, that Rosine wears a grey dress. Dr. John surreptitiously runs into the garden and looks around for the casket. He turns into the alley and finds Lucy holding out the casket. She gives it to him, and he inquires if she will tell Madame about it. Lucy says she does not know whom it is for or from, but if Dr. John can assure her that it has nothing to do any of Madame's students then she will keep the secret. Madame Beck spies on Dr. John and Lucy during this conversation.

In Chapter XIII, "A Sneeze out of Season," Lucy has cause to learn more about Madame Beck's spying. In the evenings, the teachers and the few boarding students gather in the refectory for "lecture pieuse," or religious instruction. Lucy, the staunch English Protestant, dislikes listening to this instruction, so she wanders in the dark schoolrooms or goes to bed.

One evening, Lucy cannot bear to stay in the refectory with the girls and teachers, so she goes up to the dormitory where her curtained sleeping area is. She spies Madame Beck carefully going through her things. Madame is obviously suspicious of Lucy for something, and Lucy infers that Madame saw Dr. John that night in the garden.

Later, Madame invents a fever in Georgette (who has been convalescing), which requires her to send for Dr. John. Madame tells Lucy to stay with Georgette until he comes. Dr. John duly comes and writes out a cursory prescription for little Georgette. As he is about to leave, Lucy sees another missive fall from the same window–from the building of the boys' college bordering the garden–while she and Dr. John are standing looking out the window. He bids her to retrieve it, for he cannot do it or he will be seen. Swiftly Lucy gets the letter and brings it back up to Dr. John. He immediately tears it up unread. Lucy asks him what is going on, for she now realizes that Dr. John wrote neither of these letters. He explains that he is protecting someone–which Lucy mistakes to be Madame Beck–from the unwanted advances of some suitor, which would cause damage to the reputation of some female at the school. Some boy in the boys' college bordering the garden is sending these letters. Dr. John is at the point of telling Lucy who the person is, as well as asking her to help him protect her, when there is a sneeze at the door leading to Madame Beck's apartment. She has returned back from her "errands" surreptitiously and has been listening at the door.

Analysis

In this section of the book the repressed and buried character of Lucy's life becomes apparent, as evidenced by the metaphor of the ghost story of the nun buried alive. Lucy, who has a violently passionate inner life, is buried under the propriety and restriction of her life as a teacher at Madame Beck's. Although most of Lucy's most pressing earlier difficulties are now resolved (employment, food, shelter, etc.), it is clear that the spiritual stuntedness, or "heart-poverty" as Lucy calls it, of her life has not improved—or has perhaps diminished during Lucy's short tenure with Miss Marchmont. Lucy's life is devoid of love and of even a single adult, close friendship. And while Lucy does not have any prospects of love or future family, it is clear hat she also feels the loss of it. Lucy is not emotionally cold, but she attempts to make herself that way in order to avoid what she considers the inevitable disappointments life will bring her. This has been a lifelong attitude for her: she had thought something similar at Mrs. Bretton's home when she was a child as well as during her time with Miss Marchmont. The reference to "The Casket," therefore, has a double meaning.

The introduction of Madame Beck's children serves two purposes. The character faults and the overall moral degradation of Labassecourian culture is illustrated in Madame's inability to properly discipline Desiree. The attachment of Lucy to the younger children (Fifine and Georgette), especially her emotional distress at their illnesses, shows Lucy's humanity and tenderheartedness. This is contrasted sharply with the utter lack of feeling and empathy that Madame Beck, the children's own mother, has for her daughters. Madame, as a mother, fails her children two ways. She cannot discipline and teach them proper behavior, which Desiree so desperately needs, nor is she able to empathize and comfort Fifine after her broken arm or Georgette during her serious infection. Again, for Lucy, this is another example of the failings of the Labassecourian Catholic way of life, personified in Madame Beck.

A direct attack on Catholicism is made by Lucy when she describes the nightly religious instruction given to the boarding students. The tales of hagiography and extreme penitence are foreign, medieval, and seem barbaric to the Protestant Lucy. The subtext, of course, is the debauched nature and overall error of the Labassecourian Catholicism. Lucy, though accepted and employed by the people of this culture still, like British colonials of her time, considers herself racially and, most importantly, culturally superior to the people whom she lives amongst.

The episode of Lucy finding and clearing the l'allée défendue shows the limitations on independence and privacy in Lucy's life. That in order to have a little solitude and a corner to call her own Lucy must retreat to a neglected, narrow corner of the garden is pathetic and indicative of the lifestyle these teacher-governesses, or genteel, educated servants, were made to lead. The intrusion of the billet-doux, or love note, which describes Lucy (presuming that it does) in such insulting terms is a further blow to Lucy's limited and loveless life. Not only is she hemmed in and restricted in this place, but she is unlucky enough to have to read of the disdain with which she is held by at least one student. Though Lucy does not look for love letters or want the love of the students—or even care about the mistrust of her employer—she does seem to wish for some kind of regard from the only Englishman in her life, Dr. John.

Dr. John's complete insensitivity toward and disregard of Lucy from the beginning of their renewed acquaintance takes an unexpected turn when Lucy discovers the first love letter in the ivory casket. Though Lucy still does not know who has written them and who the intended recipient is, she knows Dr. John is somehow involved. The painful irony for Lucy is never spared, for she learns that Dr. John in this affair is entirely blameless and hoping only to protect the reputation of the recipient, who Lucy erroneously believes is Madame Beck. Dr. John sees Lucy only as a person who has regrettably found out the secret of the letters, a person who may be useful if she can be persuaded to assist him in keeping the secret from Madame Beck and the rest of the school. Considering Lucy so far beneath him–in physical appearance, social standing, and fortune–Dr. John, though described incredibly by Lucy as "the best gentleman in Christendom," has no regard for Lucy's feelings. That she would continue to admire a man with so little regard for her and for people of her station and condition is indicative of an element of self-loathing in Lucy's character.

Chapter XIV is eventful: a secret love is revealed, and M. Paul Emanuel's character is explored.

Each summer, the pensionnat has a fête in honor of Madame Beck. The parents and families of the students are invited, as well as some single young men from good families. The day is filled with excitement. The highlight of the event, however, is the play put on by the students and directed by the literature professor, M. Paul Emanuel. This is the teacher, a cousin of Madame Beck, who "read" Lucy's face on the night she first came to Madame Beck's.

Ginevra Fanshawe is set to play the part of the beautiful coquette in the little comedy, but one of the girls who was to play the young rake has fallen ill and is unable to participate. M. Paul is in a panic, and the only option for him is to press Lucy into service.

In order to make sure that Lucy, who has up to this point only observed the play preparations, learn her part in the space of a few hours, M. Paul marches Lucy up to the attic and locks her in. She is left in the heat, with the beetles and rats, all day. She learns her part and acts tolerably well in the performance. She and Ginevra warm to their subject, and they subvert the spirit of the lines to such an extent that the rake is seen in a more sympathetic light than he was written.

After the performance there is a ball, and Dr. John approaches Ginevra and Lucy and tells them they are standing in a draft. During the conversation it becomes clear that Dr. John is Isidore, the mysterious suitor who is passionately in love with Ginevra and who has been giving her presents of jewelry. Also present at the ball is another admirer of Ginevra, Colonel Count De Hamal, a small-featured, dark, middle-sized man who is the physical and social opposite of Dr. John. Ginevra, to Lucy's chagrin, claims to prefer the Colonel-Count.

In Chapter XV, "The Long Vacation," we learn that the two months between the party and the end of term is the time when most of the schoolwork of the year is done in preparation for the final examinations. M. Paul conducts the examinations in all subjects except English, which Lucy must conduct. Lucy perceives that M. Paul, while a great intellect, is vain and jealous of his academic power.

After the examinations are over, Lucy is left almost alone at the school for eight weeks as the sole around-the-clock charge of a handicapped, deformed girl. With no other teachers, students, or masters for company, Lucy is essentially left alone for a long period of time. Lucy becomes severely depressed and even contemplates the attractiveness of death. She takes long, solitary, dangerous walks far out into the country, returning to the school late at night. After an aunt of the deformed child comes to take the girl away, Lucy, even more alone than before, falls ill and has night terrors and ominous, hallucinatory dreams.

One evening Lucy is gripped by a desire to walk, so she wanders out into town and ends up in a church during Catholic Mass. Lucy tells the priest that, though she is a Protestant, she wishes to tell some "consecrated ear" that she has "a pressure of affliction" on her mind. He says he must reflect and then tells her that she should visit him the next morning. Lucy does not go, for she is convinced that if she did so she would be seduced by "all that was tender, and comforting, and gentle in the honest popish superstition." On the way back to Madame Beck's, in a fearful storm, Lucy loses her way and faints on the steps of a large building.

"Auld Lang Syne" is the name of Chapter XVI, implying that things from the remembered past (and those from the island that contains the Scottish dialect in which that song is sung) will return. Lucy, waking up from her faint, finds herself, incredibly, in a room which contains articles from Mrs. Bretton's house on St. Ann's Street, which Lucy has not visited in almost ten years. Mrs. Bretton, also incredibly, appears to ask after Lucy's health, and for a while Lucy doubts her sanity.

Lucy now understands that this is indeed her godmother and that Dr. John (Graham Bretton) is her son. Lucy admits to the reader, however, that she had guessed his identity on his first or second visit to Madame Beck's. Since Dr. John had taken so little notice of Lucy at the time, however, and when she had inspected him and recognized him he had dismissed her so peremptorily, Lucy had chosen, whether out of embarrassment or perversity, not to enlighten him regarding their previous acquaintance. Dr. John's lack of interest in her, and his inability to recognize her, too, were significant, and these inattentions hurt Lucy deeply.

Mrs. Bretton recognizes Lucy after a closer examination and chides her son for not recognizing her sooner. Dr. John does now recognize her and, while kindly welcoming her and abjuring his own stupidity at his error, does not directly apologize to Lucy for taking so little notice of her. Lucy, of course, excuses him.

Lucy goes to bed that night and weeps. She is pleased that she once again has people in this world–specifically English people of her own class and religion–whom she may call friends, but the fact that Dr. John had to be prompted by his mother in order to recognize Lucy is indicative not only of her regrettable change in status in the world, but also of her continuing lack of importance in Dr. John's eyes.

Analysis

In this part of the novel, the reader discovers three important things about Lucy Snowe. The most important, perhaps, is that Lucy is not a narrator who can be trusted to give full or accurate information. Her perspective is skewed not only by her own limitations and point of view, but also by her willful, almost perverse desire not to reveal her identity, motives, desires, or virtues—even when such a revelation would have been to her benefit. That Lucy would keep the knowledge of Dr. John's identity as Graham, her godmother's son, not only from him (presumably because her pride was hurt that he did not recognize her) but also from the reader for six chapters, lets the reader know that, for reasons of her own, Lucy is not a reliable narrator. The reader can no longer trust Lucy to tell the whole story, and everything she writes thereafter must be treated with greater skepticism. This is the first indication of this major stylistic aspect of this novel. It changes the tone of the novel from one of a generally trusted narrator with the possibility of a receptive, largely passive reader, to one where the reader is a more active, critical participant in the decipherment of Lucy's biased, sometimes erroneous, and even at times deliberately deceptive story.

For readers accustomed to other nineteenth-century fiction, this kind of deception and point-of-view writing may come as a shock. It was definitely a departure from traditional writing style for Brontë, and her experimentation in a relatively new and untried form was part of her commentary on the unknowable nature of Lucy (and, by extension, all people outside ourselves, at least to a significant degree) and the subterfuge and dissimulation required of women living Lucy's kind of life.

The second important thing that is revealed is the identity of Dr. John. His identity was, perhaps, expected, but the revelation of it points out another instance of Lucy's complete alienation from society and the world around her. Through her lack of friends, money, family, and the conventional requirements of feminine attractiveness, the world (and Lucy's own attitude) has convinced her that she is to expect nothing good from life—not even the regard and recognition of her own past acquaintances. Lucy retains, not surprisingly, her self-loathing—which cannot but have been reinforced by the insensitivity of Ginevra Fanshawe, who says, after the play, "I would not be you for a kingdom," and even though Lucy feels exactly the same way about the silly and immoral Ginevra, the statement does nothing for Lucy's self-esteem—and her moral and intellectual defiance. While Lucy knows her own inner worth and recognizes the great faults in the people around her whom fortune has smiled upon (even the adored Dr. John), she expects no one in her life to acknowledge them, nor does she hope for any reward in this life.

Knowing this about Lucy, it is not surprising to discover her capacity for depression. When left alone with the severely handicapped child during the long vacation, Lucy cannot prevent herself, cut off from any kind of companionship, from falling into a nearly suicidal hallucinatory state, attended by an either self-inflicted (through neglect) or psychosomatic illness. Lucy, however, with astounding presence of mind, is able to recognize her weakness and avoid what would be, to her, a fatal error: a conversion to Catholicism.

Third, and this point was more important for Brontë's contemporary readers than it is for readers today, the exact nature of Lucy's social status is explained. Brontë spells it out ("her degree was mine," in Chapter XVI). Though Mrs. Bretton dotes on and patronizes Lucy, their "degree" is equal. That is, the social and economic status of Mrs. Bretton (who was formerly quite rich and the owner of a large mansion and enough property for a very comfortable income) is the same as that which Lucy was born into. Lucy's family (that great, barely-hinted-at, unknowable family of Lucy's past) must have been descended from some sort of gentry, or at least they were country landowners at some point. Lucy is not from any kind of working class; she was a full-fledged member of the educated, leisured, somewhat cultured upper-middle-class, English country gentry of the nineteenth century. For Brontë's contemporaries this state of affairs would make Lucy's fall into the status of a working teacher to be all that much more pathetic and even tragic. While the peril Lucy began her adult life in, both physical and economic, is certainly exciting and engaging to today's readers, the fall from one class to another has not the same sting it had in Brontë's age. The transition from one class to another–especially when downward, for a woman dependent on others’ income–was a subject not only of economic tragedy but of social and possibly moral degradation for those who suffered the descent. That Lucy, raised to be a lady at least of Mrs. Bretton's level, is now an English teacher in a Labassecourian girls' school is supposed to make her more sympathetic and tragic to the reader. The fact that modern ideas of social class mobility have changed would not necessarily influence the reader in the way a twenty-first century novel with a similar story would.

Chapter XIV's fête and play show more of Lucy's capacity for self-knowledge and her extraordinary ability to correctly read and critique the characters of those around her. Lucy, who judges Ginevra to be a vain and selfish sort of person, nevertheless sees that, though Ginevra is relatively poor, Ginevra will have much more of the good things of life offered to her (including the coveted love of Dr. John) simply because of her physical beauty and family connections than Lucy ever will. The disparity between two young women's prospects, though they were born into the same class and station in life, is thrown into high relief. The subtext, of course, is also the disparity between Lucy, who is dependent upon luck, her wits, and the kindness of strangers for her very existence, and Dr. John, who is able to choose his profession, be trained for it, and actively earn a good living by it.

Lucy's first real interaction with M. Paul shows both his capacity for cruelty and his ability to be kind. Lucy is not overawed by him, but she allows the literature professor to shanghai her, make her learn a part in a play (playing a man, no less, and a man pursuing Ginevra Fanshawe at that, further continuing the negative comparison of Lucy with Dr. John) in which she has no interest in taking part. In order for her to learn this part in the space of a few hours, when M. Paul locks Lucy in an extremely hot, dirty, and pest-infested attic, she is trapped and starved all day, so the kind ministrations M. Paul performs for her when he finally frees her only shows his desire to dominate her completely and bend her to his will. Lucy admirably keeps her dignity and performs the part well (though she refuses to dress completely as a man, which would have added verisimilitude to the part but, in her mind, degraded her dignity) and, while not directly defying M. Paul, she lets him know that she is not a silly, vain, or empty-headed female as most of the other students at Madame Beck's seem to be. She takes control of the part she is expected to play, interpreting it how she wants.

Chapter XVII's title, "La Terrasse" (The Terrace), is the name of Dr. John's and Mrs. Bretton's small country chateau. The circumstances of Lucy's rescue are told in this chapter. After her collapse on the steps of a large building in the Basse-Ville (low town), Père Silas, Lucy's confessor, finds her. The kind old priest sees Dr. John riding past on his way home. Père Silas flags him down, and he and Dr. John get Lucy into a coach and take her off to La Terrasse. Lucy is grateful to be rescued, especially by Dr. John.

During this time Lucy struggles with her own envy of other, more fortunate people, and her anger at God for putting so much difficulty in her life. She has a monologue at the beginning of the chapter in which she tries to adopt a stoic philosophy that would enable her to accept any suffering that God sends her way. She also talks of how people on earth are equals yet unable to judge each other—that should be left to God. This is particularly interesting from Lucy, because she is such a sharp and often accurate judge of others' characters. Lucy makes a prayer for relief of her suffering, even referring to Azrael, the angel of death.

Lucy and Dr. John become friendlier with each other, and the talk naturally turns to Ginevra. Lucy sees that Dr. John's affection for Ginevra is undiminished. Lucy thinks that, if Mrs. Bretton were to know how Ginevra was using Dr. John's affections (by taking jewelry from him, though she prefers another man), Mrs. Bretton would condemn that young lady. Dr. John also puts forward the idea that Lucy's illness is psychosomatic, caused by her depression.

Dr. John's prescription is that Lucy should travel for six months in order to calm her over-excited nerves. That Lucy has not the wherewithal to leave her job and travel for half a year is never brought up. Though he is solicitous and kind, Dr. John's diagnoses are more patronizing than helpful. Never once has he inquired into the true nature of her distress or indicated that her illness is anything other brought on by her own depression.

Lucy and John are at odds in Chapter XVIII, "We Quarrel." During a talk about Dr. John's rival, Count De Hamal, Lucy becomes exasperated with Dr. John's inability to see Ginevra's own trivial and fickle character and that she definitely prefers Count De Hamal to himself. This causes Lucy, in a fit of pique, to tell him that "there is no delusion like your own"—and that Ginevra Fanshawe does not respect him, nor does Lucy Snowe. This causes a rift between them for some time, which causes them to have a courteous silence. Finally, after tea, while Dr. John reads a book quietly and sadly, Lucy asks for forgiveness for her hasty words. He admits that if she doesn't respect him, it is because he doesn't deserve respect. Lucy retracts her statement and vows respect for him. She says that he thinks far too much of Ginevra, but she will let him believe what he likes. They discuss Dr. John's practice of giving Ginevra costly ornaments, which Lucy criticizes roundly. While Dr. John professes to believe that Ginevra accepts them out of a disinterested, entirely naïve, and childish good nature, Lucy, of course, knows better. At the end of their conversation Lucy fancies there may have been an ironic gleam in Dr. John's eye, implying that he is not so completely fooled by Ginevra as his words indicate.

"The Cleopatra" in Chapter XIX refers to a painting. During her additional two-week stay, arranged with Madame Beck by Mrs. Bretton, Lucy often frequents the art galleries and museums in town, studying painting and discovering her likes and dislikes.

One day she wanders the gallery alone. In the gallery she is approached by M. Paul Emanuel. M. Paul disapproves of the picture Lucy is looking at, a large nude depicting Cleopatra. He steers her away from the painting, admonishing her that young unmarried ladies shouldn't look at such things. He sets her down in front of a series of paintings depicting the "Ages of Woman," showing traditional phases of a Catholic woman's life (young womanhood, the young bride, the young mother, and the widow)—which is painted in an appallingly bad fashion. Lucy looks at them for a time and then endeavors to gaze around the gallery while standing in her designated corner. M. Paul, staring at the painting of Cleopatra, keeps an eye on Lucy to make sure she stays in her place.

M. Paul and Lucy speak again, and he chides her not only for becoming ill, but for not enjoying or relishing the care of Marie Broc, the handicapped child. Lucy gently counters, asking him if he would be able to cheerfully care for Marie. He avoids the question by saying that worthy women (and by this he excludes Lucy) are able to nurse people far better than the self-indulgent male. Lucy does not get angry with him, and she is less than impressed with his verbal antics.

Across the room Lucy spies M. De Hamal, the suitor of Ginevra. She watches him for some minutes, and during that time she is separated from M. Paul. She is repulsed by the sleek dandy character of the Count, and she then sees, to her mind, a much better man entering the gallery—Dr. John. She makes a frankly ethnocentric comparison between the tall and fair (English) Dr. John on the one hand, and the smaller, darker men M. Paul and the Count De Hamal (Labassecourians) on the other.

Analysis

Lucy's convalescence at the Brettons' is, finally, a soft landing for this much-buffeted character. To be among people of her own class (so important in Brontë's time) and among people who acknowledge Lucy as being of that same class is the first real bright spot for Lucy in this novel. Even Lucy's incredible luck at finding a job at Madame Beck's just in the nick of time to save her from destitution (and, it was implied, very probably a lonely death) was only a stop-gap measure; it was no promise of happiness. In fact, it was at Madame Beck's that Lucy experienced her most intensely depressive episode so far. While the work she does teaching English may inspire Lucy, and she may be good at it, no young woman of Lucy's class in Brontë's age would have been happy or proud at earning her own living, no matter how intellectually stimulating or respectable the work might be. Lucy was not raised to earn her own living, and any time she can live in a household and not be employed, instead surrounded by those of her own "degree," will necessarily be more agreeable to her than any job. Contemporary readers should continue to have this alternative value system in mind.

The ludicrous coincidences which got Lucy to a reunion with her godmother, who is the only quasi-relative she has on this earth, are to be put aside in favor of the dramatic effect on the reader, as well as the interesting combination of passiveness and luck that seem to have been required of Victorian heroines. That Lucy would end up in just the right European city as Dr. John, working at a school that he happened to frequent (even putting aside the extreme coincidence of him being at the stagecoach bureau to help her with her luggage problem on her first night in Villette)—and furthermore that she would be found by Dr. John, with the help of Père Silas, at just the right moment after her collapse—and that Mrs. Bretton would have arrived recently from England to live with her son, raise the pattern of coincidences from the dramatic to the truly extraordinary. As stated before, however, this sort of literary convention was more accepted by Victorian readers than modern ones.

The fact that Lucy holds Dr. John's identity from the reader for six chapters aids Brontë in the floating of these rather preposterous instances of good fortune. While the reader may suspect that Dr. John is Graham Bretton, and there are more than enough clues to give away his identity almost immediately after his introduction, the lack of stated acknowledgement of the coincidence makes the whole situation more plausible. The fact that Lucy ends up in close proximity with one of the only people left in the world of her close acquaintance, therefore, is eased on the reader over several chapters before it is fully explained. Brontë uses many such clever constructions throughout her novel to help the reader suspend disbelief. It is a Brontëan characteristic that the unlikely and even fantastic is made acceptable through skillful plotting and judicious timing of information given to the reader.

The scene in the gallery with M. Paul is meant to illustrate the differences in not only the perception of art between the "Continental" sensibility and the English, but the basic divergence in philosophy on the education and liberty of women, in Brontë's mind, between the two cultures. M. Paul (not unlike his cousin Madame Beck) believes that one of the ways to properly inculcate modest virtues in women is to shield them from depictions of raw sexuality (such as the Cleopatra painting) and confine women, as M. Paul does to Lucy, to the contemplation only of saccharine pictures of hypocritical "female virtues." Lucy's way, and by extension the "English" way, perhaps, is to allow women the same access to art as men, so that they can be instructed in the ways of moral virtue and artistic taste by means of negative examples as well as positive ones. This is all part of Brontë's English chauvinism and belief in the inherent moral superiority of the Protestant education to the Catholic practice of female limitation. The message of the freedom of education, especially for women, is very clear here. That Brontë divides it along national and religious lines, making it a cultural issue as well as an educational one, is part of the satire of this novel.

The picture of the Veuve (a widow) showing a "black woman" does not mean a woman of color but a European woman dressed in black mourning clothing. The silliness of this insincere group of paintings is contrasted with the raw, if in bad taste, feminine sexuality of the Cleopatra. That sexuality shown this obviously had to be of a non-European woman (Dr. John calls her a "mulatto," and M. Paul, though he contemplates the painting for a long time, sanctimoniously says that he does not want a woman like that for a sister, wife, or daughter) illustrates the sexual repression of the time in both cultures. M. Paul seems to think that, by virtue of being a man, he is allowed to order Lucy, a grown woman and employed as a teacher at the same school at which M. Paul works (and thus should be considered his equal in everything but age), as he pleases. On the two occasions that they have been together, he has confined her physically both times, once in the attic and then confining her to a corner of the museum to look at the religious paintings. Lucy seems to submit to these peremptory limitations on her physical mobility with relatively good grace, but never submitting mentally to his remonstrances. She sees him for what he is, and while she can acknowledge his good points (for example, the fact that he keeps his own impatience in check for pity of little Marie Broc), she has no illusions about his faults. And her adoration of Dr. John is not only for his physical attractiveness in her eyes (for he has been almost as imperious with Lucy as M. Paul has been) but for his Englishness. M. Paul, even putting aside his personal faults of despotism and insensitivity, is entirely too European in his religion, appearance, sensibilities, and especially his attitude toward women for Lucy to admire. Lucy is more able to forgive the faults of Dr. John (such as his misguided love for the unworthy Ginevra and his complete neglect of Lucy's feelings before he knew who she was) because she is more indulgent of what she considers "English" faults than of foreign ones.

Chapter XX's "Concert" is a royalty-attended gala musical event, presided over by M. Paul's half-brother, M. Josef Emanuel. M. Josef is the premier music teacher in Villette, and various professional artists and the best pupils from the Conservatoire will perform. For this event Dr. John has procured tickets for himself, Mrs. Bretton, and Lucy.

The morning of the concert, Mrs. Bretton surveys Lucy's clothing and determines that she does not have a nice enough dress to wear to such a grand event. Against Lucy's better judgment, Mrs. Bretton has the seamstress make for Lucy a new pink dress, relieved only by a drapery of black lace. Though the style of dress is modest and plain, the pink color worries Lucy that she is being too showy. But Mrs. Bretton will not be persuaded otherwise, and Lucy wears it to the concert.

The event is a dazzling affair, replete with chandeliers, satin-clothed ladies, and crimson cloth and carpets. The hall is great and filled with light, and the elite of Labassecourian society is there. As a peripheral part of the royal court, Ginevra Fanshawe is placed next to the daughter of an English peer, Lady Sara. Ginevra, looking pretty and virginal, surveys the crowd and notes Dr. John and Mrs. Bretton. She makes a face through her eyeglass at Mrs. Bretton and then curls her lip in disdain at her. Dr. John notes this, having noted earlier a shared look of "understanding" between Ginevra and the Count De Hamal. Since Dr. John will not have a young woman for his wife who has any sort of understanding with another man, and as Ginevra obviously looks down on the respectable middle-class Mrs. Bretton, Dr. John has decided that Ginevra is not worthy of him. He tells Lucy this, and while she defends Ginevra as only a giddy schoolgirl who is necessarily warped by the slapdash education her family has given her, they agree that Ginevra really is not worthy of Dr. John's affection. Lucy is glad that Dr. John is free of this attachment, but she cautions him not to be overly severe on the young Ginevra. Later, he significantly tells Lucy that he will not look for love in adversity any longer, but will only love when love is returned to him.

M. Paul is there with his half-brother, marshalling the female performers of the Conservatoire. Lucy happens near him in the crowd, and he notes the color of her new dress, she thinks, with disapproval. Not wanting another scene or lecture from M. Paul resembling the one in the museum, she turns her face into Dr. John's sleeve, hoping to avoid him. M. Paul sees this and is obviously hurt or offended that she has not curtseyed or stopped to talk to him. Dr. John sees that M. Paul is angry and asks Lucy why this is so. She explains that M. Paul thinks that she is not showing him proper respect, and Dr. John scoffs at this idea. M. Paul pushes by them in the crowd, and the three do not speak to each other.

Dr. John tells his mother in an oblique way that he has given up on the object of his affection, and he and his mother tease each other a bit about him preferring his mother to a wife. The three go home after a happy night.

Chapter XXI concerns the time after Lucy returns back to Madame Beck's. She is sad to leave the Brettons, and they are sad to see her leave, trying to delay her departure. They leave each other on very good terms, and Dr. Bretton promises that he will write and that his mother will come to visit. Lucy, awake in the dormitory that night, wrestles with her conscience and with what she calls the personification of Reason, which counsels her not to put too much hope or happiness in the receipt of this letter. She thinks that if Dr. John does write, he will only do so in a cursory manner, and only once, and she must be stern with herself and come to be happy only with that. She has a long discussion with herself concerning how Reason has given her only coldness and unhappiness in her life, which is all she should expect, while Feeling has always been her succor and has given her a respite from the unremitting dreariness that Reason says her life will be. This rather florid passage shows Lucy's philosophic cast of mind as well as her desire to quell all emotions in her that might cause disappointment in the future, including her innocent hopes.

Lucy is downcast the next day, and M. Paul sees her in the refectory alone. He comes in and tries to tell her to steel herself to her life and take her "bitters" daily, not to succumb to the "sweet poison" of vain hopes. Lucy resents his sermonizing and, weeping, begs him to leave.

Lucy is reunited with Ginevra, and she tells her a patently false story of Dr. John's distress at her turning her nose up at Mrs. Bretton and her attention to Count De Hamal. Lucy distorts the truth so much that Ginevra, in her vanity, believes that Dr. John was in a perfect fit of jealousy and rage at seeing Ginevra, wearing the bracelet he gave to her, flirting with De Hamal. In reality, Dr. John was perfectly self-possessed and only mildly regretful upon learning Ginevra's true nature.

One day Lucy is to have charge of a class while M. Paul is to lecture, and he intercepts a letter for Lucy from Dr. John. M. Paul gives it to Lucy in front of the entire class, and, knowing whom it is from, she rushes upstairs and locks it in her case unread. She comes back to class and sees M. Paul storming at the girls—he then turns his fury on Lucy. She sits quietly and eventually begins to silently weep. She tells him she has no wish to insult him. He softens and gives her a clean silk handkerchief by way of apology. He finishes teaching the class, and after the girls are gone he mentions the letter. She says it is only from a friend, but he says he knows what friend that is. Lucy tries to return M. Paul’s handkerchief, and he says she should keep until the letter is read; he will determine the tenor of the letter by the state of the handkerchief. When Lucy thinks she is alone, she has a moment of happiness, and she tosses the handkerchief around like a toy or a ball. M. Paul has been watching this, however, and he reaches over her shoulder and catches his handkerchief back, saying that she has been making fun of him with his possession. Lucy thinks that M. Paul, while making good points, is not a good little man.

Lucy gets a chance to read "The Letter" in chapter XXII. She creeps up to the unused attic with a candle. Lucy, who for so long has been used to privation, disregard, and hostility is now so incredibly overjoyed by the contents of the kind, good-natured letter that she claims to feel more happiness in that moment than any queen in a palace. As she reads, a figure dressed in white and black, resembling a nun, comes toward her out of the shadows. Lucy is terrified and rushes out of the attic.

She rushes to Madame's sitting room, where a small company of people are assembled, including Dr. John. The nearly hysterical Lucy tells them that something is in the grenier (attic), and they all go up to investigate. At first they claim that the objects there look to have been disturbed, and someone certainly must have been there, but Madame tells Lucy later that she now fancies that things were much the same as always. Lucy has left her letter from Dr. John there, and she searches madly for it—but Dr. John has secretly pocketed it.

They go downstairs, and John takes Lucy into a small room to help comfort her. She continues to weep bitterly at the loss of her letter. Dr. John, acting somewhat strangely, sees this and finally gives it back to her. He teases her that it is worth nothing, and the reader begins to think that he has an inkling of Lucy's unsaid love for him and that he is doing his best to quash it. He tells her that possibly her vision of the nun came from her own depression. He tells her to cultivate happiness. Lucy, sensibly though not aloud, observes that happiness is not a potato. She finds it peculiarly patronizing when people tell her to cultivate happiness, for she has had so little cause for happiness in her life and cultivation of it has been impossible. Dr. John swears to tell no one what she saw, and he urges Lucy never to mention it again in specific terms, for fear that she will be considered hysterical.

Analysis

Though Dr. John is often kind, he shows almost unbelievable effrontery when he patronizes Lucy by saying that her vision of the nun was a result of her failure to cultivate enough happiness in her life. This meanness is not lost on Lucy. Though she obviously is in hopeless love with Dr. John, she at least acknowledges his faults. Sadly, with her low opinion of herself, she accepts his "diagnosis" and allows him to extol the virtues of Ginevra Fanshawe in front of her. Even after he has fallen out with Ginevra over her behavior at the concert, Dr. John still acknowledges her beauty to Lucy, to whom this can only be a sore point. Lucy is so desperate for his companionship that she will endure even the praise of her rival in order to be near him. None of this is surprising–she has no other real friends in the world. Lucy is pathetic in the true sense of that word, and Dr. John should, if he is supposedly the "best gentleman in Christendom," be more sensitive to her extremity of poverty, both in money and in spirit.

Lucy's love for Dr. John is so hopeless that Lucy cannot ever entertain the idea that she will have Dr. John for herself. So, she does the next best thing by becoming friends with his beloved, Ginevra, and she makes a point of being intellectually and morally superior to Ginevra. That Ginevra is objectified is not considered unusual by either Lucy or Dr. John. A marriageable girl had to have the requirements of physical beauty and innocent virtue, and any knowledge of the world (like an understanding with Count De Hamal) was considered a count against her. Young women, especially the young woman Dr. John has in mind for his future wife, were treated as little more than products of good schooling, breeding, and care, ready to be molded by their future husbands.

Thus Lucy muses to herself, that morning in the refectory, about why she has chosen Ginevra to be her special friend to share her morning rolls with, and beyond that to share her cup on country outings. Lucy does not have enough self-knowledge to know that she finds her closeness with Ginevra to be the nearest she will ever get to the kind of romantic relationship she wants with Dr. John.

As a comparison, the figure of the blustering, furious, apoplectic M. Paul is a humorous interpolation between the extremes of youthful romance of Ginevra and Dr. John. Most of his scenes are very funny depictions of his imperious nature, his jealous egotism, and his intellectual vanity. Lucy is not even allowed to sew in his presence, for he feels this activity takes away from the attention due to him.

Though Lucy at this point has no affection for M. Paul, the fact is that he, through all his silly naïve posturing and bluster, has been a truer friend to her than Dr. John. Dr. John never even recognized Lucy until his mother reminded him of Lucy's identity. This self-absorption should have been Lucy's first clue to the poverty of his character. The first time Dr. John ever had a real conversation with Lucy, he asked her to hide a love letter sent to Ginevra in order to protect her reputation. He never approached her in friendship; he asked her only to keep a secret for him. While Dr. John was kind to her and helped her after her illness—and certainly provided good company to her during her stay at his house—he also spent a large amount of time talking about his love for Ginevra. That he would not even consider that this might hurt Lucy's feelings, or even perhaps bore her, does not occur to him.

M. Paul, on the other hand, tells Lucy that she must take the "bitters" of life daily and learn to accept the hard lot her life will probably continue to have. M. Paul, unblinkingly, tells her the truth, and he does not play silly games that toy with her feelings (such as Dr. John’s keeping the letter needlessly from Lucy while she weeps over it). Most importantly, Dr. John, while again dispensing kindness, never attributes Lucy's illnesses to anything other than her own female hysteria. And, acknowledging her depression, he blames her for not cultivating happiness. This kind of hypocrisy should enrage Lucy, but she is blinded by love and thus excuses him or glosses over these enormities of insensitivity.

M. Paul, who is less physically attractive to Lucy and has a less charismatic personal style, is nevertheless truly concerned about Lucy's sorrow and never sugarcoats it or tries to dismiss it. He tells her she should indeed be prepared for the blows of life (as Lucy sternly told herself ten years ago that night in her bed at the Brettons' house in England) and that if she would allow it he would help her, daily, to do so. Lucy is in fact duped by the same kind of surface show that she accuses Dr. John of being duped by in his admiration of Ginevra. While Dr. John is drawn in by Ginevra's beauty and seeming innocence, Lucy is attracted to Dr. John because of his handsomeness and his English brand of camaraderie and gallantry. When she learns that his gallantries with regard to her are really only skin-deep (which John learns is true of Ginevra, as well), Lucy excuses it by saying that she does not deserve deep friendship from Dr. John—and that she has no right to expect any better.

In Lucy's Snowe's inwardly dramatic thoughts, this section of the novel contains a great deal of Old Testament imagery, including a reference to Isaiah (beautiful feet upon the mountain), Deuteronomy (Moses surveying Canaan from Mount Nebo), Exodus (pillar of cloud), and Genesis (Esau hunting venison for Isaac). It must be remembered that Charlotte Brontë was a clergyman's daughter and that she spent all her life surrounded by the religious life. For a person of Brontë's disposition and upbringing (and, by the same token, Lucy Snowe's upbringing and character), Biblical references when writing about extremes of feeling would have been natural. Besides, her audience would easily have understood these references, generally being quite aware of these images as well.

The intense passage wherein Lucy describes her persecution by Reason and her comfort in Feeling are of a style not seen often in contemporary novels. The extended metaphor for anthropomorphized concepts has fallen out of fashion, but it still reads as intense and dramatic as Brontë intended. Lucy, the perpetual outsider and the child at the table who always gets the smallest portion, has had to school herself all her life in the hard class of Reason, and the fact that she wrestles with it continually makes her uniquely sympathetic and accessible.

At the beginning of Volume Two, Lucy is taken to the theatre by Dr. John in the place of his mother, who has been detained at home by an arrival. When Lucy goes to find her dun-mist-colored dress in the wardrobe, she finds that someone has taken it out and moved it to the haunted attic. Her desire to go with Dr. John making her bold, she dashes up to the attic and snatches her dress off the hook near the door. Before she leaves, however, she sees a faint light and the suggestion of a curtained alcove, but the vision vanishes. Steeling herself, she runs away without hysteria, gets dressed, and goes down to the waiting Dr. John. He claims that the peculiar light in her eye means that she has seen the ghostly nun again, but Lucy staunchly denies it.

They go to the theatre to see Vashti, the most famous and provocative actress in Europe. Lucy is captivated by Vashti's acting and find it very powerful indeed, but Lucy decides that Vashti must not be a good person because she is able to channel such powerfully evil emotions.

When there is the scare of a fire in the theatre at the penultimate moment of the play, pandemonium ensues, but Dr. John charges Lucy not to move. Dr. John helps a young lady who was crushed by the crowd while clinging to her father, and the four people escape the building and get to their carriages. The young woman has a hurt shoulder, and Dr. John agrees to treat her. He takes Lucy with him to the others’ elegant dwelling, where Lucy helps with ministering to the young woman's needs. Lucy thinks the young woman small and pretty—but with a proud mouth and perhaps an over-inflated idea of her importance. The father and daughter are very kind and grateful, however, and Lucy and Dr. John leave once the girl is comfortable.

In Chapter XXIV, "M. de Bassompierre," Polly Home and her father return into the circle of Lucy and the Brettons. The girl and man to whom Dr. John and Lucy administered aid turn out to be Ginevra Fanshawe's first cousin and the de Bassompierre uncle who pays for her schooling. Lucy learns of this connection when Ginevra comes home from dining out, saying she had a boring time with her uncle and her affected little cousin.

When Lucy, who has been pining for seven weeks for a letter, receives one unexpectedly from Mrs. Bretton inviting her to La Terrasse, she meets the same girl in her room at that house. Polly, of course, has been told of Lucy's existence by Mrs. Bretton, and Polly tells Lucy that she—Paulina Mary Home de Bassompierre—is the same little Missy Home of their childhood visits in Bretton.

At first Lucy is taken aback, sure that Lucy cannot possibly remember those days in the town of Bretton. But Polly remembers perfectly, especially her deep attachment for Dr. John. Polly has grown up to be a beautiful, slight, and not showy young woman, quite unlike her first cousin Ginevra. Lucy judges Polly to be more beautiful than Ginevra and of a higher quality of character, and it is clear that Lucy already fears that Dr. John will find Polly very attractive.

In Chapter XXV, we learn that "The Little Countess" is Polly. Her father, having inherited the title of Count from his de Bassompierre relatives, passes the title of Countess to Polly while he is still living (doing so in the Continental fashion). In this chapter, Lucy watches while Dr. John becomes enamored of the Countess.

Lucy, Polly, and Mrs. Bretton are next at La Terrasse, awaiting the return of Dr. Bretton and M. de Bassompierre. When they return, the entire company drinks a wassail bowl to the New Year (for it is January) and sing “Auld Lang Syne” (for M. de Bassompierre is Scottish). Polly, ever the child, dances about the kitchen like a fairy. She dotes on her father and acts childlike around him. Dr. John teases her with the wassail cup, holding it back from her. She tastes it and does not like it, and they banter while Lucy watches.

The next day is still snowy, and Lucy and Polly are left together in a sitting room. After the original shock of recognition has faded, they have very little to say to each other.

The subject of Lucy going to Madame Beck's school is brought up, and Lucy's status as a teacher is revealed to both of the de Bassompierres. Polly, with rather rude naïvete, says that she thought Lucy was rich and she is thus sorry for her. Mr. Home, a kindly gentleman with more tact than his daughter, closes the subject and turns it back to the prospect of Lucy attending Madame Beck's. There are reasons against this, namely, that Mr. Home in the past visited his daughter incessantly at her school, disrupting her studies. Lucy is at least spared having to see the new object of Dr. John's affections on a daily basis. The chapter ends with a domestic scene of all the friends by the fireside. Lucy again notes that Dr. John watches Polly intently.

Analysis

The reference to Vashti as having her "day of Sirius" means that at that point in her career she is, like Sirius, the brightest star in the sky (and, possibly, still on the rise). Lucy again, predictably, refers to the Old Testament when describing her emotions in struggling between Feeling and Reason when replying to Dr. John's letters. "The houses of Rimmon" is a reference to the Bible’s Second Book of Kings, implying that Lucy serves two masters, both her head and her heart, when she writes her letters first from her feelings, then tears them up, then writes a cooler letter under the auspices of Reason. The "Barmecide's loaf" of Dr. John's letters is a story from the Arabian Nights, in which an illusory feast, though attractive, does not satisfy the eater. Ginevra sarcastically calls Dr. John "Esculapius" in reference to the classical first doctor. The reference to Saul and David is another Old Testament analogy, for Saul starved his troops of food and David soothed the people with his Psalms of God. Lucy thinks of these Old Testament kings when she is starving for companionship and reflecting that people are more likely to be sympathetic to physical want (such as hunger) than to psychological deprivation (such as Lucy's enforced solitude).

Lucy is more indulgent with the faults of her companions than the reader may feel that she needs to be. The patently silly Lucy (having a childish lisp and the ignorance of a wassail cup, and who can be seen fairy-dancing around the kitchen in the company of adults) remains practically infantile at seventeen, and she takes every opportunity to be innocent, ignorant, and possessive of her father. She probably is viewed much more harshly by the reader than by Lucy. The fact that these people (the Brettons and the de Bassompierres) are Lucy's only friends on earth, the only people who help her cling to the vestiges of her old life before she fell to the status of wage earner, makes her more indulgent with them than these sometimes selfish people deserve. They are kind to her, and perhaps Polly does not mean to be patronizing or to cause Lucy embarrassment, but the facts remain that Dr. John and Polly are wondrously oblivious to Lucy's feelings, especially when it comes to her feelings for Dr. John.

The older people, Count de Bassompierre and Mrs. Bretton, are more mindful of her tenuous position and difficult situation. But they, too, allow her to come among them and be occasionally taunted by their less-than-sensitive offspring. Lucy has more forbearance for this than might be otherwise expected, for her alternative is utter solitude and friendlessness at Madame Beck's.

The reappearance of Polly and Mr. Home is a more gentle coincidence than the revelation of the identity of Dr. John, and their arrival is brought on more subtly. The reader instantly suspects them upon finding them at the theatre, but the suspense is only spun out over a couple of chapters rather than the six that were reserved for Dr. John. That the little group of all those years ago is again united in Mrs. Bretton's (really Dr. John's) house by the fire is a nice symmetry, though, and it appears that the affections and behavior of the members of the group have changed very little.

The twenty-sixth chapter, "A Burial," refers to the entombment of an inanimate object rather than a human being.

Lucy enters a somewhat happier phase of her life now; she is often asked to the Brettons' and to the de Bassompierres'. At this time Lucy finds that her five letters from Dr. John have gone missing from her bureau drawer. She waits, and they are returned. Suspecting Madame, for she has seen the woman more than once going through her things on spying missions, she tries to accept it as the way Madame runs her school.

The letters are again disturbed, and Lucy thinks that possibly Madame has taken the letters to show to M. Paul. The letters have become even more precious to Lucy lately because, although she now has enough friends to keep her from being lonely and depressed, Dr. John has transferred his affections to Polly and it is not likely he will write to Lucy again.

Lucy is now upset and no longer wants her letters to be accessible. She has the letters sealed in a bottle and then buries them under the tree where the stone covering the tomb of the nun is supposed to be. She seals it up with slate and cement. The spectral nun, predictably but terrifyingly, appears to Lucy there in her l'allée défendue, but Lucy bravely tries to speak to it and touch it. The nun recedes, and Lucy tells no one what she saw.

Lucy shows some of her resistance to being beholden to other people by refusing a princely sum (three times her salary at Madame Beck's) to become a paid companion to Polly. M. de Bassompierre is kind enough, but Lucy cannot imagine being tied to Polly or giving up the little independence she has.

Though Lucy is innocently taking German lessons at the de Bassompierres', M. Paul suspects that Lucy's absences are somehow sinister. He says that Madame allows Lucy her own way too often. M. Paul seems bent on keeping Lucy confined and limited however he can.

Paulina has been under the impression that Dr. John will marry her cousin Ginevra. Lucy says that Polly should not worry too much about that, but that they should perform a test on Ginevra to see if it is so. The plan is then hatched for a party for Ginevra and some of Paulina's father's friends, at which Polly and Lucy will observe her.

In Chapter XXVII, "The Hotel Crécy," the scene opens with a learned speech given at Villette's college. M. Paul is the eminent speaker in honor of the Prince of Labassecour's birthday. His speech is patriotic, and it brings down the house. M. Paul, usually so severe with Lucy, now asks Lucy's opinion of his speech when it is over. He is unable to hide his desire for Lucy to like his speech and to admire him for it. Lucy, who in the past admired his naïveté and his frankly despotic and sometimes selfish emotions, cannot help but be surprised that he thinks she could have a proper opinion about his speech. She is overcome and cannot make a proper response beyond some stock phrases.

At the dinner afterward at the Bassompierres', Lucy has the opportunity to observe both Paulina and Ginevra. Lucy and Dr. John have a chance to talk, and he remarks on Ginevra's beauty (a common subject between the two). He also says that if Lucy were a boy, he and she would have been good friends as children. This disappoints Lucy.

Dr. John, ever self-absorbed, says that he is able now to remember Polly in his childhood, and he recalls her remarkable fondness for him. Lucy, again with her rivals thrown in her face, decides she has had enough of Dr. John, and she refuses to ask Polly about the old days for him. Dr. John urges her on while M. Paul overhears—once again, Lucy's character and actions are misinterpreted. M. Paul vehemently hisses in her ear that she is a coquette, and Lucy turns on him in righteous anger. M. Paul is gone, and Dr. John laughs at that scene until Lucy nearly weeps. Dr. John, callously, notices that there is a space next to Polly and goes to sit by her. The little plan that Paulina and Lucy made has come to fruition, and their answer is clear: Dr. John's affections do not lie any longer with Ginevra Fanshawe.

While Lucy is waiting for Ginevra, M. Paul again approaches her. Lucy is very short with him, and M. Paul is surprised that his words hurt her. He abjectly asks for forgiveness, and Lucy finally gives it. This is perhaps the first truly social interaction that M. Paul and Lucy have ever shared. He smiles a true smile, and he is transformed in Lucy's eyes to something more attractive than he has ever been before.

On the way home, Ginevra is upset that she has lost the affection of Dr. John, which means she no longer has him in her power. Lucy roundly criticizes her selfish and vain friend.

In Chapter XXVIII, M. Paul is in a rage at the interruptions of his class. He has always required the absolute attention of anyone around him, and he is in such a state that he swears he will hang the next person who enters his class. The Athenee requires M. Paul to come at once for an inspection. Madame Beck and Rosine will not interrupt his class any more that morning for fear of his wrath. Lucy, who was sitting with her embroidery, is required to take him the message. She is ready for him to storm against her. Showing her innate cleverness, she has made a tiny thread noose for him to "hang" her with.

In the classroom, as Lucy tries to explain the urgency of the message, Lucy accidentally breaks his eyeglasses. She is truly sorry, and M. Paul finally softens and leaves for the college.

It has been M. Paul's custom to arrive unexpectedly at Madame Beck's and read to the boarders during the evenings. He arrives that night, and he uncharacteristically squeezes in to sit between Ginevra and Lucy. In a strange show of pique, M. Paul says that Lucy was trying to get away from him when she moved over to let him sit, and he marshals all the girls around so that Lucy may sit as far away from him as possible.

At the girls' supper, Lucy eats, retaining her "seat of punishment," and she rather relishes the smug way this situation is continuing to bother M. Paul. Before he leaves, he comes to her and says she has a way of making herself particularly unpleasant. As always, he implies that she has, or soon will have, a weaker character than she should. He notes her slightly more feminine dress of late, which Lucy defends. She is working on making a watchguard for a gift for a gentleman, which, since he disapproves of adornment for women, should at least not be suspect. He softens slightly and asks if she has come to hate him for his hot words here and at the dinner at the de Bassompierres'. She says she does not. He relents slightly, saying she may have some simple adornments, but he cautions her not to become too vain about them.

Analysis

The almost absurdly childish flirtatious games between M. Paul and Lucy are surprising in two characters of such obviously hard and unyielding temperaments. That M. Paul resorts only to storming at Lucy, and even insulting her in order to get her attention, makes him seem a little pathetic, and Lucy, though more continent in her responses, cannot help her little games, such as the thread noose and her smugness at sitting at the far end of the room. These two people have some affinity for one another, whether they admit it or not, but they refuse to express it in any positive way.

M. Paul does attempt to engage Lucy in sincere conversation after his speech, but he is so intellectually vain that he cannot really begin a true conversation when the subject is his own achievement. Lucy, though actually quite impressed with him, cannot, therefore, engage completely in the way she would like. Lucy is almost unrelentingly proud, especially around M. Paul, and while M. Paul's errors are mainly of action, Lucy's are mainly of abstention or inaction. This is a common romantic conceit of the passive female/active male, which not even the frustrated feminist Brontë can avoid.

Ginevra has increasingly become a comic figure, and she now is almost a caricature of herself in response to the rising star of Polly, her much superior cousin (at least with respect to Lucy). That Polly is trying to grow up properly is admired by Lucy, but the true nature of Polly as a dependent and other-centered individual will not change. There is no reason for Lucy to love Polly other than that Polly is kind to her. That Lucy does have an affection for Polly shows Lucy's ability to subvert her own jealousy in the face of another person's virtue.

Dr. John's blindness has been constant throughout the novel–he could not even recognize his old friend after months of association before he was told Lucy's identity. His condition is not only physical but also intellectual and emotional. He misperceives almost everything about Lucy's character and, though he is still forgiven, is unable to stop laughing at her when he knows he has hurt her. Though a kind and generous physician to the poor, he cannot see the pain he is causing in his young and poor friend Lucy, and even if he did see it, it is not clear that he would necessarily want to stop it. He and his mother are always railing at each other, and they both find it difficult to remain serious. In Volume I, when Lucy and he had a serious talk about his gifts of jewelry to Ginevra, he couldn't help but flash a mischievous glance in her direction. Dr. John is coming to look almost as flighty as Ginevra.

The number of comic episodes interspersed with Gothic ones (like the nun's visitation) is increasing. Some of M. Paul's antics are humorous, such as the scene in the schoolroom, but increasingly others, such as Rosine, Dr. John, or Madame Beck, are providing the comedy. The shift is finally occurring—from the focus on the young lovers Ginevra, Dr. John, and Count De Hamal to a different triangle of Dr. John, Polly, and Ginevra. Lucy, as always, is outside of this interaction, though she longs to be a part of it. She is shown to be less of a solitary depressive and more of a social being. The change in Lucy is gradual, almost glacial in pace, but the reader is beginning to believe that her resolve to "believe in happiness" in Chapter XXIII may actually be coming true.

The only other person honored with a fête at Madame Beck's is M. Paul. Lucy has been making a watchguard for him, which M. Paul probably assumed she was making for Dr. John. Everyone else gives M. Paul flowers, since he is not materialistic and prefers tokens or sincere gifts rather than the lavish but empty "subscription" presents that are given each year to Madame Beck.

While all the students and teachers present M. Paul with their bouquets, Lucy hangs back. Zelie St. Pierre (another teacher who has set her cap for M. Paul) makes fun of Lucy, saying she is English and knows not the custom of giving the professor of literature a floral tribute. This angers Lucy and, showing once again her perversity when faced with misunderstanding, she decides to keep the watchguard back.

Lucy listens to the man's lecture to the class, but she drops her thimble to the floor, causing her to bend to get it. She hits her head loudly on the table, interrupting the flow of M. Paul's talk. He rails against all things English, which Lucy endures, but when he attacks specifically the honor of the country's history, she bursts out “Vive L'Angleterre” and casts aspersions on the honor of France. M. Paul, now enjoying having made Lucy so angry, now talks mildly about his collection of flowers, singling out Zelie especially. He proposes to take the girls to breakfast in the country, but Lucy refuses and goes up to her dormitory.

In private, Lucy now laughs at this silly display between two adults who should know better. She goes back to the schoolroom to get the watchguard. She finds M. Paul rifling through her desk. He has done so in the past, correcting her schoolwork and leaving her things to read. M. Paul is not embarrassed by being surprised in this instance, for he is only leaving her more books. He chides Lucy for spoiling the fête by not giving him a bouquet. She then gives him the watchguard, now chiding him for impatience. He immediately puts it on. He leaves but returns that night for the reading in the refectory. They sit together, and Lucy smiles at him.

In Chapter XXX, "Monsieur Paul," it is clear that even after this rather violent quarrel, the relationship between Lucy and M. Paul has not changed. He is still autocratic and largely disapproving of Lucy. Lucy does not allow the reader to entertain any "kindly conclusions" about the despotic little man.

Lucy, like so many women of her time, was never properly taught mathematics. M. Paul, who always believes that correcting deficiencies in people is his business, instructs her. It is hard for her, and he is kindly and actually quite encouraging. Lucy's learning curve finally steepens, and she begins to enjoy the work. Then, perversely, M. Paul seems to dislike it. He seems not to want Lucy to enjoy or take pride in intellectual achievement, though he himself is instructing her. Lucy cannot bear this, and she has another fit of temper at him. M. Paul wants to give Lucy a public examination, for he thinks that she would fail and that failure would quash her intellectual pride. She has no desire to be publicly humiliated by M. Paul.

In Chapter XXXI Lucy goes to her l'allée défendue to contemplate her future and try to carve out some independence for herself. She would like to save up her money and begin a small school of her own, so that she would no longer be under the thumb of Madame Beck. She reckons that she needs about one thousand francs. M. Paul finds her and walks with her. He thinks that she looks pale and possibly ill.

M. Paul has a room for study at the boy's college, which borders the walled garden of Madame Beck's, and from that study's window he has been observing Madame Beck's school closely. She learns that he has been observing her in her l'allée défendue from the very beginning. He claims to be only judging people's characters, but Lucy cannot help but feel that he is spying.

The discussion turns to the supernatural, and M. Paul reveals, incredibly, that he has seen the nun. As they are standing there, they are both visited with the vision of the nun passing quite close to them.

In Chapter XXXII Polly and her father have been traveling away from Villette for some time. Lucy sees them in the park one fine day in April, with Dr. John approaching. Dr. John, as is his wont, rides past Lucy without seeing her, intent on joining Paulina and her father. Polly, however, has more presence of mind, and he comes to talk to Lucy. Now that Paulina has returned, their old habit of Lucy visiting the Hotel Crécy is resumed.

Paulina doesn't want to be like her flighty cousin Ginevra, and she is worried about Lucy's opinion of her