After this, in _Villette_, the story drifts away from the real experience of Charlotte herself, not only in the circumstances related, but even in the emotions pictured, now painted, not from what she has felt herself, but from what she imagines for her heroine, that other happier self, lifted up into the heaven of romance, who, assured of Paul Emanuel's love, and his betrothed, waits and works in the school where he has appointed her Directress; in patient expectation of his return,--_that never comes to pass!_ For (why or wherefore, no literary critic of _Villette_ who measures the book by simply artistic standards can find any reason to explain) Charlotte won't let Lucy Snowe, the heroine, who is her other self, find happiness at last with Paul Emanuel: or even find him again, after that cruel separation, all due to the wicked craft and selfish jealousy of Madame Beck. Destiny interferes; a storm; a shipwreck--one is not told _what_ has happened: one is made to hear wailing winds and moaning ocean, that is all; we know nothing further than this: _Lucy Snowe waited and hoped; hoped and waited; but Paul Emanuel never came back._ But, at any rate, before he sailed on that last fatal voyage, all misunderstandings, all doubts had been swept away. He had driven Madame Beck from the room, and shown her his contempt and indignation. He had, with tenderness and passion, declared his love for Lucy; and had asked her to be his wife. This is what had followed after those scenes between Lucy and Madame Beck in the late night scene in the class-rooms and between Lucy and Paul Emanuel, when Madame Beck is put out of the room by Paul Emanuel, who insists upon saying good-bye to Lucy. All that we know of what followed these scenes, enacted under different circumstances, in Charlotte's life, must be gathered, not by a quite literal acceptance, but by an intelligent and impartial weighing, of her statements, contained in a letter written on the 23rd January 1844, three weeks after her return to Haworth. 'I suffered much before I left Brussels. I think, however long I live, I shall not forget what the parting with M. Heger cost me: it grieved me so much to grieve him, who had been so true, kind and disinterested a friend. At parting, he gave me a kind of diploma certifying my abilities as a teacher sealed with the seal of the Athenée Royal of which he is a professor.... I do not know whether you feel as I do, but there are times when it appears to me as if all my ideas and feelings, except a few friendships and affections, are changed from what they used to be. Something in me which used to be enthusiasm is tamed down and broken. I no longer regard myself as young--indeed I shall soon be twenty-eight--and it seems as if I ought to be working and having the rough realities of the world as other people do.'[2] [1] New Year's Day, perhaps? Charlotte left Bruxelles 2nd January 1843. [2] _Life_, p. 273. CHAPTER VI THE LOVE-LETTERS OF A ROMANTIC[1]