She cou ld a nswer no more th an a bare af firmative, so gr eat was the emotion aroused in her at the th ought of going thr ough the world with him as his own familiar friend.Her feelin gs alm ost filled her ey es like a babb le of waves, and surged up to her ey es.She put her hand in his, an d thus they went on, to a place Where the reflected sun glared up from the river, under a bridge, with a molten-metallic glow that dazzled th eir eyes, though the sun itself, w as hidden by th e bridge.Th ey stood still, whereupon little furred and feathered heads popped up f rom the s mooth surface of the water; but, finding that the disturbing pr esences had paused, and not passed b y, they disa ppeared again.Upon this r iver-brink th ey lingered till the fog began to close round th em—which was very early in the even ing at this ti me of the year—settling on the lashes of her eyes, where it rested like crystals, and on his brows and hair.
They walked later on Sunday s, when it was quite d ark.Some of th e dairy-people, who were also out of doors on the first Sunday evening after their engagement, heard her im pulsive sp eeches, e csta-sized to fr agments, though they were to o far off to hear the words discoursed; noted the spasmodic catch in her remarks, broken into syllables by the leapings of her heart, as she walked leaning on his ar m; her conten ted pauses, the occasional little laugh u pon which her s oul seemed to ride—the laugh of a woman in company with th eman she lov es and h as won fro m all other wo men—unlike anything else in nature.They marked the buoyancy of her tread, like th e skim of a b ird which has not quite alighted.
Her af fection for h im was now th e breath an d life of Tess's being; i t enveloped h er as a photosphere, irr adiated her into for getfulness of her past sorrows, keeping back the gloomy spectres that would persis t in their attemp ts to touch her—doubt, fear, moodiness, care, shame.She kn ew that they were waiting like wolves, jus t ou tside the cir cumscribing light, bu t she had l ong spells of power to keep them in hungry subjection there.
A spiritual forgetfulness co-existed with an intellectual remembrance.She walked in b rightness, bu t she kn ew that in the background those shap es of darkness were alway s spread.They might be receding, or they migh t be approaching, one or the other, a little every day.
One evening Tess and Clare were obliged to sit indoors keeping house, all the o ther occupants of the do micile being away.As they talked she loo ked thoughtfully up at him, and met his two appreciative eyes.
“I am not worthy of y ou—no, I am n ot！”she burs t out, jumping up fro m her low stool as though appalled at h is homage, and the fullness of her own joy thereat.
Clare, d eeming the whole basis of h er excite ment to be that which was only the smaller part of it, said—
“I won't have you speak like it, dear Tess！Distinction does not consist in the facile us e of a contem ptible s et of conven tions, but in b eing nu mbered among those who are tru e, and honest, and just, and pure, and lovely, and of good report—as you are, my Tess.”
She struggled with the s ob in her th roat.How often had that string of excellences made her young heart ache in church of late years, and how strange that he should have cited them now.
“Why didn't you stay and love me when I—was sixteen; livin g with my little s isters and bro thers, and y ou danced on the green?O, why didn't y ou, why didn't you！”she said, impetuously clasping her hands.
Angel began to comfort and reassure her, thinking to himself, truly enough, what a creature of moods she was, and how car eful he would have to be of herwhen she depended for her happiness entirely on him.
“Ah—why didn't I stay！”he said.“That is just what I feel.If I h ad only known！But you must not be so bitter in your regret—why should you be?”
With the woman's instinct to hide she diverged hastily—
“I should have had four years more of your heart than I can ever have now.Then I should not have wasted my time as I hav e done—I should have had so much longer happiness！”
It was no mature woman with a long dark vista of intrigue behind her who was tormented thus; but a girl of ****** life, not yet one-and-twenty, who had been caught during her days of immaturi ty like a bird in a s pringe.To calm herself the more co mpletely she rose fro m h er l ittle stool an d lef t th e ro om, overturning the stool with her skirts as she went.
He sat on by the cheerful fir elight thrown from a bundle of greenash-sticks laid across th e logs; the s ticks snapped pleasantly, and h issed outbubbles of sap from their ends.When she came back she was herself again.
“Do you not think you are just a wee bit capricious, fitful, Tess?”he said, good hu mouredly as he spread a cu shion for h er on th e sto ol, an d seated himself in the settle beside her.“I wanted to ask you something, and jus t then you ran away.”
“Yes, perhaps I am capricious, ”sh e murmured.She suddenly approached him, and put a hand upon each of his arms.“No, Angel, I am not really so—by Nature, I mean！”Th e more par ticularly to assu re him that she was not, she placed herse lf close to him in the settle, and allowed her head to find a resting-place against Clare's shoulder.“What did you want to ask me—I am sure I will answer it, ”she continued humbly.
“Well, you love me, and have agreed to marry me, and hence there follows a thirdly, ‘When shall the day be?'”
“I like living like this.”
“But I m ust think of star ting in bus iness on m y own hook with the new year, or a little later.And before I get involved in the multifarious details of my new position, I should like to have secured my partner.”
“But, ”she timidly answered, “to talk quite practically, wouldn't it be best not to marry till after all that?—Though I can't bear the thought o'your goingaway and leaving me here！”
“Of course you cannot—and it is no t best in th is case.I want you to help me in many ways in ****** my start.When shall it be?Why not a fortnight from now?”
“No, ”she said, becoming grave; “I have so many things to think of first.”
“But——”
He drew her gently nearer to him.
The r eality of marriage was star tling when it loomed so near.Befor e discussion of the question had proceeded further there walked round the corner of the se ttle into the full firelight of t he apartment Mr.Dairyman Crick, Mrs.Crick, and two of the milkmaids.
Tess sprang like an elastic ball from hi s side to her feet, while her face flushed and her eyes shone in the firelight.
“I knew how it would be if I sat so close to him！”she cried, with vexation.“I said to myself, they are sure to come and catch us！But I wasn't really sitting on his knee, though it might ha'seemed as if I was almost！”
“Well—if so be you hadn't told us, I am sure we shouldn't ha'noticed that ye had been sitting anywhere at all in this light, ”r eplied the dairy man.He continued to his wife, with the stolid mien of a man who understood nothing of the emotions relating to matrimony—”Now, Christianner, that shows that folks should never fancy other folks be supposing th ings when they bain't.O no, I should never ha'thought a word of where she was a sitting to, if she hadn't told me—not I.”
“We are going to be married soon, ”said Clare, with improvised phlegm.
“Ah—and be ye！Well, I am truly glad to hear it, sir.I've thought you mid do such a th ing for so me time.She's too good for a dairy maid—I said so the very first day I zid her—and a prize for any man; and what's more, a wonderful woman for a gentleman-farmer's wife; he won't be at the mercy of his baily wi'her at his side.”
Somehow Tess disappeared.She had been even more struck with the look of the girls who followed Crick than abashed by Crick's blunt praise.
After supper, when she reached her bedroom, they were all present.A light was burning, and each damsel was sitting up whitely in her bed, awaiting Tess, the whole like a row of avengirg ghosts.
But she saw in a few moments that there was n o malice in their mood.They could scarcely feel as a loss what they had never expected to have.Their condition was objective, contemplative.
“He's going to marry her！”murmured Retty, never taking her eyes off Tess.“How her face do show it！”
“You be going to marry him?”asked Marian.
“Yes, ”said Tess.
“When?”
“Some day.”
They thought that this was evasiveness only.
“Yes—going to marry him—a gentleman！”repeated Izz Huett.
And by a sort of fascination the three girls, one after another, crept out of their beds, and came an d stood b arefooted r ound Tess.Retty put h er han ds upon Tess's shoulders, as if to realize her friend's corporeality after su ch a miracle, and the oth er two laid th eir arms round her waist, all looking into her face.
“How it do seem！Almost more than I can think of！”said Izz Huett.
Marian kissed Tess.“Yes, ”she murmured as she withdrew her lips.
“Was that because of love for her, or because other lips have touched there by now?”continued Izz drily to Marian.
“I wasn't thinking o'that, ”said Marian simply.“I was on'y feeling all the strangeness o't—that she is to be his wife, and nobody else.I don't say nay to it, nor either of us, because we did not think of it—only loved him.Still, nobody else is to marry'n in the world—no fine lady, nobody in silks and satins; b ut she who do live like we.”
“Are you sure you don't dislike me for it?”said Tess in a low voice.
They hung about her in their white n ightgowns before replying, as if th ey considered their answer might lie in her look.
“I don't know—I don't know, ”murmured Retty Priddle.“I want to hate'ee; but I cannot！”
“That's how I feel, ”echoed Izz and Marian.“I can't hate her.
Somehow she hinders me！”
“He ought to marry one of you, ”murmured Tess.
“Why?”
“You are all better than I.”
“We better than you?”said the girls in a low, slow whisper.“No, no, dear Tess！”
“You are！”she contradicted impetuously.And suddenly tearing away from their clinging arms she burst into a hysterical fit of tears, bowing herself on the chest of drawers and repeating incessantly, “O yes, yes, yes！”
Having once given way she could not stop her weeping.
“He ought to have had one of you！”she cried.“I think I ought to make him even now！You would be better for him than—I don't know what I'm saying！O！O！”
They went up to her and clasped her round, but still her sobs tore her.
“Get so me water, ”said Marian.“She's upset b y us, poor thing, poor thing！”
They gently led her back to the sid e of her bed, where they kissed her warmly.
“You are best for'n, ”said Marian.“More lady like, and a better s cholar than we, especially since he has taught'ee so much.But even you ought to be proud.You be proud, I'm sure！”
“Yes, I am, ”she said; “and I am ashamed at so breaking down！”
When they were all in bed, and the light was out, Marian whispered across to her—
“You will think of us when you be his wife, Tess, and of how we told'ee that we loved him, and how we tried not to hate you, and did not hate you, and could not hate you, because y ou were his choice, and we n ever hoped to be chose by him.”
They were not aware that, at these words, salt, stinging tears trickled down upon Tess's pillow anew, and how she resolved, with a bursting heart, to tell all her his tory to Angel Clare, desp ite h er mother's co mmand—to le t h im fo r whom she lived and br eathed despise her if h e would, and her mother reg ard her as a fool, rather than preserve a silence which might be deemed a treachery to him, and which somehow seemed a wrong to these.
32
This pe nitential mood kept her from naming the wed dingday.Th e Tbeginning of November found its date still in abeyance, though he asked her at the most tem pting tim es.But T ess's desire seemed to be for a perp etual betrothal in which everything should remain as it was then.
The meads were chang ing now; but it was still warm enou gh in early afternoons, before milking to id le there awhile, and the st ate of dairy-work at this time of year allowed a spare hour for idling.Looking over the damp sod in the direction of th e sun, a glistening ripple of g ossamer webs was visib le to their eyes under the lu minary, like the track of m oonlight on the sea.Gnats, knowing nothing of their brief glorification, wandered across the shimmer of this pathway, irradiated as if they bore fire w ithin them, then passed out o f its line, and were quite extinct.In the presence of these th ings he would r emind her that the date was still the question.
Or he would ask her at night, when he accompanied her on some mission invented by Mrs.Crick to give him the opportunity.This was mostly a journey to th e far mhouse on the slopes abov e the v ale, to inquire ho w the ad vanced cows were gett ing on in the straw-barton to whic h they were releg ated.For i t was a time of the year that brought great changes to the world of kine.Batches of the animals were sent away daily to this lying-in hospital, where they lived on straw till their calves were born, after which event, and as soon as the calf could walk, mother and offspring were driven back to the dairy.In the interval which elapsed before the calves were sold there was, of course, little milking to be done, but as soon as the calf had been taken away the milkmaids would have to set to work as usual.
Returning from one of these dark w alks they reached a g reat gravel-cliff immediately over the levels, where they stood still and listened.The water was now high in the str eams, squ irting through the weirs, and tink ling under culverts; the smal lest gullies were all fu ll; t here was no tak ing short cu ts anywhere, and foot-passengers were compelled to follow the permanent ways.From the whole extent of the invisible vale came a multitudinous intonation; it forced upon their fancy that a great city lay below them, and that th e murmur was the vociferation of its populace.
“It seem s like tens o f thousands of them, ”said Tess; “hold ing pu blic meetings in their m arket-places, arguing, pr eaching, quarrelling, sobbing, groaning, praying, and cursing.”
Clare was not particularly heeding.
“Did Crick speak to you today, dear, about his not w anting much assistance during the winter months?”
“No.”
“The cows are going dry rapidly.”
“Yes.Six or seven wen t to the straw-barton yesterday, and thr ee the day before, ****** nearly tw enty in the s traw alr eady.Ah—is it t hat the farmer don't want my help for the calving?O, I am not wanted here any more！And I have tried so hard to——”
“Crick didn't exactly say that he would no lon ger require you.But, knowing wh at ou r relations were, h e said in the most goo d-natured and respectful manner p ossible that h e s upposed on my leav ing at Christmas I should take you with me, and on m y asking what he would do without y ou he merely observed th at, as a matter of f act, it was a time of y ear when he c ould do with a very little female help.I am afraid！was sinner enough to feel rather glad that he was in this way forcing your hand.”
“I don't think y ou ought to have felt glad, Angel.Because't is alway s mournful not to be wanted, even if at the same time'tis convenient.”
“Well, it is convenient—you have admitted that.”He put his finger upon her cheek.“Ah！”he said.
“What?”
“I feel the red rising up at her having been caught！But why should I trifle so！We will not trifle—life is too serious.”
“It is.Perhaps I saw that before you did.”
She was seeing it then.To decline to marry him after all—in obedience to her emotion of last night—and leave the dairy, meant to go to some strange place, not a dairy; for milkmaids we re not in re quest now c alving-time was coming on; to go to some arable farm where no divine being like Angel Clare was.She hated the thought, and she hated more.the thought of going home.
“So that, ser iously, dearest T ess”he continued, “since you will proh ably have to leav e at Christmas, it is in every way desirable an d convenient th at I should carry you off then as my property.Besides, if y ou were not the mostuncalculating girl in the world you would know that we co uld not go on like this forever.”
“I wish we could.Th at it would alway s be summer and autu mn, and y ou always courting me, and alway s thin king as much of me as you have done through the past summertime！”
“I always shall.”
“O, I know y ou will！”s he cried, with a sudden fervour of f aith in him.“Angel, I will fix the day when I will become yours for always！”
Thus at last it was arr anged between them, during that dark walk home, amid the myriads of liquid voices on the right and left.
When they r eached the d airy Mr.and Mrs.Crick were pro mptly told—with injunctions to secr ecy; for each of th e lo vers was desirous th at the marriage should be kept as private as possible.The dairy man, though he had thought of d ismissing h er soon, now made a great concern about los ing her.What should he do about his skimming?Who would make the ornam ental butter-pats for the Anglebury and Sandbourne ladies?Mrs.Crick congratulated Tess on the shilly-shallying having at last come to an end, and said that directly she set eyes on Tess she divined that she was to be the chosen one of somebody who was no co mmon outdoor man; Tess had looked so superior as she walked across the barton on that afternoon of her arrival; that she was of a good family she could have sworn.In point of f act Mrs.Cr ick did r emember thinking that Tess was gr aceful and goodlooking as sh e approached; b ut th e superio rity might have been a growth of the imagination aided by subsequent knowledge.
Tess was no w carried, along upo n the wings of the hours, without th e sense of a will.The word had been given; the number of the day written down.Her naturally bright in telligence had begun to ad mit the fatalistic convictions common to field-folk and those who associate more extensively with na tural phenomena t han with th eir fe llowcreatures; and s he ac cordingly drifted in to that passive responsiveness to all th ings her lover suggested, characteris tic of the frame of mind.
But she wrot e anew to h er mother, ostensibly to n otify the we dding-day; really to again implor e h er advice.I t was a gentlem an who h ad chosen h er, which perhaps her mother had not suf ficiently considered.A post-n uptialexplanation, which might be accep ted with a light hear t by a rougher man, might not be received with the same feeling by him.But this communication brought no reply from Mrs.Durbeyfield.
Despite Angel Clare's plausible repr esentations to himself and to Tess of the practical need for the ir immediate marriage, there was in tr uth an e lement of precipitancy in the step, as became apparent at a later date.He loved her dearly, though perhaps rather ideally and fancif ully than with th e impassioned thoroughness of her f eeling for h im.He had entertained n o notion, w hen doomed as he had thought to an unintellectual bucolic life, that such charms as he beheld in this idy llic creature would be found behind the scenes.
Unsophistication was a thing to talk of; but he h ad not known how it really struck one until he came here.Yet he was very far from seeing his future track clearly, and it might be a y ear or two before he would be ab le to consider himself fa irly, started in life.The secre t lay in the tinge of reck lessness imparted to his career and character by the sense that he had been made to miss his true destiny, through the prejudices of his family.
“Don't you think, twould have been better for us to wait till you were quite settled in your midland farm?”she once ask ed timidly.（A midland farm was the idea just then.）
“To tell the truth, my Tess, I don't like you to be left anywhere away from my protection and sympathy.”
The reason was a good one, so far as it went.H is influence over her had been so marked tha t she had caugh t his manners and habits, his speech and phrases, his likings and his aversions.And to leave her in farmland would be to let her slip back again out of accord with him.He wished to have her under his charge for another reason.His parents ha d naturally desired to see her once at least before he carried her off to a distant settlement, English or colonial; and as no opinion of theirs was to be allowed to change his intention, he judged that a couple of months'life with him in lodgings whilst seeking for an advantageous opening would be of so me social assistance to her at what she might feel to be a trying ordeal—her presentation to his mother at the Vicarage.
Next, he wished to see a little of the working of a flour-mill, having an idea that he might combine the use of one with corn-growing.The proprietor ofa large old water-mill at Wellbridge—once the mill of an Abbey—had offered him the inspection of his time-honoured mode of procedure, and a hand in the operations for a few day s, whenever he should choose to co me.Clare paid a visit to t he place, so me few mil es distant, one day at this time, to in quire particulars, and return ed to T albothays in the evening.S he found him determined to spend a short time at the Wellbridge flour-mills.And what had determined him?Less the opportu nity of an insight in to grinding and bolting than the casual fact that lodgings were to b e obtained in that v ery farmhouse which, before its mutilation, had been the mansion of abranch of thed'Urberville family.This was alway s how Clare settled practical questions; by a sentim ent which had nothing to do with them.Th ey decid ed to go immediately after th e wedding, and rem ain for a fortnight, ins tead of journeying to towns and inns.
“Then we will start off to examine some farms on the other side of London that I have heard of, ”he said, “and by March or April we will pay a visit to my father and mother.”
