"Is it my fault if in the monotony of my existence est tout à coup apparue a person whose talents, education, and character have been appreciated by all and by me.... Have I attempted to pervert your mind, to seduce your heart? No, no! I have suffered, suffered in silence [see my reference to the _Imitation of Christ_], suffered alone, suffered always. And my crime, what is it?... It is to make to you the avowal of suffering on the day when you go to leave me for ever a prey to incurable despair!" Thus have we real insight into the state of affairs at Brussels when Miss Brontë left. We see the divining, jealous Madame de Morville--Madame Héger, of course--subjecting her to the "taquineries sournoises"; we hear Madame saying of her: "Ce que me faisait tolérer cette pauvre Mdlle. Lagrange, c'est qu'elle était laide comme les sept péchés mortels," and sneering at the excuse she made to leave the establishment, calling it a "véritable prétexte" when the real reason was Madame's jealousy and its causes. Oh, the bitterness of it! And now in this light read the carefully worded representation of Mrs Gaskell that:-- Towards the end of 1843 various reasons conspired ... to make her [Charlotte Brontë] feel that her presence was absolutely and imperatively required at home, while she was ... no longer regarded with the former kindliness of feeling by Madame Héger. In consequence of this state of things working down with a sharp edge into a sensitive mind, she suddenly announced to that lady her immediate intention of returning to England. Something of the foregoing I gave in my article "The Lifting of the Brontë Veil" in _The Fortnightly Review_, and I have to thank the press generally for their kind acknowledgment of my important discovery. _The Spectator_, in consonance with others, says:--"Mr. Malham-Dembleby has found a _feuilleton_ by Eugène Sue which is curious, as it certainly indicates a knowledge of Charlotte Brontë and of Monsieur and Madame Héger at Brussels." In the extant French copy Eugène Sue has given a dramatic version of the parting scene between "Miss Mary" and "Madame de Morville"--Charlotte Brontë and Madame Héger. The latter had surprised her husband and the Irish governess, _tête-à-tête_ in the lonely pavilion, late in the evening. Monsieur protests:-- "Madame," he cries, "... I will not permit you, in my presence, to dare to calumniate and outrage Mademoiselle Lawson." Miss Mary asks him not to defend her, as she does not wish to be a cause of irritating discussion between them. "That is charming!" cried Madame de Morville, with a burst of sardonic laughter--"Grâce au bon accord du ménage, mademoiselle would desire to continue in perfect tranquillity the undignified rôle she has played at my house!"