Come, Bessie, we will leave her: I wouldn't have her heart for
anything. Say your prayers, Miss Eyre, when you are by yourself;
for if you don't repent, something bad might be permitted to come
down the chimney and fetch you away."

They went, shutting the door, and locking it behind them.

The red-room was a square chamber, very seldom slept in, I might
say never, indeed, unless when a chance influx of visitors at
Gateshead Hall rendered it necessary to turn to account all the
accommodation it contained: yet it was one of the largest and
stateliest chambers in the mansion. A bed supported on massive
pillars of mahogany, hung with curtains of deep red damask, stood
out like a tabernacle in the centre; the two large windows, with
their blinds always drawn down, were half shrouded in festoons
and falls of similar drapery; the carpet was red; the table at the
foot of the bed was covered with a crimson cloth; the walls were
a soft fawn colour with a blush of pink in it; the wardrobe, the
toilet-table, the chairs were of darkly polished old mahogany. Out
of these deep surrounding shades rose high, and glared white, the
piled-up mattresses and pillows of the bed, spread with a snowy
Marseilles counterpane. Scarcely less prominent was an ample
cushioned easy-chair near the head of the bed, also white, with a
footstool before it; and looking, as I thought, like a pale throne.

This room was chill, because it seldom had a fire; it was silent,
because remote from the nursery and kitchen; solemn, because it
was known to be so seldom entered. The house-maid alone came here
on Saturdays, to wipe from the mirrors and the furniture a week's
quiet dust: and Mrs. Reed herself, at far intervals, visited it