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diff --git a/143-0.txt b/143-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..172f56c --- /dev/null +++ b/143-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,13120 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 143 *** + +cover + + + +The Mayor of Casterbridge + +The Life and Death of a Man of Character + + +by Thomas Hardy + + + + +Contents + + + I + II + III + IV + V + VI + VII + VIII + IX + X + XI + XII + XIII + XIV + XV + XVI + XVII + XVIII + XIX + XX + XXI + XXII + XXIII + XXIV + XXV + XXVI + XXVII + XXVIII + XXIX + XXX + XXXI + XXXII + XXXIII + XXXIV + XXXV + XXXVI + XXXVII + XXXVIII + XXXIX + XL + XLI + XLII + XLIII + XLIV + XLV + + +I. + +One evening of late summer, before the nineteenth century had reached +one-third of its span, a young man and woman, the latter carrying a +child, were approaching the large village of Weydon-Priors, in Upper +Wessex, on foot. They were plainly but not ill clad, though the thick +hoar of dust which had accumulated on their shoes and garments from an +obviously long journey lent a disadvantageous shabbiness to their +appearance just now. + +The man was of fine figure, swarthy, and stern in aspect; and he showed +in profile a facial angle so slightly inclined as to be almost +perpendicular. He wore a short jacket of brown corduroy, newer than the +remainder of his suit, which was a fustian waistcoat with white horn +buttons, breeches of the same, tanned leggings, and a straw hat +overlaid with black glazed canvas. At his back he carried by a looped +strap a rush basket, from which protruded at one end the crutch of a +hay-knife, a wimble for hay-bonds being also visible in the aperture. +His measured, springless walk was the walk of the skilled countryman as +distinct from the desultory shamble of the general labourer; while in +the turn and plant of each foot there was, further, a dogged and +cynical indifference personal to himself, showing its presence even in +the regularly interchanging fustian folds, now in the left leg, now in +the right, as he paced along. + +What was really peculiar, however, in this couple’s progress, and would +have attracted the attention of any casual observer otherwise disposed +to overlook them, was the perfect silence they preserved. They walked +side by side in such a way as to suggest afar off the low, easy, +confidential chat of people full of reciprocity; but on closer view it +could be discerned that the man was reading, or pretending to read, a +ballad sheet which he kept before his eyes with some difficulty by the +hand that was passed through the basket strap. Whether this apparent +cause were the real cause, or whether it were an assumed one to escape +an intercourse that would have been irksome to him, nobody but himself +could have said precisely; but his taciturnity was unbroken, and the +woman enjoyed no society whatever from his presence. Virtually she +walked the highway alone, save for the child she bore. Sometimes the +man’s bent elbow almost touched her shoulder, for she kept as close to +his side as was possible without actual contact, but she seemed to have +no idea of taking his arm, nor he of offering it; and far from +exhibiting surprise at his ignoring silence she appeared to receive it +as a natural thing. If any word at all were uttered by the little +group, it was an occasional whisper of the woman to the child—a tiny +girl in short clothes and blue boots of knitted yarn—and the murmured +babble of the child in reply. + +The chief—almost the only—attraction of the young woman’s face was its +mobility. When she looked down sideways to the girl she became pretty, +and even handsome, particularly that in the action her features caught +slantwise the rays of the strongly coloured sun, which made +transparencies of her eyelids and nostrils and set fire on her lips. +When she plodded on in the shade of the hedge, silently thinking, she +had the hard, half-apathetic expression of one who deems anything +possible at the hands of Time and Chance except, perhaps, fair play. +The first phase was the work of Nature, the second probably of +civilization. + +That the man and woman were husband and wife, and the parents of the +girl in arms there could be little doubt. No other than such +relationship would have accounted for the atmosphere of stale +familiarity which the trio carried along with them like a nimbus as +they moved down the road. + +The wife mostly kept her eyes fixed ahead, though with little +interest—the scene for that matter being one that might have been +matched at almost any spot in any county in England at this time of the +year; a road neither straight nor crooked, neither level nor hilly, +bordered by hedges, trees, and other vegetation, which had entered the +blackened-green stage of colour that the doomed leaves pass through on +their way to dingy, and yellow, and red. The grassy margin of the bank, +and the nearest hedgerow boughs, were powdered by the dust that had +been stirred over them by hasty vehicles, the same dust as it lay on +the road deadening their footfalls like a carpet; and this, with the +aforesaid total absence of conversation, allowed every extraneous sound +to be heard. + +For a long time there was none, beyond the voice of a weak bird singing +a trite old evening song that might doubtless have been heard on the +hill at the same hour, and with the self-same trills, quavers, and +breves, at any sunset of that season for centuries untold. But as they +approached the village sundry distant shouts and rattles reached their +ears from some elevated spot in that direction, as yet screened from +view by foliage. When the outlying houses of Weydon-Priors could just +be described, the family group was met by a turnip-hoer with his hoe on +his shoulder, and his dinner-bag suspended from it. The reader promptly +glanced up. + +“Any trade doing here?” he asked phlegmatically, designating the +village in his van by a wave of the broadsheet. And thinking the +labourer did not understand him, he added, “Anything in the +hay-trussing line?” + +The turnip-hoer had already begun shaking his head. “Why, save the man, +what wisdom’s in him that ’a should come to Weydon for a job of that +sort this time o’ year?” + +“Then is there any house to let—a little small new cottage just a +builded, or such like?” asked the other. + +The pessimist still maintained a negative. “Pulling down is more the +nater of Weydon. There were five houses cleared away last year, and +three this; and the volk nowhere to go—no, not so much as a thatched +hurdle; that’s the way o’ Weydon-Priors.” + +The hay-trusser, which he obviously was, nodded with some +superciliousness. Looking towards the village, he continued, “There is +something going on here, however, is there not?” + +“Ay. ’Tis Fair Day. Though what you hear now is little more than the +clatter and scurry of getting away the money o’ children and fools, for +the real business is done earlier than this. I’ve been working within +sound o’t all day, but I didn’t go up—not I. ’Twas no business of +mine.” + +The trusser and his family proceeded on their way, and soon entered the +Fair-field, which showed standing-places and pens where many hundreds +of horses and sheep had been exhibited and sold in the forenoon, but +were now in great part taken away. At present, as their informant had +observed, but little real business remained on hand, the chief being +the sale by auction of a few inferior animals, that could not otherwise +be disposed of, and had been absolutely refused by the better class of +traders, who came and went early. Yet the crowd was denser now than +during the morning hours, the frivolous contingent of visitors, +including journeymen out for a holiday, a stray soldier or two come on +furlough, village shopkeepers, and the like, having latterly flocked +in; persons whose activities found a congenial field among the +peep-shows, toy-stands, waxworks, inspired monsters, disinterested +medical men who travelled for the public good, thimble-riggers, +nick-nack vendors, and readers of Fate. + +Neither of our pedestrians had much heart for these things, and they +looked around for a refreshment tent among the many which dotted the +down. Two, which stood nearest to them in the ochreous haze of expiring +sunlight, seemed almost equally inviting. One was formed of new, +milk-hued canvas, and bore red flags on its summit; it announced “Good +Home-brewed Beer, Ale, and Cyder.” The other was less new; a little +iron stove-pipe came out of it at the back and in front appeared the +placard, “Good Furmity Sold Hear.” The man mentally weighed the two +inscriptions and inclined to the former tent. + +“No—no—the other one,” said the woman. “I always like furmity; and so +does Elizabeth-Jane; and so will you. It is nourishing after a long +hard day.” + +“I’ve never tasted it,” said the man. However, he gave way to her +representations, and they entered the furmity booth forthwith. + +A rather numerous company appeared within, seated at the long narrow +tables that ran down the tent on each side. At the upper end stood a +stove, containing a charcoal fire, over which hung a large three-legged +crock, sufficiently polished round the rim to show that it was made of +bell-metal. A haggish creature of about fifty presided, in a white +apron, which as it threw an air of respectability over her as far as it +extended, was made so wide as to reach nearly round her waist. She +slowly stirred the contents of the pot. The dull scrape of her large +spoon was audible throughout the tent as she thus kept from burning the +mixture of corn in the grain, flour, milk, raisins, currants, and what +not, that composed the antiquated slop in which she dealt. Vessels +holding the separate ingredients stood on a white-clothed table of +boards and trestles close by. + +The young man and woman ordered a basin each of the mixture, steaming +hot, and sat down to consume it at leisure. This was very well so far, +for furmity, as the woman had said, was nourishing, and as proper a +food as could be obtained within the four seas; though, to those not +accustomed to it, the grains of wheat swollen as large as lemon-pips, +which floated on its surface, might have a deterrent effect at first. + +But there was more in that tent than met the cursory glance; and the +man, with the instinct of a perverse character, scented it quickly. +After a mincing attack on his bowl, he watched the hag’s proceedings +from the corner of his eye, and saw the game she played. He winked to +her, and passed up his basin in reply to her nod; when she took a +bottle from under the table, slily measured out a quantity of its +contents, and tipped the same into the man’s furmity. The liquor poured +in was rum. The man as slily sent back money in payment. + +He found the concoction, thus strongly laced, much more to his +satisfaction than it had been in its natural state. His wife had +observed the proceeding with much uneasiness; but he persuaded her to +have hers laced also, and she agreed to a milder allowance after some +misgiving. + +The man finished his basin, and called for another, the rum being +signalled for in yet stronger proportion. The effect of it was soon +apparent in his manner, and his wife but too sadly perceived that in +strenuously steering off the rocks of the licensed liquor-tent she had +only got into maelstrom depths here amongst the smugglers. + +The child began to prattle impatiently, and the wife more than once +said to her husband, “Michael, how about our lodging? You know we may +have trouble in getting it if we don’t go soon.” + +But he turned a deaf ear to those bird-like chirpings. He talked loud +to the company. The child’s black eyes, after slow, round, ruminating +gazes at the candles when they were lighted, fell together; then they +opened, then shut again, and she slept. + +At the end of the first basin the man had risen to serenity; at the +second he was jovial; at the third, argumentative, at the fourth, the +qualities signified by the shape of his face, the occasional clench of +his mouth, and the fiery spark of his dark eye, began to tell in his +conduct; he was overbearing—even brilliantly quarrelsome. + +The conversation took a high turn, as it often does on such occasions. +The ruin of good men by bad wives, and, more particularly, the +frustration of many a promising youth’s high aims and hopes and the +extinction of his energies by an early imprudent marriage, was the +theme. + +“I did for myself that way thoroughly,” said the trusser with a +contemplative bitterness that was well-nigh resentful. “I married at +eighteen, like the fool that I was; and this is the consequence o’t.” +He pointed at himself and family with a wave of the hand intended to +bring out the penuriousness of the exhibition. + +The young woman his wife, who seemed accustomed to such remarks, acted +as if she did not hear them, and continued her intermittent private +words of tender trifles to the sleeping and waking child, who was just +big enough to be placed for a moment on the bench beside her when she +wished to ease her arms. The man continued— + +“I haven’t more than fifteen shillings in the world, and yet I am a +good experienced hand in my line. I’d challenge England to beat me in +the fodder business; and if I were a free man again I’d be worth a +thousand pound before I’d done o’t. But a fellow never knows these +little things till all chance of acting upon ’em is past.” + +The auctioneer selling the old horses in the field outside could be +heard saying, “Now this is the last lot—now who’ll take the last lot +for a song? Shall I say forty shillings? ’Tis a very promising +broodmare, a trifle over five years old, and nothing the matter with +the hoss at all, except that she’s a little holler in the back and had +her left eye knocked out by the kick of another, her own sister, coming +along the road.” + +“For my part I don’t see why men who have got wives and don’t want ’em, +shouldn’t get rid of ’em as these gipsy fellows do their old horses,” +said the man in the tent. “Why shouldn’t they put ’em up and sell ’em +by auction to men who are in need of such articles? Hey? Why, begad, +I’d sell mine this minute if anybody would buy her!” + +“There’s them that would do that,” some of the guests replied, looking +at the woman, who was by no means ill-favoured. + +“True,” said a smoking gentleman, whose coat had the fine polish about +the collar, elbows, seams, and shoulder-blades that long-continued +friction with grimy surfaces will produce, and which is usually more +desired on furniture than on clothes. From his appearance he had +possibly been in former time groom or coachman to some neighbouring +county family. “I’ve had my breedings in as good circles, I may say, as +any man,” he added, “and I know true cultivation, or nobody do; and I +can declare she’s got it—in the bone, mind ye, I say—as much as any +female in the fair—though it may want a little bringing out.” Then, +crossing his legs, he resumed his pipe with a nicely-adjusted gaze at a +point in the air. + +The fuddled young husband stared for a few seconds at this unexpected +praise of his wife, half in doubt of the wisdom of his own attitude +towards the possessor of such qualities. But he speedily lapsed into +his former conviction, and said harshly— + +“Well, then, now is your chance; I am open to an offer for this gem o’ +creation.” + +She turned to her husband and murmured, “Michael, you have talked this +nonsense in public places before. A joke is a joke, but you may make it +once too often, mind!” + +“I know I’ve said it before; I meant it. All I want is a buyer.” + +At the moment a swallow, one among the last of the season, which had by +chance found its way through an opening into the upper part of the +tent, flew to and fro quick curves above their heads, causing all eyes +to follow it absently. In watching the bird till it made its escape the +assembled company neglected to respond to the workman’s offer, and the +subject dropped. + +But a quarter of an hour later the man, who had gone on lacing his +furmity more and more heavily, though he was either so strong-minded or +such an intrepid toper that he still appeared fairly sober, recurred to +the old strain, as in a musical fantasy the instrument fetches up the +original theme. “Here—I am waiting to know about this offer of mine. +The woman is no good to me. Who’ll have her?” + +The company had by this time decidedly degenerated, and the renewed +inquiry was received with a laugh of appreciation. The woman whispered; +she was imploring and anxious: “Come, come, it is getting dark, and +this nonsense won’t do. If you don’t come along, I shall go without +you. Come!” + +She waited and waited; yet he did not move. In ten minutes the man +broke in upon the desultory conversation of the furmity drinkers with, +“I asked this question, and nobody answered to ’t. Will any Jack Rag or +Tom Straw among ye buy my goods?” + +The woman’s manner changed, and her face assumed the grim shape and +colour of which mention has been made. + +“Mike, Mike,” she said; “this is getting serious. O!—too serious!” + +“Will anybody buy her?” said the man. + +“I wish somebody would,” said she firmly. “Her present owner is not at +all to her liking!” + +“Nor you to mine,” said he. “So we are agreed about that. Gentlemen, +you hear? It’s an agreement to part. She shall take the girl if she +wants to, and go her ways. I’ll take my tools, and go my ways. ’Tis +simple as Scripture history. Now then, stand up, Susan, and show +yourself.” + +“Don’t, my chiel,” whispered a buxom staylace dealer in voluminous +petticoats, who sat near the woman; “yer good man don’t know what he’s +saying.” + +The woman, however, did stand up. “Now, who’s auctioneer?” cried the +hay-trusser. + +“I be,” promptly answered a short man, with a nose resembling a copper +knob, a damp voice, and eyes like button-holes. “Who’ll make an offer +for this lady?” + +The woman looked on the ground, as if she maintained her position by a +supreme effort of will. + +“Five shillings,” said someone, at which there was a laugh. + +“No insults,” said the husband. “Who’ll say a guinea?” + +Nobody answered; and the female dealer in staylaces interposed. + +“Behave yerself moral, good man, for Heaven’s love! Ah, what a cruelty +is the poor soul married to! Bed and board is dear at some figures ’pon +my ’vation ’tis!” + +“Set it higher, auctioneer,” said the trusser. + +“Two guineas!” said the auctioneer; and no one replied. + +“If they don’t take her for that, in ten seconds they’ll have to give +more,” said the husband. “Very well. Now auctioneer, add another.” + +“Three guineas—going for three guineas!” said the rheumy man. + +“No bid?” said the husband. “Good Lord, why she’s cost me fifty times +the money, if a penny. Go on.” + +“Four guineas!” cried the auctioneer. + +“I’ll tell ye what—I won’t sell her for less than five,” said the +husband, bringing down his fist so that the basins danced. “I’ll sell +her for five guineas to any man that will pay me the money, and treat +her well; and he shall have her for ever, and never hear aught o’ me. +But she shan’t go for less. Now then—five guineas—and she’s yours. +Susan, you agree?” + +She bowed her head with absolute indifference. + +“Five guineas,” said the auctioneer, “or she’ll be withdrawn. Do +anybody give it? The last time. Yes or no?” + +“Yes,” said a loud voice from the doorway. + +All eyes were turned. Standing in the triangular opening which formed +the door of the tent was a sailor, who, unobserved by the rest, had +arrived there within the last two or three minutes. A dead silence +followed his affirmation. + +“You say you do?” asked the husband, staring at him. + +“I say so,” replied the sailor. + +“Saying is one thing, and paying is another. Where’s the money?” + +The sailor hesitated a moment, looked anew at the woman, came in, +unfolded five crisp pieces of paper, and threw them down upon the +tablecloth. They were Bank-of-England notes for five pounds. Upon the +face of this he clinked down the shillings severally—one, two, three, +four, five. + +The sight of real money in full amount, in answer to a challenge for +the same till then deemed slightly hypothetical had a great effect upon +the spectators. Their eyes became riveted upon the faces of the chief +actors, and then upon the notes as they lay, weighted by the shillings, +on the table. + +Up to this moment it could not positively have been asserted that the +man, in spite of his tantalizing declaration, was really in earnest. +The spectators had indeed taken the proceedings throughout as a piece +of mirthful irony carried to extremes; and had assumed that, being out +of work, he was, as a consequence, out of temper with the world, and +society, and his nearest kin. But with the demand and response of real +cash the jovial frivolity of the scene departed. A lurid colour seemed +to fill the tent, and change the aspect of all therein. The +mirth-wrinkles left the listeners’ faces, and they waited with parting +lips. + +“Now,” said the woman, breaking the silence, so that her low dry voice +sounded quite loud, “before you go further, Michael, listen to me. If +you touch that money, I and this girl go with the man. Mind, it is a +joke no longer.” + +“A joke? Of course it is not a joke!” shouted her husband, his +resentment rising at her suggestion. “I take the money; the sailor +takes you. That’s plain enough. It has been done elsewhere—and why not +here?” + +“’Tis quite on the understanding that the young woman is willing,” said +the sailor blandly. “I wouldn’t hurt her feelings for the world.” + +“Faith, nor I,” said her husband. “But she is willing, provided she can +have the child. She said so only the other day when I talked o’t!” + +“That you swear?” said the sailor to her. + +“I do,” said she, after glancing at her husband’s face and seeing no +repentance there. + +“Very well, she shall have the child, and the bargain’s complete,” said +the trusser. He took the sailor’s notes and deliberately folded them, +and put them with the shillings in a high remote pocket, with an air of +finality. + +The sailor looked at the woman and smiled. “Come along!” he said +kindly. “The little one too—the more the merrier!” She paused for an +instant, with a close glance at him. Then dropping her eyes again, and +saying nothing, she took up the child and followed him as he made +towards the door. On reaching it, she turned, and pulling off her +wedding-ring, flung it across the booth in the hay-trusser’s face. + +“Mike,” she said, “I’ve lived with thee a couple of years, and had +nothing but temper! Now I’m no more to ’ee; I’ll try my luck elsewhere. +’Twill be better for me and Elizabeth-Jane, both. So good-bye!” + +Seizing the sailor’s arm with her right hand, and mounting the little +girl on her left, she went out of the tent sobbing bitterly. + +A stolid look of concern filled the husband’s face, as if, after all, +he had not quite anticipated this ending; and some of the guests +laughed. + +“Is she gone?” he said. + +“Faith, ay! she’s gone clane enough,” said some rustics near the door. + +He rose and walked to the entrance with the careful tread of one +conscious of his alcoholic load. Some others followed, and they stood +looking into the twilight. The difference between the peacefulness of +inferior nature and the wilful hostilities of mankind was very apparent +at this place. In contrast with the harshness of the act just ended +within the tent was the sight of several horses crossing their necks +and rubbing each other lovingly as they waited in patience to be +harnessed for the homeward journey. Outside the fair, in the valleys +and woods, all was quiet. The sun had recently set, and the west heaven +was hung with rosy cloud, which seemed permanent, yet slowly changed. +To watch it was like looking at some grand feat of stagery from a +darkened auditorium. In presence of this scene after the other there +was a natural instinct to abjure man as the blot on an otherwise kindly +universe; till it was remembered that all terrestrial conditions were +intermittent, and that mankind might some night be innocently sleeping +when these quiet objects were raging loud. + +“Where do the sailor live?” asked a spectator, when they had vainly +gazed around. + +“God knows that,” replied the man who had seen high life. “He’s without +doubt a stranger here.” + +“He came in about five minutes ago,” said the furmity woman, joining +the rest with her hands on her hips. “And then ’a stepped back, and +then ’a looked in again. I’m not a penny the better for him.” + +“Serves the husband well be-right,” said the staylace vendor. “A comely +respectable body like her—what can a man want more? I glory in the +woman’s sperrit. I’d ha’ done it myself—od send if I wouldn’t, if a +husband had behaved so to me! I’d go, and ’a might call, and call, till +his keacorn was raw; but I’d never come back—no, not till the great +trumpet, would I!” + +“Well, the woman will be better off,” said another of a more +deliberative turn. “For seafaring natures be very good shelter for +shorn lambs, and the man do seem to have plenty of money, which is what +she’s not been used to lately, by all showings.” + +“Mark me—I’ll not go after her!” said the trusser, returning doggedly +to his seat. “Let her go! If she’s up to such vagaries she must suffer +for ’em. She’d no business to take the maid—’tis my maid; and if it +were the doing again she shouldn’t have her!” + +Perhaps from some little sense of having countenanced an indefensible +proceeding, perhaps because it was late, the customers thinned away +from the tent shortly after this episode. The man stretched his elbows +forward on the table leant his face upon his arms, and soon began to +snore. The furmity seller decided to close for the night, and after +seeing the rum-bottles, milk, corn, raisins, etc., that remained on +hand, loaded into the cart, came to where the man reclined. She shook +him, but could not wake him. As the tent was not to be struck that +night, the fair continuing for two or three days, she decided to let +the sleeper, who was obviously no tramp, stay where he was, and his +basket with him. Extinguishing the last candle, and lowering the flap +of the tent, she left it, and drove away. + + + +II. + +The morning sun was streaming through the crevices of the canvas when +the man awoke. A warm glow pervaded the whole atmosphere of the +marquee, and a single big blue fly buzzed musically round and round it. +Besides the buzz of the fly there was not a sound. He looked about—at +the benches—at the table supported by trestles—at his basket of +tools—at the stove where the furmity had been boiled—at the empty +basins—at some shed grains of wheat—at the corks which dotted the +grassy floor. Among the odds and ends he discerned a little shining +object, and picked it up. It was his wife’s ring. + +A confused picture of the events of the previous evening seemed to come +back to him, and he thrust his hand into his breast-pocket. A rustling +revealed the sailor’s bank-notes thrust carelessly in. + +This second verification of his dim memories was enough; he knew now +they were not dreams. He remained seated, looking on the ground for +some time. “I must get out of this as soon as I can,” he said +deliberately at last, with the air of one who could not catch his +thoughts without pronouncing them. “She’s gone—to be sure she is—gone +with that sailor who bought her, and little Elizabeth-Jane. We walked +here, and I had the furmity, and rum in it—and sold her. Yes, that’s +what’s happened and here am I. Now, what am I to do—am I sober enough +to walk, I wonder?” He stood up, found that he was in fairly good +condition for progress, unencumbered. Next he shouldered his tool +basket, and found he could carry it. Then lifting the tent door he +emerged into the open air. + +Here the man looked around with gloomy curiosity. The freshness of the +September morning inspired and braced him as he stood. He and his +family had been weary when they arrived the night before, and they had +observed but little of the place; so that he now beheld it as a new +thing. It exhibited itself as the top of an open down, bounded on one +extreme by a plantation, and approached by a winding road. At the +bottom stood the village which lent its name to the upland and the +annual fair that was held thereon. The spot stretched downward into +valleys, and onward to other uplands, dotted with barrows, and trenched +with the remains of prehistoric forts. The whole scene lay under the +rays of a newly risen sun, which had not as yet dried a single blade of +the heavily dewed grass, whereon the shadows of the yellow and red vans +were projected far away, those thrown by the felloe of each wheel being +elongated in shape to the orbit of a comet. All the gipsies and showmen +who had remained on the ground lay snug within their carts and tents or +wrapped in horse-cloths under them, and were silent and still as death, +with the exception of an occasional snore that revealed their presence. +But the Seven Sleepers had a dog; and dogs of the mysterious breeds +that vagrants own, that are as much like cats as dogs and as much like +foxes as cats also lay about here. A little one started up under one of +the carts, barked as a matter of principle, and quickly lay down again. +He was the only positive spectator of the hay-trusser’s exit from the +Weydon Fair-field. + +This seemed to accord with his desire. He went on in silent thought, +unheeding the yellowhammers which flitted about the hedges with straws +in their bills, the crowns of the mushrooms, and the tinkling of local +sheep-bells, whose wearer had had the good fortune not to be included +in the fair. When he reached a lane, a good mile from the scene of the +previous evening, the man pitched his basket and leant upon a gate. A +difficult problem or two occupied his mind. + +“Did I tell my name to anybody last night, or didn’t I tell my name?” +he said to himself; and at last concluded that he did not. His general +demeanour was enough to show how he was surprised and nettled that his +wife had taken him so literally—as much could be seen in his face, and +in the way he nibbled a straw which he pulled from the hedge. He knew +that she must have been somewhat excited to do this; moreover, she must +have believed that there was some sort of binding force in the +transaction. On this latter point he felt almost certain, knowing her +freedom from levity of character, and the extreme simplicity of her +intellect. There may, too, have been enough recklessness and resentment +beneath her ordinary placidity to make her stifle any momentary doubts. +On a previous occasion when he had declared during a fuddle that he +would dispose of her as he had done, she had replied that she would not +hear him say that many times more before it happened, in the resigned +tones of a fatalist.... “Yet she knows I am not in my senses when I do +that!” he exclaimed. “Well, I must walk about till I find her.... Seize +her, why didn’t she know better than bring me into this disgrace!” he +roared out. “She wasn’t queer if I was. ’Tis like Susan to show such +idiotic simplicity. Meek—that meekness has done me more harm than the +bitterest temper!” + +When he was calmer he turned to his original conviction that he must +somehow find her and his little Elizabeth-Jane, and put up with the +shame as best he could. It was of his own making, and he ought to bear +it. But first he resolved to register an oath, a greater oath than he +had ever sworn before: and to do it properly he required a fit place +and imagery; for there was something fetichistic in this man’s beliefs. + +He shouldered his basket and moved on, casting his eyes inquisitively +round upon the landscape as he walked, and at the distance of three or +four miles perceived the roofs of a village and the tower of a church. +He instantly made towards the latter object. The village was quite +still, it being that motionless hour of rustic daily life which fills +the interval between the departure of the field-labourers to their +work, and the rising of their wives and daughters to prepare the +breakfast for their return. Hence he reached the church without +observation, and the door being only latched he entered. The +hay-trusser deposited his basket by the font, went up the nave till he +reached the altar-rails, and opening the gate entered the sacrarium, +where he seemed to feel a sense of the strangeness for a moment; then +he knelt upon the footpace. Dropping his head upon the clamped book +which lay on the Communion-table, he said aloud— + +“I, Michael Henchard, on this morning of the sixteenth of September, do +take an oath before God here in this solemn place that I will avoid all +strong liquors for the space of twenty-one years to come, being a year +for every year that I have lived. And this I swear upon the book before +me; and may I be strook dumb, blind, and helpless, if I break this my +oath!” + +When he had said it and kissed the big book, the hay-trusser arose, and +seemed relieved at having made a start in a new direction. While +standing in the porch a moment he saw a thick jet of wood smoke +suddenly start up from the red chimney of a cottage near, and knew that +the occupant had just lit her fire. He went round to the door, and the +housewife agreed to prepare him some breakfast for a trifling payment, +which was done. Then he started on the search for his wife and child. + +The perplexing nature of the undertaking became apparent soon enough. +Though he examined and inquired, and walked hither and thither day +after day, no such characters as those he described had anywhere been +seen since the evening of the fair. To add to the difficulty he could +gain no sound of the sailor’s name. As money was short with him he +decided, after some hesitation, to spend the sailor’s money in the +prosecution of this search; but it was equally in vain. The truth was +that a certain shyness of revealing his conduct prevented Michael +Henchard from following up the investigation with the loud hue-and-cry +such a pursuit demanded to render it effectual; and it was probably for +this reason that he obtained no clue, though everything was done by him +that did not involve an explanation of the circumstances under which he +had lost her. + +Weeks counted up to months, and still he searched on, maintaining +himself by small jobs of work in the intervals. By this time he had +arrived at a seaport, and there he derived intelligence that persons +answering somewhat to his description had emigrated a little time +before. Then he said he would search no longer, and that he would go +and settle in the district which he had had for some time in his mind. + +Next day he started, journeying south-westward, and did not pause, +except for nights’ lodgings, till he reached the town of Casterbridge, +in a far distant part of Wessex. + + + +III. + +The highroad into the village of Weydon-Priors was again carpeted with +dust. The trees had put on as of yore their aspect of dingy green, and +where the Henchard family of three had once walked along, two persons +not unconnected with the family walked now. + +The scene in its broad aspect had so much of its previous character, +even to the voices and rattle from the neighbouring village down, that +it might for that matter have been the afternoon following the +previously recorded episode. Change was only to be observed in details; +but here it was obvious that a long procession of years had passed by. +One of the two who walked the road was she who had figured as the young +wife of Henchard on the previous occasion; now her face had lost much +of its rotundity; her skin had undergone a textural change; and though +her hair had not lost colour it was considerably thinner than +heretofore. She was dressed in the mourning clothes of a widow. Her +companion, also in black, appeared as a well-formed young woman about +eighteen, completely possessed of that ephemeral precious essence +youth, which is itself beauty, irrespective of complexion or contour. + +A glance was sufficient to inform the eye that this was Susan +Henchard’s grown-up daughter. While life’s middle summer had set its +hardening mark on the mother’s face, her former spring-like +specialities were transferred so dexterously by Time to the second +figure, her child, that the absence of certain facts within her +mother’s knowledge from the girl’s mind would have seemed for the +moment, to one reflecting on those facts, to be a curious imperfection +in Nature’s powers of continuity. + +They walked with joined hands, and it could be perceived that this was +the act of simple affection. The daughter carried in her outer hand a +withy basket of old-fashioned make; the mother a blue bundle, which +contrasted oddly with her black stuff gown. + +Reaching the outskirts of the village they pursued the same track as +formerly, and ascended to the fair. Here, too it was evident that the +years had told. Certain mechanical improvements might have been noticed +in the roundabouts and high-fliers, machines for testing rustic +strength and weight, and in the erections devoted to shooting for nuts. +But the real business of the fair had considerably dwindled. The new +periodical great markets of neighbouring towns were beginning to +interfere seriously with the trade carried on here for centuries. The +pens for sheep, the tie-ropes for horses, were about half as long as +they had been. The stalls of tailors, hosiers, coopers, linen-drapers, +and other such trades had almost disappeared, and the vehicles were far +less numerous. The mother and daughter threaded the crowd for some +little distance, and then stood still. + +“Why did we hinder our time by coming in here? I thought you wished to +get onward?” said the maiden. + +“Yes, my dear Elizabeth-Jane,” explained the other. “But I had a fancy +for looking up here.” + +“Why?” + +“It was here I first met with Newson—on such a day as this.” + +“First met with father here? Yes, you have told me so before. And now +he’s drowned and gone from us!” As she spoke the girl drew a card from +her pocket and looked at it with a sigh. It was edged with black, and +inscribed within a design resembling a mural tablet were the words, “In +affectionate memory of Richard Newson, mariner, who was unfortunately +lost at sea, in the month of November 184—, aged forty-one years.” + +“And it was here,” continued her mother, with more hesitation, “that I +last saw the relation we are going to look for—Mr. Michael Henchard.” + +“What is his exact kin to us, mother? I have never clearly had it told +me.” + +“He is, or was—for he may be dead—a connection by marriage,” said her +mother deliberately. + +“That’s exactly what you have said a score of times before!” replied +the young woman, looking about her inattentively. “He’s not a near +relation, I suppose?” + +“Not by any means.” + +“He was a hay-trusser, wasn’t he, when you last heard of him? + +“He was.” + +“I suppose he never knew me?” the girl innocently continued. + +Mrs. Henchard paused for a moment, and answered uneasily, “Of course +not, Elizabeth-Jane. But come this way.” She moved on to another part +of the field. + +“It is not much use inquiring here for anybody, I should think,” the +daughter observed, as she gazed round about. “People at fairs change +like the leaves of trees; and I daresay you are the only one here +to-day who was here all those years ago.” + +“I am not so sure of that,” said Mrs. Newson, as she now called +herself, keenly eyeing something under a green bank a little way off. +“See there.” + +The daughter looked in the direction signified. The object pointed out +was a tripod of sticks stuck into the earth, from which hung a +three-legged crock, kept hot by a smouldering wood fire beneath. Over +the pot stooped an old woman haggard, wrinkled, and almost in rags. She +stirred the contents of the pot with a large spoon, and occasionally +croaked in a broken voice, “Good furmity sold here!” + +It was indeed the former mistress of the furmity tent—once thriving, +cleanly, white-aproned, and chinking with money—now tentless, dirty, +owning no tables or benches, and having scarce any customers except two +small whity-brown boys, who came up and asked for “A ha’p’orth, +please—good measure,” which she served in a couple of chipped yellow +basins of commonest clay. + +“She was here at that time,” resumed Mrs. Newson, making a step as if +to draw nearer. + +“Don’t speak to her—it isn’t respectable!” urged the other. + +“I will just say a word—you, Elizabeth-Jane, can stay here.” + +The girl was not loth, and turned to some stalls of coloured prints +while her mother went forward. The old woman begged for the latter’s +custom as soon as she saw her, and responded to Mrs. Henchard-Newson’s +request for a pennyworth with more alacrity than she had shown in +selling six-pennyworths in her younger days. When the _soi-disant_ +widow had taken the basin of thin poor slop that stood for the rich +concoction of the former time, the hag opened a little basket behind +the fire, and looking up slily, whispered, “Just a thought o’ rum in +it?—smuggled, you know—say two penn’orth—’twill make it slip down like +cordial!” + +Her customer smiled bitterly at this survival of the old trick, and +shook her head with a meaning the old woman was far from translating. +She pretended to eat a little of the furmity with the leaden spoon +offered, and as she did so said blandly to the hag, “You’ve seen better +days?” + +“Ah, ma’am—well ye may say it!” responded the old woman, opening the +sluices of her heart forthwith. “I’ve stood in this fair-ground, maid, +wife, and widow, these nine-and-thirty years, and in that time have +known what it was to do business with the richest stomachs in the land! +Ma’am you’d hardly believe that I was once the owner of a great +pavilion-tent that was the attraction of the fair. Nobody could come, +nobody could go, without having a dish of Mrs. Goodenough’s furmity. I +knew the clergy’s taste, the dandy gent’s taste; I knew the town’s +taste, the country’s taste. I even knowed the taste of the coarse +shameless females. But Lord’s my life—the world’s no memory; +straightforward dealings don’t bring profit—’tis the sly and the +underhand that get on in these times!” + +Mrs. Newson glanced round—her daughter was still bending over the +distant stalls. “Can you call to mind,” she said cautiously to the old +woman, “the sale of a wife by her husband in your tent eighteen years +ago to-day?” + +The hag reflected, and half shook her head. “If it had been a big thing +I should have minded it in a moment,” she said. “I can mind every +serious fight o’ married parties, every murder, every manslaughter, +even every pocket-picking—leastwise large ones—that ’t has been my lot +to witness. But a selling? Was it done quiet-like?” + +“Well, yes. I think so.” + +The furmity woman half shook her head again. “And yet,” she said, “I +do. At any rate, I can mind a man doing something o’ the sort—a man in +a cord jacket, with a basket of tools; but, Lord bless ye, we don’t +gi’e it head-room, we don’t, such as that. The only reason why I can +mind the man is that he came back here to the next year’s fair, and +told me quite private-like that if a woman ever asked for him I was to +say he had gone to—where?—Casterbridge—yes—to Casterbridge, said he. +But, Lord’s my life, I shouldn’t ha’ thought of it again!” + +Mrs. Newson would have rewarded the old woman as far as her small means +afforded had she not discreetly borne in mind that it was by that +unscrupulous person’s liquor her husband had been degraded. She briefly +thanked her informant, and rejoined Elizabeth, who greeted her with, +“Mother, do let’s get on—it was hardly respectable for you to buy +refreshments there. I see none but the lowest do.” + +“I have learned what I wanted, however,” said her mother quietly. “The +last time our relative visited this fair he said he was living at +Casterbridge. It is a long, long way from here, and it was many years +ago that he said it, but there I think we’ll go.” + +With this they descended out of the fair, and went onward to the +village, where they obtained a night’s lodging. + + + +IV. + +Henchard’s wife acted for the best, but she had involved herself in +difficulties. A hundred times she had been upon the point of telling +her daughter Elizabeth-Jane the true story of her life, the tragical +crisis of which had been the transaction at Weydon Fair, when she was +not much older than the girl now beside her. But she had refrained. An +innocent maiden had thus grown up in the belief that the relations +between the genial sailor and her mother were the ordinary ones that +they had always appeared to be. The risk of endangering a child’s +strong affection by disturbing ideas which had grown with her growth +was to Mrs. Henchard too fearful a thing to contemplate. It had seemed, +indeed folly to think of making Elizabeth-Jane wise. + +But Susan Henchard’s fear of losing her dearly loved daughter’s heart +by a revelation had little to do with any sense of wrong-doing on her +own part. Her simplicity—the original ground of Henchard’s contempt for +her—had allowed her to live on in the conviction that Newson had +acquired a morally real and justifiable right to her by his +purchase—though the exact bearings and legal limits of that right were +vague. It may seem strange to sophisticated minds that a sane young +matron could believe in the seriousness of such a transfer; and were +there not numerous other instances of the same belief the thing might +scarcely be credited. But she was by no means the first or last peasant +woman who had religiously adhered to her purchaser, as too many rural +records show. + +The history of Susan Henchard’s adventures in the interim can be told +in two or three sentences. Absolutely helpless she had been taken off +to Canada where they had lived several years without any great worldly +success, though she worked as hard as any woman could to keep their +cottage cheerful and well-provided. When Elizabeth-Jane was about +twelve years old the three returned to England, and settled at +Falmouth, where Newson made a living for a few years as boatman and +general handy shoreman. + +He then engaged in the Newfoundland trade, and it was during this +period that Susan had an awakening. A friend to whom she confided her +history ridiculed her grave acceptance of her position; and all was +over with her peace of mind. When Newson came home at the end of one +winter he saw that the delusion he had so carefully sustained had +vanished for ever. + +There was then a time of sadness, in which she told him her doubts if +she could live with him longer. Newson left home again on the +Newfoundland trade when the season came round. The vague news of his +loss at sea a little later on solved a problem which had become torture +to her meek conscience. She saw him no more. + +Of Henchard they heard nothing. To the liege subjects of Labour, the +England of those days was a continent, and a mile a geographical +degree. + +Elizabeth-Jane developed early into womanliness. One day a month or so +after receiving intelligence of Newson’s death off the Bank of +Newfoundland, when the girl was about eighteen, she was sitting on a +willow chair in the cottage they still occupied, working twine nets for +the fishermen. Her mother was in a back corner of the same room engaged +in the same labour, and dropping the heavy wood needle she was filling +she surveyed her daughter thoughtfully. The sun shone in at the door +upon the young woman’s head and hair, which was worn loose, so that the +rays streamed into its depths as into a hazel copse. Her face, though +somewhat wan and incomplete, possessed the raw materials of beauty in a +promising degree. There was an under-handsomeness in it, struggling to +reveal itself through the provisional curves of immaturity, and the +casual disfigurements that resulted from the straitened circumstances +of their lives. She was handsome in the bone, hardly as yet handsome in +the flesh. She possibly might never be fully handsome, unless the +carking accidents of her daily existence could be evaded before the +mobile parts of her countenance had settled to their final mould. + +The sight of the girl made her mother sad—not vaguely but by logical +inference. They both were still in that strait-waistcoat of poverty +from which she had tried so many times to be delivered for the girl’s +sake. The woman had long perceived how zealously and constantly the +young mind of her companion was struggling for enlargement; and yet +now, in her eighteenth year, it still remained but little unfolded. The +desire—sober and repressed—of Elizabeth-Jane’s heart was indeed to see, +to hear, and to understand. How could she become a woman of wider +knowledge, higher repute—“better,” as she termed it—this was her +constant inquiry of her mother. She sought further into things than +other girls in her position ever did, and her mother groaned as she +felt she could not aid in the search. + +The sailor, drowned or no, was probably now lost to them; and Susan’s +staunch, religious adherence to him as her husband in principle, till +her views had been disturbed by enlightenment, was demanded no more. +She asked herself whether the present moment, now that she was a free +woman again, were not as opportune a one as she would find in a world +where everything had been so inopportune, for making a desperate effort +to advance Elizabeth. To pocket her pride and search for the first +husband seemed, wisely or not, the best initiatory step. He had +possibly drunk himself into his tomb. But he might, on the other hand, +have had too much sense to do so; for in her time with him he had been +given to bouts only, and was not a habitual drunkard. + +At any rate, the propriety of returning to him, if he lived, was +unquestionable. The awkwardness of searching for him lay in +enlightening Elizabeth, a proceeding which her mother could not endure +to contemplate. She finally resolved to undertake the search without +confiding to the girl her former relations with Henchard, leaving it to +him if they found him to take what steps he might choose to that end. +This will account for their conversation at the fair and the +half-informed state at which Elizabeth was led onward. + +In this attitude they proceeded on their journey, trusting solely to +the dim light afforded of Henchard’s whereabouts by the furmity woman. +The strictest economy was indispensable. Sometimes they might have been +seen on foot, sometimes on farmers’ waggons, sometimes in carriers’ +vans; and thus they drew near to Casterbridge. Elizabeth-Jane +discovered to her alarm that her mother’s health was not what it once +had been, and there was ever and anon in her talk that renunciatory +tone which showed that, but for the girl, she would not be very sorry +to quit a life she was growing thoroughly weary of. + +It was on a Friday evening, near the middle of September and just +before dusk, that they reached the summit of a hill within a mile of +the place they sought. There were high banked hedges to the coach-road +here, and they mounted upon the green turf within, and sat down. The +spot commanded a full view of the town and its environs. + +“What an old-fashioned place it seems to be!” said Elizabeth-Jane, +while her silent mother mused on other things than topography. “It is +huddled all together; and it is shut in by a square wall of trees, like +a plot of garden ground by a box-edging.” + +Its squareness was, indeed, the characteristic which most struck the +eye in this antiquated borough, the borough of Casterbridge—at that +time, recent as it was, untouched by the faintest sprinkle of +modernism. It was compact as a box of dominoes. It had no suburbs—in +the ordinary sense. Country and town met at a mathematical line. + +To birds of the more soaring kind Casterbridge must have appeared on +this fine evening as a mosaic-work of subdued reds, browns, greys, and +crystals, held together by a rectangular frame of deep green. To the +level eye of humanity it stood as an indistinct mass behind a dense +stockade of limes and chestnuts, set in the midst of miles of rotund +down and concave field. The mass became gradually dissected by the +vision into towers, gables, chimneys, and casements, the highest +glazings shining bleared and bloodshot with the coppery fire they +caught from the belt of sunlit cloud in the west. + +From the centre of each side of this tree-bound square ran avenues +east, west, and south into the wide expanse of cornland and coomb to +the distance of a mile or so. It was by one of these avenues that the +pedestrians were about to enter. Before they had risen to proceed two +men passed outside the hedge, engaged in argumentative conversation. + +“Why, surely,” said Elizabeth, as they receded, “those men mentioned +the name of Henchard in their talk—the name of our relative?” + +“I thought so too,” said Mrs. Newson. + +“That seems a hint to us that he is still here.” + +“Yes.” + +“Shall I run after them, and ask them about him——” + +“No, no, no! Not for the world just yet. He may be in the workhouse, or +in the stocks, for all we know.” + +“Dear me—why should you think that, mother?” + +“’Twas just something to say—that’s all! But we must make private +inquiries.” + +Having sufficiently rested they proceeded on their way at evenfall. The +dense trees of the avenue rendered the road dark as a tunnel, though +the open land on each side was still under a faint daylight, in other +words, they passed down a midnight between two gloamings. The features +of the town had a keen interest for Elizabeth’s mother, now that the +human side came to the fore. As soon as they had wandered about they +could see that the stockade of gnarled trees which framed in +Casterbridge was itself an avenue, standing on a low green bank or +escarpment, with a ditch yet visible without. Within the avenue and +bank was a wall more or less discontinuous, and within the wall were +packed the abodes of the burghers. + +Though the two women did not know it these external features were but +the ancient defences of the town, planted as a promenade. + +The lamplights now glimmered through the engirdling trees, conveying a +sense of great smugness and comfort inside, and rendering at the same +time the unlighted country without strangely solitary and vacant in +aspect, considering its nearness to life. The difference between burgh +and champaign was increased, too, by sounds which now reached them +above others—the notes of a brass band. The travellers returned into +the High Street, where there were timber houses with overhanging +stories, whose small-paned lattices were screened by dimity curtains on +a drawing-string, and under whose bargeboards old cobwebs waved in the +breeze. There were houses of brick-nogging, which derived their chief +support from those adjoining. There were slate roofs patched with +tiles, and tile roofs patched with slate, with occasionally a roof of +thatch. + +The agricultural and pastoral character of the people upon whom the +town depended for its existence was shown by the class of objects +displayed in the shop windows. Scythes, reap-hooks, sheep-shears, +bill-hooks, spades, mattocks, and hoes at the iron-monger’s; bee-hives, +butter-firkins, churns, milking stools and pails, hay-rakes, +field-flagons, and seed-lips at the cooper’s; cart-ropes and +plough-harness at the saddler’s; carts, wheel-barrows, and mill-gear at +the wheelwright’s and machinist’s, horse-embrocations at the chemist’s; +at the glover’s and leather-cutter’s, hedging-gloves, thatchers’ +knee-caps, ploughmen’s leggings, villagers’ pattens and clogs. + +They came to a grizzled church, whose massive square tower rose +unbroken into the darkening sky, the lower parts being illuminated by +the nearest lamps sufficiently to show how completely the mortar from +the joints of the stonework had been nibbled out by time and weather, +which had planted in the crevices thus made little tufts of stone-crop +and grass almost as far up as the very battlements. From this tower the +clock struck eight, and thereupon a bell began to toll with a +peremptory clang. The curfew was still rung in Casterbridge, and it was +utilized by the inhabitants as a signal for shutting their shops. No +sooner did the deep notes of the bell throb between the house-fronts +than a clatter of shutters arose through the whole length of the High +Street. In a few minutes business at Casterbridge was ended for the +day. + +Other clocks struck eight from time to time—one gloomily from the gaol, +another from the gable of an almshouse, with a preparative creak of +machinery, more audible than the note of the bell; a row of tall, +varnished case-clocks from the interior of a clock-maker’s shop joined +in one after another just as the shutters were enclosing them, like a +row of actors delivering their final speeches before the fall of the +curtain; then chimes were heard stammering out the Sicilian Mariners’ +Hymn; so that chronologists of the advanced school were appreciably on +their way to the next hour before the whole business of the old one was +satisfactorily wound up. + +In an open space before the church walked a woman with her gown-sleeves +rolled up so high that the edge of her underlinen was visible, and her +skirt tucked up through her pocket hole. She carried a loaf under her +arm from which she was pulling pieces of bread, and handing them to +some other women who walked with her, which pieces they nibbled +critically. The sight reminded Mrs. Henchard-Newson and her daughter +that they had an appetite; and they inquired of the woman for the +nearest baker’s. + +“Ye may as well look for manna-food as good bread in Casterbridge just +now,” she said, after directing them. “They can blare their trumpets +and thump their drums, and have their roaring dinners”—waving her hand +towards a point further along the street, where the brass band could be +seen standing in front of an illuminated building—“but we must needs be +put-to for want of a wholesome crust. There’s less good bread than good +beer in Casterbridge now.” + +“And less good beer than swipes,” said a man with his hands in his +pockets. + +“How does it happen there’s no good bread?” asked Mrs. Henchard. + +“Oh, ’tis the corn-factor—he’s the man that our millers and bakers all +deal wi’, and he has sold ’em growed wheat, which they didn’t know was +growed, so they say, till the dough ran all over the ovens like +quicksilver; so that the loaves be as flat as toads, and like suet +pudden inside. I’ve been a wife, and I’ve been a mother, and I never +see such unprincipled bread in Casterbridge as this before.—But you +must be a real stranger here not to know what’s made all the poor +volks’ insides plim like blowed bladders this week?” + +“I am,” said Elizabeth’s mother shyly. + +Not wishing to be observed further till she knew more of her future in +this place, she withdrew with her daughter from the speaker’s side. +Getting a couple of biscuits at the shop indicated as a temporary +substitute for a meal, they next bent their steps instinctively to +where the music was playing. + + + +V. + +A few score yards brought them to the spot where the town band was now +shaking the window-panes with the strains of “The Roast Beef of Old +England.” + +The building before whose doors they had pitched their music-stands was +the chief hotel in Casterbridge—namely, the King’s Arms. A spacious +bow-window projected into the street over the main portico, and from +the open sashes came the babble of voices, the jingle of glasses, and +the drawing of corks. The blinds, moreover, being left unclosed, the +whole interior of this room could be surveyed from the top of a flight +of stone steps to the road-waggon office opposite, for which reason a +knot of idlers had gathered there. + +“We might, perhaps, after all, make a few inquiries about—our relation +Mr. Henchard,” whispered Mrs. Newson who, since her entry into +Casterbridge, had seemed strangely weak and agitated, “And this, I +think, would be a good place for trying it—just to ask, you know, how +he stands in the town—if he is here, as I think he must be. You, +Elizabeth-Jane, had better be the one to do it. I’m too worn out to do +anything—pull down your fall first.” + +She sat down upon the lowest step, and Elizabeth-Jane obeyed her +directions and stood among the idlers. + +“What’s going on to-night?” asked the girl, after singling out an old +man and standing by him long enough to acquire a neighbourly right of +converse. + +“Well, ye must be a stranger sure,” said the old man, without taking +his eyes from the window. “Why, ’tis a great public dinner of the +gentle-people and such like leading volk—wi’ the Mayor in the chair. As +we plainer fellows bain’t invited, they leave the winder-shutters open +that we may get jist a sense o’t out here. If you mount the steps you +can see em. That’s Mr. Henchard, the Mayor, at the end of the table, a +facing ye; and that’s the Council men right and left.... Ah, lots of +them when they begun life were no more than I be now!” + +“Henchard!” said Elizabeth-Jane, surprised, but by no means suspecting +the whole force of the revelation. She ascended to the top of the +steps. + +Her mother, though her head was bowed, had already caught from the +inn-window tones that strangely riveted her attention, before the old +man’s words, “Mr. Henchard, the Mayor,” reached her ears. She arose, +and stepped up to her daughter’s side as soon as she could do so +without showing exceptional eagerness. + +The interior of the hotel dining-room was spread out before her, with +its tables, and glass, and plate, and inmates. Facing the window, in +the chair of dignity, sat a man about forty years of age; of heavy +frame, large features, and commanding voice; his general build being +rather coarse than compact. He had a rich complexion, which verged on +swarthiness, a flashing black eye, and dark, bushy brows and hair. When +he indulged in an occasional loud laugh at some remark among the +guests, his large mouth parted so far back as to show to the rays of +the chandelier a full score or more of the two-and-thirty sound white +teeth that he obviously still could boast of. + +That laugh was not encouraging to strangers, and hence it may have been +well that it was rarely heard. Many theories might have been built upon +it. It fell in well with conjectures of a temperament which would have +no pity for weakness, but would be ready to yield ungrudging admiration +to greatness and strength. Its producer’s personal goodness, if he had +any, would be of a very fitful cast—an occasional almost oppressive +generosity rather than a mild and constant kindness. + +Susan Henchard’s husband—in law, at least—sat before them, matured in +shape, stiffened in line, exaggerated in traits; disciplined, +thought-marked—in a word, older. Elizabeth, encumbered with no +recollections as her mother was, regarded him with nothing more than +the keen curiosity and interest which the discovery of such unexpected +social standing in the long-sought relative naturally begot. He was +dressed in an old-fashioned evening suit, an expanse of frilled shirt +showing on his broad breast; jewelled studs, and a heavy gold chain. +Three glasses stood at his right hand; but, to his wife’s surprise, the +two for wine were empty, while the third, a tumbler, was half full of +water. + +When last she had seen him he was sitting in a corduroy jacket, fustian +waistcoat and breeches, and tanned leather leggings, with a basin of +hot furmity before him. Time, the magician, had wrought much here. +Watching him, and thus thinking of past days, she became so moved that +she shrank back against the jamb of the waggon-office doorway to which +the steps gave access, the shadow from it conveniently hiding her +features. She forgot her daughter till a touch from Elizabeth-Jane +aroused her. “Have you seen him, mother?” whispered the girl. + +“Yes, yes,” answered her companion hastily. “I have seen him, and it is +enough for me! Now I only want to go—pass away—die.” + +“Why—O what?” She drew closer, and whispered in her mother’s ear, “Does +he seem to you not likely to befriend us? I thought he looked a +generous man. What a gentleman he is, isn’t he? and how his diamond +studs shine! How strange that you should have said he might be in the +stocks, or in the workhouse, or dead! Did ever anything go more by +contraries! Why do you feel so afraid of him? I am not at all; I’ll +call upon him—he can but say he don’t own such remote kin.” + +“I don’t know at all—I can’t tell what to set about. I feel so down.” + +“Don’t be that, mother, now we have got here and all! Rest there where +you be a little while—I will look on and find out more about him.” + +“I don’t think I can ever meet Mr. Henchard. He is not how I thought he +would be—he overpowers me! I don’t wish to see him any more.” + +“But wait a little time and consider.” + +Elizabeth-Jane had never been so much interested in anything in her +life as in their present position, partly from the natural elation she +felt at discovering herself akin to a coach; and she gazed again at the +scene. The younger guests were talking and eating with animation; their +elders were searching for titbits, and sniffing and grunting over their +plates like sows nuzzling for acorns. Three drinks seemed to be sacred +to the company—port, sherry, and rum; outside which old-established +trinity few or no palates ranged. + +A row of ancient rummers with ground figures on their sides, and each +primed with a spoon, was now placed down the table, and these were +promptly filled with grog at such high temperatures as to raise serious +considerations for the articles exposed to its vapours. But +Elizabeth-Jane noticed that, though this filling went on with great +promptness up and down the table, nobody filled the Mayor’s glass, who +still drank large quantities of water from the tumbler behind the clump +of crystal vessels intended for wine and spirits. + +“They don’t fill Mr. Henchard’s wine-glasses,” she ventured to say to +her elbow acquaintance, the old man. + +“Ah, no; don’t ye know him to be the celebrated abstaining worthy of +that name? He scorns all tempting liquors; never touches nothing. O +yes, he’ve strong qualities that way. I have heard tell that he sware a +gospel oath in bygone times, and has bode by it ever since. So they +don’t press him, knowing it would be unbecoming in the face of that: +for yer gospel oath is a serious thing.” + +Another elderly man, hearing this discourse, now joined in by +inquiring, “How much longer have he got to suffer from it, Solomon +Longways?” + +“Another two year, they say. I don’t know the why and the wherefore of +his fixing such a time, for ’a never has told anybody. But ’tis exactly +two calendar years longer, they say. A powerful mind to hold out so +long!” + +“True.... But there’s great strength in hope. Knowing that in +four-and-twenty months’ time ye’ll be out of your bondage, and able to +make up for all you’ve suffered, by partaking without stint—why, it +keeps a man up, no doubt.” + +“No doubt, Christopher Coney, no doubt. And ’a must need such +reflections—a lonely widow man,” said Longways. + +“When did he lose his wife?” asked Elizabeth. + +“I never knowed her. ’Twas afore he came to Casterbridge,” Solomon +Longways replied with terminative emphasis, as if the fact of his +ignorance of Mrs. Henchard were sufficient to deprive her history of +all interest. “But I know that ’a’s a banded teetotaller, and that if +any of his men be ever so little overtook by a drop he’s down upon ’em +as stern as the Lord upon the jovial Jews.” + +“Has he many men, then?” said Elizabeth-Jane. + +“Many! Why, my good maid, he’s the powerfullest member of the Town +Council, and quite a principal man in the country round besides. Never +a big dealing in wheat, barley, oats, hay, roots, and such-like but +Henchard’s got a hand in it. Ay, and he’ll go into other things too; +and that’s where he makes his mistake. He worked his way up from +nothing when ’a came here; and now he’s a pillar of the town. Not but +what he’s been shaken a little to-year about this bad corn he has +supplied in his contracts. I’ve seen the sun rise over Durnover Moor +these nine-and-sixty year, and though Mr. Henchard has never cussed me +unfairly ever since I’ve worked for’n, seeing I be but a little small +man, I must say that I have never before tasted such rough bread as has +been made from Henchard’s wheat lately. ’Tis that growed out that ye +could a’most call it malt, and there’s a list at bottom o’ the loaf as +thick as the sole of one’s shoe.” + +The band now struck up another melody, and by the time it was ended the +dinner was over, and speeches began to be made. The evening being calm, +and the windows still open, these orations could be distinctly heard. +Henchard’s voice arose above the rest; he was telling a story of his +hay-dealing experiences, in which he had outwitted a sharper who had +been bent upon outwitting him. + +“Ha-ha-ha!” responded his audience at the upshot of the story; and +hilarity was general till a new voice arose with, “This is all very +well; but how about the bad bread?” + +It came from the lower end of the table, where there sat a group of +minor tradesmen who, although part of the company, appeared to be a +little below the social level of the others; and who seemed to nourish +a certain independence of opinion and carry on discussions not quite in +harmony with those at the head; just as the west end of a church is +sometimes persistently found to sing out of time and tune with the +leading spirits in the chancel. + +This interruption about the bad bread afforded infinite satisfaction to +the loungers outside, several of whom were in the mood which finds its +pleasure in others’ discomfiture; and hence they echoed pretty freely, +“Hey! How about the bad bread, Mr. Mayor?” Moreover, feeling none of +the restraints of those who shared the feast, they could afford to add, +“You rather ought to tell the story o’ that, sir!” + +The interruption was sufficient to compel the Mayor to notice it. + +“Well, I admit that the wheat turned out badly,” he said. “But I was +taken in in buying it as much as the bakers who bought it o’ me.” + +“And the poor folk who had to eat it whether or no,” said the +inharmonious man outside the window. + +Henchard’s face darkened. There was temper under the thin bland +surface—the temper which, artificially intensified, had banished a wife +nearly a score of years before. + +“You must make allowances for the accidents of a large business,” he +said. “You must bear in mind that the weather just at the harvest of +that corn was worse than we have known it for years. However, I have +mended my arrangements on account o’t. Since I have found my business +too large to be well looked after by myself alone, I have advertised +for a thorough good man as manager of the corn department. When I’ve +got him you will find these mistakes will no longer occur—matters will +be better looked into.” + +“But what are you going to do to repay us for the past?” inquired the +man who had before spoken, and who seemed to be a baker or miller. +“Will you replace the grown flour we’ve still got by sound grain?” + +Henchard’s face had become still more stern at these interruptions, and +he drank from his tumbler of water as if to calm himself or gain time. +Instead of vouchsafing a direct reply, he stiffly observed— + +“If anybody will tell me how to turn grown wheat into wholesome wheat +I’ll take it back with pleasure. But it can’t be done.” + +Henchard was not to be drawn again. Having said this, he sat down. + + + +VI. + +Now the group outside the window had within the last few minutes been +reinforced by new arrivals, some of them respectable shopkeepers and +their assistants, who had come out for a whiff of air after putting up +the shutters for the night; some of them of a lower class. Distinct +from either there appeared a stranger—a young man of remarkably +pleasant aspect—who carried in his hand a carpet-bag of the smart +floral pattern prevalent in such articles at that time. + +He was ruddy and of a fair countenance, bright-eyed, and slight in +build. He might possibly have passed by without stopping at all, or at +most for half a minute to glance in at the scene, had not his advent +coincided with the discussion on corn and bread, in which event this +history had never been enacted. But the subject seemed to arrest him, +and he whispered some inquiries of the other bystanders, and remained +listening. + +When he heard Henchard’s closing words, “It can’t be done,” he smiled +impulsively, drew out his pocketbook, and wrote down a few words by the +aid of the light in the window. He tore out the leaf, folded and +directed it, and seemed about to throw it in through the open sash upon +the dining-table; but, on second thoughts, edged himself through the +loiterers, till he reached the door of the hotel, where one of the +waiters who had been serving inside was now idly leaning against the +doorpost. + +“Give this to the Mayor at once,” he said, handing in his hasty note. + +Elizabeth-Jane had seen his movements and heard the words, which +attracted her both by their subject and by their accent—a strange one +for those parts. It was quaint and northerly. + +The waiter took the note, while the young stranger continued— + +“And can ye tell me of a respectable hotel that’s a little more +moderate than this?” + +The waiter glanced indifferently up and down the street. + +“They say the Three Mariners, just below here, is a very good place,” +he languidly answered; “but I have never stayed there myself.” + +The Scotchman, as he seemed to be, thanked him, and strolled on in the +direction of the Three Mariners aforesaid, apparently more concerned +about the question of an inn than about the fate of his note, now that +the momentary impulse of writing it was over. While he was disappearing +slowly down the street the waiter left the door, and Elizabeth-Jane saw +with some interest the note brought into the dining-room and handed to +the Mayor. + +Henchard looked at it carelessly, unfolded it with one hand, and +glanced it through. Thereupon it was curious to note an unexpected +effect. The nettled, clouded aspect which had held possession of his +face since the subject of his corn-dealings had been broached, changed +itself into one of arrested attention. He read the note slowly, and +fell into thought, not moody, but fitfully intense, as that of a man +who has been captured by an idea. + +By this time toasts and speeches had given place to songs, the wheat +subject being quite forgotten. Men were putting their heads together in +twos and threes, telling good stories, with pantomimic laughter which +reached convulsive grimace. Some were beginning to look as if they did +not know how they had come there, what they had come for, or how they +were going to get home again; and provisionally sat on with a dazed +smile. Square-built men showed a tendency to become hunchbacks; men +with a dignified presence lost it in a curious obliquity of figure, in +which their features grew disarranged and one-sided, whilst the heads +of a few who had dined with extreme thoroughness were somehow sinking +into their shoulders, the corners of their mouth and eyes being bent +upwards by the subsidence. Only Henchard did not conform to these +flexuous changes; he remained stately and vertical, silently thinking. + +The clock struck nine. Elizabeth-Jane turned to her companion. “The +evening is drawing on, mother,” she said. “What do you propose to do?” + +She was surprised to find how irresolute her mother had become. “We +must get a place to lie down in,” she murmured. “I have seen—Mr. +Henchard; and that’s all I wanted to do.” + +“That’s enough for to-night, at any rate,” Elizabeth-Jane replied +soothingly. “We can think to-morrow what is best to do about him. The +question now is—is it not?—how shall we find a lodging?” + +As her mother did not reply Elizabeth-Jane’s mind reverted to the words +of the waiter, that the Three Mariners was an inn of moderate charges. +A recommendation good for one person was probably good for another. +“Let’s go where the young man has gone to,” she said. “He is +respectable. What do you say?” + +Her mother assented, and down the street they went. + +In the meantime the Mayor’s thoughtfulness, engendered by the note as +stated, continued to hold him in abstraction; till, whispering to his +neighbour to take his place, he found opportunity to leave the chair. +This was just after the departure of his wife and Elizabeth. + +Outside the door of the assembly-room he saw the waiter, and beckoning +to him asked who had brought the note which had been handed in a +quarter of an hour before. + +“A young man, sir—a sort of traveller. He was a Scotchman seemingly.” + +“Did he say how he had got it?” + +“He wrote it himself, sir, as he stood outside the window.” + +“Oh—wrote it himself.... Is the young man in the hotel?” + +“No, sir. He went to the Three Mariners, I believe.” + +The mayor walked up and down the vestibule of the hotel with his hands +under his coat tails, as if he were merely seeking a cooler atmosphere +than that of the room he had quitted. But there could be no doubt that +he was in reality still possessed to the full by the new idea, whatever +that might be. At length he went back to the door of the dining-room, +paused, and found that the songs, toasts, and conversation were +proceeding quite satisfactorily without his presence. The Corporation, +private residents, and major and minor tradesmen had, in fact, gone in +for comforting beverages to such an extent that they had quite +forgotten, not only the Mayor, but all those vast, political, +religious, and social differences which they felt necessary to maintain +in the daytime, and which separated them like iron grills. Seeing this +the Mayor took his hat, and when the waiter had helped him on with a +thin holland overcoat, went out and stood under the portico. + +Very few persons were now in the street; and his eyes, by a sort of +attraction, turned and dwelt upon a spot about a hundred yards further +down. It was the house to which the writer of the note had gone—the +Three Mariners—whose two prominent Elizabethan gables, bow-window, and +passage-light could be seen from where he stood. Having kept his eyes +on it for a while he strolled in that direction. + +This ancient house of accommodation for man and beast, now, +unfortunately, pulled down, was built of mellow sandstone, with +mullioned windows of the same material, markedly out of perpendicular +from the settlement of foundations. The bay window projecting into the +street, whose interior was so popular among the frequenters of the inn, +was closed with shutters, in each of which appeared a heart-shaped +aperture, somewhat more attenuated in the right and left ventricles +than is seen in Nature. Inside these illuminated holes, at a distance +of about three inches, were ranged at this hour, as every passer knew, +the ruddy polls of Billy Wills the glazier, Smart the shoemaker, +Buzzford the general dealer, and others of a secondary set of worthies, +of a grade somewhat below that of the diners at the King’s Arms, each +with his yard of clay. + +A four-centred Tudor arch was over the entrance, and over the arch the +signboard, now visible in the rays of an opposite lamp. Hereon the +Mariners, who had been represented by the artist as persons of two +dimensions only—in other words, flat as a shadow—were standing in a row +in paralyzed attitudes. Being on the sunny side of the street the three +comrades had suffered largely from warping, splitting, fading, and +shrinkage, so that they were but a half-invisible film upon the reality +of the grain, and knots, and nails, which composed the signboard. As a +matter of fact, this state of things was not so much owing to Stannidge +the landlord’s neglect, as from the lack of a painter in Casterbridge +who would undertake to reproduce the features of men so traditional. + +A long, narrow, dimly-lit passage gave access to the inn, within which +passage the horses going to their stalls at the back, and the coming +and departing human guests, rubbed shoulders indiscriminately, the +latter running no slight risk of having their toes trodden upon by the +animals. The good stabling and the good ale of the Mariners, though +somewhat difficult to reach on account of there being but this narrow +way to both, were nevertheless perseveringly sought out by the +sagacious old heads who knew what was what in Casterbridge. + +Henchard stood without the inn for a few instants; then lowering the +dignity of his presence as much as possible by buttoning the brown +holland coat over his shirt-front, and in other ways toning himself +down to his ordinary everyday appearance, he entered the inn door. + + + +VII. + +Elizabeth-Jane and her mother had arrived some twenty minutes earlier. +Outside the house they had stood and considered whether even this +homely place, though recommended as moderate, might not be too serious +in its prices for their light pockets. Finally, however, they had found +courage to enter, and duly met Stannidge the landlord, a silent man, +who drew and carried frothing measures to this room and to that, +shoulder to shoulder with his waiting-maids—a stately slowness, +however, entering into his ministrations by contrast with theirs, as +became one whose service was somewhat optional. It would have been +altogether optional but for the orders of the landlady, a person who +sat in the bar, corporeally motionless, but with a flitting eye and +quick ear, with which she observed and heard through the open door and +hatchway the pressing needs of customers whom her husband overlooked +though close at hand. Elizabeth and her mother were passively accepted +as sojourners, and shown to a small bedroom under one of the gables, +where they sat down. + +The principle of the inn seemed to be to compensate for the antique +awkwardness, crookedness, and obscurity of the passages, floors, and +windows, by quantities of clean linen spread about everywhere, and this +had a dazzling effect upon the travellers. + +“’Tis too good for us—we can’t meet it!” said the elder woman, looking +round the apartment with misgiving as soon as they were left alone. + +“I fear it is, too,” said Elizabeth. “But we must be respectable.” + +“We must pay our way even before we must be respectable,” replied her +mother. “Mr. Henchard is too high for us to make ourselves known to +him, I much fear; so we’ve only our own pockets to depend on.” + +“I know what I’ll do,” said Elizabeth-Jane after an interval of +waiting, during which their needs seemed quite forgotten under the +press of business below. And leaving the room, she descended the stairs +and penetrated to the bar. + +If there was one good thing more than another which characterized this +single-hearted girl it was a willingness to sacrifice her personal +comfort and dignity to the common weal. + +“As you seem busy here to-night, and mother’s not well off, might I +take out part of our accommodation by helping?” she asked of the +landlady. + +The latter, who remained as fixed in the arm-chair as if she had been +melted into it when in a liquid state, and could not now be unstuck, +looked the girl up and down inquiringly, with her hands on the +chair-arms. Such arrangements as the one Elizabeth proposed were not +uncommon in country villages; but, though Casterbridge was +old-fashioned, the custom was well-nigh obsolete here. The mistress of +the house, however, was an easy woman to strangers, and she made no +objection. Thereupon Elizabeth, being instructed by nods and motions +from the taciturn landlord as to where she could find the different +things, trotted up and down stairs with materials for her own and her +parent’s meal. + +While she was doing this the wood partition in the centre of the house +thrilled to its centre with the tugging of a bell-pull upstairs. A bell +below tinkled a note that was feebler in sound than the twanging of +wires and cranks that had produced it. + +“’Tis the Scotch gentleman,” said the landlady omnisciently; and +turning her eyes to Elizabeth, “Now then, can you go and see if his +supper is on the tray? If it is you can take it up to him. The front +room over this.” + +Elizabeth-Jane, though hungry, willingly postponed serving herself +awhile, and applied to the cook in the kitchen whence she brought forth +the tray of supper viands, and proceeded with it upstairs to the +apartment indicated. The accommodation of the Three Mariners was far +from spacious, despite the fair area of ground it covered. The room +demanded by intrusive beams and rafters, partitions, passages, +staircases, disused ovens, settles, and four-posters, left +comparatively small quarters for human beings. Moreover, this being at +a time before home-brewing was abandoned by the smaller victuallers, +and a house in which the twelve-bushel strength was still religiously +adhered to by the landlord in his ale, the quality of the liquor was +the chief attraction of the premises, so that everything had to make +way for utensils and operations in connection therewith. Thus Elizabeth +found that the Scotchman was located in a room quite close to the small +one that had been allotted to herself and her mother. + +When she entered nobody was present but the young man himself—the same +whom she had seen lingering without the windows of the King’s Arms +Hotel. He was now idly reading a copy of the local paper, and was +hardly conscious of her entry, so that she looked at him quite coolly, +and saw how his forehead shone where the light caught it, and how +nicely his hair was cut, and the sort of velvet-pile or down that was +on the skin at the back of his neck, and how his cheek was so truly +curved as to be part of a globe, and how clearly drawn were the lids +and lashes which hid his bent eyes. + +She set down the tray, spread his supper, and went away without a word. +On her arrival below the landlady, who was as kind as she was fat and +lazy, saw that Elizabeth-Jane was rather tired, though in her +earnestness to be useful she was waiving her own needs altogether. Mrs. +Stannidge thereupon said with a considerate peremptoriness that she and +her mother had better take their own suppers if they meant to have any. + +Elizabeth fetched their simple provisions, as she had fetched the +Scotchman’s, and went up to the little chamber where she had left her +mother, noiselessly pushing open the door with the edge of the tray. To +her surprise her mother, instead of being reclined on the bed where she +had left her was in an erect position, with lips parted. At Elizabeth’s +entry she lifted her finger. + +The meaning of this was soon apparent. The room allotted to the two +women had at one time served as a dressing-room to the Scotchman’s +chamber, as was evidenced by signs of a door of communication between +them—now screwed up and pasted over with the wall paper. But, as is +frequently the case with hotels of far higher pretensions than the +Three Mariners, every word spoken in either of these rooms was +distinctly audible in the other. Such sounds came through now. + +Thus silently conjured Elizabeth deposited the tray, and her mother +whispered as she drew near, “’Tis he.” + +“Who?” said the girl. + +“The Mayor.” + +The tremors in Susan Henchard’s tone might have led any person but one +so perfectly unsuspicious of the truth as the girl was, to surmise some +closer connection than the admitted simple kinship as a means of +accounting for them. + +Two men were indeed talking in the adjoining chamber, the young +Scotchman and Henchard, who, having entered the inn while +Elizabeth-Jane was in the kitchen waiting for the supper, had been +deferentially conducted upstairs by host Stannidge himself. The girl +noiselessly laid out their little meal, and beckoned to her mother to +join her, which Mrs. Henchard mechanically did, her attention being +fixed on the conversation through the door. + +“I merely strolled in on my way home to ask you a question about +something that has excited my curiosity,” said the Mayor, with careless +geniality. “But I see you have not finished supper.” + +“Ay, but I will be done in a little! Ye needn’t go, sir. Take a seat. +I’ve almost done, and it makes no difference at all.” + +Henchard seemed to take the seat offered, and in a moment he resumed: +“Well, first I should ask, did you write this?” A rustling of paper +followed. + +“Yes, I did,” said the Scotchman. + +“Then,” said Henchard, “I am under the impression that we have met by +accident while waiting for the morning to keep an appointment with each +other? My name is Henchard, ha’n’t you replied to an advertisement for +a corn-factor’s manager that I put into the paper—ha’n’t you come here +to see me about it?” + +“No,” said the Scotchman, with some surprise. + +“Surely you are the man,” went on Henchard insistingly, “who arranged +to come and see me? Joshua, Joshua, Jipp—Jopp—what was his name?” + +“You’re wrong!” said the young man. “My name is Donald Farfrae. It is +true I am in the corren trade—but I have replied to no advertisement, +and arranged to see no one. I am on my way to Bristol—from there to the +other side of the warrld, to try my fortune in the great wheat-growing +districts of the West! I have some inventions useful to the trade, and +there is no scope for developing them heere.” + +“To America—well, well,” said Henchard, in a tone of disappointment, so +strong as to make itself felt like a damp atmosphere. “And yet I could +have sworn you were the man!” + +The Scotchman murmured another negative, and there was a silence, till +Henchard resumed: “Then I am truly and sincerely obliged to you for the +few words you wrote on that paper.” + +“It was nothing, sir.” + +“Well, it has a great importance for me just now. This row about my +grown wheat, which I declare to Heaven I didn’t know to be bad till the +people came complaining, has put me to my wits’ end. I’ve some hundreds +of quarters of it on hand; and if your renovating process will make it +wholesome, why, you can see what a quag ’twould get me out of. I saw in +a moment there might be truth in it. But I should like to have it +proved; and of course you don’t care to tell the steps of the process +sufficiently for me to do that, without my paying ye well for’t first.” + +The young man reflected a moment or two. “I don’t know that I have any +objection,” he said. “I’m going to another country, and curing bad corn +is not the line I’ll take up there. Yes, I’ll tell ye the whole of +it—you’ll make more out of it heere than I will in a foreign country. +Just look heere a minute, sir. I can show ye by a sample in my +carpet-bag.” + +The click of a lock followed, and there was a sifting and rustling; +then a discussion about so many ounces to the bushel, and drying, and +refrigerating, and so on. + +“These few grains will be sufficient to show ye with,” came in the +young fellow’s voice; and after a pause, during which some operation +seemed to be intently watched by them both, he exclaimed, “There, now, +do you taste that.” + +“It’s complete!—quite restored, or—well—nearly.” + +“Quite enough restored to make good seconds out of it,” said the +Scotchman. “To fetch it back entirely is impossible; Nature won’t stand +so much as that, but heere you go a great way towards it. Well, sir, +that’s the process, I don’t value it, for it can be but of little use +in countries where the weather is more settled than in ours; and I’ll +be only too glad if it’s of service to you.” + +“But hearken to me,” pleaded Henchard. “My business you know, is in +corn and in hay, but I was brought up as a hay-trusser simply, and hay +is what I understand best though I now do more in corn than in the +other. If you’ll accept the place, you shall manage the corn branch +entirely, and receive a commission in addition to salary.” + +“You’re liberal—very liberal, but no, no—I cannet!” the young man still +replied, with some distress in his accents. + +“So be it!” said Henchard conclusively. “Now—to change the subject—one +good turn deserves another; don’t stay to finish that miserable supper. +Come to my house, I can find something better for ’ee than cold ham and +ale.” + +Donald Farfrae was grateful—said he feared he must decline—that he +wished to leave early next day. + +“Very well,” said Henchard quickly, “please yourself. But I tell you, +young man, if this holds good for the bulk, as it has done for the +sample, you have saved my credit, stranger though you be. What shall I +pay you for this knowledge?” + +“Nothing at all, nothing at all. It may not prove necessary to ye to +use it often, and I don’t value it at all. I thought I might just as +well let ye know, as you were in a difficulty, and they were harrd upon +ye.” + +Henchard paused. “I shan’t soon forget this,” he said. “And from a +stranger!... I couldn’t believe you were not the man I had engaged! +Says I to myself, ‘He knows who I am, and recommends himself by this +stroke.’ And yet it turns out, after all, that you are not the man who +answered my advertisement, but a stranger!” + +“Ay, ay; that’s so,” said the young man. + +Henchard again suspended his words, and then his voice came +thoughtfully: “Your forehead, Farfrae, is something like my poor +brother’s—now dead and gone; and the nose, too, isn’t unlike his. You +must be, what—five foot nine, I reckon? I am six foot one and a half +out of my shoes. But what of that? In my business, ’tis true that +strength and bustle build up a firm. But judgment and knowledge are +what keep it established. Unluckily, I am bad at science, Farfrae; bad +at figures—a rule o’ thumb sort of man. You are just the reverse—I can +see that. I have been looking for such as you these two year, and yet +you are not for me. Well, before I go, let me ask this: Though you are +not the young man I thought you were, what’s the difference? Can’t ye +stay just the same? Have you really made up your mind about this +American notion? I won’t mince matters. I feel you would be invaluable +to me—that needn’t be said—and if you will bide and be my manager, I +will make it worth your while.” + +“My plans are fixed,” said the young man, in negative tones. “I have +formed a scheme, and so we need na say any more about it. But will you +not drink with me, sir? I find this Casterbridge ale warreming to the +stomach.” + +“No, no; I fain would, but I can’t,” said Henchard gravely, the +scraping of his chair informing the listeners that he was rising to +leave. “When I was a young man I went in for that sort of thing too +strong—far too strong—and was well-nigh ruined by it! I did a deed on +account of it which I shall be ashamed of to my dying day. It made such +an impression on me that I swore, there and then, that I’d drink +nothing stronger than tea for as many years as I was old that day. I +have kept my oath; and though, Farfrae, I am sometimes that dry in the +dog days that I could drink a quarter-barrel to the pitching, I think +o’ my oath, and touch no strong drink at all.” + +“I’ll no’ press ye, sir—I’ll no’ press ye. I respect your vow.” + +“Well, I shall get a manager somewhere, no doubt,” said Henchard, with +strong feeling in his tones. “But it will be long before I see one that +would suit me so well!” + +The young man appeared much moved by Henchard’s warm convictions of his +value. He was silent till they reached the door. “I wish I could +stay—sincerely I would like to,” he replied. “But no—it cannet be! it +cannet! I want to see the warrld.” + + + +VIII. + +Thus they parted; and Elizabeth-Jane and her mother remained each in +her thoughts over their meal, the mother’s face being strangely bright +since Henchard’s avowal of shame for a past action. The quivering of +the partition to its core presently denoted that Donald Farfrae had +again rung his bell, no doubt to have his supper removed; for humming a +tune, and walking up and down, he seemed to be attracted by the lively +bursts of conversation and melody from the general company below. He +sauntered out upon the landing, and descended the staircase. + +When Elizabeth-Jane had carried down his supper tray, and also that +used by her mother and herself, she found the bustle of serving to be +at its height below, as it always was at this hour. The young woman +shrank from having anything to do with the ground-floor serving, and +crept silently about observing the scene—so new to her, fresh from the +seclusion of a seaside cottage. In the general sitting-room, which was +large, she remarked the two or three dozen strong-backed chairs that +stood round against the wall, each fitted with its genial occupant; the +sanded floor; the black settle which, projecting endwise from the wall +within the door, permitted Elizabeth to be a spectator of all that went +on without herself being particularly seen. + +The young Scotchman had just joined the guests. These, in addition to +the respectable master-tradesmen occupying the seats of privileges in +the bow-window and its neighbourhood, included an inferior set at the +unlighted end, whose seats were mere benches against the wall, and who +drank from cups instead of from glasses. Among the latter she noticed +some of those personages who had stood outside the windows of the +King’s Arms. + +Behind their backs was a small window, with a wheel ventilator in one +of the panes, which would suddenly start off spinning with a jingling +sound, as suddenly stop, and as suddenly start again. + +While thus furtively making her survey the opening words of a song +greeted her ears from the front of the settle, in a melody and accent +of peculiar charm. There had been some singing before she came down; +and now the Scotchman had made himself so soon at home that, at the +request of some of the master-tradesmen, he, too, was favouring the +room with a ditty. + +Elizabeth-Jane was fond of music; she could not help pausing to listen; +and the longer she listened the more she was enraptured. She had never +heard any singing like this and it was evident that the majority of the +audience had not heard such frequently, for they were attentive to a +much greater degree than usual. They neither whispered, nor drank, nor +dipped their pipe-stems in their ale to moisten them, nor pushed the +mug to their neighbours. The singer himself grew emotional, till she +could imagine a tear in his eye as the words went on:— + +“It’s hame, and it’s hame, hame fain would I be, +O hame, hame, hame to my ain countree! +There’s an eye that ever weeps, and a fair face will be fain, +As I pass through Annan Water with my bonnie bands again; +When the flower is in the bud, and the leaf upon the tree, +The lark shall sing me hame to my ain countree!” + + +There was a burst of applause, and a deep silence which was even more +eloquent than the applause. It was of such a kind that the snapping of +a pipe-stem too long for him by old Solomon Longways, who was one of +those gathered at the shady end of the room, seemed a harsh and +irreverent act. Then the ventilator in the window-pane spasmodically +started off for a new spin, and the pathos of Donald’s song was +temporarily effaced. + +“’Twas not amiss—not at all amiss!” muttered Christopher Coney, who was +also present. And removing his pipe a finger’s breadth from his lips, +he said aloud, “Draw on with the next verse, young gentleman, please.” + +“Yes. Let’s have it again, stranger,” said the glazier, a stout, +bucket-headed man, with a white apron rolled up round his waist. “Folks +don’t lift up their hearts like that in this part of the world.” And +turning aside, he said in undertones, “Who is the young man?—Scotch, +d’ye say?” + +“Yes, straight from the mountains of Scotland, I believe,” replied +Coney. + +Young Farfrae repeated the last verse. It was plain that nothing so +pathetic had been heard at the Three Mariners for a considerable time. +The difference of accent, the excitability of the singer, the intense +local feeling, and the seriousness with which he worked himself up to a +climax, surprised this set of worthies, who were only too prone to shut +up their emotions with caustic words. + +“Danged if our country down here is worth singing about like that!” +continued the glazier, as the Scotchman again melodized with a dying +fall, “My ain countree!” “When you take away from among us the fools +and the rogues, and the lammigers, and the wanton hussies, and the +slatterns, and such like, there’s cust few left to ornament a song with +in Casterbridge, or the country round.” + +“True,” said Buzzford, the dealer, looking at the grain of the table. +“Casterbridge is a old, hoary place o’ wickedness, by all account. ’Tis +recorded in history that we rebelled against the King one or two +hundred years ago, in the time of the Romans, and that lots of us was +hanged on Gallows Hill, and quartered, and our different jints sent +about the country like butcher’s meat; and for my part I can well +believe it.” + +“What did ye come away from yer own country for, young maister, if ye +be so wownded about it?” inquired Christopher Coney, from the +background, with the tone of a man who preferred the original subject. +“Faith, it wasn’t worth your while on our account, for as Maister Billy +Wills says, we be bruckle folk here—the best o’ us hardly honest +sometimes, what with hard winters, and so many mouths to fill, and +Goda’mighty sending his little taties so terrible small to fill ’em +with. We don’t think about flowers and fair faces, not we—except in the +shape o’ cauliflowers and pigs’ chaps.” + +“But, no!” said Donald Farfrae, gazing round into their faces with +earnest concern; “the best of ye hardly honest—not that surely? None of +ye has been stealing what didn’t belong to him?” + +“Lord! no, no!” said Solomon Longways, smiling grimly. “That’s only his +random way o’ speaking. ’A was always such a man of underthoughts.” +(And reprovingly towards Christopher): “Don’t ye be so over-familiar +with a gentleman that ye know nothing of—and that’s travelled a’most +from the North Pole.” + +Christopher Coney was silenced, and as he could get no public sympathy, +he mumbled his feelings to himself: “Be dazed, if I loved my country +half as well as the young feller do, I’d live by claning my neighbour’s +pigsties afore I’d go away! For my part I’ve no more love for my +country than I have for Botany Bay!” + +“Come,” said Longways; “let the young man draw onward with his ballet, +or we shall be here all night.” + +“That’s all of it,” said the singer apologetically. + +“Soul of my body, then we’ll have another!” said the general dealer. + +“Can you turn a strain to the ladies, sir?” inquired a fat woman with a +figured purple apron, the waiststring of which was overhung so far by +her sides as to be invisible. + +“Let him breathe—let him breathe, Mother Cuxsom. He hain’t got his +second wind yet,” said the master glazier. + +“Oh yes, but I have!” exclaimed the young man; and he at once rendered +“O Nannie” with faultless modulations, and another or two of the like +sentiment, winding up at their earnest request with “Auld Lang Syne.” + +By this time he had completely taken possession of the hearts of the +Three Mariners’ inmates, including even old Coney. Notwithstanding an +occasional odd gravity which awoke their sense of the ludicrous for the +moment, they began to view him through a golden haze which the tone of +his mind seemed to raise around him. Casterbridge had +sentiment—Casterbridge had romance; but this stranger’s sentiment was +of differing quality. Or rather, perhaps, the difference was mainly +superficial; he was to them like the poet of a new school who takes his +contemporaries by storm; who is not really new, but is the first to +articulate what all his listeners have felt, though but dumbly till +then. + +The silent landlord came and leant over the settle while the young man +sang; and even Mrs. Stannidge managed to unstick herself from the +framework of her chair in the bar and get as far as the door-post, +which movement she accomplished by rolling herself round, as a cask is +trundled on the chine by a drayman without losing much of its +perpendicular. + +“And are you going to bide in Casterbridge, sir?” she asked. + +“Ah—no!” said the Scotchman, with melancholy fatality in his voice, +“I’m only passing thirrough! I am on my way to Bristol, and on frae +there to foreign parts.” + +“We be truly sorry to hear it,” said Solomon Longways. “We can ill +afford to lose tuneful wynd-pipes like yours when they fall among us. +And verily, to mak’ acquaintance with a man a-come from so far, from +the land o’ perpetual snow, as we may say, where wolves and wild boars +and other dangerous animalcules be as common as blackbirds +here-about—why, ’tis a thing we can’t do every day; and there’s good +sound information for bide-at-homes like we when such a man opens his +mouth.” + +“Nay, but ye mistake my country,” said the young man, looking round +upon them with tragic fixity, till his eye lighted up and his cheek +kindled with a sudden enthusiasm to right their errors. “There are not +perpetual snow and wolves at all in it!—except snow in winter, +and—well—a little in summer just sometimes, and a ‘gaberlunzie’ or two +stalking about here and there, if ye may call them dangerous. Eh, but +you should take a summer jarreny to Edinboro’, and Arthur’s Seat, and +all round there, and then go on to the lochs, and all the Highland +scenery—in May and June—and you would never say ’tis the land of wolves +and perpetual snow!” + +“Of course not—it stands to reason,” said Buzzford. “’Tis barren +ignorance that leads to such words. He’s a simple home-spun man, that +never was fit for good company—think nothing of him, sir.” + +“And do ye carry your flock bed, and your quilt, and your crock, and +your bit of chiney? or do ye go in bare bones, as I may say?” inquired +Christopher Coney. + +“I’ve sent on my luggage—though it isn’t much; for the voyage is long.” +Donald’s eyes dropped into a remote gaze as he added: “But I said to +myself, ‘Never a one of the prizes of life will I come by unless I +undertake it!’ and I decided to go.” + +A general sense of regret, in which Elizabeth-Jane shared not least, +made itself apparent in the company. As she looked at Farfrae from the +back of the settle she decided that his statements showed him to be no +less thoughtful than his fascinating melodies revealed him to be +cordial and impassioned. She admired the serious light in which he +looked at serious things. He had seen no jest in ambiguities and +roguery, as the Casterbridge toss-pots had done; and rightly not—there +was none. She disliked those wretched humours of Christopher Coney and +his tribe; and he did not appreciate them. He seemed to feel exactly as +she felt about life and its surroundings—that they were a tragical +rather than a comical thing; that though one could be gay on occasion, +moments of gaiety were interludes, and no part of the actual drama. It +was extraordinary how similar their views were. + +Though it was still early the young Scotchman expressed his wish to +retire, whereupon the landlady whispered to Elizabeth to run upstairs +and turn down his bed. She took a candlestick and proceeded on her +mission, which was the act of a few moments only. When, candle in hand, +she reached the top of the stairs on her way down again, Mr. Farfrae +was at the foot coming up. She could not very well retreat; they met +and passed in the turn of the staircase. + +She must have appeared interesting in some way—not-withstanding her +plain dress—or rather, possibly, in consequence of it, for she was a +girl characterized by earnestness and soberness of mien, with which +simple drapery accorded well. Her face flushed, too, at the slight +awkwardness of the meeting, and she passed him with her eyes bent on +the candle-flame that she carried just below her nose. Thus it happened +that when confronting her he smiled; and then, with the manner of a +temporarily light-hearted man, who has started himself on a flight of +song whose momentum he cannot readily check, he softly tuned an old +ditty that she seemed to suggest— + +“As I came in by my bower door, + As day was waxin’ wearie, +Oh wha came tripping down the stair + But bonnie Peg my dearie.” + + +Elizabeth-Jane, rather disconcerted, hastened on; and the Scotchman’s +voice died away, humming more of the same within the closed door of his +room. + +Here the scene and sentiment ended for the present. When soon after, +the girl rejoined her mother, the latter was still in thought—on quite +another matter than a young man’s song. + +“We’ve made a mistake,” she whispered (that the Scotchman might not +overhear). “On no account ought ye to have helped serve here to-night. +Not because of ourselves, but for the sake of _him_. If he should +befriend us, and take us up, and then find out what you did when +staying here, ’twould grieve and wound his natural pride as Mayor of +the town.” + +Elizabeth, who would perhaps have been more alarmed at this than her +mother had she known the real relationship, was not much disturbed +about it as things stood. Her “he” was another man than her poor +mother’s. “For myself,” she said, “I didn’t at all mind waiting a +little upon him. He’s so respectable, and educated—far above the rest +of ’em in the inn. They thought him very simple not to know their grim +broad way of talking about themselves here. But of course he didn’t +know—he was too refined in his mind to know such things!” Thus she +earnestly pleaded. + +Meanwhile, the “he” of her mother was not so far away as even they +thought. After leaving the Three Mariners he had sauntered up and down +the empty High Street, passing and repassing the inn in his promenade. +When the Scotchman sang his voice had reached Henchard’s ears through +the heart-shaped holes in the window-shutters, and had led him to pause +outside them a long while. + +“To be sure, to be sure, how that fellow does draw me!” he had said to +himself. “I suppose ’tis because I’m so lonely. I’d have given him a +third share in the business to have stayed!” + + + +IX. + +When Elizabeth-Jane opened the hinged casement next morning the mellow +air brought in the feel of imminent autumn almost as distinctly as if +she had been in the remotest hamlet. Casterbridge was the complement of +the rural life around, not its urban opposite. Bees and butterflies in +the cornfields at the top of the town, who desired to get to the meads +at the bottom, took no circuitous course, but flew straight down High +Street without any apparent consciousness that they were traversing +strange latitudes. And in autumn airy spheres of thistledown floated +into the same street, lodged upon the shop fronts, blew into drains, +and innumerable tawny and yellow leaves skimmed along the pavement, and +stole through people’s doorways into their passages with a hesitating +scratch on the floor, like the skirts of timid visitors. + +Hearing voices, one of which was close at hand, she withdrew her head +and glanced from behind the window-curtains. Mr. Henchard—now habited +no longer as a great personage, but as a thriving man of business—was +pausing on his way up the middle of the street, and the Scotchman was +looking from the window adjoining her own. Henchard it appeared, had +gone a little way past the inn before he had noticed his acquaintance +of the previous evening. He came back a few steps, Donald Farfrae +opening the window further. + +“And you are off soon, I suppose?” said Henchard upwards. + +“Yes—almost this moment, sir,” said the other. “Maybe I’ll walk on till +the coach makes up on me.” + +“Which way?” + +“The way ye are going.” + +“Then shall we walk together to the top o’ town?” + +“If ye’ll wait a minute,” said the Scotchman. + +In a few minutes the latter emerged, bag in hand. Henchard looked at +the bag as at an enemy. It showed there was no mistake about the young +man’s departure. “Ah, my lad,” he said, “you should have been a wise +man, and have stayed with me.” + +“Yes, yes—it might have been wiser,” said Donald, looking +microscopically at the houses that were furthest off. “It is only +telling ye the truth when I say my plans are vague.” + +They had by this time passed on from the precincts of the inn, and +Elizabeth-Jane heard no more. She saw that they continued in +conversation, Henchard turning to the other occasionally, and +emphasizing some remark with a gesture. Thus they passed the King’s +Arms Hotel, the Market House, St. Peter’s churchyard wall, ascending to +the upper end of the long street till they were small as two grains of +corn; when they bent suddenly to the right into the Bristol Road, and +were out of view. + +“He was a good man—and he’s gone,” she said to herself. “I was nothing +to him, and there was no reason why he should have wished me good-bye.” + +The simple thought, with its latent sense of slight, had moulded itself +out of the following little fact: when the Scotchman came out at the +door he had by accident glanced up at her; and then he had looked away +again without nodding, or smiling, or saying a word. + +“You are still thinking, mother,” she said, when she turned inwards. + +“Yes; I am thinking of Mr. Henchard’s sudden liking for that young man. +He was always so. Now, surely, if he takes so warmly to people who are +not related to him at all, may he not take as warmly to his own kin?” + +While they debated this question a procession of five large waggons +went past, laden with hay up to the bedroom windows. They came in from +the country, and the steaming horses had probably been travelling a +great part of the night. To the shaft of each hung a little board, on +which was painted in white letters, “Henchard, corn-factor and +hay-merchant.” The spectacle renewed his wife’s conviction that, for +her daughter’s sake, she should strain a point to rejoin him. + +The discussion was continued during breakfast, and the end of it was +that Mrs. Henchard decided, for good or for ill, to send Elizabeth-Jane +with a message to Henchard, to the effect that his relative Susan, a +sailor’s widow, was in the town; leaving it to him to say whether or +not he would recognize her. What had brought her to this determination +were chiefly two things. He had been described as a lonely widower; and +he had expressed shame for a past transaction of his life. There was +promise in both. + +“If he says no,” she enjoined, as Elizabeth-Jane stood, bonnet on, +ready to depart; “if he thinks it does not become the good position he +has reached to in the town, to own—to let us call on him as—his distant +kinfolk, say, ‘Then, sir, we would rather not intrude; we will leave +Casterbridge as quietly as we have come, and go back to our own +country.’ ...I almost feel that I would rather he did say so, as I have +not seen him for so many years, and we are so—little allied to him!” + +“And if he say yes?” inquired the more sanguine one. + +“In that case,” answered Mrs. Henchard cautiously, “ask him to write me +a note, saying when and how he will see us—or _me_.” + +Elizabeth-Jane went a few steps towards the landing. “And tell him,” +continued her mother, “that I fully know I have no claim upon him—that +I am glad to find he is thriving; that I hope his life may be long and +happy—there, go.” Thus with a half-hearted willingness, a smothered +reluctance, did the poor forgiving woman start her unconscious daughter +on this errand. + +It was about ten o’clock, and market-day, when Elizabeth paced up the +High Street, in no great hurry; for to herself her position was only +that of a poor relation deputed to hunt up a rich one. The front doors +of the private houses were mostly left open at this warm autumn time, +no thought of umbrella stealers disturbing the minds of the placid +burgesses. Hence, through the long, straight, entrance passages thus +unclosed could be seen, as through tunnels, the mossy gardens at the +back, glowing with nasturtiums, fuchsias, scarlet geraniums, “bloody +warriors,” snapdragons, and dahlias, this floral blaze being backed by +crusted grey stone-work remaining from a yet remoter Casterbridge than +the venerable one visible in the street. The old-fashioned fronts of +these houses, which had older than old-fashioned backs, rose sheer from +the pavement, into which the bow windows protruded like bastions, +necessitating a pleasing _chassez-déchassez_ movement to the +time-pressed pedestrian at every few yards. He was bound also to evolve +other Terpsichorean figures in respect of door-steps, scrapers, +cellar-hatches, church buttresses, and the overhanging angles of walls +which, originally unobtrusive, had become bow-legged and knock-kneed. + +In addition to these fixed obstacles which spoke so cheerfully of +individual unrestraint as to boundaries, movables occupied the path and +roadway to a perplexing extent. First the vans of the carriers in and +out of Casterbridge, who hailed from Mellstock, Weatherbury, The +Hintocks, Sherton-Abbas, Kingsbere, Overcombe, and many other towns and +villages round. Their owners were numerous enough to be regarded as a +tribe, and had almost distinctiveness enough to be regarded as a race. +Their vans had just arrived, and were drawn up on each side of the +street in close file, so as to form at places a wall between the +pavement and the roadway. Moreover every shop pitched out half its +contents upon trestles and boxes on the kerb, extending the display +each week a little further and further into the roadway, despite the +expostulations of the two feeble old constables, until there remained +but a tortuous defile for carriages down the centre of the street, +which afforded fine opportunities for skill with the reins. Over the +pavement on the sunny side of the way hung shopblinds so constructed as +to give the passenger’s hat a smart buffet off his head, as from the +unseen hands of Cranstoun’s Goblin Page, celebrated in romantic lore. + +Horses for sale were tied in rows, their forelegs on the pavement, +their hind legs in the street, in which position they occasionally +nipped little boys by the shoulder who were passing to school. And any +inviting recess in front of a house that had been modestly kept back +from the general line was utilized by pig-dealers as a pen for their +stock. + +The yeomen, farmers, dairymen, and townsfolk, who came to transact +business in these ancient streets, spoke in other ways than by +articulation. Not to hear the words of your interlocutor in +metropolitan centres is to know nothing of his meaning. Here the face, +the arms, the hat, the stick, the body throughout spoke equally with +the tongue. To express satisfaction the Casterbridge market-man added +to his utterance a broadening of the cheeks, a crevicing of the eyes, a +throwing back of the shoulders, which was intelligible from the other +end of the street. If he wondered, though all Henchard’s carts and +waggons were rattling past him, you knew it from perceiving the inside +of his crimson mouth, and a target-like circling of his eyes. +Deliberation caused sundry attacks on the moss of adjoining walls with +the end of his stick, a change of his hat from the horizontal to the +less so; a sense of tediousness announced itself in a lowering of the +person by spreading the knees to a lozenge-shaped aperture and +contorting the arms. Chicanery, subterfuge, had hardly a place in the +streets of this honest borough to all appearance; and it was said that +the lawyers in the Court House hard by occasionally threw in strong +arguments for the other side out of pure generosity (though apparently +by mischance) when advancing their own. + +Thus Casterbridge was in most respects but the pole, focus, or +nerve-knot of the surrounding country life; differing from the many +manufacturing towns which are as foreign bodies set down, like boulders +on a plain, in a green world with which they have nothing in common. +Casterbridge lived by agriculture at one remove further from the +fountainhead than the adjoining villages—no more. The townsfolk +understood every fluctuation in the rustic’s condition, for it affected +their receipts as much as the labourer’s; they entered into the +troubles and joys which moved the aristocratic families ten miles +round—for the same reason. And even at the dinner-parties of the +professional families the subjects of discussion were corn, +cattle-disease, sowing and reaping, fencing and planting; while +politics were viewed by them less from their own standpoint of +burgesses with rights and privileges than from the standpoint of their +country neighbours. + +All the venerable contrivances and confusions which delighted the eye +by their quaintness, and in a measure reasonableness, in this rare old +market-town, were metropolitan novelties to the unpractised eyes of +Elizabeth-Jane, fresh from netting fish-seines in a seaside cottage. +Very little inquiry was necessary to guide her footsteps. Henchard’s +house was one of the best, faced with dull red-and-grey old brick. The +front door was open, and, as in other houses, she could see through the +passage to the end of the garden—nearly a quarter of a mile off. + +Mr. Henchard was not in the house, but in the store-yard. She was +conducted into the mossy garden, and through a door in the wall, which +was studded with rusty nails speaking of generations of fruit-trees +that had been trained there. The door opened upon the yard, and here +she was left to find him as she could. It was a place flanked by +hay-barns, into which tons of fodder, all in trusses, were being packed +from the waggons she had seen pass the inn that morning. On other sides +of the yard were wooden granaries on stone staddles, to which access +was given by Flemish ladders, and a store-house several floors high. +Wherever the doors of these places were open, a closely packed throng +of bursting wheat-sacks could be seen standing inside, with the air of +awaiting a famine that would not come. + +She wandered about this place, uncomfortably conscious of the impending +interview, till she was quite weary of searching; she ventured to +inquire of a boy in what quarter Mr. Henchard could be found. He +directed her to an office which she had not seen before, and knocking +at the door she was answered by a cry of “Come in.” + +Elizabeth turned the handle; and there stood before her, bending over +some sample-bags on a table, not the corn-merchant, but the young +Scotchman Mr. Farfrae—in the act of pouring some grains of wheat from +one hand to the other. His hat hung on a peg behind him, and the roses +of his carpet-bag glowed from the corner of the room. + +Having toned her feelings and arranged words on her lips for Mr. +Henchard, and for him alone, she was for the moment confounded. + +“Yes, what it is?” said the Scotchman, like a man who permanently ruled +there. + +She said she wanted to see Mr. Henchard. + +“Ah, yes; will you wait a minute? He’s engaged just now,” said the +young man, apparently not recognizing her as the girl at the inn. He +handed her a chair, bade her sit down and turned to his sample-bags +again. While Elizabeth-Jane sits waiting in great amaze at the young +man’s presence we may briefly explain how he came there. + +When the two new acquaintances had passed out of sight that morning +towards the Bath and Bristol road they went on silently, except for a +few commonplaces, till they had gone down an avenue on the town walls +called the Chalk Walk, leading to an angle where the North and West +escarpments met. From this high corner of the square earthworks a vast +extent of country could be seen. A footpath ran steeply down the green +slope, conducting from the shady promenade on the walls to a road at +the bottom of the scarp. It was by this path the Scotchman had to +descend. + +“Well, here’s success to ’ee,” said Henchard, holding out his right +hand and leaning with his left upon the wicket which protected the +descent. In the act there was the inelegance of one whose feelings are +nipped and wishes defeated. “I shall often think of this time, and of +how you came at the very moment to throw a light upon my difficulty.” + +Still holding the young man’s hand he paused, and then added +deliberately: “Now I am not the man to let a cause be lost for want of +a word. And before ye are gone for ever I’ll speak. Once more, will ye +stay? There it is, flat and plain. You can see that it isn’t all +selfishness that makes me press ’ee; for my business is not quite so +scientific as to require an intellect entirely out of the common. +Others would do for the place without doubt. Some selfishness perhaps +there is, but there is more; it isn’t for me to repeat what. Come bide +with me—and name your own terms. I’ll agree to ’em willingly and +’ithout a word of gainsaying; for, hang it, Farfrae, I like thee well!” + +The young man’s hand remained steady in Henchard’s for a moment or two. +He looked over the fertile country that stretched beneath them, then +backward along the shaded walk reaching to the top of the town. His +face flushed. + +“I never expected this—I did not!” he said. “It’s Providence! Should +any one go against it? No; I’ll not go to America; I’ll stay and be +your man!” + +His hand, which had lain lifeless in Henchard’s, returned the latter’s +grasp. + +“Done,” said Henchard. + +“Done,” said Donald Farfrae. + +The face of Mr. Henchard beamed forth a satisfaction that was almost +fierce in its strength. “Now you are my friend!” he exclaimed. “Come +back to my house; let’s clinch it at once by clear terms, so as to be +comfortable in our minds.” Farfrae caught up his bag and retraced the +North-West Avenue in Henchard’s company as he had come. Henchard was +all confidence now. + +“I am the most distant fellow in the world when I don’t care for a +man,” he said. “But when a man takes my fancy he takes it strong. Now I +am sure you can eat another breakfast? You couldn’t have eaten much so +early, even if they had anything at that place to gi’e thee, which they +hadn’t; so come to my house and we will have a solid, staunch tuck-in, +and settle terms in black-and-white if you like; though my word’s my +bond. I can always make a good meal in the morning. I’ve got a splendid +cold pigeon-pie going just now. You can have some home-brewed if you +want to, you know.” + +“It is too airly in the morning for that,” said Farfrae with a smile. + +“Well, of course, I didn’t know. I don’t drink it because of my oath, +but I am obliged to brew for my work-people.” + +Thus talking they returned, and entered Henchard’s premises by the back +way or traffic entrance. Here the matter was settled over the +breakfast, at which Henchard heaped the young Scotchman’s plate to a +prodigal fulness. He would not rest satisfied till Farfrae had written +for his luggage from Bristol, and dispatched the letter to the +post-office. When it was done this man of strong impulses declared that +his new friend should take up his abode in his house—at least till some +suitable lodgings could be found. + +He then took Farfrae round and showed him the place, and the stores of +grain, and other stock; and finally entered the offices where the +younger of them has already been discovered by Elizabeth. + + + +X. + +While she still sat under the Scotchman’s eyes a man came up to the +door, reaching it as Henchard opened the door of the inner office to +admit Elizabeth. The newcomer stepped forward like the quicker cripple +at Bethesda, and entered in her stead. She could hear his words to +Henchard: “Joshua Jopp, sir—by appointment—the new manager.” + +“The new manager!—he’s in his office,” said Henchard bluntly. + +“In his office!” said the man, with a stultified air. + +“I mentioned Thursday,” said Henchard; “and as you did not keep your +appointment, I have engaged another manager. At first I thought he must +be you. Do you think I can wait when business is in question?” + +“You said Thursday or Saturday, sir,” said the newcomer, pulling out a +letter. + +“Well, you are too late,” said the corn-factor. “I can say no more.” + +“You as good as engaged me,” murmured the man. + +“Subject to an interview,” said Henchard. “I am sorry for you—very +sorry indeed. But it can’t be helped.” + +There was no more to be said, and the man came out, encountering +Elizabeth-Jane in his passage. She could see that his mouth twitched +with anger, and that bitter disappointment was written in his face +everywhere. + +Elizabeth-Jane now entered, and stood before the master of the +premises. His dark pupils—which always seemed to have a red spark of +light in them, though this could hardly be a physical fact—turned +indifferently round under his dark brows until they rested on her +figure. “Now then, what is it, my young woman?” he said blandly. + +“Can I speak to you—not on business, sir?” said she. + +“Yes—I suppose.” He looked at her more thoughtfully. + +“I am sent to tell you, sir,” she innocently went on, “that a distant +relative of yours by marriage, Susan Newson, a sailor’s widow, is in +the town, and to ask whether you would wish to see her.” + +The rich _rouge-et-noir_ of his countenance underwent a slight change. +“Oh—Susan is—still alive?” he asked with difficulty. + +“Yes, sir.” + +“Are you her daughter?” + +“Yes, sir—her only daughter.” + +“What—do you call yourself—your Christian name?” + +“Elizabeth-Jane, sir.” + +“Newson?” + +“Elizabeth-Jane Newson.” + +This at once suggested to Henchard that the transaction of his early +married life at Weydon Fair was unrecorded in the family history. It +was more than he could have expected. His wife had behaved kindly to +him in return for his unkindness, and had never proclaimed her wrong to +her child or to the world. + +“I am—a good deal interested in your news,” he said. “And as this is +not a matter of business, but pleasure, suppose we go indoors.” + +It was with a gentle delicacy of manner, surprising to Elizabeth, that +he showed her out of the office and through the outer room, where +Donald Farfrae was overhauling bins and samples with the inquiring +inspection of a beginner in charge. Henchard preceded her through the +door in the wall to the suddenly changed scene of the garden and +flowers, and onward into the house. The dining-room to which he +introduced her still exhibited the remnants of the lavish breakfast +laid for Farfrae. It was furnished to profusion with heavy mahogany +furniture of the deepest red-Spanish hues. Pembroke tables, with leaves +hanging so low that they well-nigh touched the floor, stood against the +walls on legs and feet shaped like those of an elephant, and on one lay +three huge folio volumes—a Family Bible, a “Josephus,” and a “Whole +Duty of Man.” In the chimney corner was a fire-grate with a fluted +semi-circular back, having urns and festoons cast in relief thereon, +and the chairs were of the kind which, since that day, has cast lustre +upon the names of Chippendale and Sheraton, though, in point of fact, +their patterns may have been such as those illustrious carpenters never +saw or heard of. + +“Sit down—Elizabeth-Jane—sit down,” he said, with a shake in his voice +as he uttered her name, and sitting down himself he allowed his hands +to hang between his knees while he looked upon the carpet. “Your +mother, then, is quite well?” + +“She is rather worn out, sir, with travelling.” + +“A sailor’s widow—when did he die?” + +“Father was lost last spring.” + +Henchard winced at the word “father,” thus applied. “Do you and she +come from abroad—America or Australia?” he asked. + +“No. We have been in England some years. I was twelve when we came here +from Canada.” + +“Ah; exactly.” By such conversation he discovered the circumstances +which had enveloped his wife and her child in such total obscurity that +he had long ago believed them to be in their graves. These things being +clear, he returned to the present. “And where is your mother staying?” + +“At the Three Mariners.” + +“And you are her daughter Elizabeth-Jane?” repeated Henchard. He arose, +came close to her, and glanced in her face. “I think,” he said, +suddenly turning away with a wet eye, “you shall take a note from me to +your mother. I should like to see her.... She is not left very well off +by her late husband?” His eye fell on Elizabeth’s clothes, which, +though a respectable suit of black, and her very best, were decidedly +old-fashioned even to Casterbridge eyes. + +“Not very well,” she said, glad that he had divined this without her +being obliged to express it. + +He sat down at the table and wrote a few lines, next taking from his +pocket-book a five-pound note, which he put in the envelope with the +letter, adding to it, as by an afterthought, five shillings. Sealing +the whole up carefully, he directed it to “Mrs. Newson, Three Mariners +Inn,” and handed the packet to Elizabeth. + +“Deliver it to her personally, please,” said Henchard. “Well, I am glad +to see you here, Elizabeth-Jane—very glad. We must have a long talk +together—but not just now.” + +He took her hand at parting, and held it so warmly that she, who had +known so little friendship, was much affected, and tears rose to her +aerial-grey eyes. The instant that she was gone Henchard’s state showed +itself more distinctly; having shut the door he sat in his dining-room +stiffly erect, gazing at the opposite wall as if he read his history +there. + +“Begad!” he suddenly exclaimed, jumping up. “I didn’t think of that. +Perhaps these are impostors—and Susan and the child dead after all!” + +However, a something in Elizabeth-Jane soon assured him that, as +regarded her, at least, there could be little doubt. And a few hours +would settle the question of her mother’s identity; for he had arranged +in his note to see her that evening. + +“It never rains but it pours!” said Henchard. His keenly excited +interest in his new friend the Scotchman was now eclipsed by this +event, and Donald Farfrae saw so little of him during the rest of the +day that he wondered at the suddenness of his employer’s moods. + +In the meantime Elizabeth had reached the inn. Her mother, instead of +taking the note with the curiosity of a poor woman expecting +assistance, was much moved at sight of it. She did not read it at once, +asking Elizabeth to describe her reception, and the very words Mr. +Henchard used. Elizabeth’s back was turned when her mother opened the +letter. It ran thus:— + +“Meet me at eight o’clock this evening, if you can, at the Ring on the +Budmouth road. The place is easy to find. I can say no more now. The +news upsets me almost. The girl seems to be in ignorance. Keep her so +till I have seen you. M. H.” + + +He said nothing about the enclosure of five guineas. The amount was +significant; it may tacitly have said to her that he bought her back +again. She waited restlessly for the close of the day, telling +Elizabeth-Jane that she was invited to see Mr. Henchard; that she would +go alone. But she said nothing to show that the place of meeting was +not at his house, nor did she hand the note to Elizabeth. + + + +XI. + +The Ring at Casterbridge was merely the local name of one of the finest +Roman Amphitheatres, if not the very finest, remaining in Britain. + +Casterbridge announced old Rome in every street, alley, and precinct. +It looked Roman, bespoke the art of Rome, concealed dead men of Rome. +It was impossible to dig more than a foot or two deep about the town +fields and gardens without coming upon some tall soldier or other of +the Empire, who had lain there in his silent unobtrusive rest for a +space of fifteen hundred years. He was mostly found lying on his side, +in an oval scoop in the chalk, like a chicken in its shell; his knees +drawn up to his chest; sometimes with the remains of his spear against +his arm, a fibula or brooch of bronze on his breast or forehead, an urn +at his knees, a jar at his throat, a bottle at his mouth; and mystified +conjecture pouring down upon him from the eyes of Casterbridge street +boys and men, who had turned a moment to gaze at the familiar spectacle +as they passed by. + +Imaginative inhabitants, who would have felt an unpleasantness at the +discovery of a comparatively modern skeleton in their gardens, were +quite unmoved by these hoary shapes. They had lived so long ago, their +time was so unlike the present, their hopes and motives were so widely +removed from ours, that between them and the living there seemed to +stretch a gulf too wide for even a spirit to pass. + +The Amphitheatre was a huge circular enclosure, with a notch at +opposite extremities of its diameter north and south. From its sloping +internal form it might have been called the spittoon of the Jötuns. It +was to Casterbridge what the ruined Coliseum is to modern Rome, and was +nearly of the same magnitude. The dusk of evening was the proper hour +at which a true impression of this suggestive place could be received. +Standing in the middle of the arena at that time there by degrees +became apparent its real vastness, which a cursory view from the summit +at noon-day was apt to obscure. Melancholy, impressive, lonely, yet +accessible from every part of the town, the historic circle was the +frequent spot for appointments of a furtive kind. Intrigues were +arranged there; tentative meetings were there experimented after +divisions and feuds. But one kind of appointment—in itself the most +common of any—seldom had place in the Amphitheatre: that of happy +lovers. + +Why, seeing that it was pre-eminently an airy, accessible, and +sequestered spot for interviews, the cheerfullest form of those +occurrences never took kindly to the soil of the ruin, would be a +curious inquiry. Perhaps it was because its associations had about them +something sinister. Its history proved that. Apart from the sanguinary +nature of the games originally played therein, such incidents attached +to its past as these: that for scores of years the town-gallows had +stood at one corner; that in 1705 a woman who had murdered her husband +was half-strangled and then burnt there in the presence of ten thousand +spectators. Tradition reports that at a certain stage of the burning +her heart burst and leapt out of her body, to the terror of them all, +and that not one of those ten thousand people ever cared particularly +for hot roast after that. In addition to these old tragedies, +pugilistic encounters almost to the death had come off down to recent +dates in that secluded arena, entirely invisible to the outside world +save by climbing to the top of the enclosure, which few townspeople in +the daily round of their lives ever took the trouble to do. So that, +though close to the turnpike-road, crimes might be perpetrated there +unseen at mid-day. + +Some boys had latterly tried to impart gaiety to the ruin by using the +central arena as a cricket-ground. But the game usually languished for +the aforesaid reason—the dismal privacy which the earthen circle +enforced, shutting out every appreciative passer’s vision, every +commendatory remark from outsiders—everything, except the sky; and to +play at games in such circumstances was like acting to an empty house. +Possibly, too, the boys were timid, for some old people said that at +certain moments in the summer time, in broad daylight, persons sitting +with a book or dozing in the arena had, on lifting their eyes, beheld +the slopes lined with a gazing legion of Hadrian’s soldiery as if +watching the gladiatorial combat; and had heard the roar of their +excited voices, that the scene would remain but a moment, like a +lightning flash, and then disappear. + +It was related that there still remained under the south entrance +excavated cells for the reception of the wild animals and athletes who +took part in the games. The arena was still smooth and circular, as if +used for its original purpose not so very long ago. The sloping +pathways by which spectators had ascended to their seats were pathways +yet. But the whole was grown over with grass, which now, at the end of +summer, was bearded with withered bents that formed waves under the +brush of the wind, returning to the attentive ear Æolian modulations, +and detaining for moments the flying globes of thistledown. + +Henchard had chosen this spot as being the safest from observation +which he could think of for meeting his long-lost wife, and at the same +time as one easily to be found by a stranger after nightfall. As Mayor +of the town, with a reputation to keep up, he could not invite her to +come to his house till some definite course had been decided on. + +Just before eight he approached the deserted earth-work and entered by +the south path which descended over the _débris_ of the former dens. In +a few moments he could discern a female figure creeping in by the great +north gap, or public gateway. They met in the middle of the arena. +Neither spoke just at first—there was no necessity for speech—and the +poor woman leant against Henchard, who supported her in his arms. + +“I don’t drink,” he said in a low, halting, apologetic voice. “You +hear, Susan?—I don’t drink now—I haven’t since that night.” Those were +his first words. + +He felt her bow her head in acknowledgment that she understood. After a +minute or two he again began: + +“If I had known you were living, Susan! But there was every reason to +suppose you and the child were dead and gone. I took every possible +step to find you—travelled—advertised. My opinion at last was that you +had started for some colony with that man, and had been drowned on your +voyage. Why did you keep silent like this?” + +“O Michael! because of him—what other reason could there be? I thought +I owed him faithfulness to the end of one of our lives—foolishly I +believed there was something solemn and binding in the bargain; I +thought that even in honour I dared not desert him when he had paid so +much for me in good faith. I meet you now only as his widow—I consider +myself that, and that I have no claim upon you. Had he not died I +should never have come—never! Of that you may be sure.” + +“Tut-tut! How could you be so simple?” + +“I don’t know. Yet it would have been very wicked—if I had not thought +like that!” said Susan, almost crying. + +“Yes—yes—so it would. It is only that which makes me feel ’ee an +innocent woman. But—to lead me into this!” + +“What, Michael?” she asked, alarmed. + +“Why, this difficulty about our living together again, and +Elizabeth-Jane. She cannot be told all—she would so despise us both +that—I could not bear it!” + +“That was why she was brought up in ignorance of you. I could not bear +it either.” + +“Well—we must talk of a plan for keeping her in her present belief, and +getting matters straight in spite of it. You have heard I am in a large +way of business here—that I am Mayor of the town, and churchwarden, and +I don’t know what all?” + +“Yes,” she murmured. + +“These things, as well as the dread of the girl discovering our +disgrace, makes it necessary to act with extreme caution. So that I +don’t see how you two can return openly to my house as the wife and +daughter I once treated badly, and banished from me; and there’s the +rub o’t.” + +“We’ll go away at once. I only came to see—” + +“No, no, Susan; you are not to go—you mistake me!” he said with kindly +severity. “I have thought of this plan: that you and Elizabeth take a +cottage in the town as the widow Mrs. Newson and her daughter; that I +meet you, court you, and marry you. Elizabeth-Jane coming to my house +as my stepdaughter. The thing is so natural and easy that it is half +done in thinking o’t. This would leave my shady, headstrong, +disgraceful life as a young man absolutely unopened; the secret would +be yours and mine only; and I should have the pleasure of seeing my own +only child under my roof, as well as my wife.” + +“I am quite in your hands, Michael,” she said meekly. “I came here for +the sake of Elizabeth; for myself, if you tell me to leave again +to-morrow morning, and never come near you more, I am content to go.” + +“Now, now; we don’t want to hear that,” said Henchard gently. “Of +course you won’t leave again. Think over the plan I have proposed for a +few hours; and if you can’t hit upon a better one we’ll adopt it. I +have to be away for a day or two on business, unfortunately; but during +that time you can get lodgings—the only ones in the town fit for you +are those over the china-shop in High Street—and you can also look for +a cottage.” + +“If the lodgings are in High Street they are dear, I suppose?” + +“Never mind—you _must_ start genteel if our plan is to be carried out. +Look to me for money. Have you enough till I come back?” + +“Quite,” said she. + +“And are you comfortable at the inn?” + +“O yes.” + +“And the girl is quite safe from learning the shame of her case and +ours?—that’s what makes me most anxious of all.” + +“You would be surprised to find how unlikely she is to dream of the +truth. How could she ever suppose such a thing?” + +“True!” + +“I like the idea of repeating our marriage,” said Mrs. Henchard, after +a pause. “It seems the only right course, after all this. Now I think I +must go back to Elizabeth-Jane, and tell her that our kinsman, Mr. +Henchard, kindly wishes us to stay in the town.” + +“Very well—arrange that yourself. I’ll go some way with you.” + +“No, no. Don’t run any risk!” said his wife anxiously. “I can find my +way back—it is not late. Please let me go alone.” + +“Right,” said Henchard. “But just one word. Do you forgive me, Susan?” + +She murmured something; but seemed to find it difficult to frame her +answer. + +“Never mind—all in good time,” said he. “Judge me by my future +works—good-bye!” + +He retreated, and stood at the upper side of the Amphitheatre while his +wife passed out through the lower way, and descended under the trees to +the town. Then Henchard himself went homeward, going so fast that by +the time he reached his door he was almost upon the heels of the +unconscious woman from whom he had just parted. He watched her up the +street, and turned into his house. + + + +XII. + +On entering his own door after watching his wife out of sight, the +Mayor walked on through the tunnel-shaped passage into the garden, and +thence by the back door towards the stores and granaries. A light shone +from the office-window, and there being no blind to screen the interior +Henchard could see Donald Farfrae still seated where he had left him, +initiating himself into the managerial work of the house by overhauling +the books. Henchard entered, merely observing, “Don’t let me interrupt +you, if ye will stay so late.” + +He stood behind Farfrae’s chair, watching his dexterity in clearing up +the numerical fogs which had been allowed to grow so thick in +Henchard’s books as almost to baffle even the Scotchman’s perspicacity. +The corn-factor’s mien was half admiring, and yet it was not without a +dash of pity for the tastes of any one who could care to give his mind +to such finnikin details. Henchard himself was mentally and physically +unfit for grubbing subtleties from soiled paper; he had in a modern +sense received the education of Achilles, and found penmanship a +tantalizing art. + +“You shall do no more to-night,” he said at length, spreading his great +hand over the paper. “There’s time enough to-morrow. Come indoors with +me and have some supper. Now you shall! I am determined on’t.” He shut +the account-books with friendly force. + +Donald had wished to get to his lodgings; but he already saw that his +friend and employer was a man who knew no moderation in his requests +and impulses, and he yielded gracefully. He liked Henchard’s warmth, +even if it inconvenienced him; the great difference in their characters +adding to the liking. + +They locked up the office, and the young man followed his companion +through the private little door which, admitting directly into +Henchard’s garden, permitted a passage from the utilitarian to the +beautiful at one step. The garden was silent, dewy, and full of +perfume. It extended a long way back from the house, first as lawn and +flower-beds, then as fruit-garden, where the long-tied espaliers, as +old as the old house itself, had grown so stout, and cramped, and +gnarled that they had pulled their stakes out of the ground and stood +distorted and writhing in vegetable agony, like leafy Laocoons. The +flowers which smelt so sweetly were not discernible; and they passed +through them into the house. + +The hospitalities of the morning were repeated, and when they were over +Henchard said, “Pull your chair round to the fireplace, my dear fellow, +and let’s make a blaze—there’s nothing I hate like a black grate, even +in September.” He applied a light to the laid-in fuel, and a cheerful +radiance spread around. + +“It is odd,” said Henchard, “that two men should meet as we have done +on a purely business ground, and that at the end of the first day I +should wish to speak to ’ee on a family matter. But, damn it all, I am +a lonely man, Farfrae: I have nobody else to speak to; and why +shouldn’t I tell it to ’ee?” + +“I’ll be glad to hear it, if I can be of any service,” said Donald, +allowing his eyes to travel over the intricate wood-carvings of the +chimney-piece, representing garlanded lyres, shields, and quivers, on +either side of a draped ox-skull, and flanked by heads of Apollo and +Diana in low relief. + +“I’ve not been always what I am now,” continued Henchard, his firm deep +voice being ever so little shaken. He was plainly under that strange +influence which sometimes prompts men to confide to the new-found +friend what they will not tell to the old. “I began life as a working +hay-trusser, and when I was eighteen I married on the strength o’ my +calling. Would you think me a married man?” + +“I heard in the town that you were a widower.” + +“Ah, yes—you would naturally have heard that. Well, I lost my wife +nineteen years ago or so—by my own fault.... This is how it came about. +One summer evening I was travelling for employment, and she was walking +at my side, carrying the baby, our only child. We came to a booth in a +country fair. I was a drinking man at that time.” + +Henchard paused a moment, threw himself back so that his elbow rested +on the table, his forehead being shaded by his hand, which, however, +did not hide the marks of introspective inflexibility on his features +as he narrated in fullest detail the incidents of the transaction with +the sailor. The tinge of indifference which had at first been visible +in the Scotchman now disappeared. + +Henchard went on to describe his attempts to find his wife; the oath he +swore; the solitary life he led during the years which followed. “I +have kept my oath for nineteen years,” he went on; “I have risen to +what you see me now.” + +“Ay!” + +“Well—no wife could I hear of in all that time; and being by nature +something of a woman-hater, I have found it no hardship to keep mostly +at a distance from the sex. No wife could I hear of, I say, till this +very day. And now—she has come back.” + +“Come back, has she!” + +“This morning—this very morning. And what’s to be done?” + +“Can ye no’ take her and live with her, and make some amends?” + +“That’s what I’ve planned and proposed. But, Farfrae,” said Henchard +gloomily, “by doing right with Susan I wrong another innocent woman.” + +“Ye don’t say that?” + +“In the nature of things, Farfrae, it is almost impossible that a man +of my sort should have the good fortune to tide through twenty years o’ +life without making more blunders than one. It has been my custom for +many years to run across to Jersey in the the way of business, +particularly in the potato and root season. I do a large trade wi’ them +in that line. Well, one autumn when stopping there I fell quite ill, +and in my illness I sank into one of those gloomy fits I sometimes +suffer from, on account o’ the loneliness of my domestic life, when the +world seems to have the blackness of hell, and, like Job, I could curse +the day that gave me birth.” + +“Ah, now, I never feel like it,” said Farfrae. + +“Then pray to God that you never may, young man. While in this state I +was taken pity on by a woman—a young lady I should call her, for she +was of good family, well bred, and well educated—the daughter of some +harum-scarum military officer who had got into difficulties, and had +his pay sequestrated. He was dead now, and her mother too, and she was +as lonely as I. This young creature was staying at the boarding-house +where I happened to have my lodging; and when I was pulled down she +took upon herself to nurse me. From that she got to have a foolish +liking for me. Heaven knows why, for I wasn’t worth it. But being +together in the same house, and her feeling warm, we got naturally +intimate. I won’t go into particulars of what our relations were. It is +enough to say that we honestly meant to marry. There arose a scandal, +which did me no harm, but was of course ruin to her. Though, Farfrae, +between you and me, as man and man, I solemnly declare that +philandering with womankind has neither been my vice nor my virtue. She +was terribly careless of appearances, and I was perhaps more, because +o’ my dreary state; and it was through this that the scandal arose. At +last I was well, and came away. When I was gone she suffered much on my +account, and didn’t forget to tell me so in letters one after another; +till latterly, I felt I owed her something, and thought that, as I had +not heard of Susan for so long, I would make this other one the only +return I could make, and ask her if she would run the risk of Susan +being alive (very slight as I believed) and marry me, such as I was. +She jumped for joy, and we should no doubt soon have been married—but, +behold, Susan appears!” + +Donald showed his deep concern at a complication so far beyond the +degree of his simple experiences. + +“Now see what injury a man may cause around him! Even after that +wrong-doing at the fair when I was young, if I had never been so +selfish as to let this giddy girl devote herself to me over at Jersey, +to the injury of her name, all might now be well. Yet, as it stands, I +must bitterly disappoint one of these women; and it is the second. My +first duty is to Susan—there’s no doubt about that.” + +“They are both in a very melancholy position, and that’s true!” +murmured Donald. + +“They are! For myself I don’t care—’twill all end one way. But these +two.” Henchard paused in reverie. “I feel I should like to treat the +second, no less than the first, as kindly as a man can in such a case.” + +“Ah, well, it cannet be helped!” said the other, with philosophic +woefulness. “You mun write to the young lady, and in your letter you +must put it plain and honest that it turns out she cannet be your wife, +the first having come back; that ye cannet see her more; and that—ye +wish her weel.” + +“That won’t do. ’Od seize it, I must do a little more than that! I +must—though she did always brag about her rich uncle or rich aunt, and +her expectations from ’em—I must send a useful sum of money to her, I +suppose—just as a little recompense, poor girl.... Now, will you help +me in this, and draw up an explanation to her of all I’ve told ye, +breaking it as gently as you can? I’m so bad at letters.” + +“And I will.” + +“Now, I haven’t told you quite all yet. My wife Susan has my daughter +with her—the baby that was in her arms at the fair; and this girl knows +nothing of me beyond that I am some sort of relation by marriage. She +has grown up in the belief that the sailor to whom I made over her +mother, and who is now dead, was her father, and her mother’s husband. +What her mother has always felt, she and I together feel now—that we +can’t proclaim our disgrace to the girl by letting her know the truth. +Now what would you do?—I want your advice.” + +“I think I’d run the risk, and tell her the truth. She’ll forgive ye +both.” + +“Never!” said Henchard. “I am not going to let her know the truth. Her +mother and I be going to marry again; and it will not only help us to +keep our child’s respect, but it will be more proper. Susan looks upon +herself as the sailor’s widow, and won’t think o’ living with me as +formerly without another religious ceremony—and she’s right.” + +Farfrae thereupon said no more. The letter to the young Jersey woman +was carefully framed by him, and the interview ended, Henchard saying, +as the Scotchman left, “I feel it a great relief, Farfrae, to tell some +friend o’ this! You see now that the Mayor of Casterbridge is not so +thriving in his mind as it seems he might be from the state of his +pocket.” + +“I do. And I’m sorry for ye!” said Farfrae. + +When he was gone Henchard copied the letter, and, enclosing a cheque, +took it to the post-office, from which he walked back thoughtfully. + +“Can it be that it will go off so easily!” he said. “Poor thing—God +knows! Now then, to make amends to Susan!” + + + +XIII. + +The cottage which Michael Henchard hired for his wife Susan under her +name of Newson—in pursuance of their plan—was in the upper or western +part of the town, near the Roman wall, and the avenue which +overshadowed it. The evening sun seemed to shine more yellowly there +than anywhere else this autumn—stretching its rays, as the hours grew +later, under the lowest sycamore boughs, and steeping the ground-floor +of the dwelling, with its green shutters, in a substratum of radiance +which the foliage screened from the upper parts. Beneath these +sycamores on the town walls could be seen from the sitting-room the +tumuli and earth forts of the distant uplands; making it altogether a +pleasant spot, with the usual touch of melancholy that a past-marked +prospect lends. + +As soon as the mother and daughter were comfortably installed, with a +white-aproned servant and all complete, Henchard paid them a visit, and +remained to tea. During the entertainment Elizabeth was carefully +hoodwinked by the very general tone of the conversation that +prevailed—a proceeding which seemed to afford some humour to Henchard, +though his wife was not particularly happy in it. The visit was +repeated again and again with business-like determination by the Mayor, +who seemed to have schooled himself into a course of strict mechanical +rightness towards this woman of prior claim, at any expense to the +later one and to his own sentiments. + +One afternoon the daughter was not indoors when Henchard came, and he +said drily, “This is a very good opportunity for me to ask you to name +the happy day, Susan.” + +The poor woman smiled faintly; she did not enjoy pleasantries on a +situation into which she had entered solely for the sake of her girl’s +reputation. She liked them so little, indeed, that there was room for +wonder why she had countenanced deception at all, and had not bravely +let the girl know her history. But the flesh is weak; and the true +explanation came in due course. + +“O Michael!” she said, “I am afraid all this is taking up your time and +giving trouble—when I did not expect any such thing!” And she looked at +him and at his dress as a man of affluence, and at the furniture he had +provided for the room—ornate and lavish to her eyes. + +“Not at all,” said Henchard, in rough benignity. “This is only a +cottage—it costs me next to nothing. And as to taking up my time”—here +his red and black visage kindled with satisfaction—“I’ve a splendid +fellow to superintend my business now—a man whose like I’ve never been +able to lay hands on before. I shall soon be able to leave everything +to him, and have more time to call my own than I’ve had for these last +twenty years.” + +Henchard’s visits here grew so frequent and so regular that it soon +became whispered, and then openly discussed in Casterbridge that the +masterful, coercive Mayor of the town was raptured and enervated by the +genteel widow Mrs. Newson. His well-known haughty indifference to the +society of womankind, his silent avoidance of converse with the sex, +contributed a piquancy to what would otherwise have been an unromantic +matter enough. That such a poor fragile woman should be his choice was +inexplicable, except on the ground that the engagement was a family +affair in which sentimental passion had no place; for it was known that +they were related in some way. Mrs. Henchard was so pale that the boys +called her “The Ghost.” Sometimes Henchard overheard this epithet when +they passed together along the Walks—as the avenues on the walls were +named—at which his face would darken with an expression of +destructiveness towards the speakers ominous to see; but he said +nothing. + +He pressed on the preparations for his union, or rather reunion, with +this pale creature in a dogged, unflinching spirit which did credit to +his conscientiousness. Nobody would have conceived from his outward +demeanour that there was no amatory fire or pulse of romance acting as +stimulant to the bustle going on in his gaunt, great house; nothing but +three large resolves—one, to make amends to his neglected Susan, +another, to provide a comfortable home for Elizabeth-Jane under his +paternal eye; and a third, to castigate himself with the thorns which +these restitutory acts brought in their train; among them the lowering +of his dignity in public opinion by marrying so comparatively humble a +woman. + +Susan Henchard entered a carriage for the first time in her life when +she stepped into the plain brougham which drew up at the door on the +wedding-day to take her and Elizabeth-Jane to church. It was a windless +morning of warm November rain, which floated down like meal, and lay in +a powdery form on the nap of hats and coats. Few people had gathered +round the church door though they were well packed within. The +Scotchman, who assisted as groomsman, was of course the only one +present, beyond the chief actors, who knew the true situation of the +contracting parties. He, however, was too inexperienced, too +thoughtful, too judicial, too strongly conscious of the serious side of +the business, to enter into the scene in its dramatic aspect. That +required the special genius of Christopher Coney, Solomon Longways, +Buzzford, and their fellows. But they knew nothing of the secret; +though, as the time for coming out of church drew on, they gathered on +the pavement adjoining, and expounded the subject according to their +lights. + +“’Tis five-and-forty years since I had my settlement in this here +town,” said Coney; “but daze me if I ever see a man wait so long before +to take so little! There’s a chance even for thee after this, Nance +Mockridge.” The remark was addressed to a woman who stood behind his +shoulder—the same who had exhibited Henchard’s bad bread in public when +Elizabeth and her mother entered Casterbridge. + +“Be cust if I’d marry any such as he, or thee either,” replied that +lady. “As for thee, Christopher, we know what ye be, and the less said +the better. And as for he—well, there—(lowering her voice) ’tis said ’a +was a poor parish ’prentice—I wouldn’t say it for all the world—but ’a +was a poor parish ’prentice, that began life wi’ no more belonging to +’en than a carrion crow.” + +“And now he’s worth ever so much a minute,” murmured Longways. “When a +man is said to be worth so much a minute, he’s a man to be considered!” + +Turning, he saw a circular disc reticulated with creases, and +recognized the smiling countenance of the fat woman who had asked for +another song at the Three Mariners. “Well, Mother Cuxsom,” he said, +“how’s this? Here’s Mrs. Newson, a mere skellinton, has got another +husband to keep her, while a woman of your tonnage have not.” + +“I have not. Nor another to beat me.... Ah, yes, Cuxsom’s gone, and so +shall leather breeches!” + +“Yes; with the blessing of God leather breeches shall go.” + +“’Tisn’t worth my old while to think of another husband,” continued +Mrs. Cuxsom. “And yet I’ll lay my life I’m as respectable born as she.” + +“True; your mother was a very good woman—I can mind her. She were +rewarded by the Agricultural Society for having begot the greatest +number of healthy children without parish assistance, and other +virtuous marvels.” + +“’Twas that that kept us so low upon ground—that great hungry family.” + +“Ay. Where the pigs be many the wash runs thin.” + +“And dostn’t mind how mother would sing, Christopher?” continued Mrs. +Cuxsom, kindling at the retrospection; “and how we went with her to the +party at Mellstock, do ye mind?—at old Dame Ledlow’s, farmer Shinar’s +aunt, do ye mind?—she we used to call Toad-skin, because her face were +so yaller and freckled, do ye mind?” + +“I do, hee-hee, I do!” said Christopher Coney. + +“And well do I—for I was getting up husband-high at that time—one-half +girl, and t’other half woman, as one may say. And canst mind”—she +prodded Solomon’s shoulder with her finger-tip, while her eyes twinkled +between the crevices of their lids—“canst mind the sherry-wine, and the +zilver-snuffers, and how Joan Dummett was took bad when we were coming +home, and Jack Griggs was forced to carry her through the mud; and how +’a let her fall in Dairyman Sweet-apple’s cow-barton, and we had to +clane her gown wi’ grass—never such a mess as ’a were in?” + +“Ay—that I do—hee-hee, such doggery as there was in them ancient days, +to be sure! Ah, the miles I used to walk then; and now I can hardly +step over a furrow!” + +Their reminiscences were cut short by the appearance of the reunited +pair—Henchard looking round upon the idlers with that ambiguous gaze of +his, which at one moment seemed to mean satisfaction, and at another +fiery disdain. + +“Well—there’s a difference between ’em, though he do call himself a +teetotaller,” said Nance Mockridge. “She’ll wish her cake dough afore +she’s done of him. There’s a blue-beardy look about ’en; and ’twill out +in time.” + +“Stuff—he’s well enough! Some folk want their luck buttered. If I had a +choice as wide as the ocean sea I wouldn’t wish for a better man. A +poor twanking woman like her—’tis a godsend for her, and hardly a pair +of jumps or night-rail to her name.” + +The plain little brougham drove off in the mist, and the idlers +dispersed. “Well, we hardly know how to look at things in these times!” +said Solomon. “There was a man dropped down dead yesterday, not so very +many miles from here; and what wi’ that, and this moist weather, ’tis +scarce worth one’s while to begin any work o’ consequence to-day. I’m +in such a low key with drinking nothing but small table ninepenny this +last week or two that I shall call and warm up at the Mar’ners as I +pass along.” + +“I don’t know but that I may as well go with ’ee, Solomon,” said +Christopher; “I’m as clammy as a cockle-snail.” + + + +XIV. + +A Martinmas summer of Mrs. Henchard’s life set in with her entry into +her husband’s large house and respectable social orbit; and it was as +bright as such summers well can be. Lest she should pine for deeper +affection than he could give he made a point of showing some semblance +of it in external action. Among other things he had the iron railings, +that had smiled sadly in dull rust for the last eighty years, painted a +bright green, and the heavy-barred, small-paned Georgian sash windows +enlivened with three coats of white. He was as kind to her as a man, +mayor, and churchwarden could possibly be. The house was large, the +rooms lofty, and the landings wide; and the two unassuming women +scarcely made a perceptible addition to its contents. + +To Elizabeth-Jane the time was a most triumphant one. The freedom she +experienced, the indulgence with which she was treated, went beyond her +expectations. The reposeful, easy, affluent life to which her mother’s +marriage had introduced her was, in truth, the beginning of a great +change in Elizabeth. She found she could have nice personal possessions +and ornaments for the asking, and, as the mediæval saying puts it, +“Take, have, and keep, are pleasant words.” With peace of mind came +development, and with development beauty. Knowledge—the result of great +natural insight—she did not lack; learning, accomplishment—those, alas, +she had not; but as the winter and spring passed by her thin face and +figure filled out in rounder and softer curves; the lines and +contractions upon her young brow went away; the muddiness of skin which +she had looked upon as her lot by nature departed with a change to +abundance of good things, and a bloom came upon her cheek. Perhaps, +too, her grey, thoughtful eyes revealed an arch gaiety sometimes; but +this was infrequent; the sort of wisdom which looked from their pupils +did not readily keep company with these lighter moods. Like all people +who have known rough times, light-heartedness seemed to her too +irrational and inconsequent to be indulged in except as a reckless dram +now and then; for she had been too early habituated to anxious +reasoning to drop the habit suddenly. She felt none of those ups and +downs of spirit which beset so many people without cause; never—to +paraphrase a recent poet—never a gloom in Elizabeth-Jane’s soul but she +well knew how it came there; and her present cheerfulness was fairly +proportionate to her solid guarantees for the same. + +It might have been supposed that, given a girl rapidly becoming +good-looking, comfortably circumstanced, and for the first time in her +life commanding ready money, she would go and make a fool of herself by +dress. But no. The reasonableness of almost everything that Elizabeth +did was nowhere more conspicuous than in this question of clothes. To +keep in the rear of opportunity in matters of indulgence is as valuable +a habit as to keep abreast of opportunity in matters of enterprise. +This unsophisticated girl did it by an innate perceptiveness that was +almost genius. Thus she refrained from bursting out like a water-flower +that spring, and clothing herself in puffings and knick-knacks, as most +of the Casterbridge girls would have done in her circumstances. Her +triumph was tempered by circumspection, she had still that field-mouse +fear of the coulter of destiny despite fair promise, which is common +among the thoughtful who have suffered early from poverty and +oppression. + +“I won’t be too gay on any account,” she would say to herself. “It +would be tempting Providence to hurl mother and me down, and afflict us +again as He used to do.” + +We now see her in a black silk bonnet, velvet mantle or silk spencer, +dark dress, and carrying a sunshade. In this latter article she drew +the line at fringe, and had it plain edged, with a little ivory ring +for keeping it closed. It was odd about the necessity for that +sunshade. She discovered that with the clarification of her complexion +and the birth of pink cheeks her skin had grown more sensitive to the +sun’s rays. She protected those cheeks forthwith, deeming spotlessness +part of womanliness. + +Henchard had become very fond of her, and she went out with him more +frequently than with her mother now. Her appearance one day was so +attractive that he looked at her critically. + +“I happened to have the ribbon by me, so I made it up,” she faltered, +thinking him perhaps dissatisfied with some rather bright trimming she +had donned for the first time. + +“Ay—of course—to be sure,” he replied in his leonine way. “Do as you +like—or rather as your mother advises ye. ’Od send—I’ve nothing to say +to’t!” + +Indoors she appeared with her hair divided by a parting that arched +like a white rainbow from ear to ear. All in front of this line was +covered with a thick encampment of curls; all behind was dressed +smoothly, and drawn to a knob. + +The three members of the family were sitting at breakfast one day, and +Henchard was looking silently, as he often did, at this head of hair, +which in colour was brown—rather light than dark. “I thought +Elizabeth-Jane’s hair—didn’t you tell me that Elizabeth-Jane’s hair +promised to be black when she was a baby?” he said to his wife. + +She looked startled, jerked his foot warningly, and murmured, “Did I?” + +As soon as Elizabeth was gone to her own room Henchard resumed. “Begad, +I nearly forgot myself just now! What I meant was that the girl’s hair +certainly looked as if it would be darker, when she was a baby.” + +“It did; but they alter so,” replied Susan. + +“Their hair gets darker, I know—but I wasn’t aware it lightened ever?” + +“O yes.” And the same uneasy expression came out on her face, to which +the future held the key. It passed as Henchard went on: + +“Well, so much the better. Now Susan, I want to have her called Miss +Henchard—not Miss Newson. Lots o’ people do it already in +carelessness—it is her legal name—so it may as well be made her usual +name—I don’t like t’other name at all for my own flesh and blood. I’ll +advertise it in the Casterbridge paper—that’s the way they do it. She +won’t object.” + +“No. O no. But—” + +“Well, then, I shall do it,” he said, peremptorily. “Surely, if she’s +willing, you must wish it as much as I?” + +“O yes—if she agrees let us do it by all means,” she replied. + +Then Mrs. Henchard acted somewhat inconsistently; it might have been +called falsely, but that her manner was emotional and full of the +earnestness of one who wishes to do right at great hazard. She went to +Elizabeth-Jane, whom she found sewing in her own sitting-room upstairs, +and told her what had been proposed about her surname. “Can you +agree—is it not a slight upon Newson—now he’s dead and gone?” + +Elizabeth reflected. “I’ll think of it, mother,” she answered. + +When, later in the day, she saw Henchard, she adverted to the matter at +once, in a way which showed that the line of feeling started by her +mother had been persevered in. “Do you wish this change so very much, +sir?” she asked. + +“Wish it? Why, my blessed fathers, what an ado you women make about a +trifle! I proposed it—that’s all. Now, ’Lizabeth-Jane, just please +yourself. Curse me if I care what you do. Now, you understand, don’t +’ee go agreeing to it to please me.” + +Here the subject dropped, and nothing more was said, and nothing was +done, and Elizabeth still passed as Miss Newson, and not by her legal +name. + +Meanwhile the great corn and hay traffic conducted by Henchard throve +under the management of Donald Farfrae as it had never thriven before. +It had formerly moved in jolts; now it went on oiled casters. The old +crude _vivâ voce_ system of Henchard, in which everything depended upon +his memory, and bargains were made by the tongue alone, was swept away. +Letters and ledgers took the place of “I’ll do’t,” and “you shall +hae’t”; and, as in all such cases of advance, the rugged +picturesqueness of the old method disappeared with its inconveniences. + +The position of Elizabeth-Jane’s room—rather high in the house, so that +it commanded a view of the hay-stores and granaries across the +garden—afforded her opportunity for accurate observation of what went +on there. She saw that Donald and Mr. Henchard were inseparables. When +walking together Henchard would lay his arm familiarly on his manager’s +shoulder, as if Farfrae were a younger brother, bearing so heavily that +his slight frame bent under the weight. Occasionally she would hear a +perfect cannonade of laughter from Henchard, arising from something +Donald had said, the latter looking quite innocent and not laughing at +all. In Henchard’s somewhat lonely life he evidently found the young +man as desirable for comradeship as he was useful for consultations. +Donald’s brightness of intellect maintained in the corn-factor the +admiration it had won at the first hour of their meeting. The poor +opinion, and but ill-concealed, that he entertained of the slim +Farfrae’s physical girth, strength, and dash was more than +counterbalanced by the immense respect he had for his brains. + +Her quiet eye discerned that Henchard’s tigerish affection for the +younger man, his constant liking to have Farfrae near him, now and then +resulted in a tendency to domineer, which, however, was checked in a +moment when Donald exhibited marks of real offence. One day, looking +down on their figures from on high, she heard the latter remark, as +they stood in the doorway between the garden and yard, that their habit +of walking and driving about together rather neutralized Farfrae’s +value as a second pair of eyes, which should be used in places where +the principal was not. “’Od damn it,” cried Henchard, “what’s all the +world! I like a fellow to talk to. Now come along and hae some supper, +and don’t take too much thought about things, or ye’ll drive me crazy.” + +When she walked with her mother, on the other hand, she often beheld +the Scotchman looking at them with a curious interest. The fact that he +had met her at the Three Mariners was insufficient to account for it, +since on the occasions on which she had entered his room he had never +raised his eyes. Besides, it was at her mother more particularly than +at herself that he looked, to Elizabeth-Jane’s half-conscious, +simple-minded, perhaps pardonable, disappointment. Thus she could not +account for this interest by her own attractiveness, and she decided +that it might be apparent only—a way of turning his eyes that Mr. +Farfrae had. + +She did not divine the ample explanation of his manner, without +personal vanity, that was afforded by the fact of Donald being the +depositary of Henchard’s confidence in respect of his past treatment of +the pale, chastened mother who walked by her side. Her conjectures on +that past never went further than faint ones based on things casually +heard and seen—mere guesses that Henchard and her mother might have +been lovers in their younger days, who had quarrelled and parted. + +Casterbridge, as has been hinted, was a place deposited in the block +upon a corn-field. There was no suburb in the modern sense, or +transitional intermixture of town and down. It stood, with regard to +the wide fertile land adjoining, clean-cut and distinct, like a +chess-board on a green tablecloth. The farmer’s boy could sit under his +barley-mow and pitch a stone into the office-window of the town-clerk; +reapers at work among the sheaves nodded to acquaintances standing on +the pavement-corner; the red-robed judge, when he condemned a +sheep-stealer, pronounced sentence to the tune of Baa, that floated in +at the window from the remainder of the flock browsing hard by; and at +executions the waiting crowd stood in a meadow immediately before the +drop, out of which the cows had been temporarily driven to give the +spectators room. + +The corn grown on the upland side of the borough was garnered by +farmers who lived in an eastern purlieu called Durnover. Here +wheat-ricks overhung the old Roman street, and thrust their eaves +against the church tower; green-thatched barns, with doorways as high +as the gates of Solomon’s temple, opened directly upon the main +thoroughfare. Barns indeed were so numerous as to alternate with every +half-dozen houses along the way. Here lived burgesses who daily walked +the fallow; shepherds in an intra-mural squeeze. A street of farmers’ +homesteads—a street ruled by a mayor and corporation, yet echoing with +the thump of the flail, the flutter of the winnowing-fan, and the purr +of the milk into the pails—a street which had nothing urban in it +whatever—this was the Durnover end of Casterbridge. + +Henchard, as was natural, dealt largely with this nursery or bed of +small farmers close at hand—and his waggons were often down that way. +One day, when arrangements were in progress for getting home corn from +one of the aforesaid farms, Elizabeth-Jane received a note by hand, +asking her to oblige the writer by coming at once to a granary on +Durnover Hill. As this was the granary whose contents Henchard was +removing, she thought the request had something to do with his +business, and proceeded thither as soon as she had put on her bonnet. +The granary was just within the farm-yard, and stood on stone staddles, +high enough for persons to walk under. The gates were open, but nobody +was within. However, she entered and waited. Presently she saw a figure +approaching the gate—that of Donald Farfrae. He looked up at the church +clock, and came in. By some unaccountable shyness, some wish not to +meet him there alone, she quickly ascended the step-ladder leading to +the granary door, and entered it before he had seen her. Farfrae +advanced, imagining himself in solitude, and a few drops of rain +beginning to fall he moved and stood under the shelter where she had +just been standing. Here he leant against one of the staddles, and gave +himself up to patience. He, too, was plainly expecting some one; could +it be herself? If so, why? In a few minutes he looked at his watch, and +then pulled out a note, a duplicate of the one she had herself +received. + +This situation began to be very awkward, and the longer she waited the +more awkward it became. To emerge from a door just above his head and +descend the ladder, and show she had been in hiding there, would look +so very foolish that she still waited on. A winnowing machine stood +close beside her, and to relieve her suspense she gently moved the +handle; whereupon a cloud of wheat husks flew out into her face, and +covered her clothes and bonnet, and stuck into the fur of her +victorine. He must have heard the slight movement for he looked up, and +then ascended the steps. + +“Ah—it’s Miss Newson,” he said as soon as he could see into the +granary. “I didn’t know you were there. I have kept the appointment, +and am at your service.” + +“O Mr. Farfrae,” she faltered, “so have I. But I didn’t know it was you +who wished to see me, otherwise I—” + +“I wished to see you? O no—at least, that is, I am afraid there may be +a mistake.” + +“Didn’t you ask me to come here? Didn’t you write this?” Elizabeth held +out her note. + +“No. Indeed, at no hand would I have thought of it! And for you—didn’t +you ask me? This is not your writing?” And he held up his. + +“By no means.” + +“And is that really so! Then it’s somebody wanting to see us both. +Perhaps we would do well to wait a little longer.” + +Acting on this consideration they lingered, Elizabeth-Jane’s face being +arranged to an expression of preternatural composure, and the young +Scot, at every footstep in the street without, looking from under the +granary to see if the passer were about to enter and declare himself +their summoner. They watched individual drops of rain creeping down the +thatch of the opposite rick—straw after straw—till they reached the +bottom; but nobody came, and the granary roof began to drip. + +“The person is not likely to be coming,” said Farfrae. “It’s a trick +perhaps, and if so, it’s a great pity to waste our time like this, and +so much to be done.” + +“’Tis a great liberty,” said Elizabeth. + +“It’s true, Miss Newson. We’ll hear news of this some day depend on’t, +and who it was that did it. I wouldn’t stand for it hindering myself; +but you, Miss Newson——” + +“I don’t mind—much,” she replied. + +“Neither do I.” + +They lapsed again into silence. “You are anxious to get back to +Scotland, I suppose, Mr. Farfrae?” she inquired. + +“O no, Miss Newson. Why would I be?” + +“I only supposed you might be from the song you sang at the Three +Mariners—about Scotland and home, I mean—which you seemed to feel so +deep down in your heart; so that we all felt for you.” + +“Ay—and I did sing there—I did—— But, Miss Newson”—and Donald’s voice +musically undulated between two semi-tones as it always did when he +became earnest—“it’s well you feel a song for a few minutes, and your +eyes they get quite tearful; but you finish it, and for all you felt +you don’t mind it or think of it again for a long while. O no, I don’t +want to go back! Yet I’ll sing the song to you wi’ pleasure whenever +you like. I could sing it now, and not mind at all?” + +“Thank you, indeed. But I fear I must go—rain or no.” + +“Ay! Then, Miss Newson, ye had better say nothing about this hoax, and +take no heed of it. And if the person should say anything to you, be +civil to him or her, as if you did not mind it—so you’ll take the +clever person’s laugh away.” In speaking his eyes became fixed upon her +dress, still sown with wheat husks. “There’s husks and dust on you. +Perhaps you don’t know it?” he said, in tones of extreme delicacy. “And +it’s very bad to let rain come upon clothes when there’s chaff on them. +It washes in and spoils them. Let me help you—blowing is the best.” + +As Elizabeth neither assented nor dissented Donald Farfrae began +blowing her back hair, and her side hair, and her neck, and the crown +of her bonnet, and the fur of her victorine, Elizabeth saying, “O, +thank you,” at every puff. At last she was fairly clean, though +Farfrae, having got over his first concern at the situation, seemed in +no manner of hurry to be gone. + +“Ah—now I’ll go and get ye an umbrella,” he said. + +She declined the offer, stepped out and was gone. Farfrae walked slowly +after, looking thoughtfully at her diminishing figure, and whistling in +undertones, “As I came down through Cannobie.” + + + +XV. + +At first Miss Newson’s budding beauty was not regarded with much +interest by anybody in Casterbridge. Donald Farfrae’s gaze, it is true, +was now attracted by the Mayor’s so-called stepdaughter, but he was +only one. The truth is that she was but a poor illustrative instance of +the prophet Baruch’s sly definition: “The virgin that loveth to go +gay.” + +When she walked abroad she seemed to be occupied with an inner chamber +of ideas, and to have slight need for visible objects. She formed +curious resolves on checking gay fancies in the matter of clothes, +because it was inconsistent with her past life to blossom gaudily the +moment she had become possessed of money. But nothing is more insidious +than the evolution of wishes from mere fancies, and of wants from mere +wishes. Henchard gave Elizabeth-Jane a box of delicately-tinted gloves +one spring day. She wanted to wear them to show her appreciation of his +kindness, but she had no bonnet that would harmonize. As an artistic +indulgence she thought she would have such a bonnet. When she had a +bonnet that would go with the gloves she had no dress that would go +with the bonnet. It was now absolutely necessary to finish; she ordered +the requisite article, and found that she had no sunshade to go with +the dress. In for a penny in for a pound; she bought the sunshade, and +the whole structure was at last complete. + +Everybody was attracted, and some said that her bygone simplicity was +the art that conceals art, the “delicate imposition” of Rochefoucauld; +she had produced an effect, a contrast, and it had been done on +purpose. As a matter of fact this was not true, but it had its result; +for as soon as Casterbridge thought her artful it thought her worth +notice. “It is the first time in my life that I have been so much +admired,” she said to herself; “though perhaps it is by those whose +admiration is not worth having.” + +But Donald Farfrae admired her, too; and altogether the time was an +exciting one; sex had never before asserted itself in her so strongly, +for in former days she had perhaps been too impersonally human to be +distinctively feminine. After an unprecedented success one day she came +indoors, went upstairs, and leant upon her bed face downwards quite +forgetting the possible creasing and damage. “Good Heaven,” she +whispered, “can it be? Here am I setting up as the town beauty!” + +When she had thought it over, her usual fear of exaggerating +appearances engendered a deep sadness. “There is something wrong in all +this,” she mused. “If they only knew what an unfinished girl I am—that +I can’t talk Italian, or use globes, or show any of the accomplishments +they learn at boarding schools, how they would despise me! Better sell +all this finery and buy myself grammar-books and dictionaries and a +history of all the philosophies!” + +She looked from the window and saw Henchard and Farfrae in the hay-yard +talking, with that impetuous cordiality on the Mayor’s part, and genial +modesty on the younger man’s, that was now so generally observable in +their intercourse. Friendship between man and man; what a rugged +strength there was in it, as evinced by these two. And yet the seed +that was to lift the foundation of this friendship was at that moment +taking root in a chink of its structure. + +It was about six o’clock; the men were dropping off homeward one by +one. The last to leave was a round-shouldered, blinking young man of +nineteen or twenty, whose mouth fell ajar on the slightest provocation, +seemingly because there was no chin to support it. Henchard called +aloud to him as he went out of the gate, “Here—Abel Whittle!” + +Whittle turned, and ran back a few steps. “Yes, sir,” he said, in +breathless deprecation, as if he knew what was coming next. + +“Once more—be in time to-morrow morning. You see what’s to be done, and +you hear what I say, and you know I’m not going to be trifled with any +longer.” + +“Yes, sir.” Then Abel Whittle left, and Henchard and Farfrae; and +Elizabeth saw no more of them. + +Now there was good reason for this command on Henchard’s part. Poor +Abel, as he was called, had an inveterate habit of over-sleeping +himself and coming late to his work. His anxious will was to be among +the earliest; but if his comrades omitted to pull the string that he +always tied round his great toe and left hanging out the window for +that purpose, his will was as wind. He did not arrive in time. + +As he was often second hand at the hay-weighing, or at the crane which +lifted the sacks, or was one of those who had to accompany the waggons +into the country to fetch away stacks that had been purchased, this +affliction of Abel’s was productive of much inconvenience. For two +mornings in the present week he had kept the others waiting nearly an +hour; hence Henchard’s threat. It now remained to be seen what would +happen to-morrow. + +Six o’clock struck, and there was no Whittle. At half-past six Henchard +entered the yard; the waggon was horsed that Abel was to accompany; and +the other man had been waiting twenty minutes. Then Henchard swore, and +Whittle coming up breathless at that instant, the corn-factor turned on +him, and declared with an oath that this was the last time; that if he +were behind once more, by God, he would come and drag him out o’ bed. + +“There is sommit wrong in my make, your worshipful!” said Abel, +“especially in the inside, whereas my poor dumb brain gets as dead as a +clot afore I’ve said my few scrags of prayers. Yes—it came on as a +stripling, just afore I’d got man’s wages, whereas I never enjoy my bed +at all, for no sooner do I lie down than I be asleep, and afore I be +awake I be up. I’ve fretted my gizzard green about it, maister, but +what can I do? Now last night, afore I went to bed, I only had a +scantling o’ cheese and—” + +“I don’t want to hear it!” roared Henchard. “To-morrow the waggons must +start at four, and if you’re not here, stand clear. I’ll mortify thy +flesh for thee!” + +“But let me clear up my points, your worshipful——” + +Henchard turned away. + +“He asked me and he questioned me, and then ’a wouldn’t hear my +points!” said Abel, to the yard in general. “Now, I shall twitch like a +moment-hand all night to-night for fear o’ him!” + +The journey to be taken by the waggons next day was a long one into +Blackmoor Vale, and at four o’clock lanterns were moving about the +yard. But Abel was missing. Before either of the other men could run to +Abel’s and warn him Henchard appeared in the garden doorway. “Where’s +Abel Whittle? Not come after all I’ve said? Now I’ll carry out my word, +by my blessed fathers—nothing else will do him any good! I’m going up +that way.” + +Henchard went off, entered Abel’s house, a little cottage in Back +Street, the door of which was never locked because the inmates had +nothing to lose. Reaching Whittle’s bedside the corn-factor shouted a +bass note so vigorously that Abel started up instantly, and beholding +Henchard standing over him, was galvanized into spasmodic movements +which had not much relation to getting on his clothes. + +“Out of bed, sir, and off to the granary, or you leave my employ +to-day! ’Tis to teach ye a lesson. March on; never mind your breeches!” + +The unhappy Whittle threw on his sleeve waistcoat, and managed to get +into his boots at the bottom of the stairs, while Henchard thrust his +hat over his head. Whittle then trotted on down Back Street, Henchard +walking sternly behind. + +Just at this time Farfrae, who had been to Henchard’s house to look for +him, came out of the back gate, and saw something white fluttering in +the morning gloom, which he soon perceived to be part of Abel’s shirt +that showed below his waistcoat. + +“For maircy’s sake, what object’s this?” said Farfrae, following Abel +into the yard, Henchard being some way in the rear by this time. + +“Ye see, Mr. Farfrae,” gibbered Abel with a resigned smile of terror, +“he said he’d mortify my flesh if so be I didn’t get up sooner, and now +he’s a-doing on’t! Ye see it can’t be helped, Mr. Farfrae; things do +happen queer sometimes! Yes—I’ll go to Blackmoor Vale half naked as I +be, since he do command; but I shall kill myself afterwards; I can’t +outlive the disgrace, for the women-folk will be looking out of their +winders at my mortification all the way along, and laughing me to scorn +as a man ’ithout breeches! You know how I feel such things, Maister +Farfrae, and how forlorn thoughts get hold upon me. Yes—I shall do +myself harm—I feel it coming on!” + +“Get back home, and slip on your breeches, and come to wark like a man! +If ye go not, you’ll ha’e your death standing there!” + +“I’m afeard I mustn’t! Mr. Henchard said——” + +“I don’t care what Mr. Henchard said, nor anybody else! ’Tis simple +foolishness to do this. Go and dress yourself instantly Whittle.” + +“Hullo, hullo!” said Henchard, coming up behind. “Who’s sending him +back?” + +All the men looked towards Farfrae. + +“I am,” said Donald. “I say this joke has been carried far enough.” + +“And I say it hasn’t! Get up in the waggon, Whittle.” + +“Not if I am manager,” said Farfrae. “He either goes home, or I march +out of this yard for good.” + +Henchard looked at him with a face stern and red. But he paused for a +moment, and their eyes met. Donald went up to him, for he saw in +Henchard’s look that he began to regret this. + +“Come,” said Donald quietly, “a man o’ your position should ken better, +sir! It is tyrannical and no worthy of you.” + +“’Tis not tyrannical!” murmured Henchard, like a sullen boy. “It is to +make him remember!” He presently added, in a tone of one bitterly hurt: +“Why did you speak to me before them like that, Farfrae? You might have +stopped till we were alone. Ah—I know why! I’ve told ye the secret o’ +my life—fool that I was to do’t—and you take advantage of me!” + +“I had forgot it,” said Farfrae simply. + +Henchard looked on the ground, said nothing more, and turned away. +During the day Farfrae learnt from the men that Henchard had kept +Abel’s old mother in coals and snuff all the previous winter, which +made him less antagonistic to the corn-factor. But Henchard continued +moody and silent, and when one of the men inquired of him if some oats +should be hoisted to an upper floor or not, he said shortly, “Ask Mr. +Farfrae. He’s master here!” + +Morally he was; there could be no doubt of it. Henchard, who had +hitherto been the most admired man in his circle, was the most admired +no longer. One day the daughters of a deceased farmer in Durnover +wanted an opinion of the value of their haystack, and sent a messenger +to ask Mr. Farfrae to oblige them with one. The messenger, who was a +child, met in the yard not Farfrae, but Henchard. + +“Very well,” he said. “I’ll come.” + +“But please will Mr. Farfrae come?” said the child. + +“I am going that way.... Why Mr. Farfrae?” said Henchard, with the +fixed look of thought. “Why do people always want Mr. Farfrae?” + +“I suppose because they like him so—that’s what they say.” + +“Oh—I see—that’s what they say—hey? They like him because he’s cleverer +than Mr. Henchard, and because he knows more; and, in short, Mr. +Henchard can’t hold a candle to him—hey?” + +“Yes—that’s just it, sir—some of it.” + +“Oh, there’s more? Of course there’s more! What besides? Come, here’s a +sixpence for a fairing.” + +“‘And he’s better tempered, and Henchard’s a fool to him,’ they say. +And when some of the women were a-walking home they said, ‘He’s a +diment—he’s a chap o’ wax—he’s the best—he’s the horse for my money,’ +says they. And they said, ‘He’s the most understanding man o’ them two +by long chalks. I wish he was the master instead of Henchard,’ they +said.” + +“They’ll talk any nonsense,” Henchard replied with covered gloom. +“Well, you can go now. And _I_ am coming to value the hay, d’ye +hear?—I.” The boy departed, and Henchard murmured, “Wish he were master +here, do they?” + +He went towards Durnover. On his way he overtook Farfrae. They walked +on together, Henchard looking mostly on the ground. + +“You’re no yoursel’ the day?” Donald inquired. + +“Yes, I am very well,” said Henchard. + +“But ye are a bit down—surely ye are down? Why, there’s nothing to be +angry about! ’Tis splendid stuff that we’ve got from Blackmoor Vale. By +the by, the people in Durnover want their hay valued.” + +“Yes. I am going there.” + +“I’ll go with ye.” + +As Henchard did not reply Donald practised a piece of music _sotto +voce_, till, getting near the bereaved people’s door, he stopped +himself with— + +“Ah, as their father is dead I won’t go on with such as that. How could +I forget?” + +“Do you care so very much about hurting folks’ feelings?” observed +Henchard with a half sneer. “You do, I know—especially mine!” + +“I am sorry if I have hurt yours, sir,” replied Donald, standing still, +with a second expression of the same sentiment in the regretfulness of +his face. “Why should you say it—think it?” + +The cloud lifted from Henchard’s brow, and as Donald finished the +corn-merchant turned to him, regarding his breast rather than his face. + +“I have been hearing things that vexed me,” he said. “’Twas that made +me short in my manner—made me overlook what you really are. Now, I +don’t want to go in here about this hay—Farfrae, you can do it better +than I. They sent for ’ee, too. I have to attend a meeting of the Town +Council at eleven, and ’tis drawing on for’t.” + +They parted thus in renewed friendship, Donald forbearing to ask +Henchard for meanings that were not very plain to him. On Henchard’s +part there was now again repose; and yet, whenever he thought of +Farfrae, it was with a dim dread; and he often regretted that he had +told the young man his whole heart, and confided to him the secrets of +his life. + + + +XVI. + +On this account Henchard’s manner towards Farfrae insensibly became +more reserved. He was courteous—too courteous—and Farfrae was quite +surprised at the good breeding which now for the first time showed +itself among the qualities of a man he had hitherto thought +undisciplined, if warm and sincere. The corn-factor seldom or never +again put his arm upon the young man’s shoulder so as to nearly weigh +him down with the pressure of mechanized friendship. He left off coming +to Donald’s lodgings and shouting into the passage. “Hoy, Farfrae, boy, +come and have some dinner with us! Don’t sit here in solitary +confinement!” But in the daily routine of their business there was +little change. + +Thus their lives rolled on till a day of public rejoicing was suggested +to the country at large in celebration of a national event that had +recently taken place. + +For some time Casterbridge, by nature slow, made no response. Then one +day Donald Farfrae broached the subject to Henchard by asking if he +would have any objection to lend some rick-cloths to himself and a few +others, who contemplated getting up an entertainment of some sort on +the day named, and required a shelter for the same, to which they might +charge admission at the rate of so much a head. + +“Have as many cloths as you like,” Henchard replied. + +When his manager had gone about the business Henchard was fired with +emulation. It certainly had been very remiss of him, as Mayor, he +thought, to call no meeting ere this, to discuss what should be done on +this holiday. But Farfrae had been so cursed quick in his movements as +to give old-fashioned people in authority no chance of the initiative. +However, it was not too late; and on second thoughts he determined to +take upon his own shoulders the responsibility of organizing some +amusements, if the other Councilmen would leave the matter in his +hands. To this they quite readily agreed, the majority being fine old +crusted characters who had a decided taste for living without worry. + +So Henchard set about his preparations for a really brilliant +thing—such as should be worthy of the venerable town. As for Farfrae’s +little affair, Henchard nearly forgot it; except once now and then +when, on it coming into his mind, he said to himself, “Charge admission +at so much a head—just like a Scotchman!—who is going to pay anything a +head?” The diversions which the Mayor intended to provide were to be +entirely free. + +He had grown so dependent upon Donald that he could scarcely resist +calling him in to consult. But by sheer self-coercion he refrained. No, +he thought, Farfrae would be suggesting such improvements in his damned +luminous way that in spite of himself he, Henchard, would sink to the +position of second fiddle, and only scrape harmonies to his manager’s +talents. + +Everybody applauded the Mayor’s proposed entertainment, especially when +it became known that he meant to pay for it all himself. + +Close to the town was an elevated green spot surrounded by an ancient +square earthwork—earthworks square and not square, were as common as +blackberries hereabout—a spot whereon the Casterbridge people usually +held any kind of merry-making, meeting, or sheep-fair that required +more space than the streets would afford. On one side it sloped to the +river Froom, and from any point a view was obtained of the country +round for many miles. This pleasant upland was to be the scene of +Henchard’s exploit. + +He advertised about the town, in long posters of a pink colour, that +games of all sorts would take place here; and set to work a little +battalion of men under his own eye. They erected greasy-poles for +climbing, with smoked hams and local cheeses at the top. They placed +hurdles in rows for jumping over; across the river they laid a slippery +pole, with a live pig of the neighbourhood tied at the other end, to +become the property of the man who could walk over and get it. There +were also provided wheelbarrows for racing, donkeys for the same, a +stage for boxing, wrestling, and drawing blood generally; sacks for +jumping in. Moreover, not forgetting his principles, Henchard provided +a mammoth tea, of which everybody who lived in the borough was invited +to partake without payment. The tables were laid parallel with the +inner slope of the rampart, and awnings were stretched overhead. + +Passing to and fro the Mayor beheld the unattractive exterior of +Farfrae’s erection in the West Walk, rick-cloths of different sizes and +colours being hung up to the arching trees without any regard to +appearance. He was easy in his mind now, for his own preparations far +transcended these. + +The morning came. The sky, which had been remarkably clear down to +within a day or two, was overcast, and the weather threatening, the +wind having an unmistakable hint of water in it. Henchard wished he had +not been quite so sure about the continuance of a fair season. But it +was too late to modify or postpone, and the proceedings went on. At +twelve o’clock the rain began to fall, small and steady, commencing and +increasing so insensibly that it was difficult to state exactly when +dry weather ended or wet established itself. In an hour the slight +moisture resolved itself into a monotonous smiting of earth by heaven, +in torrents to which no end could be prognosticated. + +A number of people had heroically gathered in the field but by three +o’clock Henchard discerned that his project was doomed to end in +failure. The hams at the top of the poles dripped watered smoke in the +form of a brown liquor, the pig shivered in the wind, the grain of the +deal tables showed through the sticking tablecloths, for the awning +allowed the rain to drift under at its will, and to enclose the sides +at this hour seemed a useless undertaking. The landscape over the river +disappeared; the wind played on the tent-cords in Æolian +improvisations, and at length rose to such a pitch that the whole +erection slanted to the ground those who had taken shelter within it +having to crawl out on their hands and knees. + +But towards six the storm abated, and a drier breeze shook the moisture +from the grass bents. It seemed possible to carry out the programme +after all. The awning was set up again; the band was called out from +its shelter, and ordered to begin, and where the tables had stood a +place was cleared for dancing. + +“But where are the folk?” said Henchard, after the lapse of +half-an-hour, during which time only two men and a woman had stood up +to dance. “The shops are all shut. Why don’t they come?” + +“They are at Farfrae’s affair in the West Walk,” answered a Councilman +who stood in the field with the Mayor. + +“A few, I suppose. But where are the body o’ ’em?” + +“All out of doors are there.” + +“Then the more fools they!” + +Henchard walked away moodily. One or two young fellows gallantly came +to climb the poles, to save the hams from being wasted; but as there +were no spectators, and the whole scene presented the most melancholy +appearance Henchard gave orders that the proceedings were to be +suspended, and the entertainment closed, the food to be distributed +among the poor people of the town. In a short time nothing was left in +the field but a few hurdles, the tents, and the poles. + +Henchard returned to his house, had tea with his wife and daughter, and +then walked out. It was now dusk. He soon saw that the tendency of all +promenaders was towards a particular spot in the Walks, and eventually +proceeded thither himself. The notes of a stringed band came from the +enclosure that Farfrae had erected—the pavilion as he called it—and +when the Mayor reached it he perceived that a gigantic tent had been +ingeniously constructed without poles or ropes. The densest point of +the avenue of sycamores had been selected, where the boughs made a +closely interlaced vault overhead; to these boughs the canvas had been +hung, and a barrel roof was the result. The end towards the wind was +enclosed, the other end was open. Henchard went round and saw the +interior. + +In form it was like the nave of a cathedral with one gable removed, but +the scene within was anything but devotional. A reel or fling of some +sort was in progress; and the usually sedate Farfrae was in the midst +of the other dancers in the costume of a wild Highlander, flinging +himself about and spinning to the tune. For a moment Henchard could not +help laughing. Then he perceived the immense admiration for the +Scotchman that revealed itself in the women’s faces; and when this +exhibition was over, and a new dance proposed, and Donald had +disappeared for a time to return in his natural garments, he had an +unlimited choice of partners, every girl being in a coming-on +disposition towards one who so thoroughly understood the poetry of +motion as he. + +All the town crowded to the Walk, such a delightful idea of a ballroom +never having occurred to the inhabitants before. Among the rest of the +onlookers were Elizabeth and her mother—the former thoughtful yet much +interested, her eyes beaming with a longing lingering light, as if +Nature had been advised by Correggio in their creation. The dancing +progressed with unabated spirit, and Henchard walked and waited till +his wife should be disposed to go home. He did not care to keep in the +light, and when he went into the dark it was worse, for there he heard +remarks of a kind which were becoming too frequent: + +“Mr. Henchard’s rejoicings couldn’t say good morning to this,” said +one. “A man must be a headstrong stunpoll to think folk would go up to +that bleak place to-day.” + +The other answered that people said it was not only in such things as +those that the Mayor was wanting. “Where would his business be if it +were not for this young fellow? ’Twas verily Fortune sent him to +Henchard. His accounts were like a bramblewood when Mr. Farfrae came. +He used to reckon his sacks by chalk strokes all in a row like +garden-palings, measure his ricks by stretching with his arms, weigh +his trusses by a lift, judge his hay by a chaw, and settle the price +with a curse. But now this accomplished young man does it all by +ciphering and mensuration. Then the wheat—that sometimes used to taste +so strong o’ mice when made into bread that people could fairly tell +the breed—Farfrae has a plan for purifying, so that nobody would dream +the smallest four-legged beast had walked over it once. O yes, +everybody is full of him, and the care Mr. Henchard has to keep him, to +be sure!” concluded this gentleman. + +“But he won’t do it for long, good-now,” said the other. + +“No!” said Henchard to himself behind the tree. “Or if he do, he’ll be +honeycombed clean out of all the character and standing that he’s built +up in these eighteen year!” + +He went back to the dancing pavilion. Farfrae was footing a quaint +little dance with Elizabeth-Jane—an old country thing, the only one she +knew, and though he considerately toned down his movements to suit her +demurer gait, the pattern of the shining little nails in the soles of +his boots became familiar to the eyes of every bystander. The tune had +enticed her into it; being a tune of a busy, vaulting, leaping +sort—some low notes on the silver string of each fiddle, then a +skipping on the small, like running up and down ladders—“Miss M’Leod of +Ayr” was its name, so Mr. Farfrae had said, and that it was very +popular in his own country. + +It was soon over, and the girl looked at Henchard for approval; but he +did not give it. He seemed not to see her. “Look here, Farfrae,” he +said, like one whose mind was elsewhere, “I’ll go to Port-Bredy Great +Market to-morrow myself. You can stay and put things right in your +clothes-box, and recover strength to your knees after your vagaries.” +He planted on Donald an antagonistic glare that had begun as a smile. + +Some other townsmen came up, and Donald drew aside. “What’s this, +Henchard,” said Alderman Tubber, applying his thumb to the corn-factor +like a cheese-taster. “An opposition randy to yours, eh? Jack’s as good +as his master, eh? Cut ye out quite, hasn’t he?” + +“You see, Mr. Henchard,” said the lawyer, another goodnatured friend, +“where you made the mistake was in going so far afield. You should have +taken a leaf out of his book, and have had your sports in a sheltered +place like this. But you didn’t think of it, you see; and he did, and +that’s where he’s beat you.” + +“He’ll be top-sawyer soon of you two, and carry all afore him,” added +jocular Mr. Tubber. + +“No,” said Henchard gloomily. “He won’t be that, because he’s shortly +going to leave me.” He looked towards Donald, who had come near. “Mr. +Farfrae’s time as my manager is drawing to a close—isn’t it, Farfrae?” + +The young man, who could now read the lines and folds of Henchard’s +strongly-traced face as if they were clear verbal inscriptions, quietly +assented; and when people deplored the fact, and asked why it was, he +simply replied that Mr. Henchard no longer required his help. + +Henchard went home, apparently satisfied. But in the morning, when his +jealous temper had passed away, his heart sank within him at what he +had said and done. He was the more disturbed when he found that this +time Farfrae was determined to take him at his word. + + + +XVII. + +Elizabeth-Jane had perceived from Henchard’s manner that in assenting +to dance she had made a mistake of some kind. In her simplicity she did +not know what it was till a hint from a nodding acquaintance +enlightened her. As the Mayor’s stepdaughter, she learnt, she had not +been quite in her place in treading a measure amid such a mixed throng +as filled the dancing pavilion. + +Thereupon her ears, cheeks, and chin glowed like live coals at the +dawning of the idea that her tastes were not good enough for her +position, and would bring her into disgrace. + +This made her very miserable, and she looked about for her mother; but +Mrs. Henchard, who had less idea of conventionality than Elizabeth +herself, had gone away, leaving her daughter to return at her own +pleasure. The latter moved on into the dark dense old avenues, or +rather vaults of living woodwork, which ran along the town boundary, +and stood reflecting. + +A man followed in a few minutes, and her face being to-wards the shine +from the tent he recognized her. It was Farfrae—just come from the +dialogue with Henchard which had signified his dismissal. + +“And it’s you, Miss Newson?—and I’ve been looking for ye everywhere!” +he said, overcoming a sadness imparted by the estrangement with the +corn-merchant. “May I walk on with you as far as your street-corner?” + +She thought there might be something wrong in this, but did not utter +any objection. So together they went on, first down the West Walk, and +then into the Bowling Walk, till Farfrae said, “It’s like that I’m +going to leave you soon.” + +She faltered, “Why?” + +“Oh—as a mere matter of business—nothing more. But we’ll not concern +ourselves about it—it is for the best. I hoped to have another dance +with you.” + +She said she could not dance—in any proper way. + +“Nay, but you do! It’s the feeling for it rather than the learning of +steps that makes pleasant dancers.... I fear I offended your father by +getting up this! And now, perhaps, I’ll have to go to another part o’ +the warrld altogether!” + +This seemed such a melancholy prospect that Elizabeth-Jane breathed a +sigh—letting it off in fragments that he might not hear her. But +darkness makes people truthful, and the Scotchman went on +impulsively—perhaps he had heard her after all: + +“I wish I was richer, Miss Newson; and your stepfather had not been +offended, I would ask you something in a short time—yes, I would ask +you to-night. But that’s not for me!” + +What he would have asked her he did not say, and instead of encouraging +him she remained incompetently silent. Thus afraid one of another they +continued their promenade along the walls till they got near the bottom +of the Bowling Walk; twenty steps further and the trees would end, and +the street-corner and lamps appear. In consciousness of this they +stopped. + +“I never found out who it was that sent us to Durnover granary on a +fool’s errand that day,” said Donald, in his undulating tones. “Did ye +ever know yourself, Miss Newson?” + +“Never,” said she. + +“I wonder why they did it!” + +“For fun, perhaps.” + +“Perhaps it was not for fun. It might have been that they thought they +would like us to stay waiting there, talking to one another? Ay, well! +I hope you Casterbridge folk will not forget me if I go.” + +“That I’m sure we won’t!” she said earnestly. “I—wish you wouldn’t go +at all.” + +They had got into the lamplight. “Now, I’ll think over that,” said +Donald Farfrae. “And I’ll not come up to your door; but part from you +here; lest it make your father more angry still.” + +They parted, Farfrae returning into the dark Bowling Walk, and +Elizabeth-Jane going up the street. Without any consciousness of what +she was doing she started running with all her might till she reached +her father’s door. “O dear me—what am I at?” she thought, as she pulled +up breathless. + +Indoors she fell to conjecturing the meaning of Farfrae’s enigmatic +words about not daring to ask her what he fain would. Elizabeth, that +silent observing woman, had long noted how he was rising in favour +among the townspeople; and knowing Henchard’s nature now she had feared +that Farfrae’s days as manager were numbered, so that the announcement +gave her little surprise. Would Mr. Farfrae stay in Casterbridge +despite his words and her father’s dismissal? His occult breathings to +her might be solvable by his course in that respect. + +The next day was windy—so windy that walking in the garden she picked +up a portion of the draft of a letter on business in Donald Farfrae’s +writing, which had flown over the wall from the office. The useless +scrap she took indoors, and began to copy the calligraphy, which she +much admired. The letter began “Dear Sir,” and presently writing on a +loose slip “Elizabeth-Jane,” she laid the latter over “Sir,” making the +phrase “Dear Elizabeth-Jane.” When she saw the effect a quick red ran +up her face and warmed her through, though nobody was there to see what +she had done. She quickly tore up the slip, and threw it away. After +this she grew cool and laughed at herself, walked about the room, and +laughed again; not joyfully, but distressfully rather. + +It was quickly known in Casterbridge that Farfrae and Henchard had +decided to dispense with each other. Elizabeth-Jane’s anxiety to know +if Farfrae were going away from the town reached a pitch that disturbed +her, for she could no longer conceal from herself the cause. At length +the news reached her that he was not going to leave the place. A man +following the same trade as Henchard, but on a very small scale, had +sold his business to Farfrae, who was forthwith about to start as corn +and hay merchant on his own account. + +Her heart fluttered when she heard of this step of Donald’s, proving +that he meant to remain; and yet, would a man who cared one little bit +for her have endangered his suit by setting up a business in opposition +to Mr. Henchard’s? Surely not; and it must have been a passing impulse +only which had led him to address her so softly. + +To solve the problem whether her appearance on the evening of the dance +were such as to inspire a fleeting love at first sight, she dressed +herself up exactly as she had dressed then—the muslin, the spencer, the +sandals, the parasol—and looked in the mirror. The picture glassed back +was in her opinion, precisely of such a kind as to inspire that +fleeting regard, and no more—“just enough to make him silly, and not +enough to keep him so,” she said luminously; and Elizabeth thought, in +a much lower key, that by this time he had discovered how plain and +homely was the informing spirit of that pretty outside. + +Hence, when she felt her heart going out to him, she would say to +herself with a mock pleasantry that carried an ache with it, “No, no, +Elizabeth-Jane—such dreams are not for you!” She tried to prevent +herself from seeing him, and thinking of him; succeeding fairly well in +the former attempt, in the latter not so completely. + +Henchard, who had been hurt at finding that Farfrae did not mean to put +up with his temper any longer, was incensed beyond measure when he +learnt what the young man had done as an alternative. It was in the +town-hall, after a council meeting, that he first became aware of +Farfrae’s _coup_ for establishing himself independently in the town; +and his voice might have been heard as far as the town-pump expressing +his feelings to his fellow councilmen. These tones showed that, though +under a long reign of self-control he had become Mayor and churchwarden +and what not, there was still the same unruly volcanic stuff beneath +the rind of Michael Henchard as when he had sold his wife at Weydon +Fair. + +“Well, he’s a friend of mine, and I’m a friend of his—or if we are not, +what are we? ’Od send, if I’ve not been his friend, who has, I should +like to know? Didn’t he come here without a sound shoe to his voot? +Didn’t I keep him here—help him to a living? Didn’t I help him to +money, or whatever he wanted? I stuck out for no terms—I said ‘Name +your own price.’ I’d have shared my last crust with that young fellow +at one time, I liked him so well. And now he’s defied me! But damn him, +I’ll have a tussle with him now—at fair buying and selling, mind—at +fair buying and selling! And if I can’t overbid such a stripling as he, +then I’m not wo’th a varden! We’ll show that we know our business as +well as one here and there!” + +His friends of the Corporation did not specially respond. Henchard was +less popular now than he had been when nearly two years before, they +had voted him to the chief magistracy on account of his amazing energy. +While they had collectively profited by this quality of the +corn-factor’s they had been made to wince individually on more than one +occasion. So he went out of the hall and down the street alone. + +Reaching home he seemed to recollect something with a sour +satisfaction. He called Elizabeth-Jane. Seeing how he looked when she +entered she appeared alarmed. + +“Nothing to find fault with,” he said, observing her concern. “Only I +want to caution you, my dear. That man, Farfrae—it is about him. I’ve +seen him talking to you two or three times—he danced with ’ee at the +rejoicings, and came home with ’ee. Now, now, no blame to you. But just +harken: Have you made him any foolish promise? Gone the least bit +beyond sniff and snaff at all?” + +“No. I have promised him nothing.” + +“Good. All’s well that ends well. I particularly wish you not to see +him again.” + +“Very well, sir.” + +“You promise?” + +She hesitated for a moment, and then said— + +“Yes, if you much wish it.” + +“I do. He’s an enemy to our house!” + +When she had gone he sat down, and wrote in a heavy hand to Farfrae +thus:— + +Sir,—I make request that henceforth you and my stepdaughter be as +strangers to each other. She on her part has promised to welcome no +more addresses from you; and I trust, therefore, you will not attempt +to force them upon her. + + +M. HENCHARD. + + +One would almost have supposed Henchard to have had policy to see that +no better _modus vivendi_ could be arrived at with Farfrae than by +encouraging him to become his son-in-law. But such a scheme for buying +over a rival had nothing to recommend it to the Mayor’s headstrong +faculties. With all domestic _finesse_ of that kind he was hopelessly +at variance. Loving a man or hating him, his diplomacy was as +wrongheaded as a buffalo’s; and his wife had not ventured to suggest +the course which she, for many reasons, would have welcomed gladly. + +Meanwhile Donald Farfrae had opened the gates of commerce on his own +account at a spot on Durnover Hill—as far as possible from Henchard’s +stores, and with every intention of keeping clear of his former friend +and employer’s customers. There was, it seemed to the younger man, room +for both of them and to spare. The town was small, but the corn and +hay-trade was proportionately large, and with his native sagacity he +saw opportunity for a share of it. + +So determined was he to do nothing which should seem like +trade-antagonism to the Mayor that he refused his first customer—a +large farmer of good repute—because Henchard and this man had dealt +together within the preceding three months. + +“He was once my friend,” said Farfrae, “and it’s not for me to take +business from him. I am sorry to disappoint you, but I cannot hurt the +trade of a man who’s been so kind to me.” + +In spite of this praiseworthy course the Scotchman’s trade increased. +Whether it were that his northern energy was an overmastering force +among the easy-going Wessex worthies, or whether it was sheer luck, the +fact remained that whatever he touched he prospered in. Like Jacob in +Padan-Aram, he would no sooner humbly limit himself to the +ringstraked-and-spotted exceptions of trade than the +ringstraked-and-spotted would multiply and prevail. + +But most probably luck had little to do with it. Character is Fate, +said Novalis, and Farfrae’s character was just the reverse of +Henchard’s, who might not inaptly be described as Faust has been +described—as a vehement gloomy being who had quitted the ways of vulgar +men without light to guide him on a better way. + +Farfrae duly received the request to discontinue attentions to +Elizabeth-Jane. His acts of that kind had been so slight that the +request was almost superfluous. Yet he had felt a considerable interest +in her, and after some cogitation he decided that it would be as well +to enact no Romeo part just then—for the young girl’s sake no less than +his own. Thus the incipient attachment was stifled down. + +A time came when, avoid collision with his former friend as he might, +Farfrae was compelled, in sheer self-defence, to close with Henchard in +mortal commercial combat. He could no longer parry the fierce attacks +of the latter by simple avoidance. As soon as their war of prices began +everybody was interested, and some few guessed the end. It was, in some +degree, Northern insight matched against Southern doggedness—the dirk +against the cudgel—and Henchard’s weapon was one which, if it did not +deal ruin at the first or second stroke, left him afterwards well-nigh +at his antagonist’s mercy. + +Almost every Saturday they encountered each other amid the crowd of +farmers which thronged about the market-place in the weekly course of +their business. Donald was always ready, and even anxious, to say a few +friendly words, but the Mayor invariably gazed stormfully past him, +like one who had endured and lost on his account, and could in no sense +forgive the wrong; nor did Farfrae’s snubbed manner of perplexity at +all appease him. The large farmers, corn-merchants, millers, +auctioneers, and others had each an official stall in the corn-market +room, with their names painted thereon; and when to the familiar series +of “Henchard,” “Everdene,” “Shiner,” “Darton,” and so on, was added one +inscribed “Farfrae,” in staring new letters, Henchard was stung into +bitterness; like Bellerophon, he wandered away from the crowd, cankered +in soul. + +From that day Donald Farfrae’s name was seldom mentioned in Henchard’s +house. If at breakfast or dinner Elizabeth-Jane’s mother inadvertently +alluded to her favourite’s movements, the girl would implore her by a +look to be silent; and her husband would say, “What—are you, too, my +enemy?” + + + +XVIII. + +There came a shock which had been foreseen for some time by Elizabeth, +as the box passenger foresees the approaching jerk from some channel +across the highway. + +Her mother was ill—too unwell to leave her room. Henchard, who treated +her kindly, except in moments of irritation, sent at once for the +richest, busiest doctor, whom he supposed to be the best. Bedtime came, +and they burnt a light all night. In a day or two she rallied. + +Elizabeth, who had been staying up, did not appear at breakfast on the +second morning, and Henchard sat down alone. He was startled to see a +letter for him from Jersey in a writing he knew too well, and had +expected least to behold again. He took it up in his hands and looked +at it as at a picture, a vision, a vista of past enactments; and then +he read it as an unimportant finale to conjecture. + +The writer said that she at length perceived how impossible it would be +for any further communications to proceed between them now that his +re-marriage had taken place. That such reunion had been the only +straightforward course open to him she was bound to admit. + +“On calm reflection, therefore,” she went on, “I quite forgive you for +landing me in such a dilemma, remembering that you concealed nothing +before our ill-advised acquaintance; and that you really did set before +me in your grim way the fact of there being a certain risk in intimacy +with you, slight as it seemed to be after fifteen or sixteen years of +silence on your wife’s part. I thus look upon the whole as a misfortune +of mine, and not a fault of yours. + +“So that, Michael, I must ask you to overlook those letters with which +I pestered you day after day in the heat of my feelings. They were +written whilst I thought your conduct to me cruel; but now I know more +particulars of the position you were in I see how inconsiderate my +reproaches were. + +“Now you will, I am sure, perceive that the one condition which will +make any future happiness possible for me is that the past connection +between our lives be kept secret outside this isle. Speak of it I know +you will not; and I can trust you not to write of it. One safe-guard +more remains to be mentioned—that no writings of mine, or trifling +articles belonging to me, should be left in your possession through +neglect or forgetfulness. To this end may I request you to return to me +any such you may have, particularly the letters written in the first +abandonment of feeling. + +“For the handsome sum you forwarded to me as a plaster to the wound I +heartily thank you. + +“I am now on my way to Bristol, to see my only relative. She is rich, +and I hope will do something for me. I shall return through +Casterbridge and Budmouth, where I shall take the packet-boat. Can you +meet me with the letters and other trifles? I shall be in the coach +which changes horses at the Antelope Hotel at half-past five Wednesday +evening; I shall be wearing a Paisley shawl with a red centre, and thus +may easily be found. I should prefer this plan of receiving them to +having them sent.—I remain still, yours; ever, + +“LUCETTA” + +Henchard breathed heavily. “Poor thing—better you had not known me! +Upon my heart and soul, if ever I should be left in a position to carry +out that marriage with thee, I _ought_ to do it—I ought to do it, +indeed!” + +The contingency that he had in his mind was, of course, the death of +Mrs. Henchard. + +As requested, he sealed up Lucetta’s letters, and put the parcel aside +till the day she had appointed; this plan of returning them by hand +being apparently a little _ruse_ of the young lady for exchanging a +word or two with him on past times. He would have preferred not to see +her; but deeming that there could be no great harm in acquiescing thus +far, he went at dusk and stood opposite the coach-office. + +The evening was chilly, and the coach was late. Henchard crossed over +to it while the horses were being changed; but there was no Lucetta +inside or out. Concluding that something had happened to modify her +arrangements he gave the matter up and went home, not without a sense +of relief. Meanwhile Mrs. Henchard was weakening visibly. She could not +go out of doors any more. One day, after much thinking which seemed to +distress her, she said she wanted to write something. A desk was put +upon her bed with pen and paper, and at her request she was left alone. +She remained writing for a short time, folded her paper carefully, +called Elizabeth-Jane to bring a taper and wax, and then, still +refusing assistance, sealed up the sheet, directed it, and locked it in +her desk. She had directed it in these words:— + +“_Mr. Michael Henchard. Not to be opened till Elizabeth-Jane’s +wedding-day._” + +The latter sat up with her mother to the utmost of her strength night +after night. To learn to take the universe seriously there is no +quicker way than to watch—to be a “waker,” as the country-people call +it. Between the hours at which the last toss-pot went by and the first +sparrow shook himself, the silence in Casterbridge—barring the rare +sound of the watchman—was broken in Elizabeth’s ear only by the +time-piece in the bedroom ticking frantically against the clock on the +stairs; ticking harder and harder till it seemed to clang like a gong; +and all this while the subtle-souled girl asking herself why she was +born, why sitting in a room, and blinking at the candle; why things +around her had taken the shape they wore in preference to every other +possible shape. Why they stared at her so helplessly, as if waiting for +the touch of some wand that should release them from terrestrial +constraint; what that chaos called consciousness, which spun in her at +this moment like a top, tended to, and began in. Her eyes fell +together; she was awake, yet she was asleep. + +A word from her mother roused her. Without preface, and as the +continuation of a scene already progressing in her mind, Mrs. Henchard +said: “You remember the note sent to you and Mr. Farfrae—asking you to +meet some one in Durnover Barton—and that you thought it was a trick to +make fools of you?” + +“Yes.” + +“It was not to make fools of you—it was done to bring you together. +’Twas I did it.” + +“Why?” said Elizabeth, with a start. + +“I—wanted you to marry Mr. Farfrae.” + +“O mother!” Elizabeth-Jane bent down her head so much that she looked +quite into her own lap. But as her mother did not go on, she said, +“What reason?” + +“Well, I had a reason. ’Twill out one day. I wish it could have been in +my time! But there—nothing is as you wish it! Henchard hates him.” + +“Perhaps they’ll be friends again,” murmured the girl. + +“I don’t know—I don’t know.” After this her mother was silent, and +dozed; and she spoke on the subject no more. + +Some little time later on Farfrae was passing Henchard’s house on a +Sunday morning, when he observed that the blinds were all down. He rang +the bell so softly that it only sounded a single full note and a small +one; and then he was informed that Mrs. Henchard was dead—just +dead—that very hour. + +At the town-pump there were gathered when he passed a few old +inhabitants, who came there for water whenever they had, as at present, +spare time to fetch it, because it was purer from that original fount +than from their own wells. Mrs. Cuxsom, who had been standing there for +an indefinite time with her pitcher, was describing the incidents of +Mrs. Henchard’s death, as she had learnt them from the nurse. + +“And she was white as marble-stone,” said Mrs. Cuxsom. “And likewise +such a thoughtful woman, too—ah, poor soul—that a’ minded every little +thing that wanted tending. ‘Yes,’ says she, ‘when I’m gone, and my last +breath’s blowed, look in the top drawer o’ the chest in the back room +by the window, and you’ll find all my coffin clothes, a piece of +flannel—that’s to put under me, and the little piece is to put under my +head; and my new stockings for my feet—they are folded alongside, and +all my other things. And there’s four ounce pennies, the heaviest I +could find, a-tied up in bits of linen, for weights—two for my right +eye and two for my left,’ she said. ‘And when you’ve used ’em, and my +eyes don’t open no more, bury the pennies, good souls and don’t ye go +spending ’em, for I shouldn’t like it. And open the windows as soon as +I am carried out, and make it as cheerful as you can for +Elizabeth-Jane.’” + +“Ah, poor heart!” + +“Well, and Martha did it, and buried the ounce pennies in the garden. +But if ye’ll believe words, that man, Christopher Coney, went and dug +’em up, and spent ’em at the Three Mariners. ‘Faith,’ he said, ‘why +should death rob life o’ fourpence? Death’s not of such good report +that we should respect ’en to that extent,’ says he.” + +“’Twas a cannibal deed!” deprecated her listeners. + +“Gad, then I won’t quite ha’e it,” said Solomon Longways. “I say it +to-day, and ’tis a Sunday morning, and I wouldn’t speak wrongfully for +a zilver zixpence at such a time. I don’t see noo harm in it. To +respect the dead is sound doxology; and I wouldn’t sell +skellintons—leastwise respectable skellintons—to be varnished for +’natomies, except I were out o’ work. But money is scarce, and throats +get dry. Why _should_ death rob life o’ fourpence? I say there was no +treason in it.” + +“Well, poor soul; she’s helpless to hinder that or anything now,” +answered Mother Cuxsom. “And all her shining keys will be took from +her, and her cupboards opened; and little things a’ didn’t wish seen, +anybody will see; and her wishes and ways will all be as nothing!” + + + +XIX. + +Henchard and Elizabeth sat conversing by the fire. It was three weeks +after Mrs. Henchard’s funeral, the candles were not lighted, and a +restless, acrobatic flame, poised on a coal, called from the shady +walls the smiles of all shapes that could respond—the old pier-glass, +with gilt columns and huge entablature, the picture-frames, sundry +knobs and handles, and the brass rosette at the bottom of each riband +bell-pull on either side of the chimney-piece. + +“Elizabeth, do you think much of old times?” said Henchard. + +“Yes, sir; often,” she said. + +“Who do you put in your pictures of ’em?” + +“Mother and father—nobody else hardly.” + +Henchard always looked like one bent on resisting pain when +Elizabeth-Jane spoke of Richard Newson as “father.” “Ah! I am out of +all that, am I not?” he said.... “Was Newson a kind father?” + +“Yes, sir; very.” + +Henchard’s face settled into an expression of stolid loneliness which +gradually modulated into something softer. “Suppose I had been your +real father?” he said. “Would you have cared for me as much as you +cared for Richard Newson?” + +“I can’t think it,” she said quickly. “I can think of no other as my +father, except my father.” + +Henchard’s wife was dissevered from him by death; his friend and helper +Farfrae by estrangement; Elizabeth-Jane by ignorance. It seemed to him +that only one of them could possibly be recalled, and that was the +girl. His mind began vibrating between the wish to reveal himself to +her and the policy of leaving well alone, till he could no longer sit +still. He walked up and down, and then he came and stood behind her +chair, looking down upon the top of her head. He could no longer +restrain his impulse. “What did your mother tell you about me—my +history?” he asked. + +“That you were related by marriage.” + +“She should have told more—before you knew me! Then my task would not +have been such a hard one.... Elizabeth, it is I who am your father, +and not Richard Newson. Shame alone prevented your wretched parents +from owning this to you while both of ’em were alive.” + +The back of Elizabeth’s head remained still, and her shoulders did not +denote even the movements of breathing. Henchard went on: “I’d rather +have your scorn, your fear, anything than your ignorance; ’tis that I +hate! Your mother and I were man and wife when we were young. What you +saw was our second marriage. Your mother was too honest. We had thought +each other dead—and—Newson became her husband.” + +This was the nearest approach Henchard could make to the full truth. As +far as he personally was concerned he would have screened nothing; but +he showed a respect for the young girl’s sex and years worthy of a +better man. + +When he had gone on to give details which a whole series of slight and +unregarded incidents in her past life strangely corroborated; when, in +short, she believed his story to be true, she became greatly agitated, +and turning round to the table flung her face upon it weeping. + +“Don’t cry—don’t cry!” said Henchard, with vehement pathos, “I can’t +bear it, I won’t bear it. I am your father; why should you cry? Am I so +dreadful, so hateful to ’ee? Don’t take against me, Elizabeth-Jane!” he +cried, grasping her wet hand. “Don’t take against me—though I was a +drinking man once, and used your mother roughly—I’ll be kinder to you +than _he_ was! I’ll do anything, if you will only look upon me as your +father!” + +She tried to stand up and comfort him trustfully; but she could not; +she was troubled at his presence, like the brethren at the avowal of +Joseph. + +“I don’t want you to come to me all of a sudden,” said Henchard in +jerks, and moving like a great tree in a wind. “No, Elizabeth, I don’t. +I’ll go away and not see you till to-morrow, or when you like, and then +I’ll show ’ee papers to prove my words. There, I am gone, and won’t +disturb you any more.... ’Twas I that chose your name, my daughter; +your mother wanted it Susan. There, don’t forget ’twas I gave you your +name!” He went out at the door and shut her softly in, and she heard +him go away into the garden. But he had not done. Before she had moved, +or in any way recovered from the effect of his disclosure, he +reappeared. + +“One word more, Elizabeth,” he said. “You’ll take my surname now—hey? +Your mother was against it, but it will be much more pleasant to me. +’Tis legally yours, you know. But nobody need know that. You shall take +it as if by choice. I’ll talk to my lawyer—I don’t know the law of it +exactly; but will you do this—let me put a few lines into the newspaper +that such is to be your name?” + +“If it is my name I must have it, mustn’t I?” she asked. + +“Well, well; usage is everything in these matters.” + +“I wonder why mother didn’t wish it?” + +“Oh, some whim of the poor soul’s. Now get a bit of paper and draw up a +paragraph as I shall tell you. But let’s have a light.” + +“I can see by the firelight,” she answered. “Yes—I’d rather.” + +“Very well.” + +She got a piece of paper, and bending over the fender wrote at his +dictation words which he had evidently got by heart from some +advertisement or other—words to the effect that she, the writer, +hitherto known as Elizabeth-Jane Newson, was going to call herself +Elizabeth-Jane Henchard forthwith. It was done, and fastened up, and +directed to the office of the _Casterbridge Chronicle_. + +“Now,” said Henchard, with the blaze of satisfaction that he always +emitted when he had carried his point—though tenderness softened it +this time—“I’ll go upstairs and hunt for some documents that will prove +it all to you. But I won’t trouble you with them till to-morrow. +Good-night, my Elizabeth-Jane!” + +He was gone before the bewildered girl could realize what it all meant, +or adjust her filial sense to the new center of gravity. She was +thankful that he had left her to herself for the evening, and sat down +over the fire. Here she remained in silence, and wept—not for her +mother now, but for the genial sailor Richard Newson, to whom she +seemed doing a wrong. + +Henchard in the meantime had gone upstairs. Papers of a domestic nature +he kept in a drawer in his bedroom, and this he unlocked. Before +turning them over he leant back and indulged in reposeful thought. +Elizabeth was his at last and she was a girl of such good sense and +kind heart that she would be sure to like him. He was the kind of man +to whom some human object for pouring out his heart upon—were it +emotive or were it choleric—was almost a necessity. The craving for his +heart for the re-establishment of this tenderest human tie had been +great during his wife’s lifetime, and now he had submitted to its +mastery without reluctance and without fear. He bent over the drawer +again, and proceeded in his search. + +Among the other papers had been placed the contents of his wife’s +little desk, the keys of which had been handed to him at her request. +Here was the letter addressed to him with the restriction, “_Not to be +opened till Elizabeth-Jane’s wedding-day_.” + +Mrs. Henchard, though more patient than her husband, had been no +practical hand at anything. In sealing up the sheet, which was folded +and tucked in without an envelope, in the old-fashioned way, she had +overlaid the junction with a large mass of wax without the requisite +under-touch of the same. The seal had cracked, and the letter was open. +Henchard had no reason to suppose the restriction one of serious +weight, and his feeling for his late wife had not been of the nature of +deep respect. “Some trifling fancy or other of poor Susan’s, I +suppose,” he said; and without curiosity he allowed his eyes to scan +the letter:— + +MY DEAR MICHAEL,—For the good of all three of us I have kept one thing +a secret from you till now. I hope you will understand why; I think you +will; though perhaps you may not forgive me. But, dear Michael, I have +done it for the best. I shall be in my grave when you read this, and +Elizabeth-Jane will have a home. Don’t curse me Mike—think of how I was +situated. I can hardly write it, but here it is. Elizabeth-Jane is not +your Elizabeth-Jane—the child who was in my arms when you sold me. No; +she died three months after that, and this living one is my other +husband’s. I christened her by the same name we had given to the first, +and she filled up the ache I felt at the other’s loss. Michael, I am +dying, and I might have held my tongue; but I could not. Tell her +husband of this or not, as you may judge; and forgive, if you can, a +woman you once deeply wronged, as she forgives you. + + +SUSAN HENCHARD + + +Her husband regarded the paper as if it were a window-pane through +which he saw for miles. His lips twitched, and he seemed to compress +his frame, as if to bear better. His usual habit was not to consider +whether destiny were hard upon him or not—the shape of his ideals in +cases of affliction being simply a moody “I am to suffer, I perceive.” +“This much scourging, then, it is for me.” But now through his +passionate head there stormed this thought—that the blasting disclosure +was what he had deserved. + +His wife’s extreme reluctance to have the girl’s name altered from +Newson to Henchard was now accounted for fully. It furnished another +illustration of that honesty in dishonesty which had characterized her +in other things. + +He remained unnerved and purposeless for near a couple of hours; till +he suddenly said, “Ah—I wonder if it is true!” + +He jumped up in an impulse, kicked off his slippers, and went with a +candle to the door of Elizabeth-Jane’s room, where he put his ear to +the keyhole and listened. She was breathing profoundly. Henchard softly +turned the handle, entered, and shading the light, approached the +bedside. Gradually bringing the light from behind a screening curtain +he held it in such a manner that it fell slantwise on her face without +shining on her eyes. He steadfastly regarded her features. + +They were fair: his were dark. But this was an unimportant preliminary. +In sleep there come to the surface buried genealogical facts, ancestral +curves, dead men’s traits, which the mobility of daytime animation +screens and overwhelms. In the present statuesque repose of the young +girl’s countenance Richard Newson’s was unmistakably reflected. He +could not endure the sight of her, and hastened away. + +Misery taught him nothing more than defiant endurance of it. His wife +was dead, and the first impulse for revenge died with the thought that +she was beyond him. He looked out at the night as at a fiend. Henchard, +like all his kind, was superstitious, and he could not help thinking +that the concatenation of events this evening had produced was the +scheme of some sinister intelligence bent on punishing him. Yet they +had developed naturally. If he had not revealed his past history to +Elizabeth he would not have searched the drawer for papers, and so on. +The mockery was, that he should have no sooner taught a girl to claim +the shelter of his paternity than he discovered her to have no kinship +with him. + +This ironical sequence of things angered him like an impish trick from +a fellow-creature. Like Prester John’s, his table had been spread, and +infernal harpies had snatched up the food. He went out of the house, +and moved sullenly onward down the pavement till he came to the bridge +at the bottom of the High Street. Here he turned in upon a bypath on +the river bank, skirting the north-eastern limits of the town. + +These precincts embodied the mournful phases of Casterbridge life, as +the south avenues embodied its cheerful moods. The whole way along here +was sunless, even in summer time; in spring, white frosts lingered here +when other places were steaming with warmth; while in winter it was the +seed-field of all the aches, rheumatisms, and torturing cramps of the +year. The Casterbridge doctors must have pined away for want of +sufficient nourishment but for the configuration of the landscape on +the north-eastern side. + +The river—slow, noiseless, and dark—the Schwarzwasser of +Casterbridge—ran beneath a low cliff, the two together forming a +defence which had rendered walls and artificial earthworks on this side +unnecessary. Here were ruins of a Franciscan priory, and a mill +attached to the same, the water of which roared down a back-hatch like +the voice of desolation. Above the cliff, and behind the river, rose a +pile of buildings, and in the front of the pile a square mass cut into +the sky. It was like a pedestal lacking its statue. This missing +feature, without which the design remained incomplete, was, in truth, +the corpse of a man, for the square mass formed the base of the +gallows, the extensive buildings at the back being the county gaol. In +the meadow where Henchard now walked the mob were wont to gather +whenever an execution took place, and there to the tune of the roaring +weir they stood and watched the spectacle. + +The exaggeration which darkness imparted to the glooms of this region +impressed Henchard more than he had expected. The lugubrious harmony of +the spot with his domestic situation was too perfect for him, impatient +of effects, scenes, and adumbrations. It reduced his heartburning to +melancholy, and he exclaimed, “Why the deuce did I come here!” He went +on past the cottage in which the old local hangman had lived and died, +in times before that calling was monopolized over all England by a +single gentleman; and climbed up by a steep back lane into the town. + +For the sufferings of that night, engendered by his bitter +disappointment, he might well have been pitied. He was like one who had +half fainted, and could neither recover nor complete the swoon. In +words he could blame his wife, but not in his heart; and had he obeyed +the wise directions outside her letter this pain would have been spared +him for long—possibly for ever, Elizabeth-Jane seeming to show no +ambition to quit her safe and secluded maiden courses for the +speculative path of matrimony. + +The morning came after this night of unrest, and with it the necessity +for a plan. He was far too self-willed to recede from a position, +especially as it would involve humiliation. His daughter he had +asserted her to be, and his daughter she should always think herself, +no matter what hyprocrisy it involved. + +But he was ill-prepared for the first step in this new situation. The +moment he came into the breakfast-room Elizabeth advanced with open +confidence to him and took him by the arm. + +“I have thought and thought all night of it,” she said frankly. “And I +see that everything must be as you say. And I am going to look upon you +as the father that you are, and not to call you Mr. Henchard any more. +It is so plain to me now. Indeed, father, it is. For, of course, you +would not have done half the things you have done for me, and let me +have my own way so entirely, and bought me presents, if I had only been +your stepdaughter! He—Mr. Newson—whom my poor mother married by such a +strange mistake” (Henchard was glad that he had disguised matters +here), “was very kind—O so kind!” (she spoke with tears in her eyes); +“but that is not the same thing as being one’s real father after all. +Now, father, breakfast is ready!” she said cheerfully. + +Henchard bent and kissed her cheek. The moment and the act he had +prefigured for weeks with a thrill of pleasure; yet it was no less than +a miserable insipidity to him now that it had come. His reinstation of +her mother had been chiefly for the girl’s sake, and the fruition of +the whole scheme was such dust and ashes as this. + + + +XX. + +Of all the enigmas which ever confronted a girl there can have been +seldom one like that which followed Henchard’s announcement of himself +to Elizabeth as her father. He had done it in an ardour and an +agitation which had half carried the point of affection with her; yet, +behold, from the next morning onwards his manner was constrained as she +had never seen it before. + +The coldness soon broke out into open chiding. One grievous failing of +Elizabeth’s was her occasional pretty and picturesque use of dialect +words—those terrible marks of the beast to the truly genteel. + +It was dinner-time—they never met except at meals—and she happened to +say when he was rising from table, wishing to show him something, “If +you’ll bide where you be a minute, father, I’ll get it.” + +“‘Bide where you be,’” he echoed sharply, “Good God, are you only fit +to carry wash to a pig-trough, that ye use such words as those?” + +She reddened with shame and sadness. + +“I meant ‘Stay where you are,’ father,” she said, in a low, humble +voice. “I ought to have been more careful.” + +He made no reply, and went out of the room. + +The sharp reprimand was not lost upon her, and in time it came to pass +that for “fay” she said “succeed”; that she no longer spoke of +“dumbledores” but of “humble bees”; no longer said of young men and +women that they “walked together,” but that they were “engaged”; that +she grew to talk of “greggles” as “wild hyacinths”; that when she had +not slept she did not quaintly tell the servants next morning that she +had been “hag-rid,” but that she had “suffered from indigestion.” + +These improvements, however, are somewhat in advance of the story. +Henchard, being uncultivated himself, was the bitterest critic the fair +girl could possibly have had of her own lapses—really slight now, for +she read omnivorously. A gratuitous ordeal was in store for her in the +matter of her handwriting. She was passing the dining-room door one +evening, and had occasion to go in for something. It was not till she +had opened the door that she knew the Mayor was there in the company of +a man with whom he transacted business. + +“Here, Elizabeth-Jane,” he said, looking round at her, “just write down +what I tell you—a few words of an agreement for me and this gentleman +to sign. I am a poor tool with a pen.” + +“Be jowned, and so be I,” said the gentleman. + +She brought forward blotting-book, paper, and ink, and sat down. + +“Now then—‘An agreement entered into this sixteenth day of +October’—write that first.” + +She started the pen in an elephantine march across the sheet. It was a +splendid round, bold hand of her own conception, a style that would +have stamped a woman as Minerva’s own in more recent days. But other +ideas reigned then: Henchard’s creed was that proper young girls wrote +ladies’-hand—nay, he believed that bristling characters were as innate +and inseparable a part of refined womanhood as sex itself. Hence when, +instead of scribbling, like the Princess Ida,— + +“In such a hand as when a field of corn +Bows all its ears before the roaring East,” + + +Elizabeth-Jane produced a line of chain-shot and sand-bags, he reddened +in angry shame for her, and, peremptorily saying, “Never mind—I’ll +finish it,” dismissed her there and then. + +Her considerate disposition became a pitfall to her now. She was, it +must be admitted, sometimes provokingly and unnecessarily willing to +saddle herself with manual labours. She would go to the kitchen instead +of ringing, “Not to make Phoebe come up twice.” She went down on her +knees, shovel in hand, when the cat overturned the coal-scuttle; +moreover, she would persistently thank the parlour-maid for everything, +till one day, as soon as the girl was gone from the room, Henchard +broke out with, “Good God, why dostn’t leave off thanking that girl as +if she were a goddess-born! Don’t I pay her a dozen pound a year to do +things for ’ee?” Elizabeth shrank so visibly at the exclamation that he +became sorry a few minutes after, and said that he did not mean to be +rough. + +These domestic exhibitions were the small protruding needlerocks which +suggested rather than revealed what was underneath. But his passion had +less terror for her than his coldness. The increasing frequency of the +latter mood told her the sad news that he disliked her with a growing +dislike. The more interesting that her appearance and manners became +under the softening influences which she could now command, and in her +wisdom did command, the more she seemed to estrange him. Sometimes she +caught him looking at her with a louring invidiousness that she could +hardly bear. Not knowing his secret it was cruel mockery that she +should for the first time excite his animosity when she had taken his +surname. + +But the most terrible ordeal was to come. Elizabeth had latterly been +accustomed of an afternoon to present a cup of cider or ale and +bread-and-cheese to Nance Mockridge, who worked in the yard wimbling +hay-bonds. Nance accepted this offering thankfully at first; afterwards +as a matter of course. On a day when Henchard was on the premises he +saw his stepdaughter enter the hay-barn on this errand; and, as there +was no clear spot on which to deposit the provisions, she at once set +to work arranging two trusses of hay as a table, Mockridge meanwhile +standing with her hands on her hips, easefully looking at the +preparations on her behalf. + +“Elizabeth, come here!” said Henchard; and she obeyed. + +“Why do you lower yourself so confoundedly?” he said with suppressed +passion. “Haven’t I told you o’t fifty times? Hey? Making yourself a +drudge for a common workwoman of such a character as hers! Why, ye’ll +disgrace me to the dust!” + +Now these words were uttered loud enough to reach Nance inside the barn +door, who fired up immediately at the slur upon her personal character. +Coming to the door she cried regardless of consequences, “Come to that, +Mr. Henchard, I can let ’ee know she’ve waited on worse!” + +“Then she must have had more charity than sense,” said Henchard. + +“O no, she hadn’t. ’Twere not for charity but for hire; and at a +public-house in this town!” + +“It is not true!” cried Henchard indignantly. + +“Just ask her,” said Nance, folding her naked arms in such a manner +that she could comfortably scratch her elbows. + +Henchard glanced at Elizabeth-Jane, whose complexion, now pink and +white from confinement, lost nearly all of the former colour. “What +does this mean?” he said to her. “Anything or nothing?” + +“It is true,” said Elizabeth-Jane. “But it was only—” + +“Did you do it, or didn’t you? Where was it?” + +“At the Three Mariners; one evening for a little while, when we were +staying there.” + +Nance glanced triumphantly at Henchard, and sailed into the barn; for +assuming that she was to be discharged on the instant she had resolved +to make the most of her victory. Henchard, however, said nothing about +discharging her. Unduly sensitive on such points by reason of his own +past, he had the look of one completely ground down to the last +indignity. Elizabeth followed him to the house like a culprit; but when +she got inside she could not see him. Nor did she see him again that +day. + +Convinced of the scathing damage to his local repute and position that +must have been caused by such a fact, though it had never before +reached his own ears, Henchard showed a positive distaste for the +presence of this girl not his own, whenever he encountered her. He +mostly dined with the farmers at the market-room of one of the two +chief hotels, leaving her in utter solitude. Could he have seen how she +made use of those silent hours he might have found reason to reserve +his judgment on her quality. She read and took notes incessantly, +mastering facts with painful laboriousness, but never flinching from +her self-imposed task. She began the study of Latin, incited by the +Roman characteristics of the town she lived in. “If I am not +well-informed it shall be by no fault of my own,” she would say to +herself through the tears that would occasionally glide down her peachy +cheeks when she was fairly baffled by the portentous obscurity of many +of these educational works. + +Thus she lived on, a dumb, deep-feeling, great-eyed creature, construed +by not a single contiguous being; quenching with patient fortitude her +incipient interest in Farfrae, because it seemed to be one-sided, +unmaidenly, and unwise. True, that for reasons best known to herself, +she had, since Farfrae’s dismissal, shifted her quarters from the back +room affording a view of the yard (which she had occupied with such +zest) to a front chamber overlooking the street; but as for the young +man, whenever he passed the house he seldom or never turned his head. + +Winter had almost come, and unsettled weather made her still more +dependent upon indoor resources. But there were certain early winter +days in Casterbridge—days of firmamental exhaustion which followed +angry south-westerly tempests—when, if the sun shone, the air was like +velvet. She seized on these days for her periodical visits to the spot +where her mother lay buried—the still-used burial-ground of the old +Roman-British city, whose curious feature was this, its continuity as a +place of sepulture. Mrs. Henchard’s dust mingled with the dust of women +who lay ornamented with glass hair-pins and amber necklaces, and men +who held in their mouths coins of Hadrian, Posthumus, and the +Constantines. + +Half-past ten in the morning was about her hour for seeking this spot—a +time when the town avenues were deserted as the avenues of Karnac. +Business had long since passed down them into its daily cells, and +Leisure had not arrived there. So Elizabeth-Jane walked and read, or +looked over the edge of the book to think, and thus reached the +churchyard. + +There, approaching her mother’s grave she saw a solitary dark figure in +the middle of the gravel-walk. This figure, too, was reading; but not +from a book: the words which engrossed it being the inscription on Mrs. +Henchard’s tombstone. The personage was in mourning like herself, was +about her age and size, and might have been her wraith or double, but +for the fact that it was a lady much more beautifully dressed than she. +Indeed, comparatively indifferent as Elizabeth-Jane was to dress, +unless for some temporary whim or purpose, her eyes were arrested by +the artistic perfection of the lady’s appearance. Her gait, too, had a +flexuousness about it, which seemed to avoid angularity. It was a +revelation to Elizabeth that human beings could reach this stage of +external development—she had never suspected it. She felt all the +freshness and grace to be stolen from herself on the instant by the +neighbourhood of such a stranger. And this was in face of the fact that +Elizabeth could now have been writ handsome, while the young lady was +simply pretty. + +Had she been envious she might have hated the woman; but she did not do +that—she allowed herself the pleasure of feeling fascinated. She +wondered where the lady had come from. The stumpy and practical walk of +honest homeliness which mostly prevailed there, the two styles of dress +thereabout, the simple and the mistaken, equally avouched that this +figure was no Casterbridge woman’s, even if a book in her hand +resembling a guide-book had not also suggested it. + +The stranger presently moved from the tombstone of Mrs. Henchard, and +vanished behind the corner of the wall. Elizabeth went to the tomb +herself; beside it were two footprints distinct in the soil, signifying +that the lady had stood there a long time. She returned homeward, +musing on what she had seen, as she might have mused on a rainbow or +the Northern Lights, a rare butterfly or a cameo. + +Interesting as things had been out of doors, at home it turned out to +be one of her bad days. Henchard, whose two years’ mayoralty was +ending, had been made aware that he was not to be chosen to fill a +vacancy in the list of aldermen; and that Farfrae was likely to become +one of the Council. This caused the unfortunate discovery that she had +played the waiting-maid in the town of which he was Mayor to rankle in +his mind yet more poisonously. He had learnt by personal inquiry at the +time that it was to Donald Farfrae—that treacherous upstart—that she +had thus humiliated herself. And though Mrs. Stannidge seemed to attach +no great importance to the incident—the cheerful souls at the Three +Mariners having exhausted its aspects long ago—such was Henchard’s +haughty spirit that the simple thrifty deed was regarded as little less +than a social catastrophe by him. + +Ever since the evening of his wife’s arrival with her daughter there +had been something in the air which had changed his luck. That dinner +at the King’s Arms with his friends had been Henchard’s Austerlitz: he +had had his successes since, but his course had not been upward. He was +not to be numbered among the aldermen—that Peerage of burghers—as he +had expected to be, and the consciousness of this soured him to-day. + +“Well, where have you been?” he said to her with offhand laconism. + +“I’ve been strolling in the Walks and churchyard, father, till I feel +quite leery.” She clapped her hand to her mouth, but too late. + +This was just enough to incense Henchard after the other crosses of the +day. “I _won’t_ have you talk like that!” he thundered. “‘Leery,’ +indeed. One would think you worked upon a farm! One day I learn that +you lend a hand in public-houses. Then I hear you talk like a +clodhopper. I’m burned, if it goes on, this house can’t hold us two.” + +The only way of getting a single pleasant thought to go to sleep upon +after this was by recalling the lady she had seen that day, and hoping +she might see her again. + +Meanwhile Henchard was sitting up, thinking over his jealous folly in +forbidding Farfrae to pay his addresses to this girl who did not belong +to him, when if he had allowed them to go on he might not have been +encumbered with her. At last he said to himself with satisfaction as he +jumped up and went to the writing-table: “Ah! he’ll think it means +peace, and a marriage portion—not that I don’t want my house to be +troubled with her, and no portion at all!” He wrote as follows:— + +Sir,—On consideration, I don’t wish to interfere with your courtship of +Elizabeth-Jane, if you care for her. I therefore withdraw my objection; +excepting in this—that the business be not carried on in my +house.—Yours, + + +M. HENCHARD. +Mr. Farfrae. + + +The morrow, being fairly fine, found Elizabeth-Jane again in the +churchyard, but while looking for the lady she was startled by the +apparition of Farfrae, who passed outside the gate. He glanced up for a +moment from a pocket-book in which he appeared to be making figures as +he went; whether or not he saw her he took no notice, and disappeared. + +Unduly depressed by a sense of her own superfluity she thought he +probably scorned her; and quite broken in spirit sat down on a bench. +She fell into painful thought on her position, which ended with her +saying quite loud, “O, I wish I was dead with dear mother!” + +Behind the bench was a little promenade under the wall where people +sometimes walked instead of on the gravel. The bench seemed to be +touched by something, she looked round, and a face was bending over +her, veiled, but still distinct, the face of the young woman she had +seen yesterday. + +Elizabeth-Jane looked confounded for a moment, knowing she had been +overheard, though there was pleasure in her confusion. “Yes, I heard +you,” said the lady, in a vivacious voice, answering her look. “What +can have happened?” + +“I don’t—I can’t tell you,” said Elizabeth, putting her hand to her +face to hide a quick flush that had come. + +There was no movement or word for a few seconds; then the girl felt +that the young lady was sitting down beside her. + +“I guess how it is with you,” said the latter. “That was your mother.” +She waved her hand towards the tombstone. Elizabeth looked up at her as +if inquiring of herself whether there should be confidence. The lady’s +manner was so desirous, so anxious, that the girl decided there should +be confidence. “It was my mother,” she said, “my only friend.” + +“But your father, Mr. Henchard. He is living?” + +“Yes, he is living,” said Elizabeth-Jane. + +“Is he not kind to you?” + +“I’ve no wish to complain of him.” + +“There has been a disagreement?” + +“A little.” + +“Perhaps you were to blame,” suggested the stranger. + +“I was—in many ways,” sighed the meek Elizabeth. “I swept up the coals +when the servants ought to have done it; and I said I was leery;—and he +was angry with me.” + +The lady seemed to warm towards her for that reply. “Do you know the +impression your words give me?” she said ingenuously. “That he is a +hot-tempered man—a little proud—perhaps ambitious; but not a bad man.” +Her anxiety not to condemn Henchard while siding with Elizabeth was +curious. + +“O no; certainly not _bad_,” agreed the honest girl. “And he has not +even been unkind to me till lately—since mother died. But it has been +very much to bear while it has lasted. All is owing to my defects, I +daresay; and my defects are owing to my history.” + +“What is your history?” + +Elizabeth-Jane looked wistfully at her questioner. She found that her +questioner was looking at her, turned her eyes down; and then seemed +compelled to look back again. “My history is not gay or attractive,” +she said. “And yet I can tell it, if you really want to know.” + +The lady assured her that she did want to know; whereupon +Elizabeth-Jane told the tale of her life as she understood it, which +was in general the true one, except that the sale at the fair had no +part therein. + +Contrary to the girl’s expectation her new friend was not shocked. This +cheered her; and it was not till she thought of returning to that home +in which she had been treated so roughly of late that her spirits fell. + +“I don’t know how to return,” she murmured. “I think of going away. But +what can I do? Where can I go?” + +“Perhaps it will be better soon,” said her friend gently. “So I would +not go far. Now what do you think of this: I shall soon want somebody +to live in my house, partly as housekeeper, partly as companion; would +you mind coming to me? But perhaps—” + +“O yes,” cried Elizabeth, with tears in her eyes. “I would, indeed—I +would do anything to be independent; for then perhaps my father might +get to love me. But, ah!” + +“What?” + +“I am no accomplished person. And a companion to you must be that.” + +“O, not necessarily.” + +“Not? But I can’t help using rural words sometimes, when I don’t mean +to.” + +“Never mind, I shall like to know them.” + +“And—O, I know I shan’t do!”—she cried with a distressful laugh. “I +accidentally learned to write round hand instead of ladies’-hand. And, +of course, you want some one who can write that?” + +“Well, no.” + +“What, not necessary to write ladies’-hand?” cried the joyous +Elizabeth. + +“Not at all.” + +“But where do you live?” + +“In Casterbridge, or rather I shall be living here after twelve o’clock +to-day.” + +Elizabeth expressed her astonishment. + +“I have been staying at Budmouth for a few days while my house was +getting ready. The house I am going into is that one they call +High-Place Hall—the old stone one looking down the lane to the market. +Two or three rooms are fit for occupation, though not all: I sleep +there to-night for the first time. Now will you think over my proposal, +and meet me here the first fine day next week, and say if you are still +in the same mind?” + +Elizabeth, her eyes shining at this prospect of a change from an +unbearable position, joyfully assented; and the two parted at the gate +of the churchyard. + + + +XXI. + +As a maxim glibly repeated from childhood remains practically unmarked +till some mature experience enforces it, so did this High-Place Hall +now for the first time really show itself to Elizabeth-Jane, though her +ears had heard its name on a hundred occasions. + +Her mind dwelt upon nothing else but the stranger, and the house, and +her own chance of living there, all the rest of the day. In the +afternoon she had occasion to pay a few bills in the town and do a +little shopping when she learnt that what was a new discovery to +herself had become a common topic about the streets. High-Place Hall +was undergoing repair; a lady was coming there to live shortly; all the +shop-people knew it, and had already discounted the chance of her being +a customer. + +Elizabeth-Jane could, however, add a capping touch to information so +new to her in the bulk. The lady, she said, had arrived that day. + +When the lamps were lighted, and it was yet not so dark as to render +chimneys, attics, and roofs invisible, Elizabeth, almost with a lover’s +feeling, thought she would like to look at the outside of High-Place +Hall. She went up the street in that direction. + +The Hall, with its grey _façade_ and parapet, was the only residence of +its sort so near the centre of the town. It had, in the first place, +the characteristics of a country mansion—birds’ nests in its chimneys, +damp nooks where fungi grew and irregularities of surface direct from +Nature’s trowel. At night the forms of passengers were patterned by the +lamps in black shadows upon the pale walls. + +This evening motes of straw lay around, and other signs of the premises +having been in that lawless condition which accompanies the entry of a +new tenant. The house was entirely of stone, and formed an example of +dignity without great size. It was not altogether aristocratic, still +less consequential, yet the old-fashioned stranger instinctively said +“Blood built it, and Wealth enjoys it” however vague his opinions of +those accessories might be. + +Yet as regards the enjoying it the stranger would have been wrong, for +until this very evening, when the new lady had arrived, the house had +been empty for a year or two while before that interval its occupancy +had been irregular. The reason of its unpopularity was soon made +manifest. Some of its rooms overlooked the market-place; and such a +prospect from such a house was not considered desirable or seemly by +its would-be occupiers. + +Elizabeth’s eyes sought the upper rooms, and saw lights there. The lady +had obviously arrived. The impression that this woman of comparatively +practised manner had made upon the studious girl’s mind was so deep +that she enjoyed standing under an opposite archway merely to think +that the charming lady was inside the confronting walls, and to wonder +what she was doing. Her admiration for the architecture of that front +was entirely on account of the inmate it screened. Though for that +matter the architecture deserved admiration, or at least study, on its +own account. It was Palladian, and like most architecture erected since +the Gothic age was a compilation rather than a design. But its +reasonableness made it impressive. It was not rich, but rich enough. A +timely consciousness of the ultimate vanity of human architecture, no +less than of other human things, had prevented artistic superfluity. + +Men had still quite recently been going in and out with parcels and +packing-cases, rendering the door and hall within like a public +thoroughfare. Elizabeth trotted through the open door in the dusk, but +becoming alarmed at her own temerity she went quickly out again by +another which stood open in the lofty wall of the back court. To her +surprise she found herself in one of the little-used alleys of the +town. Looking round at the door which had given her egress, by the +light of the solitary lamp fixed in the alley, she saw that it was +arched and old—older even than the house itself. The door was studded, +and the keystone of the arch was a mask. Originally the mask had +exhibited a comic leer, as could still be discerned; but generations of +Casterbridge boys had thrown stones at the mask, aiming at its open +mouth; and the blows thereon had chipped off the lips and jaws as if +they had been eaten away by disease. The appearance was so ghastly by +the weakly lamp-glimmer that she could not bear to look at it—the first +unpleasant feature of her visit. + +The position of the queer old door and the odd presence of the leering +mask suggested one thing above all others as appertaining to the +mansion’s past history—intrigue. By the alley it had been possible to +come unseen from all sorts of quarters in the town—the old play-house, +the old bull-stake, the old cock-pit, the pool wherein nameless infants +had been used to disappear. High-Place Hall could boast of its +conveniences undoubtedly. + +She turned to come away in the nearest direction homeward, which was +down the alley, but hearing footsteps approaching in that quarter, and +having no great wish to be found in such a place at such a time she +quickly retreated. There being no other way out she stood behind a +brick pier till the intruder should have gone his ways. + +Had she watched she would have been surprised. She would have seen that +the pedestrian on coming up made straight for the arched doorway: that +as he paused with his hand upon the latch the lamplight fell upon the +face of Henchard. + +But Elizabeth-Jane clung so closely to her nook that she discerned +nothing of this. Henchard passed in, as ignorant of her presence as she +was ignorant of his identity, and disappeared in the darkness. +Elizabeth came out a second time into the alley, and made the best of +her way home. + +Henchard’s chiding, by begetting in her a nervous fear of doing +anything definable as unladylike, had operated thus curiously in +keeping them unknown to each other at a critical moment. Much might +have resulted from recognition—at the least a query on either side in +one and the selfsame form: What could he or she possibly be doing +there? + +Henchard, whatever his business at the lady’s house, reached his own +home only a few minutes later than Elizabeth-Jane. Her plan was to +broach the question of leaving his roof this evening; the events of the +day had urged her to the course. But its execution depended upon his +mood, and she anxiously awaited his manner towards her. She found that +it had changed. He showed no further tendency to be angry; he showed +something worse. Absolute indifference had taken the place of +irritability; and his coldness was such that it encouraged her to +departure, even more than hot temper could have done. + +“Father, have you any objection to my going away?” she asked. + +“Going away! No—none whatever. Where are you going?” + +She thought it undesirable and unnecessary to say anything at present +about her destination to one who took so little interest in her. He +would know that soon enough. “I have heard of an opportunity of getting +more cultivated and finished, and being less idle,” she answered, with +hesitation. “A chance of a place in a household where I can have +advantages of study, and seeing refined life.” + +“Then make the best of it, in Heaven’s name—if you can’t get cultivated +where you are.” + +“You don’t object?” + +“Object—I? Ho—no! Not at all.” After a pause he said, “But you won’t +have enough money for this lively scheme without help, you know? If you +like I should be willing to make you an allowance, so that you not be +bound to live upon the starvation wages refined folk are likely to pay +’ee.” + +She thanked him for this offer. + +“It had better be done properly,” he added after a pause. “A small +annuity is what I should like you to have—so as to be independent of +me—and so that I may be independent of you. Would that please ye?” + +“Certainly.” + +“Then I’ll see about it this very day.” He seemed relieved to get her +off his hands by this arrangement, and as far as they were concerned +the matter was settled. She now simply waited to see the lady again. + +The day and the hour came; but a drizzling rain fell. Elizabeth-Jane +having now changed her orbit from one of gay independence to laborious +self-help, thought the weather good enough for such declined glory as +hers, if her friend would only face it—a matter of doubt. She went to +the boot-room where her pattens had hung ever since her apotheosis; +took them down, had their mildewed leathers blacked, and put them on as +she had done in old times. Thus mounted, and with cloak and umbrella, +she went off to the place of appointment—intending, if the lady were +not there, to call at the house. + +One side of the churchyard—the side towards the weather—was sheltered +by an ancient thatched mud wall whose eaves overhung as much as one or +two feet. At the back of the wall was a corn-yard with its granary and +barns—the place wherein she had met Farfrae many months earlier. Under +the projection of the thatch she saw a figure. The young lady had come. + +Her presence so exceptionally substantiated the girl’s utmost hopes +that she almost feared her good fortune. Fancies find rooms in the +strongest minds. Here, in a churchyard old as civilization, in the +worst of weathers, was a strange woman of curious fascinations never +seen elsewhere: there might be some devilry about her presence. +However, Elizabeth went on to the church tower, on whose summit the +rope of a flagstaff rattled in the wind; and thus she came to the wall. + +The lady had such a cheerful aspect in the drizzle that Elizabeth +forgot her fancy. “Well,” said the lady, a little of the whiteness of +her teeth appearing with the word through the black fleece that +protected her face, “have you decided?” + +“Yes, quite,” said the other eagerly. + +“Your father is willing?” + +“Yes.” + +“Then come along.” + +“When?” + +“Now—as soon as you like. I had a good mind to send to you to come to +my house, thinking you might not venture up here in the wind. But as I +like getting out of doors, I thought I would come and see first.” + +“It was my own thought.” + +“That shows we shall agree. Then can you come to-day? My house is so +hollow and dismal that I want some living thing there.” + +“I think I might be able to,” said the girl, reflecting. + +Voices were borne over to them at that instant on the wind and +raindrops from the other side of the wall. There came such words as +“sacks,” “quarters,” “threshing,” “tailing,” “next Saturday’s market,” +each sentence being disorganized by the gusts like a face in a cracked +mirror. Both the women listened. + +“Who are those?” said the lady. + +“One is my father. He rents that yard and barn.” + +The lady seemed to forget the immediate business in listening to the +technicalities of the corn trade. At last she said suddenly, “Did you +tell him where you were going to?” + +“No.” + +“O—how was that?” + +“I thought it safer to get away first—as he is so uncertain in his +temper.” + +“Perhaps you are right.... Besides, I have never told you my name. It +is Miss Templeman.... Are they gone—on the other side?” + +“No. They have only gone up into the granary.” + +“Well, it is getting damp here. I shall expect you to-day—this evening, +say, at six.” + +“Which way shall I come, ma’am?” + +“The front way—round by the gate. There is no other that I have +noticed.” + +Elizabeth-Jane had been thinking of the door in the alley. + +“Perhaps, as you have not mentioned your destination, you may as well +keep silent upon it till you are clear off. Who knows but that he may +alter his mind?” + +Elizabeth-Jane shook her head. “On consideration I don’t fear it,” she +said sadly. “He has grown quite cold to me.” + +“Very well. Six o’clock then.” + +When they had emerged upon the open road and parted, they found enough +to do in holding their bowed umbrellas to the wind. Nevertheless the +lady looked in at the corn-yard gates as she passed them, and paused on +one foot for a moment. But nothing was visible there save the ricks, +and the humpbacked barn cushioned with moss, and the granary rising +against the church-tower behind, where the smacking of the rope against +the flag-staff still went on. + +Now Henchard had not the slightest suspicion that Elizabeth-Jane’s +movement was to be so prompt. Hence when, just before six, he reached +home and saw a fly at the door from the King’s Arms, and his +stepdaughter, with all her little bags and boxes, getting into it, he +was taken by surprise. + +“But you said I might go, father?” she explained through the carriage +window. + +“Said!—yes. But I thought you meant next month, or next year. ’Od, +seize it—you take time by the forelock! This, then, is how you be going +to treat me for all my trouble about ye?” + +“O father! how can you speak like that? It is unjust of you!” she said +with spirit. + +“Well, well, have your own way,” he replied. He entered the house, and, +seeing that all her things had not yet been brought down, went up to +her room to look on. He had never been there since she had occupied it. +Evidences of her care, of her endeavours for improvement, were visible +all around, in the form of books, sketches, maps, and little +arrangements for tasteful effects. Henchard had known nothing of these +efforts. He gazed at them, turned suddenly about, and came down to the +door. + +“Look here,” he said, in an altered voice—he never called her by name +now—“don’t ’ee go away from me. It may be I’ve spoke roughly to you—but +I’ve been grieved beyond everything by you—there’s something that +caused it.” + +“By me?” she said, with deep concern. “What have I done?” + +“I can’t tell you now. But if you’ll stop, and go on living as my +daughter, I’ll tell you all in time.” + +But the proposal had come ten minutes too late. She was in the fly—was +already, in imagination, at the house of the lady whose manner had such +charms for her. “Father,” she said, as considerately as she could, “I +think it best for us that I go on now. I need not stay long; I shall +not be far away, and if you want me badly I can soon come back again.” + +He nodded ever so slightly, as a receipt of her decision and no more. +“You are not going far, you say. What will be your address, in case I +wish to write to you? Or am I not to know?” + +“Oh yes—certainly. It is only in the town—High-Place Hall!” + +“Where?” said Henchard, his face stilling. + +She repeated the words. He neither moved nor spoke, and waving her hand +to him in utmost friendliness she signified to the flyman to drive up +the street. + + + +XXII. + +We go back for a moment to the preceding night, to account for +Henchard’s attitude. + +At the hour when Elizabeth-Jane was contemplating her stealthy +reconnoitring excursion to the abode of the lady of her fancy, he had +been not a little amazed at receiving a letter by hand in Lucetta’s +well-known characters. The self-repression, the resignation of her +previous communication had vanished from her mood; she wrote with some +of the natural lightness which had marked her in their early +acquaintance. + +HIGH-PLACE HALL +MY DEAR MR. HENCHARD,—Don’t be surprised. It is for your good and mine, +as I hope, that I have come to live at Casterbridge—for how long I +cannot tell. That depends upon another; and he is a man, and a +merchant, and a Mayor, and one who has the first right to my +affections. + Seriously, _mon ami_, I am not so light-hearted as I may seem to be + from this. I have come here in consequence of hearing of the death + of your wife—whom you used to think of as dead so many years + before! Poor woman, she seems to have been a sufferer, though + uncomplaining, and though weak in intellect not an imbecile. I am + glad you acted fairly by her. As soon as I knew she was no more, it + was brought home to me very forcibly by my conscience that I ought + to endeavour to disperse the shade which my _étourderie_ flung over + my name, by asking you to carry out your promise to me. I hope you + are of the same mind, and that you will take steps to this end. As, + however, I did not know how you were situated, or what had happened + since our separation, I decided to come and establish myself here + before communicating with you. + You probably feel as I do about this. I shall be able to see you in + a day or two. Till then, farewell.—Yours, + + +LUCETTA. + + +_P.S._—I was unable to keep my appointment to meet you for a moment or +two in passing through Casterbridge the other day. My plans were +altered by a family event, which it will surprise you to hear of. + + +Henchard had already heard that High-Place Hall was being prepared for +a tenant. He said with a puzzled air to the first person he +encountered, “Who is coming to live at the Hall?” + +“A lady of the name of Templeman, I believe, sir,” said his informant. + +Henchard thought it over. “Lucetta is related to her, I suppose,” he +said to himself. “Yes, I must put her in her proper position, +undoubtedly.” + +It was by no means with the oppression that would once have accompanied +the thought that he regarded the moral necessity now; it was, indeed, +with interest, if not warmth. His bitter disappointment at finding +Elizabeth-Jane to be none of his, and himself a childless man, had left +an emotional void in Henchard that he unconsciously craved to fill. In +this frame of mind, though without strong feeling, he had strolled up +the alley and into High-Place Hall by the postern at which Elizabeth +had so nearly encountered him. He had gone on thence into the court, +and inquired of a man whom he saw unpacking china from a crate if Miss +Le Sueur was living there. Miss Le Sueur had been the name under which +he had known Lucetta—or “Lucette,” as she had called herself at that +time. + +The man replied in the negative; that Miss Templeman only had come. +Henchard went away, concluding that Lucetta had not as yet settled in. + +He was in this interested stage of the inquiry when he witnessed +Elizabeth-Jane’s departure the next day. On hearing her announce the +address there suddenly took possession of him the strange thought that +Lucetta and Miss Templeman were one and the same person, for he could +recall that in her season of intimacy with him the name of the rich +relative whom he had deemed somewhat a mythical personage had been +given as Templeman. Though he was not a fortune-hunter, the possibility +that Lucetta had been sublimed into a lady of means by some munificent +testament on the part of this relative lent a charm to her image which +it might not otherwise have acquired. He was getting on towards the +dead level of middle age, when material things increasingly possess the +mind. + +But Henchard was not left long in suspense. Lucetta was rather addicted +to scribbling, as had been shown by the torrent of letters after the +_fiasco_ in their marriage arrangements, and hardly had Elizabeth gone +away when another note came to the Mayor’s house from High-Place Hall. + +“I am in residence,” she said, “and comfortable, though getting here +has been a wearisome undertaking. You probably know what I am going to +tell you, or do you not? My good Aunt Templeman, the banker’s widow, +whose very existence you used to doubt, much more her affluence, has +lately died, and bequeathed some of her property to me. I will not +enter into details except to say that I have taken her name—as a means +of escape from mine, and its wrongs. + +“I am now my own mistress, and have chosen to reside in Casterbridge—to +be tenant of High-Place Hall, that at least you may be put to no +trouble if you wish to see me. My first intention was to keep you in +ignorance of the changes in my life till you should meet me in the +street; but I have thought better of this. + +“You probably are aware of my arrangement with your daughter, and have +doubtless laughed at the—what shall I call it?—practical joke (in all +affection) of my getting her to live with me. But my first meeting with +her was purely an accident. Do you see, Michael, partly why I have done +it?—why, to give you an excuse for coming here as if to visit _her_, +and thus to form my acquaintance naturally. She is a dear, good girl, +and she thinks you have treated her with undue severity. You may have +done so in your haste, but not deliberately, I am sure. As the result +has been to bring her to me I am not disposed to upbraid you.—In haste, +yours always, + +“LUCETTA.” + +The excitement which these announcements produced in Henchard’s gloomy +soul was to him most pleasurable. He sat over his dining-table long and +dreamily, and by an almost mechanical transfer the sentiments which had +run to waste since his estrangement from Elizabeth-Jane and Donald +Farfrae gathered around Lucetta before they had grown dry. She was +plainly in a very coming-on disposition for marriage. But what else +could a poor woman be who had given her time and her heart to him so +thoughtlessly, at that former time, as to lose her credit by it? +Probably conscience no less than affection had brought her here. On the +whole he did not blame her. + +“The artful little woman!” he said, smiling (with reference to +Lucetta’s adroit and pleasant manœuvre with Elizabeth-Jane). + +To feel that he would like to see Lucetta was with Henchard to start +for her house. He put on his hat and went. It was between eight and +nine o’clock when he reached her door. The answer brought him was that +Miss Templeman was engaged for that evening; but that she would be +happy to see him the next day. + +“That’s rather like giving herself airs!” he thought. “And considering +what we—” But after all, she plainly had not expected him, and he took +the refusal quietly. Nevertheless he resolved not to go next day. +“These cursed women—there’s not an inch of straight grain in ’em!” he +said. + +Let us follow the train of Mr. Henchard’s thought as if it were a clue +line, and view the interior of High-Place Hall on this particular +evening. + +On Elizabeth-Jane’s arrival she had been phlegmatically asked by an +elderly woman to go upstairs and take off her things. She replied with +great earnestness that she would not think of giving that trouble, and +on the instant divested herself of her bonnet and cloak in the passage. +She was then conducted to the first floor on the landing, and left to +find her way further alone. + +The room disclosed was prettily furnished as a boudoir or small +drawing-room, and on a sofa with two cylindrical pillows reclined a +dark-haired, large-eyed, pretty woman, of unmistakably French +extraction on one side or the other. She was probably some years older +than Elizabeth, and had a sparkling light in her eye. In front of the +sofa was a small table, with a pack of cards scattered upon it faces +upward. + +The attitude had been so full of abandonment that she bounded up like a +spring on hearing the door open. + +Perceiving that it was Elizabeth she lapsed into ease, and came across +to her with a reckless skip that innate grace only prevented from being +boisterous. + +“Why, you are late,” she said, taking hold of Elizabeth-Jane’s hands. + +“There were so many little things to put up.” + +“And you seem dead-alive and tired. Let me try to enliven you by some +wonderful tricks I have learnt, to kill time. Sit there and don’t +move.” She gathered up the pack of cards, pulled the table in front of +her, and began to deal them rapidly, telling Elizabeth to choose some. + +“Well, have you chosen?” she asked flinging down the last card. + +“No,” stammered Elizabeth, arousing herself from a reverie. “I forgot, +I was thinking of—you, and me—and how strange it is that I am here.” + +Miss Templeman looked at Elizabeth-Jane with interest, and laid down +the cards. “Ah! never mind,” she said. “I’ll lie here while you sit by +me; and we’ll talk.” + +Elizabeth drew up silently to the head of the sofa, but with obvious +pleasure. It could be seen that though in years she was younger than +her entertainer in manner and general vision she seemed more of the +sage. Miss Templeman deposited herself on the sofa in her former +flexuous position, and throwing her arm above her brow—somewhat in the +pose of a well-known conception of Titian’s—talked up at Elizabeth-Jane +invertedly across her forehead and arm. + +“I must tell you something,” she said. “I wonder if you have suspected +it. I have only been mistress of a large house and fortune a little +while.” + +“Oh—only a little while?” murmured Elizabeth-Jane, her countenance +slightly falling. + +“As a girl I lived about in garrison towns and elsewhere with my +father, till I was quite flighty and unsettled. He was an officer in +the army. I should not have mentioned this had I not thought it best +you should know the truth.” + +“Yes, yes.” She looked thoughtfully round the room—at the little square +piano with brass inlayings, at the window-curtains, at the lamp, at the +fair and dark kings and queens on the card-table, and finally at the +inverted face of Lucetta Templeman, whose large lustrous eyes had such +an odd effect upside down. + +Elizabeth’s mind ran on acquirements to an almost morbid degree. “You +speak French and Italian fluently, no doubt,” she said. “I have not +been able to get beyond a wretched bit of Latin yet.” + +“Well, for that matter, in my native isle speaking French does not go +for much. It is rather the other way.” + +“Where is your native isle?” + +It was with rather more reluctance that Miss Templeman said, “Jersey. +There they speak French on one side of the street and English on the +other, and a mixed tongue in the middle of the road. But it is a long +time since I was there. Bath is where my people really belong to, +though my ancestors in Jersey were as good as anybody in England. They +were the Le Sueurs, an old family who have done great things in their +time. I went back and lived there after my father’s death. But I don’t +value such past matters, and am quite an English person in my feelings +and tastes.” + +Lucetta’s tongue had for a moment outrun her discretion. She had +arrived at Casterbridge as a Bath lady, and there were obvious reasons +why Jersey should drop out of her life. But Elizabeth had tempted her +to make free, and a deliberately formed resolve had been broken. + +It could not, however, have been broken in safer company. Lucetta’s +words went no further, and after this day she was so much upon her +guard that there appeared no chance of her identification with the +young Jersey woman who had been Henchard’s dear comrade at a critical +time. Not the least amusing of her safeguards was her resolute +avoidance of a French word if one by accident came to her tongue more +readily than its English equivalent. She shirked it with the suddenness +of the weak Apostle at the accusation, “Thy speech bewrayeth thee!” + +Expectancy sat visibly upon Lucetta the next morning. She dressed +herself for Mr. Henchard, and restlessly awaited his call before +mid-day; as he did not come she waited on through the afternoon. But +she did not tell Elizabeth that the person expected was the girl’s +stepfather. + +They sat in adjoining windows of the same room in Lucetta’s great stone +mansion, netting, and looking out upon the market, which formed an +animated scene. Elizabeth could see the crown of her stepfather’s hat +among the rest beneath, and was not aware that Lucetta watched the same +object with yet intenser interest. He moved about amid the throng, at +this point lively as an ant-hill; elsewhere more reposeful, and broken +up by stalls of fruit and vegetables. The farmers as a rule preferred +the open _carrefour_ for their transactions, despite its inconvenient +jostlings and the danger from crossing vehicles, to the gloomy +sheltered market-room provided for them. Here they surged on this one +day of the week, forming a little world of leggings, switches, and +sample-bags; men of extensive stomachs, sloping like mountain sides; +men whose heads in walking swayed as the trees in November gales; who +in conversing varied their attitudes much, lowering themselves by +spreading their knees, and thrusting their hands into the pockets of +remote inner jackets. Their faces radiated tropical warmth; for though +when at home their countenances varied with the seasons, their +market-faces all the year round were glowing little fires. + +All over-clothes here were worn as if they were an inconvenience, a +hampering necessity. Some men were well dressed; but the majority were +careless in that respect, appearing in suits which were historical +records of their wearer’s deeds, sun-scorchings, and daily struggles +for many years past. Yet many carried ruffled cheque-books in their +pockets which regulated at the bank hard by a balance of never less +than four figures. In fact, what these gibbous human shapes specially +represented was ready money—money insistently ready—not ready next year +like a nobleman’s—often not merely ready at the bank like a +professional man’s, but ready in their large plump hands. + +It happened that to-day there rose in the midst of them all two or +three tall apple-trees standing as if they grew on the spot; till it +was perceived that they were held by men from the cider-districts who +came here to sell them, bringing the clay of their county on their +boots. Elizabeth-Jane, who had often observed them, said, “I wonder if +the same trees come every week?” + +“What trees?” said Lucetta, absorbed in watching for Henchard. + +Elizabeth replied vaguely, for an incident checked her. Behind one of +the trees stood Farfrae, briskly discussing a sample-bag with a farmer. +Henchard had come up, accidentally encountering the young man, whose +face seemed to inquire, “Do we speak to each other?” + +She saw her stepfather throw a shine into his eye which answered “No!” +Elizabeth-Jane sighed. + +“Are you particularly interested in anybody out there?” said Lucetta. + +“O, no,” said her companion, a quick red shooting over her face. + +Luckily Farfrae’s figure was immediately covered by the apple-tree. + +Lucetta looked hard at her. “Quite sure?” she said. + +“O yes,” said Elizabeth-Jane. + +Again Lucetta looked out. “They are all farmers, I suppose?” she said. + +“No. There’s Mr. Bulge—he’s a wine merchant; there’s Benjamin +Brownlet—a horse dealer; and Kitson, the pig breeder; and Yopper, the +auctioneer; besides maltsters, and millers—and so on.” Farfrae stood +out quite distinctly now; but she did not mention him. + +The Saturday afternoon slipped on thus desultorily. The market changed +from the sample-showing hour to the idle hour before starting +homewards, when tales were told. Henchard had not called on Lucetta +though he had stood so near. He must have been too busy, she thought. +He would come on Sunday or Monday. + +The days came but not the visitor, though Lucetta repeated her dressing +with scrupulous care. She got disheartened. It may at once be declared +that Lucetta no longer bore towards Henchard all that warm allegiance +which had characterized her in their first acquaintance, the then +unfortunate issue of things had chilled pure love considerably. But +there remained a conscientious wish to bring about her union with him, +now that there was nothing to hinder it—to right her position—which in +itself was a happiness to sigh for. With strong social reasons on her +side why their marriage should take place there had ceased to be any +worldly reason on his why it should be postponed, since she had +succeeded to fortune. + +Tuesday was the great Candlemas fair. At breakfast she said to +Elizabeth-Jane quite coolly: “I imagine your father may call to see you +to-day. I suppose he stands close by in the market-place with the rest +of the corn-dealers?” + +She shook her head. “He won’t come.” + +“Why?” + +“He has taken against me,” she said in a husky voice. + +“You have quarreled more deeply than I know of.” + +Elizabeth, wishing to shield the man she believed to be her father from +any charge of unnatural dislike, said “Yes.” + +“Then where you are is, of all places, the one he will avoid?” + +Elizabeth nodded sadly. + +Lucetta looked blank, twitched up her lovely eyebrows and lip, and +burst into hysterical sobs. Here was a disaster—her ingenious scheme +completely stultified. + +“O, my dear Miss Templeman—what’s the matter?” cried her companion. + +“I like your company much!” said Lucetta, as soon as she could speak. + +“Yes, yes—and so do I yours!” Elizabeth chimed in soothingly. + +“But—but—” She could not finish the sentence, which was, naturally, +that if Henchard had such a rooted dislike for the girl as now seemed +to be the case, Elizabeth-Jane would have to be got rid of—a +disagreeable necessity. + +A provisional resource suggested itself. “Miss Henchard—will you go on +an errand for me as soon as breakfast is over?—Ah, that’s very good of +you. Will you go and order—” Here she enumerated several commissions at +sundry shops, which would occupy Elizabeth’s time for the next hour or +two, at least. + +“And have you ever seen the Museum?” + +Elizabeth-Jane had not. + +“Then you should do so at once. You can finish the morning by going +there. It is an old house in a back street—I forget where—but you’ll +find out—and there are crowds of interesting things—skeletons, teeth, +old pots and pans, ancient boots and shoes, birds’ eggs—all charmingly +instructive. You’ll be sure to stay till you get quite hungry.” + +Elizabeth hastily put on her things and departed. “I wonder why she +wants to get rid of me to-day!” she said sorrowfully as she went. That +her absence, rather than her services or instruction, was in request, +had been readily apparent to Elizabeth-Jane, simple as she seemed, and +difficult as it was to attribute a motive for the desire. + +She had not been gone ten minutes when one of Lucetta’s servants was +sent to Henchard’s with a note. The contents were briefly:— + +DEAR MICHAEL,—You will be standing in view of my house to-day for two +or three hours in the course of your business, so do please call and +see me. I am sadly disappointed that you have not come before, for can +I help anxiety about my own equivocal relation to you?—especially now +my aunt’s fortune has brought me more prominently before society? Your +daughter’s presence here may be the cause of your neglect; and I have +therefore sent her away for the morning. Say you come on business—I +shall be quite alone. + + +LUCETTA. + + +When the messenger returned her mistress gave directions that if a +gentleman called he was to be admitted at once, and sat down to await +results. + +Sentimentally she did not much care to see him—his delays had wearied +her, but it was necessary; and with a sigh she arranged herself +picturesquely in the chair; first this way, then that; next so that the +light fell over her head. Next she flung herself on the couch in the +cyma-recta curve which so became her, and with her arm over her brow +looked towards the door. This, she decided, was the best position after +all, and thus she remained till a man’s step was heard on the stairs. +Whereupon Lucetta, forgetting her curve (for Nature was too strong for +Art as yet), jumped up and ran and hid herself behind one of the +window-curtains in a freak of timidity. In spite of the waning of +passion the situation was an agitating one—she had not seen Henchard +since his (supposed) temporary parting from her in Jersey. + +She could hear the servant showing the visitor into the room, shutting +the door upon him, and leaving as if to go and look for her mistress. +Lucetta flung back the curtain with a nervous greeting. The man before +her was not Henchard. + + + +XXIII. + +A conjecture that her visitor might be some other person had, indeed, +flashed through Lucetta’s mind when she was on the point of bursting +out; but it was just too late to recede. + +He was years younger than the Mayor of Casterbridge; fair, fresh, and +slenderly handsome. He wore genteel cloth leggings with white buttons, +polished boots with infinite lace holes, light cord breeches under a +black velveteen coat and waistcoat; and he had a silver-topped switch +in his hand. Lucetta blushed, and said with a curious mixture of pout +and laugh on her face—“O, I’ve made a mistake!” + +The visitor, on the contrary, did not laugh half a wrinkle. + +“But I’m very sorry!” he said, in deprecating tones. “I came and I +inquired for Miss Henchard, and they showed me up here, and in no case +would I have caught ye so unmannerly if I had known!” + +“I was the unmannerly one,” she said. + +“But is it that I have come to the wrong house, madam?” said Mr. +Farfrae, blinking a little in his bewilderment and nervously tapping +his legging with his switch. + +“O no, sir,—sit down. You must come and sit down now you are here,” +replied Lucetta kindly, to relieve his embarrassment. “Miss Henchard +will be here directly.” + +Now this was not strictly true; but that something about the young +man—that hyperborean crispness, stringency, and charm, as of a +well-braced musical instrument, which had awakened the interest of +Henchard, and of Elizabeth-Jane and of the Three Mariners’ jovial crew, +at sight, made his unexpected presence here attractive to Lucetta. He +hesitated, looked at the chair, thought there was no danger in it +(though there was), and sat down. + +Farfrae’s sudden entry was simply the result of Henchard’s permission +to him to see Elizabeth if he were minded to woo her. At first he had +taken no notice of Henchard’s brusque letter; but an exceptionally +fortunate business transaction put him on good terms with everybody, +and revealed to him that he could undeniably marry if he chose. Then +who so pleasing, thrifty, and satisfactory in every way as +Elizabeth-Jane? Apart from her personal recommendations a +reconciliation with his former friend Henchard would, in the natural +course of things, flow from such a union. He therefore forgave the +Mayor his curtness; and this morning on his way to the fair he had +called at her house, where he learnt that she was staying at Miss +Templeman’s. A little stimulated at not finding her ready and +waiting—so fanciful are men!—he hastened on to High-Place Hall to +encounter no Elizabeth but its mistress herself. + +“The fair to-day seems a large one,” she said when, by natural +deviation, their eyes sought the busy scene without. “Your numerous +fairs and markets keep me interested. How many things I think of while +I watch from here!” + +He seemed in doubt how to answer, and the babble without reached them +as they sat—voices as of wavelets on a looping sea, one ever and anon +rising above the rest. “Do you look out often?” he asked. + +“Yes—very often.” + +“Do you look for any one you know?” + +Why should she have answered as she did? + +“I look as at a picture merely. But,” she went on, turning pleasantly +to him, “I may do so now—I may look for you. You are always there, are +you not? Ah—I don’t mean it seriously! But it is amusing to look for +somebody one knows in a crowd, even if one does not want him. It takes +off the terrible oppressiveness of being surrounded by a throng, and +having no point of junction with it through a single individual.” + +“Ay! Maybe you’ll be very lonely, ma’am?” + +“Nobody knows how lonely.” + +“But you are rich, they say?” + +“If so, I don’t know how to enjoy my riches. I came to Casterbridge +thinking I should like to live here. But I wonder if I shall.” + +“Where did ye come from, ma’am?” + +“The neighbourhood of Bath.” + +“And I from near Edinboro’,” he murmured. “It’s better to stay at home, +and that’s true; but a man must live where his money is made. It is a +great pity, but it’s always so! Yet I’ve done very well this year. O +yes,” he went on with ingenuous enthusiasm. “You see that man with the +drab kerseymere coat? I bought largely of him in the autumn when wheat +was down, and then afterwards when it rose a little I sold off all I +had! It brought only a small profit to me; while the farmers kept +theirs, expecting higher figures—yes, though the rats were gnawing the +ricks hollow. Just when I sold the markets went lower, and I bought up +the corn of those who had been holding back at less price than my first +purchases. And then,” cried Farfrae impetuously, his face alight, “I +sold it a few weeks after, when it happened to go up again! And so, by +contenting mysel’ with small profits frequently repeated, I soon made +five hundred pounds—yes!”—(bringing down his hand upon the table, and +quite forgetting where he was)—“while the others by keeping theirs in +hand made nothing at all!” + +Lucetta regarded him with a critical interest. He was quite a new type +of person to her. At last his eye fell upon the lady’s and their +glances met. + +“Ay, now, I’m wearying you!” he exclaimed. + +She said, “No, indeed,” colouring a shade. + +“What then?” + +“Quite otherwise. You are most interesting.” + +It was now Farfrae who showed the modest pink. + +“I mean all you Scotchmen,” she added in hasty correction. “So free +from Southern extremes. We common people are all one way or the +other—warm or cold, passionate or frigid. You have both temperatures +going on in you at the same time.” + +“But how do you mean that? Ye were best to explain clearly, ma’am.” + +“You are animated—then you are thinking of getting on. You are sad the +next moment—then you are thinking of Scotland and friends.” + +“Yes. I think of home sometimes!” he said simply. + +“So do I—as far as I can. But it was an old house where I was born, and +they pulled it down for improvements, so I seem hardly to have any home +to think of now.” + +Lucetta did not add, as she might have done, that the house was in St. +Helier, and not in Bath. + +“But the mountains, and the mists and the rocks, they are there! And +don’t they seem like home?” + +She shook her head. + +“They do to me—they do to me,” he murmured. And his mind could be seen +flying away northwards. Whether its origin were national or personal, +it was quite true what Lucetta had said, that the curious double +strands in Farfrae’s thread of life—the commercial and the +romantic—were very distinct at times. Like the colours in a variegated +cord those contrasts could be seen intertwisted, yet not mingling. + +“You are wishing you were back again,” she said. + +“Ah, no, ma’am,” said Farfrae, suddenly recalling himself. + +The fair without the windows was now raging thick and loud. It was the +chief hiring fair of the year, and differed quite from the market of a +few days earlier. In substance it was a whitey-brown crowd flecked with +white—this being the body of labourers waiting for places. The long +bonnets of the women, like waggon-tilts, their cotton gowns and checked +shawls, mixed with the carters’ smockfrocks; for they, too, entered +into the hiring. Among the rest, at the corner of the pavement, stood +an old shepherd, who attracted the eyes of Lucetta and Farfrae by his +stillness. He was evidently a chastened man. The battle of life had +been a sharp one with him, for, to begin with, he was a man of small +frame. He was now so bowed by hard work and years that, approaching +from behind, a person could hardly see his head. He had planted the +stem of his crook in the gutter and was resting upon the bow, which was +polished to silver brightness by the long friction of his hands. He had +quite forgotten where he was, and what he had come for, his eyes being +bent on the ground. A little way off negotiations were proceeding which +had reference to him; but he did not hear them, and there seemed to be +passing through his mind pleasant visions of the hiring successes of +his prime, when his skill laid open to him any farm for the asking. + +The negotiations were between a farmer from a distant county and the +old man’s son. In these there was a difficulty. The farmer would not +take the crust without the crumb of the bargain, in other words, the +old man without the younger; and the son had a sweetheart on his +present farm, who stood by, waiting the issue with pale lips. + +“I’m sorry to leave ye, Nelly,” said the young man with emotion. “But, +you see, I can’t starve father, and he’s out o’ work at Lady-day. ’Tis +only thirty-five mile.” + +The girl’s lips quivered. “Thirty-five mile!” she murmured. “Ah! ’tis +enough! I shall never see ’ee again!” It was, indeed, a hopeless length +of traction for Dan Cupid’s magnet; for young men were young men at +Casterbridge as elsewhere. + +“O! no, no—I never shall,” she insisted, when he pressed her hand; and +she turned her face to Lucetta’s wall to hide her weeping. The farmer +said he would give the young man half-an-hour for his answer, and went +away, leaving the group sorrowing. + +Lucetta’s eyes, full of tears, met Farfrae’s. His, too, to her +surprise, were moist at the scene. + +“It is very hard,” she said with strong feelings. “Lovers ought not to +be parted like that! O, if I had my wish, I’d let people live and love +at their pleasure!” + +“Maybe I can manage that they’ll not be parted,” said Farfrae. “I want +a young carter; and perhaps I’ll take the old man too—yes; he’ll not be +very expensive, and doubtless he will answer my pairrpose somehow.” + +“O, you are so good!” she cried, delighted. “Go and tell them, and let +me know if you have succeeded!” + +Farfrae went out, and she saw him speak to the group. The eyes of all +brightened; the bargain was soon struck. Farfrae returned to her +immediately it was concluded. + +“It is kind-hearted of you, indeed,” said Lucetta. “For my part, I have +resolved that all my servants shall have lovers if they want them! Do +make the same resolve!” + +Farfrae looked more serious, waving his head a half turn. “I must be a +little stricter than that,” he said. + +“Why?” + +“You are a—a thriving woman; and I am a struggling hay-and-corn +merchant.” + +“I am a very ambitious woman.” + +“Ah, well, I cannet explain. I don’t know how to talk to ladies, +ambitious or no; and that’s true,” said Donald with grave regret. “I +try to be civil to a’ folk—no more!” + +“I see you are as you say,” replied she, sensibly getting the upper +hand in these exchanges of sentiment. Under this revelation of insight +Farfrae again looked out of the window into the thick of the fair. + +Two farmers met and shook hands, and being quite near the window their +remarks could be heard as others’ had been. + +“Have you seen young Mr. Farfrae this morning?” asked one. “He promised +to meet me here at the stroke of twelve; but I’ve gone athwart and +about the fair half-a-dozen times, and never a sign of him: though he’s +mostly a man to his word.” + +“I quite forgot the engagement,” murmured Farfrae. + +“Now you must go,” said she; “must you not?” + +“Yes,” he replied. But he still remained. + +“You had better go,” she urged. “You will lose a customer. + +“Now, Miss Templeman, you will make me angry,” exclaimed Farfrae. + +“Then suppose you don’t go; but stay a little longer?” + +He looked anxiously at the farmer who was seeking him and who just then +ominously walked across to where Henchard was standing, and he looked +into the room and at her. “I like staying; but I fear I must go!” he +said. “Business ought not to be neglected, ought it?” + +“Not for a single minute.” + +“It’s true. I’ll come another time—if I may, ma’am?” + +“Certainly,” she said. “What has happened to us to-day is very +curious.” + +“Something to think over when we are alone, it’s like to be?” + +“Oh, I don’t know that. It is commonplace after all.” + +“No, I’ll not say that. O no!” + +“Well, whatever it has been, it is now over; and the market calls you +to be gone.” + +“Yes, yes. Market—business! I wish there were no business in the +warrld.” + +Lucetta almost laughed—she would quite have laughed—but that there was +a little emotion going in her at the time. “How you change!” she said. +“You should not change like this. + +“I have never wished such things before,” said the Scotchman, with a +simple, shamed, apologetic look for his weakness. “It is only since +coming here and seeing you!” + +“If that’s the case, you had better not look at me any longer. Dear me, +I feel I have quite demoralized you!” + +“But look or look not, I will see you in my thoughts. Well, I’ll +go—thank you for the pleasure of this visit.” + +“Thank you for staying.” + +“Maybe I’ll get into my market-mind when I’ve been out a few minutes,” +he murmured. “But I don’t know—I don’t know!” + +As he went she said eagerly, “You may hear them speak of me in +Casterbridge as time goes on. If they tell you I’m a coquette, which +some may, because of the incidents of my life, don’t believe it, for I +am not.” + +“I swear I will not!” he said fervidly. + +Thus the two. She had enkindled the young man’s enthusiasm till he was +quite brimming with sentiment; while he from merely affording her a new +form of idleness, had gone on to wake her serious solicitude. Why was +this? They could not have told. + +Lucetta as a young girl would hardly have looked at a tradesman. But +her ups and downs, capped by her indiscretions with Henchard had made +her uncritical as to station. In her poverty she had met with repulse +from the society to which she had belonged, and she had no great zest +for renewing an attempt upon it now. Her heart longed for some ark into +which it could fly and be at rest. Rough or smooth she did not care so +long as it was warm. + +Farfrae was shown out, it having entirely escaped him that he had +called to see Elizabeth. Lucetta at the window watched him threading +the maze of farmers and farmers’ men. She could see by his gait that he +was conscious of her eyes, and her heart went out to him for his +modesty—pleaded with her sense of his unfitness that he might be +allowed to come again. He entered the market-house, and she could see +him no more. + +Three minutes later, when she had left the window, knocks, not of +multitude but of strength, sounded through the house, and the +waiting-maid tripped up. + +“The Mayor,” she said. + +Lucetta had reclined herself, and she was looking dreamily through her +fingers. She did not answer at once, and the maid repeated the +information with the addition, “And he’s afraid he hasn’t much time to +spare, he says.” + +“Oh! Then tell him that as I have a headache I won’t detain him +to-day.” + +The message was taken down, and she heard the door close. + +Lucetta had come to Casterbridge to quicken Henchard’s feelings with +regard to her. She had quickened them, and now she was indifferent to +the achievement. + +Her morning view of Elizabeth-Jane as a disturbing element changed, and +she no longer felt strongly the necessity of getting rid of the girl +for her stepfather’s sake. When the young woman came in, sweetly +unconscious of the turn in the tide, Lucetta went up to her, and said +quite sincerely— + +“I’m so glad you’ve come. You’ll live with me a long time, won’t you?” + +Elizabeth as a watch-dog to keep her father off—what a new idea. Yet it +was not unpleasing. Henchard had neglected her all these days, after +compromising her indescribably in the past. The least he could have +done when he found himself free, and herself affluent, would have been +to respond heartily and promptly to her invitation. + +Her emotions rose, fell, undulated, filled her with wild surmise at +their suddenness; and so passed Lucetta’s experiences of that day. + + + +XXIV. + +Poor Elizabeth-Jane, little thinking what her malignant star had done +to blast the budding attentions she had won from Donald Farfrae, was +glad to hear Lucetta’s words about remaining. + +For in addition to Lucetta’s house being a home, that raking view of +the market-place which it afforded had as much attraction for her as +for Lucetta. The _carrefour_ was like the regulation Open Place in +spectacular dramas, where the incidents that occur always happen to +bear on the lives of the adjoining residents. Farmers, merchants, +dairymen, quacks, hawkers, appeared there from week to week, and +disappeared as the afternoon wasted away. It was the node of all +orbits. + +From Saturday to Saturday was as from day to day with the two young +women now. In an emotional sense they did not live at all during the +intervals. Wherever they might go wandering on other days, on +market-day they were sure to be at home. Both stole sly glances out of +the window at Farfrae’s shoulders and poll. His face they seldom saw, +for, either through shyness, or not to disturb his mercantile mood, he +avoided looking towards their quarters. + +Thus things went on, till a certain market-morning brought a new +sensation. Elizabeth and Lucetta were sitting at breakfast when a +parcel containing two dresses arrived for the latter from London. She +called Elizabeth from her breakfast, and entering her friend’s bedroom +Elizabeth saw the gowns spread out on the bed, one of a deep cherry +colour, the other lighter—a glove lying at the end of each sleeve, a +bonnet at the top of each neck, and parasols across the gloves, Lucetta +standing beside the suggested human figure in an attitude of +contemplation. + +“I wouldn’t think so hard about it,” said Elizabeth, marking the +intensity with which Lucetta was alternating the question whether this +or that would suit best. + +“But settling upon new clothes is so trying,” said Lucetta. “You are +that person” (pointing to one of the arrangements), “or you are _that_ +totally different person” (pointing to the other), “for the whole of +the coming spring and one of the two, you don’t know which, may turn +out to be very objectionable.” + +It was finally decided by Miss Templeman that she would be the +cherry-coloured person at all hazards. The dress was pronounced to be a +fit, and Lucetta walked with it into the front room, Elizabeth +following her. + +The morning was exceptionally bright for the time of year. The sun fell +so flat on the houses and pavement opposite Lucetta’s residence that +they poured their brightness into her rooms. Suddenly, after a rumbling +of wheels, there were added to this steady light a fantastic series of +circling irradiations upon the ceiling, and the companions turned to +the window. Immediately opposite a vehicle of strange description had +come to a standstill, as if it had been placed there for exhibition. + +It was the new-fashioned agricultural implement called a horse-drill, +till then unknown, in its modern shape, in this part of the country, +where the venerable seed-lip was still used for sowing as in the days +of the Heptarchy. Its arrival created about as much sensation in the +corn-market as a flying machine would create at Charing Cross. The +farmers crowded round it, women drew near it, children crept under and +into it. The machine was painted in bright hues of green, yellow, and +red, and it resembled as a whole a compound of hornet, grasshopper, and +shrimp, magnified enormously. Or it might have been likened to an +upright musical instrument with the front gone. That was how it struck +Lucetta. “Why, it is a sort of agricultural piano,” she said. + +“It has something to do with corn,” said Elizabeth. + +“I wonder who thought of introducing it here?” + +Donald Farfrae was in the minds of both as the innovator, for though +not a farmer he was closely leagued with farming operations. And as if +in response to their thought he came up at that moment, looked at the +machine, walked round it, and handled it as if he knew something about +its make. The two watchers had inwardly started at his coming, and +Elizabeth left the window, went to the back of the room, and stood as +if absorbed in the panelling of the wall. She hardly knew that she had +done this till Lucetta, animated by the conjunction of her new attire +with the sight of Farfrae, spoke out: “Let us go and look at the +instrument, whatever it is.” + +Elizabeth-Jane’s bonnet and shawl were pitchforked on in a moment, and +they went out. Among all the agriculturists gathered round the only +appropriate possessor of the new machine seemed to be Lucetta, because +she alone rivalled it in colour. + +They examined it curiously; observing the rows of trumpet-shaped tubes +one within the other, the little scoops, like revolving salt-spoons, +which tossed the seed into the upper ends of the tubes that conducted +it to the ground; till somebody said, “Good morning, Elizabeth-Jane.” +She looked up, and there was her stepfather. + +His greeting had been somewhat dry and thunderous, and Elizabeth-Jane, +embarrassed out of her equanimity, stammered at random, “This is the +lady I live with, father—Miss Templeman.” + +Henchard put his hand to his hat, which he brought down with a great +wave till it met his body at the knee. Miss Templeman bowed. “I am +happy to become acquainted with you, Mr. Henchard,” she said. “This is +a curious machine.” + +“Yes,” Henchard replied; and he proceeded to explain it, and still more +forcibly to ridicule it. + +“Who brought it here?” said Lucetta. + +“Oh, don’t ask me, ma’am!” said Henchard. “The thing—why ’tis +impossible it should act. ’Twas brought here by one of our machinists +on the recommendation of a jumped-up jackanapes of a fellow who +thinks——” His eye caught Elizabeth-Jane’s imploring face, and he +stopped, probably thinking that the suit might be progressing. + +He turned to go away. Then something seemed to occur which his +stepdaughter fancied must really be a hallucination of hers. A murmur +apparently came from Henchard’s lips in which she detected the words, +“You refused to see me!” reproachfully addressed to Lucetta. She could +not believe that they had been uttered by her stepfather; unless, +indeed, they might have been spoken to one of the yellow-gaitered +farmers near them. Yet Lucetta seemed silent, and then all thought of +the incident was dissipated by the humming of a song, which sounded as +though from the interior of the machine. Henchard had by this time +vanished into the market-house, and both the women glanced towards the +corn-drill. They could see behind it the bent back of a man who was +pushing his head into the internal works to master their simple +secrets. The hummed song went on— + +“’Tw—s on a s—m—r aftern—n, +A wee be—re the s—n w—nt d—n, +When Kitty wi’ a braw n—w g—wn +C—me ow’re the h—lls to Gowrie.” + + +Elizabeth-Jane had apprehended the singer in a moment, and looked +guilty of she did not know what. Lucetta next recognized him, and more +mistress of herself said archly, “The ‘Lass of Gowrie’ from inside of a +seed-drill—what a phenomenon!” + +Satisfied at last with his investigation the young man stood upright, +and met their eyes across the summit. + +“We are looking at the wonderful new drill,” Miss Templeman said. “But +practically it is a stupid thing—is it not?” she added, on the strength +of Henchard’s information. + +“Stupid? O no!” said Farfrae gravely. “It will revolutionize sowing +heerabout! No more sowers flinging their seed about broadcast, so that +some falls by the wayside and some among thorns, and all that. Each +grain will go straight to its intended place, and nowhere else +whatever!” + +“Then the romance of the sower is gone for good,” observed +Elizabeth-Jane, who felt herself at one with Farfrae in Bible-reading +at least. “‘He that observeth the wind shall not sow,’ so the Preacher +said; but his words will not be to the point any more. How things +change!” + +“Ay; ay.... It must be so!” Donald admitted, his gaze fixing itself on +a blank point far away. “But the machines are already very common in +the East and North of England,” he added apologetically. + +Lucetta seemed to be outside this train of sentiment, her acquaintance +with the Scriptures being somewhat limited. “Is the machine yours?” she +asked of Farfrae. + +“O no, madam,” said he, becoming embarrassed and deferential at the +sound of her voice, though with Elizabeth-Jane he was quite at his +ease. “No, no—I merely recommended that it should be got.” + +In the silence which followed Farfrae appeared only conscious of her; +to have passed from perception of Elizabeth into a brighter sphere of +existence than she appertained to. Lucetta, discerning that he was much +mixed that day, partly in his mercantile mood and partly in his +romantic one, said gaily to him— + +“Well, don’t forsake the machine for us,” and went indoors with her +companion. + +The latter felt that she had been in the way, though why was +unaccountable to her. Lucetta explained the matter somewhat by saying +when they were again in the sitting-room— + +“I had occasion to speak to Mr. Farfrae the other day, and so I knew +him this morning.” + +Lucetta was very kind towards Elizabeth that day. Together they saw the +market thicken, and in course of time thin away with the slow decline +of the sun towards the upper end of town, its rays taking the street +endways and enfilading the long thoroughfare from top to bottom. The +gigs and vans disappeared one by one till there was not a vehicle in +the street. The time of the riding world was over; the pedestrian world +held sway. Field labourers and their wives and children trooped in from +the villages for their weekly shopping, and instead of a rattle of +wheels and a tramp of horses ruling the sound as earlier, there was +nothing but the shuffle of many feet. All the implements were gone; all +the farmers; all the moneyed class. The character of the town’s trading +had changed from bulk to multiplicity and pence were handled now as +pounds had been handled earlier in the day. + +Lucetta and Elizabeth looked out upon this, for though it was night and +the street lamps were lighted, they had kept their shutters unclosed. +In the faint blink of the fire they spoke more freely. + +“Your father was distant with you,” said Lucetta. + +“Yes.” And having forgotten the momentary mystery of Henchard’s seeming +speech to Lucetta she continued, “It is because he does not think I am +respectable. I have tried to be so more than you can imagine, but in +vain! My mother’s separation from my father was unfortunate for me. You +don’t know what it is to have shadows like that upon your life.” + +Lucetta seemed to wince. “I do not—of that kind precisely,” she said, +“but you may feel a—sense of disgrace—shame—in other ways.” + +“Have you ever had any such feeling?” said the younger innocently. + +“O no,” said Lucetta quickly. “I was thinking of—what happens sometimes +when women get themselves in strange positions in the eyes of the world +from no fault of their own.” + +“It must make them very unhappy afterwards.” + +“It makes them anxious; for might not other women despise them?” + +“Not altogether despise them. Yet not quite like or respect them.” + +Lucetta winced again. Her past was by no means secure from +investigation, even in Casterbridge. For one thing Henchard had never +returned to her the cloud of letters she had written and sent him in +her first excitement. Possibly they were destroyed; but she could have +wished that they had never been written. + +The rencounter with Farfrae and his bearings towards Lucetta had made +the reflective Elizabeth more observant of her brilliant and amiable +companion. A few days afterwards, when her eyes met Lucetta’s as the +latter was going out, she somehow knew that Miss Templeman was +nourishing a hope of seeing the attractive Scotchman. The fact was +printed large all over Lucetta’s cheeks and eyes to any one who could +read her as Elizabeth-Jane was beginning to do. Lucetta passed on and +closed the street door. + +A seer’s spirit took possession of Elizabeth, impelling her to sit down +by the fire and divine events so surely from data already her own that +they could be held as witnessed. She followed Lucetta thus mentally—saw +her encounter Donald somewhere as if by chance—saw him wear his special +look when meeting women, with an added intensity because this one was +Lucetta. She depicted his impassioned manner; beheld the indecision of +both between their lothness to separate and their desire not to be +observed; depicted their shaking of hands; how they probably parted +with frigidity in their general contour and movements, only in the +smaller features showing the spark of passion, thus invisible to all +but themselves. This discerning silent witch had not done thinking of +these things when Lucetta came noiselessly behind her and made her +start. + +It was all true as she had pictured—she could have sworn it. Lucetta +had a heightened luminousness in her eye over and above the advanced +colour of her cheeks. + +“You’ve seen Mr. Farfrae,” said Elizabeth demurely. + +“Yes,” said Lucetta. “How did you know?” + +She knelt down on the hearth and took her friend’s hands excitedly in +her own. But after all she did not say when or how she had seen him or +what he had said. + +That night she became restless; in the morning she was feverish; and at +breakfast-time she told her companion that she had something on her +mind—something which concerned a person in whom she was interested +much. Elizabeth was earnest to listen and sympathize. + +“This person—a lady—once admired a man much—very much,” she said +tentatively. + +“Ah,” said Elizabeth-Jane. + +“They were intimate—rather. He did not think so deeply of her as she +did of him. But in an impulsive moment, purely out of reparation, he +proposed to make her his wife. She agreed. But there was an unsuspected +hitch in the proceedings; though she had been so far compromised with +him that she felt she could never belong to another man, as a pure +matter of conscience, even if she should wish to. After that they were +much apart, heard nothing of each other for a long time, and she felt +her life quite closed up for her.” + +“Ah—poor girl!” + +“She suffered much on account of him; though I should add that he could +not altogether be blamed for what had happened. At last the obstacle +which separated them was providentially removed; and he came to marry +her.” + +“How delightful!” + +“But in the interval she—my poor friend—had seen a man, she liked +better than him. Now comes the point: Could she in honour dismiss the +first?” + +“A new man she liked better—that’s bad!” + +“Yes,” said Lucetta, looking pained at a boy who was swinging the town +pump-handle. “It is bad! Though you must remember that she was forced +into an equivocal position with the first man by an accident—that he +was not so well educated or refined as the second, and that she had +discovered some qualities in the first that rendered him less desirable +as a husband than she had at first thought him to be.” + +“I cannot answer,” said Elizabeth-Jane thoughtfully. “It is so +difficult. It wants a Pope to settle that!” + +“You prefer not to perhaps?” Lucetta showed in her appealing tone how +much she leant on Elizabeth’s judgment. + +“Yes, Miss Templeman,” admitted Elizabeth. “I would rather not say.” + +Nevertheless, Lucetta seemed relieved by the simple fact of having +opened out the situation a little, and was slowly convalescent of her +headache. “Bring me a looking-glass. How do I appear to people?” she +said languidly. + +“Well—a little worn,” answered Elizabeth, eyeing her as a critic eyes a +doubtful painting; fetching the glass she enabled Lucetta to survey +herself in it, which Lucetta anxiously did. + +“I wonder if I wear well, as times go!” she observed after a while. + +“Yes—fairly. + +“Where am I worst?” + +“Under your eyes—I notice a little brownness there.” + +“Yes. That is my worst place, I know. How many years more do you think +I shall last before I get hopelessly plain?” + +There was something curious in the way in which Elizabeth, though the +younger, had come to play the part of experienced sage in these +discussions. “It may be five years,” she said judicially. “Or, with a +quiet life, as many as ten. With no love you might calculate on ten.” + +Lucetta seemed to reflect on this as on an unalterable, impartial +verdict. She told Elizabeth-Jane no more of the past attachment she had +roughly adumbrated as the experiences of a third person; and Elizabeth, +who in spite of her philosophy was very tender-hearted, sighed that +night in bed at the thought that her pretty, rich Lucetta did not treat +her to the full confidence of names and dates in her confessions. For +by the “she” of Lucetta’s story Elizabeth had not been beguiled. + + + +XXV. + +The next phase of the supersession of Henchard in Lucetta’s heart was +an experiment in calling on her performed by Farfrae with some apparent +trepidation. Conventionally speaking he conversed with both Miss +Templeman and her companion; but in fact it was rather that Elizabeth +sat invisible in the room. Donald appeared not to see her at all, and +answered her wise little remarks with curtly indifferent monosyllables, +his looks and faculties hanging on the woman who could boast of a more +Protean variety in her phases, moods, opinions, and also principles, +than could Elizabeth. Lucetta had persisted in dragging her into the +circle; but she had remained like an awkward third point which that +circle would not touch. + +Susan Henchard’s daughter bore up against the frosty ache of the +treatment, as she had borne up under worse things, and contrived as +soon as possible to get out of the inharmonious room without being +missed. The Scotchman seemed hardly the same Farfrae who had danced +with her and walked with her in a delicate poise between love and +friendship—that period in the history of a love when alone it can be +said to be unalloyed with pain. + +She stoically looked from her bedroom window, and contemplated her fate +as if it were written on the top of the church-tower hard by. “Yes,” +she said at last, bringing down her palm upon the sill with a pat: +“_He_ is the second man of that story she told me!” + +All this time Henchard’s smouldering sentiments towards Lucetta had +been fanned into higher and higher inflammation by the circumstances of +the case. He was discovering that the young woman for whom he once felt +a pitying warmth which had been almost chilled out of him by +reflection, was, when now qualified with a slight inaccessibility and a +more matured beauty, the very being to make him satisfied with life. +Day after day proved to him, by her silence, that it was no use to +think of bringing her round by holding aloof; so he gave in, and called +upon her again, Elizabeth-Jane being absent. + +He crossed the room to her with a heavy tread of some awkwardness, his +strong, warm gaze upon her—like the sun beside the moon in comparison +with Farfrae’s modest look—and with something of a hail-fellow bearing, +as, indeed, was not unnatural. But she seemed so transubstantiated by +her change of position, and held out her hand to him in such cool +friendship, that he became deferential, and sat down with a perceptible +loss of power. He understood but little of fashion in dress, yet enough +to feel himself inadequate in appearance beside her whom he had +hitherto been dreaming of as almost his property. She said something +very polite about his being good enough to call. This caused him to +recover balance. He looked her oddly in the face, losing his awe. + +“Why, of course I have called, Lucetta,” he said. “What does that +nonsense mean? You know I couldn’t have helped myself if I had +wished—that is, if I had any kindness at all. I’ve called to say that I +am ready, as soon as custom will permit, to give you my name in return +for your devotion and what you lost by it in thinking too little of +yourself and too much of me; to say that you can fix the day or month, +with my full consent, whenever in your opinion it would be seemly: you +know more of these things than I.” + +“It is full early yet,” she said evasively. + +“Yes, yes; I suppose it is. But you know, Lucetta, I felt directly my +poor ill-used Susan died, and when I could not bear the idea of +marrying again, that after what had happened between us it was my duty +not to let any unnecessary delay occur before putting things to rights. +Still, I wouldn’t call in a hurry, because—well, you can guess how this +money you’ve come into made me feel.” His voice slowly fell; he was +conscious that in this room his accents and manner wore a roughness not +observable in the street. He looked about the room at the novel +hangings and ingenious furniture with which she had surrounded herself. + +“Upon my life I didn’t know such furniture as this could be bought in +Casterbridge,” he said. + +“Nor can it be,” said she. “Nor will it till fifty years more of +civilization have passed over the town. It took a waggon and four +horses to get it here.” + +“H’m. It looks as if you were living on capital.” + +“O no, I am not.” + +“So much the better. But the fact is, your setting up like this makes +my beaming towards you rather awkward.” + +“Why?” + +An answer was not really needed, and he did not furnish one. “Well,” he +went on, “there’s nobody in the world I would have wished to see enter +into this wealth before you, Lucetta, and nobody, I am sure, who will +become it more.” He turned to her with congratulatory admiration so +fervid that she shrank somewhat, notwithstanding that she knew him so +well. + +“I am greatly obliged to you for all that,” said she, rather with an +air of speaking ritual. The stint of reciprocal feeling was perceived, +and Henchard showed chagrin at once—nobody was more quick to show that +than he. + +“You may be obliged or not for’t. Though the things I say may not have +the polish of what you’ve lately learnt to expect for the first time in +your life, they are real, my lady Lucetta.” + +“That’s rather a rude way of speaking to me,” pouted Lucetta, with +stormy eyes. + +“Not at all!” replied Henchard hotly. “But there, there, I don’t wish +to quarrel with ’ee. I come with an honest proposal for silencing your +Jersey enemies, and you ought to be thankful.” + +“How can you speak so!” she answered, firing quickly. “Knowing that my +only crime was the indulging in a foolish girl’s passion for you with +too little regard for correctness, and that I was what I call innocent +all the time they called me guilty, you ought not to be so cutting! I +suffered enough at that worrying time, when you wrote to tell me of +your wife’s return and my consequent dismissal, and if I am a little +independent now, surely the privilege is due to me!” + +“Yes, it is,” he said. “But it is not by what is, in this life, but by +what appears, that you are judged; and I therefore think you ought to +accept me—for your own good name’s sake. What is known in your native +Jersey may get known here.” + +“How you keep on about Jersey! I am English!” + +“Yes, yes. Well, what do you say to my proposal?” + +For the first time in their acquaintance Lucetta had the move; and yet +she was backward. “For the present let things be,” she said with some +embarrassment. “Treat me as an acquaintance, and I’ll treat you as one. +Time will—” She stopped; and he said nothing to fill the gap for +awhile, there being no pressure of half acquaintance to drive them into +speech if they were not minded for it. + +“That’s the way the wind blows, is it?” he said at last grimly, nodding +an affirmative to his own thoughts. + +A yellow flood of reflected sunlight filled the room for a few +instants. It was produced by the passing of a load of newly trussed hay +from the country, in a waggon marked with Farfrae’s name. Beside it +rode Farfrae himself on horseback. Lucetta’s face became—as a woman’s +face becomes when the man she loves rises upon her gaze like an +apparition. + +A turn of the eye by Henchard, a glance from the window, and the secret +of her inaccessibility would have been revealed. But Henchard in +estimating her tone was looking down so plumb-straight that he did not +note the warm consciousness upon Lucetta’s face. + +“I shouldn’t have thought it—I shouldn’t have thought it of women!” he +said emphatically by-and-by, rising and shaking himself into activity; +while Lucetta was so anxious to divert him from any suspicion of the +truth that she asked him to be in no hurry. Bringing him some apples +she insisted upon paring one for him. + +He would not take it. “No, no; such is not for me,” he said drily, and +moved to the door. At going out he turned his eye upon her. + +“You came to live in Casterbridge entirely on my account,” he said. +“Yet now you are here you won’t have anything to say to my offer!” + +He had hardly gone down the staircase when she dropped upon the sofa +and jumped up again in a fit of desperation. “I will love him!” she +cried passionately; “as for _him_—he’s hot-tempered and stern, and it +would be madness to bind myself to him knowing that. I won’t be a slave +to the past—I’ll love where I choose!” + +Yet having decided to break away from Henchard one might have supposed +her capable of aiming higher than Farfrae. But Lucetta reasoned +nothing: she feared hard words from the people with whom she had been +earlier associated; she had no relatives left; and with native +lightness of heart took kindly to what fate offered. + +Elizabeth-Jane, surveying the position of Lucetta between her two +lovers from the crystalline sphere of a straightforward mind, did not +fail to perceive that her father, as she called him, and Donald Farfrae +became more desperately enamoured of her friend every day. On Farfrae’s +side it was the unforced passion of youth. On Henchard’s the +artificially stimulated coveting of maturer age. + +The pain she experienced from the almost absolute obliviousness to her +existence that was shown by the pair of them became at times half +dissipated by her sense of its humourousness. When Lucetta had pricked +her finger they were as deeply concerned as if she were dying; when she +herself had been seriously sick or in danger they uttered a +conventional word of sympathy at the news, and forgot all about it +immediately. But, as regarded Henchard, this perception of hers also +caused her some filial grief; she could not help asking what she had +done to be neglected so, after the professions of solicitude he had +made. As regarded Farfrae, she thought, after honest reflection, that +it was quite natural. What was she beside Lucetta?—as one of the +“meaner beauties of the night,” when the moon had risen in the skies. + +She had learnt the lesson of renunciation, and was as familiar with the +wreck of each day’s wishes as with the diurnal setting of the sun. If +her earthly career had taught her few book philosophies it had at least +well practised her in this. Yet her experience had consisted less in a +series of pure disappointments than in a series of substitutions. +Continually it had happened that what she had desired had not been +granted her, and that what had been granted her she had not desired. So +she viewed with an approach to equanimity the now cancelled days when +Donald had been her undeclared lover, and wondered what unwished-for +thing Heaven might send her in place of him. + + + +XXVI. + +It chanced that on a fine spring morning Henchard and Farfrae met in +the chestnut-walk which ran along the south wall of the town. Each had +just come out from his early breakfast, and there was not another soul +near. Henchard was reading a letter from Lucetta, sent in answer to a +note from him, in which she made some excuse for not immediately +granting him a second interview that he had desired. + +Donald had no wish to enter into conversation with his former friend on +their present constrained terms; neither would he pass him in scowling +silence. He nodded, and Henchard did the same. They receded from each +other several paces when a voice cried “Farfrae!” It was Henchard’s, +who stood regarding him. + +“Do you remember,” said Henchard, as if it were the presence of the +thought and not of the man which made him speak, “do you remember my +story of that second woman—who suffered for her thoughtless intimacy +with me?” + +“I do,” said Farfrae. + +“Do you remember my telling ’ee how it all began and how it ended? + +“Yes.” + +“Well, I have offered to marry her now that I can; but she won’t marry +me. Now what would you think of her—I put it to you?” + +“Well, ye owe her nothing more now,” said Farfrae heartily. + +“It is true,” said Henchard, and went on. + +That he had looked up from a letter to ask his questions completely +shut out from Farfrae’s mind all vision of Lucetta as the culprit. +Indeed, her present position was so different from that of the young +woman of Henchard’s story as of itself to be sufficient to blind him +absolutely to her identity. As for Henchard, he was reassured by +Farfrae’s words and manner against a suspicion which had crossed his +mind. They were not those of a conscious rival. + +Yet that there was rivalry by some one he was firmly persuaded. He +could feel it in the air around Lucetta, see it in the turn of her pen. +There was an antagonistic force in exercise, so that when he had tried +to hang near her he seemed standing in a refluent current. That it was +not innate caprice he was more and more certain. Her windows gleamed as +if they did not want him; her curtains seem to hang slily, as if they +screened an ousting presence. To discover whose presence that +was—whether really Farfrae’s after all, or another’s—he exerted himself +to the utmost to see her again; and at length succeeded. + +At the interview, when she offered him tea, he made it a point to +launch a cautious inquiry if she knew Mr. Farfrae. + +O yes, she knew him, she declared; she could not help knowing almost +everybody in Casterbridge, living in such a gazebo over the centre and +arena of the town. + +“Pleasant young fellow,” said Henchard. + +“Yes,” said Lucetta. + +“We both know him,” said kind Elizabeth-Jane, to relieve her +companion’s divined embarrassment. + +There was a knock at the door; literally, three full knocks and a +little one at the end. + +“That kind of knock means half-and-half—somebody between gentle and +simple,” said the corn-merchant to himself. “I shouldn’t wonder +therefore if it is he.” In a few seconds surely enough Donald walked +in. + +Lucetta was full of little fidgets and flutters, which increased +Henchard’s suspicions without affording any special proof of their +correctness. He was well-nigh ferocious at the sense of the queer +situation in which he stood towards this woman. One who had reproached +him for deserting her when calumniated, who had urged claims upon his +consideration on that account, who had lived waiting for him, who at +the first decent opportunity had come to ask him to rectify, by making +her his, the false position into which she had placed herself for his +sake; such she had been. And now he sat at her tea-table eager to gain +her attention, and in his amatory rage feeling the other man present to +be a villain, just as any young fool of a lover might feel. + +They sat stiffly side by side at the darkening table, like some Tuscan +painting of the two disciples supping at Emmaus. Lucetta, forming the +third and haloed figure, was opposite them; Elizabeth-Jane, being out +of the game, and out of the group, could observe all from afar, like +the evangelist who had to write it down: that there were long spaces of +taciturnity, when all exterior circumstances were subdued to the touch +of spoons and china, the click of a heel on the pavement under the +window, the passing of a wheelbarrow or cart, the whistling of the +carter, the gush of water into householders’ buckets at the town-pump +opposite, the exchange of greetings among their neighbours, and the +rattle of the yokes by which they carried off their evening supply. + +“More bread-and-butter?” said Lucetta to Henchard and Farfrae equally, +holding out between them a plateful of long slices. Henchard took a +slice by one end and Donald by the other; each feeling certain he was +the man meant; neither let go, and the slice came in two. + +“Oh—I am so sorry!” cried Lucetta, with a nervous titter. Farfrae tried +to laugh; but he was too much in love to see the incident in any but a +tragic light. + +“How ridiculous of all three of them!” said Elizabeth to herself. + +Henchard left the house with a ton of conjecture, though without a +grain of proof, that the counterattraction was Farfrae; and therefore +he would not make up his mind. Yet to Elizabeth-Jane it was plain as +the town-pump that Donald and Lucetta were incipient lovers. More than +once, in spite of her care, Lucetta had been unable to restrain her +glance from flitting across into Farfrae’s eyes like a bird to its +nest. But Henchard was constructed upon too large a scale to discern +such minutiæ as these by an evening light, which to him were as the +notes of an insect that lie above the compass of the human ear. + +But he was disturbed. And the sense of occult rivalry in suitorship was +so much superadded to the palpable rivalry of their business lives. To +the coarse materiality of that rivalry it added an inflaming soul. + +The thus vitalized antagonism took the form of action by Henchard +sending for Jopp, the manager originally displaced by Farfrae’s +arrival. Henchard had frequently met this man about the streets, +observed that his clothing spoke of neediness, heard that he lived in +Mixen Lane—a back slum of the town, the _pis aller_ of Casterbridge +domiciliation—itself almost a proof that a man had reached a stage when +he would not stick at trifles. + +Jopp came after dark, by the gates of the storeyard, and felt his way +through the hay and straw to the office where Henchard sat in solitude +awaiting him. + +“I am again out of a foreman,” said the corn-factor. “Are you in a +place?” + +“Not so much as a beggar’s, sir.” + +“How much do you ask?” + +Jopp named his price, which was very moderate. + +“When can you come?” + +“At this hour and moment, sir,” said Jopp, who, standing hands-pocketed +at the street corner till the sun had faded the shoulders of his coat +to scarecrow green, had regularly watched Henchard in the market-place, +measured him, and learnt him, by virtue of the power which the still +man has in his stillness of knowing the busy one better than he knows +himself. Jopp too, had had a convenient experience; he was the only one +in Casterbridge besides Henchard and the close-lipped Elizabeth who +knew that Lucetta came truly from Jersey, and but proximately from +Bath. “I know Jersey too, sir,” he said. “Was living there when you +used to do business that way. O yes—have often seen ye there.” + +“Indeed! Very good. Then the thing is settled. The testimonials you +showed me when you first tried for’t are sufficient.” + +That characters deteriorated in time of need possibly did not occur to +Henchard. Jopp said, “Thank you,” and stood more firmly, in the +consciousness that at last he officially belonged to that spot. + +“Now,” said Henchard, digging his strong eyes into Jopp’s face, “one +thing is necessary to me, as the biggest corn-and-hay dealer in these +parts. The Scotchman, who’s taking the town trade so bold into his +hands, must be cut out. D’ye hear? We two can’t live side by +side—that’s clear and certain.” + +“I’ve seen it all,” said Jopp. + +“By fair competition I mean, of course,” Henchard continued. “But as +hard, keen, and unflinching as fair—rather more so. By such a desperate +bid against him for the farmers’ custom as will grind him into the +ground—starve him out. I’ve capital, mind ye, and I can do it.” + +“I’m all that way of thinking,” said the new foreman. Jopp’s dislike of +Farfrae as the man who had once ursurped his place, while it made him a +willing tool, made him, at the same time, commercially as unsafe a +colleague as Henchard could have chosen. + +“I sometimes think,” he added, “that he must have some glass that he +sees next year in. He has such a knack of making everything bring him +fortune.” + +“He’s deep beyond all honest men’s discerning, but we must make him +shallower. We’ll undersell him, and over-buy him, and so snuff him +out.” + +They then entered into specific details of the process by which this +would be accomplished, and parted at a late hour. + +Elizabeth-Jane heard by accident that Jopp had been engaged by her +stepfather. She was so fully convinced that he was not the right man +for the place that, at the risk of making Henchard angry, she expressed +her apprehension to him when they met. But it was done to no purpose. +Henchard shut up her argument with a sharp rebuff. + +The season’s weather seemed to favour their scheme. The time was in the +years immediately before foreign competition had revolutionized the +trade in grain; when still, as from the earliest ages, the wheat +quotations from month to month depended entirely upon the home harvest. +A bad harvest, or the prospect of one, would double the price of corn +in a few weeks; and the promise of a good yield would lower it as +rapidly. Prices were like the roads of the period, steep in gradient, +reflecting in their phases the local conditions, without engineering, +levellings, or averages. + +The farmer’s income was ruled by the wheat-crop within his own horizon, +and the wheat-crop by the weather. Thus in person, he became a sort of +flesh-barometer, with feelers always directed to the sky and wind +around him. The local atmosphere was everything to him; the atmospheres +of other countries a matter of indifference. The people, too, who were +not farmers, the rural multitude, saw in the god of the weather a more +important personage than they do now. Indeed, the feeling of the +peasantry in this matter was so intense as to be almost unrealizable in +these equable days. Their impulse was well-nigh to prostrate themselves +in lamentation before untimely rains and tempests, which came as the +Alastor of those households whose crime it was to be poor. + +After midsummer they watched the weather-cocks as men waiting in +antechambers watch the lackey. Sun elated them; quiet rain sobered +them; weeks of watery tempest stupefied them. That aspect of the sky +which they now regard as disagreeable they then beheld as maleficent. + +It was June, and the weather was very unfavourable. Casterbridge, being +as it were the bell-board on which all the adjacent hamlets and +villages sounded their notes, was decidedly dull. Instead of new +articles in the shop-windows those that had been rejected in the +foregoing summer were brought out again; superseded reap-hooks, +badly-shaped rakes, shop-worn leggings, and time-stiffened water-tights +reappeared, furbished up as near to new as possible. + +Henchard, backed by Jopp, read a disastrous garnering, and resolved to +base his strategy against Farfrae upon that reading. But before acting +he wished—what so many have wished—that he could know for certain what +was at present only strong probability. He was superstitious—as such +head-strong natures often are—and he nourished in his mind an idea +bearing on the matter; an idea he shrank from disclosing even to Jopp. + +In a lonely hamlet a few miles from the town—so lonely that what are +called lonely villages were teeming by comparison—there lived a man of +curious repute as a forecaster or weather-prophet. The way to his house +was crooked and miry—even difficult in the present unpropitious season. +One evening when it was raining so heavily that ivy and laurel +resounded like distant musketry, and an out-door man could be excused +for shrouding himself to his ears and eyes, such a shrouded figure on +foot might have been perceived travelling in the direction of the +hazel-copse which dripped over the prophet’s cot. The turnpike-road +became a lane, the lane a cart-track, the cart-track a bridle-path, the +bridle-path a foot-way, the foot-way overgrown. The solitary walker +slipped here and there, and stumbled over the natural springes formed +by the brambles, till at length he reached the house, which, with its +garden, was surrounded with a high, dense hedge. The cottage, +comparatively a large one, had been built of mud by the occupier’s own +hands, and thatched also by himself. Here he had always lived, and here +it was assumed he would die. + +He existed on unseen supplies; for it was an anomalous thing that while +there was hardly a soul in the neighbourhood but affected to laugh at +this man’s assertions, uttering the formula, “There’s nothing in ’em,” +with full assurance on the surface of their faces, very few of them +were unbelievers in their secret hearts. Whenever they consulted him +they did it “for a fancy.” When they paid him they said, “Just a trifle +for Christmas,” or “Candlemas,” as the case might be. + +He would have preferred more honesty in his clients, and less sham +ridicule; but fundamental belief consoled him for superficial irony. As +stated, he was enabled to live; people supported him with their backs +turned. He was sometimes astonished that men could profess so little +and believe so much at his house, when at church they professed so much +and believed so little. + +Behind his back he was called “Wide-oh,” on account of his reputation; +to his face “Mr.” Fall. + +The hedge of his garden formed an arch over the entrance, and a door +was inserted as in a wall. Outside the door the tall traveller stopped, +bandaged his face with a handkerchief as if he were suffering from +toothache, and went up the path. The window shutters were not closed, +and he could see the prophet within, preparing his supper. + +In answer to the knock Fall came to the door, candle in hand. The +visitor stepped back a little from the light, and said, “Can I speak to +’ee?” in significant tones. The other’s invitation to come in was +responded to by the country formula, “This will do, thank ’ee,” after +which the householder had no alternative but to come out. He placed the +candle on the corner of the dresser, took his hat from a nail, and +joined the stranger in the porch, shutting the door behind him. + +“I’ve long heard that you can—do things of a sort?” began the other, +repressing his individuality as much as he could. + +“Maybe so, Mr. Henchard,” said the weather-caster. + +“Ah—why do you call me that?” asked the visitor with a start. + +“Because it’s your name. Feeling you’d come I’ve waited for ’ee; and +thinking you might be leery from your walk I laid two supper +plates—look ye here.” He threw open the door and disclosed the +supper-table, at which appeared a second chair, knife and fork, plate +and mug, as he had declared. + +Henchard felt like Saul at his reception by Samuel; he remained in +silence for a few moments, then throwing off the disguise of frigidity +which he had hitherto preserved he said, “Then I have not come in +vain.... Now, for instance, can ye charm away warts?” + +“Without trouble.” + +“Cure the evil?” + +“That I’ve done—with consideration—if they will wear the toad-bag by +night as well as by day.” + +“Forecast the weather?” + +“With labour and time.” + +“Then take this,” said Henchard. “’Tis a crownpiece. Now, what is the +harvest fortnight to be? When can I know?’ + +“I’ve worked it out already, and you can know at once.” (The fact was +that five farmers had already been there on the same errand from +different parts of the country.) “By the sun, moon, and stars, by the +clouds, the winds, the trees, and grass, the candle-flame and swallows, +the smell of the herbs; likewise by the cats’ eyes, the ravens, the +leeches, the spiders, and the dungmixen, the last fortnight in August +will be—rain and tempest.” + +“You are not certain, of course?” + +“As one can be in a world where all’s unsure. ’Twill be more like +living in Revelations this autumn than in England. Shall I sketch it +out for ’ee in a scheme?” + +“O no, no,” said Henchard. “I don’t altogether believe in forecasts, +come to second thoughts on such. But I—” + +“You don’t—you don’t—’tis quite understood,” said Wide-oh, without a +sound of scorn. “You have given me a crown because you’ve one too many. +But won’t you join me at supper, now ’tis waiting and all?” + +Henchard would gladly have joined; for the savour of the stew had +floated from the cottage into the porch with such appetizing +distinctness that the meat, the onions, the pepper, and the herbs could +be severally recognized by his nose. But as sitting down to hob-and-nob +there would have seemed to mark him too implicitly as the +weather-caster’s apostle, he declined, and went his way. + +The next Saturday Henchard bought grain to such an enormous extent that +there was quite a talk about his purchases among his neighbours the +lawyer, the wine merchant, and the doctor; also on the next, and on all +available days. When his granaries were full to choking all the +weather-cocks of Casterbridge creaked and set their faces in another +direction, as if tired of the south-west. The weather changed; the +sunlight, which had been like tin for weeks, assumed the hues of topaz. +The temperament of the welkin passed from the phlegmatic to the +sanguine; an excellent harvest was almost a certainty; and as a +consequence prices rushed down. + +All these transformations, lovely to the outsider, to the wrong-headed +corn-dealer were terrible. He was reminded of what he had well known +before, that a man might gamble upon the square green areas of fields +as readily as upon those of a card-room. + +Henchard had backed bad weather, and apparently lost. He had mistaken +the turn of the flood for the turn of the ebb. His dealings had been so +extensive that settlement could not long be postponed, and to settle he +was obliged to sell off corn that he had bought only a few weeks before +at figures higher by many shillings a quarter. Much of the corn he had +never seen; it had not even been moved from the ricks in which it lay +stacked miles away. Thus he lost heavily. + +In the blaze of an early August day he met Farfrae in the market-place. +Farfrae knew of his dealings (though he did not guess their intended +bearing on himself) and commiserated him; for since their exchange of +words in the South Walk they had been on stiffly speaking terms. +Henchard for the moment appeared to resent the sympathy; but he +suddenly took a careless turn. + +“Ho, no, no!—nothing serious, man!” he cried with fierce gaiety. “These +things always happen, don’t they? I know it has been said that figures +have touched me tight lately; but is that anything rare? The case is +not so bad as folk make out perhaps. And dammy, a man must be a fool to +mind the common hazards of trade!” + +But he had to enter the Casterbridge Bank that day for reasons which +had never before sent him there—and to sit a long time in the partners’ +room with a constrained bearing. It was rumoured soon after that much +real property as well as vast stores of produce, which had stood in +Henchard’s name in the town and neighbourhood, was actually the +possession of his bankers. + +Coming down the steps of the bank he encountered Jopp. The gloomy +transactions just completed within had added fever to the original +sting of Farfrae’s sympathy that morning, which Henchard fancied might +be a satire disguised so that Jopp met with anything but a bland +reception. The latter was in the act of taking off his hat to wipe his +forehead, and saying, “A fine hot day,” to an acquaintance. + +“You can wipe and wipe, and say, ‘A fine hot day,’ can ye!” cried +Henchard in a savage undertone, imprisoning Jopp between himself and +the bank wall. “If it hadn’t been for your blasted advice it might have +been a fine day enough! Why did ye let me go on, hey?—when a word of +doubt from you or anybody would have made me think twice! For you can +never be sure of weather till ’tis past.” + +“My advice, sir, was to do what you thought best.” + +“A useful fellow! And the sooner you help somebody else in that way the +better!” Henchard continued his address to Jopp in similar terms till +it ended in Jopp’s dismissal there and then, Henchard turning upon his +heel and leaving him. + +“You shall be sorry for this, sir; sorry as a man can be!” said Jopp, +standing pale, and looking after the corn-merchant as he disappeared in +the crowd of market-men hard by. + + + +XXVII. + +It was the eve of harvest. Prices being low Farfrae was buying. As was +usual, after reckoning too surely on famine weather the local farmers +had flown to the other extreme, and (in Farfrae’s opinion) were selling +off too recklessly—calculating with just a trifle too much certainty +upon an abundant yield. So he went on buying old corn at its +comparatively ridiculous price: for the produce of the previous year, +though not large, had been of excellent quality. + +When Henchard had squared his affairs in a disastrous way, and got rid +of his burdensome purchases at a monstrous loss, the harvest began. +There were three days of excellent weather, and then—“What if that +curst conjuror should be right after all!” said Henchard. + +The fact was, that no sooner had the sickles begun to play than the +atmosphere suddenly felt as if cress would grow in it without other +nourishment. It rubbed people’s cheeks like damp flannel when they +walked abroad. There was a gusty, high, warm wind; isolated raindrops +starred the window-panes at remote distances: the sunlight would flap +out like a quickly opened fan, throw the pattern of the window upon the +floor of the room in a milky, colourless shine, and withdraw as +suddenly as it had appeared. + +From that day and hour it was clear that there was not to be so +successful an ingathering after all. If Henchard had only waited long +enough he might at least have avoided loss though he had not made a +profit. But the momentum of his character knew no patience. At this +turn of the scales he remained silent. The movements of his mind seemed +to tend to the thought that some power was working against him. + +“I wonder,” he asked himself with eerie misgiving; “I wonder if it can +be that somebody has been roasting a waxen image of me, or stirring an +unholy brew to confound me! I don’t believe in such power; and yet—what +if they should ha’ been doing it!” Even he could not admit that the +perpetrator, if any, might be Farfrae. These isolated hours of +superstition came to Henchard in time of moody depression, when all his +practical largeness of view had oozed out of him. + +Meanwhile Donald Farfrae prospered. He had purchased in so depressed a +market that the present moderate stiffness of prices was sufficient to +pile for him a large heap of gold where a little one had been. + +“Why, he’ll soon be Mayor!” said Henchard. It was indeed hard that the +speaker should, of all others, have to follow the triumphal chariot of +this man to the Capitol. + +The rivalry of the masters was taken up by the men. + +September night-shades had fallen upon Casterbridge; the clocks had +struck half-past eight, and the moon had risen. The streets of the town +were curiously silent for such a comparatively early hour. A sound of +jangling horse-bells and heavy wheels passed up the street. These were +followed by angry voices outside Lucetta’s house, which led her and +Elizabeth-Jane to run to the windows, and pull up the blinds. + +The neighbouring Market House and Town Hall abutted against its next +neighbour the Church except in the lower storey, where an arched +thoroughfare gave admittance to a large square called Bull Stake. A +stone post rose in the midst, to which the oxen had formerly been tied +for baiting with dogs to make them tender before they were killed in +the adjoining shambles. In a corner stood the stocks. + +The thoroughfare leading to this spot was now blocked by two four-horse +waggons and horses, one laden with hay-trusses, the leaders having +already passed each other, and become entangled head to tail. The +passage of the vehicles might have been practicable if empty; but built +up with hay to the bedroom windows as one was, it was impossible. + +“You must have done it a’ purpose!” said Farfrae’s waggoner. “You can +hear my horses’ bells half-a-mile such a night as this!” + +“If ye’d been minding your business instead of zwailing along in such a +gawk-hammer way, you would have zeed me!” retorted the wroth +representative of Henchard. + +However, according to the strict rule of the road it appeared that +Henchard’s man was most in the wrong, he therefore attempted to back +into the High Street. In doing this the near hind-wheel rose against +the churchyard wall and the whole mountainous load went over, two of +the four wheels rising in the air, and the legs of the thill horse. + +Instead of considering how to gather up the load the two men closed in +a fight with their fists. Before the first round was quite over +Henchard came upon the spot, somebody having run for him. + +Henchard sent the two men staggering in contrary directions by +collaring one with each hand, turned to the horse that was down, and +extricated him after some trouble. He then inquired into the +circumstances; and seeing the state of his waggon and its load began +hotly rating Farfrae’s man. + +Lucetta and Elizabeth-Jane had by this time run down to the street +corner, whence they watched the bright heap of new hay lying in the +moon’s rays, and passed and repassed by the forms of Henchard and the +waggoners. The women had witnessed what nobody else had seen—the origin +of the mishap; and Lucetta spoke. + +“I saw it all, Mr. Henchard,” she cried; “and your man was most in the +wrong!” + +Henchard paused in his harangue and turned. “Oh, I didn’t notice you, +Miss Templeman,” said he. “My man in the wrong? Ah, to be sure; to be +sure! But I beg your pardon notwithstanding. The other’s is the empty +waggon, and he must have been most to blame for coming on.” + +“No; I saw it, too,” said Elizabeth-Jane. “And I can assure you he +couldn’t help it.” + +“You can’t trust _their_ senses!” murmured Henchard’s man. + +“Why not?” asked Henchard sharply. + +“Why, you see, sir, all the women side with Farfrae—being a damn young +dand—of the sort that he is—one that creeps into a maid’s heart like +the giddying worm into a sheep’s brain—making crooked seem straight to +their eyes!” + +“But do you know who that lady is you talk about in such a fashion? Do +you know that I pay my attentions to her, and have for some time? Just +be careful!” + +“Not I. I know nothing, sir, outside eight shillings a week.” + +“And that Mr. Farfrae is well aware of it? He’s sharp in trade, but he +wouldn’t do anything so underhand as what you hint at.” + +Whether because Lucetta heard this low dialogue, or not her white +figure disappeared from her doorway inward, and the door was shut +before Henchard could reach it to converse with her further. This +disappointed him, for he had been sufficiently disturbed by what the +man had said to wish to speak to her more closely. While pausing the +old constable came up. + +“Just see that nobody drives against that hay and waggon to-night, +Stubberd,” said the corn-merchant. “It must bide till the morning, for +all hands are in the field still. And if any coach or road-waggon wants +to come along, tell ’em they must go round by the back street, and be +hanged to ’em.... Any case tomorrow up in Hall?” + +“Yes, sir. One in number, sir.” + +“Oh, what’s that?” + +“An old flagrant female, sir, swearing and committing a nuisance in a +horrible profane manner against the church wall, sir, as if ’twere no +more than a pot-house! That’s all, sir.” + +“Oh. The Mayor’s out o’ town, isn’t he?” + +“He is, sir.” + +“Very well, then I’ll be there. Don’t forget to keep an eye on that +hay. Good night t’ ’ee.” + +During those moments Henchard had determined to follow up Lucetta +notwithstanding her elusiveness, and he knocked for admission. + +The answer he received was an expression of Miss Templeman’s sorrow at +being unable to see him again that evening because she had an +engagement to go out. + +Henchard walked away from the door to the opposite side of the street, +and stood by his hay in a lonely reverie, the constable having strolled +elsewhere, and the horses being removed. Though the moon was not bright +as yet there were no lamps lighted, and he entered the shadow of one of +the projecting jambs which formed the thoroughfare to Bull Stake; here +he watched Lucetta’s door. + +Candle-lights were flitting in and out of her bedroom, and it was +obvious that she was dressing for the appointment, whatever the nature +of that might be at such an hour. The lights disappeared, the clock +struck nine, and almost at the moment Farfrae came round the opposite +corner and knocked. That she had been waiting just inside for him was +certain, for she instantly opened the door herself. They went together +by the way of a back lane westward, avoiding the front street; guessing +where they were going he determined to follow. + +The harvest had been so delayed by the capricious weather that whenever +a fine day occurred all sinews were strained to save what could be +saved of the damaged crops. On account of the rapid shortening of the +days the harvesters worked by moonlight. Hence to-night the +wheat-fields abutting on the two sides of the square formed by +Casterbridge town were animated by the gathering hands. Their shouts +and laughter had reached Henchard at the Market House, while he stood +there waiting, and he had little doubt from the turn which Farfrae and +Lucetta had taken that they were bound for the spot. + +Nearly the whole town had gone into the fields. The Casterbridge +populace still retained the primitive habit of helping one another in +time of need; and thus, though the corn belonged to the farming section +of the little community—that inhabiting the Durnover quarter—the +remainder was no less interested in the labour of getting it home. + +Reaching the top of the lane Henchard crossed the shaded avenue on the +walls, slid down the green rampart, and stood amongst the stubble. The +“stitches” or shocks rose like tents about the yellow expanse, those in +the distance becoming lost in the moonlit hazes. + +He had entered at a point removed from the scene of immediate +operations; but two others had entered at that place, and he could see +them winding among the shocks. They were paying no regard to the +direction of their walk, whose vague serpentining soon began to bear +down towards Henchard. A meeting promised to be awkward, and he +therefore stepped into the hollow of the nearest shock, and sat down. + +“You have my leave,” Lucetta was saying gaily. “Speak what you like.” + +“Well, then,” replied Farfrae, with the unmistakable inflection of the +lover pure, which Henchard had never heard in full resonance of his +lips before, “you are sure to be much sought after for your position, +wealth, talents, and beauty. But will ye resist the temptation to be +one of those ladies with lots of admirers—ay—and be content to have +only a homely one?” + +“And he the speaker?” said she, laughing. “Very well, sir, what next?” + +“Ah! I’m afraid that what I feel will make me forget my manners!” + +“Then I hope you’ll never have any, if you lack them only for that +cause.” After some broken words which Henchard lost she added, “Are you +sure you won’t be jealous?” + +Farfrae seemed to assure her that he would not, by taking her hand. + +“You are convinced, Donald, that I love nobody else,” she presently +said. “But I should wish to have my own way in some things.” + +“In everything! What special thing did you mean?” + +“If I wished not to live always in Casterbridge, for instance, upon +finding that I should not be happy here?” + +Henchard did not hear the reply; he might have done so and much more, +but he did not care to play the eavesdropper. They went on towards the +scene of activity, where the sheaves were being handed, a dozen a +minute, upon the carts and waggons which carried them away. + +Lucetta insisted on parting from Farfrae when they drew near the +workpeople. He had some business with them, and, though he entreated +her to wait a few minutes, she was inexorable, and tripped off homeward +alone. + +Henchard thereupon left the field and followed her. His state of mind +was such that on reaching Lucetta’s door he did not knock but opened +it, and walked straight up to her sitting-room, expecting to find her +there. But the room was empty, and he perceived that in his haste he +had somehow passed her on the way hither. He had not to wait many +minutes, however, for he soon heard her dress rustling in the hall, +followed by a soft closing of the door. In a moment she appeared. + +The light was so low that she did not notice Henchard at first. As soon +as she saw him she uttered a little cry, almost of terror. + +“How can you frighten me so?” she exclaimed, with a flushed face. “It +is past ten o’clock, and you have no right to surprise me here at such +a time.” + +“I don’t know that I’ve not the right. At any rate I have the excuse. +Is it so necessary that I should stop to think of manners and customs?” + +“It is too late for propriety, and might injure me.” + +“I called an hour ago, and you would not see me, and I thought you were +in when I called now. It is you, Lucetta, who are doing wrong. It is +not proper in ’ee to throw me over like this. I have a little matter to +remind you of, which you seem to forget.” + +She sank into a chair, and turned pale. + +“I don’t want to hear it—I don’t want to hear it!” she said through her +hands, as he, standing close to the edge of her gown, began to allude +to the Jersey days. + +“But you ought to hear it,” said he. + +“It came to nothing; and through you. Then why not leave me the freedom +that I gained with such sorrow! Had I found that you proposed to marry +me for pure love I might have felt bound now. But I soon learnt that +you had planned it out of mere charity—almost as an unpleasant +duty—because I had nursed you, and compromised myself, and you thought +you must repay me. After that I did not care for you so deeply as +before.” + +“Why did you come here to find me, then?” + +“I thought I ought to marry you for conscience’ sake, since you were +free, even though I—did not like you so well.” + +“And why then don’t you think so now?” + +She was silent. It was only too obvious that conscience had ruled well +enough till new love had intervened and usurped that rule. In feeling +this she herself forgot for the moment her partially justifying +argument—that having discovered Henchard’s infirmities of temper, she +had some excuse for not risking her happiness in his hands after once +escaping them. The only thing she could say was, “I was a poor girl +then; and now my circumstances have altered, so I am hardly the same +person.” + +“That’s true. And it makes the case awkward for me. But I don’t want to +touch your money. I am quite willing that every penny of your property +shall remain to your personal use. Besides, that argument has nothing +in it. The man you are thinking of is no better than I.” + +“If you were as good as he you would leave me!” she cried passionately. + +This unluckily aroused Henchard. “You cannot in honour refuse me,” he +said. “And unless you give me your promise this very night to be my +wife, before a witness, I’ll reveal our intimacy—in common fairness to +other men!” + +A look of resignation settled upon her. Henchard saw its bitterness; +and had Lucetta’s heart been given to any other man in the world than +Farfrae he would probably have had pity upon her at that moment. But +the supplanter was the upstart (as Henchard called him) who had mounted +into prominence upon his shoulders, and he could bring himself to show +no mercy. + +Without another word she rang the bell, and directed that +Elizabeth-Jane should be fetched from her room. The latter appeared, +surprised in the midst of her lucubrations. As soon as she saw Henchard +she went across to him dutifully. + +“Elizabeth-Jane,” he said, taking her hand, “I want you to hear this.” +And turning to Lucetta: “Will you, or will you not, marry me? + +“If you—wish it, I must agree!” + +“You say yes?” + +“I do.” + +No sooner had she given the promise than she fell back in a fainting +state. + +“What dreadful thing drives her to say this, father, when it is such a +pain to her?” asked Elizabeth, kneeling down by Lucetta. “Don’t compel +her to do anything against her will! I have lived with her, and know +that she cannot bear much.” + +“Don’t be a no’thern simpleton!” said Henchard drily. “This promise +will leave him free for you, if you want him, won’t it?” + +At this Lucetta seemed to wake from her swoon with a start. + +“Him? Who are you talking about?” she said wildly. + +“Nobody, as far as I am concerned,” said Elizabeth firmly. + +“Oh—well. Then it is my mistake,” said Henchard. “But the business is +between me and Miss Templeman. She agrees to be my wife.” + +“But don’t dwell on it just now,” entreated Elizabeth, holding +Lucetta’s hand. + +“I don’t wish to, if she promises,” said Henchard. + +“I have, I have,” groaned Lucetta, her limbs hanging like fluid, from +very misery and faintness. “Michael, please don’t argue it any more!” + +“I will not,” he said. And taking up his hat he went away. + +Elizabeth-Jane continued to kneel by Lucetta. “What is this?” she said. +“You called my father ‘Michael’ as if you knew him well? And how is it +he has got this power over you, that you promise to marry him against +your will? Ah—you have many many secrets from me!” + +“Perhaps you have some from me,” Lucetta murmured with closed eyes, +little thinking, however, so unsuspicious was she, that the secret of +Elizabeth’s heart concerned the young man who had caused this damage to +her own. + +“I would not—do anything against you at all!” stammered Elizabeth, +keeping in all signs of emotion till she was ready to burst. “I cannot +understand how my father can command you so; I don’t sympathize with +him in it at all. I’ll go to him and ask him to release you.” + +“No, no,” said Lucetta. “Let it all be.” + + + +XXVIII. + +The next morning Henchard went to the Town Hall below Lucetta’s house, +to attend Petty Sessions, being still a magistrate for the year by +virtue of his late position as Mayor. In passing he looked up at her +windows, but nothing of her was to be seen. + +Henchard as a Justice of the Peace may at first seem to be an even +greater incongruity than Shallow and Silence themselves. But his rough +and ready perceptions, his sledge-hammer directness, had often served +him better than nice legal knowledge in despatching such simple +business as fell to his hands in this Court. To-day Dr. Chalkfield, the +Mayor for the year, being absent, the corn-merchant took the big chair, +his eyes still abstractedly stretching out of the window to the ashlar +front of High-Place Hall. + +There was one case only, and the offender stood before him. She was an +old woman of mottled countenance, attired in a shawl of that nameless +tertiary hue which comes, but cannot be made—a hue neither tawny, +russet, hazel, nor ash; a sticky black bonnet that seemed to have been +worn in the country of the Psalmist where the clouds drop fatness; and +an apron that had been white in time so comparatively recent as still +to contrast visibly with the rest of her clothes. The steeped aspect of +the woman as a whole showed her to be no native of the country-side or +even of a country-town. + +She looked cursorily at Henchard and the second magistrate, and +Henchard looked at her, with a momentary pause, as if she had reminded +him indistinctly of somebody or something which passed from his mind as +quickly as it had come. “Well, and what has she been doing?” he said, +looking down at the charge sheet. + +“She is charged, sir, with the offence of disorderly female and +nuisance,” whispered Stubberd. + +“Where did she do that?” said the other magistrate. + +“By the church, sir, of all the horrible places in the world!—I caught +her in the act, your worship.” + +“Stand back then,” said Henchard, “and let’s hear what you’ve got to +say.” + +Stubberd was sworn in, the magistrate’s clerk dipped his pen, Henchard +being no note-taker himself, and the constable began— + +“Hearing a’ illegal noise I went down the street at twenty-five minutes +past eleven P.M. on the night of the fifth instinct, Hannah Dominy. +When I had— + +“Don’t go so fast, Stubberd,” said the clerk. + +The constable waited, with his eyes on the clerk’s pen, till the latter +stopped scratching and said, “yes.” Stubberd continued: “When I had +proceeded to the spot I saw defendant at another spot, namely, the +gutter.” He paused, watching the point of the clerk’s pen again. + +“Gutter, yes, Stubberd.” + +“Spot measuring twelve feet nine inches or thereabouts from where I—” +Still careful not to outrun the clerk’s penmanship Stubberd pulled up +again; for having got his evidence by heart it was immaterial to him +whereabouts he broke off. + +“I object to that,” spoke up the old woman, “‘spot measuring twelve +feet nine or thereabouts from where I,’ is not sound testimony!” + +The magistrates consulted, and the second one said that the bench was +of opinion that twelve feet nine inches from a man on his oath was +admissible. + +Stubberd, with a suppressed gaze of victorious rectitude at the old +woman, continued: “Was standing myself. She was wambling about quite +dangerous to the thoroughfare and when I approached to draw near she +committed the nuisance, and insulted me.” + +“‘Insulted me.’ ...Yes, what did she say?” + +“She said, ‘Put away that dee lantern,’ she says.” + +“Yes.” + +“Says she, ‘Dost hear, old turmit-head? Put away that dee lantern. I +have floored fellows a dee sight finer-looking than a dee fool like +thee, you son of a bee, dee me if I haint,’ she says. + +“I object to that conversation!” interposed the old woman. “I was not +capable enough to hear what I said, and what is said out of my hearing +is not evidence.” + +There was another stoppage for consultation, a book was referred to, +and finally Stubberd was allowed to go on again. The truth was that the +old woman had appeared in court so many more times than the magistrates +themselves, that they were obliged to keep a sharp look-out upon their +procedure. However, when Stubberd had rambled on a little further +Henchard broke out impatiently, “Come—we don’t want to hear any more of +them cust dees and bees! Say the words out like a man, and don’t be so +modest, Stubberd; or else leave it alone!” Turning to the woman, “Now +then, have you any questions to ask him, or anything to say?” + +“Yes,” she replied with a twinkle in her eye; and the clerk dipped his +pen. + +“Twenty years ago or thereabout I was selling of furmity in a tent at +Weydon Fair——” + +“‘Twenty years ago’—well, that’s beginning at the beginning; suppose +you go back to the Creation!” said the clerk, not without satire. + +But Henchard stared, and quite forgot what was evidence and what was +not. + +“A man and a woman with a little child came into my tent,” the woman +continued. “They sat down and had a basin apiece. Ah, Lord’s my life! I +was of a more respectable station in the world then than I am now, +being a land smuggler in a large way of business; and I used to season +my furmity with rum for them who asked for’t. I did it for the man; and +then he had more and more; till at last he quarrelled with his wife, +and offered to sell her to the highest bidder. A sailor came in and bid +five guineas, and paid the money, and led her away. And the man who +sold his wife in that fashion is the man sitting there in the great big +chair.” The speaker concluded by nodding her head at Henchard and +folding her arms. + +Everybody looked at Henchard. His face seemed strange, and in tint as +if it had been powdered over with ashes. “We don’t want to hear your +life and adventures,” said the second magistrate sharply, filling the +pause which followed. “You’ve been asked if you’ve anything to say +bearing on the case.” + +“That bears on the case. It proves that he’s no better than I, and has +no right to sit there in judgment upon me.” + +“’Tis a concocted story,” said the clerk. “So hold your tongue!” + +“No—’tis true.” The words came from Henchard. “’Tis as true as the +light,” he said slowly. “And upon my soul it does prove that I’m no +better than she! And to keep out of any temptation to treat her hard +for her revenge, I’ll leave her to you.” + +The sensation in the court was indescribably great. Henchard left the +chair, and came out, passing through a group of people on the steps and +outside that was much larger than usual; for it seemed that the old +furmity dealer had mysteriously hinted to the denizens of the lane in +which she had been lodging since her arrival, that she knew a queer +thing or two about their great local man Mr. Henchard, if she chose to +tell it. This had brought them hither. + +“Why are there so many idlers round the Town Hall to-day?” said Lucetta +to her servant when the case was over. She had risen late, and had just +looked out of the window. + +“Oh, please, ma’am, ’tis this larry about Mr. Henchard. A woman has +proved that before he became a gentleman he sold his wife for five +guineas in a booth at a fair.” + +In all the accounts which Henchard had given her of the separation from +his wife Susan for so many years, of his belief in her death, and so +on, he had never clearly explained the actual and immediate cause of +that separation. The story she now heard for the first time. + +A gradual misery overspread Lucetta’s face as she dwelt upon the +promise wrung from her the night before. At bottom, then, Henchard was +this. How terrible a contingency for a woman who should commit herself +to his care. + +During the day she went out to the Ring and to other places, not coming +in till nearly dusk. As soon as she saw Elizabeth-Jane after her return +indoors she told her that she had resolved to go away from home to the +seaside for a few days—to Port-Bredy; Casterbridge was so gloomy. + +Elizabeth, seeing that she looked wan and disturbed, encouraged her in +the idea, thinking a change would afford her relief. She could not help +suspecting that the gloom which seemed to have come over Casterbridge +in Lucetta’s eyes might be partially owing to the fact that Farfrae was +away from home. + +Elizabeth saw her friend depart for Port-Bredy, and took charge of +High-Place Hall till her return. After two or three days of solitude +and incessant rain Henchard called at the house. He seemed disappointed +to hear of Lucetta’s absence and though he nodded with outward +indifference he went away handling his beard with a nettled mien. + +The next day he called again. “Is she come now?” he asked. + +“Yes. She returned this morning,” replied his stepdaughter. “But she is +not indoors. She has gone for a walk along the turnpike-road to +Port-Bredy. She will be home by dusk.” + +After a few words, which only served to reveal his restless impatience, +he left the house again. + + + +XXIX. + +At this hour Lucetta was bounding along the road to Port-Bredy just as +Elizabeth had announced. That she had chosen for her afternoon walk the +road along which she had returned to Casterbridge three hours earlier +in a carriage was curious—if anything should be called curious in +concatenations of phenomena wherein each is known to have its +accounting cause. It was the day of the chief market—Saturday—and +Farfrae for once had been missed from his corn-stand in the dealers’ +room. Nevertheless, it was known that he would be home that night—“for +Sunday,” as Casterbridge expressed it. + +Lucetta, in continuing her walk, had at length reached the end of the +ranked trees which bordered the highway in this and other directions +out of the town. This end marked a mile; and here she stopped. + +The spot was a vale between two gentle acclivities, and the road, still +adhering to its Roman foundation, stretched onward straight as a +surveyor’s line till lost to sight on the most distant ridge. There was +neither hedge nor tree in the prospect now, the road clinging to the +stubby expanse of corn-land like a strip to an undulating garment. Near +her was a barn—the single building of any kind within her horizon. + +She strained her eyes up the lessening road, but nothing appeared +thereon—not so much as a speck. She sighed one word—“Donald!” and +turned her face to the town for retreat. + +Here the case was different. A single figure was approaching +her—Elizabeth-Jane’s. + +Lucetta, in spite of her loneliness, seemed a little vexed. Elizabeth’s +face, as soon as she recognized her friend, shaped itself into +affectionate lines while yet beyond speaking distance. “I suddenly +thought I would come and meet you,” she said, smiling. + +Lucetta’s reply was taken from her lips by an unexpected diversion. A +by-road on her right hand descended from the fields into the highway at +the point where she stood, and down the track a bull was rambling +uncertainly towards her and Elizabeth, who, facing the other way, did +not observe him. + +In the latter quarter of each year cattle were at once the mainstay and +the terror of families about Casterbridge and its neighbourhood, where +breeding was carried on with Abrahamic success. The head of stock +driven into and out of the town at this season to be sold by the local +auctioneer was very large; and all these horned beasts, in travelling +to and fro, sent women and children to shelter as nothing else could +do. In the main the animals would have walked along quietly enough; but +the Casterbridge tradition was that to drive stock it was indispensable +that hideous cries, coupled with Yahoo antics and gestures, should be +used, large sticks flourished, stray dogs called in, and in general +everything done that was likely to infuriate the viciously disposed and +terrify the mild. Nothing was commoner than for a house-holder on going +out of his parlour to find his hall or passage full of little children, +nursemaids, aged women, or a ladies’ school, who apologized for their +presence by saying, “A bull passing down street from the sale.” + +Lucetta and Elizabeth regarded the animal in doubt, he meanwhile +drawing vaguely towards them. It was a large specimen of the breed, in +colour rich dun, though disfigured at present by splotches of mud about +his seamy sides. His horns were thick and tipped with brass; his two +nostrils like the Thames Tunnel as seen in the perspective toys of +yore. Between them, through the gristle of his nose, was a stout copper +ring, welded on, and irremovable as Gurth’s collar of brass. To the +ring was attached an ash staff about a yard long, which the bull with +the motions of his head flung about like a flail. + +It was not till they observed this dangling stick that the young women +were really alarmed; for it revealed to them that the bull was an old +one, too savage to be driven, which had in some way escaped, the staff +being the means by which the drover controlled him and kept his horns +at arms’ length. + +They looked round for some shelter or hiding-place, and thought of the +barn hard by. As long as they had kept their eyes on the bull he had +shown some deference in his manner of approach; but no sooner did they +turn their backs to seek the barn than he tossed his head and decided +to thoroughly terrify them. This caused the two helpless girls to run +wildly, whereupon the bull advanced in a deliberate charge. + +The barn stood behind a green slimy pond, and it was closed save as to +one of the usual pair of doors facing them, which had been propped open +by a hurdle-stick, and for this opening they made. The interior had +been cleared by a recent bout of threshing except at one end, where +there was a stack of dry clover. Elizabeth-Jane took in the situation. +“We must climb up there,” she said. + +But before they had even approached it they heard the bull scampering +through the pond without, and in a second he dashed into the barn, +knocking down the hurdle-stake in passing; the heavy door slammed +behind him; and all three were imprisoned in the barn together. The +mistaken creature saw them, and stalked towards the end of the barn +into which they had fled. The girls doubled so adroitly that their +pursuer was against the wall when the fugitives were already half way +to the other end. By the time that his length would allow him to turn +and follow them thither they had crossed over; thus the pursuit went +on, the hot air from his nostrils blowing over them like a sirocco, and +not a moment being attainable by Elizabeth or Lucetta in which to open +the door. What might have happened had their situation continued cannot +be said; but in a few moments a rattling of the door distracted their +adversary’s attention, and a man appeared. He ran forward towards the +leading-staff, seized it, and wrenched the animal’s head as if he would +snap it off. The wrench was in reality so violent that the thick neck +seemed to have lost its stiffness and to become half-paralyzed, whilst +the nose dropped blood. The premeditated human contrivance of the +nose-ring was too cunning for impulsive brute force, and the creature +flinched. + +The man was seen in the partial gloom to be large-framed and +unhesitating. He led the bull to the door, and the light revealed +Henchard. He made the bull fast without, and re-entered to the succour +of Lucetta; for he had not perceived Elizabeth, who had climbed on to +the clover-heap. Lucetta was hysterical, and Henchard took her in his +arms and carried her to the door. + +“You—have saved me!” she cried, as soon as she could speak. + +“I have returned your kindness,” he responded tenderly. “You once saved +me.” + +“How—comes it to be you—you?” she asked, not heeding his reply. + +“I came out here to look for you. I have been wanting to tell you +something these two or three days; but you have been away, and I could +not. Perhaps you cannot talk now?” + +“Oh—no! Where is Elizabeth?” + +“Here am I!” cried the missing one cheerfully; and without waiting for +the ladder to be placed she slid down the face of the clover-stack to +the floor. + +Henchard supporting Lucetta on one side, and Elizabeth-Jane on the +other, they went slowly along the rising road. They had reached the top +and were descending again when Lucetta, now much recovered, recollected +that she had dropped her muff in the barn. + +“I’ll run back,” said Elizabeth-Jane. “I don’t mind it at all, as I am +not tired as you are.” She thereupon hastened down again to the barn, +the others pursuing their way. + +Elizabeth soon found the muff, such an article being by no means small +at that time. Coming out she paused to look for a moment at the bull, +now rather to be pitied with his bleeding nose, having perhaps rather +intended a practical joke than a murder. Henchard had secured him by +jamming the staff into the hinge of the barn-door, and wedging it there +with a stake. At length she turned to hasten onward after her +contemplation, when she saw a green-and-black gig approaching from the +contrary direction, the vehicle being driven by Farfrae. + +His presence here seemed to explain Lucetta’s walk that way. Donald saw +her, drew up, and was hastily made acquainted with what had occurred. +At Elizabeth-Jane mentioning how greatly Lucetta had been jeopardized, +he exhibited an agitation different in kind no less than in intensity +from any she had seen in him before. He became so absorbed in the +circumstance that he scarcely had sufficient knowledge of what he was +doing to think of helping her up beside him. + +“She has gone on with Mr. Henchard, you say?” he inquired at last. + +“Yes. He is taking her home. They are almost there by this time.” + +“And you are sure she can get home?” + +Elizabeth-Jane was quite sure. + +“Your stepfather saved her?” + +“Entirely.” + +Farfrae checked his horse’s pace; she guessed why. He was thinking that +it would be best not to intrude on the other two just now. Henchard had +saved Lucetta, and to provoke a possible exhibition of her deeper +affection for himself was as ungenerous as it was unwise. + +The immediate subject of their talk being exhausted she felt more +embarrassed at sitting thus beside her past lover; but soon the two +figures of the others were visible at the entrance to the town. The +face of the woman was frequently turned back, but Farfrae did not whip +on the horse. When these reached the town walls Henchard and his +companion had disappeared down the street; Farfrae set down +Elizabeth-Jane on her expressing a particular wish to alight there, and +drove round to the stables at the back of his lodgings. + +On this account he entered the house through his garden, and going up +to his apartments found them in a particularly disturbed state, his +boxes being hauled out upon the landing, and his bookcase standing in +three pieces. These phenomena, however, seemed to cause him not the +least surprise. “When will everything be sent up?” he said to the +mistress of the house, who was superintending. + +“I am afraid not before eight, sir,” said she. “You see we wasn’t aware +till this morning that you were going to move, or we could have been +forwarder.” + +“A—well, never mind, never mind!” said Farfrae cheerily. “Eight o’clock +will do well enough if it be not later. Now, don’t ye be standing here +talking, or it will be twelve, I doubt.” Thus speaking he went out by +the front door and up the street. + +During this interval Henchard and Lucetta had had experiences of a +different kind. After Elizabeth’s departure for the muff the +corn-merchant opened himself frankly, holding her hand within his arm, +though she would fain have withdrawn it. “Dear Lucetta, I have been +very, very anxious to see you these two or three days,” he said, “ever +since I saw you last! I have thought over the way I got your promise +that night. You said to me, ‘If I were a man I should not insist.’ That +cut me deep. I felt that there was some truth in it. I don’t want to +make you wretched; and to marry me just now would do that as nothing +else could—it is but too plain. Therefore I agree to an indefinite +engagement—to put off all thought of marriage for a year or two.” + +“But—but—can I do nothing of a different kind?” said Lucetta. “I am +full of gratitude to you—you have saved my life. And your care of me is +like coals of fire on my head! I am a monied person now. Surely I can +do something in return for your goodness—something practical?” + +Henchard remained in thought. He had evidently not expected this. +“There is one thing you might do, Lucetta,” he said. “But not exactly +of that kind.” + +“Then of what kind is it?” she asked with renewed misgiving. + +“I must tell you a secret to ask it.—You may have heard that I have +been unlucky this year? I did what I have never done before—speculated +rashly; and I lost. That’s just put me in a strait. + +“And you would wish me to advance some money?” + +“No, no!” said Henchard, almost in anger. “I’m not the man to sponge on +a woman, even though she may be so nearly my own as you. No, Lucetta; +what you can do is this and it would save me. My great creditor is +Grower, and it is at his hands I shall suffer if at anybody’s; while a +fortnight’s forbearance on his part would be enough to allow me to pull +through. This may be got out of him in one way—that you would let it be +known to him that you are my intended—that we are to be quietly married +in the next fortnight.—Now stop, you haven’t heard all! Let him have +this story, without, of course, any prejudice to the fact that the +actual engagement between us is to be a long one. Nobody else need +know: you could go with me to Mr. Grower and just let me speak to ’ee +before him as if we were on such terms. We’ll ask him to keep it +secret. He will willingly wait then. At the fortnight’s end I shall be +able to face him; and I can coolly tell him all is postponed between us +for a year or two. Not a soul in the town need know how you’ve helped +me. Since you wish to be of use, there’s your way.” + +It being now what the people called the “pinking in” of the day, that +is, the quarter-hour just before dusk, he did not at first observe the +result of his own words upon her. + +“If it were anything else,” she began, and the dryness of her lips was +represented in her voice. + +“But it is such a little thing!” he said, with a deep reproach. “Less +than you have offered—just the beginning of what you have so lately +promised! I could have told him as much myself, but he would not have +believed me.” + +“It is not because I won’t—it is because I absolutely can’t,” she said, +with rising distress. + +“You are provoking!” he burst out. “It is enough to make me force you +to carry out at once what you have promised.” + +“I cannot!” she insisted desperately. + +“Why? When I have only within these few minutes released you from your +promise to do the thing offhand.” + +“Because—he was a witness!” + +“Witness? Of what? + +“If I must tell you——. Don’t, don’t upbraid me!” + +“Well! Let’s hear what you mean?” + +“Witness of my marriage—Mr. Grower was!” + +“Marriage?” + +“Yes. With Mr. Farfrae. O Michael! I am already his wife. We were +married this week at Port-Bredy. There were reasons against our doing +it here. Mr. Grower was a witness because he happened to be at +Port-Bredy at the time.” + +Henchard stood as if idiotized. She was so alarmed at his silence that +she murmured something about lending him sufficient money to tide over +the perilous fortnight. + +“Married him?” said Henchard at length. “My good—what, married him +whilst—bound to marry me?” + +“It was like this,” she explained, with tears in her eyes and quavers +in her voice; “don’t—don’t be cruel! I loved him so much, and I thought +you might tell him of the past—and that grieved me! And then, when I +had promised you, I learnt of the rumour that you had—sold your first +wife at a fair like a horse or cow! How could I keep my promise after +hearing that? I could not risk myself in your hands; it would have been +letting myself down to take your name after such a scandal. But I knew +I should lose Donald if I did not secure him at once—for you would +carry out your threat of telling him of our former acquaintance, as +long as there was a chance of keeping me for yourself by doing so. But +you will not do so now, will you, Michael? for it is too late to +separate us.” + +The notes of St. Peter’s bells in full peal had been wafted to them +while he spoke, and now the genial thumping of the town band, renowned +for its unstinted use of the drum-stick, throbbed down the street. + +“Then this racket they are making is on account of it, I suppose?” said +he. + +“Yes—I think he has told them, or else Mr. Grower has.... May I leave +you now? My—he was detained at Port-Bredy to-day, and sent me on a few +hours before him.” + +“Then it is _his wife’s_ life I have saved this afternoon.” + +“Yes—and he will be for ever grateful to you.” + +“I am much obliged to him.... O you false woman!” burst from Henchard. +“You promised me!” + +“Yes, yes! But it was under compulsion, and I did not know all your +past——” + +“And now I’ve a mind to punish you as you deserve! One word to this +bran-new husband of how you courted me, and your precious happiness is +blown to atoms!” + +“Michael—pity me, and be generous!” + +“You don’t deserve pity! You did; but you don’t now.” + +“I’ll help you to pay off your debt.” + +“A pensioner of Farfrae’s wife—not I! Don’t stay with me longer—I shall +say something worse. Go home!” + +She disappeared under the trees of the south walk as the band came +round the corner, awaking the echoes of every stock and stone in +celebration of her happiness. Lucetta took no heed, but ran up the back +street and reached her own home unperceived. + + + +XXX. + +Farfrae’s words to his landlady had referred to the removal of his +boxes and other effects from his late lodgings to Lucetta’s house. The +work was not heavy, but it had been much hindered on account of the +frequent pauses necessitated by exclamations of surprise at the event, +of which the good woman had been briefly informed by letter a few hours +earlier. + +At the last moment of leaving Port-Bredy, Farfrae, like John Gilpin, +had been detained by important customers, whom, even in the exceptional +circumstances, he was not the man to neglect. Moreover, there was a +convenience in Lucetta arriving first at her house. Nobody there as yet +knew what had happened; and she was best in a position to break the +news to the inmates, and give directions for her husband’s +accommodation. He had, therefore, sent on his two-days’ bride in a +hired brougham, whilst he went across the country to a certain group of +wheat and barley ricks a few miles off, telling her the hour at which +he might be expected the same evening. This accounted for her trotting +out to meet him after their separation of four hours. + +By a strenuous effort, after leaving Henchard she calmed herself in +readiness to receive Donald at High-Place Hall when he came on from his +lodgings. One supreme fact empowered her to this, the sense that, come +what would, she had secured him. Half-an-hour after her arrival he +walked in, and she met him with a relieved gladness, which a month’s +perilous absence could not have intensified. + +“There is one thing I have not done; and yet it is important,” she said +earnestly, when she had finished talking about the adventure with the +bull. “That is, broken the news of our marriage to my dear +Elizabeth-Jane.” + +“Ah, and you have not?” he said thoughtfully. “I gave her a lift from +the barn homewards; but I did not tell her either; for I thought she +might have heard of it in the town, and was keeping back her +congratulations from shyness, and all that.” + +“She can hardly have heard of it. But I’ll find out; I’ll go to her +now. And, Donald, you don’t mind her living on with me just the same as +before? She is so quiet and unassuming.” + +“O no, indeed I don’t,” Farfrae answered with, perhaps, a faint +awkwardness. “But I wonder if she would care to?” + +“O yes!” said Lucetta eagerly. “I am sure she would like to. Besides, +poor thing, she has no other home.” + +Farfrae looked at her and saw that she did not suspect the secret of +her more reserved friend. He liked her all the better for the +blindness. “Arrange as you like with her by all means,” he said. “It is +I who have come to your house, not you to mine.” + +“I’ll run and speak to her,” said Lucetta. + +When she got upstairs to Elizabeth-Jane’s room the latter had taken off +her out-door things, and was resting over a book. Lucetta found in a +moment that she had not yet learnt the news. + +“I did not come down to you, Miss Templeman,” she said simply. “I was +coming to ask if you had quite recovered from your fright, but I found +you had a visitor. What are the bells ringing for, I wonder? And the +band, too, is playing. Somebody must be married; or else they are +practising for Christmas.” + +Lucetta uttered a vague “Yes,” and seating herself by the other young +woman looked musingly at her. “What a lonely creature you are,” she +presently said; “never knowing what’s going on, or what people are +talking about everywhere with keen interest. You should get out, and +gossip about as other women do, and then you wouldn’t be obliged to ask +me a question of that kind. Well, now, I have something to tell you.” + +Elizabeth-Jane said she was so glad, and made herself receptive. + +“I must go rather a long way back,” said Lucetta, the difficulty of +explaining herself satisfactorily to the pondering one beside her +growing more apparent at each syllable. “You remember that trying case +of conscience I told you of some time ago—about the first lover and the +second lover?” She let out in jerky phrases a leading word or two of +the story she had told. + +“O yes—I remember the story of _your friend_,” said Elizabeth drily, +regarding the irises of Lucetta’s eyes as though to catch their exact +shade. “The two lovers—the old one and the new: how she wanted to marry +the second, but felt she ought to marry the first; so that the good she +would have done she did not, and the evil that she would not, that she +did—exactly like the Apostle Paul.” + +“O no; she didn’t do evil exactly!” said Lucetta hastily. + +“But you said that she—or as I may say _you_”—answered Elizabeth, +dropping the mask, “were in honour and conscience bound to marry the +first?” + +Lucetta’s blush at being seen through came and went again before she +replied anxiously, “You will never breathe this, will you, +Elizabeth-Jane?” + +“Certainly not, if you say not. + +“Then I will tell you that the case is more complicated—worse, in +fact—than it seemed in my story. I and the first man were thrown +together in a strange way, and felt that we ought to be united, as the +world had talked of us. He was a widower, as he supposed. He had not +heard of his first wife for many years. But the wife returned, and we +parted. She is now dead, and the husband comes paying me addresses +again, saying, ‘Now we’ll complete our purposes.’ But, Elizabeth-Jane, +all this amounts to a new courtship of me by him; I was absolved from +all vows by the return of the other woman.” + +“Have you not lately renewed your promise?” said the younger with quiet +surmise. She had divined Man Number One. + +“That was wrung from me by a threat.” + +“Yes, it was. But I think when any one gets coupled up with a man in +the past so unfortunately as you have done she ought to become his wife +if she can, even if she were not the sinning party.” + +Lucetta’s countenance lost its sparkle. “He turned out to be a man I +should be afraid to marry,” she pleaded. “Really afraid! And it was not +till after my renewed promise that I knew it.” + +“Then there is only one course left to honesty. You must remain a +single woman.” + +“But think again! Do consider——” + +“I am certain,” interrupted her companion hardily. “I have guessed very +well who the man is. My father; and I say it is him or nobody for you.” + +Any suspicion of impropriety was to Elizabeth-Jane like a red rag to a +bull. Her craving for correctness of procedure was, indeed, almost +vicious. Owing to her early troubles with regard to her mother a +semblance of irregularity had terrors for her which those whose names +are safeguarded from suspicion know nothing of. “You ought to marry Mr. +Henchard or nobody—certainly not another man!” she went on with a +quivering lip in whose movement two passions shared. + +“I don’t admit that!” said Lucetta passionately. + +“Admit it or not, it is true!” + +Lucetta covered her eyes with her right hand, as if she could plead no +more, holding out her left to Elizabeth-Jane. + +“Why, you _have_ married him!” cried the latter, jumping up with +pleasure after a glance at Lucetta’s fingers. “When did you do it? Why +did you not tell me, instead of teasing me like this? How very +honourable of you! He did treat my mother badly once, it seems, in a +moment of intoxication. And it is true that he is stern sometimes. But +you will rule him entirely, I am sure, with your beauty and wealth and +accomplishments. You are the woman he will adore, and we shall all +three be happy together now!” + +“O, my Elizabeth-Jane!” cried Lucetta distressfully. “’Tis somebody +else that I have married! I was so desperate—so afraid of being forced +to anything else—so afraid of revelations that would quench his love +for me, that I resolved to do it offhand, come what might, and purchase +a week of happiness at any cost!” + +“You—have—married Mr. Farfrae!” cried Elizabeth-Jane, in Nathan tones + +Lucetta bowed. She had recovered herself. + +“The bells are ringing on that account,” she said. “My husband is +downstairs. He will live here till a more suitable house is ready for +us; and I have told him that I want you to stay with me just as +before.” + +“Let me think of it alone,” the girl quickly replied, corking up the +turmoil of her feeling with grand control. + +“You shall. I am sure we shall be happy together.” + +Lucetta departed to join Donald below, a vague uneasiness floating over +her joy at seeing him quite at home there. Not on account of her friend +Elizabeth did she feel it: for of the bearings of Elizabeth-Jane’s +emotions she had not the least suspicion; but on Henchard’s alone. + +Now the instant decision of Susan Henchard’s daughter was to dwell in +that house no more. Apart from her estimate of the propriety of +Lucetta’s conduct, Farfrae had been so nearly her avowed lover that she +felt she could not abide there. + +It was still early in the evening when she hastily put on her things +and went out. In a few minutes, knowing the ground, she had found a +suitable lodging, and arranged to enter it that night. Returning and +entering noiselessly she took off her pretty dress and arrayed herself +in a plain one, packing up the other to keep as her best; for she would +have to be very economical now. She wrote a note to leave for Lucetta, +who was closely shut up in the drawing-room with Farfrae; and then +Elizabeth-Jane called a man with a wheel-barrow; and seeing her boxes +put into it she trotted off down the street to her rooms. They were in +the street in which Henchard lived, and almost opposite his door. + +Here she sat down and considered the means of subsistence. The little +annual sum settled on her by her stepfather would keep body and soul +together. A wonderful skill in netting of all sorts—acquired in +childhood by making seines in Newson’s home—might serve her in good +stead; and her studies, which were pursued unremittingly, might serve +her in still better. + +By this time the marriage that had taken place was known throughout +Casterbridge; had been discussed noisily on kerbstones, confidentially +behind counters, and jovially at the Three Mariners. Whether Farfrae +would sell his business and set up for a gentleman on his wife’s money, +or whether he would show independence enough to stick to his trade in +spite of his brilliant alliance, was a great point of interest. + + + +XXXI. + +The retort of the furmity-woman before the magistrates had spread; and +in four-and-twenty hours there was not a person in Casterbridge who +remained unacquainted with the story of Henchard’s mad freak at +Weydon-Priors Fair, long years before. The amends he had made in after +life were lost sight of in the dramatic glare of the original act. Had +the incident been well known of old and always, it might by this time +have grown to be lightly regarded as the rather tall wild oat, but +well-nigh the single one, of a young man with whom the steady and +mature (if somewhat headstrong) burgher of to-day had scarcely a point +in common. But the act having lain as dead and buried ever since, the +interspace of years was unperceived; and the black spot of his youth +wore the aspect of a recent crime. + +Small as the police-court incident had been in itself, it formed the +edge or turn in the incline of Henchard’s fortunes. On that day—almost +at that minute—he passed the ridge of prosperity and honour, and began +to descend rapidly on the other side. It was strange how soon he sank +in esteem. Socially he had received a startling fillip downwards; and, +having already lost commercial buoyancy from rash transactions, the +velocity of his descent in both aspects became accelerated every hour. + +He now gazed more at the pavements and less at the house-fronts when he +walked about; more at the feet and leggings of men, and less into the +pupils of their eyes with the blazing regard which formerly had made +them blink. + +New events combined to undo him. It had been a bad year for others +besides himself, and the heavy failure of a debtor whom he had trusted +generously completed the overthrow of his tottering credit. And now, in +his desperation, he failed to preserve that strict correspondence +between bulk and sample which is the soul of commerce in grain. For +this, one of his men was mainly to blame; that worthy, in his great +unwisdom, having picked over the sample of an enormous quantity of +second-rate corn which Henchard had in hand, and removed the pinched, +blasted, and smutted grains in great numbers. The produce if honestly +offered would have created no scandal; but the blunder of +misrepresentation, coming at such a moment, dragged Henchard’s name +into the ditch. + +The details of his failure were of the ordinary kind. One day +Elizabeth-Jane was passing the King’s Arms, when she saw people +bustling in and out more than usual where there was no market. A +bystander informed her, with some surprise at her ignorance, that it +was a meeting of the Commissioners under Mr. Henchard’s bankruptcy. She +felt quite tearful, and when she heard that he was present in the hotel +she wished to go in and see him, but was advised not to intrude that +day. + +The room in which debtor and creditors had assembled was a front one, +and Henchard, looking out of the window, had caught sight of +Elizabeth-Jane through the wire blind. His examination had closed, and +the creditors were leaving. The appearance of Elizabeth threw him into +a reverie, till, turning his face from the window, and towering above +all the rest, he called their attention for a moment more. His +countenance had somewhat changed from its flush of prosperity; the +black hair and whiskers were the same as ever, but a film of ash was +over the rest. + +“Gentlemen,” he said, “over and above the assets that we’ve been +talking about, and that appear on the balance-sheet, there be these. It +all belongs to ye, as much as everything else I’ve got, and I don’t +wish to keep it from you, not I.” Saying this, he took his gold watch +from his pocket and laid it on the table; then his purse—the yellow +canvas moneybag, such as was carried by all farmers and dealers—untying +it, and shaking the money out upon the table beside the watch. The +latter he drew back quickly for an instant, to remove the hair-guard +made and given him by Lucetta. “There, now you have all I’ve got in the +world,” he said. “And I wish for your sakes ’twas more.” + +The creditors, farmers almost to a man, looked at the watch, and at the +money, and into the street; when Farmer James Everdene of Weatherbury +spoke. + +“No, no, Henchard,” he said warmly. “We don’t want that. ’Tis +honourable in ye; but keep it. What do you say, neighbours—do ye +agree?” + +“Ay, sure: we don’t wish it at all,” said Grower, another creditor. + +“Let him keep it, of course,” murmured another in the background—a +silent, reserved young man named Boldwood; and the rest responded +unanimously. + +“Well,” said the senior Commissioner, addressing Henchard, “though the +case is a desperate one, I am bound to admit that I have never met a +debtor who behaved more fairly. I’ve proved the balance-sheet to be as +honestly made out as it could possibly be; we have had no trouble; +there have been no evasions and no concealments. The rashness of +dealing which led to this unhappy situation is obvious enough; but as +far as I can see every attempt has been made to avoid wronging +anybody.” + +Henchard was more affected by this than he cared to let them perceive, +and he turned aside to the window again. A general murmur of agreement +followed the Commissioner’s words, and the meeting dispersed. When they +were gone Henchard regarded the watch they had returned to him. +“’Tisn’t mine by rights,” he said to himself. “Why the devil didn’t +they take it?—I don’t want what don’t belong to me!” Moved by a +recollection he took the watch to the maker’s just opposite, sold it +there and then for what the tradesman offered, and went with the +proceeds to one among the smaller of his creditors, a cottager of +Durnover in straitened circumstances, to whom he handed the money. + +When everything was ticketed that Henchard had owned, and the auctions +were in progress, there was quite a sympathetic reaction in the town, +which till then for some time past had done nothing but condemn him. +Now that Henchard’s whole career was pictured distinctly to his +neighbours, and they could see how admirably he had used his one talent +of energy to create a position of affluence out of absolutely +nothing—which was really all he could show when he came to the town as +a journeyman hay-trusser, with his wimble and knife in his basket—they +wondered and regretted his fall. + +Try as she might, Elizabeth could never meet with him. She believed in +him still, though nobody else did; and she wanted to be allowed to +forgive him for his roughness to her, and to help him in his trouble. + +She wrote to him; he did not reply. She then went to his house—the +great house she had lived in so happily for a time—with its front of +dun brick, vitrified here and there and its heavy sash-bars—but +Henchard was to be found there no more. The ex-Mayor had left the home +of his prosperity, and gone into Jopp’s cottage by the Priory Mill—the +sad purlieu to which he had wandered on the night of his discovery that +she was not his daughter. Thither she went. + +Elizabeth thought it odd that he had fixed on this spot to retire to, +but assumed that necessity had no choice. Trees which seemed old enough +to have been planted by the friars still stood around, and the back +hatch of the original mill yet formed a cascade which had raised its +terrific roar for centuries. The cottage itself was built of old stones +from the long dismantled Priory, scraps of tracery, moulded +window-jambs, and arch-labels, being mixed in with the rubble of the +walls. + +In this cottage he occupied a couple of rooms, Jopp, whom Henchard had +employed, abused, cajoled, and dismissed by turns, being the +householder. But even here her stepfather could not be seen. + +“Not by his daughter?” pleaded Elizabeth. + +“By nobody—at present: that’s his order,” she was informed. + +Afterwards she was passing by the corn-stores and hay-barns which had +been the headquarters of his business. She knew that he ruled there no +longer; but it was with amazement that she regarded the familiar +gateway. A smear of decisive lead-coloured paint had been laid on to +obliterate Henchard’s name, though its letters dimly loomed through +like ships in a fog. Over these, in fresh white, spread the name of +Farfrae. + +Abel Whittle was edging his skeleton in at the wicket, and she said, +“Mr. Farfrae is master here?” + +“Yaas, Miss Henchet,” he said, “Mr. Farfrae have bought the concern and +all of we work-folk with it; and ’tis better for us than ’twas—though I +shouldn’t say that to you as a daughter-law. We work harder, but we +bain’t made afeard now. It was fear made my few poor hairs so thin! No +busting out, no slamming of doors, no meddling with yer eternal soul +and all that; and though ’tis a shilling a week less I’m the richer +man; for what’s all the world if yer mind is always in a larry, Miss +Henchet?” + +The intelligence was in a general sense true; and Henchard’s stores, +which had remained in a paralyzed condition during the settlement of +his bankruptcy, were stirred into activity again when the new tenant +had possession. Thenceforward the full sacks, looped with the shining +chain, went scurrying up and down under the cat-head, hairy arms were +thrust out from the different door-ways, and the grain was hauled in; +trusses of hay were tossed anew in and out of the barns, and the +wimbles creaked; while the scales and steel-yards began to be busy +where guess-work had formerly been the rule. + + + +XXXII. + +Two bridges stood near the lower part of Casterbridge town. The first, +of weather-stained brick, was immediately at the end of High Street, +where a diverging branch from that thoroughfare ran round to the +low-lying Durnover lanes; so that the precincts of the bridge formed +the merging point of respectability and indigence. The second bridge, +of stone, was further out on the highway—in fact, fairly in the +meadows, though still within the town boundary. + +These bridges had speaking countenances. Every projection in each was +worn down to obtuseness, partly by weather, more by friction from +generations of loungers, whose toes and heels had from year to year +made restless movements against these parapets, as they had stood there +meditating on the aspect of affairs. In the case of the more friable +bricks and stones even the flat faces were worn into hollows by the +same mixed mechanism. The masonry of the top was clamped with iron at +each joint; since it had been no uncommon thing for desperate men to +wrench the coping off and throw it down the river, in reckless defiance +of the magistrates. + +For to this pair of bridges gravitated all the failures of the town; +those who had failed in business, in love, in sobriety, in crime. Why +the unhappy hereabout usually chose the bridges for their meditations +in preference to a railing, a gate, or a stile, was not so clear. + +There was a marked difference of quality between the personages who +haunted the near bridge of brick and the personages who haunted the far +one of stone. Those of lowest character preferred the former, adjoining +the town; they did not mind the glare of the public eye. They had been +of comparatively no account during their successes; and though they +might feel dispirited, they had no particular sense of shame in their +ruin. Their hands were mostly kept in their pockets; they wore a +leather strap round their hips or knees, and boots that required a +great deal of lacing, but seemed never to get any. Instead of sighing +at their adversities they spat, and instead of saying the iron had +entered into their souls they said they were down on their luck. Jopp +in his time of distress had often stood here; so had Mother Cuxsom, +Christopher Coney, and poor Abel Whittle. + +The _misérables_ who would pause on the remoter bridge were of a +politer stamp. They included bankrupts, hypochondriacs, persons who +were what is called “out of a situation” from fault or lucklessness, +the inefficient of the professional class—shabby-genteel men, who did +not know how to get rid of the weary time between breakfast and dinner, +and the yet more weary time between dinner and dark. The eye of this +species were mostly directed over the parapet upon the running water +below. A man seen there looking thus fixedly into the river was pretty +sure to be one whom the world did not treat kindly for some reason or +other. While one in straits on the townward bridge did not mind who saw +him so, and kept his back to the parapet to survey the passers-by, one +in straits on this never faced the road, never turned his head at +coming footsteps, but, sensitive to his own condition, watched the +current whenever a stranger approached, as if some strange fish +interested him, though every finned thing had been poached out of the +river years before. + +There and thus they would muse; if their grief were the grief of +oppression they would wish themselves kings; if their grief were +poverty, wish themselves millionaires; if sin, they would wish they +were saints or angels; if despised love, that they were some +much-courted Adonis of county fame. Some had been known to stand and +think so long with this fixed gaze downward that eventually they had +allowed their poor carcases to follow that gaze; and they were +discovered the next morning out of reach of their troubles, either here +or in the deep pool called Blackwater, a little higher up the river. + +To this bridge came Henchard, as other unfortunates had come before +him, his way thither being by the riverside path on the chilly edge of +the town. Here he was standing one windy afternoon when Durnover church +clock struck five. While the gusts were bringing the notes to his ears +across the damp intervening flat a man passed behind him and greeted +Henchard by name. Henchard turned slightly and saw that the comer was +Jopp, his old foreman, now employed elsewhere, to whom, though he hated +him, he had gone for lodgings because Jopp was the one man in +Casterbridge whose observation and opinion the fallen corn-merchant +despised to the point of indifference. + +Henchard returned him a scarcely perceptible nod, and Jopp stopped. + +“He and she are gone into their new house to-day,” said Jopp. + +“Oh,” said Henchard absently. “Which house is that?” + +“Your old one.” + +“Gone into my house?” And starting up Henchard added, “_My_ house of +all others in the town!” + +“Well, as somebody was sure to live there, and you couldn’t, it can do +’ee no harm that he’s the man.” + +It was quite true: he felt that it was doing him no harm. Farfrae, who +had already taken the yards and stores, had acquired possession of the +house for the obvious convenience of its contiguity. And yet this act +of his taking up residence within those roomy chambers while he, their +former tenant, lived in a cottage, galled Henchard indescribably. + +Jopp continued: “And you heard of that fellow who bought all the best +furniture at your sale? He was bidding for no other than Farfrae all +the while! It has never been moved out of the house, as he’d already +got the lease.” + +“My furniture too! Surely he’ll buy my body and soul likewise!” + +“There’s no saying he won’t, if you be willing to sell.” And having +planted these wounds in the heart of his once imperious master Jopp +went on his way; while Henchard stared and stared into the racing river +till the bridge seemed moving backward with him. + +The low land grew blacker, and the sky a deeper grey, When the +landscape looked like a picture blotted in with ink, another traveller +approached the great stone bridge. He was driving a gig, his direction +being also townwards. On the round of the middle of the arch the gig +stopped. “Mr. Henchard?” came from it in the voice of Farfrae. Henchard +turned his face. + +Finding that he had guessed rightly Farfrae told the man who +accompanied him to drive home; while he alighted and went up to his +former friend. + +“I have heard that you think of emigrating, Mr. Henchard?” he said. “Is +it true? I have a real reason for asking.” + +Henchard withheld his answer for several instants, and then said, “Yes; +it is true. I am going where you were going to a few years ago, when I +prevented you and got you to bide here. ’Tis turn and turn about, isn’t +it! Do ye mind how we stood like this in the Chalk Walk when I +persuaded ’ee to stay? You then stood without a chattel to your name, +and I was the master of the house in Corn Street. But now I stand +without a stick or a rag, and the master of that house is you.” + +“Yes, yes; that’s so! It’s the way o’ the warrld,” said Farfrae. + +“Ha, ha, true!” cried Henchard, throwing himself into a mood of +jocularity. “Up and down! I’m used to it. What’s the odds after all!” + +“Now listen to me, if it’s no taking up your time,” said Farfrae, “just +as I listened to you. Don’t go. Stay at home.” + +“But I can do nothing else, man!” said Henchard scornfully. “The little +money I have will just keep body and soul together for a few weeks, and +no more. I have not felt inclined to go back to journey-work yet; but I +can’t stay doing nothing, and my best chance is elsewhere.” + +“No; but what I propose is this—if ye will listen. Come and live in +your old house. We can spare some rooms very well—I am sure my wife +would not mind it at all—until there’s an opening for ye.” + +Henchard started. Probably the picture drawn by the unsuspecting Donald +of himself under the same roof with Lucetta was too striking to be +received with equanimity. “No, no,” he said gruffly; “we should +quarrel.” + +“You should hae a part to yourself,” said Farfrae; “and nobody to +interfere wi’ you. It will be a deal healthier than down there by the +river where you live now.” + +Still Henchard refused. “You don’t know what you ask,” he said. +“However, I can do no less than thank ’ee.” + +They walked into the town together side by side, as they had done when +Henchard persuaded the young Scotchman to remain. “Will you come in and +have some supper?” said Farfrae when they reached the middle of the +town, where their paths diverged right and left. + +“No, no.” + +“By-the-bye, I had nearly forgot. I bought a good deal of your +furniture. + +“So I have heard.” + +“Well, it was no that I wanted it so very much for myself; but I wish +ye to pick out all that you care to have—such things as may be endeared +to ye by associations, or particularly suited to your use. And take +them to your own house—it will not be depriving me, we can do with less +very well, and I will have plenty of opportunities of getting more.” + +“What—give it to me for nothing?” said Henchard. “But you paid the +creditors for it!” + +“Ah, yes; but maybe it’s worth more to you than it is to me.” + +Henchard was a little moved. “I—sometimes think I’ve wronged ’ee!” he +said, in tones which showed the disquietude that the night shades hid +in his face. He shook Farfrae abruptly by the hand, and hastened away +as if unwilling to betray himself further. Farfrae saw him turn through +the thoroughfare into Bull Stake and vanish down towards the Priory +Mill. + +Meanwhile Elizabeth-Jane, in an upper room no larger than the Prophet’s +chamber, and with the silk attire of her palmy days packed away in a +box, was netting with great industry between the hours which she +devoted to studying such books as she could get hold of. + +Her lodgings being nearly opposite her stepfather’s former residence, +now Farfrae’s, she could see Donald and Lucetta speeding in and out of +their door with all the bounding enthusiasm of their situation. She +avoided looking that way as much as possible, but it was hardly in +human nature to keep the eyes averted when the door slammed. + +While living on thus quietly she heard the news that Henchard had +caught cold and was confined to his room—possibly a result of standing +about the meads in damp weather. She went off to his house at once. +This time she was determined not to be denied admittance, and made her +way upstairs. He was sitting up in the bed with a greatcoat round him, +and at first resented her intrusion. “Go away—go away,” he said. “I +don’t like to see ’ee!” + +“But, father—” + +“I don’t like to see ’ee,” he repeated. + +However, the ice was broken, and she remained. She made the room more +comfortable, gave directions to the people below, and by the time she +went away had reconciled her stepfather to her visiting him. + +The effect, either of her ministrations or of her mere presence, was a +rapid recovery. He soon was well enough to go out; and now things +seemed to wear a new colour in his eyes. He no longer thought of +emigration, and thought more of Elizabeth. The having nothing to do +made him more dreary than any other circumstance; and one day, with +better views of Farfrae than he had held for some time, and a sense +that honest work was not a thing to be ashamed of, he stoically went +down to Farfrae’s yard and asked to be taken on as a journeyman +hay-trusser. He was engaged at once. This hiring of Henchard was done +through a foreman, Farfrae feeling that it was undesirable to come +personally in contact with the ex-corn-factor more than was absolutely +necessary. While anxious to help him he was well aware by this time of +his uncertain temper, and thought reserved relations best. For the same +reason his orders to Henchard to proceed to this and that country farm +trussing in the usual way were always given through a third person. + +For a time these arrangements worked well, it being the custom to truss +in the respective stack-yards, before bringing it away, the hay bought +at the different farms about the neighbourhood; so that Henchard was +often absent at such places the whole week long. When this was all +done, and Henchard had become in a measure broken in, he came to work +daily on the home premises like the rest. And thus the once flourishing +merchant and Mayor and what not stood as a day-labourer in the barns +and granaries he formerly had owned. + +“I have worked as a journeyman before now, ha’n’t I?” he would say in +his defiant way; “and why shouldn’t I do it again?” But he looked a far +different journeyman from the one he had been in his earlier days. Then +he had worn clean, suitable clothes, light and cheerful in hue; +leggings yellow as marigolds, corduroys immaculate as new flax, and a +neckerchief like a flower-garden. Now he wore the remains of an old +blue cloth suit of his gentlemanly times, a rusty silk hat, and a once +black satin stock, soiled and shabby. Clad thus he went to and fro, +still comparatively an active man—for he was not much over forty—and +saw with the other men in the yard Donald Farfrae going in and out the +green door that led to the garden, and the big house, and Lucetta. + +At the beginning of the winter it was rumoured about Casterbridge that +Mr. Farfrae, already in the Town Council, was to be proposed for Mayor +in a year or two. + +“Yes, she was wise, she was wise in her generation!” said Henchard to +himself when he heard of this one day on his way to Farfrae’s hay-barn. +He thought it over as he wimbled his bonds, and the piece of news acted +as a reviviscent breath to that old view of his—of Donald Farfrae as +his triumphant rival who rode rough-shod over him. + +“A fellow of his age going to be Mayor, indeed!” he murmured with a +corner-drawn smile on his mouth. “But ’tis her money that floats en +upward. Ha-ha—how cust odd it is! Here be I, his former master, working +for him as man, and he the man standing as master, with my house and my +furniture and my what-you-may-call wife all his own.” + +He repeated these things a hundred times a day. During the whole period +of his acquaintance with Lucetta he had never wished to claim her as +his own so desperately as he now regretted her loss. It was no +mercenary hankering after her fortune that moved him, though that +fortune had been the means of making her so much the more desired by +giving her the air of independence and sauciness which attracts men of +his composition. It had given her servants, house, and fine clothing—a +setting that invested Lucetta with a startling novelty in the eyes of +him who had known her in her narrow days. + +He accordingly lapsed into moodiness, and at every allusion to the +possibility of Farfrae’s near election to the municipal chair his +former hatred of the Scotchman returned. Concurrently with this he +underwent a moral change. It resulted in his significantly saying every +now and then, in tones of recklessness, “Only a fortnight more!”—“Only +a dozen days!” and so forth, lessening his figures day by day. + +“Why d’ye say only a dozen days?” asked Solomon Longways as he worked +beside Henchard in the granary weighing oats. + +“Because in twelve days I shall be released from my oath.” + +“What oath?” + +“The oath to drink no spirituous liquid. In twelve days it will be +twenty-one years since I swore it, and then I mean to enjoy myself, +please God!” + +Elizabeth-Jane sat at her window one Sunday, and while there she heard +in the street below a conversation which introduced Henchard’s name. +She was wondering what was the matter, when a third person who was +passing by asked the question in her mind. + +“Michael Henchard have busted out drinking after taking nothing for +twenty-one years!” + +Elizabeth-Jane jumped up, put on her things, and went out. + + + +XXXIII. + +At this date there prevailed in Casterbridge a convivial +custom—scarcely recognized as such, yet none the less established. On +the afternoon of every Sunday a large contingent of the Casterbridge +journeymen—steady churchgoers and sedate characters—having attended +service, filed from the church doors across the way to the Three +Mariners Inn. The rear was usually brought up by the choir, with their +bass-viols, fiddles, and flutes under their arms. + +The great point, the point of honour, on these sacred occasions was for +each man to strictly limit himself to half-a-pint of liquor. This +scrupulosity was so well understood by the landlord that the whole +company was served in cups of that measure. They were all exactly +alike—straight-sided, with two leafless lime-trees done in eel-brown on +the sides—one towards the drinker’s lips, the other confronting his +comrade. To wonder how many of these cups the landlord possessed +altogether was a favourite exercise of children in the marvellous. +Forty at least might have been seen at these times in the large room, +forming a ring round the margin of the great sixteen-legged oak table, +like the monolithic circle of Stonehenge in its pristine days. Outside +and above the forty cups came a circle of forty smoke-jets from forty +clay pipes; outside the pipes the countenances of the forty +church-goers, supported at the back by a circle of forty chairs. + +The conversation was not the conversation of week-days, but a thing +altogether finer in point and higher in tone. They invariably discussed +the sermon, dissecting it, weighing it, as above or below the +average—the general tendency being to regard it as a scientific feat or +performance which had no relation to their own lives, except as between +critics and the thing criticized. The bass-viol player and the clerk +usually spoke with more authority than the rest on account of their +official connection with the preacher. + +Now the Three Mariners was the inn chosen by Henchard as the place for +closing his long term of dramless years. He had so timed his entry as +to be well established in the large room by the time the forty +church-goers entered to their customary cups. The flush upon his face +proclaimed at once that the vow of twenty-one years had lapsed, and the +era of recklessness begun anew. He was seated on a small table, drawn +up to the side of the massive oak board reserved for the churchmen, a +few of whom nodded to him as they took their places and said, “How be +ye, Mr. Henchard? Quite a stranger here.” + +Henchard did not take the trouble to reply for a few moments, and his +eyes rested on his stretched-out legs and boots. “Yes,” he said at +length; “that’s true. I’ve been down in spirit for weeks; some of ye +know the cause. I am better now, but not quite serene. I want you +fellows of the choir to strike up a tune; and what with that and this +brew of Stannidge’s, I am in hopes of getting altogether out of my +minor key.” + +“With all my heart,” said the first fiddle. “We’ve let back our +strings, that’s true, but we can soon pull ’em up again. Sound A, +neighbours, and give the man a stave.” + +“I don’t care a curse what the words be,” said Henchard. “Hymns, +ballets, or rantipole rubbish; the Rogue’s March or the cherubim’s +warble—’tis all the same to me if ’tis good harmony, and well put out.” + +“Well—heh, heh—it may be we can do that, and not a man among us that +have sat in the gallery less than twenty year,” said the leader of the +band. “As ’tis Sunday, neighbours, suppose we raise the Fourth Psa’am, +to Samuel Wakely’s tune, as improved by me?” + +“Hang Samuel Wakely’s tune, as improved by thee!” said Henchard. “Chuck +across one of your psalters—old Wiltshire is the only tune worth +singing—the psalm-tune that would make my blood ebb and flow like the +sea when I was a steady chap. I’ll find some words to fit en.” He took +one of the psalters and began turning over the leaves. + +Chancing to look out of the window at that moment he saw a flock of +people passing by, and perceived them to be the congregation of the +upper church, now just dismissed, their sermon having been a longer one +than that the lower parish was favoured with. Among the rest of the +leading inhabitants walked Mr. Councillor Farfrae with Lucetta upon his +arm, the observed and imitated of all the smaller tradesmen’s +womankind. Henchard’s mouth changed a little, and he continued to turn +over the leaves. + +“Now then,” he said, “Psalm the Hundred-and-Ninth, to the tune of +Wiltshire: verses ten to fifteen. I gi’e ye the words: + +“His seed shall orphans be, his wife + A widow plunged in grief; +His vagrant children beg their bread + Where none can give relief. + +His ill-got riches shall be made + To usurers a prey; +The fruit of all his toil shall be + By strangers borne away. + +None shall be found that to his wants + Their mercy will extend, +Or to his helpless orphan seed + The least assistance lend. + +A swift destruction soon shall seize + On his unhappy race; +And the next age his hated name + Shall utterly deface.” + + +“I know the Psa’am—I know the Psa’am!” said the leader hastily; “but I +would as lief not sing it. ’Twasn’t made for singing. We chose it once +when the gipsy stole the pa’son’s mare, thinking to please him, but +pa’son were quite upset. Whatever Servant David were thinking about +when he made a Psalm that nobody can sing without disgracing himself, I +can’t fathom! Now then, the Fourth Psalm, to Samuel Wakely’s tune, as +improved by me.” + +“’Od seize your sauce—I tell ye to sing the Hundred-and-Ninth to +Wiltshire, and sing it you shall!” roared Henchard. “Not a single one +of all the droning crew of ye goes out of this room till that Psalm is +sung!” He slipped off the table, seized the poker, and going to the +door placed his back against it. “Now then, go ahead, if you don’t wish +to have your cust pates broke!” + +“Don’t ’ee, don’t ’ee take on so!—As ’tis the Sabbath-day, and ’tis +Servant David’s words and not ours, perhaps we don’t mind for once, +hey?” said one of the terrified choir, looking round upon the rest. So +the instruments were tuned and the comminatory verses sung. + +“Thank ye, thank ye,” said Henchard in a softened voice, his eyes +growing downcast, and his manner that of a man much moved by the +strains. “Don’t you blame David,” he went on in low tones, shaking his +head without raising his eyes. “He knew what he was about when he wrote +that!... If I could afford it, be hanged if I wouldn’t keep a church +choir at my own expense to play and sing to me at these low, dark times +of my life. But the bitter thing is, that when I was rich I didn’t need +what I could have, and now I be poor I can’t have what I need!” + +While they paused, Lucetta and Farfrae passed again, this time +homeward, it being their custom to take, like others, a short walk out +on the highway and back, between church and tea-time. “There’s the man +we’ve been singing about,” said Henchard. + +The players and singers turned their heads and saw his meaning. “Heaven +forbid!” said the bass-player. + +“’Tis the man,” repeated Henchard doggedly. + +“Then if I’d known,” said the performer on the clarionet solemnly, +“that ’twas meant for a living man, nothing should have drawn out of my +wynd-pipe the breath for that Psalm, so help me!” + +“Nor from mine,” said the first singer. “But, thought I, as it was made +so long ago perhaps there isn’t much in it, so I’ll oblige a neighbour; +for there’s nothing to be said against the tune.” + +“Ah, my boys, you’ve sung it,” said Henchard triumphantly. “As for him, +it was partly by his songs that he got over me, and heaved me out.... I +could double him up like that—and yet I don’t.” He laid the poker +across his knee, bent it as if it were a twig, flung it down, and came +away from the door. + +It was at this time that Elizabeth-Jane, having heard where her +stepfather was, entered the room with a pale and agonized countenance. +The choir and the rest of the company moved off, in accordance with +their half-pint regulation. Elizabeth-Jane went up to Henchard, and +entreated him to accompany her home. + +By this hour the volcanic fires of his nature had burnt down, and +having drunk no great quantity as yet he was inclined to acquiesce. She +took his arm, and together they went on. Henchard walked blankly, like +a blind man, repeating to himself the last words of the singers— + +“And the next age his hated name + Shall utterly deface.” + + +At length he said to her, “I am a man to my word. I have kept my oath +for twenty-one years; and now I can drink with a good conscience.... If +I don’t do for him—well, I am a fearful practical joker when I choose! +He has taken away everything from me, and by heavens, if I meet him I +won’t answer for my deeds!” + +These half-uttered words alarmed Elizabeth—all the more by reason of +the still determination of Henchard’s mien. + +“What will you do?” she asked cautiously, while trembling with +disquietude, and guessing Henchard’s allusion only too well. + +Henchard did not answer, and they went on till they had reached his +cottage. “May I come in?” she said. + +“No, no; not to-day,” said Henchard; and she went away; feeling that to +caution Farfrae was almost her duty, as it was certainly her strong +desire. + +As on the Sunday, so on the week-days, Farfrae and Lucetta might have +been seen flitting about the town like two butterflies—or rather like a +bee and a butterfly in league for life. She seemed to take no pleasure +in going anywhere except in her husband’s company; and hence when +business would not permit him to waste an afternoon she remained +indoors waiting for the time to pass till his return, her face being +visible to Elizabeth-Jane from her window aloft. The latter, however, +did not say to herself that Farfrae should be thankful for such +devotion, but, full of her reading, she cited Rosalind’s exclamation: +“Mistress, know yourself; down on your knees and thank Heaven fasting +for a good man’s love.” + +She kept her eye upon Henchard also. One day he answered her inquiry +for his health by saying that he could not endure Abel Whittle’s +pitying eyes upon him while they worked together in the yard. “He is +such a fool,” said Henchard, “that he can never get out of his mind the +time when I was master there.” + +“I’ll come and wimble for you instead of him, if you will allow me,” +said she. Her motive on going to the yard was to get an opportunity of +observing the general position of affairs on Farfrae’s premises now +that her stepfather was a workman there. Henchard’s threats had alarmed +her so much that she wished to see his behaviour when the two were face +to face. + +For two or three days after her arrival Donald did not make any +appearance. Then one afternoon the green door opened, and through came, +first Farfrae, and at his heels Lucetta. Donald brought his wife +forward without hesitation, it being obvious that he had no suspicion +whatever of any antecedents in common between her and the now +journeyman hay-trusser. + +Henchard did not turn his eyes toward either of the pair, keeping them +fixed on the bond he twisted, as if that alone absorbed him. A feeling +of delicacy, which ever prompted Farfrae to avoid anything that might +seem like triumphing over a fallen rival, led him to keep away from the +hay-barn where Henchard and his daughter were working, and to go on to +the corn department. Meanwhile Lucetta, never having been informed that +Henchard had entered her husband’s service, rambled straight on to the +barn, where she came suddenly upon Henchard, and gave vent to a little +“Oh!” which the happy and busy Donald was too far off to hear. +Henchard, with withering humility of demeanour, touched the brim of his +hat to her as Whittle and the rest had done, to which she breathed a +dead-alive “Good afternoon.” + +“I beg your pardon, ma’am?” said Henchard, as if he had not heard. + +“I said good afternoon,” she faltered. + +“O yes, good afternoon, ma’am,” he replied, touching his hat again. “I +am glad to see you, ma’am.” Lucetta looked embarrassed, and Henchard +continued: “For we humble workmen here feel it a great honour that a +lady should look in and take an interest in us.” + +She glanced at him entreatingly; the sarcasm was too bitter, too +unendurable. + +“Can you tell me the time, ma’am?” he asked. + +“Yes,” she said hastily; “half-past four.” + +“Thank ’ee. An hour and a half longer before we are released from work. +Ah, ma’am, we of the lower classes know nothing of the gay leisure that +such as you enjoy!” + +As soon as she could do so Lucetta left him, nodded and smiled to +Elizabeth-Jane, and joined her husband at the other end of the +enclosure, where she could be seen leading him away by the outer gates, +so as to avoid passing Henchard again. That she had been taken by +surprise was obvious. The result of this casual rencounter was that the +next morning a note was put into Henchard’s hand by the postman. + +“Will you,” said Lucetta, with as much bitterness as she could put into +a small communication, “will you kindly undertake not to speak to me in +the biting undertones you used to-day, if I walk through the yard at +any time? I bear you no ill-will, and I am only too glad that you +should have employment of my dear husband; but in common fairness treat +me as his wife, and do not try to make me wretched by covert sneers. I +have committed no crime, and done you no injury.” + +“Poor fool!” said Henchard with fond savagery, holding out the note. +“To know no better than commit herself in writing like this! Why, if I +were to show that to her dear husband—pooh!” He threw the letter into +the fire. + +Lucetta took care not to come again among the hay and corn. She would +rather have died than run the risk of encountering Henchard at such +close quarters a second time. The gulf between them was growing wider +every day. Farfrae was always considerate to his fallen acquaintance; +but it was impossible that he should not, by degrees, cease to regard +the ex-corn-merchant as more than one of his other workmen. Henchard +saw this, and concealed his feelings under a cover of stolidity, +fortifying his heart by drinking more freely at the Three Mariners +every evening. + +Often did Elizabeth-Jane, in her endeavours to prevent his taking other +liquor, carry tea to him in a little basket at five o’clock. Arriving +one day on this errand she found her stepfather was measuring up +clover-seed and rape-seed in the corn-stores on the top floor, and she +ascended to him. Each floor had a door opening into the air under a +cat-head, from which a chain dangled for hoisting the sacks. + +When Elizabeth’s head rose through the trap she perceived that the +upper door was open, and that her stepfather and Farfrae stood just +within it in conversation, Farfrae being nearest the dizzy edge, and +Henchard a little way behind. Not to interrupt them she remained on the +steps without raising her head any higher. While waiting thus she +saw—or fancied she saw, for she had a terror of feeling certain—her +stepfather slowly raise his hand to a level behind Farfrae’s shoulders, +a curious expression taking possession of his face. The young man was +quite unconscious of the action, which was so indirect that, if Farfrae +had observed it, he might almost have regarded it as an idle +outstretching of the arm. But it would have been possible, by a +comparatively light touch, to push Farfrae off his balance, and send +him head over heels into the air. + +Elizabeth felt quite sick at heart on thinking of what this _might_ +have meant. As soon as they turned she mechanically took the tea to +Henchard, left it, and went away. Reflecting, she endeavoured to assure +herself that the movement was an idle eccentricity, and no more. Yet, +on the other hand, his subordinate position in an establishment where +he once had been master might be acting on him like an irritant poison; +and she finally resolved to caution Donald. + + + +XXXIV. + +Next morning, accordingly, she rose at five o’clock and went into the +street. It was not yet light; a dense fog prevailed, and the town was +as silent as it was dark, except that from the rectangular avenues +which framed in the borough there came a chorus of tiny rappings, +caused by the fall of water-drops condensed on the boughs; now it was +wafted from the West Walk, now from the South Walk; and then from both +quarters simultaneously. She moved on to the bottom of Corn Street, +and, knowing his time well, waited only a few minutes before she heard +the familiar bang of his door, and then his quick walk towards her. She +met him at the point where the last tree of the engirding avenue +flanked the last house in the street. + +He could hardly discern her till, glancing inquiringly, he said, +“What—Miss Henchard—and are ye up so airly?” + +She asked him to pardon her for waylaying him at such an unseemly time. +“But I am anxious to mention something,” she said. “And I wished not to +alarm Mrs. Farfrae by calling.” + +“Yes?” said he, with the cheeriness of a superior. “And what may it be? +It’s very kind of ye, I’m sure.” + +She now felt the difficulty of conveying to his mind the exact aspect +of possibilities in her own. But she somehow began, and introduced +Henchard’s name. “I sometimes fear,” she said with an effort, “that he +may be betrayed into some attempt to—insult you, sir.” + +“But we are the best of friends?” + +“Or to play some practical joke upon you, sir. Remember that he has +been hardly used.” + +“But we are quite friendly?” + +“Or to do something—that would injure you—hurt you—wound you.” Every +word cost her twice its length of pain. And she could see that Farfrae +was still incredulous. Henchard, a poor man in his employ, was not to +Farfrae’s view the Henchard who had ruled him. Yet he was not only the +same man, but that man with his sinister qualities, formerly latent, +quickened into life by his buffetings. + +Farfrae, happy, and thinking no evil, persisted in making light of her +fears. Thus they parted, and she went homeward, journeymen now being in +the street, waggoners going to the harness-makers for articles left to +be repaired, farm-horses going to the shoeing-smiths, and the sons of +labour showing themselves generally on the move. Elizabeth entered her +lodging unhappily, thinking she had done no good, and only made herself +appear foolish by her weak note of warning. + +But Donald Farfrae was one of those men upon whom an incident is never +absolutely lost. He revised impressions from a subsequent point of +view, and the impulsive judgment of the moment was not always his +permanent one. The vision of Elizabeth’s earnest face in the rimy dawn +came back to him several times during the day. Knowing the solidity of +her character he did not treat her hints altogether as idle sounds. + +But he did not desist from a kindly scheme on Henchard’s account that +engaged him just then; and when he met Lawyer Joyce, the town-clerk, +later in the day, he spoke of it as if nothing had occurred to damp it. + +“About that little seedsman’s shop,” he said, “the shop overlooking the +churchyard, which is to let. It is not for myself I want it, but for +our unlucky fellow-townsman Henchard. It would be a new beginning for +him, if a small one; and I have told the Council that I would head a +private subscription among them to set him up in it—that I would be +fifty pounds, if they would make up the other fifty among them.” + +“Yes, yes; so I’ve heard; and there’s nothing to say against it for +that matter,” the town-clerk replied, in his plain, frank way. “But, +Farfrae, others see what you don’t. Henchard hates ’ee—ay, hates ’ee; +and ’tis right that you should know it. To my knowledge he was at the +Three Mariners last night, saying in public that about you which a man +ought not to say about another.” + +“Is that so—ah, is that so?” said Farfrae, looking down. “Why should he +do it?” added the young man bitterly; “what harm have I done him that +he should try to wrong me?” + +“God only knows,” said Joyce, lifting his eyebrows. “It shows much +long-suffering in you to put up with him, and keep him in your employ.” + +“But I cannet discharge a man who was once a good friend to me. How can +I forget that when I came here ’twas he enabled me to make a footing +for mysel’? No, no. As long as I’ve a day’s work to offer he shall do +it if he chooses. ’Tis not I who will deny him such a little as that. +But I’ll drop the idea of establishing him in a shop till I can think +more about it.” + +It grieved Farfrae much to give up this scheme. But a damp having been +thrown over it by these and other voices in the air, he went and +countermanded his orders. The then occupier of the shop was in it when +Farfrae spoke to him and feeling it necessary to give some explanation +of his withdrawal from the negotiation Donald mentioned Henchard’s +name, and stated that the intentions of the Council had been changed. + +The occupier was much disappointed, and straight-way informed Henchard, +as soon as he saw him, that a scheme of the Council for setting him up +in a shop had been knocked on the head by Farfrae. And thus out of +error enmity grew. + +When Farfrae got indoors that evening the tea-kettle was singing on the +high hob of the semi-egg-shaped grate. Lucetta, light as a sylph, ran +forward and seized his hands, whereupon Farfrae duly kissed her. + +“Oh!” she cried playfully, turning to the window. “See—the blinds are +not drawn down, and the people can look in—what a scandal!” + +When the candles were lighted, the curtains drawn, and the twain sat at +tea, she noticed that he looked serious. Without directly inquiring why +she let her eyes linger solicitously on his face. + +“Who has called?” he absently asked. “Any folk for me?” + +“No,” said Lucetta. “What’s the matter, Donald?” + +“Well—nothing worth talking of,” he responded sadly. + +“Then, never mind it. You will get through it, Scotchmen are always +lucky.” + +“No—not always!” he said, shaking his head gloomily as he contemplated +a crumb on the table. “I know many who have not been so! There was +Sandy Macfarlane, who started to America to try his fortune, and he was +drowned; and Archibald Leith, he was murdered! And poor Willie +Dunbleeze and Maitland Macfreeze—they fell into bad courses, and went +the way of all such!” + +“Why—you old goosey—I was only speaking in a general sense, of course! +You are always so literal. Now when we have finished tea, sing me that +funny song about high-heeled shoon and siller tags, and the +one-and-forty wooers.” + +“No, no. I couldna sing to-night! It’s Henchard—he hates me; so that I +may not be his friend if I would. I would understand why there should +be a wee bit of envy; but I cannet see a reason for the whole intensity +of what he feels. Now, can you, Lucetta? It is more like old-fashioned +rivalry in love than just a bit of rivalry in trade.” + +Lucetta had grown somewhat wan. “No,” she replied. + +“I give him employment—I cannet refuse it. But neither can I blind +myself to the fact that with a man of passions such as his, there is no +safeguard for conduct!” + +“What have you heard—O Donald, dearest?” said Lucetta in alarm. The +words on her lips were “anything about me?”—but she did not utter them. +She could not, however, suppress her agitation, and her eyes filled +with tears. + +“No, no—it is not so serious as ye fancy,” declared Farfrae soothingly; +though he did not know its seriousness so well as she. + +“I wish you would do what we have talked of,” mournfully remarked +Lucetta. “Give up business, and go away from here. We have plenty of +money, and why should we stay?” + +Farfrae seemed seriously disposed to discuss this move, and they talked +thereon till a visitor was announced. Their neighbour Alderman Vatt +came in. + +“You’ve heard, I suppose of poor Doctor Chalkfield’s death? Yes—died +this afternoon at five,” said Mr. Vatt. Chalkfield was the Councilman +who had succeeded to the Mayoralty in the preceding November. + +Farfrae was sorry at the intelligence, and Mr. Vatt continued: “Well, +we know he’s been going some days, and as his family is well provided +for we must take it all as it is. Now I have called to ask ’ee +this—quite privately. If I should nominate ’ee to succeed him, and +there should be no particular opposition, will ’ee accept the chair?” + +“But there are folk whose turn is before mine; and I’m over young, and +may be thought pushing!” said Farfrae after a pause. + +“Not at all. I don’t speak for myself only, several have named it. You +won’t refuse?” + +“We thought of going away,” interposed Lucetta, looking at Farfrae +anxiously. + +“It was only a fancy,” Farfrae murmured. “I wouldna refuse if it is the +wish of a respectable majority in the Council.” + +“Very well, then, look upon yourself as elected. We have had older men +long enough.” + +When he was gone Farfrae said musingly, “See now how it’s ourselves +that are ruled by the Powers above us! We plan this, but we do that. If +they want to make me Mayor I will stay, and Henchard must rave as he +will.” + +From this evening onward Lucetta was very uneasy. If she had not been +imprudence incarnate she would not have acted as she did when she met +Henchard by accident a day or two later. It was in the bustle of the +market, when no one could readily notice their discourse. + +“Michael,” said she, “I must again ask you what I asked you months +ago—to return me any letters or papers of mine that you may have—unless +you have destroyed them? You must see how desirable it is that the time +at Jersey should be blotted out, for the good of all parties.” + +“Why, bless the woman!—I packed up every scrap of your handwriting to +give you in the coach—but you never appeared.” + +She explained how the death of her aunt had prevented her taking the +journey on that day. “And what became of the parcel then?” she asked. + +He could not say—he would consider. When she was gone he recollected +that he had left a heap of useless papers in his former dining-room +safe—built up in the wall of his old house—now occupied by Farfrae. The +letters might have been amongst them. + +A grotesque grin shaped itself on Henchard’s face. Had that safe been +opened? + +On the very evening which followed this there was a great ringing of +bells in Casterbridge, and the combined brass, wood, catgut, and +leather bands played round the town with more prodigality of +percussion-notes than ever. Farfrae was Mayor—the two-hundredth odd of +a series forming an elective dynasty dating back to the days of Charles +I—and the fair Lucetta was the courted of the town.... But, Ah! the +worm i’ the bud—Henchard; what he could tell! + +He, in the meantime, festering with indignation at some erroneous +intelligence of Farfrae’s opposition to the scheme for installing him +in the little seed-shop, was greeted with the news of the municipal +election (which, by reason of Farfrae’s comparative youth and his +Scottish nativity—a thing unprecedented in the case—had an interest far +beyond the ordinary). The bell-ringing and the band-playing, loud as +Tamerlane’s trumpet, goaded the downfallen Henchard indescribably: the +ousting now seemed to him to be complete. + +The next morning he went to the corn-yard as usual, and about eleven +o’clock Donald entered through the green door, with no trace of the +worshipful about him. The yet more emphatic change of places between +him and Henchard which this election had established renewed a slight +embarrassment in the manner of the modest young man; but Henchard +showed the front of one who had overlooked all this; and Farfrae met +his amenities half-way at once. + +“I was going to ask you,” said Henchard, “about a packet that I may +possibly have left in my old safe in the dining-room.” He added +particulars. + +“If so, it is there now,” said Farfrae. “I have never opened the safe +at all as yet; for I keep ma papers at the bank, to sleep easy o’ +nights.” + +“It was not of much consequence—to me,” said Henchard. “But I’ll call +for it this evening, if you don’t mind?” + +It was quite late when he fulfilled his promise. He had primed himself +with grog, as he did very frequently now, and a curl of sardonic humour +hung on his lip as he approached the house, as though he were +contemplating some terrible form of amusement. Whatever it was, the +incident of his entry did not diminish its force, this being his first +visit to the house since he had lived there as owner. The ring of the +bell spoke to him like the voice of a familiar drudge who had been +bribed to forsake him; the movements of the doors were revivals of dead +days. + +Farfrae invited him into the dining-room, where he at once unlocked the +iron safe built into the wall, _his_, Henchard’s safe, made by an +ingenious locksmith under his direction. Farfrae drew thence the +parcel, and other papers, with apologies for not having returned them. + +“Never mind,” said Henchard drily. “The fact is they are letters +mostly.... Yes,” he went on, sitting down and unfolding Lucetta’s +passionate bundle, “here they be. That ever I should see ’em again! I +hope Mrs. Farfrae is well after her exertions of yesterday?” + +“She has felt a bit weary; and has gone to bed airly on that account.” + +Henchard returned to the letters, sorting them over with interest, +Farfrae being seated at the other end of the dining-table. “You don’t +forget, of course,” he resumed, “that curious chapter in the history of +my past which I told you of, and that you gave me some assistance in? +These letters are, in fact, related to that unhappy business. Though, +thank God, it is all over now.” + +“What became of the poor woman?” asked Farfrae. + +“Luckily she married, and married well,” said Henchard. “So that these +reproaches she poured out on me do not now cause me any twinges, as +they might otherwise have done.... Just listen to what an angry woman +will say!” + +Farfrae, willing to humour Henchard, though quite uninterested, and +bursting with yawns, gave well-mannered attention. + +“‘For me,’” Henchard read, “‘there is practically no future. A creature +too unconventionally devoted to you—who feels it impossible that she +can be the wife of any other man; and who is yet no more to you than +the first woman you meet in the street—such am I. I quite acquit you of +any intention to wrong me, yet you are the door through which wrong has +come to me. That in the event of your present wife’s death you will +place me in her position is a consolation so far as it goes—but how far +does it go? Thus I sit here, forsaken by my few acquaintance, and +forsaken by you!’” + +“That’s how she went on to me,” said Henchard, “acres of words like +that, when what had happened was what I could not cure.” + +“Yes,” said Farfrae absently, “it is the way wi’ women.” But the fact +was that he knew very little of the sex; yet detecting a sort of +resemblance in style between the effusions of the woman he worshipped +and those of the supposed stranger, he concluded that Aphrodite ever +spoke thus, whosesoever the personality she assumed. + +Henchard unfolded another letter, and read it through likewise, +stopping at the subscription as before. “Her name I don’t give,” he +said blandly. “As I didn’t marry her, and another man did, I can +scarcely do that in fairness to her.” + +“Tr-rue, tr-rue,” said Farfrae. “But why didn’t you marry her when your +wife Susan died?” Farfrae asked this and the other questions in the +comfortably indifferent tone of one whom the matter very remotely +concerned. + +“Ah—well you may ask that!” said Henchard, the new-moon-shaped grin +adumbrating itself again upon his mouth. “In spite of all her +protestations, when I came forward to do so, as in generosity bound, +she was not the woman for me.” + +“She had already married another—maybe?” + +Henchard seemed to think it would be sailing too near the wind to +descend further into particulars, and he answered “Yes.” + +“The young lady must have had a heart that bore transplanting very +readily!” + +“She had, she had,” said Henchard emphatically. + +He opened a third and fourth letter, and read. This time he approached +the conclusion as if the signature were indeed coming with the rest. +But again he stopped short. The truth was that, as may be divined, he +had quite intended to effect a grand catastrophe at the end of this +drama by reading out the name, he had come to the house with no other +thought. But sitting here in cold blood he could not do it. + +Such a wrecking of hearts appalled even him. His quality was such that +he could have annihilated them both in the heat of action; but to +accomplish the deed by oral poison was beyond the nerve of his enmity. + + + +XXXV. + +As Donald stated, Lucetta had retired early to her room because of +fatigue. She had, however, not gone to rest, but sat in the bedside +chair reading and thinking over the events of the day. At the ringing +of the door-bell by Henchard she wondered who it should be that would +call at that comparatively late hour. The dining-room was almost under +her bed-room; she could hear that somebody was admitted there, and +presently the indistinct murmur of a person reading became audible. + +The usual time for Donald’s arrival upstairs came and passed, yet still +the reading and conversation went on. This was very singular. She could +think of nothing but that some extraordinary crime had been committed, +and that the visitor, whoever he might be, was reading an account of it +from a special edition of the _Casterbridge Chronicle_. At last she +left the room, and descended the stairs. The dining-room door was ajar, +and in the silence of the resting household the voice and the words +were recognizable before she reached the lower flight. She stood +transfixed. Her own words greeted her in Henchard’s voice, like spirits +from the grave. + +Lucetta leant upon the banister with her cheek against the smooth +hand-rail, as if she would make a friend of it in her misery. Rigid in +this position, more and more words fell successively upon her ear. But +what amazed her most was the tone of her husband. He spoke merely in +the accents of a man who made a present of his time. + +“One word,” he was saying, as the crackling of paper denoted that +Henchard was unfolding yet another sheet. “Is it quite fair to this +young woman’s memory to read at such length to a stranger what was +intended for your eye alone?” + +“Well, yes,” said Henchard. “By not giving her name I make it an +example of all womankind, and not a scandal to one.” + +“If I were you I would destroy them,” said Farfrae, giving more thought +to the letters than he had hitherto done. “As another man’s wife it +would injure the woman if it were known.” + +“No, I shall not destroy them,” murmured Henchard, putting the letters +away. Then he arose, and Lucetta heard no more. + +She went back to her bedroom in a semi-paralyzed state. For very fear +she could not undress, but sat on the edge of the bed, waiting. Would +Henchard let out the secret in his parting words? Her suspense was +terrible. Had she confessed all to Donald in their early acquaintance +he might possibly have got over it, and married her just the +same—unlikely as it had once seemed; but for her or any one else to +tell him now would be fatal. + +The door slammed; she could hear her husband bolting it. After looking +round in his customary way he came leisurely up the stairs. The spark +in her eyes well-nigh went out when he appeared round the bedroom door. +Her gaze hung doubtful for a moment, then to her joyous amazement she +saw that he looked at her with the rallying smile of one who had just +been relieved of a scene that was irksome. She could hold out no +longer, and sobbed hysterically. + +When he had restored her Farfrae naturally enough spoke of Henchard. +“Of all men he was the least desirable as a visitor,” he said; “but it +is my belief that he’s just a bit crazed. He has been reading to me a +long lot of letters relating to his past life; and I could do no less +than indulge him by listening.” + +This was sufficient. Henchard, then, had not told. Henchard’s last +words to Farfrae, in short, as he stood on the doorstep, had been +these: “Well—I’m obliged to ’ee for listening. I may tell more about +her some day.” + +Finding this, she was much perplexed as to Henchard’s motives in +opening the matter at all; for in such cases we attribute to an enemy a +power of consistent action which we never find in ourselves or in our +friends; and forget that abortive efforts from want of heart are as +possible to revenge as to generosity. + +Next morning Lucetta remained in bed, meditating how to parry this +incipient attack. The bold stroke of telling Donald the truth, dimly +conceived, was yet too bold; for she dreaded lest in doing so he, like +the rest of the world, should believe that the episode was rather her +fault than her misfortune. She decided to employ persuasion—not with +Donald but with the enemy himself. It seemed the only practicable +weapon left her as a woman. Having laid her plan she rose, and wrote to +him who kept her on these tenterhooks:— + +“I overheard your interview with my husband last night, and saw the +drift of your revenge. The very thought of it crushes me! Have pity on +a distressed woman! If you could see me you would relent. You do not +know how anxiety has told upon me lately. I will be at the Ring at the +time you leave work—just before the sun goes down. Please come that +way. I cannot rest till I have seen you face to face, and heard from +your mouth that you will carry this horse-play no further.” + +To herself she said, on closing up her appeal: “If ever tears and +pleadings have served the weak to fight the strong, let them do so +now!” + +With this view she made a toilette which differed from all she had ever +attempted before. To heighten her natural attraction had hitherto been +the unvarying endeavour of her adult life, and one in which she was no +novice. But now she neglected this, and even proceeded to impair the +natural presentation. Beyond a natural reason for her slightly drawn +look, she had not slept all the previous night, and this had produced +upon her pretty though slightly worn features the aspect of a +countenance ageing prematurely from extreme sorrow. She selected—as +much from want of spirit as design—her poorest, plainest and longest +discarded attire. + +To avoid the contingency of being recognized she veiled herself, and +slipped out of the house quickly. The sun was resting on the hill like +a drop of blood on an eyelid by the time she had got up the road +opposite the amphitheatre, which she speedily entered. The interior was +shadowy, and emphatic of the absence of every living thing. + +She was not disappointed in the fearful hope with which she awaited +him. Henchard came over the top, descended and Lucetta waited +breathlessly. But having reached the arena she saw a change in his +bearing: he stood still at a little distance from her; she could not +think why. + +Nor could any one else have known. The truth was that in appointing +this spot, and this hour, for the rendezvous, Lucetta had unwittingly +backed up her entreaty by the strongest argument she could have used +outside words, with this man of moods, glooms, and superstitions. Her +figure in the midst of the huge enclosure, the unusual plainness of her +dress, her attitude of hope and appeal, so strongly revived in his soul +the memory of another ill-used woman who had stood there and thus in +bygone days, and had now passed away into her rest, that he was +unmanned, and his heart smote him for having attempted reprisals on one +of a sex so weak. When he approached her, and before she had spoken a +word, her point was half gained. + +His manner as he had come down had been one of cynical carelessness; +but he now put away his grim half-smile, and said, in a kindly subdued +tone, “Goodnight t’ye. Of course I’m glad to come if you want me.” + +“O, thank you,” she said apprehensively. + +“I am sorry to see ’ee looking so ill,” he stammered with unconcealed +compunction. + +She shook her head. “How can you be sorry,” she asked, “when you +deliberately cause it?” + +“What!” said Henchard uneasily. “Is it anything I have done that has +pulled you down like that?” + +“It is all your doing,” she said. “I have no other grief. My happiness +would be secure enough but for your threats. O Michael! don’t wreck me +like this! You might think that you have done enough! When I came here +I was a young woman; now I am rapidly becoming an old one. Neither my +husband nor any other man will regard me with interest long.” + +Henchard was disarmed. His old feeling of supercilious pity for +womankind in general was intensified by this suppliant appearing here +as the double of the first. Moreover that thoughtless want of foresight +which had led to all her trouble remained with poor Lucetta still; she +had come to meet him here in this compromising way without perceiving +the risk. Such a woman was very small deer to hunt; he felt ashamed, +lost all zest and desire to humiliate Lucetta there and then, and no +longer envied Farfrae his bargain. He had married money, but nothing +more. Henchard was anxious to wash his hands of the game. + +“Well, what do you want me to do?” he said gently. “I am sure I shall +be very willing. My reading of those letters was only a sort of +practical joke, and I revealed nothing.” + +“To give me back the letters and any papers you may have that breathe +of matrimony or worse.” + +“So be it. Every scrap shall be yours.... But, between you and me, +Lucetta, he is sure to find out something of the matter, sooner or +later.” + +“Ah!” she said with eager tremulousness; “but not till I have proved +myself a faithful and deserving wife to him, and then he may forgive me +everything!” + +Henchard silently looked at her: he almost envied Farfrae such love as +that, even now. “H’m—I hope so,” he said. “But you shall have the +letters without fail. And your secret shall be kept. I swear it.” + +“How good you are!—how shall I get them?” + +He reflected, and said he would send them the next morning. “Now don’t +doubt me,” he added. “I can keep my word.” + + + +XXXVI. + +Returning from her appointment Lucetta saw a man waiting by the lamp +nearest to her own door. When she stopped to go in he came and spoke to +her. It was Jopp. + +He begged her pardon for addressing her. But he had heard that Mr. +Farfrae had been applied to by a neighbouring corn-merchant to +recommend a working partner; if so he wished to offer himself. He could +give good security, and had stated as much to Mr. Farfrae in a letter; +but he would feel much obliged if Lucetta would say a word in his +favour to her husband. + +“It is a thing I know nothing about,” said Lucetta coldly. + +“But you can testify to my trustworthiness better than anybody, ma’am,” +said Jopp. “I was in Jersey several years, and knew you there by +sight.” + +“Indeed,” she replied. “But I knew nothing of you.” + +“I think, ma’am, that a word or two from you would secure for me what I +covet very much,” he persisted. + +She steadily refused to have anything to do with the affair, and +cutting him short, because of her anxiety to get indoors before her +husband should miss her, left him on the pavement. + +He watched her till she had vanished, and then went home. When he got +there he sat down in the fireless chimney corner looking at the iron +dogs, and the wood laid across them for heating the morning kettle. A +movement upstairs disturbed him, and Henchard came down from his +bedroom, where he seemed to have been rummaging boxes. + +“I wish,” said Henchard, “you would do me a service, Jopp, +now—to-night, I mean, if you can. Leave this at Mrs. Farfrae’s for her. +I should take it myself, of course, but I don’t wish to be seen there.” + +He handed a package in brown paper, sealed. Henchard had been as good +as his word. Immediately on coming indoors he had searched over his few +belongings, and every scrap of Lucetta’s writing that he possessed was +here. Jopp indifferently expressed his willingness. + +“Well, how have ye got on to-day?” his lodger asked. “Any prospect of +an opening?” + +“I am afraid not,” said Jopp, who had not told the other of his +application to Farfrae. + +“There never will be in Casterbridge,” declared Henchard decisively. +“You must roam further afield.” He said goodnight to Jopp, and returned +to his own part of the house. + +Jopp sat on till his eyes were attracted by the shadow of the +candle-snuff on the wall, and looking at the original he found that it +had formed itself into a head like a red-hot cauliflower. Henchard’s +packet next met his gaze. He knew there had been something of the +nature of wooing between Henchard and the now Mrs. Farfrae; and his +vague ideas on the subject narrowed themselves down to these: Henchard +had a parcel belonging to Mrs. Farfrae, and he had reasons for not +returning that parcel to her in person. What could be inside it? So he +went on and on till, animated by resentment at Lucetta’s haughtiness, +as he thought it, and curiosity to learn if there were any weak sides +to this transaction with Henchard, he examined the package. The pen and +all its relations being awkward tools in Henchard’s hands he had +affixed the seals without an impression, it never occurring to him that +the efficacy of such a fastening depended on this. Jopp was far less of +a tyro; he lifted one of the seals with his penknife, peeped in at the +end thus opened, saw that the bundle consisted of letters; and, having +satisfied himself thus far, sealed up the end again by simply softening +the wax with the candle, and went off with the parcel as requested. + +His path was by the river-side at the foot of the town. Coming into the +light at the bridge which stood at the end of High Street he beheld +lounging thereon Mother Cuxsom and Nance Mockridge. + +“We be just going down Mixen Lane way, to look into Peter’s Finger +afore creeping to bed,” said Mrs. Cuxsom. “There’s a fiddle and +tambourine going on there. Lord, what’s all the world—do ye come along +too, Jopp—’twon’t hinder ye five minutes.” + +Jopp had mostly kept himself out of this company, but present +circumstances made him somewhat more reckless than usual, and without +many words he decided to go to his destination that way. + +Though the upper part of Durnover was mainly composed of a curious +congeries of barns and farm-steads, there was a less picturesque side +to the parish. This was Mixen Lane, now in great part pulled down. + +Mixen Lane was the Adullam of all the surrounding villages. It was the +hiding-place of those who were in distress, and in debt, and trouble of +every kind. Farm-labourers and other peasants, who combined a little +poaching with their farming, and a little brawling and bibbing with +their poaching, found themselves sooner or later in Mixen Lane. Rural +mechanics too idle to mechanize, rural servants too rebellious to +serve, drifted or were forced into Mixen Lane. + +The lane and its surrounding thicket of thatched cottages stretched out +like a spit into the moist and misty lowland. Much that was sad, much +that was low, some things that were baneful, could be seen in Mixen +Lane. Vice ran freely in and out certain of the doors in the +neighbourhood; recklessness dwelt under the roof with the crooked +chimney; shame in some bow-windows; theft (in times of privation) in +the thatched and mud-walled houses by the sallows. Even slaughter had +not been altogether unknown here. In a block of cottages up an alley +there might have been erected an altar to disease in years gone by. +Such was Mixen Lane in the times when Henchard and Farfrae were Mayors. + +Yet this mildewed leaf in the sturdy and flourishing Casterbridge plant +lay close to the open country; not a hundred yards from a row of noble +elms, and commanding a view across the moor of airy uplands and +corn-fields, and mansions of the great. A brook divided the moor from +the tenements, and to outward view there was no way across it—no way to +the houses but round about by the road. But under every householder’s +stairs there was kept a mysterious plank nine inches wide; which plank +was a secret bridge. + +If you, as one of those refugee householders, came in from business +after dark—and this was the business time here—you stealthily crossed +the moor, approached the border of the aforesaid brook, and whistled +opposite the house to which you belonged. A shape thereupon made its +appearance on the other side bearing the bridge on end against the sky; +it was lowered; you crossed, and a hand helped you to land yourself, +together with the pheasants and hares gathered from neighbouring +manors. You sold them slily the next morning, and the day after you +stood before the magistrates with the eyes of all your sympathizing +neighbours concentrated on your back. You disappeared for a time; then +you were again found quietly living in Mixen Lane. + +Walking along the lane at dusk the stranger was struck by two or three +peculiar features therein. One was an intermittent rumbling from the +back premises of the inn half-way up; this meant a skittle alley. +Another was the extensive prevalence of whistling in the various +domiciles—a piped note of some kind coming from nearly every open door. +Another was the frequency of white aprons over dingy gowns among the +women around the doorways. A white apron is a suspicious vesture in +situations where spotlessness is difficult; moreover, the industry and +cleanliness which the white apron expressed were belied by the postures +and gaits of the women who wore it—their knuckles being mostly on their +hips (an attitude which lent them the aspect of two-handled mugs), and +their shoulders against door-posts; while there was a curious alacrity +in the turn of each honest woman’s head upon her neck and in the twirl +of her honest eyes, at any noise resembling a masculine footfall along +the lane. + +Yet amid so much that was bad needy respectability also found a home. +Under some of the roofs abode pure and virtuous souls whose presence +there was due to the iron hand of necessity, and to that alone. +Families from decayed villages—families of that once bulky, but now +nearly extinct, section of village society called “liviers,” or +lifeholders—copyholders and others, whose roof-trees had fallen for +some reason or other, compelling them to quit the rural spot that had +been their home for generations—came here, unless they chose to lie +under a hedge by the wayside. + +The inn called Peter’s Finger was the church of Mixen Lane. + +It was centrally situate, as such places should be, and bore about the +same social relation to the Three Mariners as the latter bore to the +King’s Arms. At first sight the inn was so respectable as to be +puzzling. The front door was kept shut, and the step was so clean that +evidently but few persons entered over its sanded surface. But at the +corner of the public-house was an alley, a mere slit, dividing it from +the next building. Half-way up the alley was a narrow door, shiny and +paintless from the rub of infinite hands and shoulders. This was the +actual entrance to the inn. + +A pedestrian would be seen abstractedly passing along Mixen Lane; and +then, in a moment, he would vanish, causing the gazer to blink like +Ashton at the disappearance of Ravenswood. That abstracted pedestrian +had edged into the slit by the adroit fillip of his person sideways; +from the slit he edged into the tavern by a similar exercise of skill. + +The company at the Three Mariners were persons of quality in comparison +with the company which gathered here; though it must be admitted that +the lowest fringe of the Mariner’s party touched the crest of Peter’s +at points. Waifs and strays of all sorts loitered about here. The +landlady was a virtuous woman who years ago had been unjustly sent to +gaol as an accessory to something or other after the fact. She +underwent her twelvemonth, and had worn a martyr’s countenance ever +since, except at times of meeting the constable who apprehended her, +when she winked her eye. + +To this house Jopp and his acquaintances had arrived. The settles on +which they sat down were thin and tall, their tops being guyed by +pieces of twine to hooks in the ceiling; for when the guests grew +boisterous the settles would rock and overturn without some such +security. The thunder of bowls echoed from the backyard; swingels hung +behind the blower of the chimney; and ex-poachers and ex-gamekeepers, +whom squires had persecuted without a cause, sat elbowing each +other—men who in past times had met in fights under the moon, till +lapse of sentences on the one part, and loss of favour and expulsion +from service on the other, brought them here together to a common +level, where they sat calmly discussing old times. + +“Dost mind how you could jerk a trout ashore with a bramble, and not +ruffle the stream, Charl?” a deposed keeper was saying. “’Twas at that +I caught ’ee once, if you can mind?” + +“That I can. But the worst larry for me was that pheasant business at +Yalbury Wood. Your wife swore false that time, Joe—O, by Gad, she +did—there’s no denying it.” + +“How was that?” asked Jopp. + +“Why—Joe closed wi’ me, and we rolled down together, close to his +garden hedge. Hearing the noise, out ran his wife with the oven pyle, +and it being dark under the trees she couldn’t see which was uppermost. +‘Where beest thee, Joe, under or top?’ she screeched. ‘O—under, by +Gad!’ says he. She then began to rap down upon my skull, back, and ribs +with the pyle till we’d roll over again. ‘Where beest now, dear Joe, +under or top?’ she’d scream again. By George, ’twas through her I was +took! And then when we got up in hall she sware that the cock pheasant +was one of her rearing, when ’twas not your bird at all, Joe; ’twas +Squire Brown’s bird—that’s whose ’twas—one that we’d picked off as we +passed his wood, an hour afore. It did hurt my feelings to be so +wronged!... Ah well—’tis over now.” + +“I might have had ’ee days afore that,” said the keeper. “I was within +a few yards of ’ee dozens of times, with a sight more of birds than +that poor one.” + +“Yes—’tis not our greatest doings that the world gets wind of,” said +the furmity-woman, who, lately settled in this purlieu, sat among the +rest. Having travelled a great deal in her time she spoke with +cosmopolitan largeness of idea. It was she who presently asked Jopp +what was the parcel he kept so snugly under his arm. + +“Ah, therein lies a grand secret,” said Jopp. “It is the passion of +love. To think that a woman should love one man so well, and hate +another so unmercifully.” + +“Who’s the object of your meditation, sir?” + +“One that stands high in this town. I’d like to shame her! Upon my +life, ’twould be as good as a play to read her love-letters, the proud +piece of silk and wax-work! For ’tis her love-letters that I’ve got +here.” + +“Love letters? then let’s hear ’em, good soul,” said Mother Cuxsom. +“Lord, do ye mind, Richard, what fools we used to be when we were +younger? Getting a schoolboy to write ours for us; and giving him a +penny, do ye mind, not to tell other folks what he’d put inside, do ye +mind?” + +By this time Jopp had pushed his finger under the seals, and unfastened +the letters, tumbling them over and picking up one here and there at +random, which he read aloud. These passages soon began to uncover the +secret which Lucetta had so earnestly hoped to keep buried, though the +epistles, being allusive only, did not make it altogether plain. + +“Mrs. Farfrae wrote that!” said Nance Mockridge. “’Tis a humbling thing +for us, as respectable women, that one of the same sex could do it. And +now she’s avowed herself to another man!” + +“So much the better for her,” said the aged furmity-woman. “Ah, I saved +her from a real bad marriage, and she’s never been the one to thank +me.” + +“I say, what a good foundation for a skimmity-ride,” said Nance. + +“True,” said Mrs. Cuxsom, reflecting. “’Tis as good a ground for a +skimmity-ride as ever I knowed; and it ought not to be wasted. The last +one seen in Casterbridge must have been ten years ago, if a day.” + +At this moment there was a shrill whistle, and the landlady said to the +man who had been called Charl, “’Tis Jim coming in. Would ye go and let +down the bridge for me?” + +Without replying Charl and his comrade Joe rose, and receiving a +lantern from her went out at the back door and down the garden-path, +which ended abruptly at the edge of the stream already mentioned. +Beyond the stream was the open moor, from which a clammy breeze smote +upon their faces as they advanced. Taking up the board that had lain in +readiness one of them lowered it across the water, and the instant its +further end touched the ground footsteps entered upon it, and there +appeared from the shade a stalwart man with straps round his knees, a +double-barrelled gun under his arm and some birds slung up behind him. +They asked him if he had had much luck. + +“Not much,” he said indifferently. “All safe inside?” + +Receiving a reply in the affirmative he went on inwards, the others +withdrawing the bridge and beginning to retreat in his rear. Before, +however, they had entered the house a cry of “Ahoy” from the moor led +them to pause. + +The cry was repeated. They pushed the lantern into an outhouse, and +went back to the brink of the stream. + +“Ahoy—is this the way to Casterbridge?” said some one from the other +side. + +“Not in particular,” said Charl. “There’s a river afore ’ee.” + +“I don’t care—here’s for through it!” said the man in the moor. “I’ve +had travelling enough for to-day.” + +“Stop a minute, then,” said Charl, finding that the man was no enemy. +“Joe, bring the plank and lantern; here’s somebody that’s lost his way. +You should have kept along the turnpike road, friend, and not have +strook across here.” + +“I should—as I see now. But I saw a light here, and says I to myself, +that’s an outlying house, depend on’t.” + +The plank was now lowered; and the stranger’s form shaped itself from +the darkness. He was a middle-aged man, with hair and whiskers +prematurely grey, and a broad and genial face. He had crossed on the +plank without hesitation, and seemed to see nothing odd in the transit. +He thanked them, and walked between them up the garden. “What place is +this?” he asked, when they reached the door. + +“A public-house.” + +“Ah, perhaps it will suit me to put up at. Now then, come in and wet +your whistle at my expense for the lift over you have given me.” + +They followed him into the inn, where the increased light exhibited him +as one who would stand higher in an estimate by the eye than in one by +the ear. He was dressed with a certain clumsy richness—his coat being +furred, and his head covered by a cap of seal-skin, which, though the +nights were chilly, must have been warm for the daytime, spring being +somewhat advanced. In his hand he carried a small mahogany case, +strapped, and clamped with brass. + +Apparently surprised at the kind of company which confronted him +through the kitchen door, he at once abandoned his idea of putting up +at the house; but taking the situation lightly, he called for glasses +of the best, paid for them as he stood in the passage, and turned to +proceed on his way by the front door. This was barred, and while the +landlady was unfastening it the conversation about the skimmington was +continued in the sitting-room, and reached his ears. + +“What do they mean by a ‘skimmity-ride’?” he asked. + +“O, sir!” said the landlady, swinging her long earrings with +deprecating modesty; “’tis a’ old foolish thing they do in these parts +when a man’s wife is—well, not too particularly his own. But as a +respectable householder I don’t encourage it. + +“Still, are they going to do it shortly? It is a good sight to see, I +suppose?” + +“Well, sir!” she simpered. And then, bursting into naturalness, and +glancing from the corner of her eye, “’Tis the funniest thing under the +sun! And it costs money.” + +“Ah! I remember hearing of some such thing. Now I shall be in +Casterbridge for two or three weeks to come, and should not mind seeing +the performance. Wait a moment.” He turned back, entered the +sitting-room, and said, “Here, good folks; I should like to see the old +custom you are talking of, and I don’t mind being something towards +it—take that.” He threw a sovereign on the table and returned to the +landlady at the door, of whom, having inquired the way into the town, +he took his leave. + +“There were more where that one came from,” said Charl when the +sovereign had been taken up and handed to the landlady for safe +keeping. “By George! we ought to have got a few more while we had him +here.” + +“No, no,” answered the landlady. “This is a respectable house, thank +God! And I’ll have nothing done but what’s honourable.” + +“Well,” said Jopp; “now we’ll consider the business begun, and will +soon get it in train.” + +“We will!” said Nance. “A good laugh warms my heart more than a +cordial, and that’s the truth on’t.” + +Jopp gathered up the letters, and it being now somewhat late he did not +attempt to call at Farfrae’s with them that night. He reached home, +sealed them up as before, and delivered the parcel at its address next +morning. Within an hour its contents were reduced to ashes by Lucetta, +who, poor soul! was inclined to fall down on her knees in thankfulness +that at last no evidence remained of the unlucky episode with Henchard +in her past. For though hers had been rather the laxity of inadvertence +than of intention, that episode, if known, was not the less likely to +operate fatally between herself and her husband. + + + +XXXVII. + +Such was the state of things when the current affairs of Casterbridge +were interrupted by an event of such magnitude that its influence +reached to the lowest social stratum there, stirring the depths of its +society simultaneously with the preparations for the skimmington. It +was one of those excitements which, when they move a country town, +leave permanent mark upon its chronicles, as a warm summer permanently +marks the ring in the tree-trunk corresponding to its date. + +A Royal Personage was about to pass through the borough on his course +further west, to inaugurate an immense engineering work out that way. +He had consented to halt half-an-hour or so in the town, and to receive +an address from the corporation of Casterbridge, which, as a +representative centre of husbandry, wished thus to express its sense of +the great services he had rendered to agricultural science and +economics, by his zealous promotion of designs for placing the art of +farming on a more scientific footing. + +Royalty had not been seen in Casterbridge since the days of the third +King George, and then only by candlelight for a few minutes, when that +monarch, on a night-journey, had stopped to change horses at the King’s +Arms. The inhabitants therefore decided to make a thorough _fête +carillonée_ of the unwonted occasion. Half-an-hour’s pause was not +long, it is true; but much might be done in it by a judicious grouping +of incidents, above all, if the weather were fine. + +The address was prepared on parchment by an artist who was handy at +ornamental lettering, and was laid on with the best gold-leaf and +colours that the sign-painter had in his shop. The Council had met on +the Tuesday before the appointed day, to arrange the details of the +procedure. While they were sitting, the door of the Council Chamber +standing open, they heard a heavy footstep coming up the stairs. It +advanced along the passage, and Henchard entered the room, in clothes +of frayed and threadbare shabbiness, the very clothes which he had used +to wear in the primal days when he had sat among them. + +“I have a feeling,” he said, advancing to the table and laying his hand +upon the green cloth, “that I should like to join ye in this reception +of our illustrious visitor. I suppose I could walk with the rest?” + +Embarrassed glances were exchanged by the Council and Grower nearly ate +the end of his quill-pen off, so gnawed he it during the silence. +Farfrae the young Mayor, who by virtue of his office sat in the large +chair, intuitively caught the sense of the meeting, and as spokesman +was obliged to utter it, glad as he would have been that the duty +should have fallen to another tongue. + +“I hardly see that it would be proper, Mr. Henchard,” said he. “The +Council are the Council, and as ye are no longer one of the body, there +would be an irregularity in the proceeding. If ye were included, why +not others?” + +“I have a particular reason for wishing to assist at the ceremony.” + +Farfrae looked round. “I think I have expressed the feeling of the +Council,” he said. + +“Yes, yes,” from Dr. Bath, Lawyer Long, Alderman Tubber, and several +more. + +“Then I am not to be allowed to have anything to do with it +officially?” + +“I am afraid so; it is out of the question, indeed. But of course you +can see the doings full well, such as they are to be, like the rest of +the spectators.” + +Henchard did not reply to that very obvious suggestion, and, turning on +his heel, went away. + +It had been only a passing fancy of his, but opposition crystallized it +into a determination. “I’ll welcome his Royal Highness, or nobody +shall!” he went about saying. “I am not going to be sat upon by +Farfrae, or any of the rest of the paltry crew! You shall see.” + +The eventful morning was bright, a full-faced sun confronting early +window-gazers eastward, and all perceived (for they were practised in +weather-lore) that there was permanence in the glow. Visitors soon +began to flock in from county houses, villages, remote copses, and +lonely uplands, the latter in oiled boots and tilt bonnets, to see the +reception, or if not to see it, at any rate to be near it. There was +hardly a workman in the town who did not put a clean shirt on. Solomon +Longways, Christopher Coney, Buzzford, and the rest of that fraternity, +showed their sense of the occasion by advancing their customary eleven +o’clock pint to half-past ten; from which they found a difficulty in +getting back to the proper hour for several days. + +Henchard had determined to do no work that day. He primed himself in +the morning with a glass of rum, and walking down the street met +Elizabeth-Jane, whom he had not seen for a week. “It was lucky,” he +said to her, “my twenty-one years had expired before this came on, or I +should never have had the nerve to carry it out.” + +“Carry out what?” said she, alarmed. + +“This welcome I am going to give our Royal visitor.” + +She was perplexed. “Shall we go and see it together?” she said. + +“See it! I have other fish to fry. You see it. It will be worth +seeing!” + +She could do nothing to elucidate this, and decked herself out with a +heavy heart. As the appointed time drew near she got sight again of her +stepfather. She thought he was going to the Three Mariners; but no, he +elbowed his way through the gay throng to the shop of Woolfrey, the +draper. She waited in the crowd without. + +In a few minutes he emerged, wearing, to her surprise, a brilliant +rosette, while more surprising still, in his hand he carried a flag of +somewhat homely construction, formed by tacking one of the small Union +Jacks, which abounded in the town to-day, to the end of a deal +wand—probably the roller from a piece of calico. Henchard rolled up his +flag on the doorstep, put it under his arm, and went down the street. + +Suddenly the taller members of the crowd turned their heads, and the +shorter stood on tiptoe. It was said that the Royal _cortège_ +approached. The railway had stretched out an arm towards Casterbridge +at this time, but had not reached it by several miles as yet; so that +the intervening distance, as well as the remainder of the journey, was +to be traversed by road in the old fashion. People thus waited—the +county families in their carriages, the masses on foot—and watched the +far-stretching London highway to the ringing of bells and chatter of +tongues. + +From the background Elizabeth-Jane watched the scene. Some seats had +been arranged from which ladies could witness the spectacle, and the +front seat was occupied by Lucetta, the Mayor’s wife, just at present. +In the road under her eyes stood Henchard. She appeared so bright and +pretty that, as it seemed, he was experiencing the momentary weakness +of wishing for her notice. But he was far from attractive to a woman’s +eye, ruled as that is so largely by the superficies of things. He was +not only a journeyman, unable to appear as he formerly had appeared, +but he disdained to appear as well as he might. Everybody else, from +the Mayor to the washerwoman, shone in new vesture according to means; +but Henchard had doggedly retained the fretted and weather-beaten +garments of bygone years. + +Hence, alas, this occurred: Lucetta’s eyes slid over him to this side +and to that without anchoring on his features—as gaily dressed women’s +eyes will too often do on such occasions. Her manner signified quite +plainly that she meant to know him in public no more. + +But she was never tired of watching Donald, as he stood in animated +converse with his friends a few yards off, wearing round his young neck +the official gold chain with great square links, like that round the +Royal unicorn. Every trifling emotion that her husband showed as he +talked had its reflex on her face and lips, which moved in little +duplicates to his. She was living his part rather than her own, and +cared for no one’s situation but Farfrae’s that day. + +At length a man stationed at the furthest turn of the high road, +namely, on the second bridge of which mention has been made, gave a +signal, and the Corporation in their robes proceeded from the front of +the Town Hall to the archway erected at the entrance to the town. The +carriages containing the Royal visitor and his suite arrived at the +spot in a cloud of dust, a procession was formed, and the whole came on +to the Town Hall at a walking pace. + +This spot was the centre of interest. There were a few clear yards in +front of the Royal carriage, sanded; and into this space a man stepped +before any one could prevent him. It was Henchard. He had unrolled his +private flag, and removing his hat he staggered to the side of the +slowing vehicle, waving the Union Jack to and fro with his left hand +while he blandly held out his right to the Illustrious Personage. + +All the ladies said with bated breath, “O, look there!” and Lucetta was +ready to faint. Elizabeth-Jane peeped through the shoulders of those in +front, saw what it was, and was terrified; and then her interest in the +spectacle as a strange phenomenon got the better of her fear. + +Farfrae, with Mayoral authority, immediately rose to the occasion. He +seized Henchard by the shoulder, dragged him back, and told him roughly +to be off. Henchard’s eyes met his, and Farfrae observed the fierce +light in them despite his excitement and irritation. For a moment +Henchard stood his ground rigidly; then by an unaccountable impulse +gave way and retired. Farfrae glanced to the ladies’ gallery, and saw +that his Calphurnia’s cheek was pale. + +“Why—it is your husband’s old patron!” said Mrs. Blowbody, a lady of +the neighbourhood who sat beside Lucetta. + +“Patron!” said Donald’s wife with quick indignation. + +“Do you say the man is an acquaintance of Mr. Farfrae’s?” observed Mrs. +Bath, the physician’s wife, a new-comer to the town through her recent +marriage with the doctor. + +“He works for my husband,” said Lucetta. + +“Oh—is that all? They have been saying to me that it was through him +your husband first got a footing in Casterbridge. What stories people +will tell!” + +“They will indeed. It was not so at all. Donald’s genius would have +enabled him to get a footing anywhere, without anybody’s help! He would +have been just the same if there had been no Henchard in the world!” + +It was partly Lucetta’s ignorance of the circumstances of Donald’s +arrival which led her to speak thus, partly the sensation that +everybody seemed bent on snubbing her at this triumphant time. The +incident had occupied but a few moments, but it was necessarily +witnessed by the Royal Personage, who, however, with practised tact +affected not to have noticed anything unusual. He alighted, the Mayor +advanced, the address was read; the Illustrious Personage replied, then +said a few words to Farfrae, and shook hands with Lucetta as the +Mayor’s wife. The ceremony occupied but a few minutes, and the +carriages rattled heavily as Pharaoh’s chariots down Corn Street and +out upon the Budmouth Road, in continuation of the journey coastward. + +In the crowd stood Coney, Buzzford, and Longways. “Some difference +between him now and when he zung at the Dree Mariners,” said the first. +“’Tis wonderful how he could get a lady of her quality to go snacks wi’ +en in such quick time.” + +“True. Yet how folk do worship fine clothes! Now there’s a +better-looking woman than she that nobody notices at all, because she’s +akin to that hontish fellow Henchard.” + +“I could worship ye, Buzz, for saying that,” remarked Nance Mockridge. +“I do like to see the trimming pulled off such Christmas candles. I am +quite unequal to the part of villain myself, or I’d gi’e all my small +silver to see that lady toppered.... And perhaps I shall soon,” she +added significantly. + +“That’s not a noble passiont for a ’oman to keep up,” said Longways. + +Nance did not reply, but every one knew what she meant. The ideas +diffused by the reading of Lucetta’s letters at Peter’s Finger had +condensed into a scandal, which was spreading like a miasmatic fog +through Mixen Lane, and thence up the back streets of Casterbridge. + +The mixed assemblage of idlers known to each other presently fell apart +into two bands by a process of natural selection, the frequenters of +Peter’s Finger going off Mixen Lanewards, where most of them lived, +while Coney, Buzzford, Longways, and that connection remained in the +street. + +“You know what’s brewing down there, I suppose?” said Buzzford +mysteriously to the others. + +Coney looked at him. “Not the skimmity-ride?” + +Buzzford nodded. + +“I have my doubts if it will be carried out,” said Longways. “If they +are getting it up they are keeping it mighty close. + +“I heard they were thinking of it a fortnight ago, at all events.” + +“If I were sure o’t I’d lay information,” said Longways emphatically. +“’Tis too rough a joke, and apt to wake riots in towns. We know that +the Scotchman is a right enough man, and that his lady has been a right +enough ’oman since she came here, and if there was anything wrong about +her afore, that’s their business, not ours.” + +Coney reflected. Farfrae was still liked in the community; but it must +be owned that, as the Mayor and man of money, engrossed with affairs +and ambitions, he had lost in the eyes of the poorer inhabitants +something of that wondrous charm which he had had for them as a +light-hearted penniless young man, who sang ditties as readily as the +birds in the trees. Hence the anxiety to keep him from annoyance showed +not quite the ardour that would have animated it in former days. + +“Suppose we make inquiration into it, Christopher,” continued Longways; +“and if we find there’s really anything in it, drop a letter to them +most concerned, and advise ’em to keep out of the way?” + +This course was decided on, and the group separated, Buzzford saying to +Coney, “Come, my ancient friend; let’s move on. There’s nothing more to +see here.” + +These well-intentioned ones would have been surprised had they known +how ripe the great jocular plot really was. “Yes, to-night,” Jopp had +said to the Peter’s party at the corner of Mixen Lane. “As a wind-up to +the Royal visit the hit will be all the more pat by reason of their +great elevation to-day.” + +To him, at least, it was not a joke, but a retaliation. + + + +XXXVIII. + +The proceedings had been brief—too brief—to Lucetta whom an +intoxicating _Weltlust_ had fairly mastered; but they had brought her a +great triumph nevertheless. The shake of the Royal hand still lingered +in her fingers; and the chit-chat she had overheard, that her husband +might possibly receive the honour of knighthood, though idle to a +degree, seemed not the wildest vision; stranger things had occurred to +men so good and captivating as her Scotchman was. + +After the collision with the Mayor, Henchard had withdrawn behind the +ladies’ stand; and there he stood, regarding with a stare of +abstraction the spot on the lapel of his coat where Farfrae’s hand had +seized it. He put his own hand there, as if he could hardly realize +such an outrage from one whom it had once been his wont to treat with +ardent generosity. While pausing in this half-stupefied state the +conversation of Lucetta with the other ladies reached his ears; and he +distinctly heard her deny him—deny that he had assisted Donald, that he +was anything more than a common journeyman. + +He moved on homeward, and met Jopp in the archway to the Bull Stake. +“So you’ve had a snub,” said Jopp. + +“And what if I have?” answered Henchard sternly. + +“Why, I’ve had one too, so we are both under the same cold shade.” He +briefly related his attempt to win Lucetta’s intercession. + +Henchard merely heard his story, without taking it deeply in. His own +relation to Farfrae and Lucetta overshadowed all kindred ones. He went +on saying brokenly to himself, “She has supplicated to me in her time; +and now her tongue won’t own me nor her eyes see me!... And he—how +angry he looked. He drove me back as if I were a bull breaking +fence.... I took it like a lamb, for I saw it could not be settled +there. He can rub brine on a green wound!... But he shall pay for it, +and she shall be sorry. It must come to a tussle—face to face; and then +we’ll see how a coxcomb can front a man!” + +Without further reflection the fallen merchant, bent on some wild +purpose, ate a hasty dinner and went forth to find Farfrae. After being +injured by him as a rival, and snubbed by him as a journeyman, the +crowning degradation had been reserved for this day—that he should be +shaken at the collar by him as a vagabond in the face of the whole +town. + +The crowds had dispersed. But for the green arches which still stood as +they were erected Casterbridge life had resumed its ordinary shape. +Henchard went down Corn Street till he came to Farfrae’s house, where +he knocked, and left a message that he would be glad to see his +employer at the granaries as soon as he conveniently could come there. +Having done this he proceeded round to the back and entered the yard. + +Nobody was present, for, as he had been aware, the labourers and +carters were enjoying a half-holiday on account of the events of the +morning—though the carters would have to return for a short time later +on, to feed and litter down the horses. He had reached the granary +steps and was about to ascend, when he said to himself aloud, “I’m +stronger than he.” + +Henchard returned to a shed, where he selected a short piece of rope +from several pieces that were lying about; hitching one end of this to +a nail, he took the other in his right hand and turned himself bodily +round, while keeping his arm against his side; by this contrivance he +pinioned the arm effectively. He now went up the ladders to the top +floor of the corn-stores. + +It was empty except of a few sacks, and at the further end was the door +often mentioned, opening under the cathead and chain that hoisted the +sacks. He fixed the door open and looked over the sill. There was a +depth of thirty or forty feet to the ground; here was the spot on which +he had been standing with Farfrae when Elizabeth-Jane had seen him lift +his arm, with many misgivings as to what the movement portended. + +He retired a few steps into the loft and waited. From this elevated +perch his eyes could sweep the roofs round about, the upper parts of +the luxurious chestnut trees, now delicate in leaves of a week’s age, +and the drooping boughs of the lines; Farfrae’s garden and the green +door leading therefrom. In course of time—he could not say how +long—that green door opened and Farfrae came through. He was dressed as +if for a journey. The low light of the nearing evening caught his head +and face when he emerged from the shadow of the wall, warming them to a +complexion of flame-colour. Henchard watched him with his mouth firmly +set, the squareness of his jaw and the verticality of his profile being +unduly marked. + +Farfrae came on with one hand in his pocket, and humming a tune in a +way which told that the words were most in his mind. They were those of +the song he had sung when he arrived years before at the Three +Mariners, a poor young man, adventuring for life and fortune, and +scarcely knowing witherward:— + +“And here’s a hand, my trusty fiere, + And gie’s a hand o’ thine.” + + +Nothing moved Henchard like an old melody. He sank back. “No; I can’t +do it!” he gasped. “Why does the infernal fool begin that now!” + +At length Farfrae was silent, and Henchard looked out of the loft door. +“Will ye come up here?” he said. + +“Ay, man,” said Farfrae. “I couldn’t see ye. What’s wrang?” + +A minute later Henchard heard his feet on the lowest ladder. He heard +him land on the first floor, ascend and land on the second, begin the +ascent to the third. And then his head rose through the trap behind. + +“What are you doing up here at this time?” he asked, coming forward. +“Why didn’t ye take your holiday like the rest of the men?” He spoke in +a tone which had just severity enough in it to show that he remembered +the untoward event of the forenoon, and his conviction that Henchard +had been drinking. + +Henchard said nothing; but going back he closed the stair hatchway, and +stamped upon it so that it went tight into its frame; he next turned to +the wondering young man, who by this time observed that one of +Henchard’s arms was bound to his side. + +“Now,” said Henchard quietly, “we stand face to face—man and man. Your +money and your fine wife no longer lift ’ee above me as they did but +now, and my poverty does not press me down.” + +“What does it all mean?” asked Farfrae simply. + +“Wait a bit, my lad. You should ha’ thought twice before you affronted +to extremes a man who had nothing to lose. I’ve stood your rivalry, +which ruined me, and your snubbing, which humbled me; but your +hustling, that disgraced me, I won’t stand!” + +Farfrae warmed a little at this. “Ye’d no business there,” he said. + +“As much as any one among ye! What, you forward stripling, tell a man +of my age he’d no business there!” The anger-vein swelled in his +forehead as he spoke. + +“You insulted Royalty, Henchard; and ’twas my duty, as the chief +magistrate, to stop you.” + +“Royalty be damned,” said Henchard. “I am as loyal as you, come to +that!” + +“I am not here to argue. Wait till you cool doon, wait till you cool; +and you will see things the same way as I do.” + +“You may be the one to cool first,” said Henchard grimly. “Now this is +the case. Here be we, in this four-square loft, to finish out that +little wrestle you began this morning. There’s the door, forty foot +above ground. One of us two puts the other out by that door—the master +stays inside. If he likes he may go down afterwards and give the alarm +that the other has fallen out by accident—or he may tell the +truth—that’s his business. As the strongest man I’ve tied one arm to +take no advantage of ’ee. D’ye understand? Then here’s at ’ee!” + +There was no time for Farfrae to do aught but one thing, to close with +Henchard, for the latter had come on at once. It was a wrestling match, +the object of each being to give his antagonist a back fall; and on +Henchard’s part, unquestionably, that it should be through the door. + +At the outset Henchard’s hold by his only free hand, the right, was on +the left side of Farfrae’s collar, which he firmly grappled, the latter +holding Henchard by his collar with the contrary hand. With his right +he endeavoured to get hold of his antagonist’s left arm, which, +however, he could not do, so adroitly did Henchard keep it in the rear +as he gazed upon the lowered eyes of his fair and slim antagonist. + +Henchard planted the first toe forward, Farfrae crossing him with his; +and thus far the struggle had very much the appearance of the ordinary +wrestling of those parts. Several minutes were passed by them in this +attitude, the pair rocking and writhing like trees in a gale, both +preserving an absolute silence. By this time their breathing could be +heard. Then Farfrae tried to get hold of the other side of Henchard’s +collar, which was resisted by the larger man exerting all his force in +a wrenching movement, and this part of the struggle ended by his +forcing Farfrae down on his knees by sheer pressure of one of his +muscular arms. Hampered as he was, however, he could not keep him +there, and Farfrae finding his feet again the struggle proceeded as +before. + +By a whirl Henchard brought Donald dangerously near the precipice; +seeing his position the Scotchman for the first time locked himself to +his adversary, and all the efforts of that infuriated Prince of +Darkness—as he might have been called from his appearance just now—were +inadequate to lift or loosen Farfrae for a time. By an extraordinary +effort he succeeded at last, though not until they had got far back +again from the fatal door. In doing so Henchard contrived to turn +Farfrae a complete somersault. Had Henchard’s other arm been free it +would have been all over with Farfrae then. But again he regained his +feet, wrenching Henchard’s arm considerably, and causing him sharp +pain, as could be seen from the twitching of his face. He instantly +delivered the younger man an annihilating turn by the left fore-hip, as +it used to be expressed, and following up his advantage thrust him +towards the door, never loosening his hold till Farfrae’s fair head was +hanging over the window-sill, and his arm dangling down outside the +wall. + +“Now,” said Henchard between his gasps, “this is the end of what you +began this morning. Your life is in my hands.” + +“Then take it, take it!” said Farfrae. “Ye’ve wished to long enough!” + +Henchard looked down upon him in silence, and their eyes met. “O +Farfrae!—that’s not true!” he said bitterly. “God is my witness that no +man ever loved another as I did thee at one time.... And now—though I +came here to kill ’ee, I cannot hurt thee! Go and give me in charge—do +what you will—I care nothing for what comes of me!” + +He withdrew to the back part of the loft, loosened his arm, and flung +himself in a corner upon some sacks, in the abandonment of remorse. +Farfrae regarded him in silence; then went to the hatch and descended +through it. Henchard would fain have recalled him, but his tongue +failed in its task, and the young man’s steps died on his ear. + +Henchard took his full measure of shame and self-reproach. The scenes +of his first acquaintance with Farfrae rushed back upon him—that time +when the curious mixture of romance and thrift in the young man’s +composition so commanded his heart that Farfrae could play upon him as +on an instrument. So thoroughly subdued was he that he remained on the +sacks in a crouching attitude, unusual for a man, and for such a man. +Its womanliness sat tragically on the figure of so stern a piece of +virility. He heard a conversation below, the opening of the coach-house +door, and the putting in of a horse, but took no notice. + +Here he stayed till the thin shades thickened to opaque obscurity, and +the loft-door became an oblong of gray light—the only visible shape +around. At length he arose, shook the dust from his clothes wearily, +felt his way to the hatch, and gropingly descended the steps till he +stood in the yard. + +“He thought highly of me once,” he murmured. “Now he’ll hate me and +despise me for ever!” + +He became possessed by an overpowering wish to see Farfrae again that +night, and by some desperate pleading to attempt the well-nigh +impossible task of winning pardon for his late mad attack. But as he +walked towards Farfrae’s door he recalled the unheeded doings in the +yard while he had lain above in a sort of stupor. Farfrae he remembered +had gone to the stable and put the horse into the gig; while doing so +Whittle had brought him a letter; Farfrae had then said that he would +not go towards Budmouth as he had intended—that he was unexpectedly +summoned to Weatherbury, and meant to call at Mellstock on his way +thither, that place lying but one or two miles out of his course. + +He must have come prepared for a journey when he first arrived in the +yard, unsuspecting enmity; and he must have driven off (though in a +changed direction) without saying a word to any one on what had +occurred between themselves. + +It would therefore be useless to call at Farfrae’s house till very +late. + +There was no help for it but to wait till his return, though waiting +was almost torture to his restless and self-accusing soul. He walked +about the streets and outskirts of the town, lingering here and there +till he reached the stone bridge of which mention has been made, an +accustomed halting-place with him now. Here he spent a long time, the +purl of waters through the weirs meeting his ear, and the Casterbridge +lights glimmering at no great distance off. + +While leaning thus upon the parapet his listless attention was awakened +by sounds of an unaccustomed kind from the town quarter. They were a +confusion of rhythmical noises, to which the streets added yet more +confusion by encumbering them with echoes. His first incurious thought +that the clangour arose from the town band, engaged in an attempt to +round off a memorable day in a burst of evening harmony, was +contradicted by certain peculiarities of reverberation. But +inexplicability did not rouse him to more than a cursory heed; his +sense of degradation was too strong for the admission of foreign ideas; +and he leant against the parapet as before. + + + +XXXIX. + +When Farfrae descended out of the loft breathless from his encounter +with Henchard, he paused at the bottom to recover himself. He arrived +at the yard with the intention of putting the horse into the gig +himself (all the men having a holiday), and driving to a village on the +Budmouth Road. Despite the fearful struggle he decided still to +persevere in his journey, so as to recover himself before going indoors +and meeting the eyes of Lucetta. He wished to consider his course in a +case so serious. + +When he was just on the point of driving off Whittle arrived with a +note badly addressed, and bearing the word “immediate” upon the +outside. On opening it he was surprised to see that it was unsigned. It +contained a brief request that he would go to Weatherbury that evening +about some business which he was conducting there. Farfrae knew nothing +that could make it pressing; but as he was bent upon going out he +yielded to the anonymous request, particularly as he had a call to make +at Mellstock which could be included in the same tour. Thereupon he +told Whittle of his change of direction, in words which Henchard had +overheard, and set out on his way. Farfrae had not directed his man to +take the message indoors, and Whittle had not been supposed to do so on +his own responsibility. + +Now the anonymous letter was a well-intentioned but clumsy contrivance +of Longways and other of Farfrae’s men to get him out of the way for +the evening, in order that the satirical mummery should fall flat, if +it were attempted. By giving open information they would have brought +down upon their heads the vengeance of those among their comrades who +enjoyed these boisterous old games; and therefore the plan of sending a +letter recommended itself by its indirectness. + +For poor Lucetta they took no protective measure, believing with the +majority there was some truth in the scandal, which she would have to +bear as she best might. + +It was about eight o’clock, and Lucetta was sitting in the drawing-room +alone. Night had set in for more than half an hour, but she had not had +the candles lighted, for when Farfrae was away she preferred waiting +for him by the firelight, and, if it were not too cold, keeping one of +the window-sashes a little way open that the sound of his wheels might +reach her ears early. She was leaning back in the chair, in a more +hopeful mood than she had enjoyed since her marriage. The day had been +such a success, and the temporary uneasiness which Henchard’s show of +effrontery had wrought in her disappeared with the quiet disappearance +of Henchard himself under her husband’s reproof. The floating evidences +of her absurd passion for him, and its consequences, had been +destroyed, and she really seemed to have no cause for fear. + +The reverie in which these and other subjects mingled was disturbed by +a hubbub in the distance, that increased moment by moment. It did not +greatly surprise her, the afternoon having been given up to recreation +by a majority of the populace since the passage of the Royal equipages. +But her attention was at once riveted to the matter by the voice of a +maid-servant next door, who spoke from an upper window across the +street to some other maid even more elevated than she. + +“Which way be they going now?” inquired the first with interest. + +“I can’t be sure for a moment,” said the second, “because of the +malter’s chimbley. O yes—I can see ’em. Well, I declare, I declare!” + +“What, what?” from the first, more enthusiastically. + +“They are coming up Corn Street after all! They sit back to back!” + +“What—two of ’em—are there two figures?” + +“Yes. Two images on a donkey, back to back, their elbows tied to one +another’s! She’s facing the head, and he’s facing the tail.” + +“Is it meant for anybody in particular?” + +“Well—it mid be. The man has got on a blue coat and kerseymere +leggings; he has black whiskers, and a reddish face. ’Tis a stuffed +figure, with a falseface.” + +The din was increasing now—then it lessened a little. + +“There—I shan’t see, after all!” cried the disappointed first maid. + +“They have gone into a back street—that’s all,” said the one who +occupied the enviable position in the attic. “There—now I have got ’em +all endways nicely!” + +“What’s the woman like? Just say, and I can tell in a moment if ’tis +meant for one I’ve in mind.” + +“My—why—’tis dressed just as _she_ was dressed when she sat in the +front seat at the time the play-actors came to the Town Hall!” + +Lucetta started to her feet, and almost at the instant the door of the +room was quickly and softly opened. Elizabeth-Jane advanced into the +firelight. + +“I have come to see you,” she said breathlessly. “I did not stop to +knock—forgive me! I see you have not shut your shutters, and the window +is open.” + +Without waiting for Lucetta’s reply she crossed quickly to the window +and pulled out one of the shutters. Lucetta glided to her side. “Let it +be—hush!” she said peremptorily, in a dry voice, while she seized +Elizabeth-Jane by the hand, and held up her finger. Their intercourse +had been so low and hurried that not a word had been lost of the +conversation without, which had thus proceeded:— + +“Her neck is uncovered, and her hair in bands, and her back-comb in +place; she’s got on a puce silk, and white stockings, and coloured +shoes.” + +Again Elizabeth-Jane attempted to close the window, but Lucetta held +her by main force. + +“’Tis me!” she said, with a face pale as death. “A procession—a +scandal—an effigy of me, and him!” + +The look of Elizabeth betrayed that the latter knew it already. + +“Let us shut it out,” coaxed Elizabeth-Jane, noting that the rigid +wildness of Lucetta’s features was growing yet more rigid and wild with +the meaning of the noise and laughter. “Let us shut it out!” + +“It is of no use!” she shrieked. “He will see it, won’t he? Donald will +see it! He is just coming home—and it will break his heart—he will +never love me any more—and O, it will kill me—kill me!” + +Elizabeth-Jane was frantic now. “O, can’t something be done to stop +it?” she cried. “Is there nobody to do it—not one?” + +She relinquished Lucetta’s hands, and ran to the door. Lucetta herself, +saying recklessly “I will see it!” turned to the window, threw up the +sash, and went out upon the balcony. Elizabeth immediately followed, +and put her arm round her to pull her in. Lucetta’s eyes were straight +upon the spectacle of the uncanny revel, now dancing rapidly. The +numerous lights round the two effigies threw them up into lurid +distinctness; it was impossible to mistake the pair for other than the +intended victims. + +“Come in, come in,” implored Elizabeth; “and let me shut the window!” + +“She’s me—she’s me—even to the parasol—my green parasol!” cried Lucetta +with a wild laugh as she stepped in. She stood motionless for one +second—then fell heavily to the floor. + +Almost at the instant of her fall the rude music of the skimmington +ceased. The roars of sarcastic laughter went off in ripples, and the +trampling died out like the rustle of a spent wind. Elizabeth was only +indirectly conscious of this; she had rung the bell, and was bending +over Lucetta, who remained convulsed on the carpet in the paroxysms of +an epileptic seizure. She rang again and again, in vain; the +probability being that the servants had all run out of the house to see +more of the Demoniac Sabbath than they could see within. + +At last Farfrae’s man, who had been agape on the doorstep, came up; +then the cook. The shutters, hastily pushed to by Elizabeth, were quite +closed, a light was obtained, Lucetta carried to her room, and the man +sent off for a doctor. While Elizabeth was undressing her she recovered +consciousness; but as soon as she remembered what had passed the fit +returned. + +The doctor arrived with unhoped-for promptitude; he had been standing +at his door, like others, wondering what the uproar meant. As soon as +he saw the unhappy sufferer he said, in answer to Elizabeth’s mute +appeal, “This is serious.” + +“It is a fit,” Elizabeth said. + +“Yes. But a fit in the present state of her health means mischief. You +must send at once for Mr. Farfrae. Where is he?” + +“He has driven into the country, sir,” said the parlour-maid; “to some +place on the Budmouth Road. He’s likely to be back soon.” + +“Never mind, he must be sent for, in case he should not hurry.” The +doctor returned to the bedside again. The man was despatched, and they +soon heard him clattering out of the yard at the back. + +Meanwhile Mr. Benjamin Grower, that prominent burgess of whom mention +has been already made, hearing the din of cleavers, tongs, tambourines, +kits, crouds, humstrums, serpents, rams’-horns, and other historical +kinds of music as he sat indoors in the High Street, had put on his hat +and gone out to learn the cause. He came to the corner above Farfrae’s, +and soon guessed the nature of the proceedings; for being a native of +the town he had witnessed such rough jests before. His first move was +to search hither and thither for the constables, there were two in the +town, shrivelled men whom he ultimately found in hiding up an alley yet +more shrivelled than usual, having some not ungrounded fears that they +might be roughly handled if seen. + +“What can we two poor lammigers do against such a multitude!” +expostulated Stubberd, in answer to Mr. Grower’s chiding. “’Tis +tempting ’em to commit _felo de se_ upon us, and that would be the +death of the perpetrator; and we wouldn’t be the cause of a +fellow-creature’s death on no account, not we!” + +“Get some help, then! Here, I’ll come with you. We’ll see what a few +words of authority can do. Quick now; have you got your staves?” + +“We didn’t want the folk to notice us as law officers, being so +short-handed, sir; so we pushed our Gover’ment staves up this +water-pipe.” + +“Out with ’em, and come along, for Heaven’s sake! Ah, here’s Mr. +Blowbody; that’s lucky.” (Blowbody was the third of the three borough +magistrates.) + +“Well, what’s the row?” said Blowbody. “Got their names—hey?” + +“No. Now,” said Grower to one of the constables, “you go with Mr. +Blowbody round by the Old Walk and come up the street; and I’ll go with +Stubberd straight forward. By this plan we shall have ’em between us. +Get their names only: no attack or interruption.” + +Thus they started. But as Stubberd with Mr. Grower advanced into Corn +Street, whence the sounds had proceeded, they were surprised that no +procession could be seen. They passed Farfrae’s, and looked to the end +of the street. The lamp flames waved, the Walk trees soughed, a few +loungers stood about with their hands in their pockets. Everything was +as usual. + +“Have you seen a motley crowd making a disturbance?” Grower said +magisterially to one of these in a fustian jacket, who smoked a short +pipe and wore straps round his knees. + +“Beg yer pardon, sir?” blandly said the person addressed, who was no +other than Charl, of Peter’s Finger. Mr. Grower repeated the words. + +Charl shook his head to the zero of childlike ignorance. “No; we +haven’t seen anything; have we, Joe? And you was here afore I.” + +Joseph was quite as blank as the other in his reply. + +“H’m—that’s odd,” said Mr. Grower. “Ah—here’s a respectable man coming +that I know by sight. Have you,” he inquired, addressing the nearing +shape of Jopp, “have you seen any gang of fellows making a devil of a +noise—skimmington riding, or something of the sort?” + +“O no—nothing, sir,” Jopp replied, as if receiving the most singular +news. “But I’ve not been far tonight, so perhaps—” + +“Oh, ’twas here—just here,” said the magistrate. + +“Now I’ve noticed, come to think o’t that the wind in the Walk trees +makes a peculiar poetical-like murmur to-night, sir; more than common; +so perhaps ’twas that?” Jopp suggested, as he rearranged his hand in +his greatcoat pocket (where it ingeniously supported a pair of kitchen +tongs and a cow’s horn, thrust up under his waistcoat). + +“No, no, no—d’ye think I’m a fool? Constable, come this way. They must +have gone into the back street.” + +Neither in back street nor in front street, however, could the +disturbers be perceived, and Blowbody and the second constable, who +came up at this time, brought similar intelligence. Effigies, donkey, +lanterns, band, all had disappeared like the crew of _Comus_. + +“Now,” said Mr. Grower, “there’s only one thing more we can do. Get ye +half-a-dozen helpers, and go in a body to Mixen Lane, and into Peter’s +Finger. I’m much mistaken if you don’t find a clue to the perpetrators +there.” + +The rusty-jointed executors of the law mustered assistance as soon as +they could, and the whole party marched off to the lane of notoriety. +It was no rapid matter to get there at night, not a lamp or glimmer of +any sort offering itself to light the way, except an occasional pale +radiance through some window-curtain, or through the chink of some door +which could not be closed because of the smoky chimney within. At last +they entered the inn boldly, by the till then bolted front-door, after +a prolonged knocking of loudness commensurate with the importance of +their standing. + +In the settles of the large room, guyed to the ceiling by cords as +usual for stability, an ordinary group sat drinking and smoking with +statuesque quiet of demeanour. The landlady looked mildly at the +invaders, saying in honest accents, “Good evening, gentlemen; there’s +plenty of room. I hope there’s nothing amiss?” + +They looked round the room. “Surely,” said Stubberd to one of the men, +“I saw you by now in Corn Street—Mr. Grower spoke to ’ee?” + +The man, who was Charl, shook his head absently. “I’ve been here this +last hour, hain’t I, Nance?” he said to the woman who meditatively +sipped her ale near him. + +“Faith, that you have. I came in for my quiet suppertime half-pint, and +you were here then, as well as all the rest.” + +The other constable was facing the clock-case, where he saw reflected +in the glass a quick motion by the landlady. Turning sharply, he caught +her closing the oven-door. + +“Something curious about that oven, ma’am!” he observed advancing, +opening it, and drawing out a tambourine. + +“Ah,” she said apologetically, “that’s what we keep here to use when +there’s a little quiet dancing. You see damp weather spoils it, so I +put it there to keep it dry.” + +The constable nodded knowingly, but what he knew was nothing. Nohow +could anything be elicited from this mute and inoffensive assembly. In +a few minutes the investigators went out, and joining those of their +auxiliaries who had been left at the door they pursued their way +elsewhither. + + + +XL. + +Long before this time Henchard, weary of his ruminations on the bridge, +had repaired towards the town. When he stood at the bottom of the +street a procession burst upon his view, in the act of turning out of +an alley just above him. The lanterns, horns, and multitude startled +him; he saw the mounted images, and knew what it all meant. + +They crossed the way, entered another street, and disappeared. He +turned back a few steps and was lost in grave reflection, finally +wending his way homeward by the obscure river-side path. Unable to rest +there he went to his stepdaughter’s lodging, and was told that +Elizabeth-Jane had gone to Mr. Farfrae’s. Like one acting in obedience +to a charm, and with a nameless apprehension, he followed in the same +direction in the hope of meeting her, the roysterers having vanished. +Disappointed in this he gave the gentlest of pulls to the door-bell, +and then learnt particulars of what had occurred, together with the +doctor’s imperative orders that Farfrae should be brought home, and how +they had set out to meet him on the Budmouth Road. + +“But he has gone to Mellstock and Weatherbury!” exclaimed Henchard, now +unspeakably grieved. “Not Budmouth way at all.” + +But, alas! for Henchard; he had lost his good name. They would not +believe him, taking his words but as the frothy utterances of +recklessness. Though Lucetta’s life seemed at that moment to depend +upon her husband’s return (she being in great mental agony lest he +should never know the unexaggerated truth of her past relations with +Henchard), no messenger was despatched towards Weatherbury. Henchard, +in a state of bitter anxiety and contrition, determined to seek Farfrae +himself. + +To this end he hastened down the town, ran along the eastern road over +Durnover Moor, up the hill beyond, and thus onward in the moderate +darkness of this spring night till he had reached a second and almost a +third hill about three miles distant. In Yalbury Bottom, or Plain, at +the foot of the hill, he listened. At first nothing, beyond his own +heart-throbs, was to be heard but the slow wind making its moan among +the masses of spruce and larch of Yalbury Wood which clothed the +heights on either hand; but presently there came the sound of light +wheels whetting their felloes against the newly stoned patches of road, +accompanied by the distant glimmer of lights. + +He knew it was Farfrae’s gig descending the hill from an indescribable +personality in its noise, the vehicle having been his own till bought +by the Scotchman at the sale of his effects. Henchard thereupon +retraced his steps along Yalbury Plain, the gig coming up with him as +its driver slackened speed between two plantations. + +It was a point in the highway near which the road to Mellstock branched +off from the homeward direction. By diverging to that village, as he +had intended to do, Farfrae might probably delay his return by a couple +of hours. It soon appeared that his intention was to do so still, the +light swerving towards Cuckoo Lane, the by-road aforesaid. Farfrae’s +off gig-lamp flashed in Henchard’s face. At the same time Farfrae +discerned his late antagonist. + +“Farfrae—Mr. Farfrae!” cried the breathless Henchard, holding up his +hand. + +Farfrae allowed the horse to turn several steps into the branch lane +before he pulled up. He then drew rein, and said “Yes?” over his +shoulder, as one would towards a pronounced enemy. + +“Come back to Casterbridge at once!” Henchard said. “There’s something +wrong at your house—requiring your return. I’ve run all the way here on +purpose to tell ye.” + +Farfrae was silent, and at his silence Henchard’s soul sank within him. +Why had he not, before this, thought of what was only too obvious? He +who, four hours earlier, had enticed Farfrae into a deadly wrestle +stood now in the darkness of late night-time on a lonely road, inviting +him to come a particular way, where an assailant might have +confederates, instead of going his purposed way, where there might be a +better opportunity of guarding himself from attack. Henchard could +almost feel this view of things in course of passage through Farfrae’s +mind. + +“I have to go to Mellstock,” said Farfrae coldly, as he loosened his +reins to move on. + +“But,” implored Henchard, “the matter is more serious than your +business at Mellstock. It is—your wife! She is ill. I can tell you +particulars as we go along.” + +The very agitation and abruptness of Henchard increased Farfrae’s +suspicion that this was a _ruse_ to decoy him on to the next wood, +where might be effectually compassed what, from policy or want of +nerve, Henchard had failed to do earlier in the day. He started the +horse. + +“I know what you think,” deprecated Henchard running after, almost +bowed down with despair as he perceived the image of unscrupulous +villainy that he assumed in his former friend’s eyes. “But I am not +what you think!” he cried hoarsely. “Believe me, Farfrae; I have come +entirely on your own and your wife’s account. She is in danger. I know +no more; and they want you to come. Your man has gone the other way in +a mistake. O Farfrae! don’t mistrust me—I am a wretched man; but my +heart is true to you still!” + +Farfrae, however, did distrust him utterly. He knew his wife was with +child, but he had left her not long ago in perfect health; and +Henchard’s treachery was more credible than his story. He had in his +time heard bitter ironies from Henchard’s lips, and there might be +ironies now. He quickened the horse’s pace, and had soon risen into the +high country lying between there and Mellstock, Henchard’s spasmodic +run after him lending yet more substance to his thought of evil +purposes. + +The gig and its driver lessened against the sky in Henchard’s eyes; his +exertions for Farfrae’s good had been in vain. Over this repentant +sinner, at least, there was to be no joy in heaven. He cursed himself +like a less scrupulous Job, as a vehement man will do when he loses +self-respect, the last mental prop under poverty. To this he had come +after a time of emotional darkness of which the adjoining woodland +shade afforded inadequate illustration. Presently he began to walk back +again along the way by which he had arrived. Farfrae should at all +events have no reason for delay upon the road by seeing him there when +he took his journey homeward later on. + +Arriving at Casterbridge Henchard went again to Farfrae’s house to make +inquiries. As soon as the door opened anxious faces confronted his from +the staircase, hall, and landing; and they all said in grievous +disappointment, “O—it is not he!” The manservant, finding his mistake, +had long since returned, and all hopes had centred upon Henchard. + +“But haven’t you found him?” said the doctor. + +“Yes.... I cannot tell ’ee!” Henchard replied as he sank down on a +chair within the entrance. “He can’t be home for two hours.” + +“H’m,” said the surgeon, returning upstairs. + +“How is she?” asked Henchard of Elizabeth, who formed one of the group. + +“In great danger, father. Her anxiety to see her husband makes her +fearfully restless. Poor woman—I fear they have killed her!” + +Henchard regarded the sympathetic speaker for a few instants as if she +struck him in a new light, then, without further remark, went out of +the door and onward to his lonely cottage. So much for man’s rivalry, +he thought. Death was to have the oyster, and Farfrae and himself the +shells. But about Elizabeth-Jane; in the midst of his gloom she seemed +to him as a pin-point of light. He had liked the look on her face as +she answered him from the stairs. There had been affection in it, and +above all things what he desired now was affection from anything that +was good and pure. She was not his own, yet, for the first time, he had +a faint dream that he might get to like her as his own,—if she would +only continue to love him. + +Jopp was just going to bed when Henchard got home. As the latter +entered the door Jopp said, “This is rather bad about Mrs. Farfrae’s +illness.” + +“Yes,” said Henchard shortly, though little dreaming of Jopp’s +complicity in the night’s harlequinade, and raising his eyes just +sufficiently to observe that Jopp’s face was lined with anxiety. + +“Somebody has called for you,” continued Jopp, when Henchard was +shutting himself into his own apartment. “A kind of traveller, or +sea-captain of some sort.” + +“Oh?—who could he be?” + +“He seemed a well-be-doing man—had grey hair and a broadish face; but +he gave no name, and no message.” + +“Nor do I gi’e him any attention.” And, saying this, Henchard closed +his door. + +The divergence to Mellstock delayed Farfrae’s return very nearly the +two hours of Henchard’s estimate. Among the other urgent reasons for +his presence had been the need of his authority to send to Budmouth for +a second physician; and when at length Farfrae did come back he was in +a state bordering on distraction at his misconception of Henchard’s +motives. + +A messenger was despatched to Budmouth, late as it had grown; the night +wore on, and the other doctor came in the small hours. Lucetta had been +much soothed by Donald’s arrival; he seldom or never left her side; and +when, immediately after his entry, she had tried to lisp out to him the +secret which so oppressed her, he checked her feeble words, lest +talking should be dangerous, assuring her there was plenty of time to +tell him everything. + +Up to this time he knew nothing of the skimmington-ride. The dangerous +illness and miscarriage of Mrs. Farfrae was soon rumoured through the +town, and an apprehensive guess having been given as to its cause by +the leaders in the exploit, compunction and fear threw a dead silence +over all particulars of their orgie; while those immediately around +Lucetta would not venture to add to her husband’s distress by alluding +to the subject. + +What, and how much, Farfrae’s wife ultimately explained to him of her +past entanglement with Henchard, when they were alone in the solitude +of that sad night, cannot be told. That she informed him of the bare +facts of her peculiar intimacy with the corn-merchant became plain from +Farfrae’s own statements. But in respect of her subsequent conduct—her +motive in coming to Casterbridge to unite herself with Henchard—her +assumed justification in abandoning him when she discovered reasons for +fearing him (though in truth her inconsequent passion for another man +at first sight had most to do with that abandonment)—her method of +reconciling to her conscience a marriage with the second when she was +in a measure committed to the first: to what extent she spoke of these +things remained Farfrae’s secret alone. + +Besides the watchman who called the hours and weather in Casterbridge +that night there walked a figure up and down Corn Street hardly less +frequently. It was Henchard’s, whose retiring to rest had proved itself +a futility as soon as attempted; and he gave it up to go hither and +thither, and make inquiries about the patient every now and then. He +called as much on Farfrae’s account as on Lucetta’s, and on +Elizabeth-Jane’s even more than on either’s. Shorn one by one of all +other interests, his life seemed centring on the personality of the +stepdaughter whose presence but recently he could not endure. To see +her on each occasion of his inquiry at Lucetta’s was a comfort to him. + +The last of his calls was made about four o’clock in the morning, in +the steely light of dawn. Lucifer was fading into day across Durnover +Moor, the sparrows were just alighting into the street, and the hens +had begun to cackle from the outhouses. When within a few yards of +Farfrae’s he saw the door gently opened, and a servant raise her hand +to the knocker, to untie the piece of cloth which had muffled it. He +went across, the sparrows in his way scarcely flying up from the +road-litter, so little did they believe in human aggression at so early +a time. + +“Why do you take off that?” said Henchard. + +She turned in some surprise at his presence, and did not answer for an +instant or two. Recognizing him, she said, “Because they may knock as +loud as they will; she will never hear it any more.” + + + +XLI. + +Henchard went home. The morning having now fully broke he lit his fire, +and sat abstractedly beside it. He had not sat there long when a gentle +footstep approached the house and entered the passage, a finger tapping +lightly at the door. Henchard’s face brightened, for he knew the +motions to be Elizabeth’s. She came into his room, looking wan and sad. + +“Have you heard?” she asked. “Mrs. Farfrae! She is—dead! Yes, +indeed—about an hour ago!” + +“I know it,” said Henchard. “I have but lately come in from there. It +is so very good of ’ee, Elizabeth, to come and tell me. You must be so +tired out, too, with sitting up. Now do you bide here with me this +morning. You can go and rest in the other room; and I will call ’ee +when breakfast is ready.” + +To please him, and herself—for his recent kindliness was winning a +surprised gratitude from the lonely girl—she did as he bade her, and +lay down on a sort of couch which Henchard had rigged up out of a +settle in the adjoining room. She could hear him moving about in his +preparations; but her mind ran most strongly on Lucetta, whose death in +such fulness of life and amid such cheerful hopes of maternity was +appallingly unexpected. Presently she fell asleep. + +Meanwhile her stepfather in the outer room had set the breakfast in +readiness; but finding that she dozed he would not call her; he waited +on, looking into the fire and keeping the kettle boiling with +house-wifely care, as if it were an honour to have her in his house. In +truth, a great change had come over him with regard to her, and he was +developing the dream of a future lit by her filial presence, as though +that way alone could happiness lie. + +He was disturbed by another knock at the door, and rose to open it, +rather deprecating a call from anybody just then. A stoutly built man +stood on the doorstep, with an alien, unfamiliar air about his figure +and bearing—an air which might have been called colonial by people of +cosmopolitan experience. It was the man who had asked the way at +Peter’s Finger. Henchard nodded, and looked inquiry. + +“Good morning, good morning,” said the stranger with profuse +heartiness. “Is it Mr. Henchard I am talking to?” + +“My name is Henchard.” + +“Then I’ve caught ’ee at home—that’s right. Morning’s the time for +business, says I. Can I have a few words with you?” + +“By all means,” Henchard answered, showing the way in. + +“You may remember me?” said his visitor, seating himself. + +Henchard observed him indifferently, and shook his head. + +“Well—perhaps you may not. My name is Newson.” + +Henchard’s face and eyes seemed to die. The other did not notice it. “I +know the name well,” Henchard said at last, looking on the floor. + +“I make no doubt of that. Well, the fact is, I’ve been looking for ’ee +this fortnight past. I landed at Havenpool and went through +Casterbridge on my way to Falmouth, and when I got there, they told me +you had some years before been living at Casterbridge. Back came I +again, and by long and by late I got here by coach, ten minutes ago. +‘He lives down by the mill,’ says they. So here I am. Now—that +transaction between us some twenty years agone—’tis that I’ve called +about. ’Twas a curious business. I was younger then than I am now, and +perhaps the less said about it, in one sense, the better.” + +“Curious business! ’Twas worse than curious. I cannot even allow that +I’m the man you met then. I was not in my senses, and a man’s senses +are himself.” + +“We were young and thoughtless,” said Newson. “However, I’ve come to +mend matters rather than open arguments. Poor Susan—hers was a strange +experience.” + +“She was a warm-hearted, home-spun woman. She was not what they call +shrewd or sharp at all—better she had been.” + +“She was not.” + +“As you in all likelihood know, she was simple-minded enough to think +that the sale was in a way binding. She was as guiltless o’ wrong-doing +in that particular as a saint in the clouds.” + +“I know it, I know it. I found it out directly,” said Henchard, still +with averted eyes. “There lay the sting o’t to me. If she had seen it +as what it was she would never have left me. Never! But how should she +be expected to know? What advantages had she? None. She could write her +own name, and no more.” + +“Well, it was not in my heart to undeceive her when the deed was done,” +said the sailor of former days. “I thought, and there was not much +vanity in thinking it, that she would be happier with me. She was +fairly happy, and I never would have undeceived her till the day of her +death. Your child died; she had another, and all went well. But a time +came—mind me, a time always does come. A time came—it was some while +after she and I and the child returned from America—when somebody she +had confided her history to, told her my claim to her was a mockery, +and made a jest of her belief in my right. After that she was never +happy with me. She pined and pined, and socked and sighed. She said she +must leave me, and then came the question of our child. Then a man +advised me how to act, and I did it, for I thought it was best. I left +her at Falmouth, and went off to sea. When I got to the other side of +the Atlantic there was a storm, and it was supposed that a lot of us, +including myself, had been washed overboard. I got ashore at +Newfoundland, and then I asked myself what I should do. + +“‘Since I’m here, here I’ll bide,’ I thought to myself; ‘’twill be most +kindness to her, now she’s taken against me, to let her believe me +lost, for,’ I thought, ‘while she supposes us both alive she’ll be +miserable; but if she thinks me dead she’ll go back to him, and the +child will have a home.’ I’ve never returned to this country till a +month ago, and I found that, as I supposed, she went to you, and my +daughter with her. They told me in Falmouth that Susan was dead. But my +Elizabeth-Jane—where is she?” + +“Dead likewise,” said Henchard doggedly. “Surely you learnt that too?” + +The sailor started up, and took an enervated pace or two down the room. +“Dead!” he said, in a low voice. “Then what’s the use of my money to +me?” + +Henchard, without answering, shook his head as if that were rather a +question for Newson himself than for him. + +“Where is she buried?” the traveller inquired. + +“Beside her mother,” said Henchard, in the same stolid tones. + +“When did she die?” + +“A year ago and more,” replied the other without hesitation. + +The sailor continued standing. Henchard never looked up from the floor. +At last Newson said: “My journey hither has been for nothing! I may as +well go as I came! It has served me right. I’ll trouble you no longer.” + +Henchard heard the retreating footsteps of Newson upon the sanded +floor, the mechanical lifting of the latch, the slow opening and +closing of the door that was natural to a baulked or dejected man; but +he did not turn his head. Newson’s shadow passed the window. He was +gone. + +Then Henchard, scarcely believing the evidence of his senses, rose from +his seat amazed at what he had done. It had been the impulse of a +moment. The regard he had lately acquired for Elizabeth, the new-sprung +hope of his loneliness that she would be to him a daughter of whom he +could feel as proud as of the actual daughter she still believed +herself to be, had been stimulated by the unexpected coming of Newson +to a greedy exclusiveness in relation to her; so that the sudden +prospect of her loss had caused him to speak mad lies like a child, in +pure mockery of consequences. He had expected questions to close in +round him, and unmask his fabrication in five minutes; yet such +questioning had not come. But surely they would come; Newson’s +departure could be but momentary; he would learn all by inquiries in +the town; and return to curse him, and carry his last treasure away! + +He hastily put on his hat, and went out in the direction that Newson +had taken. Newson’s back was soon visible up the road, crossing +Bull-stake. Henchard followed, and saw his visitor stop at the King’s +Arms, where the morning coach which had brought him waited half-an-hour +for another coach which crossed there. The coach Newson had come by was +now about to move again. Newson mounted, his luggage was put in, and in +a few minutes the vehicle disappeared with him. + +He had not so much as turned his head. It was an act of simple faith in +Henchard’s words—faith so simple as to be almost sublime. The young +sailor who had taken Susan Henchard on the spur of the moment and on +the faith of a glance at her face, more than twenty years before, was +still living and acting under the form of the grizzled traveller who +had taken Henchard’s words on trust so absolute as to shame him as he +stood. + +Was Elizabeth-Jane to remain his by virtue of this hardy invention of a +moment? “Perhaps not for long,” said he. Newson might converse with his +fellow-travellers, some of whom might be Casterbridge people; and the +trick would be discovered. + +This probability threw Henchard into a defensive attitude, and instead +of considering how best to right the wrong, and acquaint Elizabeth’s +father with the truth at once, he bethought himself of ways to keep the +position he had accidentally won. Towards the young woman herself his +affection grew more jealously strong with each new hazard to which his +claim to her was exposed. + +He watched the distant highway expecting to see Newson return on foot, +enlightened and indignant, to claim his child. But no figure appeared. +Possibly he had spoken to nobody on the coach, but buried his grief in +his own heart. + +His grief!—what was it, after all, to that which he, Henchard, would +feel at the loss of her? Newson’s affection cooled by years, could not +equal his who had been constantly in her presence. And thus his jealous +soul speciously argued to excuse the separation of father and child. + +He returned to the house half expecting that she would have vanished. +No; there she was—just coming out from the inner room, the marks of +sleep upon her eyelids, and exhibiting a generally refreshed air. + +“O father!” she said smiling. “I had no sooner lain down than I napped, +though I did not mean to. I wonder I did not dream about poor Mrs. +Farfrae, after thinking of her so; but I did not. How strange it is +that we do not often dream of latest events, absorbing as they may be.” + +“I am glad you have been able to sleep,” he said, taking her hand with +anxious proprietorship—an act which gave her a pleasant surprise. + +They sat down to breakfast, and Elizabeth-Jane’s thoughts reverted to +Lucetta. Their sadness added charm to a countenance whose beauty had +ever lain in its meditative soberness. + +“Father,” she said, as soon as she recalled herself to the outspread +meal, “it is so kind of you to get this nice breakfast with your own +hands, and I idly asleep the while.” + +“I do it every day,” he replied. “You have left me; everybody has left +me; how should I live but by my own hands.” + +“You are very lonely, are you not?” + +“Ay, child—to a degree that you know nothing of! It is my own fault. +You are the only one who has been near me for weeks. And you will come +no more.” + +“Why do you say that? Indeed I will, if you would like to see me.” + +Henchard signified dubiousness. Though he had so lately hoped that +Elizabeth-Jane might again live in his house as daughter, he would not +ask her to do so now. Newson might return at any moment, and what +Elizabeth would think of him for his deception it were best to bear +apart from her. + +When they had breakfasted his stepdaughter still lingered, till the +moment arrived at which Henchard was accustomed to go to his daily +work. Then she arose, and with assurance of coming again soon went up +the hill in the morning sunlight. + +“At this moment her heart is as warm towards me as mine is towards her, +she would live with me here in this humble cottage for the asking! Yet +before the evening probably he will have come, and then she will scorn +me!” + +This reflection, constantly repeated by Henchard to himself, +accompanied him everywhere through the day. His mood was no longer that +of the rebellious, ironical, reckless misadventurer; but the leaden +gloom of one who has lost all that can make life interesting, or even +tolerable. There would remain nobody for him to be proud of, nobody to +fortify him; for Elizabeth-Jane would soon be but as a stranger, and +worse. Susan, Farfrae, Lucetta, Elizabeth—all had gone from him, one +after one, either by his fault or by his misfortune. + +In place of them he had no interest, hobby, or desire. If he could have +summoned music to his aid his existence might even now have been borne; +for with Henchard music was of regal power. The merest trumpet or organ +tone was enough to move him, and high harmonies transubstantiated him. +But hard fate had ordained that he should be unable to call up this +Divine spirit in his need. + +The whole land ahead of him was as darkness itself; there was nothing +to come, nothing to wait for. Yet in the natural course of life he +might possibly have to linger on earth another thirty or forty +years—scoffed at; at best pitied. + +The thought of it was unendurable. + +To the east of Casterbridge lay moors and meadows through which much +water flowed. The wanderer in this direction who should stand still for +a few moments on a quiet night, might hear singular symphonies from +these waters, as from a lampless orchestra, all playing in their sundry +tones from near and far parts of the moor. At a hole in a rotten weir +they executed a recitative; where a tributary brook fell over a stone +breastwork they trilled cheerily; under an arch they performed a +metallic cymballing, and at Durnover Hole they hissed. The spot at +which their instrumentation rose loudest was a place called Ten +Hatches, whence during high springs there proceeded a very fugue of +sounds. + +The river here was deep and strong at all times, and the hatches on +this account were raised and lowered by cogs and a winch. A path led +from the second bridge over the highway (so often mentioned) to these +Hatches, crossing the stream at their head by a narrow plank-bridge. +But after night-fall human beings were seldom found going that way, the +path leading only to a deep reach of the stream called Blackwater, and +the passage being dangerous. + +Henchard, however, leaving the town by the east road, proceeded to the +second, or stone bridge, and thence struck into this path of solitude, +following its course beside the stream till the dark shapes of the Ten +Hatches cut the sheen thrown upon the river by the weak lustre that +still lingered in the west. In a second or two he stood beside the +weir-hole where the water was at its deepest. He looked backwards and +forwards, and no creature appeared in view. He then took off his coat +and hat, and stood on the brink of the stream with his hands clasped in +front of him. + +While his eyes were bent on the water beneath there slowly became +visible a something floating in the circular pool formed by the wash of +centuries; the pool he was intending to make his death-bed. At first it +was indistinct by reason of the shadow from the bank; but it emerged +thence and took shape, which was that of a human body, lying stiff and +stark upon the surface of the stream. + +In the circular current imparted by the central flow the form was +brought forward, till it passed under his eyes; and then he perceived +with a sense of horror that it was _himself_. Not a man somewhat +resembling him, but one in all respects his counterpart, his actual +double, was floating as if dead in Ten Hatches Hole. + +The sense of the supernatural was strong in this unhappy man, and he +turned away as one might have done in the actual presence of an +appalling miracle. He covered his eyes and bowed his head. Without +looking again into the stream he took his coat and hat, and went slowly +away. + +Presently he found himself by the door of his own dwelling. To his +surprise Elizabeth-Jane was standing there. She came forward, spoke, +called him “father” just as before. Newson, then, had not even yet +returned. + +“I thought you seemed very sad this morning,” she said, “so I have come +again to see you. Not that I am anything but sad myself. But everybody +and everything seem against you so, and I know you must be suffering.” + +How this woman divined things! Yet she had not divined their whole +extremity. + +He said to her, “Are miracles still worked, do ye think, Elizabeth? I +am not a read man. I don’t know so much as I could wish. I have tried +to peruse and learn all my life; but the more I try to know the more +ignorant I seem.” + +“I don’t quite think there are any miracles nowadays,” she said. + +“No interference in the case of desperate intentions, for instance? +Well, perhaps not, in a direct way. Perhaps not. But will you come and +walk with me, and I will show ’ee what I mean.” + +She agreed willingly, and he took her over the highway, and by the +lonely path to Ten Hatches. He walked restlessly, as if some haunting +shade, unseen of her, hovered round him and troubled his glance. She +would gladly have talked of Lucetta, but feared to disturb him. When +they got near the weir he stood still, and asked her to go forward and +look into the pool, and tell him what she saw. + +She went, and soon returned to him. “Nothing,” she said. + +“Go again,” said Henchard, “and look narrowly.” + +She proceeded to the river brink a second time. On her return, after +some delay, she told him that she saw something floating round and +round there; but what it was she could not discern. It seemed to be a +bundle of old clothes. + +“Are they like mine?” asked Henchard. + +“Well—they are. Dear me—I wonder if—Father, let us go away!” + +“Go and look once more; and then we will get home.” + +She went back, and he could see her stoop till her head was close to +the margin of the pool. She started up, and hastened back to his side. + +“Well,” said Henchard; “what do you say now?” + +“Let us go home.” + +“But tell me—do—what is it floating there?” + +“The effigy,” she answered hastily. “They must have thrown it into the +river higher up amongst the willows at Blackwater, to get rid of it in +their alarm at discovery by the magistrates, and it must have floated +down here.” + +“Ah—to be sure—the image o’ me! But where is the other? Why that one +only?... That performance of theirs killed her, but kept me alive!” + +Elizabeth-Jane thought and thought of these words “kept me alive,” as +they slowly retraced their way to the town, and at length guessed their +meaning. “Father!—I will not leave you alone like this!” she cried. +“May I live with you, and tend upon you as I used to do? I do not mind +your being poor. I would have agreed to come this morning, but you did +not ask me.” + +“May you come to me?” he cried bitterly. “Elizabeth, don’t mock me! If +you only would come!” + +“I will,” said she. + +“How will you forgive all my roughness in former days? You cannot!” + +“I have forgotten it. Talk of that no more.” + +Thus she assured him, and arranged their plans for reunion; and at +length each went home. Then Henchard shaved for the first time during +many days, and put on clean linen, and combed his hair; and was as a +man resuscitated thenceforward. + +The next morning the fact turned out to be as Elizabeth-Jane had +stated; the effigy was discovered by a cowherd, and that of Lucetta a +little higher up in the same stream. But as little as possible was said +of the matter, and the figures were privately destroyed. + +Despite this natural solution of the mystery Henchard no less regarded +it as an intervention that the figure should have been floating there. +Elizabeth-Jane heard him say, “Who is such a reprobate as I! And yet it +seems that even I be in Somebody’s hand!” + + + +XLII. + +But the emotional conviction that he was in Somebody’s hand began to +die out of Henchard’s breast as time slowly removed into distance the +event which had given that feeling birth. The apparition of Newson +haunted him. He would surely return. + +Yet Newson did not arrive. Lucetta had been borne along the churchyard +path; Casterbridge had for the last time turned its regard upon her, +before proceeding to its work as if she had never lived. But Elizabeth +remained undisturbed in the belief of her relationship to Henchard, and +now shared his home. Perhaps, after all, Newson was gone for ever. + +In due time the bereaved Farfrae had learnt the, at least, proximate +cause of Lucetta’s illness and death, and his first impulse was +naturally enough to wreak vengeance in the name of the law upon the +perpetrators of the mischief. He resolved to wait till the funeral was +over ere he moved in the matter. The time having come he reflected. +Disastrous as the result had been, it was obviously in no way foreseen +or intended by the thoughtless crew who arranged the motley procession. +The tempting prospect of putting to the blush people who stand at the +head of affairs—that supreme and piquant enjoyment of those who writhe +under the heel of the same—had alone animated them, so far as he could +see; for he knew nothing of Jopp’s incitements. Other considerations +were also involved. Lucetta had confessed everything to him before her +death, and it was not altogether desirable to make much ado about her +history, alike for her sake, for Henchard’s, and for his own. To regard +the event as an untoward accident seemed, to Farfrae, truest +consideration for the dead one’s memory, as well as best philosophy. + +Henchard and himself mutually forbore to meet. For Elizabeth’s sake the +former had fettered his pride sufficiently to accept the small seed and +root business which some of the Town Council, headed by Farfrae, had +purchased to afford him a new opening. Had he been only personally +concerned Henchard, without doubt, would have declined assistance even +remotely brought about by the man whom he had so fiercely assailed. But +the sympathy of the girl seemed necessary to his very existence; and on +her account pride itself wore the garments of humility. + +Here they settled themselves; and on each day of their lives Henchard +anticipated her every wish with a watchfulness in which paternal regard +was heightened by a burning jealous dread of rivalry. Yet that Newson +would ever now return to Casterbridge to claim her as a daughter there +was little reason to suppose. He was a wanderer and a stranger, almost +an alien; he had not seen his daughter for several years; his affection +for her could not in the nature of things be keen; other interests +would probably soon obscure his recollections of her, and prevent any +such renewal of inquiry into the past as would lead to a discovery that +she was still a creature of the present. To satisfy his conscience +somewhat Henchard repeated to himself that the lie which had retained +for him the coveted treasure had not been deliberately told to that +end, but had come from him as the last defiant word of a despair which +took no thought of consequences. Furthermore he pleaded within himself +that no Newson could love her as he loved her, or would tend her to his +life’s extremity as he was prepared to do cheerfully. + +Thus they lived on in the shop overlooking the churchyard, and nothing +occurred to mark their days during the remainder of the year. Going out +but seldom, and never on a marketday, they saw Donald Farfrae only at +rarest intervals, and then mostly as a transitory object in the +distance of the street. Yet he was pursuing his ordinary avocations, +smiling mechanically to fellow-tradesmen, and arguing with +bargainers—as bereaved men do after a while. + +Time, “in his own grey style,” taught Farfrae how to estimate his +experience of Lucetta—all that it was, and all that it was not. There +are men whose hearts insist upon a dogged fidelity to some image or +cause thrown by chance into their keeping, long after their judgment +has pronounced it no rarity—even the reverse, indeed, and without them +the band of the worthy is incomplete. But Farfrae was not of those. It +was inevitable that the insight, briskness, and rapidity of his nature +should take him out of the dead blank which his loss threw about him. +He could not but perceive that by the death of Lucetta he had exchanged +a looming misery for a simple sorrow. After that revelation of her +history, which must have come sooner or later in any circumstances, it +was hard to believe that life with her would have been productive of +further happiness. + +But as a memory, nothwithstanding such conditions, Lucetta’s image +still lived on with him, her weaknesses provoking only the gentlest +criticism, and her sufferings attenuating wrath at her concealments to +a momentary spark now and then. + +By the end of a year Henchard’s little retail seed and grain shop, not +much larger than a cupboard, had developed its trade considerably, and +the stepfather and daughter enjoyed much serenity in the pleasant, +sunny corner in which it stood. The quiet bearing of one who brimmed +with an inner activity characterized Elizabeth-Jane at this period. She +took long walks into the country two or three times a week, mostly in +the direction of Budmouth. Sometimes it occurred to him that when she +sat with him in the evening after those invigorating walks she was +civil rather than affectionate; and he was troubled; one more bitter +regret being added to those he had already experienced at having, by +his severe censorship, frozen up her precious affection when originally +offered. + +She had her own way in everything now. In going and coming, in buying +and selling, her word was law. + +“You have got a new muff, Elizabeth,” he said to her one day quite +humbly. + +“Yes; I bought it,” she said. + +He looked at it again as it lay on an adjoining table. The fur was of a +glossy brown, and, though he was no judge of such articles, he thought +it seemed an unusually good one for her to possess. + +“Rather costly, I suppose, my dear, was it not?” he hazarded. + +“It was rather above my figure,” she said quietly. “But it is not +showy.” + +“O no,” said the netted lion, anxious not to pique her in the least. + +Some little time after, when the year had advanced into another spring, +he paused opposite her empty bedroom in passing it. He thought of the +time when she had cleared out of his then large and handsome house in +Corn Street, in consequence of his dislike and harshness, and he had +looked into her chamber in just the same way. The present room was much +humbler, but what struck him about it was the abundance of books lying +everywhere. Their number and quality made the meagre furniture that +supported them seem absurdly disproportionate. Some, indeed many, must +have been recently purchased; and though he encouraged her to buy in +reason, he had no notion that she indulged her innate passion so +extensively in proportion to the narrowness of their income. For the +first time he felt a little hurt by what he thought her extravagance, +and resolved to say a word to her about it. But, before he had found +the courage to speak an event happened which set his thoughts flying in +quite another direction. + +The busy time of the seed trade was over, and the quiet weeks that +preceded the hay-season had come—setting their special stamp upon +Casterbridge by thronging the market with wood rakes, new waggons in +yellow, green, and red, formidable scythes, and pitchforks of prong +sufficient to skewer up a small family. Henchard, contrary to his wont, +went out one Saturday afternoon towards the market-place from a curious +feeling that he would like to pass a few minutes on the spot of his +former triumphs. Farfrae, to whom he was still a comparative stranger, +stood a few steps below the Corn Exchange door—a usual position with +him at this hour—and he appeared lost in thought about something he was +looking at a little way off. + +Henchard’s eyes followed Farfrae’s, and he saw that the object of his +gaze was no sample-showing farmer, but his own stepdaughter, who had +just come out of a shop over the way. She, on her part, was quite +unconscious of his attention, and in this was less fortunate than those +young women whose very plumes, like those of Juno’s bird, are set with +Argus eyes whenever possible admirers are within ken. + +Henchard went away, thinking that perhaps there was nothing significant +after all in Farfrae’s look at Elizabeth-Jane at that juncture. Yet he +could not forget that the Scotchman had once shown a tender interest in +her, of a fleeting kind. Thereupon promptly came to the surface that +idiosyncrasy of Henchard’s which had ruled his courses from the +beginning and had mainly made him what he was. Instead of thinking that +a union between his cherished stepdaughter and the energetic thriving +Donald was a thing to be desired for her good and his own, he hated the +very possibility. + +Time had been when such instinctive opposition would have taken shape +in action. But he was not now the Henchard of former days. He schooled +himself to accept her will, in this as in other matters, as absolute +and unquestionable. He dreaded lest an antagonistic word should lose +for him such regard as he had regained from her by his devotion, +feeling that to retain this under separation was better than to incur +her dislike by keeping her near. + +But the mere thought of such separation fevered his spirit much, and in +the evening he said, with the stillness of suspense: “Have you seen Mr. +Farfrae to-day, Elizabeth?” + +Elizabeth-Jane started at the question; and it was with some confusion +that she replied “No.” + +“Oh—that’s right—that’s right.... It was only that I saw him in the +street when we both were there.” He was wondering if her embarrassment +justified him in a new suspicion—that the long walks which she had +latterly been taking, that the new books which had so surprised him, +had anything to do with the young man. She did not enlighten him, and +lest silence should allow her to shape thoughts unfavourable to their +present friendly relations, he diverted the discourse into another +channel. + +Henchard was, by original make, the last man to act stealthily, for +good or for evil. But the _solicitus timor_ of his love—the dependence +upon Elizabeth’s regard into which he had declined (or, in another +sense, to which he had advanced)—denaturalized him. He would often +weigh and consider for hours together the meaning of such and such a +deed or phrase of hers, when a blunt settling question would formerly +have been his first instinct. And now, uneasy at the thought of a +passion for Farfrae which should entirely displace her mild filial +sympathy with himself, he observed her going and coming more narrowly. + +There was nothing secret in Elizabeth-Jane’s movements beyond what +habitual reserve induced, and it may at once be owned on her account +that she was guilty of occasional conversations with Donald when they +chanced to meet. Whatever the origin of her walks on the Budmouth Road, +her return from those walks was often coincident with Farfrae’s +emergence from Corn Street for a twenty minutes’ blow on that rather +windy highway—just to winnow the seeds and chaff out of him before +sitting down to tea, as he said. Henchard became aware of this by going +to the Ring, and, screened by its enclosure, keeping his eye upon the +road till he saw them meet. His face assumed an expression of extreme +anguish. + +“Of her, too, he means to rob me!” he whispered. “But he has the right. +I do not wish to interfere.” + +The meeting, in truth, was of a very innocent kind, and matters were by +no means so far advanced between the young people as Henchard’s jealous +grief inferred. Could he have heard such conversation as passed he +would have been enlightened thus much:— + +_He_.—“You like walking this way, Miss Henchard—and is it not so?” +(uttered in his undulatory accents, and with an appraising, pondering +gaze at her). + +_She_.—“O yes. I have chosen this road latterly. I have no great reason +for it.” + +_He_.—“But that may make a reason for others.” + +_She_ (reddening).—“I don’t know that. My reason, however, such as it +is, is that I wish to get a glimpse of the sea every day.” + +_He_.—“Is it a secret why?” + +_She_ ( reluctantly ).—“Yes.” + +_He_ (with the pathos of one of his native ballads).—“Ah, I doubt there +will be any good in secrets! A secret cast a deep shadow over my life. +And well you know what it was.” + +Elizabeth admitted that she did, but she refrained from confessing why +the sea attracted her. She could not herself account for it fully, not +knowing the secret possibly to be that, in addition to early marine +associations, her blood was a sailor’s. + +“Thank you for those new books, Mr. Farfrae,” she added shyly. “I +wonder if I ought to accept so many!” + +“Ay! why not? It gives me more pleasure to get them for you, than you +to have them!” + +“It cannot.” + +They proceeded along the road together till they reached the town, and +their paths diverged. + +Henchard vowed that he would leave them to their own devices, put +nothing in the way of their courses, whatever they might mean. If he +were doomed to be bereft of her, so it must be. In the situation which +their marriage would create he could see no _locus standi_ for himself +at all. Farfrae would never recognize him more than superciliously; his +poverty ensured that, no less than his past conduct. And so Elizabeth +would grow to be a stranger to him, and the end of his life would be +friendless solitude. + +With such a possibility impending he could not help watchfulness. +Indeed, within certain lines, he had the right to keep an eye upon her +as his charge. The meetings seemed to become matters of course with +them on special days of the week. + +At last full proof was given him. He was standing behind a wall close +to the place at which Farfrae encountered her. He heard the young man +address her as “Dearest Elizabeth-Jane,” and then kiss her, the girl +looking quickly round to assure herself that nobody was near. + +When they were gone their way Henchard came out from the wall, and +mournfully followed them to Casterbridge. The chief looming trouble in +this engagement had not decreased. Both Farfrae and Elizabeth-Jane, +unlike the rest of the people, must suppose Elizabeth to be his actual +daughter, from his own assertion while he himself had the same belief; +and though Farfrae must have so far forgiven him as to have no +objection to own him as a father-in-law, intimate they could never be. +Thus would the girl, who was his only friend, be withdrawn from him by +degrees through her husband’s influence, and learn to despise him. + +Had she lost her heart to any other man in the world than the one he +had rivalled, cursed, wrestled with for life in days before his spirit +was broken, Henchard would have said, “I am content.” But content with +the prospect as now depicted was hard to acquire. + +There is an outer chamber of the brain in which thoughts unowned, +unsolicited, and of noxious kind, are sometimes allowed to wander for a +moment prior to being sent off whence they came. One of these thoughts +sailed into Henchard’s ken now. + +Suppose he were to communicate to Farfrae the fact that his betrothed +was not the child of Michael Henchard at all—legally, nobody’s child; +how would that correct and leading townsman receive the information? He +might possibly forsake Elizabeth-Jane, and then she would be her +step-sire’s own again. + +Henchard shuddered, and exclaimed, “God forbid such a thing! Why should +I still be subject to these visitations of the devil, when I try so +hard to keep him away?” + + + +XLIII. + +What Henchard saw thus early was, naturally enough, seen at a little +later date by other people. That Mr. Farfrae “walked with that bankrupt +Henchard’s stepdaughter, of all women,” became a common topic in the +town, the simple perambulating term being used hereabout to signify a +wooing; and the nineteen superior young ladies of Casterbridge, who had +each looked upon herself as the only woman capable of making the +merchant Councilman happy, indignantly left off going to the church +Farfrae attended, left off conscious mannerisms, left off putting him +in their prayers at night amongst their blood relations; in short, +reverted to their normal courses. + +Perhaps the only inhabitants of the town to whom this looming choice of +the Scotchman’s gave unmixed satisfaction were the members of the +philosophic party, which included Longways, Christopher Coney, Billy +Wills, Mr. Buzzford, and the like. The Three Mariners having been, +years before, the house in which they had witnessed the young man and +woman’s first and humble appearance on the Casterbridge stage, they +took a kindly interest in their career, not unconnected, perhaps, with +visions of festive treatment at their hands hereafter. Mrs. Stannidge, +having rolled into the large parlour one evening and said that it was a +wonder such a man as Mr. Farfrae, “a pillow of the town,” who might +have chosen one of the daughters of the professional men or private +residents, should stoop so low, Coney ventured to disagree with her. + +“No, ma’am, no wonder at all. ’Tis she that’s a stooping to he—that’s +my opinion. A widow man—whose first wife was no credit to him—what is +it for a young perusing woman that’s her own mistress and well liked? +But as a neat patching up of things I see much good in it. When a man +have put up a tomb of best marble-stone to the other one, as he’ve +done, and weeped his fill, and thought it all over, and said to +hisself, ‘T’other took me in, I knowed this one first; she’s a sensible +piece for a partner, and there’s no faithful woman in high life +now’;—well, he may do worse than not to take her, if she’s +tender-inclined.” + +Thus they talked at the Mariners. But we must guard against a too +liberal use of the conventional declaration that a great sensation was +caused by the prospective event, that all the gossips’ tongues were set +wagging thereby, and so-on, even though such a declaration might lend +some eclat to the career of our poor only heroine. When all has been +said about busy rumourers, a superficial and temporary thing is the +interest of anybody in affairs which do not directly touch them. It +would be a truer representation to say that Casterbridge (ever +excepting the nineteen young ladies) looked up for a moment at the +news, and withdrawing its attention, went on labouring and victualling, +bringing up its children, and burying its dead, without caring a tittle +for Farfrae’s domestic plans. + +Not a hint of the matter was thrown out to her stepfather by Elizabeth +herself or by Farfrae either. Reasoning on the cause of their reticence +he concluded that, estimating him by his past, the throbbing pair were +afraid to broach the subject, and looked upon him as an irksome +obstacle whom they would be heartily glad to get out of the way. +Embittered as he was against society, this moody view of himself took +deeper and deeper hold of Henchard, till the daily necessity of facing +mankind, and of them particularly Elizabeth-Jane, became well-nigh more +than he could endure. His health declined; he became morbidly +sensitive. He wished he could escape those who did not want him, and +hide his head for ever. + +But what if he were mistaken in his views, and there were no necessity +that his own absolute separation from her should be involved in the +incident of her marriage? + +He proceeded to draw a picture of the alternative—himself living like a +fangless lion about the back rooms of a house in which his stepdaughter +was mistress, an inoffensive old man, tenderly smiled on by Elizabeth, +and good-naturedly tolerated by her husband. It was terrible to his +pride to think of descending so low; and yet, for the girl’s sake he +might put up with anything; even from Farfrae; even snubbings and +masterful tongue-scourgings. The privilege of being in the house she +occupied would almost outweigh the personal humiliation. + +Whether this were a dim possibility or the reverse, the courtship—which +it evidently now was—had an absorbing interest for him. + +Elizabeth, as has been said, often took her walks on the Budmouth Road, +and Farfrae as often made it convenient to create an accidental meeting +with her there. Two miles out, a quarter of a mile from the highway, +was the prehistoric fort called Mai Dun, of huge dimensions and many +ramparts, within or upon whose enclosures a human being as seen from +the road, was but an insignificant speck. Hitherward Henchard often +resorted, glass in hand, and scanned the hedgeless _Via_—for it was the +original track laid out by the legions of the Empire—to a distance of +two or three miles, his object being to read the progress of affairs +between Farfrae and his charmer. + +One day Henchard was at this spot when a masculine figure came along +the road from Budmouth, and lingered. Applying his telescope to his eye +Henchard expected that Farfrae’s features would be disclosed as usual. +But the lenses revealed that today the man was not Elizabeth-Jane’s +lover. + +It was one clothed as a merchant captain, and as he turned in the +scrutiny of the road he revealed his face. Henchard lived a lifetime +the moment he saw it. The face was Newson’s. + +Henchard dropped the glass, and for some seconds made no other +movement. Newson waited, and Henchard waited—if that could be called a +waiting which was a transfixture. But Elizabeth-Jane did not come. +Something or other had caused her to neglect her customary walk that +day. Perhaps Farfrae and she had chosen another road for variety’s +sake. But what did that amount to? She might be here to-morrow, and in +any case Newson, if bent on a private meeting and a revelation of the +truth to her, would soon make his opportunity. + +Then he would tell her not only of his paternity, but of the ruse by +which he had been once sent away. Elizabeth’s strict nature would cause +her for the first time to despise her stepfather, would root out his +image as that of an arch-deceiver, and Newson would reign in her heart +in his stead. + +But Newson did not see anything of her that morning. Having stood still +awhile he at last retraced his steps, and Henchard felt like a +condemned man who has a few hours’ respite. When he reached his own +house he found her there. + +“O father!” she said innocently. “I have had a letter—a strange one—not +signed. Somebody has asked me to meet him, either on the Budmouth Road +at noon today, or in the evening at Mr. Farfrae’s. He says he came to +see me some time ago, but a trick was played him, so that he did not +see me. I don’t understand it; but between you and me I think Donald is +at the bottom of the mystery, and that it is a relation of his who +wants to pass an opinion on his choice. But I did not like to go till I +had seen you. Shall I go?” + +Henchard replied heavily, “Yes; go.” + +The question of his remaining in Casterbridge was for ever disposed of +by this closing in of Newson on the scene. Henchard was not the man to +stand the certainty of condemnation on a matter so near his heart. And +being an old hand at bearing anguish in silence, and haughty withal, he +resolved to make as light as he could of his intentions, while +immediately taking his measures. + +He surprised the young woman whom he had looked upon as his all in this +world by saying to her, as if he did not care about her more: “I am +going to leave Casterbridge, Elizabeth-Jane.” + +“Leave Casterbridge!” she cried, “and leave—me?” + +“Yes, this little shop can be managed by you alone as well as by us +both; I don’t care about shops and streets and folk—I would rather get +into the country by myself, out of sight, and follow my own ways, and +leave you to yours.” + +She looked down and her tears fell silently. It seemed to her that this +resolve of his had come on account of her attachment and its probable +result. She showed her devotion to Farfrae, however, by mastering her +emotion and speaking out. + +“I am sorry you have decided on this,” she said with difficult +firmness. “For I thought it probable—possible—that I might marry Mr. +Farfrae some little time hence, and I did not know that you disapproved +of the step!” + +“I approve of anything you desire to do, Izzy,” said Henchard huskily. +“If I did not approve it would be no matter! I wish to go away. My +presence might make things awkward in the future, and, in short, it is +best that I go.” + +Nothing that her affection could urge would induce him to reconsider +his determination; for she could not urge what she did not know—that +when she should learn he was not related to her other than as a +step-parent she would refrain from despising him, and that when she +knew what he had done to keep her in ignorance she would refrain from +hating him. It was his conviction that she would not so refrain; and +there existed as yet neither word nor event which could argue it away. + +“Then,” she said at last, “you will not be able to come to my wedding; +and that is not as it ought to be.” + +“I don’t want to see it—I don’t want to see it!” he exclaimed; adding +more softly, “but think of me sometimes in your future life—you’ll do +that, Izzy?—think of me when you are living as the wife of the richest, +the foremost man in the town, and don’t let my sins, _when you know +them all_, cause ’ee to quite forget that though I loved ’ee late I +loved ’ee well.” + +“It is because of Donald!” she sobbed. + +“I don’t forbid you to marry him,” said Henchard. “Promise not to quite +forget me when——” He meant when Newson should come. + +She promised mechanically, in her agitation; and the same evening at +dusk Henchard left the town, to whose development he had been one of +the chief stimulants for many years. During the day he had bought a new +tool-basket, cleaned up his old hay-knife and wimble, set himself up in +fresh leggings, kneenaps and corduroys, and in other ways gone back to +the working clothes of his young manhood, discarding for ever the +shabby-genteel suit of cloth and rusty silk hat that since his decline +had characterized him in the Casterbridge street as a man who had seen +better days. + +He went secretly and alone, not a soul of the many who had known him +being aware of his departure. Elizabeth-Jane accompanied him as far as +the second bridge on the highway—for the hour of her appointment with +the unguessed visitor at Farfrae’s had not yet arrived—and parted from +him with unfeigned wonder and sorrow, keeping him back a minute or two +before finally letting him go. She watched his form diminish across the +moor, the yellow rush-basket at his back moving up and down with each +tread, and the creases behind his knees coming and going alternately +till she could no longer see them. Though she did not know it Henchard +formed at this moment much the same picture as he had presented when +entering Casterbridge for the first time nearly a quarter of a century +before; except, to be sure, that the serious addition to his years had +considerably lessened the spring to his stride, that his state of +hopelessness had weakened him, and imparted to his shoulders, as +weighted by the basket, a perceptible bend. + +He went on till he came to the first milestone, which stood in the +bank, half way up a steep hill. He rested his basket on the top of the +stone, placed his elbows on it, and gave way to a convulsive twitch, +which was worse than a sob, because it was so hard and so dry. + +“If I had only got her with me—if I only had!” he said. “Hard work +would be nothing to me then! But that was not to be. I—Cain—go alone as +I deserve—an outcast and a vagabond. But my punishment is _not_ greater +than I can bear!” + +He sternly subdued his anguish, shouldered his basket, and went on. + +Elizabeth, in the meantime, had breathed him a sigh, recovered her +equanimity, and turned her face to Casterbridge. Before she had reached +the first house she was met in her walk by Donald Farfrae. This was +evidently not their first meeting that day; they joined hands without +ceremony, and Farfrae anxiously asked, “And is he gone—and did you tell +him?—I mean of the other matter—not of ours.” + +“He is gone; and I told him all I knew of your friend. Donald, who is +he?” + +“Well, well, dearie; you will know soon about that. And Mr. Henchard +will hear of it if he does not go far.” + +“He will go far—he’s bent upon getting out of sight and sound!” + +She walked beside her lover, and when they reached the Crossways, or +Bow, turned with him into Corn Street instead of going straight on to +her own door. At Farfrae’s house they stopped and went in. + +Farfrae flung open the door of the ground-floor sitting-room, saying, +“There he is waiting for you,” and Elizabeth entered. In the arm-chair +sat the broad-faced genial man who had called on Henchard on a +memorable morning between one and two years before this time, and whom +the latter had seen mount the coach and depart within half-an-hour of +his arrival. It was Richard Newson. The meeting with the light-hearted +father from whom she had been separated half-a-dozen years, as if by +death, need hardly be detailed. It was an affecting one, apart from the +question of paternity. Henchard’s departure was in a moment explained. +When the true facts came to be handled the difficulty of restoring her +to her old belief in Newson was not so great as might have seemed +likely, for Henchard’s conduct itself was a proof that those facts were +true. Moreover, she had grown up under Newson’s paternal care; and even +had Henchard been her father in nature, this father in early +domiciliation might almost have carried the point against him, when the +incidents of her parting with Henchard had a little worn off. + +Newson’s pride in what she had grown up to be was more than he could +express. He kissed her again and again. + +“I’ve saved you the trouble to come and meet me—ha-ha!” said Newson. +“The fact is that Mr. Farfrae here, he said, ‘Come up and stop with me +for a day or two, Captain Newson, and I’ll bring her round.’ ‘Faith,’ +says I, ‘so I will’; and here I am.” + +“Well, Henchard is gone,” said Farfrae, shutting the door. “He has done +it all voluntarily, and, as I gather from Elizabeth, he has been very +nice with her. I was got rather uneasy; but all is as it should be, and +we will have no more deefficulties at all.” + +“Now, that’s very much as I thought,” said Newson, looking into the +face of each by turns. “I said to myself, ay, a hundred times, when I +tried to get a peep at her unknown to herself—‘Depend upon it, ’tis +best that I should live on quiet for a few days like this till +something turns up for the better.’ I now know you are all right, and +what can I wish for more?” + +“Well, Captain Newson, I will be glad to see ye here every day now, +since it can do no harm,” said Farfrae. “And what I’ve been thinking is +that the wedding may as well be kept under my own roof, the house being +large, and you being in lodgings by yourself—so that a great deal of +trouble and expense would be saved ye?—and ’tis a convenience when a +couple’s married not to hae far to go to get home!” + +“With all my heart,” said Captain Newson; “since, as ye say, it can do +no harm, now poor Henchard’s gone; though I wouldn’t have done it +otherwise, or put myself in his way at all; for I’ve already in my +lifetime been an intruder into his family quite as far as politeness +can be expected to put up with. But what do the young woman say herself +about it? Elizabeth, my child, come and hearken to what we be talking +about, and not bide staring out o’ the window as if ye didn’t hear.” + +“Donald and you must settle it,” murmured Elizabeth, still keeping up a +scrutinizing gaze at some small object in the street. + +“Well, then,” continued Newson, turning anew to Farfrae with a face +expressing thorough entry into the subject, “that’s how we’ll have it. +And, Mr. Farfrae, as you provide so much, and houseroom, and all that, +I’ll do my part in the drinkables, and see to the rum and +schiedam—maybe a dozen jars will be sufficient?—as many of the folk +will be ladies, and perhaps they won’t drink hard enough to make a high +average in the reckoning? But you know best. I’ve provided for men and +shipmates times enough, but I’m as ignorant as a child how many glasses +of grog a woman, that’s not a drinking woman, is expected to consume at +these ceremonies?” + +“Oh, none—we’ll no want much of that—O no!” said Farfrae, shaking his +head with appalled gravity. “Do you leave all to me.” + +When they had gone a little further in these particulars Newson, +leaning back in his chair and smiling reflectively at the ceiling, +said, “I’ve never told ye, or have I, Mr. Farfrae, how Henchard put me +off the scent that time?” + +He expressed ignorance of what the Captain alluded to. + +“Ah, I thought I hadn’t. I resolved that I would not, I remember, not +to hurt the man’s name. But now he’s gone I can tell ye. Why, I came to +Casterbridge nine or ten months before that day last week that I found +ye out. I had been here twice before then. The first time I passed +through the town on my way westward, not knowing Elizabeth lived here. +Then hearing at some place—I forget where—that a man of the name of +Henchard had been mayor here, I came back, and called at his house one +morning. The old rascal!—he said Elizabeth-Jane had died years ago.” + +Elizabeth now gave earnest heed to his story. + +“Now, it never crossed my mind that the man was selling me a packet,” +continued Newson. “And, if you’ll believe me, I was that upset, that I +went back to the coach that had brought me, and took passage onward +without lying in the town half-an-hour. Ha-ha!—’twas a good joke, and +well carried out, and I give the man credit for’t!” + +Elizabeth-Jane was amazed at the intelligence. “A joke?—O no!” she +cried. “Then he kept you from me, father, all those months, when you +might have been here?” + +The father admitted that such was the case. + +“He ought not to have done it!” said Farfrae. + +Elizabeth sighed. “I said I would never forget him. But O! I think I +ought to forget him now!” + +Newson, like a good many rovers and sojourners among strange men and +strange moralities, failed to perceive the enormity of Henchard’s +crime, notwithstanding that he himself had been the chief sufferer +therefrom. Indeed, the attack upon the absent culprit waxing serious, +he began to take Henchard’s part. + +“Well, ’twas not ten words that he said, after all,” Newson pleaded. +“And how could he know that I should be such a simpleton as to believe +him? ’Twas as much my fault as his, poor fellow!” + +“No,” said Elizabeth-Jane firmly, in her revulsion of feeling. “He knew +your disposition—you always were so trusting, father; I’ve heard my +mother say so hundreds of times—and he did it to wrong you. After +weaning me from you these five years by saying he was my father, he +should not have done this.” + +Thus they conversed; and there was nobody to set before Elizabeth any +extenuation of the absent one’s deceit. Even had he been present +Henchard might scarce have pleaded it, so little did he value himself +or his good name. + +“Well, well—never mind—it is all over and past,” said Newson +good-naturedly. “Now, about this wedding again.” + + + +XLIV. + +Meanwhile, the man of their talk had pursued his solitary way eastward +till weariness overtook him, and he looked about for a place of rest. +His heart was so exacerbated at parting from the girl that he could not +face an inn, or even a household of the most humble kind; and entering +a field he lay down under a wheatrick, feeling no want of food. The +very heaviness of his soul caused him to sleep profoundly. + +The bright autumn sun shining into his eyes across the stubble awoke +him the next morning early. He opened his basket and ate for his +breakfast what he had packed for his supper; and in doing so overhauled +the remainder of his kit. Although everything he brought necessitated +carriage at his own back, he had secreted among his tools a few of +Elizabeth-Jane’s cast-off belongings, in the shape of gloves, shoes, a +scrap of her handwriting, and the like, and in his pocket he carried a +curl of her hair. Having looked at these things he closed them up +again, and went onward. + +During five consecutive days Henchard’s rush basket rode along upon his +shoulder between the highway hedges, the new yellow of the rushes +catching the eye of an occasional field-labourer as he glanced through +the quickset, together with the wayfarer’s hat and head, and +down-turned face, over which the twig shadows moved in endless +procession. It now became apparent that the direction of his journey +was Weydon Priors, which he reached on the afternoon of the sixth day. + +The renowned hill whereon the annual fair had been held for so many +generations was now bare of human beings, and almost of aught besides. +A few sheep grazed thereabout, but these ran off when Henchard halted +upon the summit. He deposited his basket upon the turf, and looked +about with sad curiosity; till he discovered the road by which his wife +and himself had entered on the upland so memorable to both, +five-and-twenty years before. + +“Yes, we came up that way,” he said, after ascertaining his bearings. +“She was carrying the baby, and I was reading a ballet-sheet. Then we +crossed about here—she so sad and weary, and I speaking to her hardly +at all, because of my cursed pride and mortification at being poor. +Then we saw the tent—that must have stood more this way.” He walked to +another spot, it was not really where the tent had stood but it seemed +so to him. “Here we went in, and here we sat down. I faced this way. +Then I drank, and committed my crime. It must have been just on that +very pixy-ring that she was standing when she said her last words to me +before going off with him; I can hear their sound now, and the sound of +her sobs: ‘O Mike! I’ve lived with thee all this while, and had nothing +but temper. Now I’m no more to ’ee—I’ll try my luck elsewhere.’” + +He experienced not only the bitterness of a man who finds, in looking +back upon an ambitious course, that what he has sacrificed in sentiment +was worth as much as what he has gained in substance; but the +superadded bitterness of seeing his very recantation nullified. He had +been sorry for all this long ago; but his attempts to replace ambition +by love had been as fully foiled as his ambition itself. His wronged +wife had foiled them by a fraud so grandly simple as to be almost a +virtue. It was an odd sequence that out of all this tampering with +social law came that flower of Nature, Elizabeth. Part of his wish to +wash his hands of life arose from his perception of its contrarious +inconsistencies—of Nature’s jaunty readiness to support unorthodox +social principles. + +He intended to go on from this place—visited as an act of penance—into +another part of the country altogether. But he could not help thinking +of Elizabeth, and the quarter of the horizon in which she lived. Out of +this it happened that the centrifugal tendency imparted by weariness of +the world was counteracted by the centripetal influence of his love for +his stepdaughter. As a consequence, instead of following a straight +course yet further away from Casterbridge, Henchard gradually, almost +unconsciously, deflected from that right line of his first intention; +till, by degrees, his wandering, like that of the Canadian woodsman, +became part of a circle of which Casterbridge formed the centre. In +ascending any particular hill he ascertained the bearings as nearly as +he could by means of the sun, moon, or stars, and settled in his mind +the exact direction in which Casterbridge and Elizabeth-Jane lay. +Sneering at himself for his weakness he yet every hour—nay, every few +minutes—conjectured her actions for the time being—her sitting down and +rising up, her goings and comings, till thought of Newson’s and +Farfrae’s counter-influence would pass like a cold blast over a pool, +and efface her image. And then he would say to himself, “O you fool! +All this about a daughter who is no daughter of thine!” + +At length he obtained employment at his own occupation of hay-trusser, +work of that sort being in demand at this autumn time. The scene of his +hiring was a pastoral farm near the old western highway, whose course +was the channel of all such communications as passed between the busy +centres of novelty and the remote Wessex boroughs. He had chosen the +neighbourhood of this artery from a sense that, situated here, though +at a distance of fifty miles, he was virtually nearer to her whose +welfare was so dear than he would be at a roadless spot only half as +remote. + +And thus Henchard found himself again on the precise standing which he +had occupied a quarter of a century before. Externally there was +nothing to hinder his making another start on the upward slope, and by +his new lights achieving higher things than his soul in its half-formed +state had been able to accomplish. But the ingenious machinery +contrived by the Gods for reducing human possibilities of amelioration +to a minimum—which arranges that wisdom to do shall come _pari passu_ +with the departure of zest for doing—stood in the way of all that. He +had no wish to make an arena a second time of a world that had become a +mere painted scene to him. + +Very often, as his hay-knife crunched down among the sweet-smelling +grassy stems, he would survey mankind and say to himself: “Here and +everywhere be folk dying before their time like frosted leaves, though +wanted by their families, the country, and the world; while I, an +outcast, an encumberer of the ground, wanted by nobody, and despised by +all, live on against my will!” + +He often kept an eager ear upon the conversation of those who passed +along the road—not from a general curiosity by any means—but in the +hope that among these travellers between Casterbridge and London some +would, sooner or later, speak of the former place. The distance, +however, was too great to lend much probability to his desire; and the +highest result of his attention to wayside words was that he did indeed +hear the name “Casterbridge” uttered one day by the driver of a +road-waggon. Henchard ran to the gate of the field he worked in, and +hailed the speaker, who was a stranger. + +“Yes—I’ve come from there, maister,” he said, in answer to Henchard’s +inquiry. “I trade up and down, ye know; though, what with this +travelling without horses that’s getting so common, my work will soon +be done.” + +“Anything moving in the old place, mid I ask?” + +“All the same as usual.” + +“I’ve heard that Mr. Farfrae, the late mayor, is thinking of getting +married. Now is that true or not?” + +“I couldn’t say for the life o’ me. O no, I should think not.” + +“But yes, John—you forget,” said a woman inside the waggon-tilt. “What +were them packages we carr’d there at the beginning o’ the week? Surely +they said a wedding was coming off soon—on Martin’s Day?” + +The man declared he remembered nothing about it; and the waggon went on +jangling over the hill. + +Henchard was convinced that the woman’s memory served her well. The +date was an extremely probable one, there being no reason for delay on +either side. He might, for that matter, write and inquire of Elizabeth; +but his instinct for sequestration had made the course difficult. Yet +before he left her she had said that for him to be absent from her +wedding was not as she wished it to be. + +The remembrance would continually revive in him now that it was not +Elizabeth and Farfrae who had driven him away from them, but his own +haughty sense that his presence was no longer desired. He had assumed +the return of Newson without absolute proof that the Captain meant to +return; still less that Elizabeth-Jane would welcome him; and with no +proof whatever that if he did return he would stay. What if he had been +mistaken in his views; if there had been no necessity that his own +absolute separation from her he loved should be involved in these +untoward incidents? To make one more attempt to be near her: to go +back, to see her, to plead his cause before her, to ask forgiveness for +his fraud, to endeavour strenuously to hold his own in her love; it was +worth the risk of repulse, ay, of life itself. + +But how to initiate this reversal of all his former resolves without +causing husband and wife to despise him for his inconsistency was a +question which made him tremble and brood. + +He cut and cut his trusses two days more, and then he concluded his +hesitancies by a sudden reckless determination to go to the wedding +festivity. Neither writing nor message would be expected of him. She +had regretted his decision to be absent—his unanticipated presence +would fill the little unsatisfied corner that would probably have place +in her just heart without him. + +To intrude as little of his personality as possible upon a gay event +with which that personality could show nothing in keeping, he decided +not to make his appearance till evening—when stiffness would have worn +off, and a gentle wish to let bygones be bygones would exercise its +sway in all hearts. + +He started on foot, two mornings before St. Martin’s-tide, allowing +himself about sixteen miles to perform for each of the three days’ +journey, reckoning the wedding-day as one. There were only two towns, +Melchester and Shottsford, of any importance along his course, and at +the latter he stopped on the second night, not only to rest, but to +prepare himself for the next evening. + +Possessing no clothes but the working suit he stood in—now stained and +distorted by their two months of hard usage, he entered a shop to make +some purchases which should put him, externally at any rate, a little +in harmony with the prevailing tone of the morrow. A rough yet +respectable coat and hat, a new shirt and neck-cloth, were the chief of +these; and having satisfied himself that in appearance at least he +would not now offend her, he proceeded to the more interesting +particular of buying her some present. + +What should that present be? He walked up and down the street, +regarding dubiously the display in the shop windows, from a gloomy +sense that what he might most like to give her would be beyond his +miserable pocket. At length a caged goldfinch met his eye. The cage was +a plain and small one, the shop humble, and on inquiry he concluded he +could afford the modest sum asked. A sheet of newspaper was tied round +the little creature’s wire prison, and with the wrapped up cage in his +hand Henchard sought a lodging for the night. + +Next day he set out upon the last stage, and was soon within the +district which had been his dealing ground in bygone years. Part of the +distance he travelled by carrier, seating himself in the darkest corner +at the back of that trader’s van; and as the other passengers, mainly +women going short journeys, mounted and alighted in front of Henchard, +they talked over much local news, not the least portion of this being +the wedding then in course of celebration at the town they were +nearing. It appeared from their accounts that the town band had been +hired for the evening party, and, lest the convivial instincts of that +body should get the better of their skill, the further step had been +taken of engaging the string band from Budmouth, so that there would be +a reserve of harmony to fall back upon in case of need. + +He heard, however, but few particulars beyond those known to him +already, the incident of the deepest interest on the journey being the +soft pealing of the Casterbridge bells, which reached the travellers’ +ears while the van paused on the top of Yalbury Hill to have the drag +lowered. The time was just after twelve o’clock. + +Those notes were a signal that all had gone well; that there had been +no slip ’twixt cup and lip in this case; that Elizabeth-Jane and Donald +Farfrae were man and wife. + +Henchard did not care to ride any further with his chattering +companions after hearing this sound. Indeed, it quite unmanned him; and +in pursuance of his plan of not showing himself in Casterbridge street +till evening, lest he should mortify Farfrae and his bride, he alighted +here, with his bundle and bird-cage, and was soon left as a lonely +figure on the broad white highway. + +It was the hill near which he had waited to meet Farfrae, almost two +years earlier, to tell him of the serious illness of his wife Lucetta. +The place was unchanged; the same larches sighed the same notes; but +Farfrae had another wife—and, as Henchard knew, a better one. He only +hoped that Elizabeth-Jane had obtained a better home than had been hers +at the former time. + +He passed the remainder of the afternoon in a curious highstrung +condition, unable to do much but think of the approaching meeting with +her, and sadly satirize himself for his emotions thereon, as a Samson +shorn. Such an innovation on Casterbridge customs as a flitting of +bridegroom and bride from the town immediately after the ceremony, was +not likely, but if it should have taken place he would wait till their +return. To assure himself on this point he asked a market-man when near +the borough if the newly-married couple had gone away, and was promptly +informed that they had not; they were at that hour, according to all +accounts, entertaining a houseful of guests at their home in Corn +Street. + +Henchard dusted his boots, washed his hands at the riverside, and +proceeded up the town under the feeble lamps. He need have made no +inquiries beforehand, for on drawing near Farfrae’s residence it was +plain to the least observant that festivity prevailed within, and that +Donald himself shared it, his voice being distinctly audible in the +street, giving strong expression to a song of his dear native country +that he loved so well as never to have revisited it. Idlers were +standing on the pavement in front; and wishing to escape the notice of +these Henchard passed quickly on to the door. + +It was wide open, the hall was lighted extravagantly, and people were +going up and down the stairs. His courage failed him; to enter +footsore, laden, and poorly dressed into the midst of such resplendency +was to bring needless humiliation upon her he loved, if not to court +repulse from her husband. Accordingly he went round into the street at +the back that he knew so well, entered the garden, and came quietly +into the house through the kitchen, temporarily depositing the bird and +cage under a bush outside, to lessen the awkwardness of his arrival. + +Solitude and sadness had so emolliated Henchard that he now feared +circumstances he would formerly have scorned, and he began to wish that +he had not taken upon himself to arrive at such a juncture. However, +his progress was made unexpectedly easy by his discovering alone in the +kitchen an elderly woman who seemed to be acting as provisional +housekeeper during the convulsions from which Farfrae’s establishment +was just then suffering. She was one of those people whom nothing +surprises, and though to her, a total stranger, his request must have +seemed odd, she willingly volunteered to go up and inform the master +and mistress of the house that “a humble old friend” had come. + +On second thought she said that he had better not wait in the kitchen, +but come up into the little back-parlour, which was empty. He thereupon +followed her thither, and she left him. Just as she got across the +landing to the door of the best parlour a dance was struck up, and she +returned to say that she would wait till that was over before +announcing him—Mr. and Mrs. Farfrae having both joined in the figure. + +The door of the front room had been taken off its hinges to give more +space, and that of the room Henchard sat in being ajar, he could see +fractional parts of the dancers whenever their gyrations brought them +near the doorway, chiefly in the shape of the skirts of dresses and +streaming curls of hair; together with about three-fifths of the band +in profile, including the restless shadow of a fiddler’s elbow, and the +tip of the bass-viol bow. + +The gaiety jarred upon Henchard’s spirits; and he could not quite +understand why Farfrae, a much-sobered man, and a widower, who had had +his trials, should have cared for it all, notwithstanding the fact that +he was quite a young man still, and quickly kindled to enthusiasm by +dance and song. That the quiet Elizabeth, who had long ago appraised +life at a moderate value, and who knew in spite of her maidenhood that +marriage was as a rule no dancing matter, should have had zest for this +revelry surprised him still more. However, young people could not be +quite old people, he concluded, and custom was omnipotent. + +With the progress of the dance the performers spread out somewhat, and +then for the first time he caught a glimpse of the once despised +daughter who had mastered him, and made his heart ache. She was in a +dress of white silk or satin, he was not near enough to say which—snowy +white, without a tinge of milk or cream; and the expression of her face +was one of nervous pleasure rather than of gaiety. Presently Farfrae +came round, his exuberant Scotch movement making him conspicuous in a +moment. The pair were not dancing together, but Henchard could discern +that whenever the chances of the figure made them the partners of a +moment their emotions breathed a much subtler essence than at other +times. + +By degrees Henchard became aware that the measure was trod by some one +who out-Farfraed Farfrae in saltatory intenseness. This was strange, +and it was stranger to find that the eclipsing personage was +Elizabeth-Jane’s partner. The first time that Henchard saw him he was +sweeping grandly round, his head quivering and low down, his legs in +the form of an X and his back towards the door. The next time he came +round in the other direction, his white waist-coat preceding his face, +and his toes preceding his white waistcoat. That happy face—Henchard’s +complete discomfiture lay in it. It was Newson’s, who had indeed come +and supplanted him. + +Henchard pushed to the door, and for some seconds made no other +movement. He rose to his feet, and stood like a dark ruin, obscured by +“the shade from his own soul up-thrown.” + +But he was no longer the man to stand these reverses unmoved. His +agitation was great, and he would fain have been gone, but before he +could leave the dance had ended, the housekeeper had informed +Elizabeth-Jane of the stranger who awaited her, and she entered the +room immediately. + +“Oh—it is—Mr. Henchard!” she said, starting back. + +“What, Elizabeth?” he cried, as he seized her hand. “What do you +say?—_Mr._ Henchard? Don’t, don’t scourge me like that! Call me +worthless old Henchard—anything—but don’t ’ee be so cold as this! O my +maid—I see you have another—a real father in my place. Then you know +all; but don’t give all your thought to him! Do ye save a little room +for me!” + +She flushed up, and gently drew her hand away. “I could have loved you +always—I would have, gladly,” she said. “But how can I when I know you +have deceived me so—so bitterly deceived me! You persuaded me that my +father was not my father—allowed me to live on in ignorance of the +truth for years; and then when he, my warm-hearted real father, came to +find me, cruelly sent him away with a wicked invention of my death, +which nearly broke his heart. O how can I love as I once did a man who +has served us like this!” + +Henchard’s lips half parted to begin an explanation. But he shut them +up like a vice, and uttered not a sound. How should he, there and then, +set before her with any effect the palliatives of his great faults—that +he had himself been deceived in her identity at first, till informed by +her mother’s letter that his own child had died; that, in the second +accusation, his lie had been the last desperate throw of a gamester who +loved her affection better than his own honour? Among the many +hindrances to such a pleading not the least was this, that he did not +sufficiently value himself to lessen his sufferings by strenuous appeal +or elaborate argument. + +Waiving, therefore, his privilege of self-defence, he regarded only his +discomposure. “Don’t ye distress yourself on my account,” he said, with +proud superiority. “I would not wish it—at such a time, too, as this. I +have done wrong in coming to ’ee—I see my error. But it is only for +once, so forgive it. I’ll never trouble ’ee again, Elizabeth-Jane—no, +not to my dying day! Good-night. Good-bye!” + +Then, before she could collect her thoughts, Henchard went out from her +rooms, and departed from the house by the back way as he had come; and +she saw him no more. + + + +XLV. + +It was about a month after the day which closed as in the last chapter. +Elizabeth-Jane had grown accustomed to the novelty of her situation, +and the only difference between Donald’s movements now and formerly was +that he hastened indoors rather more quickly after business hours than +he had been in the habit of doing for some time. + +Newson had stayed in Casterbridge three days after the wedding party +(whose gaiety, as might have been surmised, was of his making rather +than of the married couple’s), and was stared at and honoured as became +the returned Crusoe of the hour. But whether or not because +Casterbridge was difficult to excite by dramatic returns and +disappearances through having been for centuries an assize town, in +which sensational exits from the world, antipodean absences, and such +like, were half-yearly occurrences, the inhabitants did not altogether +lose their equanimity on his account. On the fourth morning he was +discovered disconsolately climbing a hill, in his craving to get a +glimpse of the sea from somewhere or other. The contiguity of salt +water proved to be such a necessity of his existence that he preferred +Budmouth as a place of residence, notwithstanding the society of his +daughter in the other town. Thither he went, and settled in lodgings in +a green-shuttered cottage which had a bow-window, jutting out +sufficiently to afford glimpses of a vertical strip of blue sea to any +one opening the sash, and leaning forward far enough to look through a +narrow lane of tall intervening houses. + +Elizabeth-Jane was standing in the middle of her upstairs parlour, +critically surveying some re-arrangement of articles with her head to +one side, when the housemaid came in with the announcement, “Oh, please +ma’am, we know now how that bird-cage came there.” + +In exploring her new domain during the first week of residence, gazing +with critical satisfaction on this cheerful room and that, penetrating +cautiously into dark cellars, sallying forth with gingerly tread to the +garden, now leaf-strewn by autumn winds, and thus, like a wise +field-marshal, estimating the capabilities of the site whereon she was +about to open her housekeeping campaign—Mrs. Donald Farfrae had +discovered in a screened corner a new bird-cage, shrouded in newspaper, +and at the bottom of the cage a little ball of feathers—the dead body +of a goldfinch. Nobody could tell her how the bird and cage had come +there, though that the poor little songster had been starved to death +was evident. The sadness of the incident had made an impression on her. +She had not been able to forget it for days, despite Farfrae’s tender +banter; and now when the matter had been nearly forgotten it was again +revived. + +“Oh, please ma’am, we know how the bird-cage came there. That farmer’s +man who called on the evening of the wedding—he was seen wi’ it in his +hand as he came up the street; and ’tis thoughted that he put it down +while he came in with his message, and then went away forgetting where +he had left it.” + +This was enough to set Elizabeth thinking, and in thinking she seized +hold of the idea, at one feminine bound, that the caged bird had been +brought by Henchard for her as a wedding gift and token of repentance. +He had not expressed to her any regrets or excuses for what he had done +in the past; but it was a part of his nature to extenuate nothing, and +live on as one of his own worst accusers. She went out, looked at the +cage, buried the starved little singer, and from that hour her heart +softened towards the self-alienated man. + +When her husband came in she told him her solution of the bird-cage +mystery; and begged Donald to help her in finding out, as soon as +possible, whither Henchard had banished himself, that she might make +her peace with him; try to do something to render his life less that of +an outcast, and more tolerable to him. Although Farfrae had never so +passionately liked Henchard as Henchard had liked him, he had, on the +other hand, never so passionately hated in the same direction as his +former friend had done, and he was therefore not the least indisposed +to assist Elizabeth-Jane in her laudable plan. + +But it was by no means easy to set about discovering Henchard. He had +apparently sunk into the earth on leaving Mr. and Mrs. Farfrae’s door. +Elizabeth-Jane remembered what he had once attempted; and trembled. + +But though she did not know it Henchard had become a changed man since +then—as far, that is, as change of emotional basis can justify such a +radical phrase; and she needed not to fear. In a few days Farfrae’s +inquiries elicited that Henchard had been seen by one who knew him +walking steadily along the Melchester highway eastward, at twelve +o’clock at night—in other words, retracing his steps on the road by +which he had come. + +This was enough; and the next morning Farfrae might have been +discovered driving his gig out of Casterbridge in that direction, +Elizabeth-Jane sitting beside him, wrapped in a thick flat fur—the +victorine of the period—her complexion somewhat richer than formerly, +and an incipient matronly dignity, which the serene Minerva-eyes of one +“whose gestures beamed with mind” made becoming, settling on her face. +Having herself arrived at a promising haven from at least the grosser +troubles of her life, her object was to place Henchard in some similar +quietude before he should sink into that lower stage of existence which +was only too possible to him now. + +After driving along the highway for a few miles they made further +inquiries, and learnt of a road-mender, who had been working +thereabouts for weeks, that he had observed such a man at the time +mentioned; he had left the Melchester coachroad at Weatherbury by a +forking highway which skirted the north of Egdon Heath. Into this road +they directed the horse’s head, and soon were bowling across that +ancient country whose surface never had been stirred to a finger’s +depth, save by the scratchings of rabbits, since brushed by the feet of +the earliest tribes. The tumuli these had left behind, dun and shagged +with heather, jutted roundly into the sky from the uplands, as though +they were the full breasts of Diana Multimammia supinely extended +there. + +They searched Egdon, but found no Henchard. Farfrae drove onward, and +by the afternoon reached the neighbourhood of some extension of the +heath to the north of Anglebury, a prominent feature of which, in the +form of a blasted clump of firs on a summit of a hill, they soon passed +under. That the road they were following had, up to this point, been +Henchard’s track on foot they were pretty certain; but the +ramifications which now began to reveal themselves in the route made +further progress in the right direction a matter of pure guess-work, +and Donald strongly advised his wife to give up the search in person, +and trust to other means for obtaining news of her stepfather. They +were now a score of miles at least from home, but, by resting the horse +for a couple of hours at a village they had just traversed, it would be +possible to get back to Casterbridge that same day, while to go much +further afield would reduce them to the necessity of camping out for +the night, “and that will make a hole in a sovereign,” said Farfrae. +She pondered the position, and agreed with him. + +He accordingly drew rein, but before reversing their direction paused a +moment and looked vaguely round upon the wide country which the +elevated position disclosed. While they looked a solitary human form +came from under the clump of trees, and crossed ahead of them. The +person was some labourer; his gait was shambling, his regard fixed in +front of him as absolutely as if he wore blinkers; and in his hand he +carried a few sticks. Having crossed the road he descended into a +ravine, where a cottage revealed itself, which he entered. + +“If it were not so far away from Casterbridge I should say that must be +poor Whittle. ’Tis just like him,” observed Elizabeth-Jane. + +“And it may be Whittle, for he’s never been to the yard these three +weeks, going away without saying any word at all; and I owing him for +two days’ work, without knowing who to pay it to.” + +The possibility led them to alight, and at least make an inquiry at the +cottage. Farfrae hitched the reins to the gate-post, and they +approached what was of humble dwellings surely the humblest. The walls, +built of kneaded clay originally faced with a trowel, had been worn by +years of rain-washings to a lumpy crumbling surface, channelled and +sunken from its plane, its gray rents held together here and there by a +leafy strap of ivy which could scarcely find substance enough for the +purpose. The rafters were sunken, and the thatch of the roof in ragged +holes. Leaves from the fence had been blown into the corners of the +doorway, and lay there undisturbed. The door was ajar; Farfrae knocked; +and he who stood before them was Whittle, as they had conjectured. + +His face showed marks of deep sadness, his eyes lighting on them with +an unfocused gaze; and he still held in his hand the few sticks he had +been out to gather. As soon as he recognized them he started. + +“What, Abel Whittle; is it that ye are heere?” said Farfrae. + +“Ay, yes sir! You see he was kind-like to mother when she wer here +below, though ’a was rough to me.” + +“Who are you talking of?” + +“O sir—Mr. Henchet! Didn’t ye know it? He’s just gone—about +half-an-hour ago, by the sun; for I’ve got no watch to my name.” + +“Not—dead?” faltered Elizabeth-Jane. + +“Yes, ma’am, he’s gone! He was kind-like to mother when she wer here +below, sending her the best ship-coal, and hardly any ashes from it at +all; and taties, and such-like that were very needful to her. I seed en +go down street on the night of your worshipful’s wedding to the lady at +yer side, and I thought he looked low and faltering. And I followed en +over Grey’s Bridge, and he turned and zeed me, and said, ‘You go back!’ +But I followed, and he turned again, and said, ‘Do you hear, sir? Go +back!’ But I zeed that he was low, and I followed on still. Then ’a +said, ‘Whittle, what do ye follow me for when I’ve told ye to go back +all these times?’ And I said, ‘Because, sir, I see things be bad with +’ee, and ye wer kind-like to mother if ye wer rough to me, and I would +fain be kind-like to you.’ Then he walked on, and I followed; and he +never complained at me no more. We walked on like that all night; and +in the blue o’ the morning, when ’twas hardly day, I looked ahead o’ +me, and I zeed that he wambled, and could hardly drag along. By the +time we had got past here, but I had seen that this house was empty as +I went by, and I got him to come back; and I took down the boards from +the windows, and helped him inside. ‘What, Whittle,’ he said, ‘and can +ye really be such a poor fond fool as to care for such a wretch as I!’ +Then I went on further, and some neighbourly woodmen lent me a bed, and +a chair, and a few other traps, and we brought ’em here, and made him +as comfortable as we could. But he didn’t gain strength, for you see, +ma’am, he couldn’t eat—no appetite at all—and he got weaker; and to-day +he died. One of the neighbours have gone to get a man to measure him.” + +“Dear me—is that so!” said Farfrae. + +As for Elizabeth, she said nothing. + +“Upon the head of his bed he pinned a piece of paper, with some writing +upon it,” continued Abel Whittle. “But not being a man o’ letters, I +can’t read writing; so I don’t know what it is. I can get it and show +ye.” + +They stood in silence while he ran into the cottage; returning in a +moment with a crumpled scrap of paper. On it there was pencilled as +follows:— + +MICHAEL HENCHARD’S WILL. +“That Elizabeth-Jane Farfrae be not told of my death, or made to grieve +on account of me. +“& that I be not bury’d in consecrated ground. +“& that no sexton be asked to toll the bell. +“& that nobody is wished to see my dead body. +“& that no murners walk behind me at my funeral. +“& that no flours be planted on my grave. +“& that no man remember me. +“To this I put my name. + + +“MICHAEL HENCHARD.” + + +“What are we to do?” said Donald, when he had handed the paper to her. + +She could not answer distinctly. “O Donald!” she cried at last through +her tears, “what bitterness lies there! O I would not have minded so +much if it had not been for my unkindness at that last parting!... But +there’s no altering—so it must be.” + +What Henchard had written in the anguish of his dying was respected as +far as practicable by Elizabeth-Jane, though less from a sense of the +sacredness of last words, as such, than from her independent knowledge +that the man who wrote them meant what he said. She knew the directions +to be a piece of the same stuff that his whole life was made of, and +hence were not to be tampered with to give herself a mournful pleasure, +or her husband credit for large-heartedness. + +All was over at last, even her regrets for having misunderstood him on +his last visit, for not having searched him out sooner, though these +were deep and sharp for a good while. From this time forward +Elizabeth-Jane found herself in a latitude of calm weather, kindly and +grateful in itself, and doubly so after the Capharnaum in which some of +her preceding years had been spent. As the lively and sparkling +emotions of her early married life cohered into an equable serenity, +the finer movements of her nature found scope in discovering to the +narrow-lived ones around her the secret (as she had once learnt it) of +making limited opportunities endurable; which she deemed to consist in +the cunning enlargement, by a species of microscopic treatment, of +those minute forms of satisfaction that offer themselves to everybody +not in positive pain; which, thus handled, have much of the same +inspiring effect upon life as wider interests cursorily embraced. + +Her teaching had a reflex action upon herself, insomuch that she +thought she could perceive no great personal difference between being +respected in the nether parts of Casterbridge and glorified at the +uppermost end of the social world. Her position was, indeed, to a +marked degree one that, in the common phrase, afforded much to be +thankful for. That she was not demonstratively thankful was no fault of +hers. Her experience had been of a kind to teach her, rightly or +wrongly, that the doubtful honour of a brief transit through a sorry +world hardly called for effusiveness, even when the path was suddenly +irradiated at some half-way point by daybeams rich as hers. But her +strong sense that neither she nor any human being deserved less than +was given, did not blind her to the fact that there were others +receiving less who had deserved much more. And in being forced to class +herself among the fortunate she did not cease to wonder at the +persistence of the unforeseen, when the one to whom such unbroken +tranquility had been accorded in the adult stage was she whose youth +had seemed to teach that happiness was but the occasional episode in a +general drama of pain. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 143 *** |