Bot-S: Adam Bede

Perhaps there was no one present except Mr. Irwine who thoroughly
understood and approved Arthur’s graceful mode of proposing his
grandfather’s health. The farmers thought the young squire knew well
enough that they hated the old squire, and Mrs. Poyser said, “he’d
better not ha’ stirred a kettle o’ sour broth.” The bucolic mind does
not readily apprehend the refinements of good taste. But the toast could
not be rejected and when it had been drunk, Arthur said, “I thank you,
both for my grandfather and myself; and now there is one more thing I
wish to tell you, that you may share my pleasure about it, as I hope
and believe you will. I think there can be no man here who has not a
respect, and some of you, I am sure, have a very high regard, for my
friend Adam Bede. It is well known to every one in this neighbourhood
that there is no man whose word can be more depended on than his; that
whatever he undertakes to do, he does well, and is as careful for the
interests of those who employ him as for his own. I’m proud to say that
I was very fond of Adam when I was a little boy, and I have never lost
my old feeling for him--I think that shows that I know a good fellow
when I find him. It has long been my wish that he should have the
management of the woods on the estate, which happen to be very valuable,
not only because I think so highly of his character, but because he has
the knowledge and the skill which fit him for the place. And I am happy
to tell you that it is my grandfather’s wish too, and it is now settled
that Adam shall manage the woods--a change which I am sure will be very
much for the advantage of the estate; and I hope you will by and by join
me in drinking his health, and in wishing him all the prosperity in life
that he deserves. But there is a still older friend of mine than Adam
Bede present, and I need not tell you that it is Mr. Irwine. I’m sure
you will agree with me that we must drink no other person’s health until
we have drunk his. I know you have all reason to love him, but no one of
his parishioners has so much reason as I. Come, charge your glasses, and
let us drink to our excellent rector--three times three!”

This toast was drunk with all the enthusiasm that was wanting to the
last, and it certainly was the most picturesque moment in the scene when
Mr. Irwine got up to speak, and all the faces in the room were turned
towards him. The superior refinement of his face was much more striking
than that of Arthur’s when seen in comparison with the people round
them. Arthur’s was a much commoner British face, and the splendour of
his new-fashioned clothes was more akin to the young farmer’s taste
in costume than Mr. Irwine’s powder and the well-brushed but well-worn
black, which seemed to be his chosen suit for great occasions; for he
had the mysterious secret of never wearing a new-looking coat.

“This is not the first time, by a great many,” he said, “that I have
had to thank my parishioners for giving me tokens of their goodwill, but
neighbourly kindness is among those things that are the more precious
the older they get. Indeed, our pleasant meeting to-day is a proof that
when what is good comes of age and is likely to live, there is reason
for rejoicing, and the relation between us as clergyman and parishioners
came of age two years ago, for it is three-and-twenty years since I
first came among you, and I see some tall fine-looking young men here,
as well as some blooming young women, that were far from looking as
pleasantly at me when I christened them as I am happy to see them
looking now. But I’m sure you will not wonder when I say that among all
those young men, the one in whom I have the strongest interest is my
friend Mr. Arthur Donnithorne, for whom you have just expressed your
regard. I had the pleasure of being his tutor for several years, and
have naturally had opportunities of knowing him intimately which cannot
have occurred to any one else who is present; and I have some pride as
well as pleasure in assuring you that I share your high hopes concerning
him, and your confidence in his possession of those qualities which will
make him an excellent landlord when the time shall come for him to take
that important position among you. We feel alike on most matters on
which a man who is getting towards fifty can feel in common with a young
man of one-and-twenty, and he has just been expressing a feeling which
I share very heartily, and I would not willingly omit the opportunity of
saying so. That feeling is his value and respect for Adam Bede. People
in a high station are of course more thought of and talked about and
have their virtues more praised, than those whose lives are passed in
humble everyday work; but every sensible man knows how necessary that
humble everyday work is, and how important it is to us that it should be
done well. And I agree with my friend Mr. Arthur Donnithorne in feeling
that when a man whose duty lies in that sort of work shows a character
which would make him an example in any station, his merit should be
acknowledged. He is one of those to whom honour is due, and his friends
should delight to honour him. I know Adam Bede well--I know what he is
as a workman, and what he has been as a son and brother--and I am saying
the simplest truth when I say that I respect him as much as I respect
any man living. But I am not speaking to you about a stranger; some of
you are his intimate friends, and I believe there is not one here who
does not know enough of him to join heartily in drinking his health.”

As Mr. Irwine paused, Arthur jumped up and, filling his glass, said, “A
bumper to Adam Bede, and may he live to have sons as faithful and clever
as himself!”

No hearer, not even Bartle Massey, was so delighted with this toast as
Mr. Poyser. “Tough work” as his first speech had been, he would have
started up to make another if he had not known the extreme irregularity
of such a course. As it was, he found an outlet for his feeling in
drinking his ale unusually fast, and setting down his glass with a swing
of his arm and a determined rap. If Jonathan Burge and a few others
felt less comfortable on the occasion, they tried their best to look
contented, and so the toast was drunk with a goodwill apparently
unanimous.

Adam was rather paler than usual when he got up to thank his friends. He
was a good deal moved by this public tribute--very naturally, for he was
in the presence of all his little world, and it was uniting to do him
honour. But he felt no shyness about speaking, not being troubled
with small vanity or lack of words; he looked neither awkward nor
embarrassed, but stood in his usual firm upright attitude, with his head
thrown a little backward and his hands perfectly still, in that rough
dignity which is peculiar to intelligent, honest, well-built workmen,
who are never wondering what is their business in the world.

“I’m quite taken by surprise,” he said. “I didn’t expect anything o’
this sort, for it’s a good deal more than my wages. But I’ve the more
reason to be grateful to you, Captain, and to you, Mr. Irwine, and to
all my friends here, who’ve drunk my health and wished me well. It ‘ud
be nonsense for me to be saying, I don’t at all deserve th’ opinion you
have of me; that ‘ud be poor thanks to you, to say that you’ve known me
all these years and yet haven’t sense enough to find out a great deal o’
the truth about me. You think, if I undertake to do a bit o’ work, I’ll
do it well, be my pay big or little--and that’s true. I’d be ashamed
to stand before you here if it wasna true. But it seems to me that’s
a man’s plain duty, and nothing to be conceited about, and it’s pretty
clear to me as I’ve never done more than my duty; for let us do what we
will, it’s only making use o’ the sperrit and the powers that ha’ been
given to us. And so this kindness o’ yours, I’m sure, is no debt you owe
me, but a free gift, and as such I accept it and am thankful. And as to
this new employment I’ve taken in hand, I’ll only say that I took it
at Captain Donnithorne’s desire, and that I’ll try to fulfil his
expectations. I’d wish for no better lot than to work under him, and
to know that while I was getting my own bread I was taking care of his
int’rests. For I believe he’s one o those gentlemen as wishes to do the
right thing, and to leave the world a bit better than he found it, which
it’s my belief every man may do, whether he’s gentle or simple, whether
he sets a good bit o’ work going and finds the money, or whether he does
the work with his own hands. There’s no occasion for me to say any more
about what I feel towards him: I hope to show it through the rest o’ my
life in my actions.”

There were various opinions about Adam’s speech: some of the women
whispered that he didn’t show himself thankful enough, and seemed to
speak as proud as could be; but most of the men were of opinion that
nobody could speak more straightfor’ard, and that Adam was as fine a
chap as need to be. While such observations were being buzzed about,
mingled with wonderings as to what the old squire meant to do for a
bailiff, and whether he was going to have a steward, the two gentlemen
had risen, and were walking round to the table where the wives and
children sat. There was none of the strong ale here, of course, but
wine and dessert--sparkling gooseberry for the young ones, and some good
sherry for the mothers. Mrs. Poyser was at the head of this table, and
Totty was now seated in her lap, bending her small nose deep down into a
wine-glass in search of the nuts floating there.

“How do you do, Mrs. Poyser?” said Arthur. “Weren’t you pleased to hear
your husband make such a good speech to-day?”

“Oh, sir, the men are mostly so tongue-tied--you’re forced partly to
guess what they mean, as you do wi’ the dumb creaturs.”

“What! you think you could have made it better for him?” said Mr.
Irwine, laughing.

“Well, sir, when I want to say anything, I can mostly find words to say
it in, thank God. Not as I’m a-finding faut wi’ my husband, for if he’s
a man o’ few words, what he says he’ll stand to.”

“I’m sure I never saw a prettier party than this,” Arthur said, looking
round at the apple-cheeked children. “My aunt and the Miss Irwines will
come up and see you presently. They were afraid of the noise of the
toasts, but it would be a shame for them not to see you at table.”

He walked on, speaking to the mothers and patting the children, while
Mr. Irwine satisfied himself with standing still and nodding at a
distance, that no one’s attention might be disturbed from the young
squire, the hero of the day. Arthur did not venture to stop near Hetty,
but merely bowed to her as he passed along the opposite side. The
foolish child felt her heart swelling with discontent; for what woman
was ever satisfied with apparent neglect, even when she knows it to be
the mask of love? Hetty thought this was going to be the most miserable
day she had had for a long while, a moment of chill daylight and reality
came across her dream: Arthur, who had seemed so near to her only a few
hours before, was separated from her, as the hero of a great procession
is separated from a small outsider in the crowd.



Chapter XXV

The Games


THE great dance was not to begin until eight o’clock, but for any lads
and lasses who liked to dance on the shady grass before then, there was
music always at hand--for was not the band of the Benefit Club capable
of playing excellent jigs, reels, and hornpipes? And, besides this,
there was a grand band hired from Rosseter, who, with their wonderful
wind-instruments and puffed-out cheeks, were themselves a delightful
show to the small boys and girls. To say nothing of Joshua Rann’s
fiddle, which, by an act of generous forethought, he had provided
himself with, in case any one should be of sufficiently pure taste to
prefer dancing to a solo on that instrument.

Meantime, when the sun had moved off the great open space in front of
the house, the games began. There were, of course, well-soaped poles
to be climbed by the boys and youths, races to be run by the old women,
races to be run in sacks, heavy weights to be lifted by the strong men,
and a long list of challenges to such ambitious attempts as that
of walking as many yards possible on one leg--feats in which it was
generally remarked that Wiry Ben, being “the lissom’st, springest fellow
i’ the country,” was sure to be pre-eminent. To crown all, there was to
be a donkey-race--that sublimest of all races, conducted on the grand
socialistic idea of everybody encouraging everybody else’s donkey, and
the sorriest donkey winning.

And soon after four o’clock, splendid old Mrs. Irwine, in her damask
satin and jewels and black lace, was led out by Arthur, followed by the
whole family party, to her raised seat under the striped marquee, where
she was to give out the prizes to the victors. Staid, formal Miss Lydia
had requested to resign that queenly office to the royal old lady, and
Arthur was pleased with this opportunity of gratifying his godmother’s
taste for stateliness. Old Mr. Donnithorne, the delicately clean,
finely scented, withered old man, led out Miss Irwine, with his air of
punctilious, acid politeness; Mr. Gawaine brought Miss Lydia, looking
neutral and stiff in an elegant peach-blossom silk; and Mr. Irwine came
last with his pale sister Anne. No other friend of the family, besides
Mr. Gawaine, was invited to-day; there was to be a grand dinner for
the neighbouring gentry on the morrow, but to-day all the forces were
required for the entertainment of the tenants.

There was a sunk fence in front of the marquee, dividing the lawn from
the park, but a temporary bridge had been made for the passage of the
victors, and the groups of people standing, or seated here and there
on benches, stretched on each side of the open space from the white
marquees up to the sunk fence.

“Upon my word it’s a pretty sight,” said the old lady, in her deep
voice, when she was seated, and looked round on the bright scene with
its dark-green background; “and it’s the last fete-day I’m likely to
see, unless you make haste and get married, Arthur. But take care you
get a charming bride, else I would rather die without seeing her.”

“You’re so terribly fastidious, Godmother,” said Arthur, “I’m afraid I
should never satisfy you with my choice.”

“Well, I won’t forgive you if she’s not handsome. I can’t be put off
with amiability, which is always the excuse people are making for the
existence of plain people. And she must not be silly; that will never
do, because you’ll want managing, and a silly woman can’t manage you.
Who is that tall young man, Dauphin, with the mild face? There, standing
without his hat, and taking such care of that tall old woman by the side
of him--his mother, of course. I like to see that.”

“What, don’t you know him, Mother?” said Mr. Irwine. “That is Seth
Bede, Adam’s brother--a Methodist, but a very good fellow. Poor Seth
has looked rather down-hearted of late; I thought it was because of his
father’s dying in that sad way, but Joshua Rann tells me he wanted to
marry that sweet little Methodist preacher who was here about a month
ago, and I suppose she refused him.”

“Ah, I remember hearing about her. But there are no end of people here
that I don’t know, for they’re grown up and altered so since I used to
go about.”

“What excellent sight you have!” said old Mr. Donnithorne, who was
holding a double glass up to his eyes, “to see the expression of that
young man’s face so far off. His face is nothing but a pale blurred
spot to me. But I fancy I have the advantage of you when we come to look
close. I can read small print without spectacles.”

“Ah, my dear sir, you began with being very near-sighted, and those
near-sighted eyes always wear the best. I want very strong spectacles to
read with, but then I think my eyes get better and better for things at
a distance. I suppose if I could live another fifty years, I should be
blind to everything that wasn’t out of other people’s sight, like a man
who stands in a well and sees nothing but the stars.”

“See,” said Arthur, “the old women are ready to set out on their race
now. Which do you bet on, Gawaine?”

“The long-legged one, unless they’re going to have several heats, and
then the little wiry one may win.”

“There are the Poysers, Mother, not far off on the right hand,” said
Miss Irwine. “Mrs. Poyser is looking at you. Do take notice of her.”

“To be sure I will,” said the old lady, giving a gracious bow to Mrs.
Poyser. “A woman who sends me such excellent cream-cheese is not to
be neglected. Bless me! What a fat child that is she is holding on her
knee! But who is that pretty girl with dark eyes?”

“That is Hetty Sorrel,” said Miss Lydia Donnithorne, “Martin Poyser’s
niece--a very likely young person, and well-looking too. My maid has
taught her fine needlework, and she has mended some lace of mine very
respectably indeed--very respectably.”

“Why, she has lived with the Poysers six or seven years, Mother; you
must have seen her,” said Miss Irwine.

“No, I’ve never seen her, child--at least not as she is now,” said Mrs.
Irwine, continuing to look at Hetty. “Well-looking, indeed! She’s a
perfect beauty! I’ve never seen anything so pretty since my young days.
What a pity such beauty as that should be thrown away among the farmers,
when it’s wanted so terribly among the good families without fortune!
I daresay, now, she’ll marry a man who would have thought her just as
pretty if she had had round eyes and red hair.”

Arthur dared not turn his eyes towards Hetty while Mrs. Irwine was
speaking of her. He feigned not to hear, and to be occupied with
something on the opposite side. But he saw her plainly enough without
looking; saw her in heightened beauty, because he heard her beauty
praised--for other men’s opinion, you know, was like a native climate
to Arthur’s feelings: it was the air on which they thrived the best, and
grew strong. Yes! She was enough to turn any man’s head: any man in his
place would have done and felt the same. And to give her up after all,
as he was determined to do, would be an act that he should always look
back upon with pride.

“No, Mother,” and Mr. Irwine, replying to her last words; “I can’t
agree with you there. The common people are not quite so stupid as you
imagine. The commonest man, who has his ounce of sense and feeling,
is conscious of the difference between a lovely, delicate woman and a
coarse one. Even a dog feels a difference in their presence. The man may
be no better able than the dog to explain the influence the more refined
beauty has on him, but he feels it.”

“Bless me, Dauphin, what does an old bachelor like you know about it?”

“Oh, that is one of the matters in which old bachelors are wiser than
married men, because they have time for more general contemplation.
Your fine critic of woman must never shackle his judgment by calling
one woman his own. But, as an example of what I was saying, that pretty
Methodist preacher I mentioned just now told me that she had preached
to the roughest miners and had never been treated with anything but the
utmost respect and kindness by them. The reason is--though she doesn’t
know it--that there’s so much tenderness, refinement, and purity about
her. Such a woman as that brings with her ‘airs from heaven’ that the
coarsest fellow is not insensible to.”

“Here’s a delicate bit of womanhood, or girlhood, coming to receive a
prize, I suppose,” said Mr. Gawaine. “She must be one of the racers in
the sacks, who had set off before we came.”

The “bit of womanhood” was our old acquaintance Bessy Cranage, otherwise
Chad’s Bess, whose large red cheeks and blowsy person had undergone
an exaggeration of colour, which, if she had happened to be a heavenly
body, would have made her sublime. Bessy, I am sorry to say, had taken
to her ear-rings again since Dinah’s departure, and was otherwise decked
out in such small finery as she could muster. Any one who could have
looked into poor Bessy’s heart would have seen a striking resemblance
between her little hopes and anxieties and Hetty’s. The advantage,
perhaps, would have been on Bessy’s side in the matter of feeling. But
then, you see, they were so very different outside! You would have been
inclined to box Bessy’s ears, and you would have longed to kiss Hetty.

Bessy had been tempted to run the arduous race, partly from mere
hedonish gaiety, partly because of the prize. Some one had said there
were to be cloaks and other nice clothes for prizes, and she approached
the marquee, fanning herself with her handkerchief, but with exultation
sparkling in her round eyes.

“Here is the prize for the first sack-race,” said Miss Lydia, taking a
large parcel from the table where the prizes were laid and giving it to
Mrs. Irwine before Bessy came up, “an excellent grogram gown and a piece
of flannel.”

“You didn’t think the winner was to be so young, I suppose, Aunt?” said
Arthur. “Couldn’t you find something else for this girl, and save that
grim-looking gown for one of the older women?”

“I have bought nothing but what is useful and substantial,” said Miss
Lydia, adjusting her own lace; “I should not think of encouraging a love
of finery in young women of that class. I have a scarlet cloak, but that
is for the old woman who wins.”

This speech of Miss Lydia’s produced rather a mocking expression in Mrs.
Irwine’s face as she looked at Arthur, while Bessy came up and dropped a
series of curtsies.

“This is Bessy Cranage, mother,” said Mr. Irwine, kindly, “Chad
Cranage’s daughter. You remember Chad Cranage, the blacksmith?”

“Yes, to be sure,” said Mrs. Irwine. “Well, Bessy, here is your
prize--excellent warm things for winter. I’m sure you have had hard work
to win them this warm day.”

Bessy’s lip fell as she saw the ugly, heavy gown--which felt so hot and
disagreeable too, on this July day, and was such a great ugly thing to
carry. She dropped her curtsies again, without looking up, and with a
growing tremulousness about the corners of her mouth, and then turned
away.

“Poor girl,” said Arthur; “I think she’s disappointed. I wish it had
been something more to her taste.”

“She’s a bold-looking young person,” observed Miss Lydia. “Not at all
one I should like to encourage.”

Arthur silently resolved that he would make Bessy a present of money
before the day was over, that she might buy something more to her mind;
but she, not aware of the consolation in store for her, turned out of
the open space, where she was visible from the marquee, and throwing
down the odious bundle under a tree, began to cry--very much tittered at
the while by the small boys. In this situation she was descried by her
discreet matronly cousin, who lost no time in coming up, having just
given the baby into her husband’s charge.

“What’s the matter wi’ ye?” said Bess the matron, taking up the bundle
and examining it. “Ye’n sweltered yoursen, I reckon, running that fool’s
race. An’ here, they’n gi’en you lots o’ good grogram and flannel, as
should ha’ been gi’en by good rights to them as had the sense to keep
away from such foolery. Ye might spare me a bit o’ this grogram to make
clothes for the lad--ye war ne’er ill-natured, Bess; I ne’er said that
on ye.”

“Ye may take it all, for what I care,” said Bess the maiden, with a
pettish movement, beginning to wipe away her tears and recover herself.

“Well, I could do wi’t, if so be ye want to get rid on’t,” said the
disinterested cousin, walking quickly away with the bundle, lest Chad’s
Bess should change her mind.

But that bonny-cheeked lass was blessed with an elasticity of spirits
that secured her from any rankling grief; and by the time the grand
climax of the donkey-race came on, her disappointment was entirely lost
in the delightful excitement of attempting to stimulate the last donkey
by hisses, while the boys applied the argument of sticks. But the
strength of the donkey mind lies in adopting a course inversely as the
arguments urged, which, well considered, requires as great a mental
force as the direct sequence; and the present donkey proved the
first-rate order of his intelligence by coming to a dead standstill
just when the blows were thickest. Great was the shouting of the crowd,
radiant the grinning of Bill Downes the stone-sawyer and the fortunate
rider of this superior beast, which stood calm and stiff-legged in the
midst of its triumph.

Arthur himself had provided the prizes for the men, and Bill was made
happy with a splendid pocket-knife, supplied with blades and gimlets
enough to make a man at home on a desert island. He had hardly returned
from the marquee with the prize in his hand, when it began to be
understood that Wiry Ben proposed to amuse the company, before
the gentry went to dinner, with an impromptu and gratuitous
performance--namely, a hornpipe, the main idea of which was doubtless
borrowed; but this was to be developed by the dancer in so peculiar and
complex a manner that no one could deny him the praise of originality.
Wiry Ben’s pride in his dancing--an accomplishment productive of great
effect at the yearly Wake--had needed only slightly elevating by an
extra quantity of good ale to convince him that the gentry would be
very much struck with his performance of his hornpipe; and he had been
decidedly encouraged in this idea by Joshua Rann, who observed that it
was nothing but right to do something to please the young squire, in
return for what he had done for them. You will be the less surprised
at this opinion in so grave a personage when you learn that Ben had
requested Mr. Rann to accompany him on the fiddle, and Joshua felt quite
sure that though there might not be much in the dancing, the music would
make up for it. Adam Bede, who was present in one of the large marquees,
where the plan was being discussed, told Ben he had better not make a
fool of himself--a remark which at once fixed Ben’s determination: he
was not going to let anything alone because Adam Bede turned up his nose
at it.

“What’s this, what’s this?” said old Mr. Donnithorne. “Is it something
you’ve arranged, Arthur? Here’s the clerk coming with his fiddle, and a
smart fellow with a nosegay in his button-hole.”

“No,” said Arthur; “I know nothing about it. By Jove, he’s going to
dance! It’s one of the carpenters--I forget his name at this moment.”

“It’s Ben Cranage--Wiry Ben, they call him,” said Mr. Irwine; “rather
a loose fish, I think. Anne, my dear, I see that fiddle-scraping is too
much for you: you’re getting tired. Let me take you in now, that you may
rest till dinner.”

Miss Anne rose assentingly, and the good brother took her away, while
Joshua’s preliminary scrapings burst into the “White Cockade,” from
which he intended to pass to a variety of tunes, by a series of
transitions which his good ear really taught him to execute with some
skill. It would have been an exasperating fact to him, if he had known
it, that the general attention was too thoroughly absorbed by Ben’s
dancing for any one to give much heed to the music.

Have you ever seen a real English rustic perform a solo dance? Perhaps
you have only seen a ballet rustic, smiling like a merry countryman in
crockery, with graceful turns of the haunch and insinuating movements
of the head. That is as much like the real thing as the “Bird Waltz” is
like the song of birds. Wiry Ben never smiled: he looked as serious as a
dancing monkey--as serious as if he had been an experimental philosopher
ascertaining in his own person the amount of shaking and the varieties
of angularity that could be given to the human limbs.

To make amends for the abundant laughter in the striped marquee, Arthur
clapped his hands continually and cried “Bravo!” But Ben had one admirer
whose eyes followed his movements with a fervid gravity that equalled
his own. It was Martin Poyser, who was seated on a bench, with Tommy
between his legs.

“What dost think o’ that?” he said to his wife. “He goes as pat to the
music as if he was made o’ clockwork. I used to be a pretty good un at
dancing myself when I was lighter, but I could niver ha’ hit it just to
th’ hair like that.”

“It’s little matter what his limbs are, to my thinking,” re-turned
Mrs. Poyser. “He’s empty enough i’ the upper story, or he’d niver come
jigging an’ stamping i’ that way, like a mad grasshopper, for the gentry
to look at him. They’re fit to die wi’ laughing, I can see.”

“Well, well, so much the better, it amuses ‘em,” said Mr. Poyser, who
did not easily take an irritable view of things. “But they’re going away
now, t’ have their dinner, I reckon. Well move about a bit, shall we,
and see what Adam Bede’s doing. He’s got to look after the drinking and
things: I doubt he hasna had much fun.”



Chapter XXVI

The Dance


ARTHUR had chosen the entrance-hall for the ballroom: very wisely, for
no other room could have been so airy, or would have had the advantage
of the wide doors opening into the garden, as well as a ready entrance
into the other rooms. To be sure, a stone floor was not the pleasantest
to dance on, but then, most of the dancers had known what it was
to enjoy a Christmas dance on kitchen quarries. It was one of those
entrance-halls which make the surrounding rooms look like closets--with
stucco angels, trumpets, and flower-wreaths on the lofty ceiling, and
great medallions of miscellaneous heroes on the walls, alternating with
statues in niches. Just the sort of place to be ornamented well with
green boughs, and Mr. Craig had been proud to show his taste and his
hothouse plants on the occasion. The broad steps of the stone staircase
were covered with cushions to serve as seats for the children, who were
to stay till half-past nine with the servant-maids to see the dancing,
and as this dance was confined to the chief tenants, there was
abundant room for every one. The lights were charmingly disposed in
coloured-paper lamps, high up among green boughs, and the farmers’
wives and daughters, as they peeped in, believed no scene could be more
splendid; they knew now quite well in what sort of rooms the king and
queen lived, and their thoughts glanced with some pity towards cousins
and acquaintances who had not this fine opportunity of knowing how
things went on in the great world. The lamps were already lit, though
the sun had not long set, and there was that calm light out of doors in
which we seem to see all objects more distinctly than in the broad day.

It was a pretty scene outside the house: the farmers and their families
were moving about the lawn, among the flowers and shrubs, or along the
broad straight road leading from the east front, where a carpet of
mossy grass spread on each side, studded here and there with a dark
flat-boughed cedar, or a grand pyramidal fir sweeping the ground with
its branches, all tipped with a fringe of paler green. The groups of
cottagers in the park were gradually diminishing, the young ones being
attracted towards the lights that were beginning to gleam from the
windows of the gallery in the abbey, which was to be their dancing-room,
and some of the sober elder ones thinking it time to go home quietly.
One of these was Lisbeth Bede, and Seth went with her--not from filial
attention only, for his conscience would not let him join in dancing.
It had been rather a melancholy day to Seth: Dinah had never been more
constantly present with him than in this scene, where everything was
so unlike her. He saw her all the more vividly after looking at the
thoughtless faces and gay-coloured dresses of the young women--just as
one feels the beauty and the greatness of a pictured Madonna the more
when it has been for a moment screened from us by a vulgar head in a
bonnet. But this presence of Dinah in his mind only helped him to bear
the better with his mother’s mood, which had been becoming more and more
querulous for the last hour. Poor Lisbeth was suffering from a strange
conflict of feelings. Her joy and pride in the honour paid to her
darling son Adam was beginning to be worsted in the conflict with the
jealousy and fretfulness which had revived when Adam came to tell her
that Captain Donnithorne desired him to join the dancers in the hall.
Adam was getting more and more out of her reach; she wished all the old
troubles back again, for then it mattered more to Adam what his mother
said and did.

“Eh, it’s fine talkin’ o’ dancin’,” she said, “an’ thy father not a five
week in’s grave. An’ I wish I war there too, i’stid o’ bein’ left to
take up merrier folks’s room above ground.”

“Nay, don’t look at it i’ that way, Mother,” said Adam, who was
determined to be gentle to her to-day. “I don’t mean to dance--I shall
only look on. And since the captain wishes me to be there, it ‘ud look
as if I thought I knew better than him to say as I’d rather not stay.
And thee know’st how he’s behaved to me to-day.”

“Eh, thee’t do as thee lik’st, for thy old mother’s got no right t’
hinder thee. She’s nought but th’ old husk, and thee’st slipped away
from her, like the ripe nut.”

“Well, Mother,” said Adam, “I’ll go and tell the captain as it hurts thy
feelings for me to stay, and I’d rather go home upo’ that account: he
won’t take it ill then, I daresay, and I’m willing.” He said this with
some effort, for he really longed to be near Hetty this evening.

“Nay, nay, I wonna ha’ thee do that--the young squire ‘ull be angered.
Go an’ do what thee’t ordered to do, an’ me and Seth ‘ull go whome. I
know it’s a grit honour for thee to be so looked on--an’ who’s to be
prouder on it nor thy mother? Hadna she the cumber o’ rearin’ thee an’
doin’ for thee all these ‘ears?”

“Well, good-bye, then, Mother--good-bye, lad--remember Gyp when you get
home,” said Adam, turning away towards the gate of the pleasure-grounds,
where he hoped he might be able to join the Poysers, for he had been so
occupied throughout the afternoon that he had had no time to speak to
Hetty. His eye soon detected a distant group, which he knew to be the
right one, returning to the house along the broad gravel road, and he
hastened on to meet them.

“Why, Adam, I’m glad to get sight on y’ again,” said Mr. Poyser, who was
carrying Totty on his arm. “You’re going t’ have a bit o’ fun, I hope,
now your work’s all done. And here’s Hetty has promised no end o’
partners, an’ I’ve just been askin’ her if she’d agreed to dance wi’
you, an’ she says no.”

“Well, I didn’t think o’ dancing to-night,” said Adam, already tempted
to change his mind, as he looked at Hetty.

“Nonsense!” said Mr. Poyser. “Why, everybody’s goin’ to dance to-night,
all but th’ old squire and Mrs. Irwine. Mrs. Best’s been tellin’ us as
Miss Lyddy and Miss Irwine ‘ull dance, an’ the young squire ‘ull pick
my wife for his first partner, t’ open the ball: so she’ll be forced to
dance, though she’s laid by ever sin’ the Christmas afore the little un
was born. You canna for shame stand still, Adam, an’ you a fine young
fellow and can dance as well as anybody.”

“Nay, nay,” said Mrs. Poyser, “it ‘ud be unbecomin’. I know the dancin’s
nonsense, but if you stick at everything because it’s nonsense, you
wonna go far i’ this life. When your broth’s ready-made for you, you mun
swallow the thickenin’, or else let the broth alone.”

“Then if Hetty ‘ull dance with me,” said Adam, yielding either to Mrs.
Poyser’s argument or to something else, “I’ll dance whichever dance
she’s free.”

“I’ve got no partner for the fourth dance,” said Hetty; “I’ll dance that
with you, if you like.”

“Ah,” said Mr. Poyser, “but you mun dance the first dance, Adam, else
it’ll look partic’ler. There’s plenty o’ nice partners to pick an’
choose from, an’ it’s hard for the gells when the men stan’ by and don’t
ask ‘em.”

Adam felt the justice of Mr. Poyser’s observation: it would not do for
him to dance with no one besides Hetty; and remembering that Jonathan
Burge had some reason to feel hurt to-day, he resolved to ask Miss Mary
to dance with him the first dance, if she had no other partner.

“There’s the big clock strikin’ eight,” said Mr. Poyser; “we must make
haste in now, else the squire and the ladies ‘ull be in afore us, an’
that wouldna look well.”

When they had entered the hall, and the three children under Molly’s
charge had been seated on the stairs, the folding-doors of the
drawing-room were thrown open, and Arthur entered in his regimentals,
leading Mrs. Irwine to a carpet-covered dais ornamented with hot-house
plants, where she and Miss Anne were to be seated with old Mr.
Donnithorne, that they might look on at the dancing, like the kings
and queens in the plays. Arthur had put on his uniform to please the
tenants, he said, who thought as much of his militia dignity as if it
had been an elevation to the premiership. He had not the least objection
to gratify them in that way: his uniform was very advantageous to his
figure.

The old squire, before sitting down, walked round the hall to greet the
tenants and make polite speeches to the wives: he was always polite; but
the farmers had found out, after long puzzling, that this polish was
one of the signs of hardness. It was observed that he gave his most
elaborate civility to Mrs. Poyser to-night, inquiring particularly about
her health, recommending her to strengthen herself with cold water as
he did, and avoid all drugs. Mrs. Poyser curtsied and thanked him with
great self-command, but when he had passed on, she whispered to her
husband, “I’ll lay my life he’s brewin’ some nasty turn against us. Old
Harry doesna wag his tail so for nothin’.” Mr. Poyser had no time to
answer, for now Arthur came up and said, “Mrs. Poyser, I’m come to
request the favour of your hand for the first dance; and, Mr. Poyser,
you must let me take you to my aunt, for she claims you as her partner.”

The wife’s pale cheek flushed with a nervous sense of unwonted honour as
Arthur led her to the top of the room; but Mr. Poyser, to whom an extra
glass had restored his youthful confidence in his good looks and good
dancing, walked along with them quite proudly, secretly flattering
himself that Miss Lydia had never had a partner in HER life who could
lift her off the ground as he would. In order to balance the honours
given to the two parishes, Miss Irwine danced with Luke Britton, the
largest Broxton farmer, and Mr. Gawaine led out Mrs. Britton. Mr.
Irwine, after seating his sister Anne, had gone to the abbey gallery,
as he had agreed with Arthur beforehand, to see how the merriment of the
cottagers was prospering. Meanwhile, all the less distinguished couples
had taken their places: Hetty was led out by the inevitable Mr. Craig,
and Mary Burge by Adam; and now the music struck up, and the glorious
country-dance, best of all dances, began.

Pity it was not a boarded floor! Then the rhythmic stamping of the thick
shoes would have been better than any drums. That merry stamping, that
gracious nodding of the head, that waving bestowal of the hand--where
can we see them now? That simple dancing of well-covered matrons, laying
aside for an hour the cares of house and dairy, remembering but not
affecting youth, not jealous but proud of the young maidens by their
side--that holiday sprightliness of portly husbands paying little
compliments to their wives, as if their courting days were come
again--those lads and lasses a little confused and awkward with their
partners, having nothing to say--it would be a pleasant variety to
see all that sometimes, instead of low dresses and large skirts, and
scanning glances exploring costumes, and languid men in lacquered boots
smiling with double meaning.

There was but one thing to mar Martin Poyser’s pleasure in this dance:
it was that he was always in close contact with Luke Britton, that
slovenly farmer. He thought of throwing a little glazed coldness into
his eye in the crossing of hands; but then, as Miss Irwine was opposite
to him instead of the offensive Luke, he might freeze the wrong person.
So he gave his face up to hilarity, unchilled by moral judgments.

How Hetty’s heart beat as Arthur approached her! He had hardly looked at
her to-day: now he must take her hand. Would he press it? Would he look
at her? She thought she would cry if he gave her no sign of feeling.
Now he was there--he had taken her hand--yes, he was pressing it. Hetty
turned pale as she looked up at him for an instant and met his eyes,
before the dance carried him away. That pale look came upon Arthur like
the beginning of a dull pain, which clung to him, though he must dance
and smile and joke all the same. Hetty would look so, when he told her
what he had to tell her; and he should never be able to bear it--he
should be a fool and give way again. Hetty’s look did not really mean
so much as he thought: it was only the sign of a struggle between the
desire for him to notice her and the dread lest she should betray the
desire to others. But Hetty’s face had a language that transcended her
feelings. There are faces which nature charges with a meaning and pathos
not belonging to the single human soul that flutters beneath them, but
speaking the joys and sorrows of foregone generations--eyes that tell of
deep love which doubtless has been and is somewhere, but not paired with
these eyes--perhaps paired with pale eyes that can say nothing; just as
a national language may be instinct with poetry unfelt by the lips that
use it. That look of Hetty’s oppressed Arthur with a dread which yet had
something of a terrible unconfessed delight in it, that she loved him
too well. There was a hard task before him, for at that moment he felt
he would have given up three years of his youth for the happiness of
abandoning himself without remorse to his passion for Hetty.

These were the incongruous thoughts in his mind as he led Mrs. Poyser,
who was panting with fatigue, and secretly resolving that neither judge
nor jury should force her to dance another dance, to take a quiet rest
in the dining-room, where supper was laid out for the guests to come and
take it as they chose.

“I’ve desired Hetty to remember as she’s got to dance wi’ you, sir,”
 said the good innocent woman; “for she’s so thoughtless, she’d be like
enough to go an’ engage herself for ivery dance. So I told her not to
promise too many.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Poyser,” said Arthur, not without a twinge. “Now, sit
down in this comfortable chair, and here is Mills ready to give you what
you would like best.”

He hurried away to seek another matronly partner, for due honour must be
paid to the married women before he asked any of the young ones; and
the country-dances, and the stamping, and the gracious nodding, and the
waving of the hands, went on joyously.

At last the time had come for the fourth dance--longed for by the
strong, grave Adam, as if he had been a delicate-handed youth of
eighteen; for we are all very much alike when we are in our first love;
and Adam had hardly ever touched Hetty’s hand for more than a transient
greeting--had never danced with her but once before. His eyes had
followed her eagerly to-night in spite of himself, and had taken in
deeper draughts of love. He thought she behaved so prettily, so quietly;
she did not seem to be flirting at all she smiled less than usual; there
was almost a sweet sadness about her. “God bless her!” he said inwardly;
“I’d make her life a happy ‘un, if a strong arm to work for her, and a
heart to love her, could do it.”

And then there stole over him delicious thoughts of coming home from
work, and drawing Hetty to his side, and feeling her cheek softly
pressed against his, till he forgot where he was, and the music and the
tread of feet might have been the falling of rain and the roaring of the
wind, for what he knew.

But now the third dance was ended, and he might go up to her and
claim her hand. She was at the far end of the hall near the staircase,
whispering with Molly, who had just given the sleeping Totty into her
arms before running to fetch shawls and bonnets from the landing. Mrs.
Poyser had taken the two boys away into the dining-room to give them
some cake before they went home in the cart with Grandfather and Molly
was to follow as fast as possible.

“Let me hold her,” said Adam, as Molly turned upstairs; “the children
are so heavy when they’re asleep.”

Hetty was glad of the relief, for to hold Totty in her arms, standing,
was not at all a pleasant variety to her. But this second transfer had
the unfortunate effect of rousing Totty, who was not behind any child
of her age in peevishness at an unseasonable awaking. While Hetty was
in the act of placing her in Adam’s arms, and had not yet withdrawn her
own, Totty opened her eyes, and forthwith fought out with her left fist
at Adam’s arm, and with her right caught at the string of brown beads
round Hetty’s neck. The locket leaped out from her frock, and the next
moment the string was broken, and Hetty, helpless, saw beads and locket
scattered wide on the floor.

“My locket, my locket!” she said, in a loud frightened whisper to Adam;
“never mind the beads.”

Adam had already seen where the locket fell, for it had attracted his
glance as it leaped out of her frock. It had fallen on the raised wooden
dais where the band sat, not on the stone floor; and as Adam picked it
up, he saw the glass with the dark and light locks of hair under it. It
had fallen that side upwards, so the glass was not broken. He turned it
over on his hand, and saw the enamelled gold back.

“It isn’t hurt,” he said, as he held it towards Hetty, who was unable to
take it because both her hands were occupied with Totty.

“Oh, it doesn’t matter, I don’t mind about it,” said Hetty, who had been
pale and was now red.

“Not matter?” said Adam, gravely. “You seemed very frightened about it.
I’ll hold it till you’re ready to take it,” he added, quietly closing
his hand over it, that she might not think he wanted to look at it
again.

By this time Molly had come with bonnet and shawl, and as soon as she
had taken Totty, Adam placed the locket in Hetty’s hand. She took it
with an air of indifference and put it in her pocket, in her heart vexed
and angry with Adam because he had seen it, but determined now that she
would show no more signs of agitation.

“See,” she said, “they’re taking their places to dance; let us go.”

Adam assented silently. A puzzled alarm had taken possession of him. Had
Hetty a lover he didn’t know of? For none of her relations, he was sure,
would give her a locket like that; and none of her admirers, with whom
he was acquainted, was in the position of an accepted lover, as the
giver of that locket must be. Adam was lost in the utter impossibility
of finding any person for his fears to alight on. He could only feel
with a terrible pang that there was something in Hetty’s life unknown to
him; that while he had been rocking himself in the hope that she would
come to love him, she was already loving another. The pleasure of the
dance with Hetty was gone; his eyes, when they rested on her, had an
uneasy questioning expression in them; he could think of nothing to say
to her; and she too was out of temper and disinclined to speak. They
were both glad when the dance was ended.

Adam was determined to stay no longer; no one wanted him, and no one
would notice if he slipped away. As soon as he got out of doors, he
began to walk at his habitual rapid pace, hurrying along without knowing
why, busy with the painful thought that the memory of this day, so full
of honour and promise to him, was poisoned for ever. Suddenly, when
he was far on through the Chase, he stopped, startled by a flash of
reviving hope. After all, he might be a fool, making a great misery out
of a trifle. Hetty, fond of finery as she was, might have bought the
thing herself. It looked too expensive for that--it looked like the
things on white satin in the great jeweller’s shop at Rosseter. But Adam
had very imperfect notions of the value of such things, and he thought
it could certainly not cost more than a guinea. Perhaps Hetty had had as
much as that in Christmas boxes, and there was no knowing but she might
have been childish enough to spend it in that way; she was such a young
thing, and she couldn’t help loving finery! But then, why had she been
so frightened about it at first, and changed colour so, and afterwards
pretended not to care? Oh, that was because she was ashamed of his
seeing that she had such a smart thing--she was conscious that it
was wrong for her to spend her money on it, and she knew that Adam
disapproved of finery. It was a proof she cared about what he liked and
disliked. She must have thought from his silence and gravity afterwards
that he was very much displeased with her, that he was inclined to be
harsh and severe towards her foibles. And as he walked on more quietly,
chewing the cud of this new hope, his only uneasiness was that he had
behaved in a way which might chill Hetty’s feeling towards him. For this
last view of the matter must be the true one. How could Hetty have
an accepted lover, quite unknown to him? She was never away from her
uncle’s house for more than a day; she could have no acquaintances that
did not come there, and no intimacies unknown to her uncle and aunt. It
would be folly to believe that the locket was given to her by a lover.
The little ring of dark hair he felt sure was her own; he could form
no guess about the light hair under it, for he had not seen it very
distinctly. It might be a bit of her father’s or mother’s, who had died
when she was a child, and she would naturally put a bit of her own along
with it.

And so Adam went to bed comforted, having woven for himself an ingenious
web of probabilities--the surest screen a wise man can place between
himself and the truth. His last waking thoughts melted into a dream that
he was with Hetty again at the Hall Farm, and that he was asking her to
forgive him for being so cold and silent.

And while he was dreaming this, Arthur was leading Hetty to the dance
and saying to her in low hurried tones, “I shall be in the wood the day
after to-morrow at seven; come as early as you can.” And Hetty’s foolish
joys and hopes, which had flown away for a little space, scared by a
mere nothing, now all came fluttering back, unconscious of the real
peril. She was happy for the first time this long day, and wished
that dance would last for hours. Arthur wished it too; it was the
last weakness he meant to indulge in; and a man never lies with more
delicious languor under the influence of a passion than when he has
persuaded himself that he shall subdue it to-morrow.

But Mrs. Poyser’s wishes were quite the reverse of this, for her mind
was filled with dreary forebodings as to the retardation of to-morrow
morning’s cheese in consequence of these late hours. Now that Hetty had
done her duty and danced one dance with the young squire, Mr. Poyser
must go out and see if the cart was come back to fetch them, for it was
half-past ten o’clock, and notwithstanding a mild suggestion on his part
that it would be bad manners for them to be the first to go, Mrs. Poyser
was resolute on the point, “manners or no manners.”

“What! Going already, Mrs. Poyser?” said old Mr. Donnithorne, as she
came to curtsy and take leave; “I thought we should not part with any of
our guests till eleven. Mrs. Irwine and I, who are elderly people, think
of sitting out the dance till then.”

“Oh, Your Honour, it’s all right and proper for gentlefolks to stay up
by candlelight--they’ve got no cheese on their minds. We’re late enough
as it is, an’ there’s no lettin’ the cows know as they mustn’t want to
be milked so early to-morrow mornin’. So, if you’ll please t’ excuse us,
we’ll take our leave.”

“Eh!” she said to her husband, as they set off in the cart, “I’d sooner
ha’ brewin’ day and washin’ day together than one o’ these pleasurin’
days. There’s no work so tirin’ as danglin’ about an’ starin’ an’ not
rightly knowin’ what you’re goin’ to do next; and keepin’ your face i’
smilin’ order like a grocer o’ market-day for fear people shouldna think
you civil enough. An’ you’ve nothing to show for’t when it’s done, if it
isn’t a yallow face wi’ eatin’ things as disagree.”

“Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, who was in his merriest mood, and felt that
he had had a great day, “a bit o’ pleasuring’s good for thee sometimes.
An’ thee danc’st as well as any of ‘em, for I’ll back thee against all
the wives i’ the parish for a light foot an’ ankle. An’ it was a great
honour for the young squire to ask thee first--I reckon it was because
I sat at th’ head o’ the table an’ made the speech. An’ Hetty too--she
never had such a partner before--a fine young gentleman in reg’mentals.
It’ll serve you to talk on, Hetty, when you’re an old woman--how you
danced wi’ th’ young squire the day he come o’ age.”





Book Four




Chapter XXVII

A crisis


IT was beyond the middle of August--nearly three weeks after the
birthday feast. The reaping of the wheat had begun in our north midland
county of Loamshire, but the harvest was likely still to be retarded
by the heavy rains, which were causing inundations and much damage
throughout the country. From this last trouble the Broxton and Hayslope
farmers, on their pleasant uplands and in their brook-watered
valleys, had not suffered, and as I cannot pretend that they were such
exceptional farmers as to love the general good better than their own,
you will infer that they were not in very low spirits about the rapid
rise in the price of bread, so long as there was hope of gathering in
their own corn undamaged; and occasional days of sunshine and drying
winds flattered this hope.

The eighteenth of August was one of these days when the sunshine looked
brighter in all eyes for the gloom that went before. Grand masses of
cloud were hurried across the blue, and the great round hills behind the
Chase seemed alive with their flying shadows; the sun was hidden for a
moment, and then shone out warm again like a recovered joy; the leaves,
still green, were tossed off the hedgerow trees by the wind; around the
farmhouses there was a sound of clapping doors; the apples fell in the
orchards; and the stray horses on the green sides of the lanes and on
the common had their manes blown about their faces. And yet the wind
seemed only part of the general gladness because the sun was shining. A
merry day for the children, who ran and shouted to see if they could
top the wind with their voices; and the grown-up people too were in
good spirits, inclined to believe in yet finer days, when the wind had
fallen. If only the corn were not ripe enough to be blown out of the
husk and scattered as untimely seed!

And yet a day on which a blighting sorrow may fall upon a man. For if it
be true that Nature at certain moments seems charged with a presentiment
of one individual lot must it not also be true that she seems unmindful
unconscious of another? For there is no hour that has not its births
of gladness and despair, no morning brightness that does not bring new
sickness to desolation as well as new forces to genius and love. There
are so many of us, and our lots are so different, what wonder that
Nature’s mood is often in harsh contrast with the great crisis of
our lives? We are children of a large family, and must learn, as such
children do, not to expect that our hurts will be made much of--to be
content with little nurture and caressing, and help each other the more.

It was a busy day with Adam, who of late had done almost double work,
for he was continuing to act as foreman for Jonathan Burge, until some
satisfactory person could be found to supply his place, and Jonathan was
slow to find that person. But he had done the extra work cheerfully, for
his hopes were buoyant again about Hetty. Every time she had seen him
since the birthday, she had seemed to make an effort to behave all the
more kindly to him, that she might make him understand she had forgiven
his silence and coldness during the dance. He had never mentioned the
locket to her again; too happy that she smiled at him--still happier
because he observed in her a more subdued air, something that he
interpreted as the growth of womanly tenderness and seriousness. “Ah!”
 he thought, again and again, “she’s only seventeen; she’ll be thoughtful
enough after a while. And her aunt allays says how clever she is at the
work. She’ll make a wife as Mother’ll have no occasion to grumble at,
after all.” To be sure, he had only seen her at home twice since the
birthday; for one Sunday, when he was intending to go from church to the
Hall Farm, Hetty had joined the party of upper servants from the Chase
and had gone home with them--almost as if she were inclined to encourage
Mr. Craig. “She’s takin’ too much likin’ to them folks i’ the house
keeper’s room,” Mrs. Poyser remarked. “For my part, I was never overfond
o’ gentlefolks’s servants--they’re mostly like the fine ladies’ fat
dogs, nayther good for barking nor butcher’s meat, but on’y for show.”
 And another evening she was gone to Treddleston to buy some things;
though, to his great surprise, as he was returning home, he saw her at
a distance getting over a stile quite out of the Treddleston road. But,
when he hastened to her, she was very kind, and asked him to go in again
when he had taken her to the yard gate. She had gone a little farther
into the fields after coming from Treddleston because she didn’t want to
go in, she said: it was so nice to be out of doors, and her aunt always
made such a fuss about it if she wanted to go out. “Oh, do come in with
me!” she said, as he was going to shake hands with her at the gate, and
he could not resist that. So he went in, and Mrs. Poyser was contented
with only a slight remark on Hetty’s being later than was expected;
while Hetty, who had looked out of spirits when he met her, smiled and
talked and waited on them all with unusual promptitude.

That was the last time he had seen her; but he meant to make leisure for
going to the Farm to-morrow. To-day, he knew, was her day for going to
the Chase to sew with the lady’s maid, so he would get as much work done
as possible this evening, that the next might be clear.

One piece of work that Adam was superintending was some slight repairs
at the Chase Farm, which had been hitherto occupied by Satchell, as
bailiff, but which it was now rumoured that the old squire was going to
let to a smart man in top-boots, who had been seen to ride over it
one day. Nothing but the desire to get a tenant could account for the
squire’s undertaking repairs, though the Saturday-evening party at Mr.
Casson’s agreed over their pipes that no man in his senses would take
the Chase Farm unless there was a bit more ploughland laid to it.
However that might be, the repairs were ordered to be executed with all
dispatch, and Adam, acting for Mr. Burge, was carrying out the order
with his usual energy. But to-day, having been occupied elsewhere,
he had not been able to arrive at the Chase Farm till late in the
afternoon, and he then discovered that some old roofing, which he had
calculated on preserving, had given way. There was clearly no good to
be done with this part of the building without pulling it all down, and
Adam immediately saw in his mind a plan for building it up again, so as
to make the most convenient of cow-sheds and calf-pens, with a hovel for
implements; and all without any great expense for materials. So, when
the workmen were gone, he sat down, took out his pocket-book, and
busied himself with sketching a plan, and making a specification of the
expenses that he might show it to Burge the next morning, and set him
on persuading the squire to consent. To “make a good job” of anything,
however small, was always a pleasure to Adam, and he sat on a block,
with his book resting on a planing-table, whistling low every now and
then and turning his head on one side with a just perceptible smile of
gratification--of pride, too, for if Adam loved a bit of good work, he
loved also to think, “I did it!” And I believe the only people who are
free from that weakness are those who have no work to call their own. It
was nearly seven before he had finished and put on his jacket again; and
on giving a last look round, he observed that Seth, who had been working
here to-day, had left his basket of tools behind him. “Why, th’ lad’s
forgot his tools,” thought Adam, “and he’s got to work up at the shop
to-morrow. There never was such a chap for wool-gathering; he’d leave
his head behind him, if it was loose. However, it’s lucky I’ve seen ‘em;
I’ll carry ‘em home.”

The buildings of the Chase Farm lay at one extremity of the Chase,
at about ten minutes’ walking distance from the Abbey. Adam had come
thither on his pony, intending to ride to the stables and put up his nag
on his way home. At the stables he encountered Mr. Craig, who had come
to look at the captain’s new horse, on which he was to ride away the day
after to-morrow; and Mr. Craig detained him to tell how all the servants
were to collect at the gate of the courtyard to wish the young squire
luck as he rode out; so that by the time Adam had got into the Chase,
and was striding along with the basket of tools over his shoulder, the
sun was on the point of setting, and was sending level crimson rays
among the great trunks of the old oaks, and touching every bare patch of
ground with a transient glory that made it look like a jewel dropt upon
the grass. The wind had fallen now, and there was only enough breeze to
stir the delicate-stemmed leaves. Any one who had been sitting in the
house all day would have been glad to walk now; but Adam had been quite
enough in the open air to wish to shorten his way home, and he bethought
himself that he might do so by striking across the Chase and going
through the Grove, where he had never been for years. He hurried on
across the Chase, stalking along the narrow paths between the fern, with
Gyp at his heels, not lingering to watch the magnificent changes of the
light--hardly once thinking of it--yet feeling its presence in a certain
calm happy awe which mingled itself with his busy working-day thoughts.
How could he help feeling it? The very deer felt it, and were more
timid.

Presently Adam’s thoughts recurred to what Mr. Craig had said about
Arthur Donnithorne, and pictured his going away, and the changes
that might take place before he came back; then they travelled back
affectionately over the old scenes of boyish companionship, and dwelt
on Arthur’s good qualities, which Adam had a pride in, as we all have in
the virtues of the superior who honours us. A nature like Adam’s, with
a great need of love and reverence in it, depends for so much of its
happiness on what it can believe and feel about others! And he had no
ideal world of dead heroes; he knew little of the life of men in
the past; he must find the beings to whom he could cling with loving
admiration among those who came within speech of him. These pleasant
thoughts about Arthur brought a milder expression than usual into his
keen rough face: perhaps they were the reason why, when he opened the
old green gate leading into the Grove, he paused to pat Gyp and say a
kind word to him.

After that pause, he strode on again along the broad winding path
through the Grove. What grand beeches! Adam delighted in a fine tree of
all things; as the fisherman’s sight is keenest on the sea, so Adam’s
perceptions were more at home with trees than with other objects. He
kept them in his memory, as a painter does, with all the flecks and
knots in their bark, all the curves and angles of their boughs, and had
often calculated the height and contents of a trunk to a nicety, as he
stood looking at it. No wonder that, not-withstanding his desire to get
on, he could not help pausing to look at a curious large beech which
he had seen standing before him at a turning in the road, and convince
himself that it was not two trees wedded together, but only one. For the
rest of his life he remembered that moment when he was calmly examining
the beech, as a man remembers his last glimpse of the home where his
youth was passed, before the road turned, and he saw it no more. The
beech stood at the last turning before the Grove ended in an archway of
boughs that let in the eastern light; and as Adam stepped away from the
tree to continue his walk, his eyes fell on two figures about twenty
yards before him.

He remained as motionless as a statue, and turned almost as pale. The
two figures were standing opposite to each other, with clasped hands
about to part; and while they were bending to kiss, Gyp, who had been
running among the brushwood, came out, caught sight of them, and gave
a sharp bark. They separated with a start--one hurried through the gate
out of the Grove, and the other, turning round, walked slowly, with
a sort of saunter, towards Adam who still stood transfixed and pale,
clutching tighter the stick with which he held the basket of tools over
his shoulder, and looking at the approaching figure with eyes in which
amazement was fast turning to fierceness.

Arthur Donnithorne looked flushed and excited; he had tried to make
unpleasant feelings more bearable by drinking a little more wine than
usual at dinner to-day, and was still enough under its flattering
influence to think more lightly of this unwished-for rencontre with Adam
than he would otherwise have done. After all, Adam was the best person
who could have happened to see him and Hetty together--he was a sensible
fellow, and would not babble about it to other people. Arthur felt
confident that he could laugh the thing off and explain it away. And so
he sauntered forward with elaborate carelessness--his flushed face, his
evening dress of fine cloth and fine linen, his hands half-thrust into
his waistcoat pockets, all shone upon by the strange evening light which
the light clouds had caught up even to the zenith, and were now shedding
down between the topmost branches above him.

Adam was still motionless, looking at him as he came up. He understood
it all now--the locket and everything else that had been doubtful to
him: a terrible scorching light showed him the hidden letters that
changed the meaning of the past. If he had moved a muscle, he must
inevitably have sprung upon Arthur like a tiger; and in the conflicting
emotions that filled those long moments, he had told himself that he
would not give loose to passion, he would only speak the right thing.
He stood as if petrified by an unseen force, but the force was his own
strong will.

“Well, Adam,” said Arthur, “you’ve been looking at the fine old beeches,
eh? They’re not to be come near by the hatchet, though; this is a sacred
grove. I overtook pretty little Hetty Sorrel as I was coming to my
den--the Hermitage, there. She ought not to come home this way so late.
So I took care of her to the gate, and asked for a kiss for my pains.
But I must get back now, for this road is confoundedly damp. Good-night,
Adam. I shall see you to-morrow--to say good-bye, you know.”

Arthur was too much preoccupied with the part he was playing himself to
be thoroughly aware of the expression in Adam’s face. He did not look
directly at Adam, but glanced carelessly round at the trees and then
lifted up one foot to look at the sole of his boot. He cared to say no
more--he had thrown quite dust enough into honest Adam’s eyes--and as he
spoke the last words, he walked on.

“Stop a bit, sir,” said Adam, in a hard peremptory voice, without
turning round. “I’ve got a word to say to you.”

Arthur paused in surprise. Susceptible persons are more affected by
a change of tone than by unexpected words, and Arthur had the
susceptibility of a nature at once affectionate and vain. He was still
more surprised when he saw that Adam had not moved, but stood with his
back to him, as if summoning him to return. What did he mean? He was
going to make a serious business of this affair. Arthur felt his temper
rising. A patronising disposition always has its meaner side, and in the
confusion of his irritation and alarm there entered the feeling that a
man to whom he had shown so much favour as to Adam was not in a position
to criticize his conduct. And yet he was dominated, as one who feels
himself in the wrong always is, by the man whose good opinion he cares
for. In spite of pride and temper, there was as much deprecation as
anger in his voice when he said, “What do you mean, Adam?”

“I mean, sir”--answered Adam, in the same harsh voice, still without
turning round--“I mean, sir, that you don’t deceive me by your light
words. This is not the first time you’ve met Hetty Sorrel in this grove,
and this is not the first time you’ve kissed her.”

Arthur felt a startled uncertainty how far Adam was speaking from
knowledge, and how far from mere inference. And this uncertainty,
which prevented him from contriving a prudent answer, heightened his
irritation. He said, in a high sharp tone, “Well, sir, what then?”

“Why, then, instead of acting like th’ upright, honourable man we’ve
all believed you to be, you’ve been acting the part of a selfish
light-minded scoundrel. You know as well as I do what it’s to lead to
when a gentleman like you kisses and makes love to a young woman like
Hetty, and gives her presents as she’s frightened for other folks
to see. And I say it again, you’re acting the part of a selfish
light-minded scoundrel though it cuts me to th’ heart to say so, and I’d
rather ha’ lost my right hand.”

“Let me tell you, Adam,” said Arthur, bridling his growing anger and
trying to recur to his careless tone, “you’re not only devilishly
impertinent, but you’re talking nonsense. Every pretty girl is not such
a fool as you, to suppose that when a gentleman admires her beauty and
pays her a little attention, he must mean something particular. Every
man likes to flirt with a pretty girl, and every pretty girl likes to be
flirted with. The wider the distance between them, the less harm there
is, for then she’s not likely to deceive herself.”

“I don’t know what you mean by flirting,” said Adam, “but if you mean
behaving to a woman as if you loved her, and yet not loving her all
the while, I say that’s not th’ action of an honest man, and what isn’t
honest does come t’ harm. I’m not a fool, and you’re not a fool, and you
know better than what you’re saying. You know it couldn’t be made
public as you’ve behaved to Hetty as y’ have done without her losing her
character and bringing shame and trouble on her and her relations. What
if you meant nothing by your kissing and your presents? Other folks
won’t believe as you’ve meant nothing; and don’t tell me about her not
deceiving herself. I tell you as you’ve filled her mind so with the
thought of you as it’ll mayhap poison her life, and she’ll never love
another man as ‘ud make her a good husband.”

Arthur had felt a sudden relief while Adam was speaking; he perceived
that Adam had no positive knowledge of the past, and that there was no
irrevocable damage done by this evening’s unfortunate rencontre. Adam
could still be deceived. The candid Arthur had brought himself into a
position in which successful lying was his only hope. The hope allayed
his anger a little.

“Well, Adam,” he said, in a tone of friendly concession, “you’re perhaps
right. Perhaps I’ve gone a little too far in taking notice of the pretty
little thing and stealing a kiss now and then. You’re such a grave,
steady fellow, you don’t understand the temptation to such trifling.
I’m sure I wouldn’t bring any trouble or annoyance on her and the good
Poysers on any account if I could help it. But I think you look a little
too seriously at it. You know I’m going away immediately, so I shan’t
make any more mistakes of the kind. But let us say good-night”--Arthur
here turned round to walk on--“and talk no more about the matter. The
whole thing will soon be forgotten.”

“No, by God!” Adam burst out with rage that could be controlled no
longer, throwing down the basket of tools and striding forward till he
was right in front of Arthur. All his jealousy and sense of personal
injury, which he had been hitherto trying to keep under, had leaped up
and mastered him. What man of us, in the first moments of a sharp
agony, could ever feel that the fellow-man who has been the medium of
inflicting it did not mean to hurt us? In our instinctive rebellion
against pain, we are children again, and demand an active will to wreak
our vengeance on. Adam at this moment could only feel that he had
been robbed of Hetty--robbed treacherously by the man in whom he had
trusted--and he stood close in front of Arthur, with fierce eyes glaring
at him, with pale lips and clenched hands, the hard tones in which he
had hitherto been constraining himself to express no more than a just
indignation giving way to a deep agitated voice that seemed to shake him
as he spoke.

“No, it’ll not be soon forgot, as you’ve come in between her and me,
when she might ha’ loved me--it’ll not soon be forgot as you’ve robbed
me o’ my happiness, while I thought you was my best friend, and a
noble-minded man, as I was proud to work for. And you’ve been kissing
her, and meaning nothing, have you? And I never kissed her i’ my
life--but I’d ha’ worked hard for years for the right to kiss her. And
you make light of it. You think little o’ doing what may damage other
folks, so as you get your bit o’ trifling, as means nothing. I throw
back your favours, for you’re not the man I took you for. I’ll never
count you my friend any more. I’d rather you’d act as my enemy, and
fight me where I stand--it’s all th’ amends you can make me.”

Poor Adam, possessed by rage that could find no other vent, began to
throw off his coat and his cap, too blind with passion to notice the
change that had taken place in Arthur while he was speaking. Arthur’s
lips were now as pale as Adam’s; his heart was beating violently. The
discovery that Adam loved Hetty was a shock which made him for the
moment see himself in the light of Adam’s indignation, and regard Adam’s
suffering as not merely a consequence, but an element of his error.
The words of hatred and contempt--the first he had ever heard in his
life--seemed like scorching missiles that were making ineffaceable scars
on him. All screening self-excuse, which rarely falls quite away while
others respect us, forsook him for an instant, and he stood face to face
with the first great irrevocable evil he had ever committed. He was
only twenty-one, and three months ago--nay, much later--he had thought
proudly that no man should ever be able to reproach him justly. His
first impulse, if there had been time for it, would perhaps have been to
utter words of propitiation; but Adam had no sooner thrown off his
coat and cap than he became aware that Arthur was standing pale and
motionless, with his hands still thrust in his waistcoat pockets.

“What!” he said, “won’t you fight me like a man? You know I won’t strike
you while you stand so.”

“Go away, Adam,” said Arthur, “I don’t want to fight you.”

“No,” said Adam, bitterly; “you don’t want to fight me--you think I’m a
common man, as you can injure without answering for it.”

“I never meant to injure you,” said Arthur, with returning anger. “I
didn’t know you loved her.”

“But you’ve made her love you,” said Adam. “You’re a double-faced
man--I’ll never believe a word you say again.”

“Go away, I tell you,” said Arthur, angrily, “or we shall both repent.”

“No,” said Adam, with a convulsed voice, “I swear I won’t go away
without fighting you. Do you want provoking any more? I tell you you’re
a coward and a scoundrel, and I despise you.”

The colour had all rushed back to Arthur’s face; in a moment his right
hand was clenched, and dealt a blow like lightning, which sent Adam
staggering backward. His blood was as thoroughly up as Adam’s now, and
the two men, forgetting the emotions that had gone before, fought
with the instinctive fierceness of panthers in the deepening twilight
darkened by the trees. The delicate-handed gentleman was a match for the
workman in everything but strength, and Arthur’s skill enabled him to
protract the struggle for some long moments. But between unarmed men the
battle is to the strong, where the strong is no blunderer, and Arthur
must sink under a well-planted blow of Adam’s as a steel rod is broken
by an iron bar. The blow soon came, and Arthur fell, his head lying
concealed in a tuft of fern, so that Adam could only discern his darkly
clad body.

He stood still in the dim light waiting for Arthur to rise.

The blow had been given now, towards which he had been straining all the
force of nerve and muscle--and what was the good of it? What had he
done by fighting? Only satisfied his own passion, only wreaked his own
vengeance. He had not rescued Hetty, nor changed the past--there it was,
just as it had been, and he sickened at the vanity of his own rage.

But why did not Arthur rise? He was perfectly motionless, and the time
seemed long to Adam. Good God! had the blow been too much for him? Adam
shuddered at the thought of his own strength, as with the oncoming of
this dread he knelt down by Arthur’s side and lifted his head from among
the fern. There was no sign of life: the eyes and teeth were set. The
horror that rushed over Adam completely mastered him, and forced upon
him its own belief. He could feel nothing but that death was in Arthur’s
face, and that he was helpless before it. He made not a single movement,
but knelt like an image of despair gazing at an image of death.



Chapter XXVIII

A Dilemma


IT was only a few minutes measured by the clock--though Adam always
thought it had been a long while--before he perceived a gleam of
consciousness in Arthur’s face and a slight shiver through his frame.
The intense joy that flooded his soul brought back some of the old
affection with it.

“Do you feel any pain, sir?” he said, tenderly, loosening Arthur’s
cravat.

Arthur turned his eyes on Adam with a vague stare which gave way to a
slightly startled motion as if from the shock of returning memory. But
he only shivered again and said nothing.

“Do you feel any hurt, sir?” Adam said again, with a trembling in his
voice.

Arthur put his hand up to his waistcoat buttons, and when Adam had
unbuttoned it, he took a longer breath. “Lay my head down,” he said,
faintly, “and get me some water if you can.”

Adam laid the head down gently on the fern again, and emptying the tools
out of the flag-basket, hurried through the trees to the edge of the
Grove bordering on the Chase, where a brook ran below the bank.

When he returned with his basket leaking, but still half-full, Arthur
looked at him with a more thoroughly reawakened consciousness.

“Can you drink a drop out o’ your hand, sir?” said Adam, kneeling down
again to lift up Arthur’s head.

“No,” said Arthur, “dip my cravat in and souse it on my head.”

The water seemed to do him some good, for he presently raised himself a
little higher, resting on Adam’s arm.

“Do you feel any hurt inside sir?” Adam asked again

“No--no hurt,” said Arthur, still faintly, “but rather done up.”

After a while he said, “I suppose I fainted away when you knocked me
down.”

“Yes, sir, thank God,” said Adam. “I thought it was worse.”

“What! You thought you’d done for me, eh? Come help me on my legs.”

“I feel terribly shaky and dizzy,” Arthur said, as he stood leaning
on Adam’s arm; “that blow of yours must have come against me like a
battering-ram. I don’t believe I can walk alone.”

“Lean on me, sir; I’ll get you along,” said Adam. “Or, will you sit down
a bit longer, on my coat here, and I’ll prop y’ up. You’ll perhaps be
better in a minute or two.”

“No,” said Arthur. “I’ll go to the Hermitage--I think I’ve got some
brandy there. There’s a short road to it a little farther on, near the
gate. If you’ll just help me on.”

They walked slowly, with frequent pauses, but without speaking again.
In both of them, the concentration in the present which had attended
the first moments of Arthur’s revival had now given way to a vivid
recollection of the previous scene. It was nearly dark in the narrow
path among the trees, but within the circle of fir-trees round the
Hermitage there was room for the growing moonlight to enter in at the
windows. Their steps were noiseless on the thick carpet of fir-needles,
and the outward stillness seemed to heighten their inward consciousness,
as Arthur took the key out of his pocket and placed it in Adam’s hand,
for him to open the door. Adam had not known before that Arthur had
furnished the old Hermitage and made it a retreat for himself, and it
was a surprise to him when he opened the door to see a snug room with
all the signs of frequent habitation.

Arthur loosed Adam’s arm and threw himself on the ottoman. “You’ll see
my hunting-bottle somewhere,” he said. “A leather case with a bottle and
glass in.”

Adam was not long in finding the case. “There’s very little brandy in
it, sir,” he said, turning it downwards over the glass, as he held it
before the window; “hardly this little glassful.”

“Well, give me that,” said Arthur, with the peevishness of physical
depression. When he had taken some sips, Adam said, “Hadn’t I better
run to th’ house, sir, and get some more brandy? I can be there and
back pretty soon. It’ll be a stiff walk home for you, if you don’t have
something to revive you.”

“Yes--go. But don’t say I’m ill. Ask for my man Pym, and tell him to get
it from Mills, and not to say I’m at the Hermitage. Get some water too.”

Adam was relieved to have an active task--both of them were relieved to
be apart from each other for a short time. But Adam’s swift pace could
not still the eager pain of thinking--of living again with concentrated
suffering through the last wretched hour, and looking out from it over
all the new sad future.

Arthur lay still for some minutes after Adam was gone, but presently
he rose feebly from the ottoman and peered about slowly in the broken
moonlight, seeking something. It was a short bit of wax candle that
stood amongst a confusion of writing and drawing materials. There was
more searching for the means of lighting the candle, and when that was
done, he went cautiously round the room, as if wishing to assure himself
of the presence or absence of something. At last he had found a slight
thing, which he put first in his pocket, and then, on a second thought,
took out again and thrust deep down into a waste-paper basket. It was a
woman’s little, pink, silk neckerchief. He set the candle on the table,
and threw himself down on the ottoman again, exhausted with the effort.

When Adam came back with his supplies, his entrance awoke Arthur from a
doze.

“That’s right,” Arthur said; “I’m tremendously in want of some
brandy-vigour.”

“I’m glad to see you’ve got a light, sir,” said Adam. “I’ve been
thinking I’d better have asked for a lanthorn.”

“No, no; the candle will last long enough--I shall soon be up to walking
home now.”

“I can’t go before I’ve seen you safe home, sir,” said Adam,
hesitatingly.

“No: it will be better for you to stay--sit down.”

Adam sat down, and they remained opposite to each other in uneasy
silence, while Arthur slowly drank brandy-and-water, with visibly
renovating effect. He began to lie in a more voluntary position, and
looked as if he were less overpowered by bodily sensations. Adam was
keenly alive to these indications, and as his anxiety about Arthur’s
condition began to be allayed, he felt more of that impatience which
every one knows who has had his just indignation suspended by the
physical state of the culprit. Yet there was one thing on his mind to be
done before he could recur to remonstrance: it was to confess what had
been unjust in his own words. Perhaps he longed all the more to make
this confession, that his indignation might be free again; and as he saw
the signs of returning ease in Arthur, the words again and again came to
his lips and went back, checked by the thought that it would be better
to leave everything till to-morrow. As long as they were silent they did
not look at each other, and a foreboding came across Adam that if they
began to speak as though they remembered the past--if they looked at
each other with full recognition--they must take fire again. So they sat
in silence till the bit of wax candle flickered low in the socket, the
silence all the while becoming more irksome to Adam. Arthur had just
poured out some more brandy-and-water, and he threw one arm behind his
head and drew up one leg in an attitude of recovered ease, which was an
irresistible temptation to Adam to speak what was on his mind.

“You begin to feel more yourself again, sir,” he said, as the candle
went out and they were half-hidden from each other in the faint
moonlight.

“Yes: I don’t feel good for much--very lazy, and not inclined to move;
but I’ll go home when I’ve taken this dose.”

There was a slight pause before Adam said, “My temper got the better of
me, and I said things as wasn’t true. I’d no right to speak as if you’d
known you was doing me an injury: you’d no grounds for knowing it; I’ve
always kept what I felt for her as secret as I could.”

He paused again before he went on.

“And perhaps I judged you too harsh--I’m apt to be harsh--and you may
have acted out o’ thoughtlessness more than I should ha’ believed was
possible for a man with a heart and a conscience. We’re not all put
together alike, and we may misjudge one another. God knows, it’s all the
joy I could have now, to think the best of you.”

Arthur wanted to go home without saying any more--he was too painfully
embarrassed in mind, as well as too weak in body, to wish for any
further explanation to-night. And yet it was a relief to him that Adam
reopened the subject in a way the least difficult for him to answer.
Arthur was in the wretched position of an open, generous man who has
committed an error which makes deception seem a necessity. The native
impulse to give truth in return for truth, to meet trust with frank
confession, must be suppressed, and duty was becoming a question of
tactics. His deed was reacting upon him--was already governing him
tyrannously and forcing him into a course that jarred with his habitual
feelings. The only aim that seemed admissible to him now was to deceive
Adam to the utmost: to make Adam think better of him than he deserved.
And when he heard the words of honest retractation--when he heard the
sad appeal with which Adam ended--he was obliged to rejoice in
the remains of ignorant confidence it implied. He did not answer
immediately, for he had to be judicious and not truthful.

“Say no more about our anger, Adam,” he said, at last, very languidly,
for the labour of speech was unwelcome to him; “I forgive your momentary
injustice--it was quite natural, with the exaggerated notions you had in
your mind. We shall be none the worse friends in future, I hope, because
we’ve fought. You had the best of it, and that was as it should be, for
I believe I’ve been most in the wrong of the two. Come, let us shake
hands.”

Arthur held out his hand, but Adam sat still.

“I don’t like to say ‘No’ to that, sir,” he said, “but I can’t shake
hands till it’s clear what we mean by’t. I was wrong when I spoke as
if you’d done me an injury knowingly, but I wasn’t wrong in what I said
before, about your behaviour t’ Hetty, and I can’t shake hands with you
as if I held you my friend the same as ever till you’ve cleared that up
better.”

Arthur swallowed his pride and resentment as he drew back his hand.
He was silent for some moments, and then said, as indifferently as he
could, “I don’t know what you mean by clearing up, Adam. I’ve told you
already that you think too seriously of a little flirtation. But if
you are right in supposing there is any danger in it--I’m going away on
Saturday, and there will be an end of it. As for the pain it has given
you, I’m heartily sorry for it. I can say no more.”

Adam said nothing, but rose from his chair and stood with his face
towards one of the windows, as if looking at the blackness of the
moonlit fir-trees; but he was in reality conscious of nothing but the
conflict within him. It was of no use now--his resolution not to speak
till to-morrow. He must speak there and then. But it was several minutes
before he turned round and stepped nearer to Arthur, standing and
looking down on him as he lay.

“It’ll be better for me to speak plain,” he said, with evident effort,
“though it’s hard work. You see, sir, this isn’t a trifle to me,
whatever it may be to you. I’m none o’ them men as can go making love
first to one woman and then t’ another, and don’t think it much odds
which of ‘em I take. What I feel for Hetty’s a different sort o’ love,
such as I believe nobody can know much about but them as feel it and God
as has given it to ‘em. She’s more nor everything else to me, all but
my conscience and my good name. And if it’s true what you’ve been saying
all along--and if it’s only been trifling and flirting as you call it,
as ‘ll be put an end to by your going away--why, then, I’d wait, and
hope her heart ‘ud turn to me after all. I’m loath to think you’d speak
false to me, and I’ll believe your word, however things may look.”

“You would be wronging Hetty more than me not to believe it,” said
Arthur, almost violently, starting up from the ottoman and moving away.
But he threw himself into a chair again directly, saying, more feebly,
“You seem to forget that, in suspecting me, you are casting imputations
upon her.”

“Nay, sir,” Adam said, in a calmer voice, as if he were
half-relieved--for he was too straightforward to make a distinction
between a direct falsehood and an indirect one--“Nay, sir, things don’t
lie level between Hetty and you. You’re acting with your eyes open,
whatever you may do; but how do you know what’s been in her mind? She’s
all but a child--as any man with a conscience in him ought to feel bound
to take care on. And whatever you may think, I know you’ve disturbed
her mind. I know she’s been fixing her heart on you, for there’s a many
things clear to me now as I didn’t understand before. But you seem to
make light o’ what she may feel--you don’t think o’ that.”

“Good God, Adam, let me alone!” Arthur burst out impetuously; “I feel it
enough without your worrying me.”

He was aware of his indiscretion as soon as the words had escaped him.

“Well, then, if you feel it,” Adam rejoined, eagerly; “if you feel as
you may ha’ put false notions into her mind, and made her believe as
you loved her, when all the while you meant nothing, I’ve this demand
to make of you--I’m not speaking for myself, but for her. I ask you t’
undeceive her before you go away. Y’aren’t going away for ever, and if
you leave her behind with a notion in her head o’ your feeling about her
the same as she feels about you, she’ll be hankering after you, and the
mischief may get worse. It may be a smart to her now, but it’ll save her
pain i’ th’ end. I ask you to write a letter--you may trust to my seeing
as she gets it. Tell her the truth, and take blame to yourself for
behaving as you’d no right to do to a young woman as isn’t your equal.
I speak plain, sir, but I can’t speak any other way. There’s nobody can
take care o’ Hetty in this thing but me.”

“I can do what I think needful in the matter,” said Arthur, more and
more irritated by mingled distress and perplexity, “without giving
promises to you. I shall take what measures I think proper.”

“No,” said Adam, in an abrupt decided tone, “that won’t do. I must know
what ground I’m treading on. I must be safe as you’ve put an end to what
ought never to ha’ been begun. I don’t forget what’s owing to you as a
gentleman, but in this thing we’re man and man, and I can’t give up.”

There was no answer for some moments. Then Arthur said, “I’ll see you
to-morrow. I can bear no more now; I’m ill.” He rose as he spoke, and
reached his cap, as if intending to go.

“You won’t see her again!” Adam exclaimed, with a flash of recurring
anger and suspicion, moving towards the door and placing his back
against it. “Either tell me she can never be my wife--tell me you’ve
been lying--or else promise me what I’ve said.”

Adam, uttering this alternative, stood like a terrible fate before
Arthur, who had moved forward a step or two, and now stopped, faint,
shaken, sick in mind and body. It seemed long to both of them--that
inward struggle of Arthur’s--before he said, feebly, “I promise; let me
go.”

Adam moved away from the door and opened it, but when Arthur reached the
step, he stopped again and leaned against the door-post.

“You’re not well enough to walk alone, sir,” said Adam. “Take my arm
again.”

Arthur made no answer, and presently walked on, Adam following. But,
after a few steps, he stood still again, and said, coldly, “I believe I
must trouble you. It’s getting late now, and there may be an alarm set
up about me at home.”

Adam gave his arm, and they walked on without uttering a word, till they
came where the basket and the tools lay.

“I must pick up the tools, sir,” Adam said. “They’re my brother’s. I
doubt they’ll be rusted. If you’ll please to wait a minute.”

Arthur stood still without speaking, and no other word passed between
them till they were at the side entrance, where he hoped to get in
without being seen by any one. He said then, “Thank you; I needn’t
trouble you any further.”

“What time will it be conven’ent for me to see you to-morrow, sir?” said
Adam.

“You may send me word that you’re here at five o’clock,” said Arthur;
“not before.”

“Good-night, sir,” said Adam. But he heard no reply; Arthur had turned
into the house.



Chapter XXIX

The Next Morning


ARTHUR did not pass a sleepless night; he slept long and well. For sleep
comes to the perplexed--if the perplexed are only weary enough. But at
seven he rang his bell and astonished Pym by declaring he was going to
get up, and must have breakfast brought to him at eight.

“And see that my mare is saddled at half-past eight, and tell my
grandfather when he’s down that I’m better this morning and am gone for
a ride.”

He had been awake an hour, and could rest in bed no longer. In bed our
yesterdays are too oppressive: if a man can only get up, though it
be but to whistle or to smoke, he has a present which offers some
resistance to the past--sensations which assert themselves against
tyrannous memories. And if there were such a thing as taking averages
of feeling, it would certainly be found that in the hunting and shooting
seasons regret, self-reproach, and mortified pride weigh lighter on
country gentlemen than in late spring and summer. Arthur felt that he
should be more of a man on horseback. Even the presence of Pym, waiting
on him with the usual deference, was a reassurance to him after the
scenes of yesterday. For, with Arthur’s sensitiveness to opinion,
the loss of Adam’s respect was a shock to his self-contentment which
suffused his imagination with the sense that he had sunk in all eyes--as
a sudden shock of fear from some real peril makes a nervous woman afraid
even to step, because all her perceptions are suffused with a sense of
danger.

Arthur’s, as you know, was a loving nature. Deeds of kindness were as
easy to him as a bad habit: they were the common issue of his weaknesses
and good qualities, of his egoism and his sympathy. He didn’t like to
witness pain, and he liked to have grateful eyes beaming on him as the
giver of pleasure. When he was a lad of seven, he one day kicked down an
old gardener’s pitcher of broth, from no motive but a kicking impulse,
not reflecting that it was the old man’s dinner; but on learning that
sad fact, he took his favourite pencil-case and a silver-hafted knife
out of his pocket and offered them as compensation. He had been the same
Arthur ever since, trying to make all offences forgotten in benefits.
If there were any bitterness in his nature, it could only show itself
against the man who refused to be conciliated by him. And perhaps the
time was come for some of that bitterness to rise. At the first moment,
Arthur had felt pure distress and self-reproach at discovering that
Adam’s happiness was involved in his relation to Hetty. If there had
been a possibility of making Adam tenfold amends--if deeds of gift, or
any other deeds, could have restored Adam’s contentment and regard for
him as a benefactor, Arthur would not only have executed them without
hesitation, but would have felt bound all the more closely to Adam,
and would never have been weary of making retribution. But Adam could
receive no amends; his suffering could not be cancelled; his respect and
affection could not be recovered by any prompt deeds of atonement. He
stood like an immovable obstacle against which no pressure could
avail; an embodiment of what Arthur most shrank from believing in--the
irrevocableness of his own wrongdoing. The words of scorn, the refusal
to shake hands, the mastery asserted over him in their last conversation
in the Hermitage--above all, the sense of having been knocked down, to
which a man does not very well reconcile himself, even under the most
heroic circumstances--pressed on him with a galling pain which was
stronger than compunction. Arthur would so gladly have persuaded himself
that he had done no harm! And if no one had told him the contrary, he
could have persuaded himself so much better. Nemesis can seldom forge a
sword for herself out of our consciences--out of the suffering we feel
in the suffering we may have caused: there is rarely metal enough there
to make an effective weapon. Our moral sense learns the manners of good
society and smiles when others smile, but when some rude person gives
rough names to our actions, she is apt to take part against us. And
so it was with Arthur: Adam’s judgment of him, Adam’s grating words,
disturbed his self-soothing arguments.

Not that Arthur had been at ease before Adam’s discovery. Struggles and
resolves had transformed themselves into compunction and anxiety. He was
distressed for Hetty’s sake, and distressed for his own, that he
must leave her behind. He had always, both in making and breaking
resolutions, looked beyond his passion and seen that it must speedily
end in separation; but his nature was too ardent and tender for him not
to suffer at this parting; and on Hetty’s account he was filled with
uneasiness. He had found out the dream in which she was living--that she
was to be a lady in silks and satins--and when he had first talked to
her about his going away, she had asked him tremblingly to let her go
with him and be married. It was his painful knowledge of this which had
given the most exasperating sting to Adam’s reproaches. He had said no
word with the purpose of deceiving her--her vision was all spun by her
own childish fancy--but he was obliged to confess to himself that it was
spun half out of his own actions. And to increase the mischief, on this
last evening he had not dared to hint the truth to Hetty; he had been
obliged to soothe her with tender, hopeful words, lest he should throw
her into violent distress. He felt the situation acutely, felt the
sorrow of the dear thing in the present, and thought with a darker
anxiety of the tenacity which her feelings might have in the future.
That was the one sharp point which pressed against him; every other he
could evade by hopeful self-persuasion. The whole thing had been secret;
the Poysers had not the shadow of a suspicion. No one, except Adam, knew
anything of what had passed--no one else was likely to know; for Arthur
had impressed on Hetty that it would be fatal to betray, by word or
look, that there had been the least intimacy between them; and Adam, who
knew half their secret, would rather help them to keep it than betray
it. It was an unfortunate business altogether, but there was no use in
making it worse than it was by imaginary exaggerations and forebodings
of evil that might never come. The temporary sadness for Hetty was
the worst consequence; he resolutely turned away his eyes from any bad
consequence that was not demonstrably inevitable. But--but Hetty might
have had the trouble in some other way if not in this. And perhaps
hereafter he might be able to do a great deal for her and make up to her
for all the tears she would shed about him. She would owe the advantage
of his care for her in future years to the sorrow she had incurred now.
So good comes out of evil. Such is the beautiful arrangement of things!

Are you inclined to ask whether this can be the same Arthur who, two
months ago, had that freshness of feeling, that delicate honour which
shrinks from wounding even a sentiment, and does not contemplate any
more positive offence as possible for it?--who thought that his own
self-respect was a higher tribunal than any external opinion? The same,
I assure you, only under different conditions. Our deeds determine us,
as much as we determine our deeds, and until we know what has been or
will be the peculiar combination of outward with inward facts, which
constitutes a man’s critical actions, it will be better not to think
ourselves wise about his character. There is a terrible coercion in
our deeds, which may first turn the honest man into a deceiver and then
reconcile him to the change, for this reason--that the second wrong
presents itself to him in the guise of the only practicable right. The
action which before commission has been seen with that blended common
sense and fresh untarnished feeling which is the healthy eye of the
soul, is looked at afterwards with the lens of apologetic ingenuity,
through which all things that men call beautiful and ugly are seen to
be made up of textures very much alike. Europe adjusts itself to a
_fait accompli_, and so does an individual character--until the placid
adjustment is disturbed by a convulsive retribution.

No man can escape this vitiating effect of an offence against his own
sentiment of right, and the effect was the stronger in Arthur because of
that very need of self-respect which, while his conscience was still at
ease, was one of his best safeguards. Self-accusation was too painful to
him--he could not face it. He must persuade himself that he had not been
very much to blame; he began even to pity himself for the necessity he
was under of deceiving Adam--it was a course so opposed to the honesty
of his own nature. But then, it was the only right thing to do.

Well, whatever had been amiss in him, he was miserable enough in
consequence: miserable about Hetty; miserable about this letter that
he had promised to write, and that seemed at one moment to be a gross
barbarity, at another perhaps the greatest kindness he could do to her.
And across all this reflection would dart every now and then a sudden
impulse of passionate defiance towards all consequences. He would carry
Hetty away, and all other considerations might go to....

In this state of mind the four walls of his room made an intolerable
prison to him; they seemed to hem in and press down upon him all the
crowd of contradictory thoughts and conflicting feelings, some of which
would fly away in the open air. He had only an hour or two to make up
his mind in, and he must get clear and calm. Once on Meg’s back, in
the fresh air of that fine morning, he should be more master of the
situation.

The pretty creature arched her bay neck in the sunshine, and pawed the
gravel, and trembled with pleasure when her master stroked her nose, and
patted her, and talked to her even in a more caressing tone than usual.
He loved her the better because she knew nothing of his secrets. But
Meg was quite as well acquainted with her master’s mental state as many
others of her sex with the mental condition of the nice young gentlemen
towards whom their hearts are in a state of fluttering expectation.

Arthur cantered for five miles beyond the Chase, till he was at the foot
of a hill where there were no hedges or trees to hem in the road. Then
he threw the bridle on Meg’s neck and prepared to make up his mind.

Hetty knew that their meeting yesterday must be the last before Arthur
went away--there was no possibility of their contriving another without
exciting suspicion--and she was like a frightened child, unable to think
of anything, only able to cry at the mention of parting, and then put
her face up to have the tears kissed away. He could do nothing but
comfort her, and lull her into dreaming on. A letter would be a
dreadfully abrupt way of awakening her! Yet there was truth in what Adam
said--that it would save her from a lengthened delusion, which might be
worse than a sharp immediate pain. And it was the only way of satisfying
Adam, who must be satisfied, for more reasons than one. If he could have
seen her again! But that was impossible; there was such a thorny hedge
of hindrances between them, and an imprudence would be fatal. And yet,
if he COULD see her again, what good would it do? Only cause him to
suffer more from the sight of her distress and the remembrance of it.
Away from him she was surrounded by all the motives to self-control.

A sudden dread here fell like a shadow across his imagination--the dread
lest she should do something violent in her grief; and close upon that
dread came another, which deepened the shadow. But he shook them off
with the force of youth and hope. What was the ground for painting the
future in that dark way? It was just as likely to be the reverse. Arthur
told himself he did not deserve that things should turn out badly. He
had never meant beforehand to do anything his conscience disapproved;
he had been led on by circumstances. There was a sort of implicit
confidence in him that he was really such a good fellow at bottom,
Providence would not treat him harshly.

At all events, he couldn’t help what would come now: all he could do
was to take what seemed the best course at the present moment. And he
persuaded himself that that course was to make the way open between
Adam and Hetty. Her heart might really turn to Adam, as he said, after a
while; and in that case there would have been no great harm done, since
it was still Adam’s ardent wish to make her his wife. To be sure, Adam
was deceived--deceived in a way that Arthur would have resented as a
deep wrong if it had been practised on himself. That was a reflection
that marred the consoling prospect. Arthur’s cheeks even burned in
mingled shame and irritation at the thought. But what could a man do in
such a dilemma? He was bound in honour to say no word that could injure
Hetty: his first duty was to guard her. He would never have told or
acted a lie on his own account. Good God! What a miserable fool he was
to have brought himself into such a dilemma; and yet, if ever a man had
excuses, he had. (Pity that consequences are determined not by excuses
but by actions!)

Well, the letter must be written; it was the only means that promised
a solution of the difficulty. The tears came into Arthur’s eyes as he
thought of Hetty reading it; but it would be almost as hard for him
to write it; he was not doing anything easy to himself; and this
last thought helped him to arrive at a conclusion. He could never
deliberately have taken a step which inflicted pain on another and left
himself at ease. Even a movement of jealousy at the thought of giving up
Hetty to Adam went to convince him that he was making a sacrifice.

When once he had come to this conclusion, he turned Meg round and set
off home again in a canter. The letter should be written the first
thing, and the rest of the day would be filled up with other business:
he should have no time to look behind him. Happily, Irwine and Gawaine
were coming to dinner, and by twelve o’clock the next day he should
have left the Chase miles behind him. There was some security in this
constant occupation against an uncontrollable impulse seizing him to
rush to Hetty and thrust into her hand some mad proposition that would
undo everything. Faster and faster went the sensitive Meg, at every
slight sign from her rider, till the canter had passed into a swift
gallop.

“I thought they said th’ young mester war took ill last night,” said
sour old John, the groom, at dinner-time in the servants’ hall. “He’s
been ridin’ fit to split the mare i’ two this forenoon.”

“That’s happen one o’ the symptims, John,” said the facetious coachman.

“Then I wish he war let blood for ‘t, that’s all,” said John, grimly.

Adam had been early at the Chase to know how Arthur was, and had been
relieved from all anxiety about the effects of his blow by learning
that he was gone out for a ride. At five o’clock he was punctually there
again, and sent up word of his arrival. In a few minutes Pym came down
with a letter in his hand and gave it to Adam, saying that the captain
was too busy to see him, and had written everything he had to say.
The letter was directed to Adam, but he went out of doors again before
opening it. It contained a sealed enclosure directed to Hetty. On the
inside of the cover Adam read:


“In the enclosed letter I have written everything you wish. I leave it
to you to decide whether you will be doing best to deliver it to Hetty
or to return it to me. Ask yourself once more whether you are not taking
a measure which may pain her more than mere silence.

“There is no need for our seeing each other again now. We shall meet
with better feelings some months hence.

“A.D.”


“Perhaps he’s i’ th’ right on ‘t not to see me,” thought Adam. “It’s
no use meeting to say more hard words, and it’s no use meeting to shake
hands and say we’re friends again. We’re not friends, an’ it’s better
not to pretend it. I know forgiveness is a man’s duty, but, to my
thinking, that can only mean as you’re to give up all thoughts o’ taking
revenge: it can never mean as you’re t’ have your old feelings back
again, for that’s not possible. He’s not the same man to me, and I can’t
feel the same towards him. God help me! I don’t know whether I feel the
same towards anybody: I seem as if I’d been measuring my work from a
false line, and had got it all to measure over again.”

But the question about delivering the letter to Hetty soon absorbed
Adam’s thoughts. Arthur had procured some relief to himself by throwing
the decision on Adam with a warning; and Adam, who was not given to
hesitation, hesitated here. He determined to feel his way--to ascertain
as well as he could what was Hetty’s state of mind before he decided on
delivering the letter.



Chapter XXX

The Delivery of the Letter


THE next Sunday Adam joined the Poysers on their way out of church,
hoping for an invitation to go home with them. He had the letter in
his pocket, and was anxious to have an opportunity of talking to Hetty
alone. He could not see her face at church, for she had changed her
seat, and when he came up to her to shake hands, her manner was doubtful
and constrained. He expected this, for it was the first time she had
met him since she had been aware that he had seen her with Arthur in the
Grove.

“Come, you’ll go on with us, Adam,” Mr. Poyser said when they reached
the turning; and as soon as they were in the fields Adam ventured to
offer his arm to Hetty. The children soon gave them an opportunity of
lingering behind a little, and then Adam said:

“Will you contrive for me to walk out in the garden a bit with you this
evening, if it keeps fine, Hetty? I’ve something partic’lar to talk to
you about.”

Hetty said, “Very well.” She was really as anxious as Adam was that she
should have some private talk with him. She wondered what he thought of
her and Arthur. He must have seen them kissing, she knew, but she had
no conception of the scene that had taken place between Arthur and Adam.
Her first feeling had been that Adam would be very angry with her, and
perhaps would tell her aunt and uncle, but it never entered her mind
that he would dare to say anything to Captain Donnithorne. It was a
relief to her that he behaved so kindly to her to-day, and wanted to
speak to her alone, for she had trembled when she found he was going
home with them lest he should mean “to tell.” But, now he wanted to talk
to her by herself, she should learn what he thought and what he meant to
do. She felt a certain confidence that she could persuade him not to
do anything she did not want him to do; she could perhaps even make him
believe that she didn’t care for Arthur; and as long as Adam thought
there was any hope of her having him, he would do just what she liked,
she knew. Besides, she MUST go on seeming to encourage Adam, lest her
uncle and aunt should be angry and suspect her of having some secret
lover.

Hetty’s little brain was busy with this combination as she hung on
Adam’s arm and said “yes” or “no” to some slight observations of his
about the many hawthorn-berries there would be for the birds this
next winter, and the low-hanging clouds that would hardly hold up till
morning. And when they rejoined her aunt and uncle, she could pursue her
thoughts without interruption, for Mr. Poyser held that though a young
man might like to have the woman he was courting on his arm, he would
nevertheless be glad of a little reasonable talk about business the
while; and, for his own part, he was curious to hear the most recent
news about the Chase Farm. So, through the rest of the walk, he claimed
Adam’s conversation for himself, and Hetty laid her small plots and
imagined her little scenes of cunning blandishment, as she walked along
by the hedgerows on honest Adam’s arm, quite as well as if she had been
an elegantly clad coquette alone in her boudoir. For if a country beauty
in clumsy shoes be only shallow-hearted enough, it is astonishing how
closely her mental processes may resemble those of a lady in society
and crinoline, who applies her refined intellect to the problem of
committing indiscretions without compromising herself. Perhaps the
resemblance was not much the less because Hetty felt very unhappy all
the while. The parting with Arthur was a double pain to her--mingling
with the tumult of passion and vanity there was a dim undefined fear
that the future might shape itself in some way quite unlike her dream.
She clung to the comforting hopeful words Arthur had uttered in their
last meeting--“I shall come again at Christmas, and then we will see
what can be done.” She clung to the belief that he was so fond of
her, he would never be happy without her; and she still hugged her
secret--that a great gentleman loved her--with gratified pride, as a
superiority over all the girls she knew. But the uncertainty of the
future, the possibilities to which she could give no shape, began to
press upon her like the invisible weight of air; she was alone on her
little island of dreams, and all around her was the dark unknown water
where Arthur was gone. She could gather no elation of spirits now by
looking forward, but only by looking backward to build confidence on
past words and caresses. But occasionally, since Thursday evening, her
dim anxieties had been almost lost behind the more definite fear that
Adam might betray what he knew to her uncle and aunt, and his sudden
proposition to talk with her alone had set her thoughts to work in a
new way. She was eager not to lose this evening’s opportunity; and after
tea, when the boys were going into the garden and Totty begged to go
with them, Hetty said, with an alacrity that surprised Mrs. Poyser,
“I’ll go with her, Aunt.”

It did not seem at all surprising that Adam said he would go too,
and soon he and Hetty were left alone together on the walk by the
filbert-trees, while the boys were busy elsewhere gathering the large
unripe nuts to play at “cob-nut” with, and Totty was watching them with
a puppylike air of contemplation. It was but a short time--hardly two
months--since Adam had had his mind filled with delicious hopes as he
stood by Hetty’s side in this garden. The remembrance of that scene had
often been with him since Thursday evening: the sunlight through
the apple-tree boughs, the red bunches, Hetty’s sweet blush. It came
importunately now, on this sad evening, with the low-hanging clouds, but
he tried to suppress it, lest some emotion should impel him to say more
than was needful for Hetty’s sake.

“After what I saw on Thursday night, Hetty,” he began, “you won’t think
me making too free in what I’m going to say. If you was being courted by
any man as ‘ud make you his wife, and I’d known you was fond of him and
meant to have him, I should have no right to speak a word to you about
it; but when I see you’re being made love to by a gentleman as can never
marry you, and doesna think o’ marrying you, I feel bound t’ interfere
for you. I can’t speak about it to them as are i’ the place o’ your
parents, for that might bring worse trouble than’s needful.”

Adam’s words relieved one of Hetty’s fears, but they also carried a
meaning which sickened her with a strengthened foreboding. She was pale
and trembling, and yet she would have angrily contradicted Adam, if she
had dared to betray her feelings. But she was silent.

“You’re so young, you know, Hetty,” he went on, almost tenderly, “and y’
haven’t seen much o’ what goes on in the world. It’s right for me to
do what I can to save you from getting into trouble for want o’ your
knowing where you’re being led to. If anybody besides me knew what I
know about your meeting a gentleman and having fine presents from him,
they’d speak light on you, and you’d lose your character. And besides
that, you’ll have to suffer in your feelings, wi’ giving your love to
a man as can never marry you, so as he might take care of you all your
life.”

Adam paused and looked at Hetty, who was plucking the leaves from the
filbert-trees and tearing them up in her hand. Her little plans and
preconcerted speeches had all forsaken her, like an ill-learnt lesson,
under the terrible agitation produced by Adam’s words. There was a cruel
force in their calm certainty which threatened to grapple and crush her
flimsy hopes and fancies. She wanted to resist them--she wanted to throw
them off with angry contradiction--but the determination to conceal what
she felt still governed her. It was nothing more than a blind prompting
now, for she was unable to calculate the effect of her words.

“You’ve no right to say as I love him,” she said, faintly, but
impetuously, plucking another rough leaf and tearing it up. She was very
beautiful in her paleness and agitation, with her dark childish eyes
dilated and her breath shorter than usual. Adam’s heart yearned over her
as he looked at her. Ah, if he could but comfort her, and soothe her,
and save her from this pain; if he had but some sort of strength that
would enable him to rescue her poor troubled mind, as he would have
rescued her body in the face of all danger!

“I doubt it must be so, Hetty,” he said, tenderly; “for I canna believe
you’d let any man kiss you by yourselves, and give you a gold box with
his hair, and go a-walking i’ the Grove to meet him, if you didna love
him. I’m not blaming you, for I know it ‘ud begin by little and little,
till at last you’d not be able to throw it off. It’s him I blame for
stealing your love i’ that way, when he knew he could never make you
the right amends. He’s been trifling with you, and making a plaything of
you, and caring nothing about you as a man ought to care.”

“Yes, he does care for me; I know better nor you,” Hetty burst out.
Everything was forgotten but the pain and anger she felt at Adam’s
words.

“Nay, Hetty,” said Adam, “if he’d cared for you rightly, he’d never
ha’ behaved so. He told me himself he meant nothing by his kissing and
presents, and he wanted to make me believe as you thought light of ‘em
too. But I know better nor that. I can’t help thinking as you’ve been
trusting to his loving you well enough to marry you, for all he’s a
gentleman. And that’s why I must speak to you about it, Hetty, for
fear you should be deceiving yourself. It’s never entered his head the
thought o’ marrying you.”

“How do you know? How durst you say so?” said Hetty, pausing in her walk
and trembling. The terrible decision of Adam’s tone shook her with fear.
She had no presence of mind left for the reflection that Arthur would
have his reasons for not telling the truth to Adam. Her words and look
were enough to determine Adam: he must give her the letter.

“Perhaps you can’t believe me, Hetty, because you think too well of
him--because you think he loves you better than he does. But I’ve got
a letter i’ my pocket, as he wrote himself for me to give you. I’ve not
read the letter, but he says he’s told you the truth in it. But before
I give you the letter, consider, Hetty, and don’t let it take too much
hold on you. It wouldna ha’ been good for you if he’d wanted to do such
a mad thing as marry you: it ‘ud ha’ led to no happiness i’ th’ end.”

Hetty said nothing; she felt a revival of hope at the mention of a
letter which Adam had not read. There would be something quite different
in it from what he thought.

Adam took out the letter, but he held it in his hand still, while he
said, in a tone of tender entreaty, “Don’t you bear me ill will, Hetty,
because I’m the means o’ bringing you this pain. God knows I’d ha’ borne
a good deal worse for the sake o’ sparing it you. And think--there’s
nobody but me knows about this, and I’ll take care of you as if I was
your brother. You’re the same as ever to me, for I don’t believe you’ve
done any wrong knowingly.”

Hetty had laid her hand on the letter, but Adam did not loose it till
he had done speaking. She took no notice of what he said--she had not
listened; but when he loosed the letter, she put it into her pocket,
without opening it, and then began to walk more quickly, as if she
wanted to go in.

“You’re in the right not to read it just yet,” said Adam. “Read it when
you’re by yourself. But stay out a little bit longer, and let us call
the children: you look so white and ill, your aunt may take notice of
it.”

Hetty heard the warning. It recalled to her the necessity of rallying
her native powers of concealment, which had half given way under the
shock of Adam’s words. And she had the letter in her pocket: she was
sure there was comfort in that letter in spite of Adam. She ran to find
Totty, and soon reappeared with recovered colour, leading Totty, who was
making a sour face because she had been obliged to throw away an unripe
apple that she had set her small teeth in.

“Hegh, Totty,” said Adam, “come and ride on my shoulder--ever so
high--you’ll touch the tops o’ the trees.”

What little child ever refused to be comforted by that glorious sense of
being seized strongly and swung upward? I don’t believe Ganymede cried
when the eagle carried him away, and perhaps deposited him on Jove’s
shoulder at the end. Totty smiled down complacently from her secure
height, and pleasant was the sight to the mother’s eyes, as she stood at
the house door and saw Adam coming with his small burden.

“Bless your sweet face, my pet,” she said, the mother’s strong love
filling her keen eyes with mildness, as Totty leaned forward and put
out her arms. She had no eyes for Hetty at that moment, and only said,
without looking at her, “You go and draw some ale, Hetty; the gells are
both at the cheese.”

After the ale had been drawn and her uncle’s pipe lighted, there was
Totty to be taken to bed, and brought down again in her night-gown
because she would cry instead of going to sleep. Then there was supper
to be got ready, and Hetty must be continually in the way to give help.
Adam stayed till he knew Mrs. Poyser expected him to go, engaging her
and her husband in talk as constantly as he could, for the sake of
leaving Hetty more at ease. He lingered, because he wanted to see her
safely through that evening, and he was delighted to find how much
self-command she showed. He knew she had not had time to read the
letter, but he did not know she was buoyed up by a secret hope that the
letter would contradict everything he had said. It was hard work for him
to leave her--hard to think that he should not know for days how she was
bearing her trouble. But he must go at last, and all he could do was
to press her hand gently as he said “Good-bye,” and hope she would take
that as a sign that if his love could ever be a refuge for her, it was
there the same as ever. How busy his thoughts were, as he walked home,
in devising pitying excuses for her folly, in referring all her weakness
to the sweet lovingness of her nature, in blaming Arthur, with less and
less inclination to admit that his conduct might be extenuated too! His
exasperation at Hetty’s suffering--and also at the sense that she was
possibly thrust for ever out of his own reach--deafened him to any
plea for the miscalled friend who had wrought this misery. Adam was a
clear-sighted, fair-minded man--a fine fellow, indeed, morally as well
as physically. But if Aristides the Just was ever in love and jealous,
he was at that moment not perfectly magnanimous. And I cannot pretend
that Adam, in these painful days, felt nothing but righteous indignation
and loving pity. He was bitterly jealous, and in proportion as his love
made him indulgent in his judgment of Hetty, the bitterness found a vent
in his feeling towards Arthur.

“Her head was allays likely to be turned,” he thought, “when a
gentleman, with his fine manners, and fine clothes, and his white hands,
and that way o’ talking gentlefolks have, came about her, making up to
her in a bold way, as a man couldn’t do that was only her equal; and
it’s much if she’ll ever like a common man now.” He could not help
drawing his own hands out of his pocket and looking at them--at the hard
palms and the broken finger-nails. “I’m a roughish fellow, altogether; I
don’t know, now I come to think on’t, what there is much for a woman to
like about me; and yet I might ha’ got another wife easy enough, if
I hadn’t set my heart on her. But it’s little matter what other women
think about me, if she can’t love me. She might ha’ loved me, perhaps,
as likely as any other man--there’s nobody hereabouts as I’m afraid of,
if he hadn’t come between us; but now I shall belike be hateful to her
because I’m so different to him. And yet there’s no telling--she may
turn round the other way, when she finds he’s made light of her all the
while. She may come to feel the vally of a man as ‘ud be thankful to be
bound to her all his life. But I must put up with it whichever way it
is--I’ve only to be thankful it’s been no worse. I am not th’ only man
that’s got to do without much happiness i’ this life. There’s many a
good bit o’ work done with a bad heart. It’s God’s will, and that’s
enough for us: we shouldn’t know better how things ought to be than He
does, I reckon, if we was to spend our lives i’ puzzling. But it ‘ud ha’
gone near to spoil my work for me, if I’d seen her brought to sorrow and
shame, and through the man as I’ve always been proud to think on. Since
I’ve been spared that, I’ve no right to grumble. When a man’s got his
limbs whole, he can bear a smart cut or two.”

As Adam was getting over a stile at this point in his reflections, he
perceived a man walking along the field before him. He knew it was Seth,
returning from an evening preaching, and made haste to overtake him.

“I thought thee’dst be at home before me,” he said, as Seth turned round
to wait for him, “for I’m later than usual to-night.”

“Well, I’m later too, for I got into talk, after meeting, with John
Barnes, who has lately professed himself in a state of perfection,
and I’d a question to ask him about his experience. It’s one o’ them
subjects that lead you further than y’ expect--they don’t lie along the
straight road.”

They walked along together in silence two or three minutes. Adam was not
inclined to enter into the subtleties of religious experience, but he
was inclined to interchange a word or two of brotherly affection and
confidence with Seth. That was a rare impulse in him, much as the
brothers loved each other. They hardly ever spoke of personal matters,
or uttered more than an allusion to their family troubles. Adam was
by nature reserved in all matters of feeling, and Seth felt a certain
timidity towards his more practical brother.

“Seth, lad,” Adam said, putting his arm on his brother’s shoulder, “hast
heard anything from Dinah Morris since she went away?”

“Yes,” said Seth. “She told me I might write her word after a while, how
we went on, and how mother bore up under her trouble. So I wrote to her
a fortnight ago, and told her about thee having a new employment, and
how Mother was more contented; and last Wednesday, when I called at the
post at Treddles’on, I found a letter from her. I think thee’dst perhaps
like to read it, but I didna say anything about it because thee’st
seemed so full of other things. It’s quite easy t’ read--she writes
wonderful for a woman.”

Seth had drawn the letter from his pocket and held it out to Adam, who
said, as he took it, “Aye, lad, I’ve got a tough load to carry just
now--thee mustna take it ill if I’m a bit silenter and crustier nor
usual. Trouble doesna make me care the less for thee. I know we shall
stick together to the last.”

“I take nought ill o’ thee, Adam. I know well enough what it means if
thee’t a bit short wi’ me now and then.”

“There’s Mother opening the door to look out for us,” said Adam, as they
mounted the slope. “She’s been sitting i’ the dark as usual. Well, Gyp,
well, art glad to see me?”

Lisbeth went in again quickly and lighted a candle, for she had heard
the welcome rustling of footsteps on the grass, before Gyp’s joyful
bark.

“Eh, my lads! Th’ hours war ne’er so long sin’ I war born as they’n been
this blessed Sunday night. What can ye both ha’ been doin’ till this
time?”

“Thee shouldstna sit i’ the dark, Mother,” said Adam; “that makes the
time seem longer.”

“Eh, what am I to do wi’ burnin’ candle of a Sunday, when there’s on’y
me an’ it’s sin to do a bit o’ knittin’? The daylight’s long enough
for me to stare i’ the booke as I canna read. It ‘ud be a fine way o’
shortenin’ the time, to make it waste the good candle. But which on
you’s for ha’in’ supper? Ye mun ayther be clemmed or full, I should
think, seein’ what time o’ night it is.”

“I’m hungry, Mother,” said Seth, seating himself at the little table,
which had been spread ever since it was light.

“I’ve had my supper,” said Adam. “Here, Gyp,” he added, taking some cold
potato from the table and rubbing the rough grey head that looked up
towards him.

“Thee needstna be gi’in’ th’ dog,” said Lisbeth; “I’n fed him well
a’ready. I’m not like to forget him, I reckon, when he’s all o’ thee I
can get sight on.”

“Come, then, Gyp,” said Adam, “we’ll go to bed. Good-night, Mother; I’m
very tired.”

“What ails him, dost know?” Lisbeth said to Seth, when Adam was gone
upstairs. “He’s like as if he was struck for death this day or two--he’s
so cast down. I found him i’ the shop this forenoon, arter thee wast
gone, a-sittin’ an’ doin’ nothin’--not so much as a booke afore him.”

“He’s a deal o’ work upon him just now, Mother,” said Seth, “and I think
he’s a bit troubled in his mind. Don’t you take notice of it, because it
hurts him when you do. Be as kind to him as you can, Mother, and don’t
say anything to vex him.”

“Eh, what dost talk o’ my vexin’ him? An’ what am I like to be but kind?
I’ll ma’ him a kettle-cake for breakfast i’ the mornin’.”

Adam, meanwhile, was reading Dinah’s letter by the light of his dip
candle.


DEAR BROTHER SETH--Your letter lay three days beyond my knowing of it
at the post, for I had not money enough by me to pay the carriage, this
being a time of great need and sickness here, with the rains that have
fallen, as if the windows of heaven were opened again; and to lay
by money, from day to day, in such a time, when there are so many in
present need of all things, would be a want of trust like the laying
up of the manna. I speak of this, because I would not have you think me
slow to answer, or that I had small joy in your rejoicing at the worldly
good that has befallen your brother Adam. The honour and love you bear
him is nothing but meet, for God has given him great gifts, and he uses
them as the patriarch Joseph did, who, when he was exalted to a place of
power and trust, yet yearned with tenderness towards his parent and his
younger brother.

“My heart is knit to your aged mother since it was granted me to be near
her in the day of trouble. Speak to her of me, and tell her I often bear
her in my thoughts at evening time, when I am sitting in the dim light
as I did with her, and we held one another’s hands, and I spoke the
words of comfort that were given to me. Ah, that is a blessed time,
isn’t it, Seth, when the outward light is fading, and the body is a
little wearied with its work and its labour. Then the inward light
shines the brighter, and we have a deeper sense of resting on the Divine
strength. I sit on my chair in the dark room and close my eyes, and it
is as if I was out of the body and could feel no want for evermore. For
then, the very hardship, and the sorrow, and the blindness, and the sin
I have beheld and been ready to weep over--yea, all the anguish of the
children of men, which sometimes wraps me round like sudden darkness--I
can bear with a willing pain, as if I was sharing the Redeemer’s cross.
For I feel it, I feel it--infinite love is suffering too--yea, in the
fulness of knowledge it suffers, it yearns, it mourns; and that is a
blind self-seeking which wants to be freed from the sorrow wherewith
the whole creation groaneth and travaileth. Surely it is not true
blessedness to be free from sorrow, while there is sorrow and sin in the
world: sorrow is then a part of love, and love does not seek to throw it
off. It is not the spirit only that tells me this--I see it in the whole
work and word of the Gospel. Is there not pleading in heaven? Is not the
Man of Sorrows there in that crucified body wherewith he ascended? And
is He not one with the Infinite Love itself--as our love is one with our
sorrow?

“These thoughts have been much borne in on me of late, and I have seen
with new clearness the meaning of those words, ‘If any man love me, let
him take up my cross.’ I have heard this enlarged on as if it meant the
troubles and persecutions we bring on ourselves by confessing Jesus. But
surely that is a narrow thought. The true cross of the Redeemer was the
sin and sorrow of this world--that was what lay heavy on his heart--and
that is the cross we shall share with him, that is the cup we must drink
of with him, if we would have any part in that Divine Love which is one
with his sorrow.

“In my outward lot, which you ask about, I have all things and abound. I
have had constant work in the mill, though some of the other hands have
been turned off for a time, and my body is greatly strengthened, so that
I feel little weariness after long walking and speaking. What you say
about staying in your own country with your mother and brother shows me
that you have a true guidance; your lot is appointed there by a clear
showing, and to seek a greater blessing elsewhere would be like laying a
false offering on the altar and expecting the fire from heaven to kindle
it. My work and my joy are here among the hills, and I sometimes think
I cling too much to my life among the people here, and should be
rebellious if I was called away.

“I was thankful for your tidings about the dear friends at the Hall
Farm, for though I sent them a letter, by my aunt’s desire, after I came
back from my sojourn among them, I have had no word from them. My
aunt has not the pen of a ready writer, and the work of the house is
sufficient for the day, for she is weak in body. My heart cleaves to her
and her children as the nearest of all to me in the flesh--yea, and to
all in that house. I am carried away to them continually in my sleep,
and often in the midst of work, and even of speech, the thought of them
is borne in on me as if they were in need and trouble, which yet is dark
to me. There may be some leading here; but I wait to be taught. You say
they are all well.

“We shall see each other again in the body, I trust, though, it may be,
not for a long while; for the brethren and sisters at Leeds are desirous
to have me for a short space among them, when I have a door opened me
again to leave Snowfield.

“Farewell, dear brother--and yet not farewell. For those children of
God whom it has been granted to see each other face to face, and to
hold communion together, and to feel the same spirit working in both can
never more be sundered though the hills may lie between. For their souls
are enlarged for evermore by that union, and they bear one another about
in their thoughts continually as it were a new strength.--Your faithful
Sister and fellow-worker in Christ,

“DINAH MORRIS.”


“I have not skill to write the words so small as you do and my pen moves
slow. And so I am straitened, and say but little of what is in my mind.
Greet your mother for me with a kiss. She asked me to kiss her twice
when we parted.”


Adam had refolded the letter, and was sitting meditatively with his head
resting on his arm at the head of the bed, when Seth came upstairs.

“Hast read the letter?” said Seth.

“Yes,” said Adam. “I don’t know what I should ha’ thought of her and her
letter if I’d never seen her: I daresay I should ha’ thought a preaching
woman hateful. But she’s one as makes everything seem right she says
and does, and I seemed to see her and hear her speaking when I read the
letter. It’s wonderful how I remember her looks and her voice. She’d
make thee rare and happy, Seth; she’s just the woman for thee.”

“It’s no use thinking o’ that,” said Seth, despondingly. “She spoke so
firm, and she’s not the woman to say one thing and mean another.”

“Nay, but her feelings may grow different. A woman may get to love by
degrees--the best fire dosna flare up the soonest. I’d have thee go and
see her by and by: I’d make it convenient for thee to be away three
or four days, and it ‘ud be no walk for thee--only between twenty and
thirty mile.”

“I should like to see her again, whether or no, if she wouldna be
displeased with me for going,” said Seth.

“She’ll be none displeased,” said Adam emphatically, getting up and
throwing off his coat. “It might be a great happiness to us all if she’d
have thee, for mother took to her so wonderful and seemed so contented
to be with her.”

“Aye,” said Seth, rather timidly, “and Dinah’s fond o’ Hetty too; she
thinks a deal about her.”

Adam made no reply to that, and no other word but “good-night” passed
between them.



Chapter XXXI

In Hetty’s Bed-Chamber


IT was no longer light enough to go to bed without a candle, even in
Mrs. Poyser’s early household, and Hetty carried one with her as she
went up at last to her bedroom soon after Adam was gone, and bolted the
door behind her.

Now she would read her letter. It must--it must have comfort in it. How
was Adam to know the truth? It was always likely he should say what he
did say.

She set down the candle and took out the letter. It had a faint scent of
roses, which made her feel as if Arthur were close to her. She put it to
her lips, and a rush of remembered sensations for a moment or two swept
away all fear. But her heart began to flutter strangely, and her hands
to tremble as she broke the seal. She read slowly; it was not easy for
her to read a gentleman’s handwriting, though Arthur had taken pains to
write plainly.


“DEAREST HETTY--I have spoken truly when I have said that I loved you,
and I shall never forget our love. I shall be your true friend as long
as life lasts, and I hope to prove this to you in many ways. If I say
anything to pain you in this letter, do not believe it is for want of
love and tenderness towards you, for there is nothing I would not do
for you, if I knew it to be really for your happiness. I cannot bear to
think of my little Hetty shedding tears when I am not there to kiss them
away; and if I followed only my own inclinations, I should be with her
at this moment instead of writing. It is very hard for me to part from
her--harder still for me to write words which may seem unkind, though
they spring from the truest kindness.

“Dear, dear Hetty, sweet as our love has been to me, sweet as it would
be to me for you to love me always, I feel that it would have been
better for us both if we had never had that happiness, and that it is
my duty to ask you to love me and care for me as little as you can. The
fault has all been mine, for though I have been unable to resist the
longing to be near you, I have felt all the while that your affection
for me might cause you grief. I ought to have resisted my feelings. I
should have done so, if I had been a better fellow than I am; but now,
since the past cannot be altered, I am bound to save you from any evil
that I have power to prevent. And I feel it would be a great evil for
you if your affections continued so fixed on me that you could think of
no other man who might be able to make you happier by his love than I
ever can, and if you continued to look towards something in the future
which cannot possibly happen. For, dear Hetty, if I were to do what you
one day spoke of, and make you my wife, I should do what you yourself
would come to feel was for your misery instead of your welfare. I know
you can never be happy except by marrying a man in your own station; and
if I were to marry you now, I should only be adding to any wrong I have
done, besides offending against my duty in the other relations of life.
You know nothing, dear Hetty, of the world in which I must always live,
and you would soon begin to dislike me, because there would be so little
in which we should be alike.

“And since I cannot marry you, we must part--we must try not to feel
like lovers any more. I am miserable while I say this, but nothing else
can be. Be angry with me, my sweet one, I deserve it; but do not believe
that I shall not always care for you--always be grateful to you--always
remember my Hetty; and if any trouble should come that we do not now
foresee, trust in me to do everything that lies in my power.

“I have told you where you are to direct a letter to, if you want to
write, but I put it down below lest you should have forgotten. Do not
write unless there is something I can really do for you; for, dear
Hetty, we must try to think of each other as little as we can. Forgive
me, and try to forget everything about me, except that I shall be, as
long as I live, your affectionate friend,

“ARTHUR DONNITHORNE.”


Slowly Hetty had read this letter; and when she looked up from it there
was the reflection of a blanched face in the old dim glass--a white
marble face with rounded childish forms, but with something sadder than
a child’s pain in it. Hetty did not see the face--she saw nothing--she
only felt that she was cold and sick and trembling. The letter shook and
rustled in her hand. She laid it down. It was a horrible sensation--this
cold and trembling. It swept away the very ideas that produced it, and
Hetty got up to reach a warm cloak from her clothes-press, wrapped it
round her, and sat as if she were thinking of nothing but getting warm.
Presently she took up the letter with a firmer hand, and began to read
it through again. The tears came this time--great rushing tears that
blinded her and blotched the paper. She felt nothing but that Arthur was
cruel--cruel to write so, cruel not to marry her. Reasons why he could
not marry her had no existence for her mind; how could she believe in
any misery that could come to her from the fulfilment of all she had
been longing for and dreaming of? She had not the ideas that could make
up the notion of that misery.

As she threw down the letter again, she caught sight of her face in the
glass; it was reddened now, and wet with tears; it was almost like a
companion that she might complain to--that would pity her. She leaned
forward on her elbows, and looked into those dark overflooding eyes and
at the quivering mouth, and saw how the tears came thicker and thicker,
and how the mouth became convulsed with sobs.

The shattering of all her little dream-world, the crushing blow on
her new-born passion, afflicted her pleasure-craving nature with an
overpowering pain that annihilated all impulse to resistance, and
suspended her anger. She sat sobbing till the candle went out, and then,
wearied, aching, stupefied with crying, threw herself on the bed without
undressing and went to sleep.

There was a feeble dawn in the room when Hetty awoke, a little after
four o’clock, with a sense of dull misery, the cause of which broke upon
her gradually as she began to discern the objects round her in the dim
light. And then came the frightening thought that she had to conceal her
misery as well as to bear it, in this dreary daylight that was coming.
She could lie no longer. She got up and went towards the table: there
lay the letter. She opened her treasure-drawer: there lay the ear-rings
and the locket--the signs of all her short happiness--the signs of
the lifelong dreariness that was to follow it. Looking at the little
trinkets which she had once eyed and fingered so fondly as the earnest
of her future paradise of finery, she lived back in the moments when
they had been given to her with such tender caresses, such strangely
pretty words, such glowing looks, which filled her with a bewildering
delicious surprise--they were so much sweeter than she had thought
anything could be. And the Arthur who had spoken to her and looked at
her in this way, who was present with her now--whose arm she felt round
her, his cheek against hers, his very breath upon her--was the cruel,
cruel Arthur who had written that letter, that letter which she snatched
and crushed and then opened again, that she might read it once more. The
half-benumbed mental condition which was the effect of the last night’s
violent crying made it necessary to her to look again and see if her
wretched thoughts were actually true--if the letter was really so cruel.
She had to hold it close to the window, else she could not have read it
by the faint light. Yes! It was worse--it was more cruel. She crushed
it up again in anger. She hated the writer of that letter--hated him
for the very reason that she hung upon him with all her love--all the
girlish passion and vanity that made up her love.

She had no tears this morning. She had wept them all away last night,
and now she felt that dry-eyed morning misery, which is worse than the
first shock because it has the future in it as well as the present.
Every morning to come, as far as her imagination could stretch, she
would have to get up and feel that the day would have no joy for her.
For there is no despair so absolute as that which comes with the first
moments of our first great sorrow, when we have not yet known what it is
to have suffered and be healed, to have despaired and to have recovered
hope. As Hetty began languidly to take off the clothes she had worn all
the night, that she might wash herself and brush her hair, she had a
sickening sense that her life would go on in this way. She should always
be doing things she had no pleasure in, getting up to the old tasks of
work, seeing people she cared nothing about, going to church, and to
Treddleston, and to tea with Mrs. Best, and carrying no happy thought
with her. For her short poisonous delights had spoiled for ever all the
little joys that had once made the sweetness of her life--the new frock
ready for Treddleston Fair, the party at Mr. Britton’s at Broxton wake,
the beaux that she would say “No” to for a long while, and the prospect
of the wedding that was to come at last when she would have a silk gown
and a great many clothes all at once. These things were all flat and
dreary to her now; everything would be a weariness, and she would carry
about for ever a hopeless thirst and longing.

She paused in the midst of her languid undressing and leaned against the
dark old clothes-press. Her neck and arms were bare, her hair hung down
in delicate rings--and they were just as beautiful as they were that
night two months ago, when she walked up and down this bed-chamber
glowing with vanity and hope. She was not thinking of her neck and arms
now; even her own beauty was indifferent to her. Her eyes wandered sadly
over the dull old chamber, and then looked out vacantly towards the
growing dawn. Did a remembrance of Dinah come across her mind? Of her
foreboding words, which had made her angry? Of Dinah’s affectionate
entreaty to think of her as a friend in trouble? No, the impression
had been too slight to recur. Any affection or comfort Dinah could
have given her would have been as indifferent to Hetty this morning as
everything else was except her bruised passion. She was only thinking
she could never stay here and go on with the old life--she could better
bear something quite new than sinking back into the old everyday round.
She would like to run away that very morning, and never see any of the
old faces again. But Hetty’s was not a nature to face difficulties--to
dare to loose her hold on the familiar and rush blindly on some unknown
condition. Hers was a luxurious and vain nature--not a passionate
one--and if she were ever to take any violent measure, she must be urged
to it by the desperation of terror. There was not much room for her
thoughts to travel in the narrow circle of her imagination, and she soon
fixed on the one thing she would do to get away from her old life: she
would ask her uncle to let her go to be a lady’s maid. Miss Lydia’s maid
would help her to get a situation, if she knew Hetty had her uncle’s
leave.

When she had thought of this, she fastened up her hair and began to
wash: it seemed more possible to her to go downstairs and try to behave
as usual. She would ask her uncle this very day. On Hetty’s blooming
health it would take a great deal of such mental suffering as hers to
leave any deep impress; and when she was dressed as neatly as usual
in her working-dress, with her hair tucked up under her little cap,
an indifferent observer would have been more struck with the young
roundness of her cheek and neck and the darkness of her eyes and
eyelashes than with any signs of sadness about her. But when she took up
the crushed letter and put it in her drawer, that she might lock it out
of sight, hard smarting tears, having no relief in them as the great
drops had that fell last night, forced their way into her eyes. She
wiped them away quickly: she must not cry in the day-time. Nobody should
find out how miserable she was, nobody should know she was disappointed
about anything; and the thought that the eyes of her aunt and uncle
would be upon her gave her the self-command which often accompanies a
great dread. For Hetty looked out from her secret misery towards the
possibility of their ever knowing what had happened, as the sick and
weary prisoner might think of the possible pillory. They would think her
conduct shameful, and shame was torture. That was poor little Hetty’s
conscience.

So she locked up her drawer and went away to her early work.

In the evening, when Mr. Poyser was smoking his pipe, and his
good-nature was therefore at its superlative moment, Hetty seized the
opportunity of her aunt’s absence to say, “Uncle, I wish you’d let me go
for a lady’s maid.”

Mr. Poyser took the pipe from his mouth and looked at Hetty in mild
surprise for some moments. She was sewing, and went on with her work
industriously.

“Why, what’s put that into your head, my wench?” he said at last, after
he had given one conservative puff.

“I should like it--I should like it better than farm-work.”

“Nay, nay; you fancy so because you donna know it, my wench. It wouldn’t
be half so good for your health, nor for your luck i’ life. I’d like you
to stay wi’ us till you’ve got a good husband: you’re my own niece, and
I wouldn’t have you go to service, though it was a gentleman’s house, as
long as I’ve got a home for you.”

Mr. Poyser paused, and puffed away at his pipe.

“I like the needlework,” said Hetty, “and I should get good wages.”

“Has your aunt been a bit sharp wi’ you?” said Mr. Poyser, not noticing
Hetty’s further argument. “You mustna mind that, my wench--she does it
for your good. She wishes you well; an’ there isn’t many aunts as are no
kin to you ‘ud ha’ done by you as she has.”

“No, it isn’t my aunt,” said Hetty, “but I should like the work better.”

“It was all very well for you to learn the work a bit--an’ I gev my
consent to that fast enough, sin’ Mrs. Pomfret was willing to teach you.
For if anything was t’ happen, it’s well to know how to turn your hand
to different sorts o’ things. But I niver meant you to go to service, my
wench; my family’s ate their own bread and cheese as fur back as anybody
knows, hanna they, Father? You wouldna like your grand-child to take
wage?”

“Na-a-y,” said old Martin, with an elongation of the word, meant to make
it bitter as well as negative, while he leaned forward and looked down
on the floor. “But the wench takes arter her mother. I’d hard work t’
hould HER in, an’ she married i’ spite o’ me--a feller wi’ on’y two head
o’ stock when there should ha’ been ten on’s farm--she might well die o’
th’ inflammation afore she war thirty.”

It was seldom the old man made so long a speech, but his son’s question
had fallen like a bit of dry fuel on the embers of a long unextinguished
resentment, which had always made the grandfather more indifferent to
Hetty than to his son’s children. Her mother’s fortune had been spent by
that good-for-nought Sorrel, and Hetty had Sorrel’s blood in her veins.

“Poor thing, poor thing!” said Martin the younger, who was sorry to have
provoked this retrospective harshness. “She’d but bad luck. But Hetty’s
got as good a chance o’ getting a solid, sober husband as any gell i’
this country.”

After throwing out this pregnant hint, Mr. Poyser recurred to his pipe
and his silence, looking at Hetty to see if she did not give some sign
of having renounced her ill-advised wish. But instead of that, Hetty,
in spite of herself, began to cry, half out of ill temper at the denial,
half out of the day’s repressed sadness.

“Hegh, hegh!” said Mr. Poyser, meaning to check her playfully, “don’t
let’s have any crying. Crying’s for them as ha’ got no home, not for
them as want to get rid o’ one. What dost think?” he continued to his
wife, who now came back into the house-place, knitting with fierce
rapidity, as if that movement were a necessary function, like the
twittering of a crab’s antennae.

“Think? Why, I think we shall have the fowl stole before we are much
older, wi’ that gell forgetting to lock the pens up o’ nights. What’s
the matter now, Hetty? What are you crying at?”

“Why, she’s been wanting to go for a lady’s maid,” said Mr. Poyser. “I
tell her we can do better for her nor that.”

“I thought she’d got some maggot in her head, she’s gone about wi’ her
mouth buttoned up so all day. It’s all wi’ going so among them servants
at the Chase, as we war fools for letting her. She thinks it ‘ud be a
finer life than being wi’ them as are akin to her and ha’ brought her up
sin’ she war no bigger nor Marty. She thinks there’s nothing belongs to
being a lady’s maid but wearing finer clothes nor she was born to, I’ll
be bound. It’s what rag she can get to stick on her as she’s thinking on
from morning till night, as I often ask her if she wouldn’t like to be
the mawkin i’ the field, for then she’d be made o’ rags inside and out.
I’ll never gi’ my consent to her going for a lady’s maid, while she’s
got good friends to take care on her till she’s married to somebody
better nor one o’ them valets, as is neither a common man nor a
gentleman, an’ must live on the fat o’ the land, an’s like enough to
stick his hands under his coat-tails and expect his wife to work for
him.”

“Aye, aye,” said Mr. Poyser, “we must have a better husband for her nor
that, and there’s better at hand. Come, my wench, give over crying and
get to bed. I’ll do better for you nor letting you go for a lady’s maid.
Let’s hear no more on’t.”

When Hetty was gone upstairs he said, “I canna make it out as she should
want to go away, for I thought she’d got a mind t’ Adam Bede. She’s
looked like it o’ late.”

“Eh, there’s no knowing what she’s got a liking to, for things take
no more hold on her than if she was a dried pea. I believe that gell,
Molly--as is aggravatin’ enough, for the matter o’ that--but I believe
she’d care more about leaving us and the children, for all she’s been
here but a year come Michaelmas, nor Hetty would. But she’s got this
notion o’ being a lady’s maid wi’ going among them servants--we might
ha’ known what it ‘ud lead to when we let her go to learn the fine work.
But I’ll put a stop to it pretty quick.”

“Thee’dst be sorry to part wi’ her, if it wasn’t for her good,” said Mr.
Poyser. “She’s useful to thee i’ the work.”

“Sorry? Yes, I’m fonder on her nor she deserves--a little hard-hearted
hussy, wanting to leave us i’ that way. I can’t ha’ had her about me
these seven year, I reckon, and done for her, and taught her everything
wi’out caring about her. An’ here I’m having linen spun, an’ thinking
all the while it’ll make sheeting and table-clothing for her when she’s
married, an’ she’ll live i’ the parish wi’ us, and never go out of
our sights--like a fool as I am for thinking aught about her, as is no
better nor a cherry wi’ a hard stone inside it.”

“Nay, nay, thee mustna make much of a trifle,” said Mr. Poyser,
soothingly. “She’s fond on us, I’ll be bound; but she’s young, an’ gets
things in her head as she can’t rightly give account on. Them young
fillies ‘ull run away often wi’-ou knowing why.”

Her uncle’s answers, however, had had another effect on Hetty besides
that of disappointing her and making her cry. She knew quite well whom
he had in his mind in his allusions to marriage, and to a sober, solid
husband; and when she was in her bedroom again, the possibility of her
marrying Adam presented itself to her in a new light. In a mind where no
strong sympathies are at work, where there is no supreme sense of
right to which the agitated nature can cling and steady itself to quiet
endurance, one of the first results of sorrow is a desperate vague
clutching after any deed that will change the actual condition. Poor
Hetty’s vision of consequences, at no time more than a narrow fantastic
calculation of her own probable pleasures and pains, was now quite shut
out by reckless irritation under present suffering, and she was ready
for one of those convulsive, motiveless actions by which wretched men
and women leap from a temporary sorrow into a lifelong misery.

Why should she not marry Adam? She did not care what she did, so that
it made some change in her life. She felt confident that he would still
want to marry her, and any further thought about Adam’s happiness in the
matter had never yet visited her.

“Strange!” perhaps you will say, “this rush of impulse to-wards a course
that might have seemed the most repugnant to her present state of mind,
and in only the second night of her sadness!”

Yes, the actions of a little trivial soul like Hetty’s, struggling
amidst the serious sad destinies of a human being, are strange. So are
the motions of a little vessel without ballast tossed about on a stormy
sea. How pretty it looked with its parti-coloured sail in the sunlight,
moored in the quiet bay!

“Let that man bear the loss who loosed it from its moorings.”

But that will not save the vessel--the pretty thing that might have been
a lasting joy.



Chapter XXXII

Mrs. Poyser “Has Her Say Out”


THE next Saturday evening there was much excited discussion at the
Donnithorne Arms concerning an incident which had occurred that very
day--no less than a second appearance of the smart man in top-boots said
by some to be a mere farmer in treaty for the Chase Farm, by others to
be the future steward, but by Mr. Casson himself, the personal witness
to the stranger’s visit, pronounced contemptuously to be nothing better
than a bailiff, such as Satchell had been before him. No one had thought
of denying Mr. Casson’s testimony to the fact that he had seen
the stranger; nevertheless, he proffered various corroborating
circumstances.

“I see him myself,” he said; “I see him coming along by the Crab-tree
Meadow on a bald-faced hoss. I’d just been t’ hev a pint--it was
half after ten i’ the fore-noon, when I hev my pint as reg’lar as the
clock--and I says to Knowles, as druv up with his waggon, ‘You’ll get
a bit o’ barley to-day, Knowles,’ I says, ‘if you look about you’; and
then I went round by the rick-yard, and towart the Treddles’on road, and
just as I come up by the big ash-tree, I see the man i’ top-boots coming
along on a bald-faced hoss--I wish I may never stir if I didn’t. And I
stood still till he come up, and I says, ‘Good morning, sir,’ I says,
for I wanted to hear the turn of his tongue, as I might know whether he
was a this-country man; so I says, ‘Good morning, sir: it ‘ll ‘old hup
for the barley this morning, I think. There’ll be a bit got hin, if
we’ve good luck.’ And he says, ‘Eh, ye may be raight, there’s noo
tallin’,’ he says, and I knowed by that”--here Mr. Casson gave a
wink--“as he didn’t come from a hundred mile off. I daresay he’d think
me a hodd talker, as you Loamshire folks allays does hany one as talks
the right language.”

“The right language!” said Bartle Massey, contemptuously. “You’re about
as near the right language as a pig’s squeaking is like a tune played on
a key-bugle.”

“Well, I don’t know,” answered Mr. Casson, with an angry smile. “I
should think a man as has lived among the gentry from a by, is likely to
know what’s the right language pretty nigh as well as a schoolmaster.”

“Aye, aye, man,” said Bartle, with a tone of sarcastic consolation,
“you talk the right language for you. When Mike Holdsworth’s goat says
ba-a-a, it’s all right--it ‘ud be unnatural for it to make any other
noise.”

The rest of the party being Loamshire men, Mr. Casson had the laugh
strongly against him, and wisely fell back on the previous question,
which, far from being exhausted in a single evening, was renewed in
the churchyard, before service, the next day, with the fresh interest
conferred on all news when there is a fresh person to hear it; and
that fresh hearer was Martin Poyser, who, as his wife said, “never
went boozin’ with that set at Casson’s, a-sittin’ soakin’ in drink, and
looking as wise as a lot o’ cod-fish wi’ red faces.”

It was probably owing to the conversation she had had with her husband
on their way from church concerning this problematic stranger that
Mrs. Poyser’s thoughts immediately reverted to him when, a day or two
afterwards, as she was standing at the house-door with her knitting,
in that eager leisure which came to her when the afternoon cleaning was
done, she saw the old squire enter the yard on his black pony,
followed by John the groom. She always cited it afterwards as a case of
prevision, which really had something more in it than her own remarkable
penetration, that the moment she set eyes on the squire she said to
herself, “I shouldna wonder if he’s come about that man as is a-going to
take the Chase Farm, wanting Poyser to do something for him without pay.
But Poyser’s a fool if he does.”

Something unwonted must clearly be in the wind, for the old squire’s
visits to his tenantry were rare; and though Mrs. Poyser had during the
last twelvemonth recited many imaginary speeches, meaning even more than
met the ear, which she was quite determined to make to him the next time
he appeared within the gates of the Hall Farm, the speeches had always
remained imaginary.

“Good-day, Mrs. Poyser,” said the old squire, peering at her with his
short-sighted eyes--a mode of looking at her which, as Mrs. Poyser
observed, “allays aggravated me: it was as if you was a insect, and he
was going to dab his finger-nail on you.”

However, she said, “Your servant, sir,” and curtsied with an air of
perfect deference as she advanced towards him: she was not the woman
to misbehave towards her betters, and fly in the face of the catechism,
without severe provocation.

“Is your husband at home, Mrs. Poyser?”

“Yes, sir; he’s only i’ the rick-yard. I’ll send for him in a minute, if
you’ll please to get down and step in.”

“Thank you; I will do so. I want to consult him about a little matter;
but you are quite as much concerned in it, if not more. I must have your
opinion too.”

“Hetty, run and tell your uncle to come in,” said Mrs. Poyser, as they
entered the house, and the old gentleman bowed low in answer to Hetty’s
curtsy; while Totty, conscious of a pinafore stained with gooseberry
jam, stood hiding her face against the clock and peeping round
furtively.

“What a fine old kitchen this is!” said Mr. Donnithorne, looking round
admiringly. He always spoke in the same deliberate, well-chiselled,
polite way, whether his words were sugary or venomous. “And you keep it
so exquisitely clean, Mrs. Poyser. I like these premises, do you know,
beyond any on the estate.”

“Well, sir, since you’re fond of ‘em, I should be glad if you’d let a
bit o’ repairs be done to ‘em, for the boarding’s i’ that state as we’re
like to be eaten up wi’ rats and mice; and the cellar, you may stan’ up
to your knees i’ water in’t, if you like to go down; but perhaps you’d
rather believe my words. Won’t you please to sit down, sir?”

“Not yet; I must see your dairy. I have not seen it for years, and I
hear on all hands about your fine cheese and butter,” said the squire,
looking politely unconscious that there could be any question on which
he and Mrs. Poyser might happen to disagree. “I think I see the door
open, there. You must not be surprised if I cast a covetous eye on your
cream and butter. I don’t expect that Mrs. Satchell’s cream and butter
will bear comparison with yours.”

“I can’t say, sir, I’m sure. It’s seldom I see other folks’s butter,
though there’s some on it as one’s no need to see--the smell’s enough.”

“Ah, now this I like,” said Mr. Donnithorne, looking round at the damp
temple of cleanliness, but keeping near the door. “I’m sure I should
like my breakfast better if I knew the butter and cream came from this
dairy. Thank you, that really is a pleasant sight. Unfortunately, my
slight tendency to rheumatism makes me afraid of damp: I’ll sit down
in your comfortable kitchen. Ah, Poyser, how do you do? In the midst of
business, I see, as usual. I’ve been looking at your wife’s beautiful
dairy--the best manager in the parish, is she not?”

Mr. Poyser had just entered in shirt-sleeves and open waistcoat, with a
face a shade redder than usual, from the exertion of “pitching.” As
he stood, red, rotund, and radiant, before the small, wiry, cool old
gentleman, he looked like a prize apple by the side of a withered crab.

“Will you please to take this chair, sir?” he said, lifting his father’s
arm-chair forward a little: “you’ll find it easy.”

“No, thank you, I never sit in easy-chairs,” said the old gentleman,
seating himself on a small chair near the door. “Do you know, Mrs.
Poyser--sit down, pray, both of you--I’ve been far from contented, for
some time, with Mrs. Satchell’s dairy management. I think she has not a
good method, as you have.”

“Indeed, sir, I can’t speak to that,” said Mrs. Poyser in a hard voice,
rolling and unrolling her knitting and looking icily out of the window,
as she continued to stand opposite the squire. Poyser might sit down if
he liked, she thought; she wasn’t going to sit down, as if she’d give in
to any such smooth-tongued palaver. Mr. Poyser, who looked and felt the
reverse of icy, did sit down in his three-cornered chair.

“And now, Poyser, as Satchell is laid up, I am intending to let the
Chase Farm to a respectable tenant. I’m tired of having a farm on my
own hands--nothing is made the best of in such cases, as you know. A
satisfactory bailiff is hard to find; and I think you and I, Poyser,
and your excellent wife here, can enter into a little arrangement in
consequence, which will be to our mutual advantage.”

“Oh,” said Mr. Poyser, with a good-natured blankness of imagination as
to the nature of the arrangement.

“If I’m called upon to speak, sir,” said Mrs. Poyser, after glancing at
her husband with pity at his softness, “you know better than me; but I
don’t see what the Chase Farm is t’ us--we’ve cumber enough wi’ our own
farm. Not but what I’m glad to hear o’ anybody respectable coming into
the parish; there’s some as ha’ been brought in as hasn’t been looked on
i’ that character.”

“You’re likely to find Mr. Thurle an excellent neighbour, I assure
you--such a one as you will feel glad to have accommodated by the little
plan I’m going to mention, especially as I hope you will find it as much
to your own advantage as his.”

“Indeed, sir, if it’s anything t’ our advantage, it’ll be the first
offer o’ the sort I’ve heared on. It’s them as take advantage that get
advantage i’ this world, I think. Folks have to wait long enough afore
it’s brought to ‘em.”

“The fact is, Poyser,” said the squire, ignoring Mrs. Poyser’s theory of
worldly prosperity, “there is too much dairy land, and too little plough
land, on the Chase Farm to suit Thurle’s purpose--indeed, he will only
take the farm on condition of some change in it: his wife, it appears,
is not a clever dairy-woman, like yours. Now, the plan I’m thinking of
is to effect a little exchange. If you were to have the Hollow Pastures,
you might increase your dairy, which must be so profitable under your
wife’s management; and I should request you, Mrs. Poyser, to supply my
house with milk, cream, and butter at the market prices. On the other
hand, Poyser, you might let Thurle have the Lower and Upper Ridges,
which really, with our wet seasons, would be a good riddance for you.
There is much less risk in dairy land than corn land.”

Mr. Poyser was leaning forward, with his elbows on his knees, his head
on one side, and his mouth screwed up--apparently absorbed in making the
tips of his fingers meet so as to represent with perfect accuracy the
ribs of a ship. He was much too acute a man not to see through the whole
business, and to foresee perfectly what would be his wife’s view of the
subject; but he disliked giving unpleasant answers. Unless it was on a
point of farming practice, he would rather give up than have a quarrel,
any day; and, after all, it mattered more to his wife than to him. So,
after a few moments’ silence, he looked up at her and said mildly, “What
dost say?”

Mrs. Poyser had had her eyes fixed on her husband with cold severity
during his silence, but now she turned away her head with a toss, looked
icily at the opposite roof of the cow-shed, and spearing her knitting
together with the loose pin, held it firmly between her clasped hands.

“Say? Why, I say you may do as you like about giving up any o’ your
corn-land afore your lease is up, which it won’t be for a year come next
Michaelmas, but I’ll not consent to take more dairy work into my hands,
either for love or money; and there’s nayther love nor money here, as I
can see, on’y other folks’s love o’ theirselves, and the money as is to
go into other folks’s pockets. I know there’s them as is born t’ own
the land, and them as is born to sweat on’t”--here Mrs. Poyser paused
to gasp a little--“and I know it’s christened folks’s duty to submit to
their betters as fur as flesh and blood ‘ull bear it; but I’ll not make
a martyr o’ myself, and wear myself to skin and bone, and worret
myself as if I was a churn wi’ butter a-coming in’t, for no landlord in
England, not if he was King George himself.”

“No, no, my dear Mrs. Poyser, certainly not,” said the squire, still
confident in his own powers of persuasion, “you must not overwork
yourself; but don’t you think your work will rather be lessened than
increased in this way? There is so much milk required at the Abbey
that you will have little increase of cheese and butter making from
the addition to your dairy; and I believe selling the milk is the most
profitable way of disposing of dairy produce, is it not?”

“Aye, that’s true,” said Mr. Poyser, unable to repress an opinion on a
question of farming profits, and forgetting that it was not in this case
a purely abstract question.

“I daresay,” said Mrs. Poyser bitterly, turning her head half-way
towards her husband and looking at the vacant arm-chair--“I daresay
it’s true for men as sit i’ th’ chimney-corner and make believe as
everything’s cut wi’ ins an’ outs to fit int’ everything else. If you
could make a pudding wi’ thinking o’ the batter, it ‘ud be easy getting
dinner. How do I know whether the milk ‘ull be wanted constant? What’s
to make me sure as the house won’t be put o’ board wage afore we’re
many months older, and then I may have to lie awake o’ nights wi’ twenty
gallons o’ milk on my mind--and Dingall ‘ull take no more butter, let
alone paying for it; and we must fat pigs till we’re obliged to beg the
butcher on our knees to buy ‘em, and lose half of ‘em wi’ the measles.
And there’s the fetching and carrying, as ‘ud be welly half a day’s work
for a man an’ hoss--that’s to be took out o’ the profits, I reckon? But
there’s folks ‘ud hold a sieve under the pump and expect to carry away
the water.”

“That difficulty--about the fetching and carrying--you will not have,
Mrs. Poyser,” said the squire, who thought that this entrance into
particulars indicated a distant inclination to compromise on Mrs.
Poyser’s part. “Bethell will do that regularly with the cart and pony.”

“Oh, sir, begging your pardon, I’ve never been used t’ having
gentlefolks’s servants coming about my back places, a-making love to
both the gells at once and keeping ‘em with their hands on their hips
listening to all manner o’ gossip when they should be down on their
knees a-scouring. If we’re to go to ruin, it shanna be wi’ having our
back kitchen turned into a public.”

“Well, Poyser,” said the squire, shifting his tactics and looking as if
he thought Mrs. Poyser had suddenly withdrawn from the proceedings and
left the room, “you can turn the Hollows into feeding-land. I can easily
make another arrangement about supplying my house. And I shall not
forget your readiness to accommodate your landlord as well as a
neighbour. I know you will be glad to have your lease renewed for three
years, when the present one expires; otherwise, I daresay Thurle, who
is a man of some capital, would be glad to take both the farms, as they
could be worked so well together. But I don’t want to part with an old
tenant like you.”

To be thrust out of the discussion in this way would have been enough to
complete Mrs. Poyser’s exasperation, even without the final threat.
Her husband, really alarmed at the possibility of their leaving the old
place where he had been bred and born--for he believed the old squire
had small spite enough for anything--was beginning a mild remonstrance
explanatory of the inconvenience he should find in having to buy and
sell more stock, with, “Well, sir, I think as it’s rether hard...” when
Mrs. Poyser burst in with the desperate determination to have her say
out this once, though it were to rain notices to quit and the only
shelter were the work-house.

“Then, sir, if I may speak--as, for all I’m a woman, and there’s folks
as thinks a woman’s fool enough to stan’ by an’ look on while the men
sign her soul away, I’ve a right to speak, for I make one quarter o’ the
rent, and save another quarter--I say, if Mr. Thurle’s so ready to take
farms under you, it’s a pity but what he should take this, and see if
he likes to live in a house wi’ all the plagues o’ Egypt in’t--wi’
the cellar full o’ water, and frogs and toads hoppin’ up the steps by
dozens--and the floors rotten, and the rats and mice gnawing every bit
o’ cheese, and runnin’ over our heads as we lie i’ bed till we expect
‘em to eat us up alive--as it’s a mercy they hanna eat the children long
ago. I should like to see if there’s another tenant besides Poyser as
‘ud put up wi’ never having a bit o’ repairs done till a place tumbles
down--and not then, on’y wi’ begging and praying and having to pay
half--and being strung up wi’ the rent as it’s much if he gets enough
out o’ the land to pay, for all he’s put his own money into the ground
beforehand. See if you’ll get a stranger to lead such a life here as
that: a maggot must be born i’ the rotten cheese to like it, I reckon.
You may run away from my words, sir,” continued Mrs. Poyser, following
the old squire beyond the door--for after the first moments of stunned
surprise he had got up, and, waving his hand towards her with a smile,
had walked out towards his pony. But it was impossible for him to get
away immediately, for John was walking the pony up and down the yard,
and was some distance from the causeway when his master beckoned.

“You may run away from my words, sir, and you may go spinnin’ underhand
ways o’ doing us a mischief, for you’ve got Old Harry to your friend,
though nobody else is, but I tell you for once as we’re not dumb
creatures to be abused and made money on by them as ha’ got the lash i’
their hands, for want o’ knowing how t’ undo the tackle. An’ if I’m th’
only one as speaks my mind, there’s plenty o’ the same way o’ thinking
i’ this parish and the next to ‘t, for your name’s no better than a
brimstone match in everybody’s nose--if it isna two-three old folks as
you think o’ saving your soul by giving ‘em a bit o’ flannel and a drop
o’ porridge. An’ you may be right i’ thinking it’ll take but little to
save your soul, for it’ll be the smallest savin’ y’ iver made, wi’ all
your scrapin’.”

There are occasions on which two servant-girls and a waggoner may be a
formidable audience, and as the squire rode away on his black pony, even
the gift of short-sightedness did not prevent him from being aware
that Molly and Nancy and Tim were grinning not far from him. Perhaps he
suspected that sour old John was grinning behind him--which was also
the fact. Meanwhile the bull-dog, the black-and-tan terrier, Alick’s
sheep-dog, and the gander hissing at a safe distance from the pony’s
heels carried out the idea of Mrs. Poyser’s solo in an impressive
quartet.

Mrs. Poyser, however, had no sooner seen the pony move off than she
turned round, gave the two hilarious damsels a look which drove them
into the back kitchen, and unspearing her knitting, began to knit again
with her usual rapidity as she re-entered the house.

“Thee’st done it now,” said Mr. Poyser, a little alarmed and uneasy, but
not without some triumphant amusement at his wife’s outbreak.

“Yes, I know I’ve done it,” said Mrs. Poyser; “but I’ve had my say out,
and I shall be th’ easier for’t all my life. There’s no pleasure i’
living if you’re to be corked up for ever, and only dribble your mind
out by the sly, like a leaky barrel. I shan’t repent saying what I
think, if I live to be as old as th’ old squire; and there’s little
likelihood--for it seems as if them as aren’t wanted here are th’ only
folks as aren’t wanted i’ th’ other world.”

“But thee wutna like moving from th’ old place, this Michaelmas
twelvemonth,” said Mr. Poyser, “and going into a strange parish, where
thee know’st nobody. It’ll be hard upon us both, and upo’ Father too.”

“Eh, it’s no use worreting; there’s plenty o’ things may happen between
this and Michaelmas twelvemonth. The captain may be master afore them,
for what we know,” said Mrs. Poyser, inclined to take an unusually
hopeful view of an embarrassment which had been brought about by her own
merit and not by other people’s fault.

“I’m none for worreting,” said Mr. Poyser, rising from his
three-cornered chair and walking slowly towards the door; “but I should
be loath to leave th’ old place, and the parish where I was bred and
born, and Father afore me. We should leave our roots behind us, I doubt,
and niver thrive again.”



Chapter XXXIII

More Links


THE barley was all carried at last, and the harvest suppers went by
without waiting for the dismal black crop of beans. The apples and
nuts were gathered and stored; the scent of whey departed from the
farm-houses, and the scent of brewing came in its stead. The woods
behind the Chase, and all the hedgerow trees, took on a solemn splendour
under the dark low-hanging skies. Michaelmas was come, with its fragrant
basketfuls of purple damsons, and its paler purple daisies, and its
lads and lasses leaving or seeking service and winding along between
the yellow hedges, with their bundles under their arms. But though
Michaelmas was come, Mr. Thurle, that desirable tenant, did not come to
the Chase Farm, and the old squire, after all, had been obliged to put
in a new bailiff. It was known throughout the two parishes that the
squire’s plan had been frustrated because the Poysers had refused to
be “put upon,” and Mrs. Poyser’s outbreak was discussed in all
the farm-houses with a zest which was only heightened by frequent
repetition. The news that “Bony” was come back from Egypt was
comparatively insipid, and the repulse of the French in Italy was
nothing to Mrs. Poyser’s repulse of the old squire. Mr. Irwine had heard
a version of it in every parishioner’s house, with the one exception of
the Chase. But since he had always, with marvellous skill, avoided any
quarrel with Mr. Donnithorne, he could not allow himself the pleasure
of laughing at the old gentleman’s discomfiture with any one besides his
mother, who declared that if she were rich she should like to allow Mrs.
Poyser a pension for life, and wanted to invite her to the parsonage
that she might hear an account of the scene from Mrs. Poyser’s own lips.

“No, no, Mother,” said Mr. Irwine; “it was a little bit of irregular
justice on Mrs. Poyser’s part, but a magistrate like me must not
countenance irregular justice. There must be no report spread that I
have taken notice of the quarrel, else I shall lose the little good
influence I have over the old man.”

“Well, I like that woman even better than her cream-cheeses,” said Mrs.
Irwine. “She has the spirit of three men, with that pale face of hers.
And she says such sharp things too.”

“Sharp! Yes, her tongue is like a new-set razor. She’s quite original
in her talk too; one of those untaught wits that help to stock a country
with proverbs. I told you that capital thing I heard her say about
Craig--that he was like a cock, who thought the sun had risen to hear
him crow. Now that’s an AEsop’s fable in a sentence.”

“But it will be a bad business if the old gentleman turns them out of
the farm next Michaelmas, eh?” said Mrs. Irwine.

“Oh, that must not be; and Poyser is such a good tenant that Donnithorne
is likely to think twice, and digest his spleen rather than turn them
out. But if he should give them notice at Lady Day, Arthur and I must
move heaven and earth to mollify him. Such old parishioners as they are
must not go.”

“Ah, there’s no knowing what may happen before Lady day,” said Mrs.
Irwine. “It struck me on Arthur’s birthday that the old man was a little
shaken: he’s eighty-three, you know. It’s really an unconscionable age.
It’s only women who have a right to live as long as that.”

“When they’ve got old-bachelor sons who would be forlorn without them,”
 said Mr. Irwine, laughing, and kissing his mother’s hand.

Mrs. Poyser, too, met her husband’s occasional forebodings of a notice
to quit with “There’s no knowing what may happen before Lady day”--one
of those undeniable general propositions which are usually intended to
convey a particular meaning very far from undeniable. But it is really
too hard upon human nature that it should be held a criminal offence to
imagine the death even of the king when he is turned eighty-three. It is
not to be believed that any but the dullest Britons can be good subjects
under that hard condition.

Apart from this foreboding, things went on much as usual in the Poyser
household. Mrs. Poyser thought she noticed a surprising improvement
in Hetty. To be sure, the girl got “closer tempered, and sometimes she
seemed as if there’d be no drawing a word from her with cart-ropes,”
 but she thought much less about her dress, and went after the work quite
eagerly, without any telling. And it was wonderful how she never wanted
to go out now--indeed, could hardly be persuaded to go; and she bore
her aunt’s putting a stop to her weekly lesson in fine-work at the Chase
without the least grumbling or pouting. It must be, after all, that she
had set her heart on Adam at last, and her sudden freak of wanting to
be a lady’s maid must have been caused by some little pique or
misunderstanding between them, which had passed by. For whenever Adam
came to the Hall Farm, Hetty seemed to be in better spirits and to talk
more than at other times, though she was almost sullen when Mr. Craig or
any other admirer happened to pay a visit there.

Adam himself watched her at first with trembling anxiety, which gave
way to surprise and delicious hope. Five days after delivering Arthur’s
letter, he had ventured to go to the Hall Farm again--not without
dread lest the sight of him might be painful to her. She was not in the
house-place when he entered, and he sat talking to Mr. and Mrs. Poyser
for a few minutes with a heavy fear on his heart that they might
presently tell him Hetty was ill. But by and by there came a light step
that he knew, and when Mrs. Poyser said, “Come, Hetty, where have you
been?” Adam was obliged to turn round, though he was afraid to see the
changed look there must be in her face. He almost started when he saw
her smiling as if she were pleased to see him--looking the same as ever
at a first glance, only that she had her cap on, which he had never seen
her in before when he came of an evening. Still, when he looked at
her again and again as she moved about or sat at her work, there was a
change: the cheeks were as pink as ever, and she smiled as much as she
had ever done of late, but there was something different in her eyes,
in the expression of her face, in all her movements, Adam
thought--something harder, older, less child-like. “Poor thing!” he
said to himself, “that’s allays likely. It’s because she’s had her first
heartache. But she’s got a spirit to bear up under it. Thank God for
that.”

As the weeks went by, and he saw her always looking pleased to see
him--turning up her lovely face towards him as if she meant him to
understand that she was glad for him to come--and going about her work
in the same equable way, making no sign of sorrow, he began to believe
that her feeling towards Arthur must have been much slighter than he had
imagined in his first indignation and alarm, and that she had been able
to think of her girlish fancy that Arthur was in love with her and would
marry her as a folly of which she was timely cured. And it perhaps was,
as he had sometimes in his more cheerful moments hoped it would be--her
heart was really turning with all the more warmth towards the man she
knew to have a serious love for her.

Possibly you think that Adam was not at all sagacious in his
interpretations, and that it was altogether extremely unbecoming in a
sensible man to behave as he did--falling in love with a girl who really
had nothing more than her beauty to recommend her, attributing imaginary
virtues to her, and even condescending to cleave to her after she had
fallen in love with another man, waiting for her kind looks as a patient
trembling dog waits for his master’s eye to be turned upon him. But in
so complex a thing as human nature, we must consider, it is hard to find
rules without exceptions. Of course, I know that, as a rule, sensible
men fall in love with the most sensible women of their acquaintance,
see through all the pretty deceits of coquettish beauty, never imagine
themselves loved when they are not loved, cease loving on all
proper occasions, and marry the woman most fitted for them in every
respect--indeed, so as to compel the approbation of all the maiden
ladies in their neighbourhood. But even to this rule an exception will
occur now and then in the lapse of centuries, and my friend Adam was
one. For my own part, however, I respect him none the less--nay, I think
the deep love he had for that sweet, rounded, blossom-like, dark-eyed
Hetty, of whose inward self he was really very ignorant, came out of the
very strength of his nature and not out of any inconsistent weakness. Is
it any weakness, pray, to be wrought on by exquisite music? To feel its
wondrous harmonies searching the subtlest windings of your soul, the
delicate fibres of life where no memory can penetrate, and binding
together your whole being past and present in one unspeakable vibration,
melting you in one moment with all the tenderness, all the love that has
been scattered through the toilsome years, concentrating in one
emotion of heroic courage or resignation all the hard-learnt lessons of
self-renouncing sympathy, blending your present joy with past sorrow and
your present sorrow with all your past joy? If not, then neither is it
a weakness to be so wrought upon by the exquisite curves of a woman’s
cheek and neck and arms, by the liquid depths of her beseeching eyes, or
the sweet childish pout of her lips. For the beauty of a lovely woman is
like music: what can one say more? Beauty has an expression beyond and
far above the one woman’s soul that it clothes, as the words of genius
have a wider meaning than the thought that prompted them. It is more
than a woman’s love that moves us in a woman’s eyes--it seems to be a
far-off mighty love that has come near to us, and made speech for itself
there; the rounded neck, the dimpled arm, move us by something more
than their prettiness--by their close kinship with all we have known
of tenderness and peace. The noblest nature sees the most of this
impersonal expression in beauty (it is needless to say that there are
gentlemen with whiskers dyed and undyed who see none of it whatever),
and for this reason, the noblest nature is often the most blinded to
the character of the one woman’s soul that the beauty clothes. Whence, I
fear, the tragedy of human life is likely to continue for a long time
to come, in spite of mental philosophers who are ready with the best
receipts for avoiding all mistakes of the kind.

Our good Adam had no fine words into which he could put his feeling for
Hetty: he could not disguise mystery in this way with the appearance of
knowledge; he called his love frankly a mystery, as you have heard him.
He only knew that the sight and memory of her moved him deeply, touching
the spring of all love and tenderness, all faith and courage within
him. How could he imagine narrowness, selfishness, hardness in her?
He created the mind he believed in out of his own, which was large,
unselfish, tender.

The hopes he felt about Hetty softened a little his feeling towards
Arthur. Surely his attentions to Hetty must have been of a slight kind;
they were altogether wrong, and such as no man in Arthur’s position
ought to have allowed himself, but they must have had an air of
playfulness about them, which had probably blinded him to their danger
and had prevented them from laying any strong hold on Hetty’s heart. As
the new promise of happiness rose for Adam, his indignation and jealousy
began to die out. Hetty was not made unhappy; he almost believed that
she liked him best; and the thought sometimes crossed his mind that the
friendship which had once seemed dead for ever might revive in the days
to come, and he would not have to say “good-bye” to the grand old woods,
but would like them better because they were Arthur’s. For this new
promise of happiness following so quickly on the shock of pain had an
intoxicating effect on the sober Adam, who had all his life been used to
much hardship and moderate hope. Was he really going to have an easy
lot after all? It seemed so, for at the beginning of November, Jonathan
Burge, finding it impossible to replace Adam, had at last made up his
mind to offer him a share in the business, without further condition
than that he should continue to give his energies to it and renounce
all thought of having a separate business of his own. Son-in-law or no
son-in-law, Adam had made himself too necessary to be parted with,
and his headwork was so much more important to Burge than his skill
in handicraft that his having the management of the woods made little
difference in the value of his services; and as to the bargains about
the squire’s timber, it would be easy to call in a third person. Adam
saw here an opening into a broadening path of prosperous work such as he
had thought of with ambitious longing ever since he was a lad: he might
come to build a bridge, or a town hall, or a factory, for he had always
said to himself that Jonathan Burge’s building business was like an
acorn, which might be the mother of a great tree. So he gave his hand
to Burge on that bargain, and went home with his mind full of happy
visions, in which (my refined reader will perhaps be shocked when I
say it) the image of Hetty hovered, and smiled over plans for seasoning
timber at a trifling expense, calculations as to the cheapening of
bricks per thousand by water-carriage, and a favourite scheme for the
strengthening of roofs and walls with a peculiar form of iron girder.
What then? Adam’s enthusiasm lay in these things; and our love is
inwrought in our enthusiasm as electricity is inwrought in the air,
exalting its power by a subtle presence.

Adam would be able to take a separate house now, and provide for his
mother in the old one; his prospects would justify his marrying very
soon, and if Dinah consented to have Seth, their mother would perhaps
be more contented to live apart from Adam. But he told himself that he
would not be hasty--he would not try Hetty’s feeling for him until it
had had time to grow strong and firm. However, tomorrow, after church,
he would go to the Hall Farm and tell them the news. Mr. Poyser, he
knew, would like it better than a five-pound note, and he should see if
Hetty’s eyes brightened at it. The months would be short with all he had
to fill his mind, and this foolish eagerness which had come over him of
late must not hurry him into any premature words. Yet when he got home
and told his mother the good news, and ate his supper, while she sat
by almost crying for joy and wanting him to eat twice as much as usual
because of this good-luck, he could not help preparing her gently for
the coming change by talking of the old house being too small for them
all to go on living in it always.



Chapter XXXIV

The Betrothal


IT was a dry Sunday, and really a pleasant day for the 2d of November.
There was no sunshine, but the clouds were high, and the wind was so
still that the yellow leaves which fluttered down from the hedgerow elms
must have fallen from pure decay. Nevertheless, Mrs. Poyser did not go
to church, for she had taken a cold too serious to be neglected; only
two winters ago she had been laid up for weeks with a cold; and since
his wife did not go to church, Mr. Poyser considered that on the whole
it would be as well for him to stay away too and “keep her company.” He
could perhaps have given no precise form to the reasons that determined
this conclusion, but it is well known to all experienced minds that our
firmest convictions are often dependent on subtle impressions for which
words are quite too coarse a medium. However it was, no one from the
Poyser family went to church that afternoon except Hetty and the boys;
yet Adam was bold enough to join them after church, and say that he
would walk home with them, though all the way through the village he
appeared to be chiefly occupied with Marty and Tommy, telling them about
the squirrels in Binton Coppice, and promising to take them there some
day. But when they came to the fields he said to the boys, “Now, then,
which is the stoutest walker? Him as gets to th’ home-gate first shall
be the first to go with me to Binton Coppice on the donkey. But Tommy
must have the start up to the next stile, because he’s the smallest.”

Adam had never behaved so much like a determined lover before. As soon
as the boys had both set off, he looked down at Hetty and said, “Won’t
you hang on my arm, Hetty?” in a pleading tone, as if he had already
asked her and she had refused. Hetty looked up at him smilingly and put
her round arm through his in a moment. It was nothing to her, putting
her arm through Adam’s, but she knew he cared a great deal about having
her arm through his, and she wished him to care. Her heart beat no
faster, and she looked at the half-bare hedgerows and the ploughed field
with the same sense of oppressive dulness as before. But Adam scarcely
felt that he was walking. He thought Hetty must know that he was
pressing her arm a little--a very little. Words rushed to his lips that
he dared not utter--that he had made up his mind not to utter yet--and
so he was silent for the length of that field. The calm patience
with which he had once waited for Hetty’s love, content only with her
presence and the thought of the future, had forsaken him since that
terrible shock nearly three months ago. The agitations of jealousy had
given a new restlessness to his passion--had made fear and uncertainty
too hard almost to bear. But though he might not speak to Hetty of his
love, he would tell her about his new prospects and see if she would be
pleased. So when he was enough master of himself to talk, he said, “I’m
going to tell your uncle some news that’ll surprise him, Hetty; and I
think he’ll be glad to hear it too.”

“What’s that?” Hetty said indifferently.

“Why, Mr. Burge has offered me a share in his business, and I’m going to
take it.”

There was a change in Hetty’s face, certainly not produced by any
agreeable impression from this news. In fact she felt a momentary
annoyance and alarm, for she had so often heard it hinted by her uncle
that Adam might have Mary Burge and a share in the business any day,
if he liked, that she associated the two objects now, and the thought
immediately occurred that perhaps Adam had given her up because of
what had happened lately, and had turned towards Mary Burge. With that
thought, and before she had time to remember any reasons why it could
not be true, came a new sense of forsakenness and disappointment. The
one thing--the one person--her mind had rested on in its dull weariness,
had slipped away from her, and peevish misery filled her eyes with
tears. She was looking on the ground, but Adam saw her face, saw the
tears, and before he had finished saying, “Hetty, dear Hetty, what
are you crying for?” his eager rapid thought had flown through all the
causes conceivable to him, and had at last alighted on half the true
one. Hetty thought he was going to marry Mary Burge--she didn’t like him
to marry--perhaps she didn’t like him to marry any one but herself? All
caution was swept away--all reason for it was gone, and Adam could feel
nothing but trembling joy. He leaned towards her and took her hand, as
he said:

“I could afford to be married now, Hetty--I could make a wife
comfortable; but I shall never want to be married if you won’t have me.”

Hetty looked up at him and smiled through her tears, as she had done to
Arthur that first evening in the wood, when she had thought he was not
coming, and yet he came. It was a feebler relief, a feebler triumph she
felt now, but the great dark eyes and the sweet lips were as beautiful
as ever, perhaps more beautiful, for there was a more luxuriant
womanliness about Hetty of late. Adam could hardly believe in the
happiness of that moment. His right hand held her left, and he pressed
her arm close against his heart as he leaned down towards her.

“Do you really love me, Hetty? Will you be my own wife, to love and take
care of as long as I live?”

Hetty did not speak, but Adam’s face was very close to hers, and she
put up her round cheek against his, like a kitten. She wanted to be
caressed--she wanted to feel as if Arthur were with her again.

Adam cared for no words after that, and they hardly spoke through the
rest of the walk. He only said, “I may tell your uncle and aunt, mayn’t
I, Hetty?” and she said, “Yes.”

The red fire-light on the hearth at the Hall Farm shone on joyful faces
that evening, when Hetty was gone upstairs and Adam took the opportunity
of telling Mr. and Mrs. Poyser and the grandfather that he saw his way
to maintaining a wife now, and that Hetty had consented to have him.

“I hope you have no objections against me for her husband,” said Adam;
“I’m a poor man as yet, but she shall want nothing as I can work for.”

“Objections?” said Mr. Poyser, while the grandfather leaned forward and
brought out his long “Nay, nay.” “What objections can we ha’ to you,
lad? Never mind your being poorish as yet; there’s money in your
head-piece as there’s money i’ the sown field, but it must ha’ time.
You’n got enough to begin on, and we can do a deal tow’rt the bit o’
furniture you’ll want. Thee’st got feathers and linen to spare--plenty,
eh?”

This question was of course addressed to Mrs. Poyser, who was wrapped up
in a warm shawl and was too hoarse to speak with her usual facility.
At first she only nodded emphatically, but she was presently unable to
resist the temptation to be more explicit.

“It ud be a poor tale if I hadna feathers and linen,” she said,
hoarsely, “when I never sell a fowl but what’s plucked, and the wheel’s
a-going every day o’ the week.”

“Come, my wench,” said Mr. Poyser, when Hetty came down, “come and kiss
us, and let us wish you luck.”

Hetty went very quietly and kissed the big good-natured man.

“There!” he said, patting her on the back, “go and kiss your aunt and
your grandfather. I’m as wishful t’ have you settled well as if you was
my own daughter; and so’s your aunt, I’ll be bound, for she’s done by
you this seven ‘ear, Hetty, as if you’d been her own. Come, come, now,”
 he went on, becoming jocose, as soon as Hetty had kissed her aunt and
the old man, “Adam wants a kiss too, I’ll warrant, and he’s a right to
one now.”

Hetty turned away, smiling, towards her empty chair.

“Come, Adam, then, take one,” persisted Mr. Poyser, “else y’ arena half
a man.”

Adam got up, blushing like a small maiden--great strong fellow as he
was--and, putting his arm round Hetty stooped down and gently kissed her
lips.

It was a pretty scene in the red fire-light; for there were no
candles--why should there be, when the fire was so bright and was
reflected from all the pewter and the polished oak? No one wanted to
work on a Sunday evening. Even Hetty felt something like contentment
in the midst of all this love. Adam’s attachment to her, Adam’s caress,
stirred no passion in her, were no longer enough to satisfy her vanity,
but they were the best her life offered her now--they promised her some
change.

There was a great deal of discussion before Adam went away, about the
possibility of his finding a house that would do for him to settle in.
No house was empty except the one next to Will Maskery’s in the village,
and that was too small for Adam now. Mr. Poyser insisted that the best
plan would be for Seth and his mother to move and leave Adam in the old
home, which might be enlarged after a while, for there was plenty of
space in the woodyard and garden; but Adam objected to turning his
mother out.

“Well, well,” said Mr. Poyser at last, “we needna fix everything
to-night. We must take time to consider. You canna think o’ getting
married afore Easter. I’m not for long courtships, but there must be a
bit o’ time to make things comfortable.”

“Aye, to be sure,” said Mrs. Poyser, in a hoarse whisper; “Christian
folks can’t be married like cuckoos, I reckon.”

“I’m a bit daunted, though,” said Mr. Poyser, “when I think as we may
have notice to quit, and belike be forced to take a farm twenty mile
off.”

“Eh,” said the old man, staring at the floor and lifting his hands up
and down, while his arms rested on the elbows of his chair, “it’s a poor
tale if I mun leave th’ ould spot an be buried in a strange parish. An’
you’ll happen ha’ double rates to pay,” he added, looking up at his son.

“Well, thee mustna fret beforehand, father,” said Martin the younger.
“Happen the captain ‘ull come home and make our peace wi’ th’ old
squire. I build upo’ that, for I know the captain ‘ll see folks righted
if he can.”



Chapter XXXV

The Hidden Dread


IT was a busy time for Adam--the time between the beginning of November
and the beginning of February, and he could see little of Hetty, except
on Sundays. But a happy time, nevertheless, for it was taking him nearer
and nearer to March, when they were to be married, and all the little
preparations for their new housekeeping marked the progress towards the
longed-for day. Two new rooms had been “run up” to the old house, for
his mother and Seth were to live with them after all. Lisbeth had cried
so piteously at the thought of leaving Adam that he had gone to Hetty
and asked her if, for the love of him, she would put up with his
mother’s ways and consent to live with her. To his great delight, Hetty
said, “Yes; I’d as soon she lived with us as not.” Hetty’s mind was
oppressed at that moment with a worse difficulty than poor Lisbeth’s
ways; she could not care about them. So Adam was consoled for the
disappointment he had felt when Seth had come back from his visit to
Snowfield and said “it was no use--Dinah’s heart wasna turned towards
marrying.” For when he told his mother that Hetty was willing they
should all live together and there was no more need of them to think of
parting, she said, in a more contented tone than he had heard her speak
in since it had been settled that he was to be married, “Eh, my lad,
I’ll be as still as th’ ould tabby, an’ ne’er want to do aught but
th’ offal work, as she wonna like t’ do. An’ then we needna part the
platters an’ things, as ha’ stood on the shelf together sin’ afore thee
wast born.”

There was only one cloud that now and then came across Adam’s sunshine:
Hetty seemed unhappy sometimes. But to all his anxious, tender
questions, she replied with an assurance that she was quite contented
and wished nothing different; and the next time he saw her she was more
lively than usual. It might be that she was a little overdone with work
and anxiety now, for soon after Christmas Mrs. Poyser had taken another
cold, which had brought on inflammation, and this illness had confined
her to her room all through January. Hetty had to manage everything
downstairs, and half-supply Molly’s place too, while that good damsel
waited on her mistress, and she seemed to throw herself so entirely into
her new functions, working with a grave steadiness which was new in her,
that Mr. Poyser often told Adam she was wanting to show him what a
good housekeeper he would have; but he “doubted the lass was o’erdoing
it--she must have a bit o’ rest when her aunt could come downstairs.”

This desirable event of Mrs. Poyser’s coming downstairs happened in the
early part of February, when some mild weather thawed the last patch of
snow on the Binton Hills. On one of these days, soon after her aunt came
down, Hetty went to Treddleston to buy some of the wedding things which
were wanting, and which Mrs. Poyser had scolded her for neglecting,
observing that she supposed “it was because they were not for th’
outside, else she’d ha’ bought ‘em fast enough.”

It was about ten o’clock when Hetty set off, and the slight hoar-frost
that had whitened the hedges in the early morning had disappeared as
the sun mounted the cloudless sky. Bright February days have a stronger
charm of hope about them than any other days in the year. One likes
to pause in the mild rays of the sun, and look over the gates at the
patient plough-horses turning at the end of the furrow, and think that
the beautiful year is all before one. The birds seem to feel just the
same: their notes are as clear as the clear air. There are no leaves on
the trees and hedgerows, but how green all the grassy fields are! And
the dark purplish brown of the ploughed earth and of the bare branches
is beautiful too. What a glad world this looks like, as one drives or
rides along the valleys and over the hills! I have often thought so
when, in foreign countries, where the fields and woods have looked to me
like our English Loamshire--the rich land tilled with just as much care,
the woods rolling down the gentle slopes to the green meadows--I have
come on something by the roadside which has reminded me that I am not
in Loamshire: an image of a great agony--the agony of the Cross. It has
stood perhaps by the clustering apple-blossoms, or in the broad sunshine
by the cornfield, or at a turning by the wood where a clear brook was
gurgling below; and surely, if there came a traveller to this world who
knew nothing of the story of man’s life upon it, this image of agony
would seem to him strangely out of place in the midst of this joyous
nature. He would not know that hidden behind the apple-blossoms, or
among the golden corn, or under the shrouding boughs of the wood, there
might be a human heart beating heavily with anguish--perhaps a young
blooming girl, not knowing where to turn for refuge from swift-advancing
shame, understanding no more of this life of ours than a foolish lost
lamb wandering farther and farther in the nightfall on the lonely heath,
yet tasting the bitterest of life’s bitterness.

Such things are sometimes hidden among the sunny fields and behind the
blossoming orchards; and the sound of the gurgling brook, if you came
close to one spot behind a small bush, would be mingled for your ear
with a despairing human sob. No wonder man’s religion has much sorrow in
it: no wonder he needs a suffering God.

Hetty, in her red cloak and warm bonnet, with her basket in her hand, is
turning towards a gate by the side of the Treddleston road, but not that
she may have a more lingering enjoyment of the sunshine and think
with hope of the long unfolding year. She hardly knows that the sun is
shining; and for weeks, now, when she has hoped at all, it has been for
something at which she herself trembles and shudders. She only wants to
be out of the high-road, that she may walk slowly and not care how her
face looks, as she dwells on wretched thoughts; and through this gate
she can get into a field-path behind the wide thick hedgerows. Her great
dark eyes wander blankly over the fields like the eyes of one who is
desolate, homeless, unloved, not the promised bride of a brave tender
man. But there are no tears in them: her tears were all wept away in
the weary night, before she went to sleep. At the next stile the pathway
branches off: there are two roads before her--one along by the hedgerow,
which will by and by lead her into the road again, the other across
the fields, which will take her much farther out of the way into the
Scantlands, low shrouded pastures where she will see nobody. She chooses
this and begins to walk a little faster, as if she had suddenly thought
of an object towards which it was worth while to hasten. Soon she is in
the Scantlands, where the grassy land slopes gradually downwards, and
she leaves the level ground to follow the slope. Farther on there is a
clump of trees on the low ground, and she is making her way towards it.
No, it is not a clump of trees, but a dark shrouded pool, so full with
the wintry rains that the under boughs of the elder-bushes lie low
beneath the water. She sits down on the grassy bank, against the
stooping stem of the great oak that hangs over the dark pool. She has
thought of this pool often in the nights of the month that has just gone
by, and now at last she is come to see it. She clasps her hands round
her knees, and leans forward, and looks earnestly at it, as if trying to
guess what sort of bed it would make for her young round limbs.

No, she has not courage to jump into that cold watery bed, and if
she had, they might find her--they might find out why she had drowned
herself. There is but one thing left to her: she must go away, go where
they can’t find her.

After the first on-coming of her great dread, some weeks after her
betrothal to Adam, she had waited and waited, in the blind vague hope
that something would happen to set her free from her terror; but she
could wait no longer. All the force of her nature had been concentrated
on the one effort of concealment, and she had shrunk with irresistible
dread from every course that could tend towards a betrayal of her
miserable secret. Whenever the thought of writing to Arthur had occurred
to her, she had rejected it. He could do nothing for her that would
shelter her from discovery and scorn among the relatives and neighbours
who once more made all her world, now her airy dream had vanished. Her
imagination no longer saw happiness with Arthur, for he could do
nothing that would satisfy or soothe her pride. No, something else
would happen--something must happen--to set her free from this dread. In
young, childish, ignorant souls there is constantly this blind trust in
some unshapen chance: it is as hard to a boy or girl to believe that
a great wretchedness will actually befall them as to believe that they
will die.

But now necessity was pressing hard upon her--now the time of her
marriage was close at hand--she could no longer rest in this blind
trust. She must run away; she must hide herself where no familiar eyes
could detect her; and then the terror of wandering out into the world,
of which she knew nothing, made the possibility of going to Arthur a
thought which brought some comfort with it. She felt so helpless now, so
unable to fashion the future for herself, that the prospect of throwing
herself on him had a relief in it which was stronger than her pride. As
she sat by the pool and shuddered at the dark cold water, the hope that
he would receive her tenderly--that he would care for her and think for
her--was like a sense of lulling warmth, that made her for the moment
indifferent to everything else; and she began now to think of nothing
but the scheme by which she should get away.

She had had a letter from Dinah lately, full of kind words about the
coming marriage, which she had heard of from Seth; and when Hetty had
read this letter aloud to her uncle, he had said, “I wish Dinah ‘ud come
again now, for she’d be a comfort to your aunt when you’re gone. What
do you think, my wench, o’ going to see her as soon as you can be spared
and persuading her to come back wi’ you? You might happen persuade her
wi’ telling her as her aunt wants her, for all she writes o’ not being
able to come.” Hetty had not liked the thought of going to Snowfield,
and felt no longing to see Dinah, so she only said, “It’s so far off,
Uncle.” But now she thought this proposed visit would serve as a pretext
for going away. She would tell her aunt when she got home again that she
should like the change of going to Snowfield for a week or ten days. And
then, when she got to Stoniton, where nobody knew her, she would ask
for the coach that would take her on the way to Windsor. Arthur was at
Windsor, and she would go to him.

As soon as Hetty had determined on this scheme, she rose from the
grassy bank of the pool, took up her basket, and went on her way to
Treddleston, for she must buy the wedding things she had come out for,
though she would never want them. She must be careful not to raise any
suspicion that she was going to run away.

Mrs. Poyser was quite agreeably surprised that Hetty wished to go and
see Dinah and try to bring her back to stay over the wedding. The sooner
she went the better, since the weather was pleasant now; and Adam, when
he came in the evening, said, if Hetty could set off to-morrow, he
would make time to go with her to Treddleston and see her safe into the
Stoniton coach.

“I wish I could go with you and take care of you, Hetty,” he said, the
next morning, leaning in at the coach door; “but you won’t stay much
beyond a week--the time ‘ull seem long.”

He was looking at her fondly, and his strong hand held hers in its
grasp. Hetty felt a sense of protection in his presence--she was used
to it now: if she could have had the past undone and known no other love
than her quiet liking for Adam! The tears rose as she gave him the last
look.

“God bless her for loving me,” said Adam, as he went on his way to work
again, with Gyp at his heels.

But Hetty’s tears were not for Adam--not for the anguish that would come
upon him when he found she was gone from him for ever. They were for the
misery of her own lot, which took her away from this brave tender man
who offered up his whole life to her, and threw her, a poor helpless
suppliant, on the man who would think it a misfortune that she was
obliged to cling to him.

At three o’clock that day, when Hetty was on the coach that was to take
her, they said, to Leicester--part of the long, long way to Windsor--she
felt dimly that she might be travelling all this weary journey towards
the beginning of new misery.

Yet Arthur was at Windsor; he would surely not be angry with her. If he
did not mind about her as he used to do, he had promised to be good to
her.





Book Five




Chapter XXXVI

The Journey of Hope


A LONG, lonely journey, with sadness in the heart; away from the
familiar to the strange: that is a hard and dreary thing even to the
rich, the strong, the instructed; a hard thing, even when we are called
by duty, not urged by dread.

What was it then to Hetty? With her poor narrow thoughts, no longer
melting into vague hopes, but pressed upon by the chill of
definite fear, repeating again and again the same small round of
memories--shaping again and again the same childish, doubtful images
of what was to come--seeing nothing in this wide world but the little
history of her own pleasures and pains; with so little money in her
pocket, and the way so long and difficult. Unless she could afford
always to go in the coaches--and she felt sure she could not, for the
journey to Stoniton was more expensive than she had expected--it was
plain that she must trust to carriers’ carts or slow waggons; and what
a time it would be before she could get to the end of her journey! The
burly old coachman from Oakbourne, seeing such a pretty young woman
among the outside passengers, had invited her to come and sit beside
him; and feeling that it became him as a man and a coachman to open the
dialogue with a joke, he applied himself as soon as they were off the
stones to the elaboration of one suitable in all respects. After many
cuts with his whip and glances at Hetty out of the corner of his eye,
he lifted his lips above the edge of his wrapper and said, “He’s pretty
nigh six foot, I’ll be bound, isna he, now?”

“Who?” said Hetty, rather startled.

“Why, the sweetheart as you’ve left behind, or else him as you’re goin’
arter--which is it?”

Hetty felt her face flushing and then turning pale. She thought this
coachman must know something about her. He must know Adam, and might
tell him where she was gone, for it is difficult to country people to
believe that those who make a figure in their own parish are not known
everywhere else, and it was equally difficult to Hetty to understand
that chance words could happen to apply closely to her circumstances.
She was too frightened to speak.

“Hegh, hegh!” said the coachman, seeing that his joke was not so
gratifying as he had expected, “you munna take it too ser’ous; if he’s
behaved ill, get another. Such a pretty lass as you can get a sweetheart
any day.”

Hetty’s fear was allayed by and by, when she found that the coachman
made no further allusion to her personal concerns; but it still had the
effect of preventing her from asking him what were the places on the
road to Windsor. She told him she was only going a little way out of
Stoniton, and when she got down at the inn where the coach stopped, she
hastened away with her basket to another part of the town. When she
had formed her plan of going to Windsor, she had not foreseen any
difficulties except that of getting away, and after she had overcome
this by proposing the visit to Dinah, her thoughts flew to the meeting
with Arthur and the question how he would behave to her--not resting on
any probable incidents of the journey. She was too entirely ignorant
of traveling to imagine any of its details, and with all her store
of money--her three guineas--in her pocket, she thought herself amply
provided. It was not until she found how much it cost her to get to
Stoniton that she began to be alarmed about the journey, and then, for
the first time, she felt her ignorance as to the places that must be
passed on her way. Oppressed with this new alarm, she walked along the
grim Stoniton streets, and at last turned into a shabby little inn,
where she hoped to get a cheap lodging for the night. Here she asked
the landlord if he could tell her what places she must go to, to get to
Windsor.

“Well, I can’t rightly say. Windsor must be pretty nigh London, for it’s
where the king lives,” was the answer. “Anyhow, you’d best go t’ Ashby
next--that’s south’ard. But there’s as many places from here to London
as there’s houses in Stoniton, by what I can make out. I’ve never been
no traveller myself. But how comes a lone young woman like you to be
thinking o’ taking such a journey as that?”

“I’m going to my brother--he’s a soldier at Windsor,” said Hetty,
frightened at the landlord’s questioning look. “I can’t afford to go
by the coach; do you think there’s a cart goes toward Ashby in the
morning?”

“Yes, there may be carts if anybody knowed where they started from; but
you might run over the town before you found out. You’d best set off and
walk, and trust to summat overtaking you.”

Every word sank like lead on Hetty’s spirits; she saw the journey
stretch bit by bit before her now. Even to get to Ashby seemed a hard
thing: it might take the day, for what she knew, and that was nothing
to the rest of the journey. But it must be done--she must get to Arthur.
Oh, how she yearned to be again with somebody who would care for her!
She who had never got up in the morning without the certainty of seeing
familiar faces, people on whom she had an acknowledged claim; whose
farthest journey had been to Rosseter on the pillion with her uncle;
whose thoughts had always been taking holiday in dreams of pleasure,
because all the business of her life was managed for her--this
kittenlike Hetty, who till a few months ago had never felt any other
grief than that of envying Mary Burge a new ribbon, or being girded
at by her aunt for neglecting Totty, must now make her toilsome way in
loneliness, her peaceful home left behind for ever, and nothing but a
tremulous hope of distant refuge before her. Now for the first time, as
she lay down to-night in the strange hard bed, she felt that her home
had been a happy one, that her uncle had been very good to her, that
her quiet lot at Hayslope among the things and people she knew, with her
little pride in her one best gown and bonnet, and nothing to hide from
any one, was what she would like to wake up to as a reality, and find
that all the feverish life she had known besides was a short nightmare.
She thought of all she had left behind with yearning regret for her own
sake. Her own misery filled her heart--there was no room in it for other
people’s sorrow. And yet, before the cruel letter, Arthur had been so
tender and loving. The memory of that had still a charm for her, though
it was no more than a soothing draught that just made pain bearable.
For Hetty could conceive no other existence for herself in future than
a hidden one, and a hidden life, even with love, would have had no
delights for her; still less a life mingled with shame. She knew no
romances, and had only a feeble share in the feelings which are the
source of romance, so that well-read ladies may find it difficult to
understand her state of mind. She was too ignorant of everything beyond
the simple notions and habits in which she had been brought up to have
any more definite idea of her probable future than that Arthur would
take care of her somehow, and shelter her from anger and scorn. He would
not marry her and make her a lady; and apart from that she could think
of nothing he could give towards which she looked with longing and
ambition.

The next morning she rose early, and taking only some milk and bread
for her breakfast, set out to walk on the road towards Ashby, under a
leaden-coloured sky, with a narrowing streak of yellow, like a departing
hope, on the edge of the horizon. Now in her faintness of heart at the
length and difficulty of her journey, she was most of all afraid of
spending her money, and becoming so destitute that she would have to ask
people’s charity; for Hettv had the pride not only of a proud nature
but of a proud class--the class that pays the most poor-rates, and
most shudders at the idea of profiting by a poor-rate. It had not yet
occurred to her that she might get money for her locket and earrings
which she carried with her, and she applied all her small arithmetic
and knowledge of prices to calculating how many meals and how many rides
were contained in her two guineas, and the odd shillings, which had
a melancholy look, as if they were the pale ashes of the other
bright-flaming coin.

For the first few miles out of Stoniton, she walked on bravely, always
fixing on some tree or gate or projecting bush at the most distant
visible point in the road as a goal, and feeling a faint joy when she
had reached it. But when she came to the fourth milestone, the first she
had happened to notice among the long grass by the roadside, and read
that she was still only four miles beyond Stoniton, her courage sank.
She had come only this little way, and yet felt tired, and almost hungry
again in the keen morning air; for though Hetty was accustomed to much
movement and exertion indoors, she was not used to long walks which
produced quite a different sort of fatigue from that of household
activity. As she was looking at the milestone she felt some drops
falling on her face--it was beginning to rain. Here was a new trouble
which had not entered into her sad thoughts before, and quite weighed
down by this sudden addition to her burden, she sat down on the step of
a stile and began to sob hysterically. The beginning of hardship is like
the first taste of bitter food--it seems for a moment unbearable; yet,
if there is nothing else to satisfy our hunger, we take another bite
and find it possible to go on. When Hetty recovered from her burst of
weeping, she rallied her fainting courage: it was raining, and she
must try to get on to a village where she might find rest and shelter.
Presently, as she walked on wearily, she heard the rumbling of heavy
wheels behind her; a covered waggon was coming, creeping slowly along
with a slouching driver cracking his whip beside the horses. She waited
for it, thinking that if the waggoner were not a very sour-looking man,
she would ask him to take her up. As the waggon approached her, the
driver had fallen behind, but there was something in the front of the
big vehicle which encouraged her. At any previous moment in her life
she would not have noticed it, but now, the new susceptibility that
suffering had awakened in her caused this object to impress her
strongly. It was only a small white-and-liver-coloured spaniel which
sat on the front ledge of the waggon, with large timid eyes, and an
incessant trembling in the body, such as you may have seen in some of
these small creatures. Hetty cared little for animals, as you know,
but at this moment she felt as if the helpless timid creature had some
fellowship with her, and without being quite aware of the reason, she
was less doubtful about speaking to the driver, who now came forward--a
large ruddy man, with a sack over his shoulders, by way of scarf or
mantle.

“Could you take me up in your waggon, if you’re going towards Ashby?”
 said Hetty. “I’ll pay you for it.”

“Aw,” said the big fellow, with that slowly dawning smile which belongs
to heavy faces, “I can take y’ up fawst enough wi’out bein’ paid for’t
if you dooant mind lyin’ a bit closish a-top o’ the wool-packs. Where do
you coom from? And what do you want at Ashby?”

“I come from Stoniton. I’m going a long way--to Windsor.”

“What! Arter some service, or what?”

“Going to my brother--he’s a soldier there.”

“Well, I’m going no furder nor Leicester--and fur enough too--but I’ll
take you, if you dooant mind being a bit long on the road. Th’ hosses
wooant feel YOUR weight no more nor they feel the little doog there, as
I puck up on the road a fortni’t agoo. He war lost, I b’lieve, an’s been
all of a tremble iver sin’. Come, gi’ us your basket an’ come behind and
let me put y’ in.”

To lie on the wool-packs, with a cranny left between the curtains of the
awning to let in the air, was luxury to Hetty now, and she half-slept
away the hours till the driver came to ask her if she wanted to get down
and have “some victual”; he himself was going to eat his dinner at this
“public.” Late at night they reached Leicester, and so this second day
of Hetty’s journey was past. She had spent no money except what she
had paid for her food, but she felt that this slow journeying would be
intolerable for her another day, and in the morning she found her way
to a coach-office to ask about the road to Windsor, and see if it would
cost her too much to go part of the distance by coach again. Yes! The
distance was too great--the coaches were too dear--she must give them
up; but the elderly clerk at the office, touched by her pretty anxious
face, wrote down for her the names of the chief places she must pass
through. This was the only comfort she got in Leicester, for the men
stared at her as she went along the street, and for the first time in
her life Hetty wished no one would look at her. She set out walking
again; but this day she was fortunate, for she was soon overtaken by
a carrier’s cart which carried her to Hinckley, and by the help of a
return chaise, with a drunken postilion--who frightened her by driving
like Jehu the son of Nimshi, and shouting hilarious remarks at her,
twisting himself backwards on his saddle--she was before night in the
heart of woody Warwickshire: but still almost a hundred miles from
Windsor, they told her. Oh what a large world it was, and what hard work
for her to find her way in it! She went by mistake to Stratford-on-Avon,
finding Stratford set down in her list of places, and then she was told
she had come a long way out of the right road. It was not till the fifth
day that she got to Stony Stratford. That seems but a slight journey as
you look at the map, or remember your own pleasant travels to and from
the meadowy banks of the Avon. But how wearily long it was to Hetty!
It seemed to her as if this country of flat fields, and hedgerows, and
dotted houses, and villages, and market-towns--all so much alike to her
indifferent eyes--must have no end, and she must go on wandering among
them for ever, waiting tired at toll-gates for some cart to come, and
then finding the cart went only a little way--a very little way--to the
miller’s a mile off perhaps; and she hated going into the public houses,
where she must go to get food and ask questions, because there were
always men lounging there, who stared at her and joked her rudely. Her
body was very weary too with these days of new fatigue and anxiety; they
had made her look more pale and worn than all the time of hidden dread
she had gone through at home. When at last she reached Stony Stratford,
her impatience and weariness had become too strong for her economical
caution; she determined to take the coach for the rest of the way,
though it should cost her all her remaining money. She would need
nothing at Windsor but to find Arthur. When she had paid the fare for
the last coach, she had only a shilling; and as she got down at the
sign of the Green Man in Windsor at twelve o’clock in the middle of the
seventh day, hungry and faint, the coachman came up, and begged her
to “remember him.” She put her hand in her pocket and took out the
shilling, but the tears came with the sense of exhaustion and the
thought that she was giving away her last means of getting food, which
she really required before she could go in search of Arthur. As she
held out the shilling, she lifted up her dark tear-filled eyes to the
coachman’s face and said, “Can you give me back sixpence?”

“No, no,” he said, gruffly, “never mind--put the shilling up again.”

The landlord of the Green Man had stood near enough to witness this
scene, and he was a man whose abundant feeding served to keep his
good nature, as well as his person, in high condition. And that lovely
tearful face of Hetty’s would have found out the sensitive fibre in most
men.

“Come, young woman, come in,” he said, “and have adrop o’ something;
you’re pretty well knocked up, I can see that.”

He took her into the bar and said to his wife, “Here, missis, take this
young woman into the parlour; she’s a little overcome”--for Hetty’s
tears were falling fast. They were merely hysterical tears: she thought
she had no reason for weeping now, and was vexed that she was too weak
and tired to help it. She was at Windsor at last, not far from Arthur.

She looked with eager, hungry eyes at the bread and meat and beer that
the landlady brought her, and for some minutes she forgot everything
else in the delicious sensations of satisfying hunger and recovering
from exhaustion. The landlady sat opposite to her as she ate, and looked
at her earnestly. No wonder: Hetty had thrown off her bonnet, and her
curls had fallen down. Her face was all the more touching in its
youth and beauty because of its weary look, and the good woman’s eyes
presently wandered to her figure, which in her hurried dressing on her
journey she had taken no pains to conceal; moreover, the stranger’s eye
detects what the familiar unsuspecting eye leaves unnoticed.

“Why, you’re not very fit for travelling,” she said, glancing while she
spoke at Hetty’s ringless hand. “Have you come far?”

“Yes,” said Hetty, roused by this question to exert more self-command,
and feeling the better for the food she had taken. “I’ve come a good
long way, and it’s very tiring. But I’m better now. Could you tell me
which way to go to this place?” Here Hetty took from her pocket a bit
of paper: it was the end of Arthur’s letter on which he had written his
address.

While she was speaking, the landlord had come in and had begun to look
at her as earnestly as his wife had done. He took up the piece of paper
which Hetty handed across the table, and read the address.

“Why, what do you want at this house?” he said. It is in the nature of
innkeepers and all men who have no pressing business of their own to ask
as many questions as possible before giving any information.

“I want to see a gentleman as is there,” said Hetty.

“But there’s no gentleman there,” returned the landlord. “It’s shut
up--been shut up this fortnight. What gentleman is it you want? Perhaps
I can let you know where to find him.”

“It’s Captain Donnithorne,” said Hetty tremulously, her heart beginning
to beat painfully at this disappointment of her hope that she should
find Arthur at once.

“Captain Donnithorne? Stop a bit,” said the landlord, slowly. “Was he
in the Loamshire Militia? A tall young officer with a fairish skin and
reddish whiskers--and had a servant by the name o’ Pym?”

“Oh yes,” said Hetty; “you know him--where is he?”

“A fine sight o’ miles away from here. The Loamshire Militia’s gone to
Ireland; it’s been gone this fortnight.”

“Look there! She’s fainting,” said the landlady, hastening to support
Hetty, who had lost her miserable consciousness and looked like a
beautiful corpse. They carried her to the sofa and loosened her dress.

“Here’s a bad business, I suspect,” said the landlord, as he brought in
some water.

“Ah, it’s plain enough what sort of business it is,” said the wife.
“She’s not a common flaunting dratchell, I can see that. She looks like
a respectable country girl, and she comes from a good way off, to judge
by her tongue. She talks something like that ostler we had that come
from the north. He was as honest a fellow as we ever had about the
house--they’re all honest folks in the north.”

“I never saw a prettier young woman in my life,” said the husband.
“She’s like a pictur in a shop-winder. It goes to one’s ‘eart to look at
her.”

“It ‘ud have been a good deal better for her if she’d been uglier and
had more conduct,” said the landlady, who on any charitable construction
must have been supposed to have more “conduct” than beauty. “But she’s
coming to again. Fetch a drop more water.”



Chapter XXXVII

The Journey in Despair


HETTY was too ill through the rest of that day for any questions to be
addressed to her--too ill even to think with any distinctness of the
evils that were to come. She only felt that all her hope was crushed,
and that instead of having found a refuge she had only reached the
borders of a new wilderness where no goal lay before her. The sensations
of bodily sickness, in a comfortable bed, and with the tendance of the
good-natured landlady, made a sort of respite for her; such a respite as
there is in the faint weariness which obliges a man to throw himself on
the sand instead of toiling onward under the scorching sun.

But when sleep and rest had brought back the strength necessary for the
keenness of mental suffering--when she lay the next morning looking at
the growing light which was like a cruel task-master returning to urge
from her a fresh round of hated hopeless labour--she began to think what
course she must take, to remember that all her money was gone, to
look at the prospect of further wandering among strangers with the new
clearness shed on it by the experience of her journey to Windsor. But
which way could she turn? It was impossible for her to enter into any
service, even if she could obtain it. There was nothing but immediate
beggary before her. She thought of a young woman who had been found
against the church wall at Hayslope one Sunday, nearly dead with cold
and hunger--a tiny infant in her arms. The woman was rescued and taken
to the parish. “The parish!” You can perhaps hardly understand the
effect of that word on a mind like Hetty’s, brought up among people who
were somewhat hard in their feelings even towards poverty, who lived
among the fields, and had little pity for want and rags as a cruel
inevitable fate such as they sometimes seem in cities, but held them
a mark of idleness and vice--and it was idleness and vice that brought
burdens on the parish. To Hetty the “parish” was next to the prison
in obloquy, and to ask anything of strangers--to beg--lay in the same
far-off hideous region of intolerable shame that Hetty had all her life
thought it impossible she could ever come near. But now the remembrance
of that wretched woman whom she had seen herself, on her way from
church, being carried into Joshua Rann’s, came back upon her with the
new terrible sense that there was very little now to divide HER from
the same lot. And the dread of bodily hardship mingled with the dread
of shame; for Hetty had the luxurious nature of a round soft-coated pet
animal.

How she yearned to be back in her safe home again, cherished and cared
for as she had always been! Her aunt’s scolding about trifles would have
been music to her ears now; she longed for it; she used to hear it in a
time when she had only trifles to hide. Could she be the same Hetty that
used to make up the butter in the dairy with the Guelder roses peeping
in at the window--she, a runaway whom her friends would not open their
doors to again, lying in this strange bed, with the knowledge that
she had no money to pay for what she received, and must offer those
strangers some of the clothes in her basket? It was then she thought of
her locket and ear-rings, and seeing her pocket lie near, she reached it
and spread the contents on the bed before her. There were the locket and
ear-rings in the little velvet-lined boxes, and with them there was a
beautiful silver thimble which Adam had bought her, the words “Remember
me” making the ornament of the border; a steel purse, with her one
shilling in it; and a small red-leather case, fastening with a strap.
Those beautiful little ear-rings, with their delicate pearls and garnet,
that she had tried in her ears with such longing in the bright sunshine
on the 30th of July! She had no longing to put them in her ears now: her
head with its dark rings of hair lay back languidly on the pillow, and
the sadness that rested about her brow and eyes was something too hard
for regretful memory. Yet she put her hands up to her ears: it was
because there were some thin gold rings in them, which were also worth
a little money. Yes, she could surely get some money for her ornaments:
those Arthur had given her must have cost a great deal of money. The
landlord and landlady had been good to her; perhaps they would help her
to get the money for these things.

But this money would not keep her long. What should she do when it was
gone? Where should she go? The horrible thought of want and beggary
drove her once to think she would go back to her uncle and aunt and ask
them to forgive her and have pity on her. But she shrank from that idea
again, as she might have shrunk from scorching metal. She could never
endure that shame before her uncle and aunt, before Mary Burge, and the
servants at the Chase, and the people at Broxton, and everybody who knew
her. They should never know what had happened to her. What could she do?
She would go away from Windsor--travel again as she had done the last
week, and get among the flat green fields with the high hedges round
them, where nobody could see her or know her; and there, perhaps, when
there was nothing else she could do, she should get courage to drown
herself in some pond like that in the Scantlands. Yes, she would get
away from Windsor as soon as possible: she didn’t like these people at
the inn to know about her, to know that she had come to look for Captain
Donnithorne. She must think of some reason to tell them why she had
asked for him.

With this thought she began to put the things back into her pocket,
meaning to get up and dress before the landlady came to her. She had her
hand on the red-leather case, when it occurred to her that there might
be something in this case which she had forgotten--something worth
selling; for without knowing what she should do with her life, she
craved the means of living as long as possible; and when we desire
eagerly to find something, we are apt to search for it in hopeless
places. No, there was nothing but common needles and pins, and dried
tulip-petals between the paper leaves where she had written down her
little money-accounts. But on one of these leaves there was a name,
which, often as she had seen it before, now flashed on Hetty’s mind like
a newly discovered message. The name was--Dinah Morris, Snowfield. There
was a text above it, written, as well as the name, by Dinah’s own hand
with a little pencil, one evening that they were sitting together and
Hetty happened to have the red case lying open before her. Hetty did not
read the text now: she was only arrested by the name. Now, for the first
time, she remembered without indifference the affectionate kindness
Dinah had shown her, and those words of Dinah in the bed-chamber--that
Hetty must think of her as a friend in trouble. Suppose she were to go
to Dinah, and ask her to help her? Dinah did not think about things as
other people did. She was a mystery to Hetty, but Hetty knew she was
always kind. She couldn’t imagine Dinah’s face turning away from her in
dark reproof or scorn, Dinah’s voice willingly speaking ill of her, or
rejoicing in her misery as a punishment. Dinah did not seem to belong to
that world of Hetty’s, whose glance she dreaded like scorching fire. But
even to her Hetty shrank from beseeching and confession. She could not
prevail on herself to say, “I will go to Dinah”: she only thought of
that as a possible alternative, if she had not courage for death.

The good landlady was amazed when she saw Hetty come downstairs soon
after herself, neatly dressed, and looking resolutely self-possessed.
Hetty told her she was quite well this morning. She had only been very
tired and overcome with her journey, for she had come a long way to ask
about her brother, who had run away, and they thought he was gone for a
soldier, and Captain Donnithorne might know, for he had been very
kind to her brother once. It was a lame story, and the landlady looked
doubtfully at Hetty as she told it; but there was a resolute air of
self-reliance about her this morning, so different from the helpless
prostration of yesterday, that the landlady hardly knew how to make a
remark that might seem like prying into other people’s affairs. She only
invited her to sit down to breakfast with them, and in the course of it
Hetty brought out her ear-rings and locket, and asked the landlord if
he could help her to get money for them. Her journey, she said, had cost
her much more than she expected, and now she had no money to get back to
her friends, which she wanted to do at once.

It was not the first time the landlady had seen the ornaments, for she
had examined the contents of Hetty’s pocket yesterday, and she and her
husband had discussed the fact of a country girl having these beautiful
things, with a stronger conviction than ever that Hetty had been
miserably deluded by the fine young officer.

“Well,” said the landlord, when Hetty had spread the precious trifles
before him, “we might take ‘em to the jeweller’s shop, for there’s one
not far off; but Lord bless you, they wouldn’t give you a quarter o’
what the things are worth. And you wouldn’t like to part with ‘em?” he
added, looking at her inquiringly.

“Oh, I don’t mind,” said Hetty, hastily, “so as I can get money to go
back.”

“And they might think the things were stolen, as you wanted to sell
‘em,” he went on, “for it isn’t usual for a young woman like you to have
fine jew’llery like that.”

The blood rushed to Hetty’s face with anger. “I belong to respectable
folks,” she said; “I’m not a thief.”

“No, that you aren’t, I’ll be bound,” said the landlady; “and you’d no
call to say that,” looking indignantly at her husband. “The things were
gev to her: that’s plain enough to be seen.”

“I didn’t mean as I thought so,” said the husband, apologetically,
“but I said it was what the jeweller might think, and so he wouldn’t be
offering much money for ‘em.”

“Well,” said the wife, “suppose you were to advance some money on the
things yourself, and then if she liked to redeem ‘em when she got home,
she could. But if we heard nothing from her after two months, we might
do as we liked with ‘em.”

I will not say that in this accommodating proposition the landlady had
no regard whatever to the possible reward of her good nature in the
ultimate possession of the locket and ear-rings: indeed, the effect they
would have in that case on the mind of the grocer’s wife had presented
itself with remarkable vividness to her rapid imagination. The landlord
took up the ornaments and pushed out his lips in a meditative manner.
He wished Hetty well, doubtless; but pray, how many of your well-wishers
would decline to make a little gain out of you? Your landlady is
sincerely affected at parting with you, respects you highly, and will
really rejoice if any one else is generous to you; but at the same
time she hands you a bill by which she gains as high a percentage as
possible.

“How much money do you want to get home with, young woman?” said the
well-wisher, at length.

“Three guineas,” answered Hetty, fixing on the sum she set out with, for
want of any other standard, and afraid of asking too much.

“Well, I’ve no objections to advance you three guineas,” said the
landlord; “and if you like to send it me back and get the jewellery
again, you can, you know. The Green Man isn’t going to run away.”

“Oh yes, I’ll be very glad if you’ll give me that,” said Hetty, relieved
at the thought that she would not have to go to the jeweller’s and be
stared at and questioned.

“But if you want the things again, you’ll write before long,” said the
landlady, “because when two months are up, we shall make up our minds as
you don’t want ‘em.”

“Yes,” said Hetty indifferently.

The husband and wife were equally content with this arrangement. The
husband thought, if the ornaments were not redeemed, he could make a
good thing of it by taking them to London and selling them. The wife
thought she would coax the good man into letting her keep them. And
they were accommodating Hetty, poor thing--a pretty, respectable-looking
young woman, apparently in a sad case. They declined to take anything
for her food and bed: she was quite welcome. And at eleven o’clock Hetty
said “Good-bye” to them with the same quiet, resolute air she had worn
all the morning, mounting the coach that was to take her twenty miles
back along the way she had come.

There is a strength of self-possession which is the sign that the
last hope has departed. Despair no more leans on others than perfect
contentment, and in despair pride ceases to be counteracted by the sense
of dependence.

Hetty felt that no one could deliver her from the evils that would make
life hateful to her; and no one, she said to herself, should ever know
her misery and humiliation. No; she would not confess even to Dinah. She
would wander out of sight, and drown herself where her body would never
be found, and no one should know what had become of her.

When she got off this coach, she began to walk again, and take cheap
rides in carts, and get cheap meals, going on and on without distinct
purpose, yet strangely, by some fascination, taking the way she had
come, though she was determined not to go back to her own country.
Perhaps it was because she had fixed her mind on the grassy Warwickshire
fields, with the bushy tree-studded hedgerows that made a hiding-place
even in this leafless season. She went more slowly than she came, often
getting over the stiles and sitting for hours under the hedgerows,
looking before her with blank, beautiful eyes; fancying herself at the
edge of a hidden pool, low down, like that in the Scantlands; wondering
if it were very painful to be drowned, and if there would be anything
worse after death than what she dreaded in life. Religious doctrines had
taken no hold on Hetty’s mind. She was one of those numerous people
who have had godfathers and godmothers, learned their catechism, been
confirmed, and gone to church every Sunday, and yet, for any practical
result of strength in life, or trust in death, have never appropriated a
single Christian idea or Christian feeling. You would misunderstand
her thoughts during these wretched days, if you imagined that they were
influenced either by religious fears or religious hopes.

She chose to go to Stratford-on-Avon again, where she had gone before by
mistake, for she remembered some grassy fields on her former way towards
it--fields among which she thought she might find just the sort of pool
she had in her mind. Yet she took care of her money still; she carried
her basket; death seemed still a long way off, and life was so strong
in her. She craved food and rest--she hastened towards them at the very
moment she was picturing to herself the bank from which she would leap
towards death. It was already five days since she had left Windsor, for
she had wandered about, always avoiding speech or questioning looks,
and recovering her air of proud self-dependence whenever she was under
observation, choosing her decent lodging at night, and dressing herself
neatly in the morning, and setting off on her way steadily, or remaining
under shelter if it rained, as if she had a happy life to cherish.

And yet, even in her most self-conscious moments, the face was sadly
different from that which had smiled at itself in the old specked glass,
or smiled at others when they glanced at it admiringly. A hard and even
fierce look had come in the eyes, though their lashes were as long as
ever, and they had all their dark brightness. And the cheek was never
dimpled with smiles now. It was the same rounded, pouting, childish
prettiness, but with all love and belief in love departed from it--the
sadder for its beauty, like that wondrous Medusa-face, with the
passionate, passionless lips.

At last she was among the fields she had been dreaming of, on a long
narrow pathway leading towards a wood. If there should be a pool in that
wood! It would be better hidden than one in the fields. No, it was not a
wood, only a wild brake, where there had once been gravel-pits, leaving
mounds and hollows studded with brushwood and small trees. She roamed up
and down, thinking there was perhaps a pool in every hollow before she
came to it, till her limbs were weary, and she sat down to rest. The
afternoon was far advanced, and the leaden sky was darkening, as if the
sun were setting behind it. After a little while Hetty started up again,
feeling that darkness would soon come on; and she must put off finding
the pool till to-morrow, and make her way to some shelter for the night.
She had quite lost her way in the fields, and might as well go in one
direction as another, for aught she knew. She walked through field after
field, and no village, no house was in sight; but there, at the corner
of this pasture, there was a break in the hedges; the land seemed to
dip down a little, and two trees leaned towards each other across the
opening. Hetty’s heart gave a great beat as she thought there must be
a pool there. She walked towards it heavily over the tufted grass, with
pale lips and a sense of trembling. It was as if the thing were come in
spite of herself, instead of being the object of her search.

There it was, black under the darkening sky: no motion, no sound near.
She set down her basket, and then sank down herself on the grass,
trembling. The pool had its wintry depth now: by the time it got
shallow, as she remembered the pools did at Hayslope, in the summer,
no one could find out that it was her body. But then there was her
basket--she must hide that too. She must throw it into the water--make
it heavy with stones first, and then throw it in. She got up to look
about for stones, and soon brought five or six, which she laid down
beside her basket, and then sat down again. There was no need to
hurry--there was all the night to drown herself in. She sat leaning her
elbow on the basket. She was weary, hungry. There were some buns in her
basket--three, which she had supplied herself with at the place where
she ate her dinner. She took them out now and ate them eagerly, and then
sat still again, looking at the pool. The soothed sensation that came
over her from the satisfaction of her hunger, and this fixed dreamy
attitude, brought on drowsiness, and presently her head sank down on her
knees. She was fast asleep.

When she awoke it was deep night, and she felt chill. She was frightened
at this darkness--frightened at the long night before her. If she could
but throw herself into the water! No, not yet. She began to walk about
that she might get warm again, as if she would have more resolution
then. Oh how long the time was in that darkness! The bright hearth and
the warmth and the voices of home, the secure uprising and lying down,
the familiar fields, the familiar people, the Sundays and holidays with
their simple joys of dress and feasting--all the sweets of her young
life rushed before her now, and she seemed to be stretching her arms
towards them across a great gulf. She set her teeth when she thought of
Arthur. She cursed him, without knowing what her cursing would do. She
wished he too might know desolation, and cold, and a life of shame that
he dared not end by death.

The horror of this cold, and darkness, and solitude--out of all human
reach--became greater every long minute. It was almost as if she were
dead already, and knew that she was dead, and longed to get back to life
again. But no: she was alive still; she had not taken the dreadful
leap. She felt a strange contradictory wretchedness and exultation:
wretchedness, that she did not dare to face death; exultation, that she
was still in life--that she might yet know light and warmth again. She
walked backwards and forwards to warm herself, beginning to discern
something of the objects around her, as her eyes became accustomed to
the night--the darker line of the hedge, the rapid motion of some living
creature--perhaps a field-mouse--rushing across the grass. She no longer
felt as if the darkness hedged her in. She thought she could walk back
across the field, and get over the stile; and then, in the very next
field, she thought she remembered there was a hovel of furze near a
sheepfold. If she could get into that hovel, she would be warmer. She
could pass the night there, for that was what Alick did at Hayslope
in lambing-time. The thought of this hovel brought the energy of a new
hope. She took up her basket and walked across the field, but it was
some time before she got in the right direction for the stile. The
exercise and the occupation of finding the stile were a stimulus to her,
however, and lightened the horror of the darkness and solitude. There
were sheep in the next field, and she startled a group as she set down
her basket and got over the stile; and the sound of their movement
comforted her, for it assured her that her impression was right--this
was the field where she had seen the hovel, for it was the field where
the sheep were. Right on along the path, and she would get to it. She
reached the opposite gate, and felt her way along its rails and the
rails of the sheep-fold, till her hand encountered the pricking of the
gorsy wall. Delicious sensation! She had found the shelter. She groped
her way, touching the prickly gorse, to the door, and pushed it open.
It was an ill-smelling close place, but warm, and there was straw on
the ground. Hetty sank down on the straw with a sense of escape. Tears
came--she had never shed tears before since she left Windsor--tears and
sobs of hysterical joy that she had still hold of life, that she
was still on the familiar earth, with the sheep near her. The very
consciousness of her own limbs was a delight to her: she turned up her
sleeves, and kissed her arms with the passionate love of life. Soon
warmth and weariness lulled her in the midst of her sobs, and she fell
continually into dozing, fancying herself at the brink of the pool
again--fancying that she had jumped into the water, and then awaking
with a start, and wondering where she was. But at last deep dreamless
sleep came; her head, guarded by her bonnet, found a pillow against
the gorsy wall, and the poor soul, driven to and fro between two equal
terrors, found the one relief that was possible to it--the relief of
unconsciousness.

Alas! That relief seems to end the moment it has begun. It seemed to
Hetty as if those dozen dreams had only passed into another dream--that
she was in the hovel, and her aunt was standing over her with a candle
in her hand. She trembled under her aunt’s glance, and opened her eyes.
There was no candle, but there was light in the hovel--the light of
early morning through the open door. And there was a face looking down
on her; but it was an unknown face, belonging to an elderly man in a
smock-frock.

“Why, what do you do here, young woman?” the man said roughly.

Hetty trembled still worse under this real fear and shame than she had
done in her momentary dream under her aunt’s glance. She felt that she
was like a beggar already--found sleeping in that place. But in spite of
her trembling, she was so eager to account to the man for her presence
here, that she found words at once.

“I lost my way,” she said. “I’m travelling--north’ard, and I got away
from the road into the fields, and was overtaken by the dark. Will you
tell me the way to the nearest village?”

She got up as she was speaking, and put her hands to her bonnet to
adjust it, and then laid hold of her basket.

The man looked at her with a slow bovine gaze, without giving her any
answer, for some seconds. Then he turned away and walked towards the
door of the hovel, but it was not till he got there that he stood still,
and, turning his shoulder half-round towards her, said, “Aw, I can show
you the way to Norton, if you like. But what do you do gettin’ out o’
the highroad?” he added, with a tone of gruff reproof. “Y’ull be gettin’
into mischief, if you dooant mind.”

“Yes,” said Hetty, “I won’t do it again. I’ll keep in the road, if
you’ll be so good as show me how to get to it.”

“Why dooant you keep where there’s a finger-poasses an’ folks to ax the
way on?” the man said, still more gruffly. “Anybody ‘ud think you was a
wild woman, an’ look at yer.”

Hetty was frightened at this gruff old man, and still more at this last
suggestion that she looked like a wild woman. As she followed him out of
the hovel she thought she would give him a sixpence for telling her the
way, and then he would not suppose she was wild. As he stopped to point
out the road to her, she put her hand in her pocket to get the six-pence
ready, and when he was turning away, without saying good-morning,
she held it out to him and said, “Thank you; will you please to take
something for your trouble?”

He looked slowly at the sixpence, and then said, “I want none o’ your
money. You’d better take care on’t, else you’ll get it stool from yer,
if you go trapesin’ about the fields like a mad woman a-thatway.”

The man left her without further speech, and Hetty held on her way.
Another day had risen, and she must wander on. It was no use to think of
drowning herself--she could not do it, at least while she had money left
to buy food and strength to journey on. But the incident on her waking
this morning heightened her dread of that time when her money would be
all gone; she would have to sell her basket and clothes then, and she
would really look like a beggar or a wild woman, as the man had said.
The passionate joy in life she had felt in the night, after escaping
from the brink of the black cold death in the pool, was gone now.
Life now, by the morning light, with the impression of that man’s hard
wondering look at her, was as full of dread as death--it was worse; it
was a dread to which she felt chained, from which she shrank and shrank
as she did from the black pool, and yet could find no refuge from it.

She took out her money from her purse, and looked at it. She had still
two-and-twenty shillings; it would serve her for many days more, or it
would help her to get on faster to Stonyshire, within reach of
Dinah. The thought of Dinah urged itself more strongly now, since the
experience of the night had driven her shuddering imagination away from
the pool. If it had been only going to Dinah--if nobody besides Dinah
would ever know--Hetty could have made up her mind to go to her. The
soft voice, the pitying eyes, would have drawn her. But afterwards the
other people must know, and she could no more rush on that shame than
she could rush on death.

She must wander on and on, and wait for a lower depth of despair to give
her courage. Perhaps death would come to her, for she was getting less
and less able to bear the day’s weariness. And yet--such is the strange
action of our souls, drawing us by a lurking desire towards the very
ends we dread--Hetty, when she set out again from Norton, asked the
straightest road northwards towards Stonyshire, and kept it all that
day.

Poor wandering Hetty, with the rounded childish face and the hard,
unloving, despairing soul looking out of it--with the narrow heart
and narrow thoughts, no room in them for any sorrows but her own, and
tasting that sorrow with the more intense bitterness! My heart bleeds
for her as I see her toiling along on her weary feet, or seated in
a cart, with her eyes fixed vacantly on the road before her, never
thinking or caring whither it tends, till hunger comes and makes her
desire that a village may be near.

What will be the end, the end of her objectless wandering, apart from
all love, caring for human beings only through her pride, clinging to
life only as the hunted wounded brute clings to it?

God preserve you and me from being the beginners of such misery!



Chapter XXXVIII

The Quest


THE first ten days after Hetty’s departure passed as quietly as any
other days with the family at the Hall Farm, and with Adam at his daily
work. They had expected Hetty to stay away a week or ten days at least,
perhaps a little longer if Dinah came back with her, because there might
then be something to detain them at Snowfield. But when a fortnight had
passed they began to feel a little surprise that Hetty did not return;
she must surely have found it pleasanter to be with Dinah than any one
could have supposed. Adam, for his part, was getting very impatient
to see her, and he resolved that, if she did not appear the next day
(Saturday), he would set out on Sunday morning to fetch her. There
was no coach on a Sunday, but by setting out before it was light, and
perhaps getting a lift in a cart by the way, he would arrive pretty
early at Snowfield, and bring back Hetty the next day--Dinah too, if she
were coming. It was quite time Hetty came home, and he would afford to
lose his Monday for the sake of bringing her.

His project was quite approved at the Farm when he went there on
Saturday evening. Mrs. Poyser desired him emphatically not to come back
without Hetty, for she had been quite too long away, considering the
things she had to get ready by the middle of March, and a week was
surely enough for any one to go out for their health. As for Dinah, Mrs.
Poyser had small hope of their bringing her, unless they could make her
believe the folks at Hayslope were twice as miserable as the folks at
Snowfield. “Though,” said Mrs. Poyser, by way of conclusion, “you might
tell her she’s got but one aunt left, and SHE’S wasted pretty nigh to
a shadder; and we shall p’rhaps all be gone twenty mile farther off her
next Michaelmas, and shall die o’ broken hearts among strange folks, and
leave the children fatherless and motherless.”

“Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, who certainly had the air of a man
perfectly heart-whole, “it isna so bad as that. Thee’t looking rarely
now, and getting flesh every day. But I’d be glad for Dinah t’ come, for
she’d help thee wi’ the little uns: they took t’ her wonderful.”

So at daybreak, on Sunday, Adam set off. Seth went with him the first
mile or two, for the thought of Snowfield and the possibility that Dinah
might come again made him restless, and the walk with Adam in the cold
morning air, both in their best clothes, helped to give him a sense of
Sunday calm. It was the last morning in February, with a low grey sky,
and a slight hoar-frost on the green border of the road and on the black
hedges. They heard the gurgling of the full brooklet hurrying down the
hill, and the faint twittering of the early birds. For they walked in
silence, though with a pleased sense of companionship.

“Good-bye, lad,” said Adam, laying his hand on Seth’s shoulder and
looking at him affectionately as they were about to part. “I wish thee
wast going all the way wi’ me, and as happy as I am.”

“I’m content, Addy, I’m content,” said Seth cheerfully. “I’ll be an old
bachelor, belike, and make a fuss wi’ thy children.”

The’y turned away from each other, and Seth walked leisurely homeward,
mentally repeating one of his favourite hymns--he was very fond of
hymns:

     Dark and cheerless is the morn
     Unaccompanied by thee:
     Joyless is the day’s return
     Till thy mercy’s beams I see:
     Till thou inward light impart,
     Glad my eyes and warm my heart.

     Visit, then, this soul of mine,
     Pierce the gloom of sin and grief--
     Fill me, Radiancy Divine,
     Scatter all my unbelief.
     More and more thyself display,
     Shining to the perfect day.

Adam walked much faster, and any one coming along the Oakbourne road
at sunrise that morning must have had a pleasant sight in this tall
broad-chested man, striding along with a carriage as upright and firm
as any soldier’s, glancing with keen glad eyes at the dark-blue hills as
they began to show themselves on his way. Seldom in Adam’s life had his
face been so free from any cloud of anxiety as it was this morning; and
this freedom from care, as is usual with constructive practical minds
like his, made him all the more observant of the objects round him
and all the more ready to gather suggestions from them towards his
own favourite plans and ingenious contrivances. His happy love--the
knowledge that his steps were carrying him nearer and nearer to Hetty,
who was so soon to be his--was to his thoughts what the sweet morning
air was to his sensations: it gave him a consciousness of well-being
that made activity delightful. Every now and then there was a rush of
more intense feeling towards her, which chased away other images than
Hetty; and along with that would come a wondering thankfulness that
all this happiness was given to him--that this life of ours had such
sweetness in it. For Adam had a devout mind, though he was perhaps
rather impatient of devout words, and his tenderness lay very close
to his reverence, so that the one could hardly be stirred without the
other. But after feeling had welled up and poured itself out in this
way, busy thought would come back with the greater vigour; and this
morning it was intent on schemes by which the roads might be improved
that were so imperfect all through the country, and on picturing all
the benefits that might come from the exertions of a single country
gentleman, if he would set himself to getting the roads made good in his
own district.

It seemed a very short walk, the ten miles to Oakbourne, that pretty
town within sight of the blue hills, where he break-fasted. After
this, the country grew barer and barer: no more rolling woods, no more
wide-branching trees near frequent homesteads, no more bushy hedgerows,
but greystone walls intersecting the meagre pastures, and dismal
wide-scattered greystone houses on broken lands where mines had been and
were no longer. “A hungry land,” said Adam to himself. “I’d rather go
south’ard, where they say it’s as flat as a table, than come to live
here; though if Dinah likes to live in a country where she can be the
most comfort to folks, she’s i’ the right to live o’ this side; for she
must look as if she’d come straight from heaven, like th’ angels in the
desert, to strengthen them as ha’ got nothing t’ eat.” And when at last
he came in sight of Snowfield, he thought it looked like a town that was
“fellow to the country,” though the stream through the valley where the
great mill stood gave a pleasant greenness to the lower fields. The town
lay, grim, stony, and unsheltered, up the side of a steep hill, and Adam
did not go forward to it at present, for Seth had told him where to find
Dinah. It was at a thatched cottage outside the town, a little way from
the mill--an old cottage, standing sideways towards the road, with a
little bit of potato-ground before it. Here Dinah lodged with an elderly
couple; and if she and Hetty happened to be out, Adam could learn where
they were gone, or when they would be at home again. Dinah might be out
on some preaching errand, and perhaps she would have left Hetty at home.
Adam could not help hoping this, and as he recognized the cottage by the
roadside before him, there shone out in his face that involuntary smile
which belongs to the expectation of a near joy.

He hurried his step along the narrow causeway, and rapped at the door.
It was opened by a very clean old woman, with a slow palsied shake of
the head.

“Is Dinah Morris at home?” said Adam.

“Eh?...no,” said the old woman, looking up at this tall stranger with
a wonder that made her slower of speech than usual. “Will you please to
come in?” she added, retiring from the door, as if recollecting herself.
“Why, ye’re brother to the young man as come afore, arena ye?”

“Yes,” said Adam, entering. “That was Seth Bede. I’m his brother Adam.
He told me to give his respects to you and your good master.”

“Aye, the same t’ him. He was a gracious young man. An’ ye feature him,
on’y ye’re darker. Sit ye down i’ th’ arm-chair. My man isna come home
from meeting.”

Adam sat down patiently, not liking to hurry the shaking old woman with
questions, but looking eagerly towards the narrow twisting stairs in one
corner, for he thought it was possible Hetty might have heard his voice
and would come down them.

“So you’re come to see Dinah Morris?” said the old woman, standing
opposite to him. “An’ you didn’ know she was away from home, then?”

“No,” said Adam, “but I thought it likely she might be away, seeing as
it’s Sunday. But the other young woman--is she at home, or gone along
with Dinah?”

The old woman looked at Adam with a bewildered air.

“Gone along wi’ her?” she said. “Eh, Dinah’s gone to Leeds, a big town
ye may ha’ heared on, where there’s a many o’ the Lord’s people. She’s
been gone sin’ Friday was a fortnight: they sent her the money for her
journey. You may see her room here,” she went on, opening a door and not
noticing the effect of her words on Adam. He rose and followed her, and
darted an eager glance into the little room with its narrow bed, the
portrait of Wesley on the wall, and the few books lying on the large
Bible. He had had an irrational hope that Hetty might be there. He could
not speak in the first moment after seeing that the room was empty; an
undefined fear had seized him--something had happened to Hetty on the
journey. Still the old woman was so slow of speech and apprehension,
that Hetty might be at Snowfield after all.

“It’s a pity ye didna know,” she said. “Have ye come from your own
country o’ purpose to see her?”

“But Hetty--Hetty Sorrel,” said Adam, abruptly; “Where is she?”

“I know nobody by that name,” said the old woman, wonderingly. “Is it
anybody ye’ve heared on at Snowfield?”

“Did there come no young woman here--very young and pretty--Friday was a
fortnight, to see Dinah Morris?”

“Nay; I’n seen no young woman.”

“Think; are you quite sure? A girl, eighteen years old, with dark eyes
and dark curly hair, and a red cloak on, and a basket on her arm? You
couldn’t forget her if you saw her.”

“Nay; Friday was a fortnight--it was the day as Dinah went away--there
come nobody. There’s ne’er been nobody asking for her till you come, for
the folks about know as she’s gone. Eh dear, eh dear, is there summat
the matter?”

The old woman had seen the ghastly look of fear in Adam’s face. But he
was not stunned or confounded: he was thinking eagerly where he could
inquire about Hetty.

“Yes; a young woman started from our country to see Dinah, Friday was a
fortnight. I came to fetch her back. I’m afraid something has happened
to her. I can’t stop. Good-bye.”

He hastened out of the cottage, and the old woman followed him to the
gate, watching him sadly with her shaking head as he almost ran towards
the town. He was going to inquire at the place where the Oakbourne coach
stopped.

No! No young woman like Hetty had been seen there. Had any accident
happened to the coach a fortnight ago? No. And there was no coach to
take him back to Oakbourne that day. Well, he would walk: he couldn’t
stay here, in wretched inaction. But the innkeeper, seeing that Adam was
in great anxiety, and entering into this new incident with the eagerness
of a man who passes a great deal of time with his hands in his pockets
looking into an obstinately monotonous street, offered to take him back
to Oakbourne in his own “taxed cart” this very evening. It was not five
o’clock; there was plenty of time for Adam to take a meal and yet to get
to Oakbourne before ten o’clock. The innkeeper declared that he really
wanted to go to Oakbourne, and might as well go to-night; he should have
all Monday before him then. Adam, after making an ineffectual attempt
to eat, put the food in his pocket, and, drinking a draught of ale,
declared himself ready to set off. As they approached the cottage, it
occurred to him that he would do well to learn from the old woman
where Dinah was to be found in Leeds: if there was trouble at the Hall
Farm--he only half-admitted the foreboding that there would be--the
Poysers might like to send for Dinah. But Dinah had not left any
address, and the old woman, whose memory for names was infirm, could not
recall the name of the “blessed woman” who was Dinah’s chief friend in
the Society at Leeds.

During that long, long journey in the taxed cart, there was time for
all the conjectures of importunate fear and struggling hope. In the very
first shock of discovering that Hetty had not been to Snowfield, the
thought of Arthur had darted through Adam like a sharp pang, but he
tried for some time to ward off its return by busying himself with modes
of accounting for the alarming fact, quite apart from that intolerable
thought. Some accident had happened. Hetty had, by some strange chance,
got into a wrong vehicle from Oakbourne: she had been taken ill, and did
not want to frighten them by letting them know. But this frail fence
of vague improbabilities was soon hurled down by a rush of distinct
agonizing fears. Hetty had been deceiving herself in thinking that she
could love and marry him: she had been loving Arthur all the while; and
now, in her desperation at the nearness of their marriage, she had run
away. And she was gone to him. The old indignation and jealousy
rose again, and prompted the suspicion that Arthur had been dealing
falsely--had written to Hetty--had tempted her to come to him--being
unwilling, after all, that she should belong to another man besides
himself. Perhaps the whole thing had been contrived by him, and he had
given her directions how to follow him to Ireland--for Adam knew that
Arthur had been gone thither three weeks ago, having recently learnt it
at the Chase. Every sad look of Hetty’s, since she had been engaged
to Adam, returned upon him now with all the exaggeration of painful
retrospect. He had been foolishly sanguine and confident. The poor thing
hadn’t perhaps known her own mind for a long while; had thought that
she could forget Arthur; had been momentarily drawn towards the man who
offered her a protecting, faithful love. He couldn’t bear to blame her:
she never meant to cause him this dreadful pain. The blame lay with
that man who had selfishly played with her heart--had perhaps even
deliberately lured her away.

At Oakbourne, the ostler at the Royal Oak remembered such a young woman
as Adam described getting out of the Treddleston coach more than a
fortnight ago--wasn’t likely to forget such a pretty lass as that in
a hurry--was sure she had not gone on by the Buxton coach that went
through Snowfield, but had lost sight of her while he went away with the
horses and had never set eyes on her again. Adam then went straight to
the house from which the Stonition coach started: Stoniton was the
most obvious place for Hetty to go to first, whatever might be
her destination, for she would hardly venture on any but the chief
coach-roads. She had been noticed here too, and was remembered to have
sat on the box by the coachman; but the coachman could not be seen, for
another man had been driving on that road in his stead the last three or
four days. He could probably be seen at Stoniton, through inquiry at the
inn where the coach put up. So the anxious heart-stricken Adam must of
necessity wait and try to rest till morning--nay, till eleven o’clock,
when the coach started.

At Stoniton another delay occurred, for the old coachman who had driven
Hetty would not be in the town again till night. When he did come he
remembered Hetty well, and remembered his own joke addressed to her,
quoting it many times to Adam, and observing with equal frequency that
he thought there was something more than common, because Hetty had not
laughed when he joked her. But he declared, as the people had done at
the inn, that he had lost sight of Hetty directly she got down. Part of
the next morning was consumed in inquiries at every house in the town
from which a coach started--(all in vain, for you know Hetty did not
start from Stonition by coach, but on foot in the grey morning)--and
then in walking out to the first toll-gates on the different lines of
road, in the forlorn hope of finding some recollection of her there. No,
she was not to be traced any farther; and the next hard task for Adam
was to go home and carry the wretched tidings to the Hall Farm. As to
what he should do beyond that, he had come to two distinct resolutions
amidst the tumult of thought and feeling which was going on within him
while he went to and fro. He would not mention what he knew of Arthur
Donnithorne’s behaviour to Hetty till there was a clear necessity for
it: it was still possible Hetty might come back, and the disclosure
might be an injury or an offence to her. And as soon as he had been home
and done what was necessary there to prepare for his further absence, he
would start off to Ireland: if he found no trace of Hetty on the road,
he would go straight to Arthur Donnithorne and make himself certain
how far he was acquainted with her movements. Several times the thought
occurred to him that he would consult Mr. Irwine, but that would be
useless unless he told him all, and so betrayed the secret about Arthur.
It seems strange that Adam, in the incessant occupation of his mind
about Hetty, should never have alighted on the probability that she had
gone to Windsor, ignorant that Arthur was no longer there. Perhaps the
reason was that he could not conceive Hetty’s throwing herself on Arthur
uncalled; he imagined no cause that could have driven her to such
a step, after that letter written in August. There were but two
alternatives in his mind: either Arthur had written to her again and
enticed her away, or she had simply fled from her approaching marriage
with himself because she found, after all, she could not love him well
enough, and yet was afraid of her friends’ anger if she retracted.

With this last determination on his mind, of going straight to Arthur,
the thought that he had spent two days in inquiries which had proved to
be almost useless, was torturing to Adam; and yet, since he would not
tell the Poysers his conviction as to where Hetty was gone, or his
intention to follow her thither, he must be able to say to them that he
had traced her as far as possible.

It was after twelve o’clock on Tuesday night when Adam reached
Treddleston; and, unwilling to disturb his mother and Seth, and also
to encounter their questions at that hour, he threw himself without
undressing on a bed at the “Waggon Overthrown,” and slept hard from pure
weariness. Not more than four hours, however, for before five o’clock he
set out on his way home in the faint morning twilight. He always kept a
key of the workshop door in his pocket, so that he could let himself in;
and he wished to enter without awaking his mother, for he was anxious
to avoid telling her the new trouble himself by seeing Seth first, and
asking him to tell her when it should be necessary. He walked gently
along the yard, and turned the key gently in the door; but, as he
expected, Gyp, who lay in the workshop, gave a sharp bark. It subsided
when he saw Adam, holding up his finger at him to impose silence, and
in his dumb, tailless joy he must content himself with rubbing his body
against his master’s legs.

Adam was too heart-sick to take notice of Gyp’s fondling. He threw
himself on the bench and stared dully at the wood and the signs of work
around him, wondering if he should ever come to feel pleasure in them
again, while Gyp, dimly aware that there was something wrong with his
master, laid his rough grey head on Adam’s knee and wrinkled his brows
to look up at him. Hitherto, since Sunday afternoon, Adam had been
constantly among strange people and in strange places, having no
associations with the details of his daily life, and now that by the
light of this new morning he was come back to his home and surrounded
by the familiar objects that seemed for ever robbed of their charm, the
reality--the hard, inevitable reality of his troubles pressed upon him
with a new weight. Right before him was an unfinished chest of drawers,
which he had been making in spare moments for Hetty’s use, when his home
should be hers.

Seth had not heard Adam’s entrance, but he had been roused by Gyp’s
bark, and Adam heard him moving about in the room above, dressing
himself. Seth’s first thoughts were about his brother: he would come
home to-day, surely, for the business would be wanting him sadly by
to-morrow, but it was pleasant to think he had had a longer holiday than
he had expected. And would Dinah come too? Seth felt that that was the
greatest happiness he could look forward to for himself, though he had
no hope left that she would ever love him well enough to marry him; but
he had often said to himself, it was better to be Dinah’s friend and
brother than any other woman’s husband. If he could but be always near
her, instead of living so far off!

He came downstairs and opened the inner door leading from the kitchen
into the workshop, intending to let out Gyp; but he stood still in
the doorway, smitten with a sudden shock at the sight of Adam seated
listlessly on the bench, pale, unwashed, with sunken blank eyes, almost
like a drunkard in the morning. But Seth felt in an instant what the
marks meant--not drunkenness, but some great calamity. Adam looked up at
him without speaking, and Seth moved forward towards the bench, himself
trembling so that speech did not come readily.

“God have mercy on us, Addy,” he said, in a low voice, sitting down on
the bench beside Adam, “what is it?”

Adam was unable to speak. The strong man, accustomed to suppress the
signs of sorrow, had felt his heart swell like a child’s at this first
approach of sympathy. He fell on Seth’s neck and sobbed.

Seth was prepared for the worst now, for, even in his recollections of
their boyhood, Adam had never sobbed before.

“Is it death, Adam? Is she dead?” he asked, in a low tone, when Adam
raised his head and was recovering himself.

“No, lad; but she’s gone--gone away from us. She’s never been to
Snowfield. Dinah’s been gone to Leeds ever since last Friday was a
fortnight, the very day Hetty set out. I can’t find out where she went
after she got to Stoniton.”

Seth was silent from utter astonishment: he knew nothing that could
suggest to him a reason for Hetty’s going away.

“Hast any notion what she’s done it for?” he said, at last.

“She can’t ha’ loved me. She didn’t like our marriage when it came
nigh--that must be it,” said Adam. He had determined to mention no
further reason.

“I hear Mother stirring,” said Seth. “Must we tell her?”

“No, not yet,” said Adam, rising from the bench and pushing the hair
from his face, as if he wanted to rouse himself. “I can’t have her told
yet; and I must set out on another journey directly, after I’ve been to
the village and th’ Hall Farm. I can’t tell thee where I’m going, and
thee must say to her I’m gone on business as nobody is to know anything
about. I’ll go and wash myself now.” Adam moved towards the door of the
workshop, but after a step or two he turned round, and, meeting Seth’s
eyes with a calm sad glance, he said, “I must take all the money out
o’ the tin box, lad; but if anything happens to me, all the rest ‘ll be
thine, to take care o’ Mother with.”

Seth was pale and trembling: he felt there was some terrible secret
under all this. “Brother,” he said, faintly--he never called Adam
“Brother” except in solemn moments--“I don’t believe you’ll do anything
as you can’t ask God’s blessing on.”

“Nay, lad,” said Adam, “don’t be afraid. I’m for doing nought but what’s
a man’s duty.”

The thought that if he betrayed his trouble to his mother, she would
only distress him by words, half of blundering affection, half of
irrepressible triumph that Hetty proved as unfit to be his wife as she
had always foreseen, brought back some of his habitual firmness and
self-command. He had felt ill on his journey home--he told her when she
came down--had stayed all night at Tredddleston for that reason; and a
bad headache, that still hung about him this morning, accounted for his
paleness and heavy eyes.

He determined to go to the village, in the first place, attend to his
business for an hour, and give notice to Burge of his being obliged to
go on a journey, which he must beg him not to mention to any one; for
he wished to avoid going to the Hall Farm near breakfast-time, when the
children and servants would be in the house-place, and there must be
exclamations in their hearing about his having returned without Hetty.
He waited until the clock struck nine before he left the work-yard at
the village, and set off, through the fields, towards the Farm. It was
an immense relief to him, as he came near the Home Close, to see Mr.
Poyser advancing towards him, for this would spare him the pain of going
to the house. Mr. Poyser was walking briskly this March morning, with a
sense of spring business on his mind: he was going to cast the master’s
eye on the shoeing of a new cart-horse, carrying his spud as a useful
companion by the way. His surprise was great when he caught sight of
Adam, but he was not a man given to presentiments of evil.

“Why, Adam, lad, is’t you? Have ye been all this time away and not
brought the lasses back, after all? Where are they?”

“No, I’ve not brought ‘em,” said Adam, turning round, to indicate that
he wished to walk back with Mr. Poyser.

“Why,” said Martin, looking with sharper attention at Adam, “ye look
bad. Is there anything happened?”

“Yes,” said Adam, heavily. “A sad thing’s happened. I didna find Hetty
at Snowfield.”

Mr. Poyser’s good-natured face showed signs of troubled astonishment.
“Not find her? What’s happened to her?” he said, his thoughts flying at
once to bodily accident.

“That I can’t tell, whether anything’s happened to her. She never went
to Snowfield--she took the coach to Stoniton, but I can’t learn nothing
of her after she got down from the Stoniton coach.”

“Why, you donna mean she’s run away?” said Martin, standing still, so
puzzled and bewildered that the fact did not yet make itself felt as a
trouble by him.

“She must ha’ done,” said Adam. “She didn’t like our marriage when it
came to the point--that must be it. She’d mistook her feelings.”

Martin was silent for a minute or two, looking on the ground and rooting
up the grass with his spud, without knowing what he was doing. His usual
slowness was always trebled when the subject of speech was painful. At
last he looked up, right in Adam’s face, saying, “Then she didna deserve
t’ ha’ ye, my lad. An’ I feel i’ fault myself, for she was my niece, and
I was allays hot for her marr’ing ye. There’s no amends I can make ye,
lad--the more’s the pity: it’s a sad cut-up for ye, I doubt.”

Adam could say nothing; and Mr. Poyser, after pursuing his walk for a
little while, went on, “I’ll be bound she’s gone after trying to get a
lady’s maid’s place, for she’d got that in her head half a year ago, and
wanted me to gi’ my consent. But I’d thought better on her”--he added,
shaking his head slowly and sadly--“I’d thought better on her, nor to
look for this, after she’d gi’en y’ her word, an’ everything been got
ready.”

Adam had the strongest motives for encouraging this supposition in Mr.
Poyser, and he even tried to believe that it might possibly be true. He
had no warrant for the certainty that she was gone to Arthur.

“It was better it should be so,” he said, as quietly as he could, “if
she felt she couldn’t like me for a husband. Better run away before than
repent after. I hope you won’t look harshly on her if she comes back, as
she may do if she finds it hard to get on away from home.”

“I canna look on her as I’ve done before,” said Martin decisively.
“She’s acted bad by you, and by all of us. But I’ll not turn my back on
her: she’s but a young un, and it’s the first harm I’ve knowed on her.
It’ll be a hard job for me to tell her aunt. Why didna Dinah come back
wi’ ye? She’d ha’ helped to pacify her aunt a bit.”

“Dinah wasn’t at Snowfield. She’s been gone to Leeds this fortnight, and
I couldn’t learn from th’ old woman any direction where she is at Leeds,
else I should ha’ brought it you.”

“She’d a deal better be staying wi’ her own kin,” said Mr. Poyser,
indignantly, “than going preaching among strange folks a-that’n.”

“I must leave you now, Mr. Poyser,” said Adam, “for I’ve a deal to see
to.”

“Aye, you’d best be after your business, and I must tell the missis when
I go home. It’s a hard job.”

“But,” said Adam, “I beg particular, you’ll keep what’s happened quiet
for a week or two. I’ve not told my mother yet, and there’s no knowing
how things may turn out.”

“Aye, aye; least said, soonest mended. We’n no need to say why the match
is broke off, an’ we may hear of her after a bit. Shake hands wi’ me,
lad: I wish I could make thee amends.”

There was something in Martin Poyser’s throat at that moment which
caused him to bring out those scanty words in rather a broken fashion.
Yet Adam knew what they meant all the better, and the two honest men
grasped each other’s hard hands in mutual understanding.

There was nothing now to hinder Adam from setting off. He had told Seth
to go to the Chase and leave a message for the squire, saying that Adam
Bede had been obliged to start off suddenly on a journey--and to say as
much, and no more, to any one else who made inquiries about him. If the
Poysers learned that he was gone away again, Adam knew they would infer
that he was gone in search of Hetty.

He had intended to go right on his way from the Hall Farm, but now the
impulse which had frequently visited him before--to go to Mr. Irwine,
and make a confidant of him--recurred with the new force which belongs
to a last opportunity. He was about to start on a long journey--a
difficult one--by sea--and no soul would know where he was gone. If
anything happened to him? Or, if he absolutely needed help in any matter
concerning Hetty? Mr. Irwine was to be trusted; and the feeling which
made Adam shrink from telling anything which was her secret must give
way before the need there was that she should have some one else besides
himself who would be prepared to defend her in the worst extremity.
Towards Arthur, even though he might have incurred no new guilt, Adam
felt that he was not bound to keep silence when Hetty’s interest called
on him to speak.

“I must do it,” said Adam, when these thoughts, which had spread
themselves through hours of his sad journeying, now rushed upon him in
an instant, like a wave that had been slowly gathering; “it’s the right
thing. I can’t stand alone in this way any longer.”



Chapter XXXIX

The Tidings


ADAM turned his face towards Broxton and walked with his swiftest
stride, looking at his watch with the fear that Mr. Irwine might be gone
out--hunting, perhaps. The fear and haste together produced a state of
strong excitement before he reached the rectory gate, and outside it he
saw the deep marks of a recent hoof on the gravel.

But the hoofs were turned towards the gate, not away from it, and though
there was a horse against the stable door, it was not Mr. Irwine’s: it
had evidently had a journey this morning, and must belong to some one
who had come on business. Mr. Irwine was at home, then; but Adam could
hardly find breath and calmness to tell Carroll that he wanted to speak
to the rector. The double suffering of certain and uncertain sorrow had
begun to shake the strong man. The butler looked at him wonderingly, as
he threw himself on a bench in the passage and stared absently at the
clock on the opposite wall. The master had somebody with him, he said,
but he heard the study door open--the stranger seemed to be coming out,
and as Adam was in a hurry, he would let the master know at once.

Adam sat looking at the clock: the minute-hand was hurrying along the
last five minutes to ten with a loud, hard, indifferent tick, and Adam
watched the movement and listened to the sound as if he had had some
reason for doing so. In our times of bitter suffering there are almost
always these pauses, when our consciousness is benumbed to everything
but some trivial perception or sensation. It is as if semi-idiocy came
to give us rest from the memory and the dread which refuse to leave us
in our sleep.

Carroll, coming back, recalled Adam to the sense of his burden. He
was to go into the study immediately. “I can’t think what that strange
person’s come about,” the butler added, from mere incontinence of
remark, as he preceded Adam to the door, “he’s gone i’ the dining-room.
And master looks unaccountable--as if he was frightened.” Adam took no
notice of the words: he could not care about other people’s business.
But when he entered the study and looked in Mr. Irwine’s face, he felt
in an instant that there was a new expression in it, strangely different
from the warm friendliness it had always worn for him before. A letter
lay open on the table, and Mr. Irwine’s hand was on it, but the changed
glance he cast on Adam could not be owing entirely to preoccupation with
some disagreeable business, for he was looking eagerly towards the door,
as if Adam’s entrance were a matter of poignant anxiety to him.

“You want to speak to me, Adam,” he said, in that low constrainedly
quiet tone which a man uses when he is determined to suppress agitation.
“Sit down here.” He pointed to a chair just opposite to him, at no more
than a yard’s distance from his own, and Adam sat down with a sense
that this cold manner of Mr. Irwine’s gave an additional unexpected
difficulty to his disclosure. But when Adam had made up his mind to
a measure, he was not the man to renounce it for any but imperative
reasons.

“I come to you, sir,” he said, “as the gentleman I look up to most of
anybody. I’ve something very painful to tell you--something as it’ll
pain you to hear as well as me to tell. But if I speak o’ the wrong
other people have done, you’ll see I didn’t speak till I’d good reason.”

Mr. Irwine nodded slowly, and Adam went on rather tremulously, “You was
t’ ha’ married me and Hetty Sorrel, you know, sir, o’ the fifteenth o’
this month. I thought she loved me, and I was th’ happiest man i’ the
parish. But a dreadful blow’s come upon me.”

Mr. Irwine started up from his chair, as if involuntarily, but then,
determined to control himself, walked to the window and looked out.

“She’s gone away, sir, and we don’t know where. She said she was going
to Snowfield o’ Friday was a fortnight, and I went last Sunday to
fetch her back; but she’d never been there, and she took the coach to
Stoniton, and beyond that I can’t trace her. But now I’m going a long
journey to look for her, and I can’t trust t’ anybody but you where I’m
going.”

Mr. Irwine came back from the window and sat down.

“Have you no idea of the reason why she went away?” he said.

“It’s plain enough she didn’t want to marry me, sir,” said Adam. “She
didn’t like it when it came so near. But that isn’t all, I doubt.
There’s something else I must tell you, sir. There’s somebody else
concerned besides me.”

A gleam of something--it was almost like relief or joy--came across the
eager anxiety of Mr. Irwine’s face at that moment. Adam was looking on
the ground, and paused a little: the next words were hard to speak.
But when he went on, he lifted up his head and looked straight at Mr.
Irwine. He would do the thing he had resolved to do, without flinching.

“You know who’s the man I’ve reckoned my greatest friend,” he said, “and
used to be proud to think as I should pass my life i’ working for him,
and had felt so ever since we were lads....”

Mr. Irwine, as if all self-control had forsaken him, grasped Adam’s arm,
which lay on the table, and, clutching it tightly like a man in pain,
said, with pale lips and a low hurried voice, “No, Adam, no--don’t say
it, for God’s sake!”

Adam, surprised at the violence of Mr. Irwine’s feeling, repented of the
words that had passed his lips and sat in distressed silence. The grasp
on his arm gradually relaxed, and Mr. Irwine threw himself back in his
chair, saying, “Go on--I must know it.”

“That man played with Hetty’s feelings, and behaved to her as he’d no
right to do to a girl in her station o’ life--made her presents and used
to go and meet her out a-walking. I found it out only two days before
he went away--found him a-kissing her as they were parting in the Grove.
There’d been nothing said between me and Hetty then, though I’d loved
her for a long while, and she knew it. But I reproached him with his
wrong actions, and words and blows passed between us; and he said
solemnly to me, after that, as it had been all nonsense and no more
than a bit o’ flirting. But I made him write a letter to tell Hetty
he’d meant nothing, for I saw clear enough, sir, by several things as
I hadn’t understood at the time, as he’d got hold of her heart, and
I thought she’d belike go on thinking of him and never come to love
another man as wanted to marry her. And I gave her the letter, and she
seemed to bear it all after a while better than I’d expected...and she
behaved kinder and kinder to me...I daresay she didn’t know her own
feelings then, poor thing, and they came back upon her when it was too
late...I don’t want to blame her...I can’t think as she meant to deceive
me. But I was encouraged to think she loved me, and--you know the rest,
sir. But it’s on my mind as he’s been false to me, and ‘ticed her away,
and she’s gone to him--and I’m going now to see, for I can never go to
work again till I know what’s become of her.”

During Adam’s narrative, Mr. Irwine had had time to recover his
self-mastery in spite of the painful thoughts that crowded upon him.
It was a bitter remembrance to him now--that morning when Arthur
breakfasted with him and seemed as if he were on the verge of a
confession. It was plain enough now what he had wanted to confess. And
if their words had taken another turn...if he himself had been less
fastidious about intruding on another man’s secrets...it was cruel
to think how thin a film had shut out rescue from all this guilt and
misery. He saw the whole history now by that terrible illumination which
the present sheds back upon the past. But every other feeling as it
rushed upon his was thrown into abeyance by pity, deep respectful pity,
for the man who sat before him--already so bruised, going forth with sad
blind resignedness to an unreal sorrow, while a real one was close
upon him, too far beyond the range of common trial for him ever to have
feared it. His own agitation was quelled by a certain awe that comes
over us in the presence of a great anguish, for the anguish he must
inflict on Adam was already present to him. Again he put his hand on
the arm that lay on the table, but very gently this time, as he said
solemnly:

“Adam, my dear friend, you have had some hard trials in your life. You
can bear sorrow manfully, as well as act manfully. God requires both
tasks at our hands. And there is a heavier sorrow coming upon you than
any you have yet known. But you are not guilty--you have not the worst
of all sorrows. God help him who has!”

The two pale faces looked at each other; in Adam’s there was trembling
suspense, in Mr. Irwine’s hesitating, shrinking pity. But he went on.

“I have had news of Hetty this morning. She is not gone to him. She is
in Stonyshire--at Stoniton.”

Adam started up from his chair, as if he thought he could have leaped
to her that moment. But Mr. Irwine laid hold of his arm again and said,
persuasively, “Wait, Adam, wait.” So he sat down.

“She is in a very unhappy position--one which will make it worse for you
to find her, my poor friend, than to have lost her for ever.”

Adam’s lips moved tremulously, but no sound came. They moved again, and
he whispered, “Tell me.”

“She has been arrested...she is in prison.”

It was as if an insulting blow had brought back the spirit of resistance
into Adam. The blood rushed to his face, and he said, loudly and
sharply, “For what?”

“For a great crime--the murder of her child.”

“It CAN’T BE!” Adam almost shouted, starting up from his chair and
making a stride towards the door; but he turned round again, setting his
back against the bookcase, and looking fiercely at Mr. Irwine. “It isn’t
possible. She never had a child. She can’t be guilty. WHO says it?”

“God grant she may be innocent, Adam. We can still hope she is.”

“But who says she is guilty?” said Adam violently. “Tell me everything.”

“Here is a letter from the magistrate before whom she was taken, and the
constable who arrested her is in the dining-room. She will not confess
her name or where she comes from; but I fear, I fear, there can be no
doubt it is Hetty. The description of her person corresponds, only
that she is said to look very pale and ill. She had a small red-leather
pocket-book in her pocket with two names written in it--one at the
beginning, ‘Hetty Sorrel, Hayslope,’ and the other near the end, ‘Dinah
Morris, Snowfield.’ She will not say which is her own name--she denies
everything, and will answer no questions, and application has been made
to me, as a magistrate, that I may take measures for identifying her,
for it was thought probable that the name which stands first is her own
name.”

“But what proof have they got against her, if it IS Hetty?” said Adam,
still violently, with an effort that seemed to shake his whole frame.
“I’ll not believe it. It couldn’t ha’ been, and none of us know it.”

“Terrible proof that she was under the temptation to commit the crime;
but we have room to hope that she did not really commit it. Try and read
that letter, Adam.”

Adam took the letter between his shaking hands and tried to fix his eyes
steadily on it. Mr. Irwine meanwhile went out to give some orders. When
he came back, Adam’s eyes were still on the first page--he couldn’t
read--he could not put the words together and make out what they meant.
He threw it down at last and clenched his fist.

“It’s HIS doing,” he said; “if there’s been any crime, it’s at his door,
not at hers. HE taught her to deceive--HE deceived me first. Let ‘em put
HIM on his trial--let him stand in court beside her, and I’ll tell ‘em
how he got hold of her heart, and ‘ticed her t’ evil, and then lied to
me. Is HE to go free, while they lay all the punishment on her...so weak
and young?”

The image called up by these last words gave a new direction to poor
Adam’s maddened feelings. He was silent, looking at the corner of the
room as if he saw something there. Then he burst out again, in a tone of
appealing anguish, “I can’t bear it...O God, it’s too hard to lay upon
me--it’s too hard to think she’s wicked.”

Mr. Irwine had sat down again in silence. He was too wise to utter
soothing words at present, and indeed, the sight of Adam before him,
with that look of sudden age which sometimes comes over a young face in
moments of terrible emotion--the hard bloodless look of the skin, the
deep lines about the quivering mouth, the furrows in the brow--the sight
of this strong firm man shattered by the invisible stroke of sorrow,
moved him so deeply that speech was not easy. Adam stood motionless,
with his eyes vacantly fixed in this way for a minute or two; in that
short space he was living through all his love again.

“She can’t ha’ done it,” he said, still without moving his eyes, as
if he were only talking to himself: “it was fear made her hide it...I
forgive her for deceiving me...I forgive thee, Hetty...thee wast
deceived too...it’s gone hard wi’ thee, my poor Hetty...but they’ll
never make me believe it.”

He was silent again for a few moments, and then he said, with fierce
abruptness, “I’ll go to him--I’ll bring him back--I’ll make him go and
look at her in her misery--he shall look at her till he can’t forget
it--it shall follow him night and day--as long as he lives it shall
follow him--he shan’t escape wi’ lies this time--I’ll fetch him, I’ll
drag him myself.”

In the act of going towards the door, Adam paused automatically and
looked about for his hat, quite unconscious where he was or who was
present with him. Mr. Irwine had followed him, and now took him by the
arm, saying, in a quiet but decided tone, “No, Adam, no; I’m sure you
will wish to stay and see what good can be done for her, instead of
going on a useless errand of vengeance. The punishment will surely fall
without your aid. Besides, he is no longer in Ireland. He must be on his
way home--or would be, long before you arrived, for his grandfather, I
know, wrote for him to come at least ten days ago. I want you now to go
with me to Stoniton. I have ordered a horse for you to ride with us, as
soon as you can compose yourself.”

While Mr. Irwine was speaking, Adam recovered his consciousness of the
actual scene. He rubbed his hair off his forehead and listened.

“Remember,” Mr. Irwine went on, “there are others to think of, and
act for, besides yourself, Adam: there are Hetty’s friends, the good
Poysers, on whom this stroke will fall more heavily than I can bear to
think. I expect it from your strength of mind, Adam--from your sense of
duty to God and man--that you will try to act as long as action can be
of any use.”

In reality, Mr. Irwine proposed this journey to Stoniton for Adam’s
own sake. Movement, with some object before him, was the best means of
counteracting the violence of suffering in these first hours.

“You will go with me to Stoniton, Adam?” he said again, after a moment’s
pause. “We have to see if it is really Hetty who is there, you know.”

“Yes, sir,” said Adam, “I’ll do what you think right. But the folks at
th’ Hall Farm?”

“I wish them not to know till I return to tell them myself. I shall
have ascertained things then which I am uncertain about now, and I shall
return as soon as possible. Come now, the horses are ready.”



Chapter XL

The Bitter Waters Spread


MR. IRWINE returned from Stoniton in a post-chaise that night, and the
first words Carroll said to him, as he entered the house, were, that
Squire Donnithorne was dead--found dead in his bed at ten o’clock that
morning--and that Mrs. Irwine desired him to say she should be awake
when Mr. Irwine came home, and she begged him not to go to bed without
seeing her.

“Well, Dauphin,” Mrs. Irwine said, as her son entered her room, “you’re
come at last. So the old gentleman’s fidgetiness and low spirits, which
made him send for Arthur in that sudden way, really meant something. I
suppose Carroll has told you that Donnithorne was found dead in his bed
this morning. You will believe my prognostications another time, though
I daresay I shan’t live to prognosticate anything but my own death.”

“What have they done about Arthur?” said Mr. Irwine. “Sent a messenger
to await him at Liverpool?”

“Yes, Ralph was gone before the news was brought to us. Dear Arthur, I
shall live now to see him master at the Chase, and making good times on
the estate, like a generous-hearted fellow as he is. He’ll be as happy
as a king now.”

Mr. Irwine could not help giving a slight groan: he was worn with
anxiety and exertion, and his mother’s light words were almost
intolerable.

“What are you so dismal about, Dauphin? Is there any bad news? Or are
you thinking of the danger for Arthur in crossing that frightful Irish
Channel at this time of year?”

“No, Mother, I’m not thinking of that; but I’m not prepared to rejoice
just now.”

“You’ve been worried by this law business that you’ve been to Stoniton
about. What in the world is it, that you can’t tell me?”

“You will know by and by, mother. It would not be right for me to tell
you at present. Good-night: you’ll sleep now you have no longer anything
to listen for.”

Mr. Irwine gave up his intention of sending a letter to meet Arthur,
since it would not now hasten his return: the news of his grandfather’s
death would bring him as soon as he could possibly come. He could go
to bed now and get some needful rest, before the time came for the
morning’s heavy duty of carrying his sickening news to the Hall Farm and
to Adam’s home.

Adam himself was not come back from Stoniton, for though he shrank from
seeing Hetty, he could not bear to go to a distance from her again.

“It’s no use, sir,” he said to the rector, “it’s no use for me to go
back. I can’t go to work again while she’s here, and I couldn’t bear
the sight o’ the things and folks round home. I’ll take a bit of a room
here, where I can see the prison walls, and perhaps I shall get, in
time, to bear seeing her.”

Adam had not been shaken in his belief that Hetty was innocent of the
crime she was charged with, for Mr. Irwine, feeling that the belief in
her guilt would be a crushing addition to Adam’s load, had kept from him
the facts which left no hope in his own mind. There was not any reason
for thrusting the whole burden on Adam at once, and Mr. Irwine, at
parting, only said, “If the evidence should tell too strongly against
her, Adam, we may still hope for a pardon. Her youth and other
circumstances will be a plea for her.”

“Ah, and it’s right people should know how she was tempted into the
wrong way,” said Adam, with bitter earnestness. “It’s right they should
know it was a fine gentleman made love to her, and turned her head wi’
notions. You’ll remember, sir, you’ve promised to tell my mother, and
Seth, and the people at the farm, who it was as led her wrong, else
they’ll think harder of her than she deserves. You’ll be doing her a
hurt by sparing him, and I hold him the guiltiest before God, let her
ha’ done what she may. If you spare him, I’ll expose him!”

“I think your demand is just, Adam,” said Mr. Irwine, “but when you are
calmer, you will judge Arthur more mercifully. I say nothing now, only
that his punishment is in other hands than ours.”

Mr. Irwine felt it hard upon him that he should have to tell of Arthur’s
sad part in the story of sin and sorrow--he who cared for Arthur with
fatherly affection, who had cared for him with fatherly pride. But he
saw clearly that the secret must be known before long, even apart from
Adam’s determination, since it was scarcely to be supposed that Hetty
would persist to the end in her obstinate silence. He made up his mind
to withhold nothing from the Poysers, but to tell them the worst at
once, for there was no time to rob the tidings of their suddenness.
Hetty’s trial must come on at the Lent assizes, and they were to be
held at Stoniton the next week. It was scarcely to be hoped that Martin
Poyser could escape the pain of being called as a witness, and it was
better he should know everything as long beforehand as possible.

Before ten o’clock on Thursday morning the home at the Hall Farm was
a house of mourning for a misfortune felt to be worse than death. The
sense of family dishonour was too keen even in the kind-hearted Martin
Poyser the younger to leave room for any compassion towards Hetty. He
and his father were simple-minded farmers, proud of their untarnished
character, proud that they came of a family which had held up its head
and paid its way as far back as its name was in the parish register;
and Hetty had brought disgrace on them all--disgrace that could never
be wiped out. That was the all-conquering feeling in the mind both of
father and son--the scorching sense of disgrace, which neutralised all
other sensibility--and Mr. Irwine was struck with surprise to observe
that Mrs. Poyser was less severe than her husband. We are often startled
by the severity of mild people on exceptional occasions; the reason is,
that mild people are most liable to be under the yoke of traditional
impressions.

“I’m willing to pay any money as is wanted towards trying to bring her
off,” said Martin the younger when Mr. Irwine was gone, while the old
grandfather was crying in the opposite chair, “but I’ll not go nigh her,
nor ever see her again, by my own will. She’s made our bread bitter to
us for all our lives to come, an’ we shall ne’er hold up our heads i’
this parish nor i’ any other. The parson talks o’ folks pitying us: it’s
poor amends pity ‘ull make us.”

“Pity?” said the grandfather, sharply. “I ne’er wanted folks’s pity i’
MY life afore...an’ I mun begin to be looked down on now, an’ me turned
seventy-two last St. Thomas’s, an’ all th’ underbearers and pall-bearers
as I’n picked for my funeral are i’ this parish and the next to
‘t....It’s o’ no use now...I mun be ta’en to the grave by strangers.”

“Don’t fret so, father,” said Mrs. Poyser, who had spoken very little,
being almost overawed by her husband’s unusual hardness and decision.
“You’ll have your children wi’ you; an’ there’s the lads and the little
un ‘ull grow up in a new parish as well as i’ th’ old un.”

“Ah, there’s no staying i’ this country for us now,” said Mr. Poyser,
and the hard tears trickled slowly down his round cheeks. “We thought
it ‘ud be bad luck if the old squire gave us notice this Lady day, but I
must gi’ notice myself now, an’ see if there can anybody be got to come
an’ take to the crops as I’n put i’ the ground; for I wonna stay upo’
that man’s land a day longer nor I’m forced to’t. An’ me, as thought him
such a good upright young man, as I should be glad when he come to be
our landlord. I’ll ne’er lift my hat to him again, nor sit i’ the same
church wi’ him...a man as has brought shame on respectable folks...an’
pretended to be such a friend t’ everybody....Poor Adam there...a fine
friend he’s been t’ Adam, making speeches an’ talking so fine, an’ all
the while poisoning the lad’s life, as it’s much if he can stay i’ this
country any more nor we can.”

“An’ you t’ ha’ to go into court, and own you’re akin t’ her,” said the
old man. “Why, they’ll cast it up to the little un, as isn’t four ‘ear
old, some day--they’ll cast it up t’ her as she’d a cousin tried at the
‘sizes for murder.”

“It’ll be their own wickedness, then,” said Mrs. Poyser, with a sob in
her voice. “But there’s One above ‘ull take care o’ the innicent child,
else it’s but little truth they tell us at church. It’ll be harder nor
ever to die an’ leave the little uns, an’ nobody to be a mother to ‘em.”

“We’d better ha’ sent for Dinah, if we’d known where she is,” said Mr.
Poyser; “but Adam said she’d left no direction where she’d be at Leeds.”

“Why, she’d be wi’ that woman as was a friend t’ her Aunt Judith,” said
Mrs. Poyser, comforted a little by this suggestion of her husband.
“I’ve often heard Dinah talk of her, but I can’t remember what name
she called her by. But there’s Seth Bede; he’s like enough to know, for
she’s a preaching woman as the Methodists think a deal on.”

“I’ll send to Seth,” said Mr. Poyser. “I’ll send Alick to tell him to
come, or else to send up word o’ the woman’s name, an’ thee canst write
a letter ready to send off to Treddles’on as soon as we can make out a
direction.”

“It’s poor work writing letters when you want folks to come to you i’
trouble,” said Mrs. Poyser. “Happen it’ll be ever so long on the road,
an’ never reach her at last.”

Before Alick arrived with the message, Lisbeth’s thoughts too had
already flown to Dinah, and she had said to Seth, “Eh, there’s no
comfort for us i’ this world any more, wi’out thee couldst get Dinah
Morris to come to us, as she did when my old man died. I’d like her to
come in an’ take me by th’ hand again, an’ talk to me. She’d tell me the
rights on’t, belike--she’d happen know some good i’ all this trouble an’
heart-break comin’ upo’ that poor lad, as ne’er done a bit o’ wrong in’s
life, but war better nor anybody else’s son, pick the country round. Eh,
my lad...Adam, my poor lad!”

“Thee wouldstna like me to leave thee, to go and fetch Dinah?” said
Seth, as his mother sobbed and rocked herself to and fro.

“Fetch her?” said Lisbeth, looking up and pausing from her grief, like
a crying child who hears some promise of consolation. “Why, what place
is’t she’s at, do they say?”

“It’s a good way off, mother--Leeds, a big town. But I could be back in
three days, if thee couldst spare me.”

“Nay, nay, I canna spare thee. Thee must go an’ see thy brother, an’
bring me word what he’s a-doin’. Mester Irwine said he’d come an’ tell
me, but I canna make out so well what it means when he tells me. Thee
must go thysen, sin’ Adam wonna let me go to him. Write a letter to
Dinah canstna? Thee’t fond enough o’ writin’ when nobody wants thee.”

“I’m not sure where she’d be i’ that big town,” said Seth. “If I’d gone
myself, I could ha’ found out by asking the members o’ the Society. But
perhaps if I put Sarah Williamson, Methodist preacher, Leeds, o’
th’ outside, it might get to her; for most like she’d be wi’ Sarah
Williamson.”

Alick came now with the message, and Seth, finding that Mrs. Poyser was
writing to Dinah, gave up the intention of writing himself; but he went
to the Hall Farm to tell them all he could suggest about the address
of the letter, and warn them that there might be some delay in the
delivery, from his not knowing an exact direction.

On leaving Lisbeth, Mr. Irwine had gone to Jonathan Burge, who had also
a claim to be acquainted with what was likely to keep Adam away from
business for some time; and before six o’clock that evening there were
few people in Broxton and Hayslope who had not heard the sad news. Mr.
Irwine had not mentioned Arthur’s name to Burge, and yet the story of
his conduct towards Hetty, with all the dark shadows cast upon it by
its terrible consequences, was presently as well known as that his
grandfather was dead, and that he was come into the estate. For Martin
Poyser felt no motive to keep silence towards the one or two neighbours
who ventured to come and shake him sorrowfully by the hand on the first
day of his trouble; and Carroll, who kept his ears open to all that
passed at the rectory, had framed an inferential version of the story,
and found early opportunities of communicating it.

One of those neighbours who came to Martin Poyser and shook him by the
hand without speaking for some minutes was Bartle Massey. He had shut
up his school, and was on his way to the rectory, where he arrived about
half-past seven in the evening, and, sending his duty to Mr. Irwine,
begged pardon for troubling him at that hour, but had something
particular on his mind. He was shown into the study, where Mr. Irwine
soon joined him.

“Well, Bartle?” said Mr. Irwine, putting out his hand. That was not his
usual way of saluting the schoolmaster, but trouble makes us treat all
who feel with us very much alike. “Sit down.”

“You know what I’m come about as well as I do, sir, I daresay,” said
Bartle.

“You wish to know the truth about the sad news that has reached
you...about Hetty Sorrel?”

“Nay, sir, what I wish to know is about Adam Bede. I understand you left
him at Stoniton, and I beg the favour of you to tell me what’s the state
of the poor lad’s mind, and what he means to do. For as for that bit o’
pink-and-white they’ve taken the trouble to put in jail, I don’t value
her a rotten nut--not a rotten nut--only for the harm or good that may
come out of her to an honest man--a lad I’ve set such store
by--trusted to, that he’d make my bit o’ knowledge go a good way in the
world....Why, sir, he’s the only scholar I’ve had in this stupid country
that ever had the will or the head-piece for mathematics. If he hadn’t
had so much hard work to do, poor fellow, he might have gone into the
higher branches, and then this might never have happened--might never
have happened.”

Bartle was heated by the exertion of walking fast in an agitated frame
of mind, and was not able to check himself on this first occasion of
venting his feelings. But he paused now to rub his moist forehead, and
probably his moist eyes also.

“You’ll excuse me, sir,” he said, when this pause had given him time to
reflect, “for running on in this way about my own feelings, like that
foolish dog of mine howling in a storm, when there’s nobody wants to
listen to me. I came to hear you speak, not to talk myself--if you’ll
take the trouble to tell me what the poor lad’s doing.”

“Don’t put yourself under any restraint, Bartle,” said Mr. Irwine. “The
fact is, I’m very much in the same condition as you just now; I’ve a
great deal that’s painful on my mind, and I find it hard work to be
quite silent about my own feelings and only attend to others. I share
your concern for Adam, though he is not the only one whose sufferings I
care for in this affair. He intends to remain at Stoniton till after the
trial: it will come on probably a week to-morrow. He has taken a room
there, and I encouraged him to do so, because I think it better he
should be away from his own home at present; and, poor fellow, he still
believes Hetty is innocent--he wants to summon up courage to see her if
he can; he is unwilling to leave the spot where she is.”

“Do you think the creatur’s guilty, then?” said Bartle. “Do you think
they’ll hang her?”

“I’m afraid it will go hard with her. The evidence is very strong. And
one bad symptom is that she denies everything--denies that she has had
a child in the face of the most positive evidence. I saw her myself, and
she was obstinately silent to me; she shrank up like a frightened animal
when she saw me. I was never so shocked in my life as at the change in
her. But I trust that, in the worst case, we may obtain a pardon for the
sake of the innocent who are involved.”

“Stuff and nonsense!” said Bartle, forgetting in his irritation to whom
he was speaking. “I beg your pardon, sir, I mean it’s stuff and nonsense
for the innocent to care about her being hanged. For my own part, I
think the sooner such women are put out o’ the world the better; and the
men that help ‘em to do mischief had better go along with ‘em for that
matter. What good will you do by keeping such vermin alive, eating the
victual that ‘ud feed rational beings? But if Adam’s fool enough to care
about it, I don’t want him to suffer more than’s needful....Is he very
much cut up, poor fellow?” Bartle added, taking out his spectacles and
putting them on, as if they would assist his imagination.

“Yes, I’m afraid the grief cuts very deep,” said Mr. Irwine. “He looks
terribly shattered, and a certain violence came over him now and then
yesterday, which made me wish I could have remained near him. But I
shall go to Stoniton again to-morrow, and I have confidence enough in
the strength of Adam’s principle to trust that he will be able to endure
the worst without being driven to anything rash.”

Mr. Irwine, who was involuntarily uttering his own thoughts rather
than addressing Bartle Massey in the last sentence, had in his mind the
possibility that the spirit of vengeance to-wards Arthur, which was
the form Adam’s anguish was continually taking, might make him seek an
encounter that was likely to end more fatally than the one in the Grove.
This possibility heightened the anxiety with which he looked forward
to Arthur’s arrival. But Bartle thought Mr. Irwine was referring to
suicide, and his face wore a new alarm.

“I’ll tell you what I have in my head, sir,” he said, “and I hope you’ll
approve of it. I’m going to shut up my school--if the scholars come,
they must go back again, that’s all--and I shall go to Stoniton and look
after Adam till this business is over. I’ll pretend I’m come to look
on at the assizes; he can’t object to that. What do you think about it,
sir?”

“Well,” said Mr. Irwine, rather hesitatingly, “there would be some real
advantages in that...and I honour you for your friendship towards him,
Bartle. But...you must be careful what you say to him, you know. I’m
afraid you have too little fellow-feeling in what you consider his
weakness about Hetty.”

“Trust to me, sir--trust to me. I know what you mean. I’ve been a fool
myself in my time, but that’s between you and me. I shan’t thrust myself
on him only keep my eye on him, and see that he gets some good food, and
put in a word here and there.”

“Then,” said Mr. Irwine, reassured a little as to Bartle’s discretion,
“I think you’ll be doing a good deed; and it will be well for you to let
Adam’s mother and brother know that you’re going.”

“Yes, sir, yes,” said Bartle, rising, and taking off his spectacles,
“I’ll do that, I’ll do that; though the mother’s a whimpering
thing--I don’t like to come within earshot of her; however, she’s
a straight-backed, clean woman, none of your slatterns. I wish you
good-bye, sir, and thank you for the time you’ve spared me. You’re
everybody’s friend in this business--everybody’s friend. It’s a heavy
weight you’ve got on your shoulders.”

“Good-bye, Bartle, till we meet at Stoniton, as I daresay we shall.”

Bartle hurried away from the rectory, evading Carroll’s conversational
advances, and saying in an exasperated tone to Vixen, whose short legs
pattered beside him on the gravel, “Now, I shall be obliged to take you
with me, you good-for-nothing woman. You’d go fretting yourself to death
if I left you--you know you would, and perhaps get snapped up by some
tramp. And you’ll be running into bad company, I expect, putting your
nose in every hole and corner where you’ve no business! But if you do
anything disgraceful, I’ll disown you--mind that, madam, mind that!”



Chapter XLI

The Eve of the Trial



AN upper room in a dull Stoniton street, with two beds in it--one laid
on the floor. It is ten o’clock on Thursday night, and the dark wall
opposite the window shuts out the moonlight that might have struggled
with the light of the one dip candle by which Bartle Massey is
pretending to read, while he is really looking over his spectacles at
Adam Bede, seated near the dark window.

You would hardly have known it was Adam without being told. His face has
got thinner this last week: he has the sunken eyes, the neglected beard
of a man just risen from a sick-bed. His heavy black hair hangs over his
forehead, and there is no active impulse in him which inclines him to
push it off, that he may be more awake to what is around him. He has one
arm over the back of the chair, and he seems to be looking down at his
clasped hands. He is roused by a knock at the door.

“There he is,” said Bartle Massey, rising hastily and unfastening the
door. It was Mr. Irwine.

Adam rose from his chair with instinctive respect, as Mr. Irwine
approached him and took his hand.

“I’m late, Adam,” he said, sitting down on the chair which Bartle placed
for him, “but I was later in setting off from Broxton than I intended
to be, and I have been incessantly occupied since I arrived. I have done
everything now, however--everything that can be done to-night, at least.
Let us all sit down.”

Adam took his chair again mechanically, and Bartle, for whom there was
no chair remaining, sat on the bed in the background.

“Have you seen her, sir?” said Adam tremulously.

“Yes, Adam; I and the chaplain have both been with her this evening.”

“Did you ask her, sir...did you say anything about me?”

“Yes,” said Mr. Irwine, with some hesitation, “I spoke of you. I said
you wished to see her before the trial, if she consented.”

As Mr. Irwine paused, Adam looked at him with eager, questioning eyes.

“You know she shrinks from seeing any one, Adam. It is not only
you--some fatal influence seems to have shut up her heart against her
fellow-creatures. She has scarcely said anything more than ‘No’ either
to me or the chaplain. Three or four days ago, before you were mentioned
to her, when I asked her if there was any one of her family whom she
would like to see--to whom she could open her mind--she said, with a
violent shudder, ‘Tell them not to come near me--I won’t see any of
them.’”

Adam’s head was hanging down again, and he did not speak. There was
silence for a few minutes, and then Mr. Irwine said, “I don’t like
to advise you against your own feelings, Adam, if they now urge you
strongly to go and see her to-morrow morning, even without her consent.
It is just possible, notwithstanding appearances to the contrary, that
the interview might affect her favourably. But I grieve to say I have
scarcely any hope of that. She didn’t seem agitated when I mentioned
your name; she only said ‘No,’ in the same cold, obstinate way as usual.
And if the meeting had no good effect on her, it would be pure, useless
suffering to you--severe suffering, I fear. She is very much changed...”

Adam started up from his chair and seized his hat, which lay on the
table. But he stood still then, and looked at Mr. Irwine, as if he had a
question to ask which it was yet difficult to utter. Bartle Massey rose
quietly, turned the key in the door, and put it in his pocket.

“Is he come back?” said Adam at last.

“No, he is not,” said Mr. Irwine, quietly. “Lay down your hat, Adam,
unless you like to walk out with me for a little fresh air. I fear you
have not been out again to-day.”

“You needn’t deceive me, sir,” said Adam, looking hard at Mr. Irwine and
speaking in a tone of angry suspicion. “You needn’t be afraid of me.
I only want justice. I want him to feel what she feels. It’s his
work...she was a child as it ‘ud ha’ gone t’ anybody’s heart to look
at...I don’t care what she’s done...it was him brought her to it. And he
shall know it...he shall feel it...if there’s a just God, he shall feel
what it is t’ ha’ brought a child like her to sin and misery.”

“I’m not deceiving you, Adam,” said Mr. Irwine. “Arthur Donnithorne is
not come back--was not come back when I left. I have left a letter for
him: he will know all as soon as he arrives.”

“But you don’t mind about it,” said Adam indignantly. “You think it
doesn’t matter as she lies there in shame and misery, and he knows
nothing about it--he suffers nothing.”

“Adam, he WILL know--he WILL suffer, long and bitterly. He has a heart
and a conscience: I can’t be entirely deceived in his character. I am
convinced--I am sure he didn’t fall under temptation without a struggle.
He may be weak, but he is not callous, not coldly selfish. I am
persuaded that this will be a shock of which he will feel the effects
all his life. Why do you crave vengeance in this way? No amount of
torture that you could inflict on him could benefit her.”

“No--O God, no,” Adam groaned out, sinking on his chair again; “but
then, that’s the deepest curse of all...that’s what makes the blackness
of it...IT CAN NEVER BE UNDONE. My poor Hetty...she can never be my
sweet Hetty again...the prettiest thing God had made--smiling up at
me...I thought she loved me...and was good...”

Adam’s voice had been gradually sinking into a hoarse undertone, as if
he were only talking to himself; but now he said abruptly, looking at
Mr. Irwine, “But she isn’t as guilty as they say? You don’t think she
is, sir? She can’t ha’ done it.”

“That perhaps can never be known with certainty, Adam,” Mr. Irwine
answered gently. “In these cases we sometimes form our judgment on what
seems to us strong evidence, and yet, for want of knowing some small
fact, our judgment is wrong. But suppose the worst: you have no right to
say that the guilt of her crime lies with him, and that he ought to bear
the punishment. It is not for us men to apportion the shares of moral
guilt and retribution. We find it impossible to avoid mistakes even in
determining who has committed a single criminal act, and the problem how
far a man is to be held responsible for the unforeseen consequences of
his own deed is one that might well make us tremble to look into it.
The evil consequences that may lie folded in a single act of selfish
indulgence is a thought so awful that it ought surely to awaken some
feeling less presumptuous than a rash desire to punish. You have a mind
that can understand this fully, Adam, when you are calm. Don’t suppose
I can’t enter into the anguish that drives you into this state
of revengeful hatred. But think of this: if you were to obey your
passion--for it IS passion, and you deceive yourself in calling it
justice--it might be with you precisely as it has been with Arthur; nay,
worse; your passion might lead you yourself into a horrible crime.”

“No--not worse,” said Adam, bitterly; “I don’t believe it’s worse--I’d
sooner do it--I’d sooner do a wickedness as I could suffer for by myself
than ha’ brought HER to do wickedness and then stand by and see ‘em
punish her while they let me alone; and all for a bit o’ pleasure, as,
if he’d had a man’s heart in him, he’d ha’ cut his hand off sooner than
he’d ha’ taken it. What if he didn’t foresee what’s happened? He foresaw
enough; he’d no right to expect anything but harm and shame to her. And
then he wanted to smooth it off wi’ lies. No--there’s plenty o’ things
folks are hanged for not half so hateful as that. Let a man do what he
will, if he knows he’s to bear the punishment himself, he isn’t half so
bad as a mean selfish coward as makes things easy t’ himself and knows
all the while the punishment ‘ll fall on somebody else.”

“There again you partly deceive yourself, Adam. There is no sort of
wrong deed of which a man can bear the punishment alone; you can’t
isolate yourself and say that the evil which is in you shall not spread.
Men’s lives are as thoroughly blended with each other as the air they
breathe: evil spreads as necessarily as disease. I know, I feel the
terrible extent of suffering this sin of Arthur’s has caused to others;
but so does every sin cause suffering to others besides those who commit
it. An act of vengeance on your part against Arthur would simply be
another evil added to those we are suffering under: you could not bear
the punishment alone; you would entail the worst sorrows on every one
who loves you. You would have committed an act of blind fury that would
leave all the present evils just as they were and add worse evils to
them. You may tell me that you meditate no fatal act of vengeance, but
the feeling in your mind is what gives birth to such actions, and as
long as you indulge it, as long as you do not see that to fix your mind
on Arthur’s punishment is revenge, and not justice, you are in danger
of being led on to the commission of some great wrong. Remember what you
told me about your feelings after you had given that blow to Arthur in
the Grove.”

Adam was silent: the last words had called up a vivid image of the past,
and Mr. Irwine left him to his thoughts, while he spoke to Bartle Massey
about old Mr. Donnithorne’s funeral and other matters of an indifferent
kind. But at length Adam turned round and said, in a more subdued tone,
“I’ve not asked about ‘em at th’ Hall Farm, sir. Is Mr. Poyser coming?”

“He is come; he is in Stoniton to-night. But I could not advise him to
see you, Adam. His own mind is in a very perturbed state, and it is best
he should not see you till you are calmer.”

“Is Dinah Morris come to ‘em, sir? Seth said they’d sent for her.”

“No. Mr. Poyser tells me she was not come when he left. They’re afraid
the letter has not reached her. It seems they had no exact address.”

Adam sat ruminating a little while, and then said, “I wonder if Dinah
‘ud ha’ gone to see her. But perhaps the Poysers would ha’ been sorely
against it, since they won’t come nigh her themselves. But I think she
would, for the Methodists are great folks for going into the prisons;
and Seth said he thought she would. She’d a very tender way with her,
Dinah had; I wonder if she could ha’ done any good. You never saw her,
sir, did you?”

“Yes, I did. I had a conversation with her--she pleased me a good deal.
And now you mention it, I wish she would come, for it is possible that a
gentle mild woman like her might move Hetty to open her heart. The jail
chaplain is rather harsh in his manner.”

“But it’s o’ no use if she doesn’t come,” said Adam sadly.

“If I’d thought of it earlier, I would have taken some measures
for finding her out,” said Mr. Irwine, “but it’s too late now, I
fear...Well, Adam, I must go now. Try to get some rest to-night. God
bless you. I’ll see you early to-morrow morning.”



Chapter XLII

The Morning of the Trial


AT one o’clock the next day, Adam was alone in his dull upper room;
his watch lay before him on the table, as if he were counting the
long minutes. He had no knowledge of what was likely to be said by
the witnesses on the trial, for he had shrunk from all the particulars
connected with Hetty’s arrest and accusation. This brave active man, who
would have hastened towards any danger or toil to rescue Hetty from an
apprehended wrong or misfortune, felt himself powerless to contemplate
irremediable evil and suffering. The susceptibility which would have
been an impelling force where there was any possibility of action became
helpless anguish when he was obliged to be passive, or else sought an
active outlet in the thought of inflicting justice on Arthur. Energetic
natures, strong for all strenuous deeds, will often rush away from a
hopeless sufferer, as if they were hard-hearted. It is the overmastering
sense of pain that drives them. They shrink by an ungovernable instinct,
as they would shrink from laceration. Adam had brought himself to think
of seeing Hetty, if she would consent to see him, because he thought the
meeting might possibly be a good to her--might help to melt away this
terrible hardness they told him of. If she saw he bore her no ill will
for what she had done to him, she might open her heart to him. But this
resolution had been an immense effort--he trembled at the thought of
seeing her changed face, as a timid woman trembles at the thought of
the surgeon’s knife, and he chose now to bear the long hours of suspense
rather than encounter what seemed to him the more intolerable agony of
witnessing her trial.

Deep unspeakable suffering may well be called a baptism, a regeneration,
the initiation into a new state. The yearning memories, the bitter
regret, the agonized sympathy, the struggling appeals to the Invisible
Right--all the intense emotions which had filled the days and nights of
the past week, and were compressing themselves again like an eager crowd
into the hours of this single morning, made Adam look back on all the
previous years as if they had been a dim sleepy existence, and he had
only now awaked to full consciousness. It seemed to him as if he had
always before thought it a light thing that men should suffer, as if all
that he had himself endured and called sorrow before was only a moment’s
stroke that had never left a bruise. Doubtless a great anguish may do
the work of years, and we may come out from that baptism of fire with a
soul full of new awe and new pity.

“O God,” Adam groaned, as he leaned on the table and looked blankly at
the face of the watch, “and men have suffered like this before...and
poor helpless young things have suffered like her....Such a little while
ago looking so happy and so pretty...kissing ‘em all, her grandfather
and all of ‘em, and they wishing her luck....O my poor, poor
Hetty...dost think on it now?”

Adam started and looked round towards the door. Vixen had begun to
whimper, and there was a sound of a stick and a lame walk on the stairs.
It was Bartle Massey come back. Could it be all over?

Bartle entered quietly, and, going up to Adam, grasped his hand and
said, “I’m just come to look at you, my boy, for the folks are gone out
of court for a bit.”

Adam’s heart beat so violently he was unable to speak--he could only
return the pressure of his friend’s hand--and Bartle, drawing up the
other chair, came and sat in front of him, taking off his hat and his
spectacles.

“That’s a thing never happened to me before,” he observed, “to go out o’
the door with my spectacles on. I clean forgot to take ‘em off.”

The old man made this trivial remark, thinking it better not to respond
at all to Adam’s agitation: he would gather, in an indirect way, that
there was nothing decisive to communicate at present.

“And now,” he said, rising again, “I must see to your having a bit of
the loaf, and some of that wine Mr. Irwine sent this morning. He’ll be
angry with me if you don’t have it. Come, now,” he went on, bringing
forward the bottle and the loaf and pouring some wine into a cup, “I
must have a bit and a sup myself. Drink a drop with me, my lad--drink
with me.”

Adam pushed the cup gently away and said, entreatingly, “Tell me about
it, Mr. Massey--tell me all about it. Was she there? Have they begun?”

“Yes, my boy, yes--it’s taken all the time since I first went; but
they’re slow, they’re slow; and there’s the counsel they’ve got for her
puts a spoke in the wheel whenever he can, and makes a deal to do with
cross-examining the witnesses and quarrelling with the other lawyers.
That’s all he can do for the money they give him; and it’s a big
sum--it’s a big sum. But he’s a ‘cute fellow, with an eye that ‘ud pick
the needles out of the hay in no time. If a man had got no feelings, it
‘ud be as good as a demonstration to listen to what goes on in court;
but a tender heart makes one stupid. I’d have given up figures for ever
only to have had some good news to bring to you, my poor lad.”

“But does it seem to be going against her?” said Adam. “Tell me what
they’ve said. I must know it now--I must know what they have to bring
against her.”

“Why, the chief evidence yet has been the doctors; all but Martin
Poyser--poor Martin. Everybody in court felt for him--it was like one
sob, the sound they made when he came down again. The worst was when
they told him to look at the prisoner at the bar. It was hard work, poor
fellow--it was hard work. Adam, my boy, the blow falls heavily on him
as well as you; you must help poor Martin; you must show courage. Drink
some wine now, and show me you mean to bear it like a man.”

Bartle had made the right sort of appeal. Adam, with an air of quiet
obedience, took up the cup and drank a little.

“Tell me how SHE looked,” he said presently.

“Frightened, very frightened, when they first brought her in; it was the
first sight of the crowd and the judge, poor creatur. And there’s a lot
o’ foolish women in fine clothes, with gewgaws all up their arms
and feathers on their heads, sitting near the judge: they’ve dressed
themselves out in that way, one ‘ud think, to be scarecrows and warnings
against any man ever meddling with a woman again. They put up their
glasses, and stared and whispered. But after that she stood like a white
image, staring down at her hands and seeming neither to hear nor see
anything. And she’s as white as a sheet. She didn’t speak when they
asked her if she’d plead ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty,’ and they pleaded ‘not
guilty’ for her. But when she heard her uncle’s name, there seemed to go
a shiver right through her; and when they told him to look at her, she
hung her head down, and cowered, and hid her face in her hands.
He’d much ado to speak poor man, his voice trembled so. And the
counsellors--who look as hard as nails mostly--I saw, spared him as much
as they could. Mr. Irwine put himself near him and went with him out o’
court. Ah, it’s a great thing in a man’s life to be able to stand by a
neighbour and uphold him in such trouble as that.”

“God bless him, and you too, Mr. Massey,” said Adam, in a low voice,
laying his hand on Bartle’s arm.

“Aye, aye, he’s good metal; he gives the right ring when you try him,
our parson does. A man o’ sense--says no more than’s needful. He’s not
one of those that think they can comfort you with chattering, as if
folks who stand by and look on knew a deal better what the trouble was
than those who have to bear it. I’ve had to do with such folks in my
time--in the south, when I was in trouble myself. Mr. Irwine is to be
a witness himself, by and by, on her side, you know, to speak to her
character and bringing up.”

“But the other evidence...does it go hard against her!” said Adam. “What
do you think, Mr. Massey? Tell me the truth.”

“Yes, my lad, yes. The truth is the best thing to tell. It must come at
last. The doctors’ evidence is heavy on her--is heavy. But she’s gone
on denying she’s had a child from first to last. These poor silly
women-things--they’ve not the sense to know it’s no use denying what’s
proved. It’ll make against her with the jury, I doubt, her being so
obstinate: they may be less for recommending her to mercy, if the
verdict’s against her. But Mr. Irwine ‘ull leave no stone unturned with
the judge--you may rely upon that, Adam.”

“Is there nobody to stand by her and seem to care for her in the court?”
 said Adam.

“There’s the chaplain o’ the jail sits near her, but he’s a sharp
ferrety-faced man--another sort o’ flesh and blood to Mr. Irwine. They
say the jail chaplains are mostly the fag-end o’ the clergy.”

“There’s one man as ought to be there,” said Adam bitterly. Presently he
drew himself up and looked fixedly out of the window, apparently turning
over some new idea in his mind.

“Mr. Massey,” he said at last, pushing the hair off his forehead, “I’ll
go back with you. I’ll go into court. It’s cowardly of me to keep away.
I’ll stand by her--I’ll own her--for all she’s been deceitful. They
oughtn’t to cast her off--her own flesh and blood. We hand folks over to
God’s mercy, and show none ourselves. I used to be hard sometimes: I’ll
never be hard again. I’ll go, Mr. Massey--I’ll go with you.”

There was a decision in Adam’s manner which would have prevented Bartle
from opposing him, even if he had wished to do so. He only said, “Take
a bit, then, and another sup, Adam, for the love of me. See, I must stop
and eat a morsel. Now, you take some.”

Nerved by an active resolution, Adam took a morsel of bread and drank
some wine. He was haggard and unshaven, as he had been yesterday, but he
stood upright again, and looked more like the Adam Bede of former days.



Chapter XLIII

The Verdict


THE place fitted up that day as a court of justice was a grand old hall,
now destroyed by fire. The midday light that fell on the close pavement
of human heads was shed through a line of high pointed windows,
variegated with the mellow tints of old painted glass. Grim dusty armour
hung in high relief in front of the dark oaken gallery at the farther
end, and under the broad arch of the great mullioned window opposite was
spread a curtain of old tapestry, covered with dim melancholy figures,
like a dozing indistinct dream of the past. It was a place that through
the rest of the year was haunted with the shadowy memories of old
kings and queens, unhappy, discrowned, imprisoned; but to-day all those
shadows had fled, and not a soul in the vast hall felt the presence of
any but a living sorrow, which was quivering in warm hearts.

But that sorrow seemed to have made it itself feebly felt hitherto, now
when Adam Bede’s tall figure was suddenly seen being ushered to the side
of the prisoner’s dock. In the broad sunlight of the great hall, among
the sleek shaven faces of other men, the marks of suffering in his face
were startling even to Mr. Irwine, who had last seen him in the dim
light of his small room; and the neighbours from Hayslope who were
present, and who told Hetty Sorrel’s story by their firesides in their
old age, never forgot to say how it moved them when Adam Bede, poor
fellow, taller by the head than most of the people round him, came into
court and took his place by her side.

But Hetty did not see him. She was standing in the same position Bartle
Massey had described, her hands crossed over each other and her eyes
fixed on them. Adam had not dared to look at her in the first moments,
but at last, when the attention of the court was withdrawn by the
proceedings he turned his face towards her with a resolution not to
shrink.

Why did they say she was so changed? In the corpse we love, it is the
likeness we see--it is the likeness, which makes itself felt the more
keenly because something else was and is not. There they were--the sweet
face and neck, with the dark tendrils of hair, the long dark lashes, the
rounded cheek and the pouting lips--pale and thin, yes, but like Hetty,
and only Hetty. Others thought she looked as if some demon had cast a
blighting glance upon her, withered up the woman’s soul in her, and
left only a hard despairing obstinacy. But the mother’s yearning, that
completest type of the life in another life which is the essence of
real human love, feels the presence of the cherished child even in the
debased, degraded man; and to Adam, this pale, hard-looking culprit
was the Hetty who had smiled at him in the garden under the apple-tree
boughs--she was that Hetty’s corpse, which he had trembled to look at
the first time, and then was unwilling to turn away his eyes from.

But presently he heard something that compelled him to listen, and made
the sense of sight less absorbing. A woman was in the witness-box, a
middle-aged woman, who spoke in a firm distinct voice. She said, “My
name is Sarah Stone. I am a widow, and keep a small shop licensed to
sell tobacco, snuff, and tea in Church Lane, Stoniton. The prisoner at
the bar is the same young woman who came, looking ill and tired, with
a basket on her arm, and asked for a lodging at my house on Saturday
evening, the 27th of February. She had taken the house for a public,
because there was a figure against the door. And when I said I didn’t
take in lodgers, the prisoner began to cry, and said she was too tired
to go anywhere else, and she only wanted a bed for one night. And her
prettiness, and her condition, and something respectable about her
clothes and looks, and the trouble she seemed to be in made me as I
couldn’t find in my heart to send her away at once. I asked her to sit
down, and gave her some tea, and asked her where she was going, and
where her friends were. She said she was going home to her friends: they
were farming folks a good way off, and she’d had a long journey that had
cost her more money than she expected, so as she’d hardly any money left
in her pocket, and was afraid of going where it would cost her much. She
had been obliged to sell most of the things out of her basket, but she’d
thankfully give a shilling for a bed. I saw no reason why I shouldn’t
take the young woman in for the night. I had only one room, but there
were two beds in it, and I told her she might stay with me. I thought
she’d been led wrong, and got into trouble, but if she was going to her
friends, it would be a good work to keep her out of further harm.”

The witness then stated that in the night a child was born, and she
identified the baby-clothes then shown to her as those in which she had
herself dressed the child.

“Those are the clothes. I made them myself, and had kept them by me
ever since my last child was born. I took a deal of trouble both for
the child and the mother. I couldn’t help taking to the little thing and
being anxious about it. I didn’t send for a doctor, for there seemed no
need. I told the mother in the day-time she must tell me the name of her
friends, and where they lived, and let me write to them. She said, by
and by she would write herself, but not to-day. She would have no nay,
but she would get up and be dressed, in spite of everything I could say.
She said she felt quite strong enough; and it was wonderful what spirit
she showed. But I wasn’t quite easy what I should do about her, and
towards evening I made up my mind I’d go, after Meeting was over, and
speak to our minister about it. I left the house about half-past eight
o’clock. I didn’t go out at the shop door, but at the back door, which
opens into a narrow alley. I’ve only got the ground-floor of the
house, and the kitchen and bedroom both look into the alley. I left the
prisoner sitting up by the fire in the kitchen with the baby on her lap.
She hadn’t cried or seemed low at all, as she did the night before. I
thought she had a strange look with her eyes, and she got a bit flushed
towards evening. I was afraid of the fever, and I thought I’d call and
ask an acquaintance of mine, an experienced woman, to come back with
me when I went out. It was a very dark night. I didn’t fasten the door
behind me; there was no lock; it was a latch with a bolt inside, and
when there was nobody in the house I always went out at the shop door.
But I thought there was no danger in leaving it unfastened that little
while. I was longer than I meant to be, for I had to wait for the woman
that came back with me. It was an hour and a half before we got back,
and when we went in, the candle was standing burning just as I left it,
but the prisoner and the baby were both gone. She’d taken her cloak and
bonnet, but she’d left the basket and the things in it....I was
dreadful frightened, and angry with her for going. I didn’t go to give
information, because I’d no thought she meant to do any harm, and I knew
she had money in her pocket to buy her food and lodging. I didn’t like
to set the constable after her, for she’d a right to go from me if she
liked.”

The effect of this evidence on Adam was electrical; it gave him new
force. Hetty could not be guilty of the crime--her heart must have clung
to her baby--else why should she have taken it with her? She might have
left it behind. The little creature had died naturally, and then she
had hidden it. Babies were so liable to death--and there might be
the strongest suspicions without any proof of guilt. His mind was so
occupied with imaginary arguments against such suspicions, that he
could not listen to the cross-examination by Hetty’s counsel, who tried,
without result, to elicit evidence that the prisoner had shown some
movements of maternal affection towards the child. The whole time this
witness was being examined, Hetty had stood as motionless as before: no
word seemed to arrest her ear. But the sound of the next witness’s
voice touched a chord that was still sensitive, she gave a start and a
frightened look towards him, but immediately turned away her head and
looked down at her hands as before. This witness was a man, a rough
peasant. He said:

“My name is John Olding. I am a labourer, and live at Tedd’s Hole, two
miles out of Stoniton. A week last Monday, towards one o’clock in the
afternoon, I was going towards Hetton Coppice, and about a quarter of a
mile from the coppice I saw the prisoner, in a red cloak, sitting under
a bit of a haystack not far off the stile. She got up when she saw me,
and seemed as if she’d be walking on the other way. It was a regular
road through the fields, and nothing very uncommon to see a young woman
there, but I took notice of her because she looked white and scared. I
should have thought she was a beggar-woman, only for her good clothes. I
thought she looked a bit crazy, but it was no business of mine. I stood
and looked back after her, but she went right on while she was in sight.
I had to go to the other side of the coppice to look after some stakes.
There’s a road right through it, and bits of openings here and there,
where the trees have been cut down, and some of ‘em not carried away.
I didn’t go straight along the road, but turned off towards the middle,
and took a shorter way towards the spot I wanted to get to. I hadn’t got
far out of the road into one of the open places before I heard a strange
cry. I thought it didn’t come from any animal I knew, but I wasn’t for
stopping to look about just then. But it went on, and seemed so strange
to me in that place, I couldn’t help stopping to look. I began to think
I might make some money of it, if it was a new thing. But I had hard
work to tell which way it came from, and for a good while I kept looking
up at the boughs. And then I thought it came from the ground; and there
was a lot of timber-choppings lying about, and loose pieces of turf, and
a trunk or two. And I looked about among them, but could find nothing,
and at last the cry stopped. So I was for giving it up, and I went on
about my business. But when I came back the same way pretty nigh an hour
after, I couldn’t help laying down my stakes to have another look. And
just as I was stooping and laying down the stakes, I saw something odd
and round and whitish lying on the ground under a nut-bush by the side
of me. And I stooped down on hands and knees to pick it up. And I saw it
was a little baby’s hand.”

At these words a thrill ran through the court. Hetty was visibly
trembling; now, for the first time, she seemed to be listening to what a
witness said.

“There was a lot of timber-choppings put together just where the ground
went hollow, like, under the bush, and the hand came out from among
them. But there was a hole left in one place and I could see down it
and see the child’s head; and I made haste and did away the turf and the
choppings, and took out the child. It had got comfortable clothes on,
but its body was cold, and I thought it must be dead. I made haste back
with it out of the wood, and took it home to my wife. She said it was
dead, and I’d better take it to the parish and tell the constable. And I
said, ‘I’ll lay my life it’s that young woman’s child as I met going to
the coppice.’ But she seemed to be gone clean out of sight. And I took
the child on to Hetton parish and told the constable, and we went on to
Justice Hardy. And then we went looking after the young woman till dark
at night, and we went and gave information at Stoniton, as they might
stop her. And the next morning, another constable came to me, to go with
him to the spot where I found the child. And when we got there, there
was the prisoner a-sitting against the bush where I found the child; and
she cried out when she saw us, but she never offered to move. She’d got
a big piece of bread on her lap.”

Adam had given a faint groan of despair while this witness was speaking.
He had hidden his face on his arm, which rested on the boarding in front
of him. It was the supreme moment of his suffering: Hetty was guilty;
and he was silently calling to God for help. He heard no more of the
evidence, and was unconscious when the case for the prosecution had
closed--unconscious that Mr. Irwine was in the witness-box, telling
of Hetty’s unblemished character in her own parish and of the virtuous
habits in which she had been brought up. This testimony could have no
influence on the verdict, but it was given as part of that plea for
mercy which her own counsel would have made if he had been allowed to
speak for her--a favour not granted to criminals in those stern times.

At last Adam lifted up his head, for there was a general movement round
him. The judge had addressed the jury, and they were retiring. The
decisive moment was not far off. Adam felt a shuddering horror that would
not let him look at Hetty, but she had long relapsed into her blank hard
indifference. All eyes were strained to look at her, but she stood like
a statue of dull despair.

‘There was a mingled rustling, whispering, and low buzzing throughout
the court during this interval. The desire to listen was suspended, and
every one had some feeling or opinion to express in undertones. Adam
sat looking blankly before him, but he did not see the objects that were
right in front of his eyes--the counsel and attorneys talking with an
air of cool business, and Mr. Irwine in low earnest conversation with
the judge--did not see Mr. Irwine sit down again in agitation and shake
his head mournfully when somebody whispered to him. The inward action
was too intense for Adam to take in outward objects until some strong
sensation roused him.

It was not very long, hardly more than a quarter of an hour, before
the knock which told that the jury had come to their decision fell as a
signal for silence on every ear. It is sublime--that sudden pause of a
great multitude which tells that one soul moves in them all. Deeper and
deeper the silence seemed to become, like the deepening night, while the
jurymen’s names were called over, and the prisoner was made to hold up
her hand, and the jury were asked for their verdict.

“Guilty.”

It was the verdict every one expected, but there was a sigh
of disappointment from some hearts that it was followed by no
recommendation to mercy. Still the sympathy of the court was not with
the prisoner. The unnaturalness of her crime stood out the more harshly
by the side of her hard immovability and obstinate silence. Even the
verdict, to distant eyes, had not appeared to move her, but those who
were near saw her trembling.

The stillness was less intense until the judge put on his black cap, and
the chaplain in his canonicals was observed behind him. Then it deepened
again, before the crier had had time to command silence. If any sound
were heard, it must have been the sound of beating hearts. The judge
spoke, “Hester Sorrel....”

The blood rushed to Hetty’s face, and then fled back again as she
looked up at the judge and kept her wide-open eyes fixed on him, as if
fascinated by fear. Adam had not yet turned towards her, there was a
deep horror, like a great gulf, between them. But at the words “and
then to be hanged by the neck till you be dead,” a piercing shriek rang
through the hall. It was Hetty’s shriek. Adam started to his feet and
stretched out his arms towards her. But the arms could not reach her:
she had fallen down in a fainting-fit, and was carried out of court.



Chapter XLIV

Arthur’s Return


When Arthur Donnithorne landed at Liverpool and read the letter from
his Aunt Lydia, briefly announcing his grand-father’s death, his first
feeling was, “Poor Grandfather! I wish I could have got to him to be
with him when he died. He might have felt or wished something at the
last that I shall never know now. It was a lonely death.”

It is impossible to say that his grief was deeper than that. Pity
and softened memory took place of the old antagonism, and in his busy
thoughts about the future, as the chaise carried him rapidly along
towards the home where he was now to be master, there was a continually
recurring effort to remember anything by which he could show a regard
for his grandfather’s wishes, without counteracting his own cherished
aims for the good of the tenants and the estate. But it is not in human
nature--only in human pretence--for a young man like Arthur, with a fine
constitution and fine spirits, thinking well of himself, believing that
others think well of him, and having a very ardent intention to give
them more and more reason for that good opinion--it is not possible for
such a young man, just coming into a splendid estate through the
death of a very old man whom he was not fond of, to feel anything very
different from exultant joy. Now his real life was beginning; now he
would have room and opportunity for action, and he would use them. He
would show the Loamshire people what a fine country gentleman was; he
would not exchange that career for any other under the sun. He felt
himself riding over the hills in the breezy autumn days, looking after
favourite plans of drainage and enclosure; then admired on sombre
mornings as the best rider on the best horse in the hunt; spoken well
of on market-days as a first-rate landlord; by and by making speeches at
election dinners, and showing a wonderful knowledge of agriculture;
the patron of new ploughs and drills, the severe upbraider of negligent
landowners, and withal a jolly fellow that everybody must like--happy
faces greeting him everywhere on his own estate, and the neighbouring
families on the best terms with him. The Irwines should dine with him
every week, and have their own carriage to come in, for in some very
delicate way that Arthur would devise, the lay-impropriator of the
Hayslope tithes would insist on paying a couple of hundreds more to
the vicar; and his aunt should be as comfortable as possible, and go on
living at the Chase, if she liked, in spite of her old-maidish ways--at
least until he was married, and that event lay in the indistinct
background, for Arthur had not yet seen the woman who would play the
lady-wife to the first-rate country gentleman.

These were Arthur’s chief thoughts, so far as a man’s thoughts through
hours of travelling can be compressed into a few sentences, which are
only like the list of names telling you what are the scenes in a long
long panorama full of colour, of detail, and of life. The happy faces
Arthur saw greeting him were not pale abstractions, but real ruddy
faces, long familiar to him: Martin Poyser was there--the whole Poyser
family.

What--Hetty?

Yes; for Arthur was at ease about Hetty--not quite at ease about the
past, for a certain burning of the ears would come whenever he thought
of the scenes with Adam last August, but at ease about her present lot.
Mr. Irwine, who had been a regular correspondent, telling him all the
news about the old places and people, had sent him word nearly three
months ago that Adam Bede was not to marry Mary Burge, as he had
thought, but pretty Hetty Sorrel. Martin Poyser and Adam himself had
both told Mr. Irwine all about it--that Adam had been deeply in love
with Hetty these two years, and that now it was agreed they were to be
married in March. That stalwart rogue Adam was more susceptible than the
rector had thought; it was really quite an idyllic love affair; and if
it had not been too long to tell in a letter, he would have liked to
describe to Arthur the blushing looks and the simple strong words with
which the fine honest fellow told his secret. He knew Arthur would like
to hear that Adam had this sort of happiness in prospect.

Yes, indeed! Arthur felt there was not air enough in the room to satisfy
his renovated life, when he had read that passage in the letter. He
threw up the windows, he rushed out of doors into the December air, and
greeted every one who spoke to him with an eager gaiety, as if there had
been news of a fresh Nelson victory. For the first time that day since
he had come to Windsor, he was in true boyish spirits. The load that
had been pressing upon him was gone, the haunting fear had vanished. He
thought he could conquer his bitterness towards Adam now--could offer
him his hand, and ask to be his friend again, in spite of that painful
memory which would still make his ears burn. He had been knocked down,
and he had been forced to tell a lie: such things make a scar, do what
we will. But if Adam were the same again as in the old days, Arthur
wished to be the same too, and to have Adam mixed up with his business
and his future, as he had always desired before the accursed meeting
in August. Nay, he would do a great deal more for Adam than he should
otherwise have done, when he came into the estate; Hetty’s husband had
a special claim on him--Hetty herself should feel that any pain she
had suffered through Arthur in the past was compensated to her a
hundredfold. For really she could not have felt much, since she had so
soon made up her mind to marry Adam.

You perceive clearly what sort of picture Adam and Hetty made in the
panorama of Arthur’s thoughts on his journey homeward. It was March now;
they were soon to be married: perhaps they were already married. And now
it was actually in his power to do a great deal for them. Sweet--sweet
little Hetty! The little puss hadn’t cared for him half as much as
he cared for her; for he was a great fool about her still--was almost
afraid of seeing her--indeed, had not cared much to look at any other
woman since he parted from her. That little figure coming towards him in
the Grove, those dark-fringed childish eyes, the lovely lips put up to
kiss him--that picture had got no fainter with the lapse of months. And
she would look just the same. It was impossible to think how he could
meet her: he should certainly tremble. Strange, how long this sort of
influence lasts, for he was certainly not in love with Hetty now. He
had been earnestly desiring, for months, that she should marry Adam,
and there was nothing that contributed more to his happiness in these
moments than the thought of their marriage. It was the exaggerating
effect of imagination that made his heart still beat a little more
quickly at the thought of her. When he saw the little thing again as she
really was, as Adam’s wife, at work quite prosaically in her new home,
he should perhaps wonder at the possibility of his past feelings. Thank
heaven it had turned out so well! He should have plenty of affairs and
interests to fill his life now, and not be in danger of playing the fool
again.

Pleasant the crack of the post-boy’s whip! Pleasant the sense of being
hurried along in swift ease through English scenes, so like those round
his own home, only not quite so charming. Here was a market-town--very
much like Treddleston--where the arms of the neighbouring lord of the
manor were borne on the sign of the principal inn; then mere fields and
hedges, their vicinity to a market-town carrying an agreeable suggestion
of high rent, till the land began to assume a trimmer look, the woods
were more frequent, and at length a white or red mansion looked down
from a moderate eminence, or allowed him to be aware of its parapet
and chimneys among the dense-looking masses of oaks and elms--masses
reddened now with early buds. And close at hand came the village: the
small church, with its red-tiled roof, looking humble even among the
faded half-timbered houses; the old green gravestones with nettles round
them; nothing fresh and bright but the children, opening round eyes at
the swift post-chaise; nothing noisy and busy but the gaping curs of
mysterious pedigree. What a much prettier village Hayslope was! And it
should not be neglected like this place: vigorous repairs should go
on everywhere among farm-buildings and cottages, and travellers in
post-chaises, coming along the Rosseter road, should do nothing but
admire as they went. And Adam Bede should superintend all the repairs,
for he had a share in Burge’s business now, and, if he liked, Arthur
would put some money into the concern and buy the old man out in another
year or two. That was an ugly fault in Arthur’s life, that affair last
summer, but the future should make amends. Many men would have retained
a feeling of vindictiveness towards Adam, but he would not--he would
resolutely overcome all littleness of that kind, for he had certainly
been very much in the wrong; and though Adam had been harsh and violent,
and had thrust on him a painful dilemma, the poor fellow was in love,
and had real provocation. No, Arthur had not an evil feeling in his mind
towards any human being: he was happy, and would make every one else
happy that came within his reach.

And here was dear old Hayslope at last, sleeping, on the hill, like a
quiet old place as it was, in the late afternoon sunlight, and opposite
to it the great shoulders of the Binton Hills, below them the purplish
blackness of the hanging woods, and at last the pale front of the Abbey,
looking out from among the oaks of the Chase, as if anxious for the
heir’s return. “Poor Grandfather! And he lies dead there. He was a young
fellow once, coming into the estate and making his plans. So the world
goes round! Aunt Lydia must feel very desolate, poor thing; but she
shall be indulged as much as she indulges her fat Fido.”

The wheels of Arthur’s chaise had been anxiously listened for at the
Chase, for to-day was Friday, and the funeral had already been deferred
two days. Before it drew up on the gravel of the courtyard, all the
servants in the house were assembled to receive him with a grave, decent
welcome, befitting a house of death. A month ago, perhaps, it would have
been difficult for them to have maintained a suitable sadness in their
faces, when Mr. Arthur was come to take possession; but the hearts of
the head-servants were heavy that day for another cause than the death
of the old squire, and more than one of them was longing to be twenty
miles away, as Mr. Craig was, knowing what was to become of Hetty
Sorrel--pretty Hetty Sorrel--whom they used to see every week. They had
the partisanship of household servants who like their places, and
were not inclined to go the full length of the severe indignation felt
against him by the farming tenants, but rather to make excuses for him;
nevertheless, the upper servants, who had been on terms of neighbourly
intercourse with the Poysers for many years, could not help feeling that
the longed-for event of the young squire’s coming into the estate had
been robbed of all its pleasantness.

To Arthur it was nothing surprising that the servants looked grave and
sad: he himself was very much touched on seeing them all again, and
feeling that he was in a new relation to them. It was that sort of
pathetic emotion which has more pleasure than pain in it--which is
perhaps one of the most delicious of all states to a good-natured man,
conscious of the power to satisfy his good nature. His heart swelled
agreeably as he said, “Well, Mills, how is my aunt?”

But now Mr. Bygate, the lawyer, who had been in the house ever since
the death, came forward to give deferential greetings and answer all
questions, and Arthur walked with him towards the library, where his
Aunt Lydia was expecting him. Aunt Lydia was the only person in the
house who knew nothing about Hetty. Her sorrow as a maiden daughter
was unmixed with any other thoughts than those of anxiety about funeral
arrangements and her own future lot; and, after the manner of women,
she mourned for the father who had made her life important, all the more
because she had a secret sense that there was little mourning for him in
other hearts.

But Arthur kissed her tearful face more tenderly than he had ever done
in his life before.

“Dear Aunt,” he said affectionately, as he held her hand, “YOUR loss is
the greatest of all, but you must tell me how to try and make it up to
you all the rest of your life.”

“It was so sudden and so dreadful, Arthur,” poor Miss Lydia began,
pouring out her little plaints, and Arthur sat down to listen with
impatient patience. When a pause came, he said:

“Now, Aunt, I’ll leave you for a quarter of an hour just to go to my own
room, and then I shall come and give full attention to everything.”

“My room is all ready for me, I suppose, Mills?” he said to the butler,
who seemed to be lingering uneasily about the entrance-hall.

“Yes, sir, and there are letters for you; they are all laid on the
writing-table in your dressing-room.”

On entering the small anteroom which was called a dressing-room, but
which Arthur really used only to lounge and write in, he just cast his
eyes on the writing-table, and saw that there were several letters and
packets lying there; but he was in the uncomfortable dusty condition
of a man who has had a long hurried journey, and he must really refresh
himself by attending to his toilette a little, before he read his
letters. Pym was there, making everything ready for him, and soon, with
a delightful freshness about him, as if he were prepared to begin a new
day, he went back into his dressing-room to open his letters. The level
rays of the low afternoon sun entered directly at the window, and as
Arthur seated himself in his velvet chair with their pleasant warmth
upon him, he was conscious of that quiet well-being which perhaps you
and I have felt on a sunny afternoon when, in our brightest youth and
health, life has opened a new vista for us, and long to-morrows of
activity have stretched before us like a lovely plain which there was no
need for hurrying to look at, because it was all our own.

The top letter was placed with its address upwards: it was in Mr.
Irwine’s handwriting, Arthur saw at once; and below the address was
written, “To be delivered as soon as he arrives.” Nothing could have
been less surprising to him than a letter from Mr. Irwine at that
moment: of course, there was something he wished Arthur to know earlier
than it was possible for them to see each other. At such a time as that
it was quite natural that Irwine should have something pressing to say.
Arthur broke the seal with an agreeable anticipation of soon seeing the
writer.


“I send this letter to meet you on your arrival, Arthur, because I may
then be at Stoniton, whither I am called by the most painful duty it has
ever been given me to perform, and it is right that you should know what
I have to tell you without delay.

“I will not attempt to add by one word of reproach to the retribution
that is now falling on you: any other words that I could write at this
moment must be weak and unmeaning by the side of those in which I must
tell you the simple fact.

“Hetty Sorrel is in prison, and will be tried on Friday for the crime of
child-murder.”...


Arthur read no more. He started up from his chair and stood for a single
minute with a sense of violent convulsion in his whole frame, as if the
life were going out of him with horrible throbs; but the next minute he
had rushed out of the room, still clutching the letter--he was hurrying
along the corridor, and down the stairs into the hall. Mills was still
there, but Arthur did not see him, as he passed like a hunted man across
the hall and out along the gravel. The butler hurried out after him
as fast as his elderly limbs could run: he guessed, he knew, where the
young squire was going.

When Mills got to the stables, a horse was being saddled, and Arthur was
forcing himself to read the remaining words of the letter. He thrust
it into his pocket as the horse was led up to him, and at that moment
caught sight of Mills’ anxious face in front of him.

“Tell them I’m gone--gone to Stoniton,” he said in a muffled tone of
agitation--sprang into the saddle, and set off at a gallop.



Chapter XLV

In the Prison


NEAR sunset that evening an elderly gentleman was standing with his back
against the smaller entrance-door of Stoniton jail, saying a few last
words to the departing chaplain. The chaplain walked away, but the
elderly gentleman stood still, looking down on the pavement and stroking
his chin with a ruminating air, when he was roused by a sweet clear
woman’s voice, saying, “Can I get into the prison, if you please?”

He turned his head and looked fixedly at the speaker for a few moments
without answering.

“I have seen you before,” he said at last. “Do you remember preaching on
the village green at Hayslope in Loamshire?”

“Yes, sir, surely. Are you the gentleman that stayed to listen on
horseback?”

“Yes. Why do you want to go into the prison?”

“I want to go to Hetty Sorrel, the young woman who has been condemned
to death--and to stay with her, if I may be permitted. Have you power in
the prison, sir?”

“Yes; I am a magistrate, and can get admittance for you. But did you
know this criminal, Hetty Sorrel?”

“Yes, we are kin. My own aunt married her uncle, Martin Poyser. But I
was away at Leeds, and didn’t know of this great trouble in time to get
here before to-day. I entreat you, sir, for the love of our heavenly
Father, to let me go to her and stay with her.”

“How did you know she was condemned to death, if you are only just come
from Leeds?”

“I have seen my uncle since the trial, sir. He is gone back to his home
now, and the poor sinner is forsaken of all. I beseech you to get leave
for me to be with her.”

“What! Have you courage to stay all night in the prison? She is very
sullen, and will scarcely make answer when she is spoken to.”

“Oh, sir, it may please God to open her heart still. Don’t let us
delay.”

“Come, then,” said the elderly gentleman, ringing and gaining admission,
“I know you have a key to unlock hearts.”

Dinah mechanically took off her bonnet and shawl as soon as they were
within the prison court, from the habit she had of throwing them off
when she preached or prayed, or visited the sick; and when they entered
the jailer’s room, she laid them down on a chair unthinkingly. There was
no agitation visible in her, but a deep concentrated calmness, as if,
even when she was speaking, her soul was in prayer reposing on an unseen
support.

After speaking to the jailer, the magistrate turned to her and said,
“The turnkey will take you to the prisoner’s cell and leave you there
for the night, if you desire it, but you can’t have a light during the
night--it is contrary to rules. My name is Colonel Townley: if I can
help you in anything, ask the jailer for my address and come to me.
I take some interest in this Hetty Sorrel, for the sake of that fine
fellow, Adam Bede. I happened to see him at Hayslope the same evening I
heard you preach, and recognized him in court to-day, ill as he looked.”

“Ah, sir, can you tell me anything about him? Can you tell me where
he lodges? For my poor uncle was too much weighed down with trouble to
remember.”

“Close by here. I inquired all about him of Mr. Irwine. He lodges over
a tinman’s shop, in the street on the right hand as you entered the
prison. There is an old school-master with him. Now, good-bye: I wish
you success.”

“Farewell, sir. I am grateful to you.”

As Dinah crossed the prison court with the turnkey, the solemn evening
light seemed to make the walls higher than they were by day, and the
sweet pale face in the cap was more than ever like a white flower on
this background of gloom. The turnkey looked askance at her all the
while, but never spoke. He somehow felt that the sound of his own rude
voice would be grating just then. He struck a light as they entered the
dark corridor leading to the condemned cell, and then said in his most
civil tone, “It’ll be pretty nigh dark in the cell a’ready, but I can
stop with my light a bit, if you like.”

“Nay, friend, thank you,” said Dinah. “I wish to go in alone.”

“As you like,” said the jailer, turning the harsh key in the lock and
opening the door wide enough to admit Dinah. A jet of light from his
lantern fell on the opposite corner of the cell, where Hetty was sitting
on her straw pallet with her face buried in her knees. It seemed as if
she were asleep, and yet the grating of the lock would have been likely
to waken her.

The door closed again, and the only light in the cell was that of the
evening sky, through the small high grating--enough to discern human
faces by. Dinah stood still for a minute, hesitating to speak because
Hetty might be asleep, and looking at the motionless heap with a
yearning heart. Then she said, softly, “Hetty!”

There was a slight movement perceptible in Hetty’s frame--a start such
as might have been produced by a feeble electrical shock--but she did
not look up. Dinah spoke again, in a tone made stronger by irrepressible
emotion, “Hetty...it’s Dinah.”

Again there was a slight startled movement through Hetty’s frame,
and without uncovering her face, she raised her head a little, as if
listening.

“Hetty...Dinah is come to you.”

After a moment’s pause, Hetty lifted her head slowly and timidly from
her knees and raised her eyes. The two pale faces were looking at
each other: one with a wild hard despair in it, the other full of sad
yearning love. Dinah unconsciously opened her arms and stretched them
out.

“Don’t you know me, Hetty? Don’t you remember Dinah? Did you think I
wouldn’t come to you in trouble?”

Hetty kept her eyes fixed on Dinah’s face--at first like an animal that
gazes, and gazes, and keeps aloof.

“I’m come to be with you, Hetty--not to leave you--to stay with you--to
be your sister to the last.”

Slowly, while Dinah was speaking, Hetty rose, took a step forward, and
was clasped in Dinah’s arms.

They stood so a long while, for neither of them felt the impulse to move
apart again. Hetty, without any distinct thought of it, hung on this
something that was come to clasp her now, while she was sinking helpless
in a dark gulf; and Dinah felt a deep joy in the first sign that her
love was welcomed by the wretched lost one. The light got fainter as
they stood, and when at last they sat down on the straw pallet together,
their faces had become indistinct.

Not a word was spoken. Dinah waited, hoping for a spontaneous word from
Hetty, but she sat in the same dull despair, only clutching the hand
that held hers and leaning her cheek against Dinah’s. It was the human
contact she clung to, but she was not the less sinking into the dark
gulf.

Dinah began to doubt whether Hetty was conscious who it was that sat
beside her. She thought suffering and fear might have driven the poor
sinner out of her mind. But it was borne in upon her, as she afterwards
said, that she must not hurry God’s work: we are overhasty to speak--as
if God did not manifest himself by our silent feeling, and make his love
felt through ours. She did not know how long they sat in that way, but
it got darker and darker, till there was only a pale patch of light on
the opposite wall: all the rest was darkness. But she felt the Divine
presence more and more--nay, as if she herself were a part of it, and
it was the Divine pity that was beating in her heart and was willing the
rescue of this helpless one. At last she was prompted to speak and find
out how far Hetty was conscious of the present.

“Hetty,” she said gently, “do you know who it is that sits by your
side?”

“Yes,” Hetty answered slowly, “it’s Dinah.”

“And do you remember the time when we were at the Hall Farm together,
and that night when I told you to be sure and think of me as a friend in
trouble?”

“Yes,” said Hetty. Then, after a pause, she added, “But you can do
nothing for me. You can’t make ‘em do anything. They’ll hang me o’
Monday--it’s Friday now.”

As Hetty said the last words, she clung closer to Dinah, shuddering.

“No, Hetty, I can’t save you from that death. But isn’t the suffering
less hard when you have somebody with you, that feels for you--that you
can speak to, and say what’s in your heart?...Yes, Hetty: you lean on
me: you are glad to have me with you.”

“You won’t leave me, Dinah? You’ll keep close to me?”

“No, Hetty, I won’t leave you. I’ll stay with you to the last....But,
Hetty, there is some one else in this cell besides me, some one close to
you.”

Hetty said, in a frightened whisper, “Who?”

“Some one who has been with you through all your hours of sin and
trouble--who has known every thought you have had--has seen where you
went, where you lay down and rose up again, and all the deeds you have
tried to hide in darkness. And on Monday, when I can’t follow you--when
my arms can’t reach you--when death has parted us--He who is with
us now, and knows all, will be with you then. It makes no
difference--whether we live or die, we are in the presence of God.”

“Oh, Dinah, won’t nobody do anything for me? Will they hang me for
certain?...I wouldn’t mind if they’d let me live.”

“My poor Hetty, death is very dreadful to you. I know it’s dreadful.
But if you had a friend to take care of you after death--in that
other world--some one whose love is greater than mine--who can do
everything?...If God our Father was your friend, and was willing to
save you from sin and suffering, so as you should neither know wicked
feelings nor pain again? If you could believe he loved you and would
help you, as you believe I love you and will help you, it wouldn’t be so
hard to die on Monday, would it?”

“But I can’t know anything about it,” Hetty said, with sullen sadness.

“Because, Hetty, you are shutting up your soul against him, by trying
to hide the truth. God’s love and mercy can overcome all things--our
ignorance, and weakness, and all the burden of our past wickedness--all
things but our wilful sin, sin that we cling to, and will not give up.
You believe in my love and pity for you, Hetty, but if you had not let
me come near you, if you wouldn’t have looked at me or spoken to me,
you’d have shut me out from helping you. I couldn’t have made you feel
my love; I couldn’t have told you what I felt for you. Don’t shut God’s
love out in that way, by clinging to sin....He can’t bless you while
you have one falsehood in your soul; his pardoning mercy can’t reach
you until you open your heart to him, and say, ‘I have done this great
wickedness; O God, save me, make me pure from sin.’ While you cling to
one sin and will not part with it, it must drag you down to misery after
death, as it has dragged you to misery here in this world, my poor, poor
Hetty. It is sin that brings dread, and darkness, and despair: there is
light and blessedness for us as soon as we cast it off. God enters our
souls then, and teaches us, and brings us strength and peace. Cast it
off now, Hetty--now: confess the wickedness you have done--the sin you
have been guilty of against your Heavenly Father. Let us kneel down
together, for we are in the presence of God.”

Hetty obeyed Dinah’s movement, and sank on her knees. They still held
each other’s hands, and there was long silence. Then Dinah said, “Hetty,
we are before God. He is waiting for you to tell the truth.”

Still there was silence. At last Hetty spoke, in a tone of beseeching--

“Dinah...help me...I can’t feel anything like you...my heart is hard.”

Dinah held the clinging hand, and all her soul went forth in her voice:


“Jesus, thou present Saviour! Thou hast known the depths of all sorrow:
thou hast entered that black darkness where God is not, and hast uttered
the cry of the forsaken. Come Lord, and gather of the fruits of thy
travail and thy pleading. Stretch forth thy hand, thou who art mighty
to save to the uttermost, and rescue this lost one. She is clothed round
with thick darkness. The fetters of her sin are upon her, and she cannot
stir to come to thee. She can only feel her heart is hard, and she is
helpless. She cries to me, thy weak creature....Saviour! It is a blind
cry to thee. Hear it! Pierce the darkness! Look upon her with thy face
of love and sorrow that thou didst turn on him who denied thee, and melt
her hard heart.

“See, Lord, I bring her, as they of old brought the sick and helpless,
and thou didst heal them. I bear her on my arms and carry her before
thee. Fear and trembling have taken hold on her, but she trembles only
at the pain and death of the body. Breathe upon her thy life-giving
Spirit, and put a new fear within her--the fear of her sin. Make her
dread to keep the accursed thing within her soul. Make her feel the
presence of the living God, who beholds all the past, to whom the
darkness is as noonday; who is waiting now, at the eleventh hour, for
her to turn to him, and confess her sin, and cry for mercy--now, before
the night of death comes, and the moment of pardon is for ever fled,
like yesterday that returneth not.

“Saviour! It is yet time--time to snatch this poor soul from everlasting
darkness. I believe--I believe in thy infinite love. What is my love or
my pleading? It is quenched in thine. I can only clasp her in my weak
arms and urge her with my weak pity. Thou--thou wilt breathe on the dead
soul, and it shall arise from the unanswering sleep of death.

“Yea, Lord, I see thee, coming through the darkness coming, like the
morning, with healing on thy wings. The marks of thy agony are upon
thee--I see, I see thou art able and willing to save--thou wilt not let
her perish for ever. Come, mighty Saviour! Let the dead hear thy voice.
Let the eyes of the blind be opened. Let her see that God encompasses
her. Let her tremble at nothing but at the sin that cuts her off from
him. Melt the hard heart. Unseal the closed lips: make her cry with her
whole soul, ‘Father, I have sinned.’...”

“Dinah,” Hetty sobbed out, throwing her arms round Dinah’s neck, “I will
speak...I will tell...I won’t hide it any more.”

But the tears and sobs were too violent. Dinah raised her gently from
her knees and seated her on the pallet again, sitting down by her side.
It was a long time before the convulsed throat was quiet, and even
then they sat some time in stillness and darkness, holding each other’s
hands. At last Hetty whispered, “I did do it, Dinah...I buried it in the
wood...the little baby...and it cried...I heard it cry...ever such a way
off...all night...and I went back because it cried.”

She paused, and then spoke hurriedly in a louder, pleading tone.

“But I thought perhaps it wouldn’t die--there might somebody find it. I
didn’t kill it--I didn’t kill it myself. I put it down there and covered
it up, and when I came back it was gone....It was because I was so
very miserable, Dinah...I didn’t know where to go...and I tried to kill
myself before, and I couldn’t. Oh, I tried so to drown myself in the
pool, and I couldn’t. I went to Windsor--I ran away--did you know? I
went to find him, as he might take care of me; and he was gone; and then
I didn’t know what to do. I daredn’t go back home again--I couldn’t bear
it. I couldn’t have bore to look at anybody, for they’d have scorned me.
I thought o’ you sometimes, and thought I’d come to you, for I didn’t
think you’d be cross with me, and cry shame on me. I thought I could
tell you. But then the other folks ‘ud come to know it at last, and I
couldn’t bear that. It was partly thinking o’ you made me come toward
Stoniton; and, besides, I was so frightened at going wandering about
till I was a beggar-woman, and had nothing; and sometimes it seemed as
if I must go back to the farm sooner than that. Oh, it was so dreadful,
Dinah...I was so miserable...I wished I’d never been born into this
world. I should never like to go into the green fields again--I hated
‘em so in my misery.”

Hetty paused again, as if the sense of the past were too strong upon her
for words.

“And then I got to Stoniton, and I began to feel frightened that night,
because I was so near home. And then the little baby was born, when I
didn’t expect it; and the thought came into my mind that I might get
rid of it and go home again. The thought came all of a sudden, as I was
lying in the bed, and it got stronger and stronger...I longed so to go
back again...I couldn’t bear being so lonely and coming to beg for want.
And it gave me strength and resolution to get up and dress myself. I
felt I must do it...I didn’t know how...I thought I’d find a pool, if
I could, like that other, in the corner of the field, in the dark.
And when the woman went out, I felt as if I was strong enough to do
anything...I thought I should get rid of all my misery, and go back
home, and never let ‘em know why I ran away. I put on my bonnet and
shawl, and went out into the dark street, with the baby under my cloak;
and I walked fast till I got into a street a good way off, and there
was a public, and I got some warm stuff to drink and some bread. And
I walked on and on, and I hardly felt the ground I trod on; and it got
lighter, for there came the moon--oh, Dinah, it frightened me when it
first looked at me out o’ the clouds--it never looked so before; and
I turned out of the road into the fields, for I was afraid o’ meeting
anybody with the moon shining on me. And I came to a haystack, where
I thought I could lie down and keep myself warm all night. There was a
place cut into it, where I could make me a bed, and I lay comfortable,
and the baby was warm against me; and I must have gone to sleep for a
good while, for when I woke it was morning, but not very light, and the
baby was crying. And I saw a wood a little way off...I thought there’d
perhaps be a ditch or a pond there...and it was so early I thought I
could hide the child there, and get a long way off before folks was up.
And then I thought I’d go home--I’d get rides in carts and go home and
tell ‘em I’d been to try and see for a place, and couldn’t get one. I
longed so for it, Dinah, I longed so to be safe at home. I don’t know
how I felt about the baby. I seemed to hate it--it was like a heavy
weight hanging round my neck; and yet its crying went through me, and I
daredn’t look at its little hands and face. But I went on to the wood,
and I walked about, but there was no water....”

Hetty shuddered. She was silent for some moments, and when she began
again, it was in a whisper.

“I came to a place where there was lots of chips and turf, and I sat
down on the trunk of a tree to think what I should do. And all of a
sudden I saw a hole under the nut-tree, like a little grave. And it
darted into me like lightning--I’d lay the baby there and cover it with
the grass and the chips. I couldn’t kill it any other way. And I’d done
it in a minute; and, oh, it cried so, Dinah--I couldn’t cover it quite
up--I thought perhaps somebody ‘ud come and take care of it, and then
it wouldn’t die. And I made haste out of the wood, but I could hear it
crying all the while; and when I got out into the fields, it was as if I
was held fast--I couldn’t go away, for all I wanted so to go. And I sat
against the haystack to watch if anybody ‘ud come. I was very hungry,
and I’d only a bit of bread left, but I couldn’t go away. And after ever
such a while--hours and hours--the man came--him in a smock-frock, and
he looked at me so, I was frightened, and I made haste and went on. I
thought he was going to the wood and would perhaps find the baby. And I
went right on, till I came to a village, a long way off from the wood,
and I was very sick, and faint, and hungry. I got something to eat
there, and bought a loaf. But I was frightened to stay. I heard the baby
crying, and thought the other folks heard it too--and I went on. But
I was so tired, and it was getting towards dark. And at last, by the
roadside there was a barn--ever such a way off any house--like the barn
in Abbot’s Close, and I thought I could go in there and hide myself
among the hay and straw, and nobody ‘ud be likely to come. I went in,
and it was half full o’ trusses of straw, and there was some hay too.
And I made myself a bed, ever so far behind, where nobody could find
me; and I was so tired and weak, I went to sleep....But oh, the baby’s
crying kept waking me, and I thought that man as looked at me so was
come and laying hold of me. But I must have slept a long while at last,
though I didn’t know, for when I got up and went out of the barn, I
didn’t know whether it was night or morning. But it was morning, for
it kept getting lighter, and I turned back the way I’d come. I couldn’t
help it, Dinah; it was the baby’s crying made me go--and yet I was
frightened to death. I thought that man in the smock-frock ‘ud see me
and know I put the baby there. But I went on, for all that. I’d left off
thinking about going home--it had gone out o’ my mind. I saw nothing
but that place in the wood where I’d buried the baby...I see it now. Oh
Dinah! shall I allays see it?”

Hetty clung round Dinah and shuddered again. The silence seemed long
before she went on.

“I met nobody, for it was very early, and I got into the wood....I knew
the way to the place...the place against the nut-tree; and I could
hear it crying at every step....I thought it was alive....I don’t know
whether I was frightened or glad...I don’t know what I felt. I only know
I was in the wood and heard the cry. I don’t know what I felt till I saw
the baby was gone. And when I’d put it there, I thought I should like
somebody to find it and save it from dying; but when I saw it was gone,
I was struck like a stone, with fear. I never thought o’ stirring, I
felt so weak. I knew I couldn’t run away, and everybody as saw me ‘ud
know about the baby. My heart went like a stone. I couldn’t wish or try
for anything; it seemed like as if I should stay there for ever, and
nothing ‘ud ever change. But they came and took me away.”

Hetty was silent, but she shuddered again, as if there was still
something behind; and Dinah waited, for her heart was so full that tears
must come before words. At last Hetty burst out, with a sob, “Dinah, do
you think God will take away that crying and the place in the wood, now
I’ve told everything?”

“Let us pray, poor sinner. Let us fall on our knees again, and pray to
the God of all mercy.”



Chapter XLVI

The Hours of Suspense


ON Sunday morning, when the church bells in Stoniton were ringing for
morning service, Bartle Massey re-entered Adam’s room, after a short
absence, and said, “Adam, here’s a visitor wants to see you.”

Adam was seated with his back towards the door, but he started up and
turned round instantly, with a flushed face and an eager look. His face
was even thinner and more worn than we have seen it before, but he was
washed and shaven this Sunday morning.

“Is it any news?” he said.

“Keep yourself quiet, my lad,” said Bartle; “keep quiet. It’s not what
you’re thinking of. It’s the young Methodist woman come from the prison.
She’s at the bottom o’ the stairs, and wants to know if you think
well to see her, for she has something to say to you about that poor
castaway; but she wouldn’t come in without your leave, she said. She
thought you’d perhaps like to go out and speak to her. These preaching
women are not so back’ard commonly,” Bartle muttered to himself.

“Ask her to come in,” said Adam.

He was standing with his face towards the door, and as Dinah entered,
lifting up her mild grey eyes towards him, she saw at once the great
change that had come since the day when she had looked up at the tall
man in the cottage. There was a trembling in her clear voice as she put
her hand into his and said, “Be comforted, Adam Bede, the Lord has not
forsaken her.”

“Bless you for coming to her,” Adam said. “Mr. Massey brought me word
yesterday as you was come.”

They could neither of them say any more just yet, but stood before each
other in silence; and Bartle Massey, too, who had put on his spectacles,
seemed transfixed, examining Dinah’s face. But he recovered himself
first, and said, “Sit down, young woman, sit down,” placing the chair
for her and retiring to his old seat on the bed.

“Thank you, friend; I won’t sit down,” said Dinah, “for I must hasten
back. She entreated me not to stay long away. What I came for, Adam
Bede, was to pray you to go and see the poor sinner and bid her
farewell. She desires to ask your forgiveness, and it is meet you should
see her to-day, rather than in the early morning, when the time will be
short.”

Adam stood trembling, and at last sank down on his chair again.

“It won’t be,” he said, “it’ll be put off--there’ll perhaps come a
pardon. Mr. Irwine said there was hope. He said, I needn’t quite give it
up.”

“That’s a blessed thought to me,” said Dinah, her eyes filling with
tears. “It’s a fearful thing hurrying her soul away so fast.”

“But let what will be,” she added presently. “You will surely come, and
let her speak the words that are in her heart. Although her poor soul is
very dark and discerns little beyond the things of the flesh, she is no
longer hard. She is contrite, she has confessed all to me. The pride of
her heart has given way, and she leans on me for help and desires to
be taught. This fills me with trust, for I cannot but think that the
brethren sometimes err in measuring the Divine love by the sinner’s
knowledge. She is going to write a letter to the friends at the Hall
Farm for me to give them when she is gone, and when I told her you were
here, she said, ‘I should like to say good-bye to Adam and ask him to
forgive me.’ You will come, Adam? Perhaps you will even now come back
with me.”

“I can’t,” Adam said. “I can’t say good-bye while there’s any hope. I’m
listening, and listening--I can’t think o’ nothing but that. It can’t be
as she’ll die that shameful death--I can’t bring my mind to it.”

He got up from his chair again and looked away out of the window, while
Dinah stood with compassionate patience. In a minute or two he turned
round and said, “I will come, Dinah...to-morrow morning...if it must be.
I may have more strength to bear it, if I know it must be. Tell her, I
forgive her; tell her I will come--at the very last.”

“I will not urge you against the voice of your own heart,” said Dinah.
“I must hasten back to her, for it is wonderful how she clings now, and
was not willing to let me out of her sight. She used never to make any
return to my affection before, but now tribulation has opened her heart.
Farewell, Adam. Our heavenly Father comfort you and strengthen you
to bear all things.” Dinah put out her hand, and Adam pressed it in
silence.

Bartle Massey was getting up to lift the stiff latch of the door for
her, but before he could reach it, she had said gently, “Farewell,
friend,” and was gone, with her light step down the stairs.

“Well,” said Bartle, taking off his spectacles and putting them into his
pocket, “if there must be women to make trouble in the world, it’s
but fair there should be women to be comforters under it; and she’s
one--she’s one. It’s a pity she’s a Methodist; but there’s no getting a
woman without some foolishness or other.”

Adam never went to bed that night. The excitement of suspense,
heightening with every hour that brought him nearer the fatal moment,
was too great, and in spite of his entreaties, in spite of his promises
that he would be perfectly quiet, the schoolmaster watched too.

“What does it matter to me, lad?” Bartle said: “a night’s sleep more
or less? I shall sleep long enough, by and by, underground. Let me keep
thee company in trouble while I can.”

It was a long and dreary night in that small chamber. Adam would
sometimes get up and tread backwards and forwards along the short space
from wall to wall; then he would sit down and hide his face, and no
sound would be heard but the ticking of the watch on the table, or
the falling of a cinder from the fire which the schoolmaster carefully
tended. Sometimes he would burst out into vehement speech, “If I could
ha’ done anything to save her--if my bearing anything would ha’ done any
good...but t’ have to sit still, and know it, and do nothing...it’s
hard for a man to bear...and to think o’ what might ha’ been now, if
it hadn’t been for HIM....O God, it’s the very day we should ha’ been
married.”

“Aye, my lad,” said Bartle tenderly, “it’s heavy--it’s heavy. But you
must remember this: when you thought of marrying her, you’d a notion
she’d got another sort of a nature inside her. You didn’t think she
could have got hardened in that little while to do what she’s done.”

“I know--I know that,” said Adam. “I thought she was loving and
tender-hearted, and wouldn’t tell a lie, or act deceitful. How could I
think any other way? And if he’d never come near her, and I’d married
her, and been loving to her, and took care of her, she might never
ha’ done anything bad. What would it ha’ signified--my having a bit o’
trouble with her? It ‘ud ha’ been nothing to this.”

“There’s no knowing, my lad--there’s no knowing what might have come.
The smart’s bad for you to bear now: you must have time--you must have
time. But I’ve that opinion of you, that you’ll rise above it all and be
a man again, and there may good come out of this that we don’t see.”

“Good come out of it!” said Adam passionately. “That doesn’t alter th’
evil: HER ruin can’t be undone. I hate that talk o’ people, as if there
was a way o’ making amends for everything. They’d more need be brought
to see as the wrong they do can never be altered. When a man’s spoiled
his fellow-creatur’s life, he’s no right to comfort himself with
thinking good may come out of it. Somebody else’s good doesn’t alter her
shame and misery.”

“Well, lad, well,” said Bartle, in a gentle tone, strangely in contrast
with his usual peremptoriness and impatience of contradiction, “it’s
likely enough I talk foolishness. I’m an old fellow, and it’s a good
many years since I was in trouble myself. It’s easy finding reasons why
other folks should be patient.”

“Mr. Massey,” said Adam penitently, “I’m very hot and hasty. I owe you
something different; but you mustn’t take it ill of me.”

“Not I, lad--not I.”

So the night wore on in agitation till the chill dawn and the growing
light brought the tremulous quiet that comes on the brink of despair.
There would soon be no more suspense.

“Let us go to the prison now, Mr. Massey,” said Adam, when he saw the
hand of his watch at six. “If there’s any news come, we shall hear about
it.”

The people were astir already, moving rapidly, in one direction, through
the streets. Adam tried not to think where they were going, as they
hurried past him in that short space between his lodging and the prison
gates. He was thankful when the gates shut him in from seeing those
eager people.

No; there was no news come--no pardon--no reprieve.

Adam lingered in the court half an hour before he could bring himself
to send word to Dinah that he was come. But a voice caught his ear: he
could not shut out the words.

“The cart is to set off at half-past seven.”

It must be said--the last good-bye: there was no help.

In ten minutes from that time, Adam was at the door of the cell. Dinah
had sent him word that she could not come to him; she could not leave
Hetty one moment; but Hetty was prepared for the meeting.

He could not see her when he entered, for agitation deadened his senses,
and the dim cell was almost dark to him. He stood a moment after the
door closed behind him, trembling and stupefied.

But he began to see through the dimness--to see the dark eyes lifted up
to him once more, but with no smile in them. O God, how sad they looked!
The last time they had met his was when he parted from her with his
heart full of joyous hopeful love, and they looked out with a tearful
smile from a pink, dimpled, childish face. The face was marble now; the
sweet lips were pallid and half-open and quivering; the dimples were all
gone--all but one, that never went; and the eyes--O, the worst of all
was the likeness they had to Hetty’s. They were Hetty’s eyes looking
at him with that mournful gaze, as if she had come back to him from the
dead to tell him of her misery.

She was clinging close to Dinah; her cheek was against Dinah’s. It
seemed as if her last faint strength and hope lay in that contact, and
the pitying love that shone out from Dinah’s face looked like a visible
pledge of the Invisible Mercy.

When the sad eyes met--when Hetty and Adam looked at each other--she
felt the change in him too, and it seemed to strike her with fresh
fear. It was the first time she had seen any being whose face seemed to
reflect the change in herself: Adam was a new image of the dreadful past
and the dreadful present. She trembled more as she looked at him.

“Speak to him, Hetty,” Dinah said; “tell him what is in your heart.”

Hetty obeyed her, like a little child.

“Adam...I’m very sorry...I behaved very wrong to you...will you forgive
me...before I die?”

Adam answered with a half-sob, “Yes, I forgive thee Hetty. I forgave
thee long ago.”

It had seemed to Adam as if his brain would burst with the anguish of
meeting Hetty’s eyes in the first moments, but the sound of her voice
uttering these penitent words touched a chord which had been less
strained. There was a sense of relief from what was becoming unbearable,
and the rare tears came--they had never come before, since he had hung
on Seth’s neck in the beginning of his sorrow.

Hetty made an involuntary movement towards him, some of the love that
she had once lived in the midst of was come near her again. She kept
hold of Dinah’s hand, but she went up to Adam and said timidly, “Will
you kiss me again, Adam, for all I’ve been so wicked?”

Adam took the blanched wasted hand she put out to him, and they gave
each other the solemn unspeakable kiss of a lifelong parting.

“And tell him,” Hetty said, in rather a stronger voice, “tell him...for
there’s nobody else to tell him...as I went after him and couldn’t find
him...and I hated him and cursed him once...but Dinah says I should
forgive him...and I try...for else God won’t forgive me.”

There was a noise at the door of the cell now--the key was being turned
in the lock, and when the door opened, Adam saw indistinctly that there
were several faces there. He was too agitated to see more--even to
see that Mr. Irwine’s face was one of them. He felt that the last
preparations were beginning, and he could stay no longer. Room
was silently made for him to depart, and he went to his chamber in
loneliness, leaving Bartle Massey to watch and see the end.



Chapter XLVII

The Last Moment


IT was a sight that some people remembered better even than their own
sorrows--the sight in that grey clear morning, when the fatal cart
with the two young women in it was descried by the waiting watching
multitude, cleaving its way towards the hideous symbol of a deliberately
inflicted sudden death.

All Stoniton had heard of Dinah Morris, the young Methodist woman who
had brought the obstinate criminal to confess, and there was as much
eagerness to see her as to see the wretched Hetty.

But Dinah was hardly conscious of the multitude. When Hetty had
caught sight of the vast crowd in the distance, she had clutched Dinah
convulsively.

“Close your eyes, Hetty,” Dinah said, “and let us pray without ceasing
to God.”

And in a low voice, as the cart went slowly along through the midst of
the gazing crowd, she poured forth her soul with the wrestling intensity
of a last pleading, for the trembling creature that clung to her and
clutched her as the only visible sign of love and pity.

Dinah did not know that the crowd was silent, gazing at her with a sort
of awe--she did not even know how near they were to the fatal spot, when
the cart stopped, and she shrank appalled at a loud shout hideous to her
ear, like a vast yell of demons. Hetty’s shriek mingled with the sound,
and they clasped each other in mutual horror.

But it was not a shout of execration--not a yell of exultant cruelty.

It was a shout of sudden excitement at the appearance of a horseman
cleaving the crowd at full gallop. The horse is hot and distressed, but
answers to the desperate spurring; the rider looks as if his eyes were
glazed by madness, and he saw nothing but what was unseen by others.
See, he has something in his hand--he is holding it up as if it were a
signal.

The Sheriff knows him: it is Arthur Donnithorne, carrying in his hand a
hard-won release from death.



Chapter XLVIII

Another Meeting in the Wood


THE next day, at evening, two men were walking from opposite points
towards the same scene, drawn thither by a common memory. The scene was
the Grove by Donnithorne Chase: you know who the men were.

The old squire’s funeral had taken place that morning, the will had been
read, and now in the first breathing-space, Arthur Donnithorne had come
out for a lonely walk, that he might look fixedly at the new future
before him and confirm himself in a sad resolution. He thought he could
do that best in the Grove.

Adam too had come from Stontion on Monday evening, and to-day he had
not left home, except to go to the family at the Hall Farm and tell
them everything that Mr. Irwine had left untold. He had agreed with the
Poysers that he would follow them to their new neighbourhood, wherever
that might be, for he meant to give up the management of the woods,
and, as soon as it was practicable, he would wind up his business with
Jonathan Burge and settle with his mother and Seth in a home within
reach of the friends to whom he felt bound by a mutual sorrow.

“Seth and me are sure to find work,” he said. “A man that’s got our
trade at his finger-ends is at home everywhere; and we must make a new
start. My mother won’t stand in the way, for she’s told me, since I came
home, she’d made up her mind to being buried in another parish, if I
wished it, and if I’d be more comfortable elsewhere. It’s wonderful
how quiet she’s been ever since I came back. It seems as if the very
greatness o’ the trouble had quieted and calmed her. We shall all be
better in a new country, though there’s some I shall be loath to leave
behind. But I won’t part from you and yours, if I can help it, Mr.
Poyser. Trouble’s made us kin.”

“Aye, lad,” said Martin. “We’ll go out o’ hearing o’ that man’s name.
But I doubt we shall ne’er go far enough for folks not to find out as
we’ve got them belonging to us as are transported o’er the seas, and
were like to be hanged. We shall have that flyin’ up in our faces, and
our children’s after us.”

That was a long visit to the Hall Farm, and drew too strongly on Adam’s
energies for him to think of seeing others, or re-entering on his old
occupations till the morrow. “But to-morrow,” he said to himself, “I’ll
go to work again. I shall learn to like it again some time, maybe; and
it’s right whether I like it or not.”

This evening was the last he would allow to be absorbed by sorrow:
suspense was gone now, and he must bear the unalterable. He was resolved
not to see Arthur Donnithorne again, if it were possible to avoid him.
He had no message to deliver from Hetty now, for Hetty had seen Arthur.
And Adam distrusted himself--he had learned to dread the violence of his
own feeling. That word of Mr. Irwine’s--that he must remember what he
had felt after giving the last blow to Arthur in the Grove--had remained
with him.

These thoughts about Arthur, like all thoughts that are charged with
strong feeling, were continually recurring, and they always called up
the image of the Grove--of that spot under the overarching boughs where
he had caught sight of the two bending figures, and had been possessed
by sudden rage.

“I’ll go and see it again to-night for the last time,” he said; “it’ll
do me good; it’ll make me feel over again what I felt when I’d knocked
him down. I felt what poor empty work it was, as soon as I’d done it,
before I began to think he might be dead.”

In this way it happened that Arthur and Adam were walking towards the
same spot at the same time.

Adam had on his working-dress again, now, for he had thrown off the
other with a sense of relief as soon as he came home; and if he had had
the basket of tools over his shoulder, he might have been taken, with
his pale wasted face, for the spectre of the Adam Bede who entered the
Grove on that August evening eight months ago. But he had no basket of
tools, and he was not walking with the old erectness, looking keenly
round him; his hands were thrust in his side pockets, and his eyes
rested chiefly on the ground. He had not long entered the Grove, and now
he paused before a beech. He knew that tree well; it was the boundary
mark of his youth--the sign, to him, of the time when some of his
earliest, strongest feelings had left him. He felt sure they would never
return. And yet, at this moment, there was a stirring of affection
at the remembrance of that Arthur Donnithorne whom he had believed in
before he had come up to this beech eight months ago. It was affection
for the dead: THAT Arthur existed no longer.

He was disturbed by the sound of approaching footsteps, but the beech
stood at a turning in the road, and he could not see who was coming
until the tall slim figure in deep mourning suddenly stood before him at
only two yards’ distance. They both started, and looked at each other
in silence. Often, in the last fortnight, Adam had imagined himself
as close to Arthur as this, assailing him with words that should be as
harrowing as the voice of remorse, forcing upon him a just share in the
misery he had caused; and often, too, he had told himself that such a
meeting had better not be. But in imagining the meeting he had always
seen Arthur, as he had met him on that evening in the Grove, florid,
careless, light of speech; and the figure before him touched him with
the signs of suffering. Adam knew what suffering was--he could not lay
a cruel finger on a bruised man. He felt no impulse that he needed to
resist. Silence was more just than reproach. Arthur was the first to
speak.

“Adam,” he said, quietly, “it may be a good thing that we have met here,
for I wished to see you. I should have asked to see you to-morrow.”

He paused, but Adam said nothing.

“I know it is painful to you to meet me,” Arthur went on, “but it is not
likely to happen again for years to come.”

“No, sir,” said Adam, coldly, “that was what I meant to write to you
to-morrow, as it would be better all dealings should be at an end
between us, and somebody else put in my place.”

Arthur felt the answer keenly, and it was not without an effort that he
spoke again.

“It was partly on that subject I wished to speak to you. I don’t want
to lessen your indignation against me, or ask you to do anything for
my sake. I only wish to ask you if you will help me to lessen the
evil consequences of the past, which is unchangeable. I don’t mean
consequences to myself, but to others. It is but little I can do, I
know. I know the worst consequences will remain; but something may be
done, and you can help me. Will you listen to me patiently?”

“Yes, sir,” said Adam, after some hesitation; “I’ll hear what it is. If
I can help to mend anything, I will. Anger ‘ull mend nothing, I know.
We’ve had enough o’ that.”

“I was going to the Hermitage,” said Arthur. “Will you go there with me
and sit down? We can talk better there.”

The Hermitage had never been entered since they left it together, for
Arthur had locked up the key in his desk. And now, when he opened the
door, there was the candle burnt out in the socket; there was the
chair in the same place where Adam remembered sitting; there was the
waste-paper basket full of scraps, and deep down in it, Arthur felt in
an instant, there was the little pink silk handkerchief. It would have
been painful to enter this place if their previous thoughts had been
less painful.

They sat down opposite each other in the old places, and Arthur said,
“I’m going away, Adam; I’m going into the army.”

Poor Arthur felt that Adam ought to be affected by this
announcement--ought to have a movement of sympathy towards him. But
Adam’s lips remained firmly closed, and the expression of his face
unchanged.

“What I want to say to you,” Arthur continued, “is this: one of my
reasons for going away is that no one else may leave Hayslope--may leave
their home on my account. I would do anything, there is no sacrifice
I would not make, to prevent any further injury to others through
my--through what has happened.”

Arthur’s words had precisely the opposite effect to that he had
anticipated. Adam thought he perceived in them that notion of
compensation for irretrievable wrong, that self-soothing attempt to
make evil bear the same fruits as good, which most of all roused his
indignation. He was as strongly impelled to look painful facts right in
the face as Arthur was to turn away his eyes from them. Moreover, he
had the wakeful suspicious pride of a poor man in the presence of a rich
man. He felt his old severity returning as he said, “The time’s past for
that, sir. A man should make sacrifices to keep clear of doing a wrong;
sacrifices won’t undo it when it’s done. When people’s feelings have got
a deadly wound, they can’t be cured with favours.”

“Favours!” said Arthur, passionately; “no; how can you suppose I meant
that? But the Poysers--Mr. Irwine tells me the Poysers mean to leave the
place where they have lived so many years--for generations. Don’t you
see, as Mr. Irwine does, that if they could be persuaded to overcome the
feeling that drives them away, it would be much better for them in the
end to remain on the old spot, among the friends and neighbours who know
them?”

“That’s true,” said Adam coldly. “But then, sir, folks’s feelings are
not so easily overcome. It’ll be hard for Martin Poyser to go to a
strange place, among strange faces, when he’s been bred up on the Hall
Farm, and his father before him; but then it ‘ud be harder for a man
with his feelings to stay. I don’t see how the thing’s to be made any
other than hard. There’s a sort o’ damage, sir, that can’t be made up
for.”

Arthur was silent some moments. In spite of other feelings dominant in
him this evening, his pride winced under Adam’s mode of treating him.
Wasn’t he himself suffering? Was not he too obliged to renounce his most
cherished hopes? It was now as it had been eight months ago--Adam was
forcing Arthur to feel more intensely the irrevocableness of his own
wrong-doing. He was presenting the sort of resistance that was the most
irritating to Arthur’s eager ardent nature. But his anger was subdued
by the same influence that had subdued Adam’s when they first confronted
each other--by the marks of suffering in a long familiar face. The
momentary struggle ended in the feeling that he could bear a great deal
from Adam, to whom he had been the occasion of bearing so much; but
there was a touch of pleading, boyish vexation in his tone as he said,
“But people may make injuries worse by unreasonable conduct--by giving
way to anger and satisfying that for the moment, instead of thinking
what will be the effect in the future.

“If I were going to stay here and act as landlord,” he added presently,
with still more eagerness--“if I were careless about what I’ve
done--what I’ve been the cause of, you would have some excuse, Adam, for
going away and encouraging others to go. You would have some excuse then
for trying to make the evil worse. But when I tell you I’m going away
for years--when you know what that means for me, how it cuts off every
plan of happiness I’ve ever formed--it is impossible for a sensible
man like you to believe that there is any real ground for the Poysers
refusing to remain. I know their feeling about disgrace--Mr. Irwine has
told me all; but he is of opinion that they might be persuaded out of
this idea that they are disgraced in the eyes of their neighbours,
and that they can’t remain on my estate, if you would join him in his
efforts--if you would stay yourself and go on managing the old woods.”

Arthur paused a moment and then added, pleadingly, “You know that’s a
good work to do for the sake of other people, besides the owner. And
you don’t know but that they may have a better owner soon, whom you will
like to work for. If I die, my cousin Tradgett will have the estate and
take my name. He is a good fellow.”

Adam could not help being moved: it was impossible for him not to feel
that this was the voice of the honest warm-hearted Arthur whom he had
loved and been proud of in old days; but nearer memories would not be
thrust away. He was silent; yet Arthur saw an answer in his face that
induced him to go on, with growing earnestness.

“And then, if you would talk to the Poysers--if you would talk the
matter over with Mr. Irwine--he means to see you to-morrow--and then if
you would join your arguments to his to prevail on them not to go....I
know, of course, that they would not accept any favour from me--I mean
nothing of that kind--but I’m sure they would suffer less in the end.
Irwine thinks so too. And Mr. Irwine is to have the chief authority
on the estate--he has consented to undertake that. They will really be
under no man but one whom they respect and like. It would be the same
with you, Adam, and it could be nothing but a desire to give me worse
pain that could incline you to go.”

Arthur was silent again for a little while, and then said, with some
agitation in his voice, “I wouldn’t act so towards you, I know. If you
were in my place and I in yours, I should try to help you to do the
best.”

Adam made a hasty movement on his chair and looked on the ground. Arthur
went on, “Perhaps you’ve never done anything you’ve had bitterly to
repent of in your life, Adam; if you had, you would be more generous.
You would know then that it’s worse for me than for you.”

Arthur rose from his seat with the last words, and went to one of the
windows, looking out and turning his back on Adam, as he continued,
passionately, “Haven’t I loved her too? Didn’t I see her yesterday?
Shan’t I carry the thought of her about with me as much as you will? And
don’t you think you would suffer more if you’d been in fault?”

There was silence for several minutes, for the struggle in Adam’s mind
was not easily decided. Facile natures, whose emotions have little
permanence, can hardly understand how much inward resistance he overcame
before he rose from his seat and turned towards Arthur. Arthur heard the
movement, and turning round, met the sad but softened look with which
Adam said, “It’s true what you say, sir. I’m hard--it’s in my nature.
I was too hard with my father, for doing wrong. I’ve been a bit hard t’
everybody but her. I felt as if nobody pitied her enough--her suffering
cut into me so; and when I thought the folks at the farm were too hard
with her, I said I’d never be hard to anybody myself again. But feeling
overmuch about her has perhaps made me unfair to you. I’ve known what
it is in my life to repent and feel it’s too late. I felt I’d been too
harsh to my father when he was gone from me--I feel it now, when I think
of him. I’ve no right to be hard towards them as have done wrong and
repent.”

Adam spoke these words with the firm distinctness of a man who is
resolved to leave nothing unsaid that he is bound to say; but he went on
with more hesitation.

“I wouldn’t shake hands with you once, sir, when you asked me--but if
you’re willing to do it now, for all I refused then...”

Arthur’s white hand was in Adam’s large grasp in an instant, and with
that action there was a strong rush, on both sides, of the old, boyish
affection.

“Adam,” Arthur said, impelled to full confession now, “it would never
have happened if I’d known you loved her. That would have helped to save
me from it. And I did struggle. I never meant to injure her. I deceived
you afterwards--and that led on to worse; but I thought it was forced
upon me, I thought it was the best thing I could do. And in that letter
I told her to let me know if she were in any trouble: don’t think I
would not have done everything I could. But I was all wrong from the
very first, and horrible wrong has come of it. God knows, I’d give my
life if I could undo it.”

They sat down again opposite each other, and Adam said, tremulously,
“How did she seem when you left her, sir?”

“Don’t ask me, Adam,” Arthur said; “I feel sometimes as if I should go
mad with thinking of her looks and what she said to me, and then, that I
couldn’t get a full pardon--that I couldn’t save her from that wretched
fate of being transported--that I can do nothing for her all those
years; and she may die under it, and never know comfort any more.”

“Ah, sir,” said Adam, for the first time feeling his own pain merged in
sympathy for Arthur, “you and me’ll often be thinking o’ the same thing,
when we’re a long way off one another. I’ll pray God to help you, as I
pray him to help me.”

“But there’s that sweet woman--that Dinah Morris,” Arthur said, pursuing
his own thoughts and not knowing what had been the sense of Adam’s
words, “she says she shall stay with her to the very last moment--till
she goes; and the poor thing clings to her as if she found some comfort
in her. I could worship that woman; I don’t know what I should do if she
were not there. Adam, you will see her when she comes back. I could say
nothing to her yesterday--nothing of what I felt towards her. Tell her,”
 Arthur went on hurriedly, as if he wanted to hide the emotion with which
he spoke, while he took off his chain and watch, “tell her I asked you
to give her this in remembrance of me--of the man to whom she is the
one source of comfort, when he thinks of...I know she doesn’t care about
such things--or anything else I can give her for its own sake. But she
will use the watch--I shall like to think of her using it.”

“I’ll give it to her, sir,” Adam said, “and tell her your words. She
told me she should come back to the people at the Hall Farm.”

“And you will persuade the Poysers to stay, Adam?” said Arthur, reminded
of the subject which both of them had forgotten in the first interchange
of revived friendship. “You will stay yourself, and help Mr. Irwine to
carry out the repairs and improvements on the estate?”

“There’s one thing, sir, that perhaps you don’t take account of,” said
Adam, with hesitating gentleness, “and that was what made me hang back
longer. You see, it’s the same with both me and the Poysers: if we stay,
it’s for our own worldly interest, and it looks as if we’d put up with
anything for the sake o’ that. I know that’s what they’ll feel, and
I can’t help feeling a little of it myself. When folks have got an
honourable independent spirit, they don’t like to do anything that might
make ‘em seem base-minded.”

“But no one who knows you will think that, Adam. That is not a reason
strong enough against a course that is really more generous, more
unselfish than the other. And it will be known--it shall be made known,
that both you and the Poysers stayed at my entreaty. Adam, don’t try to
make things worse for me; I’m punished enough without that.”

“No, sir, no,” Adam said, looking at Arthur with mournful affection.
“God forbid I should make things worse for you. I used to wish I could
do it, in my passion--but that was when I thought you didn’t feel
enough. I’ll stay, sir, I’ll do the best I can. It’s all I’ve got to
think of now--to do my work well and make the world a bit better place
for them as can enjoy it.”

“Then we’ll part now, Adam. You will see Mr. Irwine to-morrow, and
consult with him about everything.”

“Are you going soon, sir?” said Adam.

“As soon as possible--after I’ve made the necessary arrangements.
Good-bye, Adam. I shall think of you going about the old place.”

“Good-bye, sir. God bless you.”

The hands were clasped once more, and Adam left the Hermitage, feeling
that sorrow was more bearable now hatred was gone.

As soon as the door was closed behind him, Arthur went to the
waste-paper basket and took out the little pink silk handkerchief.





Book Six




Chapter XLIX

At the Hall Farm


THE first autumnal afternoon sunshine of 1801--more than eighteen months
after that parting of Adam and Arthur in the Hermitage--was on the
yard at the Hall Farm; and the bull-dog was in one of his most excited
moments, for it was that hour of the day when the cows were being driven
into the yard for their afternoon milking. No wonder the patient beasts
ran confusedly into the wrong places, for the alarming din of the
bull-dog was mingled with more distant sounds which the timid feminine
creatures, with pardonable superstition, imagined also to have some
relation to their own movements--with the tremendous crack of the
waggoner’s whip, the roar of his voice, and the booming thunder of the
waggon, as it left the rick-yard empty of its golden load.

The milking of the cows was a sight Mrs. Poyser loved, and at this
hour on mild days she was usually standing at the house door, with her
knitting in her hands, in quiet contemplation, only heightened to a
keener interest when the vicious yellow cow, who had once kicked over a
pailful of precious milk, was about to undergo the preventive punishment
of having her hinder-legs strapped.

To-day, however, Mrs. Poyser gave but a divided attention to the
arrival of the cows, for she was in eager discussion with Dinah, who was
stitching Mr. Poyser’s shirt-collars, and had borne patiently to have
her thread broken three times by Totty pulling at her arm with a sudden
insistence that she should look at “Baby,” that is, at a large wooden
doll with no legs and a long skirt, whose bald head Totty, seated in her
small chair at Dinah’s side, was caressing and pressing to her fat cheek
with much fervour. Totty is larger by more than two years’ growth than
when you first saw her, and she has on a black frock under her pinafore.
Mrs. Poyser too has on a black gown, which seems to heighten the family
likeness between her and Dinah. In other respects there is little
outward change now discernible in our old friends, or in the pleasant
house-place, bright with polished oak and pewter.

“I never saw the like to you, Dinah,” Mrs. Poyser was saying, “when
you’ve once took anything into your head: there’s no more moving you
than the rooted tree. You may say what you like, but I don’t believe
that’s religion; for what’s the Sermon on the Mount about, as you’re so
fond o’ reading to the boys, but doing what other folks ‘ud have you do?
But if it was anything unreasonable they wanted you to do, like taking
your cloak off and giving it to ‘em, or letting ‘em slap you i’ the
face, I daresay you’d be ready enough. It’s only when one ‘ud have you
do what’s plain common sense and good for yourself, as you’re obstinate
th’ other way.”

“Nay, dear Aunt,” said Dinah, smiling slightly as she went on with her
work, “I’m sure your wish ‘ud be a reason for me to do anything that I
didn’t feel it was wrong to do.”

“Wrong! You drive me past bearing. What is there wrong, I should like
to know, i’ staying along wi’ your own friends, as are th’ happier for
having you with ‘em an’ are willing to provide for you, even if your
work didn’t more nor pay ‘em for the bit o’ sparrow’s victual y’ eat
and the bit o’ rag you put on? An’ who is it, I should like to know, as
you’re bound t’ help and comfort i’ the world more nor your own flesh
and blood--an’ me th’ only aunt you’ve got above-ground, an’ am brought
to the brink o’ the grave welly every winter as comes, an’ there’s the
child as sits beside you ‘ull break her little heart when you go, an’
the grandfather not been dead a twelvemonth, an’ your uncle ‘ull miss
you so as never was--a-lighting his pipe an’ waiting on him, an’ now I
can trust you wi’ the butter, an’ have had all the trouble o’ teaching
you, and there’s all the sewing to be done, an’ I must have a strange
gell out o’ Treddles’on to do it--an’ all because you must go back to
that bare heap o’ stones as the very crows fly over an’ won’t stop at.”

“Dear Aunt Rachel,” said Dinah, looking up in Mrs. Poyser’s face, “it’s
your kindness makes you say I’m useful to you. You don’t really want me
now, for Nancy and Molly are clever at their work, and you’re in good
health now, by the blessing of God, and my uncle is of a cheerful
countenance again, and you have neighbours and friends not a few--some
of them come to sit with my uncle almost daily. Indeed, you will not
miss me; and at Snowfield there are brethren and sisters in great need,
who have none of those comforts you have around you. I feel that I am
called back to those amongst whom my lot was first cast. I feel drawn
again towards the hills where I used to be blessed in carrying the word
of life to the sinful and desolate.”

“You feel! Yes,” said Mrs. Poyser, returning from a parenthetic glance
at the cows, “that’s allays the reason I’m to sit down wi’, when you’ve
a mind to do anything contrairy. What do you want to be preaching for
more than you’re preaching now? Don’t you go off, the Lord knows where,
every Sunday a-preaching and praying? An’ haven’t you got Methodists
enow at Treddles’on to go and look at, if church-folks’s faces are too
handsome to please you? An’ isn’t there them i’ this parish as you’ve
got under hand, and they’re like enough to make friends wi’ Old Harry
again as soon as your back’s turned? There’s that Bessy Cranage--she’ll
be flaunting i’ new finery three weeks after you’re gone, I’ll be bound.
She’ll no more go on in her new ways without you than a dog ‘ull stand
on its hind-legs when there’s nobody looking. But I suppose it doesna
matter so much about folks’s souls i’ this country, else you’d be for
staying with your own aunt, for she’s none so good but what you might
help her to be better.”

There was a certain something in Mrs. Poyser’s voice just then, which
she did not wish to be noticed, so she turned round hastily to look at
the clock, and said: “See there! It’s tea-time; an’ if Martin’s i’ the
rick-yard, he’ll like a cup. Here, Totty, my chicken, let mother put
your bonnet on, and then you go out into the rick-yard and see if
Father’s there, and tell him he mustn’t go away again without coming t’
have a cup o’ tea; and tell your brothers to come in too.”

Totty trotted off in her flapping bonnet, while Mrs. Poyser set out the
bright oak table and reached down the tea-cups.

“You talk o’ them gells Nancy and Molly being clever i’ their work,”
 she began again; “it’s fine talking. They’re all the same, clever or
stupid--one can’t trust ‘em out o’ one’s sight a minute. They want
somebody’s eye on ‘em constant if they’re to be kept to their work.
An’ suppose I’m ill again this winter, as I was the winter before last?
Who’s to look after ‘em then, if you’re gone? An’ there’s that blessed
child--something’s sure t’ happen to her--they’ll let her tumble into
the fire, or get at the kettle wi’ the boiling lard in’t, or some
mischief as ‘ull lame her for life; an’ it’ll be all your fault, Dinah.”

“Aunt,” said Dinah, “I promise to come back to you in the winter if
you’re ill. Don’t think I will ever stay away from you if you’re in real
want of me. But, indeed, it is needful for my own soul that I should go
away from this life of ease and luxury in which I have all things too
richly to enjoy--at least that I should go away for a short space. No
one can know but myself what are my inward needs, and the besetments I
am most in danger from. Your wish for me to stay is not a call of duty
which I refuse to hearken to because it is against my own desires; it
is a temptation that I must resist, lest the love of the creature should
become like a mist in my soul shutting out the heavenly light.”

“It passes my cunning to know what you mean by ease and luxury,” said
Mrs. Poyser, as she cut the bread and butter. “It’s true there’s good
victual enough about you, as nobody shall ever say I don’t provide
enough and to spare, but if there’s ever a bit o’ odds an’ ends as
nobody else ‘ud eat, you’re sure to pick it out...but look there!
There’s Adam Bede a-carrying the little un in. I wonder how it is he’s
come so early.”

Mrs. Poyser hastened to the door for the pleasure of looking at her
darling in a new position, with love in her eyes but reproof on her
tongue.

“Oh for shame, Totty! Little gells o’ five year old should be ashamed to
be carried. Why, Adam, she’ll break your arm, such a big gell as that;
set her down--for shame!”

“Nay, nay,” said Adam, “I can lift her with my hand--I’ve no need to
take my arm to it.”

Totty, looking as serenely unconscious of remark as a fat white puppy,
was set down at the door-place, and the mother enforced her reproof with
a shower of kisses.

“You’re surprised to see me at this hour o’ the day,” said Adam.

“Yes, but come in,” said Mrs. Poyser, making way for him; “there’s no
bad news, I hope?”

“No, nothing bad,” Adam answered, as he went up to Dinah and put out his
hand to her. She had laid down her work and stood up, instinctively, as
he approached her. A faint blush died away from her pale cheek as she
put her hand in his and looked up at him timidly.

“It’s an errand to you brought me, Dinah,” said Adam, apparently
unconscious that he was holding her hand all the while; “mother’s a bit
ailing, and she’s set her heart on your coming to stay the night with
her, if you’ll be so kind. I told her I’d call and ask you as I came
from the village. She overworks herself, and I can’t persuade her to
have a little girl t’ help her. I don’t know what’s to be done.”

Adam released Dinah’s hand as he ceased speaking, and was expecting an
answer, but before she had opened her lips Mrs. Poyser said, “Look there
now! I told you there was folks enow t’ help i’ this parish, wi’out
going further off. There’s Mrs. Bede getting as old and cas’alty as can
be, and she won’t let anybody but you go a-nigh her hardly. The folks at
Snowfield have learnt by this time to do better wi’out you nor she can.”

“I’ll put my bonnet on and set off directly, if you don’t want anything
done first, Aunt,” said Dinah, folding up her work.

“Yes, I do want something done. I want you t’ have your tea, child; it’s
all ready--and you’ll have a cup, Adam, if y’ arena in too big a hurry.”

“Yes, I’ll have a cup, please; and then I’ll walk with Dinah. I’m going
straight home, for I’ve got a lot o’ timber valuations to write out.”

“Why, Adam, lad, are you here?” said Mr. Poyser, entering warm and
coatless, with the two black-eyed boys behind him, still looking as much
like him as two small elephants are like a large one. “How is it we’ve
got sight o’ you so long before foddering-time?”

“I came on an errand for Mother,” said Adam. “She’s got a touch of her
old complaint, and she wants Dinah to go and stay with her a bit.”

“Well, we’ll spare her for your mother a little while,” said Mr. Poyser.
“But we wonna spare her for anybody else, on’y her husband.”

“Husband!” said Marty, who was at the most prosaic and literal period of
the boyish mind. “Why, Dinah hasn’t got a husband.”

“Spare her?” said Mrs. Poyser, placing a seed-cake on the table and then
seating herself to pour out the tea. “But we must spare her, it seems,
and not for a husband neither, but for her own megrims. Tommy, what are
you doing to your little sister’s doll? Making the child naughty, when
she’d be good if you’d let her. You shanna have a morsel o’ cake if you
behave so.”

Tommy, with true brotherly sympathy, was amusing himself by turning
Dolly’s skirt over her bald head and exhibiting her truncated body to
the general scorn--an indignity which cut Totty to the heart.

“What do you think Dinah’s been a-telling me since dinner-time?” Mrs.
Poyser continued, looking at her husband.

“Eh! I’m a poor un at guessing,” said Mr. Poyser.

“Why, she means to go back to Snowfield again, and work i’ the mill,
and starve herself, as she used to do, like a creatur as has got no
friends.”

Mr. Poyser did not readily find words to express his unpleasant
astonishment; he only looked from his wife to Dinah, who had now seated
herself beside Totty, as a bulwark against brotherly playfulness, and
was busying herself with the children’s tea. If he had been given to
making general reflections, it would have occurred to him that there was
certainly a change come over Dinah, for she never used to change colour;
but, as it was, he merely observed that her face was flushed at that
moment. Mr. Poyser thought she looked the prettier for it: it was
a flush no deeper than the petal of a monthly rose. Perhaps it came
because her uncle was looking at her so fixedly; but there is no
knowing, for just then Adam was saying, with quiet surprise, “Why, I
hoped Dinah was settled among us for life. I thought she’d given up the
notion o’ going back to her old country.”

“Thought! Yes,” said Mrs. Poyser, “and so would anybody else ha’
thought, as had got their right end up’ards. But I suppose you must be
a Methodist to know what a Methodist ‘ull do. It’s ill guessing what the
bats are flying after.”

“Why, what have we done to you. Dinah, as you must go away from us?”
 said Mr. Poyser, still pausing over his tea-cup. “It’s like breaking
your word, welly, for your aunt never had no thought but you’d make this
your home.”

“Nay, Uncle,” said Dinah, trying to be quite calm. “When I first came, I
said it was only for a time, as long as I could be of any comfort to my
aunt.”

“Well, an’ who said you’d ever left off being a comfort to me?” said
Mrs. Poyser. “If you didna mean to stay wi’ me, you’d better never ha’
come. Them as ha’ never had a cushion don’t miss it.”

“Nay, nay,” said Mr. Poyser, who objected to exaggerated views. “Thee
mustna say so; we should ha’ been ill off wi’out her, Lady day was a
twelvemont’. We mun be thankful for that, whether she stays or no. But
I canna think what she mun leave a good home for, to go back int’ a
country where the land, most on’t, isna worth ten shillings an acre,
rent and profits.”

“Why, that’s just the reason she wants to go, as fur as she can give a
reason,” said Mrs. Poyser. “She says this country’s too comfortable,
an’ there’s too much t’ eat, an’ folks arena miserable enough. And she’s
going next week. I canna turn her, say what I will. It’s allays the way
wi’ them meek-faced people; you may’s well pelt a bag o’ feathers as
talk to ‘em. But I say it isna religion, to be so obstinate--is it now,
Adam?”

Adam saw that Dinah was more disturbed than he had ever seen her by any
matter relating to herself, and, anxious to relieve her, if possible,
he said, looking at her affectionately, “Nay, I can’t find fault with
anything Dinah does. I believe her thoughts are better than our guesses,
let ‘em be what they may. I should ha’ been thankful for her to stay
among us, but if she thinks well to go, I wouldn’t cross her, or make it
hard to her by objecting. We owe her something different to that.”

As it often happens, the words intended to relieve her were just too
much for Dinah’s susceptible feelings at this moment. The tears came
into the grey eyes too fast to be hidden and she got up hurriedly,
meaning it to be understood that she was going to put on her bonnet.

“Mother, what’s Dinah crying for?” said Totty. “She isn’t a naughty
dell.”

“Thee’st gone a bit too fur,” said Mr. Poyser. “We’ve no right t’
interfere with her doing as she likes. An’ thee’dst be as angry as could
be wi’ me, if I said a word against anything she did.”

“Because you’d very like be finding fault wi’out reason,” said Mrs.
Poyser. “But there’s reason i’ what I say, else I shouldna say it. It’s
easy talking for them as can’t love her so well as her own aunt does.
An’ me got so used to her! I shall feel as uneasy as a new sheared sheep
when she’s gone from me. An’ to think of her leaving a parish where
she’s so looked on. There’s Mr. Irwine makes as much of her as if
she was a lady, for all her being a Methodist, an’ wi’ that maggot o’
preaching in her head--God forgi’e me if I’m i’ the wrong to call it
so.”

“Aye,” said Mr. Poyser, looking jocose; “but thee dostna tell Adam what
he said to thee about it one day. The missis was saying, Adam, as the
preaching was the only fault to be found wi’ Dinah, and Mr. Irwine says,
‘But you mustn’t find fault with her for that, Mrs. Poyser; you forget
she’s got no husband to preach to. I’ll answer for it, you give Poyser
many a good sermon.’ The parson had thee there,” Mr. Poyser added,
laughing unctuously. “I told Bartle Massey on it, an’ he laughed too.”

“Yes, it’s a small joke sets men laughing when they sit a-staring at
one another with a pipe i’ their mouths,” said Mrs. Poyser. “Give
Bartle Massey his way and he’d have all the sharpness to himself. If
the chaff-cutter had the making of us, we should all be straw, I reckon.
Totty, my chicken, go upstairs to cousin Dinah, and see what she’s
doing, and give her a pretty kiss.”

This errand was devised for Totty as a means of checking certain
threatening symptoms about the corners of the mouth; for Tommy,
no longer expectant of cake, was lifting up his eyelids with his
forefingers and turning his eyeballs towards Totty in a way that she
felt to be disagreeably personal.

“You’re rare and busy now--eh, Adam?” said Mr. Poyser. “Burge’s getting
so bad wi’ his asthmy, it’s well if he’ll ever do much riding about
again.”

“Yes, we’ve got a pretty bit o’ building on hand now,” said Adam, “what
with the repairs on th’ estate, and the new houses at Treddles’on.”

“I’ll bet a penny that new house Burge is building on his own bit o’
land is for him and Mary to go to,” said Mr. Poyser. “He’ll be for
laying by business soon, I’ll warrant, and be wanting you to take to it
all and pay him so much by th’ ‘ear. We shall see you living on th’ hill
before another twelvemont’s over.”

“Well,” said Adam, “I should like t’ have the business in my own hands.
It isn’t as I mind much about getting any more money. We’ve enough and
to spare now, with only our two selves and mother; but I should like
t’ have my own way about things--I could try plans then, as I can’t do
now.”

“You get on pretty well wi’ the new steward, I reckon?” said Mr. Poyser.

“Yes, yes; he’s a sensible man enough; understands farming--he’s
carrying on the draining, and all that, capital. You must go some day
towards the Stonyshire side and see what alterations they’re making. But
he’s got no notion about buildings. You can so seldom get hold of a man
as can turn his brains to more nor one thing; it’s just as if they wore
blinkers like th’ horses and could see nothing o’ one side of ‘em. Now,
there’s Mr. Irwine has got notions o’ building more nor most architects;
for as for th’ architects, they set up to be fine fellows, but the most
of ‘em don’t know where to set a chimney so as it shan’t be quarrelling
with a door. My notion is, a practical builder that’s got a bit o’
taste makes the best architect for common things; and I’ve ten times the
pleasure i’ seeing after the work when I’ve made the plan myself.”

Mr. Poyser listened with an admiring interest to Adam’s discourse on
building, but perhaps it suggested to him that the building of his
corn-rick had been proceeding a little too long without the control of
the master’s eye, for when Adam had done speaking, he got up and said,
“Well, lad, I’ll bid you good-bye now, for I’m off to the rick-yard
again.”

Adam rose too, for he saw Dinah entering, with her bonnet on and a
little basket in her hand, preceded by Totty.

“You’re ready, I see, Dinah,” Adam said; “so we’ll set off, for the
sooner I’m at home the better.”

“Mother,” said Totty, with her treble pipe, “Dinah was saying her
prayers and crying ever so.”

“Hush, hush,” said the mother, “little gells mustn’t chatter.”

Whereupon the father, shaking with silent laughter, set Totty on the
white deal table and desired her to kiss him. Mr. and Mrs. Poyser, you
perceive, had no correct principles of education.

“Come back to-morrow if Mrs. Bede doesn’t want you, Dinah,” said Mrs.
Poyser: “but you can stay, you know, if she’s ill.”

So, when the good-byes had been said, Dinah and Adam left the Hall Farm
together.



Chapter L

In the Cottage


ADAM did not ask Dinah to take his arm when they got out into the lane.
He had never yet done so, often as they had walked together, for he had
observed that she never walked arm-in-arm with Seth, and he thought,
perhaps, that kind of support was not agreeable to her. So they walked
apart, though side by side, and the close poke of her little black
bonnet hid her face from him.

“You can’t be happy, then, to make the Hall Farm your home, Dinah?”
 Adam said, with the quiet interest of a brother, who has no anxiety for
himself in the matter. “It’s a pity, seeing they’re so fond of you.”

“You know, Adam, my heart is as their heart, so far as love for them
and care for their welfare goes, but they are in no present need. Their
sorrows are healed, and I feel that I am called back to my old work, in
which I found a blessing that I have missed of late in the midst of too
abundant worldly good. I know it is a vain thought to flee from the work
that God appoints us, for the sake of finding a greater blessing to our
own souls, as if we could choose for ourselves where we shall find the
fulness of the Divine Presence, instead of seeking it where alone it
is to be found, in loving obedience. But now, I believe, I have a clear
showing that my work lies elsewhere--at least for a time. In the years
to come, if my aunt’s health should fail, or she should otherwise need
me, I shall return.”

“You know best, Dinah,” said Adam. “I don’t believe you’d go against the
wishes of them that love you, and are akin to you, without a good and
sufficient reason in your own conscience. I’ve no right to say anything
about my being sorry: you know well enough what cause I have to put you
above every other friend I’ve got; and if it had been ordered so that
you could ha’ been my sister, and lived with us all our lives, I should
ha’ counted it the greatest blessing as could happen to us now. But
Seth tells me there’s no hope o’ that: your feelings are different, and
perhaps I’m taking too much upon me to speak about it.”

Dinah made no answer, and they walked on in silence for some yards, till
they came to the stone stile, where, as Adam had passed through first
and turned round to give her his hand while she mounted the unusually
high step, she could not prevent him from seeing her face. It struck
him with surprise, for the grey eyes, usually so mild and grave, had
the bright uneasy glance which accompanies suppressed agitation, and
the slight flush in her cheeks, with which she had come downstairs, was
heightened to a deep rose-colour. She looked as if she were only sister
to Dinah. Adam was silent with surprise and conjecture for some moments,
and then he said, “I hope I’ve not hurt or displeased you by what I’ve
said, Dinah. Perhaps I was making too free. I’ve no wish different from
what you see to be best, and I’m satisfied for you to live thirty mile
off, if you think it right. I shall think of you just as much as I do
now, for you’re bound up with what I can no more help remembering than I
can help my heart beating.”

Poor Adam! Thus do men blunder. Dinah made no answer, but she presently
said, “Have you heard any news from that poor young man, since we last
spoke of him?”

Dinah always called Arthur so; she had never lost the image of him as
she had seen him in the prison.

“Yes,” said Adam. “Mr. Irwine read me part of a letter from him
yesterday. It’s pretty certain, they say, that there’ll be a peace soon,
though nobody believes it’ll last long; but he says he doesn’t mean to
come home. He’s no heart for it yet, and it’s better for others that he
should keep away. Mr. Irwine thinks he’s in the right not to come. It’s
a sorrowful letter. He asks about you and the Poysers, as he always
does. There’s one thing in the letter cut me a good deal: ‘You can’t
think what an old fellow I feel,’ he says; ‘I make no schemes now. I’m
the best when I’ve a good day’s march or fighting before me.’”

“He’s of a rash, warm-hearted nature, like Esau, for whom I have always
felt great pity,” said Dinah. “That meeting between the brothers, where
Esau is so loving and generous, and Jacob so timid and distrustful,
notwithstanding his sense of the Divine favour, has always touched me
greatly. Truly, I have been tempted sometimes to say that Jacob was of a
mean spirit. But that is our trial: we must learn to see the good in the
midst of much that is unlovely.”

“Ah,” said Adam, “I like to read about Moses best, in th’ Old Testament.
He carried a hard business well through, and died when other folks were
going to reap the fruits. A man must have courage to look at his life
so, and think what’ll come of it after he’s dead and gone. A good solid
bit o’ work lasts: if it’s only laying a floor down, somebody’s the
better for it being done well, besides the man as does it.”

They were both glad to talk of subjects that were not personal, and
in this way they went on till they passed the bridge across the Willow
Brook, when Adam turned round and said, “Ah, here’s Seth. I thought he’d
be home soon. Does he know of you’re going, Dinah?”

“Yes, I told him last Sabbath.”

Adam remembered now that Seth had come home much depressed on Sunday
evening, a circumstance which had been very unusual with him of late,
for the happiness he had in seeing Dinah every week seemed long to have
outweighed the pain of knowing she would never marry him. This evening
he had his habitual air of dreamy benignant contentment, until he came
quite close to Dinah and saw the traces of tears on her delicate eyelids
and eyelashes. He gave one rapid glance at his brother, but Adam was
evidently quite outside the current of emotion that had shaken Dinah: he
wore his everyday look of unexpectant calm. Seth tried not to let Dinah
see that he had noticed her face, and only said, “I’m thankful you’re
come, Dinah, for Mother’s been hungering after the sight of you all day.
She began to talk of you the first thing in the morning.”

When they entered the cottage, Lisbeth was seated in her arm-chair, too
tired with setting out the evening meal, a task she always performed a
long time beforehand, to go and meet them at the door as usual, when she
heard the approaching footsteps.

“Coom, child, thee’t coom at last,” she said, when Dinah went towards
her. “What dost mane by lavin’ me a week an’ ne’er coomin’ a-nigh me?”

“Dear friend,” said Dinah, taking her hand, “you’re not well. If I’d
known it sooner, I’d have come.”

“An’ how’s thee t’ know if thee dostna coom? Th’ lads on’y know what
I tell ‘em. As long as ye can stir hand and foot the men think ye’re
hearty. But I’m none so bad, on’y a bit of a cold sets me achin’. An’
th’ lads tease me so t’ ha’ somebody wi’ me t’ do the work--they make me
ache worse wi’ talkin’. If thee’dst come and stay wi’ me, they’d let me
alone. The Poysers canna want thee so bad as I do. But take thy bonnet
off, an’ let me look at thee.”

Dinah was moving away, but Lisbeth held her fast, while she was taking
off her bonnet, and looked at her face as one looks into a newly
gathered snowdrop, to renew the old impressions of purity and
gentleness.

“What’s the matter wi’ thee?” said Lisbeth, in astonishment; “thee’st
been a-cryin’.”

“It’s only a grief that’ll pass away,” said Dinah, who did not wish just
now to call forth Lisbeth’s remonstrances by disclosing her intention
to leave Hayslope. “You shall know about it shortly--we’ll talk of it
to-night. I shall stay with you to-night.”

Lisbeth was pacified by this prospect. And she had the whole evening
to talk with Dinah alone; for there was a new room in the cottage,
you remember, built nearly two years ago, in the expectation of a new
inmate; and here Adam always sat when he had writing to do or plans to
make. Seth sat there too this evening, for he knew his mother would like
to have Dinah all to herself.

There were two pretty pictures on the two sides of the wall in the
cottage. On one side there was the broad-shouldered, large-featured,
hardy old woman, in her blue jacket and buff kerchief, with her dim-eyed
anxious looks turned continually on the lily face and the slight form
in the black dress that were either moving lightly about in helpful
activity, or seated close by the old woman’s arm-chair, holding her
withered hand, with eyes lifted up towards her to speak a language which
Lisbeth understood far better than the Bible or the hymn-book. She would
scarcely listen to reading at all to-night. “Nay, nay, shut the book,”
 she said. “We mun talk. I want t’ know what thee was cryin’ about. Hast
got troubles o’ thy own, like other folks?”

On the other side of the wall there were the two brothers so like each
other in the midst of their unlikeness: Adam with knit brows, shaggy
hair, and dark vigorous colour, absorbed in his “figuring”; Seth, with
large rugged features, the close copy of his brother’s, but with thin,
wavy, brown hair and blue dreamy eyes, as often as not looking vaguely
out of the window instead of at his book, although it was a newly bought
book--Wesley’s abridgment of Madame Guyon’s life, which was full of
wonder and interest for him. Seth had said to Adam, “Can I help thee
with anything in here to-night? I don’t want to make a noise in the
shop.”

“No, lad,” Adam answered, “there’s nothing but what I must do myself.
Thee’st got thy new book to read.”

And often, when Seth was quite unconscious, Adam, as he paused after
drawing a line with his ruler, looked at his brother with a kind smile
dawning in his eyes. He knew “th’ lad liked to sit full o’ thoughts he
could give no account of; they’d never come t’ anything, but they made
him happy,” and in the last year or so, Adam had been getting more and
more indulgent to Seth. It was part of that growing tenderness which
came from the sorrow at work within him.

For Adam, though you see him quite master of himself, working hard and
delighting in his work after his inborn inalienable nature, had not
outlived his sorrow--had not felt it slip from him as a temporary
burden, and leave him the same man again. Do any of us? God forbid. It
would be a poor result of all our anguish and our wrestling if we won
nothing but our old selves at the end of it--if we could return to the
same blind loves, the same self-confident blame, the same light thoughts
of human suffering, the same frivolous gossip over blighted human lives,
the same feeble sense of that Unknown towards which we have sent forth
irrepressible cries in our loneliness. Let us rather be thankful that
our sorrow lives in us as an indestructible force, only changing its
form, as forces do, and passing from pain into sympathy--the one poor
word which includes all our best insight and our best love. Not that
this transformation of pain into sympathy had completely taken place
in Adam yet. There was still a great remnant of pain, and this he felt
would subsist as long as her pain was not a memory, but an existing
thing, which he must think of as renewed with the light of every
new morning. But we get accustomed to mental as well as bodily pain,
without, for all that, losing our sensibility to it. It becomes a habit
of our lives, and we cease to imagine a condition of perfect ease
as possible for us. Desire is chastened into submission, and we are
contented with our day when we have been able to bear our grief in
silence and act as if we were not suffering. For it is at such periods
that the sense of our lives having visible and invisible relations,
beyond any of which either our present or prospective self is the
centre, grows like a muscle that we are obliged to lean on and exert.

That was Adam’s state of mind in this second autumn of his sorrow. His
work, as you know, had always been part of his religion, and from very
early days he saw clearly that good carpentry was God’s will--was that
form of God’s will that most immediately concerned him. But now there
was no margin of dreams for him beyond this daylight reality, no
holiday-time in the working-day world, no moment in the distance when
duty would take off her iron glove and breast-plate and clasp him gently
into rest. He conceived no picture of the future but one made up of
hard-working days such as he lived through, with growing contentment and
intensity of interest, every fresh week. Love, he thought, could never
be anything to him but a living memory--a limb lopped off, but not gone
from consciousness. He did not know that the power of loving was all the
while gaining new force within him; that the new sensibilities bought by
a deep experience were so many new fibres by which it was possible, nay,
necessary to him, that his nature should intertwine with another. Yet he
was aware that common affection and friendship were more precious to him
than they used to be--that he clung more to his mother and Seth, and
had an unspeakable satisfaction in the sight or imagination of any small
addition to their happiness. The Poysers, too--hardly three or four days
passed but he felt the need of seeing them and interchanging words and
looks of friendliness with them. He would have felt this, probably, even
if Dinah had not been with them, but he had only said the simplest truth
in telling Dinah that he put her above all other friends in the world.
Could anything be more natural? For in the darkest moments of memory the
thought of her always came as the first ray of returning comfort. The
early days of gloom at the Hall Farm had been gradually turned into soft
moonlight by her presence; and in the cottage, too, for she had come
at every spare moment to soothe and cheer poor Lisbeth, who had been
stricken with a fear that subdued even her querulousness at the sight of
her darling Adam’s grief-worn face. He had become used to watching her
light quiet movements, her pretty loving ways to the children, when he
went to the Hall Farm; to listen for her voice as for a recurrent music;
to think everything she said and did was just right, and could not have
been better. In spite of his wisdom, he could not find fault with her
for her overindulgence of the children, who had managed to convert Dinah
the preacher, before whom a circle of rough men had often trembled a
little, into a convenient household slave--though Dinah herself was
rather ashamed of this weakness, and had some inward conflict as to her
departure from the precepts of Solomon. Yes, there was one thing that
might have been better; she might have loved Seth and consented to marry
him. He felt a little vexed, for his brother’s sake, and he could not
help thinking regretfully how Dinah, as Seth’s wife, would have made
their home as happy as it could be for them all--how she was the one
being that would have soothed their mother’s last days into peacefulness
and rest.

“It’s wonderful she doesn’t love th’ lad,” Adam had said sometimes to
himself, “for anybody ‘ud think he was just cut out for her. But her
heart’s so taken up with other things. She’s one o’ those women that
feel no drawing towards having a husband and children o’ their own. She
thinks she should be filled up with her own life then, and she’s been
used so to living in other folks’s cares, she can’t bear the thought of
her heart being shut up from ‘em. I see how it is, well enough. She’s
cut out o’ different stuff from most women: I saw that long ago. She’s
never easy but when she’s helping somebody, and marriage ‘ud interfere
with her ways--that’s true. I’ve no right to be contriving and thinking
it ‘ud be better if she’d have Seth, as if I was wiser than she is--or
than God either, for He made her what she is, and that’s one o’ the
greatest blessings I’ve ever had from His hands, and others besides me.”

This self-reproof had recurred strongly to Adam’s mind when he gathered
from Dinah’s face that he had wounded her by referring to his wish
that she had accepted Seth, and so he had endeavoured to put into the
strongest words his confidence in her decision as right--his resignation
even to her going away from them and ceasing to make part of their life
otherwise than by living in their thoughts, if that separation were
chosen by herself. He felt sure she knew quite well enough how much
he cared to see her continually--to talk to her with the silent
consciousness of a mutual great remembrance. It was not possible she
should hear anything but self-renouncing affection and respect in
his assurance that he was contented for her to go away; and yet there
remained an uneasy feeling in his mind that he had not said quite the
right thing--that, somehow, Dinah had not understood him.

Dinah must have risen a little before the sun the next morning, for she
was downstairs about five o’clock. So was Seth, for, through Lisbeth’s
obstinate refusal to have any woman-helper in the house, he had learned
to make himself, as Adam said, “very handy in the housework,” that he
might save his mother from too great weariness; on which ground I hope
you will not think him unmanly, any more than you can have thought the
gallant Colonel Bath unmanly when he made the gruel for his invalid
sister. Adam, who had sat up late at his writing, was still asleep,
and was not likely, Seth said, to be down till breakfast-time. Often as
Dinah had visited Lisbeth during the last eighteen months, she had never
slept in the cottage since that night after Thias’s death, when, you
remember, Lisbeth praised her deft movements and even gave a modified
approval to her porridge. But in that long interval Dinah had made great
advances in household cleverness, and this morning, since Seth was there
to help, she was bent on bringing everything to a pitch of cleanliness
and order that would have satisfied her Aunt Poyser. The cottage was far
from that standard at present, for Lisbeth’s rheumatism had forced her
to give up her old habits of dilettante scouring and polishing. When the
kitchen was to her mind, Dinah went into the new room, where Adam had
been writing the night before, to see what sweeping and dusting were
needed there. She opened the window and let in the fresh morning air,
and the smell of the sweet-brier, and the bright low-slanting rays of
the early sun, which made a glory about her pale face and pale auburn
hair as she held the long brush, and swept, singing to herself in a very
low tone--like a sweet summer murmur that you have to listen for very
closely--one of Charles Wesley’s hymns:

     Eternal Beam of Light Divine,
     Fountain of unexhausted love,
     In whom the Father’s glories shine,
     Through earth beneath and heaven above;

     Jesus! the weary wanderer’s rest,
     Give me thy easy yoke to bear;
     With steadfast patience arm my breast,
     With spotless love and holy fear.

     Speak to my warring passions, “Peace!”
      Say to my trembling heart, “Be still!”
      Thy power my strength and fortress is,
     For all things serve thy sovereign will.

She laid by the brush and took up the duster; and if you had ever lived
in Mrs. Poyser’s household, you would know how the duster behaved in
Dinah’s hand--how it went into every small corner, and on every ledge
in and out of sight--how it went again and again round every bar of the
chairs, and every leg, and under and over everything that lay on the
table, till it came to Adam’s papers and rulers and the open desk near
them. Dinah dusted up to the very edge of these and then hesitated,
looking at them with a longing but timid eye. It was painful to see
how much dust there was among them. As she was looking in this way, she
heard Seth’s step just outside the open door, towards which her back
was turned, and said, raising her clear treble, “Seth, is your brother
wrathful when his papers are stirred?”

“Yes, very, when they are not put back in the right places,” said a deep
strong voice, not Seth’s.

It was as if Dinah had put her hands unawares on a vibrating chord.
She was shaken with an intense thrill, and for the instant felt nothing
else; then she knew her cheeks were glowing, and dared not look round,
but stood still, distressed because she could not say good-morning in a
friendly way. Adam, finding that she did not look round so as to see
the smile on his face, was afraid she had thought him serious about his
wrathfulness, and went up to her, so that she was obliged to look at
him.

“What! You think I’m a cross fellow at home, Dinah?” he said, smilingly.

“Nay,” said Dinah, looking up with timid eyes, “not so. But you might
be put about by finding things meddled with; and even the man Moses, the
meekest of men, was wrathful sometimes.”

“Come, then,” said Adam, looking at her affectionately, “I’ll help you
move the things, and put ‘em back again, and then they can’t get wrong.
You’re getting to be your aunt’s own niece, I see, for particularness.”

They began their little task together, but Dinah had not recovered
herself sufficiently to think of any remark, and Adam looked at her
uneasily. Dinah, he thought, had seemed to disapprove him somehow
lately; she had not been so kind and open to him as she used to be.
He wanted her to look at him, and be as pleased as he was himself with
doing this bit of playful work. But Dinah did not look at him--it was
easy for her to avoid looking at the tall man--and when at last there
was no more dusting to be done and no further excuse for him to linger
near her, he could bear it no longer, and said, in rather a pleading
tone, “Dinah, you’re not displeased with me for anything, are you? I’ve
not said or done anything to make you think ill of me?”

The question surprised her, and relieved her by giving a new course to
her feeling. She looked up at him now, quite earnestly, almost with the
tears coming, and said, “Oh, no, Adam! how could you think so?”

“I couldn’t bear you not to feel as much a friend to me as I do to you,”
 said Adam. “And you don’t know the value I set on the very thought of
you, Dinah. That was what I meant yesterday, when I said I’d be content
for you to go, if you thought right. I meant, the thought of you was
worth so much to me, I should feel I ought to be thankful, and not
grumble, if you see right to go away. You know I do mind parting with
you, Dinah?”

“Yes, dear friend,” said Dinah, trembling, but trying to speak calmly,
“I know you have a brother’s heart towards me, and we shall often be
with one another in spirit; but at this season I am in heaviness through
manifold temptations. You must not mark me. I feel called to leave my
kindred for a while; but it is a trial--the flesh is weak.”

Adam saw that it pained her to be obliged to answer.

“I hurt you by talking about it, Dinah,” he said. “I’ll say no more.
Let’s see if Seth’s ready with breakfast now.”

That is a simple scene, reader. But it is almost certain that you, too,
have been in love--perhaps, even, more than once, though you may not
choose to say so to all your feminine friends. If so, you will no more
think the slight words, the timid looks, the tremulous touches, by which
two human souls approach each other gradually, like two little quivering
rain-streams, before they mingle into one--you will no more think these
things trivial than you will think the first-detected signs of coming
spring trivial, though they be but a faint indescribable something
in the air and in the song of the birds, and the tiniest perceptible
budding on the hedge-row branches. Those slight words and looks and
touches are part of the soul’s language; and the finest language,
I believe, is chiefly made up of unimposing words, such as “light,”
 “sound,” “stars,” “music”--words really not worth looking at, or
hearing, in themselves, any more than “chips” or “sawdust.” It is only
that they happen to be the signs of something unspeakably great and
beautiful. I am of opinion that love is a great and beautiful thing too,
and if you agree with me, the smallest signs of it will not be chips and
sawdust to you: they will rather be like those little words, “light” and
“music,” stirring the long-winding fibres of your memory and enriching
your present with your most precious past.



Chapter LI

Sunday Morning


LISBETH’S touch of rheumatism could not be made to appear serious enough
to detain Dinah another night from the Hall Farm, now she had made up
her mind to leave her aunt so soon, and at evening the friends must
part. “For a long while,” Dinah had said, for she had told Lisbeth of
her resolve.

“Then it’ll be for all my life, an’ I shall ne’er see thee again,” said
Lisbeth. “Long while! I’n got no long while t’ live. An’ I shall be
took bad an’ die, an’ thee canst ne’er come a-nigh me, an’ I shall die
a-longing for thee.”

That had been the key-note of her wailing talk all day; for Adam was not
in the house, and so she put no restraint on her complaining. She had
tried poor Dinah by returning again and again to the question, why
she must go away; and refusing to accept reasons, which seemed to her
nothing but whim and “contrairiness”; and still more, by regretting that
she “couldna’ ha’ one o’ the lads” and be her daughter.

“Thee couldstna put up wi’ Seth,” she said. “He isna cliver enough for
thee, happen, but he’d ha’ been very good t’ thee--he’s as handy as can
be at doin’ things for me when I’m bad, an’ he’s as fond o’ the Bible
an’ chappellin’ as thee art thysen. But happen, thee’dst like a husband
better as isna just the cut o’ thysen: the runnin’ brook isna athirst
for th’ rain. Adam ‘ud ha’ done for thee--I know he would--an’ he might
come t’ like thee well enough, if thee’dst stop. But he’s as stubborn
as th’ iron bar--there’s no bending him no way but’s own. But he’d be
a fine husband for anybody, be they who they will, so looked-on an’ so
cliver as he is. And he’d be rare an’ lovin’: it does me good on’y a
look o’ the lad’s eye when he means kind tow’rt me.”

Dinah tried to escape from Lisbeth’s closest looks and questions by
finding little tasks of housework that kept her moving about, and as
soon as Seth came home in the evening she put on her bonnet to go. It
touched Dinah keenly to say the last good-bye, and still more to look
round on her way across the fields and see the old woman still standing
at the door, gazing after her till she must have been the faintest speck
in the dim aged eyes. “The God of love and peace be with them,”
 Dinah prayed, as she looked back from the last stile. “Make them glad
according to the days wherein thou hast afflicted them, and the years
wherein they have seen evil. It is thy will that I should part from
them; let me have no will but thine.”

Lisbeth turned into the house at last and sat down in the workshop near
Seth, who was busying himself there with fitting some bits of turned
wood he had brought from the village into a small work-box, which he
meant to give to Dinah before she went away.

“Thee’t see her again o’ Sunday afore she goes,” were her first words.
“If thee wast good for anything, thee’dst make her come in again o’
Sunday night wi’ thee, and see me once more.”

“Nay, Mother,” said Seth. “Dinah ‘ud be sure to come again if she saw
right to come. I should have no need to persuade her. She only thinks it
‘ud be troubling thee for nought, just to come in to say good-bye over
again.”

“She’d ne’er go away, I know, if Adam ‘ud be fond on her an’ marry her,
but everything’s so contrairy,” said Lisbeth, with a burst of vexation.

Seth paused a moment and looked up, with a slight blush, at his mother’s
face. “What! Has she said anything o’ that sort to thee, Mother?” he
said, in a lower tone.

“Said? Nay, she’ll say nothin’. It’s on’y the men as have to wait till
folks say things afore they find ‘em out.”

“Well, but what makes thee think so, Mother? What’s put it into thy
head?”

“It’s no matter what’s put it into my head. My head’s none so hollow as
it must get in, an’ nought to put it there. I know she’s fond on him, as
I know th’ wind’s comin’ in at the door, an’ that’s anoof. An’ he might
be willin’ to marry her if he know’d she’s fond on him, but he’ll ne’er
think on’t if somebody doesna put it into’s head.”

His mother’s suggestion about Dinah’s feeling towards Adam was not quite
a new thought to Seth, but her last words alarmed him, lest she should
herself undertake to open Adam’s eyes. He was not sure about Dinah’s
feeling, and he thought he was sure about Adam’s.

“Nay, Mother, nay,” he said, earnestly, “thee mustna think o’ speaking
o’ such things to Adam. Thee’st no right to say what Dinah’s feelings
are if she hasna told thee, and it ‘ud do nothing but mischief to say
such things to Adam. He feels very grateful and affectionate toward
Dinah, but he’s no thoughts towards her that ‘ud incline him to make her
his wife, and I don’t believe Dinah ‘ud marry him either. I don’t think
she’ll marry at all.”

“Eh,” said Lisbeth, impatiently. “Thee think’st so ‘cause she wouldna
ha’ thee. She’ll ne’er marry thee; thee mightst as well like her t’ ha’
thy brother.”

Seth was hurt. “Mother,” he said, in a remonstrating tone, “don’t think
that of me. I should be as thankful t’ have her for a sister as thee
wouldst t’ have her for a daughter. I’ve no more thoughts about myself
in that thing, and I shall take it hard if ever thee say’st it again.”

“Well, well, then thee shouldstna cross me wi’ sayin’ things arena as I
say they are.”

“But, Mother,” said Seth, “thee’dst be doing Dinah a wrong by telling
Adam what thee think’st about her. It ‘ud do nothing but mischief,
for it ‘ud make Adam uneasy if he doesna feel the same to her. And I’m
pretty sure he feels nothing o’ the sort.”

“Eh, donna tell me what thee’t sure on; thee know’st nought about it.
What’s he allays goin’ to the Poysers’ for, if he didna want t’ see her?
He goes twice where he used t’ go once. Happen he knowsna as he wants
t’ see her; he knowsna as I put salt in’s broth, but he’d miss it pretty
quick if it warna there. He’ll ne’er think o’ marrying if it isna put
into’s head, an’ if thee’dst any love for thy mother, thee’dst put him
up to’t an’ not let her go away out o’ my sight, when I might ha’ her to
make a bit o’ comfort for me afore I go to bed to my old man under the
white thorn.”

“Nay, Mother,” said Seth, “thee mustna think me unkind, but I should
be going against my conscience if I took upon me to say what Dinah’s
feelings are. And besides that, I think I should give offence to Adam by
speaking to him at all about marrying; and I counsel thee not to do’t.
Thee may’st be quite deceived about Dinah. Nay, I’m pretty sure, by
words she said to me last Sabbath, as she’s no mind to marry.”

“Eh, thee’t as contrairy as the rest on ‘em. If it war summat I didna
want, it ‘ud be done fast enough.”

Lisbeth rose from the bench at this, and went out of the workshop,
leaving Seth in much anxiety lest she should disturb Adam’s mind about
Dinah. He consoled himself after a time with reflecting that, since
Adam’s trouble, Lisbeth had been very timid about speaking to him on
matters of feeling, and that she would hardly dare to approach this
tenderest of all subjects. Even if she did, he hoped Adam would not take
much notice of what she said.

Seth was right in believing that Lisbeth would be held in restraint by
timidity, and during the next three days, the intervals in which she had
an opportunity of speaking to Adam were too rare and short to cause her
any strong temptation. But in her long solitary hours she brooded over
her regretful thoughts about Dinah, till they had grown very near that
point of unmanageable strength when thoughts are apt to take wing out
of their secret nest in a startling manner. And on Sunday morning, when
Seth went away to chapel at Treddleston, the dangerous opportunity came.

Sunday morning was the happiest time in all the week to Lisbeth, for
as there was no service at Hayslope church till the afternoon, Adam was
always at home, doing nothing but reading, an occupation in which she
could venture to interrupt him. Moreover, she had always a better dinner
than usual to prepare for her sons--very frequently for Adam and herself
alone, Seth being often away the entire day--and the smell of the roast
meat before the clear fire in the clean kitchen, the clock ticking in
a peaceful Sunday manner, her darling Adam seated near her in his best
clothes, doing nothing very important, so that she could go and stroke
her hand across his hair if she liked, and see him look up at her and
smile, while Gyp, rather jealous, poked his muzzle up between them--all
these things made poor Lisbeth’s earthly paradise.

The book Adam most often read on a Sunday morning was his large pictured
Bible, and this morning it lay open before him on the round white deal
table in the kitchen; for he sat there in spite of the fire, because he
knew his mother liked to have him with her, and it was the only day in
the week when he could indulge her in that way. You would have liked to
see Adam reading his Bible. He never opened it on a weekday, and so he
came to it as a holiday book, serving him for history, biography, and
poetry. He held one hand thrust between his waistcoat buttons, and the
other ready to turn the pages, and in the course of the morning you
would have seen many changes in his face. Sometimes his lips moved in
semi-articulation--it was when he came to a speech that he could fancy
himself uttering, such as Samuel’s dying speech to the people; then his
eyebrows would be raised, and the corners of his mouth would quiver a
little with sad sympathy--something, perhaps old Isaac’s meeting with
his son, touched him closely; at other times, over the New Testament,
a very solemn look would come upon his face, and he would every now and
then shake his head in serious assent, or just lift up his hand and let
it fall again. And on some mornings, when he read in the Apocrypha, of
which he was very fond, the son of Sirach’s keen-edged words would bring
a delighted smile, though he also enjoyed the freedom of occasionally
differing from an Apocryphal writer. For Adam knew the Articles quite
well, as became a good churchman.

Lisbeth, in the pauses of attending to her dinner, always sat opposite
to him and watched him, till she could rest no longer without going
up to him and giving him a caress, to call his attention to her. This
morning he was reading the Gospel according to St. Matthew, and Lisbeth
had been standing close by him for some minutes, stroking his hair,
which was smoother than usual this morning, and looking down at the
large page with silent wonderment at the mystery of letters. She was
encouraged to continue this caress, because when she first went up
to him, he had thrown himself back in his chair to look at her
affectionately and say, “Why, Mother, thee look’st rare and hearty this
morning. Eh, Gyp wants me t’ look at him. He can’t abide to think I love
thee the best.” Lisbeth said nothing, because she wanted to say so many
things. And now there was a new leaf to be turned over, and it was
a picture--that of the angel seated on the great stone that has been
rolled away from the sepulchre. This picture had one strong association
in Lisbeth’s memory, for she had been reminded of it when she first
saw Dinah, and Adam had no sooner turned the page, and lifted the book
sideways that they might look at the angel, than she said, “That’s
her--that’s Dinah.”

Adam smiled, and, looking more intently at the angel’s face, said, “It
is a bit like her; but Dinah’s prettier, I think.”

“Well, then, if thee think’st her so pretty, why arn’t fond on her?”

Adam looked up in surprise. “Why, Mother, dost think I don’t set store
by Dinah?”

“Nay,” said Lisbeth, frightened at her own courage, yet feeling that
she had broken the ice, and the waters must flow, whatever mischief they
might do. “What’s th’ use o’ settin’ store by things as are thirty mile
off? If thee wast fond enough on her, thee wouldstna let her go away.”

“But I’ve no right t’ hinder her, if she thinks well,” said Adam,
looking at his book as if he wanted to go on reading. He foresaw a
series of complaints tending to nothing. Lisbeth sat down again in the
chair opposite to him, as she said:

“But she wouldna think well if thee wastna so contrairy.” Lisbeth dared
not venture beyond a vague phrase yet.

“Contrairy, mother?” Adam said, looking up again in some anxiety. “What
have I done? What dost mean?”

“Why, thee’t never look at nothin’, nor think o’ nothin’, but thy
figurin, an’ thy work,” said Lisbeth, half-crying. “An’ dost think thee
canst go on so all thy life, as if thee wast a man cut out o’ timber?
An’ what wut do when thy mother’s gone, an’ nobody to take care on thee
as thee gett’st a bit o’ victual comfortable i’ the mornin’?”

“What hast got i’ thy mind, Mother?” said Adam, vexed at this
whimpering. “I canna see what thee’t driving at. Is there anything I
could do for thee as I don’t do?”

“Aye, an’ that there is. Thee might’st do as I should ha’ somebody wi’
me to comfort me a bit, an’ wait on me when I’m bad, an’ be good to me.”

“Well, Mother, whose fault is it there isna some tidy body i’ th’ house
t’ help thee? It isna by my wish as thee hast a stroke o’ work to do. We
can afford it--I’ve told thee often enough. It ‘ud be a deal better for
us.”

“Eh, what’s the use o’ talking o’ tidy bodies, when thee mean’st one o’
th’ wenches out o’ th’ village, or somebody from Treddles’on as I ne’er
set eyes on i’ my life? I’d sooner make a shift an’ get into my own
coffin afore I die, nor ha’ them folks to put me in.”

Adam was silent, and tried to go on reading. That was the utmost
severity he could show towards his mother on a Sunday morning. But
Lisbeth had gone too far now to check herself, and after scarcely a
minute’s quietness she began again.

“Thee mightst know well enough who ‘tis I’d like t’ ha’ wi’ me. It isna
many folks I send for t’ come an’ see me. I reckon. An’ thee’st had the
fetchin’ on her times enow.”

“Thee mean’st Dinah, Mother, I know,” said Adam. “But it’s no use
setting thy mind on what can’t be. If Dinah ‘ud be willing to stay at
Hayslope, it isn’t likely she can come away from her aunt’s house, where
they hold her like a daughter, and where she’s more bound than she is to
us. If it had been so that she could ha’ married Seth, that ‘ud ha’ been
a great blessing to us, but we can’t have things just as we like in this
life. Thee must try and make up thy mind to do without her.”

“Nay, but I canna ma’ up my mind, when she’s just cut out for thee; an’
nought shall ma’ me believe as God didna make her an’ send her there o’
purpose for thee. What’s it sinnify about her bein’ a Methody! It ‘ud
happen wear out on her wi’ marryin’.”

Adam threw himself back in his chair and looked at his mother. He
understood now what she had been aiming at from the beginning of the
conversation. It was as unreasonable, impracticable a wish as she had
ever urged, but he could not help being moved by so entirely new an
idea. The chief point, however, was to chase away the notion from his
mother’s mind as quickly as possible.

“Mother,” he said, gravely, “thee’t talking wild. Don’t let me hear
thee say such things again. It’s no good talking o’ what can never be.
Dinah’s not for marrying; she’s fixed her heart on a different sort o’
life.”

“Very like,” said Lisbeth, impatiently, “very like she’s none for
marr’ing, when them as she’d be willin’ t’ marry wonna ax her. I
shouldna ha’ been for marr’ing thy feyther if he’d ne’er axed me; an’
she’s as fond o’ thee as e’er I war o’ Thias, poor fellow.”

The blood rushed to Adam’s face, and for a few moments he was not quite
conscious where he was. His mother and the kitchen had vanished for him,
and he saw nothing but Dinah’s face turned up towards his. It seemed
as if there were a resurrection of his dead joy. But he woke up very
speedily from that dream (the waking was chill and sad), for it would
have been very foolish in him to believe his mother’s words--she could
have no ground for them. He was prompted to express his disbelief very
strongly--perhaps that he might call forth the proofs, if there were any
to be offered.

“What dost say such things for, Mother, when thee’st got no foundation
for ‘em? Thee know’st nothing as gives thee a right to say that.”

“Then I knowna nought as gi’es me a right to say as the year’s turned,
for all I feel it fust thing when I get up i’ th’ morning. She isna fond
o’ Seth, I reckon, is she? She doesna want to marry HIM? But I can see
as she doesna behave tow’rt thee as she daes tow’rt Seth. She makes no
more o’ Seth’s coming a-nigh her nor if he war Gyp, but she’s all of a
tremble when thee’t a-sittin’ down by her at breakfast an’ a-looking at
her. Thee think’st thy mother knows nought, but she war alive afore thee
wast born.”

“But thee canstna be sure as the trembling means love?” said Adam
anxiously.

“Eh, what else should it mane? It isna hate, I reckon. An’ what should
she do but love thee? Thee’t made to be loved--for where’s there a
straighter cliverer man? An’ what’s it sinnify her bein’ a Methody? It’s
on’y the marigold i’ th’ parridge.”

Adam had thrust his hands in his pockets, and was looking down at the
book on the table, without seeing any of the letters. He was trembling
like a gold-seeker who sees the strong promise of gold but sees in the
same moment a sickening vision of disappointment. He could not trust his
mother’s insight; she had seen what she wished to see. And yet--and yet,
now the suggestion had been made to him, he remembered so many things,
very slight things, like the stirring of the water by an imperceptible
breeze, which seemed to him some confirmation of his mother’s words.

Lisbeth noticed that he was moved. She went on, “An’ thee’t find out
as thee’t poorly aff when she’s gone. Thee’t fonder on her nor thee
know’st. Thy eyes follow her about, welly as Gyp’s follow thee.”

Adam could sit still no longer. He rose, took down his hat, and went out
into the fields.

The sunshine was on them: that early autumn sunshine which we should
know was not summer’s, even if there were not the touches of yellow
on the lime and chestnut; the Sunday sunshine too, which has more than
autumnal calmness for the working man; the morning sunshine, which still
leaves the dew-crystals on the fine gossamer webs in the shadow of the
bushy hedgerows.

Adam needed the calm influence; he was amazed at the way in which
this new thought of Dinah’s love had taken possession of him, with an
overmastering power that made all other feelings give way before the
impetuous desire to know that the thought was true. Strange, that till
that moment the possibility of their ever being lovers had never crossed
his mind, and yet now, all his longing suddenly went out towards that
possibility. He had no more doubt or hesitation as to his own wishes
than the bird that flies towards the opening through which the daylight
gleams and the breath of heaven enters.

The autumnal Sunday sunshine soothed him, but not by preparing him with
resignation to the disappointment if his mother--if he himself--proved
to be mistaken about Dinah. It soothed him by gentle encouragement of
his hopes. Her love was so like that calm sunshine that they seemed to
make one presence to him, and he believed in them both alike. And Dinah
was so bound up with the sad memories of his first passion that he was
not forsaking them, but rather giving them a new sacredness by loving
her. Nay, his love for her had grown out of that past: it was the noon
of that morning.

But Seth? Would the lad be hurt? Hardly; for he had seemed quite
contented of late, and there was no selfish jealousy in him; he had
never been jealous of his mother’s fondness for Adam. But had he seen
anything of what their mother talked about? Adam longed to know this,
for he thought he could trust Seth’s observation better than his
mother’s. He must talk to Seth before he went to see Dinah, and, with
this intention in his mind, he walked back to the cottage and said to
his mother, “Did Seth say anything to thee about when he was coming
home? Will he be back to dinner?”

“Aye, lad, he’ll be back for a wonder. He isna gone to Treddles’on. He’s
gone somewhere else a-preachin’ and a-prayin’.”

“Hast any notion which way he’s gone?” said Adam.

“Nay, but he aften goes to th’ Common. Thee know’st more o’s goings nor
I do.”

Adam wanted to go and meet Seth, but he must content himself with
walking about the near fields and getting sight of him as soon as
possible. That would not be for more than an hour to come, for Seth
would scarcely be at home much before their dinner-time, which was
twelve o’clock. But Adam could not sit down to his reading again, and he
sauntered along by the brook and stood leaning against the stiles, with
eager intense eyes, which looked as if they saw something very vividly;
but it was not the brook or the willows, not the fields or the sky.
Again and again his vision was interrupted by wonder at the strength of
his own feeling, at the strength and sweetness of this new love--almost
like the wonder a man feels at the added power he finds in himself for
an art which he had laid aside for a space. How is it that the poets
have said so many fine things about our first love, so few about our
later love? Are their first poems their best? Or are not those the best
which come from their fuller thought, their larger experience, their
deeper-rooted affections? The boy’s flutelike voice has its own spring
charm; but the man should yield a richer deeper music.

At last, there was Seth, visible at the farthest stile, and Adam
hastened to meet him. Seth was surprised, and thought something unusual
must have happened, but when Adam came up, his face said plainly enough
that it was nothing alarming.

“Where hast been?” said Adam, when they were side by side.

“I’ve been to the Common,” said Seth. “Dinah’s been speaking the Word
to a little company of hearers at Brimstone’s, as they call him. They’re
folks as never go to church hardly--them on the Common--but they’ll go
and hear Dinah a bit. She’s been speaking with power this forenoon
from the words, ‘I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to
repentance.’ And there was a little thing happened as was pretty to see.
The women mostly bring their children with ‘em, but to-day there was one
stout curly headed fellow about three or four year old, that I never saw
there before. He was as naughty as could be at the beginning while I was
praying, and while we was singing, but when we all sat down and Dinah
began to speak, th’ young un stood stock still all at once, and began to
look at her with’s mouth open, and presently he ran away from’s mother
and went to Dinah, and pulled at her, like a little dog, for her to take
notice of him. So Dinah lifted him up and held th’ lad on her lap, while
she went on speaking; and he was as good as could be till he went to
sleep--and the mother cried to see him.”

“It’s a pity she shouldna be a mother herself,” said Adam, “so fond as
the children are of her. Dost think she’s quite fixed against marrying,
Seth? Dost think nothing ‘ud turn her?”

There was something peculiar in his brother’s tone, which made Seth
steal a glance at his face before he answered.

“It ‘ud be wrong of me to say nothing ‘ud turn her,” he answered. “But
if thee mean’st it about myself, I’ve given up all thoughts as she can
ever be my wife. She calls me her brother, and that’s enough.”

“But dost think she might ever get fond enough of anybody else to be
willing to marry ‘em?” said Adam rather shyly.

“Well,” said Seth, after some hesitation, “it’s crossed my mind
sometimes o’ late as she might; but Dinah ‘ud let no fondness for the
creature draw her out o’ the path as she believed God had marked out for
her. If she thought the leading was not from Him, she’s not one to
be brought under the power of it. And she’s allays seemed clear about
that--as her work was to minister t’ others, and make no home for
herself i’ this world.”

“But suppose,” said Adam, earnestly, “suppose there was a man as ‘ud
let her do just the same and not interfere with her--she might do a good
deal o’ what she does now, just as well when she was married as when
she was single. Other women of her sort have married--that’s to say, not
just like her, but women as preached and attended on the sick and needy.
There’s Mrs. Fletcher as she talks of.”

A new light had broken in on Seth. He turned round, and laying his
hand on Adam’s shoulder, said, “Why, wouldst like her to marry THEE,
Brother?”

Adam looked doubtfully at Seth’s inquiring eyes and said, “Wouldst be
hurt if she was to be fonder o’ me than o’ thee?”

“Nay,” said Seth warmly, “how canst think it? Have I felt thy trouble so
little that I shouldna feel thy joy?”

There was silence a few moments as they walked on, and then Seth said,
“I’d no notion as thee’dst ever think of her for a wife.”

“But is it o’ any use to think of her?” said Adam. “What dost say?
Mother’s made me as I hardly know where I am, with what she’s been
saying to me this forenoon. She says she’s sure Dinah feels for me more
than common, and ‘ud be willing t’ have me. But I’m afraid she speaks
without book. I want to know if thee’st seen anything.”

“It’s a nice point to speak about,” said Seth, “and I’m afraid o’ being
wrong; besides, we’ve no right t’ intermeddle with people’s feelings
when they wouldn’t tell ‘em themselves.”

Seth paused.

“But thee mightst ask her,” he said presently. “She took no offence at
me for asking, and thee’st more right than I had, only thee’t not in the
Society. But Dinah doesn’t hold wi’ them as are for keeping the Society
so strict to themselves. She doesn’t mind about making folks enter the
Society, so as they’re fit t’ enter the kingdom o’ God. Some o’ the
brethren at Treddles’on are displeased with her for that.”

“Where will she be the rest o’ the day?” said Adam.

“She said she shouldn’t leave the farm again to-day,” said Seth,
“because it’s her last Sabbath there, and she’s going t’ read out o’ the
big Bible wi’ the children.”

Adam thought--but did not say--“Then I’ll go this afternoon; for if I
go to church, my thoughts ‘ull be with her all the while. They must sing
th’ anthem without me to-day.”



Chapter LII

Adam and Dinah


IT was about three o’clock when Adam entered the farmyard and roused
Alick and the dogs from their Sunday dozing. Alick said everybody was
gone to church “but th’ young missis”--so he called Dinah--but this
did not disappoint Adam, although the “everybody” was so liberal as
to include Nancy the dairymaid, whose works of necessity were not
unfrequently incompatible with church-going.

There was perfect stillness about the house. The doors were all closed,
and the very stones and tubs seemed quieter than usual. Adam heard the
water gently dripping from the pump--that was the only sound--and
he knocked at the house door rather softly, as was suitable in that
stillness.

The door opened, and Dinah stood before him, colouring deeply with the
great surprise of seeing Adam at this hour, when she knew it was his
regular practice to be at church. Yesterday he would have said to her
without any difficulty, “I came to see you, Dinah: I knew the rest were
not at home.” But to-day something prevented him from saying that, and
he put out his hand to her in silence. Neither of them spoke, and yet
both wished they could speak, as Adam entered, and they sat down. Dinah
took the chair she had just left; it was at the corner of the table
near the window, and there was a book lying on the table, but it was not
open. She had been sitting perfectly still, looking at the small bit
of clear fire in the bright grate. Adam sat down opposite her, in Mr.
Poyser’s three-cornered chair.

“Your mother is not ill again, I hope, Adam?” Dinah said, recovering
herself. “Seth said she was well this morning.”

“No, she’s very hearty to-day,” said Adam, happy in the signs of Dinah’s
feeling at the sight of him, but shy.

“There’s nobody at home, you see,” Dinah said; “but you’ll wait. You’ve
been hindered from going to church to-day, doubtless.”

“Yes,” Adam said, and then paused, before he added, “I was thinking
about you: that was the reason.”

This confession was very awkward and sudden, Adam felt, for he thought
Dinah must understand all he meant. But the frankness of the words
caused her immediately to interpret them into a renewal of his brotherly
regrets that she was going away, and she answered calmly, “Do not be
careful and troubled for me, Adam. I have all things and abound at
Snowfield. And my mind is at rest, for I am not seeking my own will in
going.”

“But if things were different, Dinah,” said Adam, hesitatingly. “If you
knew things that perhaps you don’t know now....”

Dinah looked at him inquiringly, but instead of going on, he reached a
chair and brought it near the corner of the table where she was sitting.
She wondered, and was afraid--and the next moment her thoughts flew to
the past: was it something about those distant unhappy ones that she
didn’t know?

Adam looked at her. It was so sweet to look at her eyes, which had now
a self-forgetful questioning in them--for a moment he forgot that he
wanted to say anything, or that it was necessary to tell her what he
meant.

“Dinah,” he said suddenly, taking both her hands between his, “I love
you with my whole heart and soul. I love you next to God who made me.”

Dinah’s lips became pale, like her cheeks, and she trembled violently
under the shock of painful joy. Her hands were cold as death between
Adam’s. She could not draw them away, because he held them fast.

“Don’t tell me you can’t love me, Dinah. Don’t tell me we must part and
pass our lives away from one another.”

The tears were trembling in Dinah’s eyes, and they fell before she could
answer. But she spoke in a quiet low voice.

“Yes, dear Adam, we must submit to another Will. We must part.”

“Not if you love me, Dinah--not if you love me,” Adam said passionately.
“Tell me--tell me if you can love me better than a brother?”

Dinah was too entirely reliant on the Supreme guidance to attempt to
achieve any end by a deceptive concealment. She was recovering now from
the first shock of emotion, and she looked at Adam with simple sincere
eyes as she said, “Yes, Adam, my heart is drawn strongly towards you;
and of my own will, if I had no clear showing to the contrary, I could
find my happiness in being near you and ministering to you continually.
I fear I should forget to rejoice and weep with others; nay, I fear I
should forget the Divine presence, and seek no love but yours.”

Adam did not speak immediately. They sat looking at each other in
delicious silence--for the first sense of mutual love excludes other
feelings; it will have the soul all to itself.

“Then, Dinah,” Adam said at last, “how can there be anything contrary
to what’s right in our belonging to one another and spending our lives
together? Who put this great love into our hearts? Can anything be
holier than that? For we can help one another in everything as is good.
I’d never think o’ putting myself between you and God, and saying you
oughtn’t to do this and you oughtn’t to do that. You’d follow your
conscience as much as you do now.”

“Yes, Adam,” Dinah said, “I know marriage is a holy state for those who
are truly called to it, and have no other drawing; but from my childhood
upwards I have been led towards another path; all my peace and my joy
have come from having no life of my own, no wants, no wishes for myself,
and living only in God and those of his creatures whose sorrows and joys
he has given me to know. Those have been very blessed years to me, and I
feel that if I was to listen to any voice that would draw me aside from
that path, I should be turning my back on the light that has shone upon
me, and darkness and doubt would take hold of me. We could not bless
each other, Adam, if there were doubts in my soul, and if I yearned,
when it was too late, after that better part which had once been given
me and I had put away from me.”

“But if a new feeling has come into your mind, Dinah, and if you love me
so as to be willing to be nearer to me than to other people, isn’t that
a sign that it’s right for you to change your life? Doesn’t the love
make it right when nothing else would?”

“Adam, my mind is full of questionings about that; for now, since you
tell me of your strong love towards me, what was clear to me has become
dark again. I felt before that my heart was too strongly drawn towards
you, and that your heart was not as mine; and the thought of you had
taken hold of me, so that my soul had lost its freedom, and was becoming
enslaved to an earthly affection, which made me anxious and careful
about what should befall myself. For in all other affection I had been
content with any small return, or with none; but my heart was beginning
to hunger after an equal love from you. And I had no doubt that I must
wrestle against that as a great temptation, and the command was clear
that I must go away.”

“But now, dear, dear Dinah, now you know I love you better than you love
me...it’s all different now. You won’t think o’ going. You’ll stay, and
be my dear wife, and I shall thank God for giving me my life as I never
thanked him before.”

“Adam, it’s hard to me to turn a deaf ear...you know it’s hard; but a
great fear is upon me. It seems to me as if you were stretching out your
arms to me, and beckoning me to come and take my ease and live for my
own delight, and Jesus, the Man of Sorrows, was standing looking towards
me, and pointing to the sinful, and suffering, and afflicted. I have
seen that again and again when I have been sitting in stillness and
darkness, and a great terror has come upon me lest I should become hard,
and a lover of self, and no more bear willingly the Redeemer’s cross.”

Dinah had closed her eyes, and a faint shudder went through her. “Adam,”
 she went on, “you wouldn’t desire that we should seek a good through
any unfaithfulness to the light that is in us; you wouldn’t believe that
could be a good. We are of one mind in that.”

“Yes, Dinah,” said Adam sadly, “I’ll never be the man t’ urge you
against your conscience. But I can’t give up the hope that you may come
to see different. I don’t believe your loving me could shut up your
heart--it’s only adding to what you’ve been before, not taking away from
it. For it seems to me it’s the same with love and happiness as with
sorrow--the more we know of it the better we can feel what other
people’s lives are or might be, and so we shall only be more tender to
‘em, and wishful to help ‘em. The more knowledge a man has, the better
he’ll do’s work; and feeling’s a sort o’ knowledge.”

Dinah was silent; her eyes were fixed in contemplation of something
visible only to herself. Adam went on presently with his pleading, “And
you can do almost as much as you do now. I won’t ask you to go to church
with me of a Sunday. You shall go where you like among the people, and
teach ‘em; for though I like church best, I don’t put my soul above
yours, as if my words was better for you to follow than your own
conscience. And you can help the sick just as much, and you’ll have more
means o’ making ‘em a bit comfortable; and you’ll be among all your
own friends as love you, and can help ‘em and be a blessing to ‘em till
their dying day. Surely, Dinah, you’d be as near to God as if you was
living lonely and away from me.”

Dinah made no answer for some time. Adam was still holding her hands and
looking at her with almost trembling anxiety, when she turned her grave
loving eyes on his and said, in rather a sad voice, “Adam there is truth
in what you say, and there’s many of the brethren and sisters who have
greater strength than I have, and find their hearts enlarged by the
cares of husband and kindred. But I have not faith that it would be so
with me, for since my affections have been set above measure on you, I
have had less peace and joy in God. I have felt as it were a division
in my heart. And think how it is with me, Adam. That life I have led is
like a land I have trodden in blessedness since my childhood; and if
I long for a moment to follow the voice which calls me to another land
that I know not, I cannot but fear that my soul might hereafter yearn
for that early blessedness which I had forsaken; and where doubt enters
there is not perfect love. I must wait for clearer guidance. I must go
from you, and we must submit ourselves entirely to the Divine Will.
We are sometimes required to lay our natural lawful affections on the
altar.”

Adam dared not plead again, for Dinah’s was not the voice of caprice or
insincerity. But it was very hard for him; his eyes got dim as he looked
at her.

“But you may come to feel satisfied...to feel that you may come to me
again, and we may never part, Dinah?”

“We must submit ourselves, Adam. With time, our duty will be made clear.
It may be when I have entered on my former life, I shall find all these
new thoughts and wishes vanish, and become as things that were not. Then
I shall know that my calling is not towards marriage. But we must wait.”

“Dinah,” said Adam mournfully, “you can’t love me so well as I love you,
else you’d have no doubts. But it’s natural you shouldn’t, for I’m not
so good as you. I can’t doubt it’s right for me to love the best thing
God’s ever given me to know.”

“Nay, Adam. It seems to me that my love for you is not weak, for my
heart waits on your words and looks, almost as a little child waits on
the help and tenderness of the strong on whom it depends. If the thought
of you took slight hold of me, I should not fear that it would be an
idol in the temple. But you will strengthen me--you will not hinder me
in seeking to obey to the uttermost.”

“Let us go out into the sunshine, Dinah, and walk together. I’ll speak
no word to disturb you.”

They went out and walked towards the fields, where they would meet the
family coming from church. Adam said, “Take my arm, Dinah,” and she took
it. That was the only change in their manner to each other since they
were last walking together. But no sadness in the prospect of her going
away--in the uncertainty of the issue--could rob the sweetness from
Adam’s sense that Dinah loved him. He thought he would stay at the Hall
Farm all that evening. He would be near her as long as he could.

“Hey-day! There’s Adam along wi’ Dinah,” said Mr. Poyser, as he opened
the far gate into the Home Close. “I couldna think how he happened away
from church. Why,” added good Martin, after a moment’s pause, “what dost
think has just jumped into my head?”

“Summat as hadna far to jump, for it’s just under our nose. You mean as
Adam’s fond o’ Dinah.”

“Aye! hast ever had any notion of it before?”

“To be sure I have,” said Mrs. Poyser, who always declined, if possible,
to be taken by surprise. “I’m not one o’ those as can see the cat i’ the
dairy an’ wonder what she’s come after.”

“Thee never saidst a word to me about it.”

“Well, I aren’t like a bird-clapper, forced to make a rattle when the
wind blows on me. I can keep my own counsel when there’s no good i’
speaking.”

“But Dinah ‘ll ha’ none o’ him. Dost think she will?”

“Nay,” said Mrs. Poyser, not sufficiently on her guard against a
possible surprise, “she’ll never marry anybody, if he isn’t a Methodist
and a cripple.”

“It ‘ud ha’ been a pretty thing though for ‘em t’ marry,” said Martin,
turning his head on one side, as if in pleased contemplation of his new
idea. “Thee’dst ha’ liked it too, wouldstna?”

“Ah! I should. I should ha’ been sure of her then, as she wouldn’t
go away from me to Snowfield, welly thirty mile off, and me not got a
creatur to look to, only neighbours, as are no kin to me, an’ most of
‘em women as I’d be ashamed to show my face, if my dairy things war like
their’n. There may well be streaky butter i’ the market. An’ I should be
glad to see the poor thing settled like a Christian woman, with a
house of her own over her head; and we’d stock her well wi’ linen and
feathers, for I love her next to my own children. An’ she makes one feel
safer when she’s i’ the house, for she’s like the driven snow: anybody
might sin for two as had her at their elbow.”

“Dinah,” said Tommy, running forward to meet her, “mother says you’ll
never marry anybody but a Methodist cripple. What a silly you must be!”
 a comment which Tommy followed up by seizing Dinah with both arms, and
dancing along by her side with incommodious fondness.

“Why, Adam, we missed you i’ the singing to-day,” said Mr. Poyser. “How
was it?”

“I wanted to see Dinah--she’s going away so soon,” said Adam.

“Ah, lad! Can you persuade her to stop somehow? Find her a good husband
somewhere i’ the parish. If you’ll do that, we’ll forgive you for
missing church. But, anyway, she isna going before the harvest supper
o’ Wednesday, and you must come then. There’s Bartle Massey comin’, an’
happen Craig. You’ll be sure an’ come, now, at seven? The missis wunna
have it a bit later.”

“Aye,” said Adam, “I’ll come if I can. But I can’t often say what I’ll
do beforehand, for the work often holds me longer than I expect. You’ll
stay till the end o’ the week, Dinah?”

“Yes, yes!” said Mr. Poyser. “We’ll have no nay.”

“She’s no call to be in a hurry,” observed Mrs. Poyser. “Scarceness
o’ victual ‘ull keep: there’s no need to be hasty wi’ the cooking. An’
scarceness is what there’s the biggest stock of i’ that country.”

Dinah smiled, but gave no promise to stay, and they talked of other
things through the rest of the walk, lingering in the sunshine to look
at the great flock of geese grazing, at the new corn-ricks, and at the
surprising abundance of fruit on the old pear-tree; Nancy and Molly
having already hastened home, side by side, each holding, carefully
wrapped in her pocket-handkerchief, a prayer-book, in which she could
read little beyond the large letters and the Amens.

Surely all other leisure is hurry compared with a sunny walk through the
fields from “afternoon church”--as such walks used to be in those old
leisurely times, when the boat, gliding sleepily along the canal, was
the newest locomotive wonder; when Sunday books had most of them old
brown-leather covers, and opened with remarkable precision always in one
place. Leisure is gone--gone where the spinning-wheels are gone, and the
pack-horses, and the slow waggons, and the pedlars, who brought bargains
to the door on sunny afternoons. Ingenious philosophers tell you,
perhaps, that the great work of the steam-engine is to create leisure
for mankind. Do not believe them: it only creates a vacuum for eager
thought to rush in. Even idleness is eager now--eager for amusement;
prone to excursion-trains, art museums, periodical literature, and
exciting novels; prone even to scientific theorizing and cursory peeps
through microscopes. Old Leisure was quite a different personage. He
only read one newspaper, innocent of leaders, and was free from
that periodicity of sensations which we call post-time. He was a
contemplative, rather stout gentleman, of excellent digestion; of quiet
perceptions, undiseased by hypothesis; happy in his inability to know
the causes of things, preferring the things themselves. He lived chiefly
in the country, among pleasant seats and homesteads, and was fond of
sauntering by the fruit-tree wall and scenting the apricots when they
were warmed by the morning sunshine, or of sheltering himself under
the orchard boughs at noon, when the summer pears were falling. He knew
nothing of weekday services, and thought none the worse of the Sunday
sermon if it allowed him to sleep from the text to the blessing; liking
the afternoon service best, because the prayers were the shortest,
and not ashamed to say so; for he had an easy, jolly conscience,
broad-backed like himself, and able to carry a great deal of beer or
port-wine, not being made squeamish by doubts and qualms and lofty
aspirations. Life was not a task to him, but a sinecure. He fingered the
guineas in his pocket, and ate his dinners, and slept the sleep of the
irresponsible, for had he not kept up his character by going to church
on the Sunday afternoons?

Fine old Leisure! Do not be severe upon him, and judge him by our modern
standard. He never went to Exeter Hall, or heard a popular preacher, or
read Tracts for the Times or Sartor Resartus.



Chapter LIII

The Harvest Supper


As Adam was going homeward, on Wednesday evening, in the six o’clock
sunlight, he saw in the distance the last load of barley winding its way
towards the yard-gate of the Hall Farm, and heard the chant of “Harvest
Home!” rising and sinking like a wave. Fainter and fainter, and more
musical through the growing distance, the falling dying sound still
reached him, as he neared the Willow Brook. The low westering sun shone
right on the shoulders of the old Binton Hills, turning the unconscious
sheep into bright spots of light; shone on the windows of the cottage
too, and made them a-flame with a glory beyond that of amber or
amethyst. It was enough to make Adam feel that he was in a great temple,
and that the distant chant was a sacred song.

“It’s wonderful,” he thought, “how that sound goes to one’s heart almost
like a funeral bell, for all it tells one o’ the joyfullest time o’ the
year, and the time when men are mostly the thankfullest. I suppose it’s
a bit hard to us to think anything’s over and gone in our lives; and
there’s a parting at the root of all our joys. It’s like what I feel
about Dinah. I should never ha’ come to know that her love ‘ud be the
greatest o’ blessings to me, if what I counted a blessing hadn’t been
wrenched and torn away from me, and left me with a greater need, so as I
could crave and hunger for a greater and a better comfort.”

He expected to see Dinah again this evening, and get leave to accompany
her as far as Oakbourne; and then he would ask her to fix some time when
he might go to Snowfield, and learn whether the last best hope that had
been born to him must be resigned like the rest. The work he had to do
at home, besides putting on his best clothes, made it seven before he
was on his way again to the Hall Farm, and it was questionable whether,
with his longest and quickest strides, he should be there in time even
for the roast beef, which came after the plum pudding, for Mrs. Poyser’s
supper would be punctual.

Great was the clatter of knives and pewter plates and tin cans when Adam
entered the house, but there was no hum of voices to this accompaniment:
the eating of excellent roast beef, provided free of expense, was too
serious a business to those good farm-labourers to be performed with
a divided attention, even if they had had anything to say to each
other--which they had not. And Mr. Poyser, at the head of the table, was
too busy with his carving to listen to Bartle Massey’s or Mr. Craig’s
ready talk.

“Here, Adam,” said Mrs. Poyser, who was standing and looking on to see
that Molly and Nancy did their duty as waiters, “here’s a place kept for
you between Mr. Massey and the boys. It’s a poor tale you couldn’t come
to see the pudding when it was whole.”

Adam looked anxiously round for a fourth woman’s figure, but Dinah
was not there. He was almost afraid of asking about her; besides, his
attention was claimed by greetings, and there remained the hope that
Dinah was in the house, though perhaps disinclined to festivities on the
eve of her departure.

It was a goodly sight--that table, with Martin Poyser’s round
good-humoured face and large person at the head of it helping his
servants to the fragrant roast beef and pleased when the empty plates
came again. Martin, though usually blest with a good appetite, really
forgot to finish his own beef to-night--it was so pleasant to him to
look on in the intervals of carving and see how the others enjoyed their
supper; for were they not men who, on all the days of the year except
Christmas Day and Sundays, ate their cold dinner, in a makeshift manner,
under the hedgerows, and drank their beer out of wooden bottles--with
relish certainly, but with their mouths towards the zenith, after a
fashion more endurable to ducks than to human bipeds. Martin Poyser had
some faint conception of the flavour such men must find in hot roast
beef and fresh-drawn ale. He held his head on one side and screwed
up his mouth, as he nudged Bartle Massey, and watched half-witted Tom
Tholer, otherwise known as “Tom Saft,” receiving his second plateful of
beef. A grin of delight broke over Tom’s face as the plate was set down
before him, between his knife and fork, which he held erect, as if
they had been sacred tapers. But the delight was too strong to continue
smouldering in a grin--it burst out the next instant in a long-drawn
“haw, haw!” followed by a sudden collapse into utter gravity, as the
knife and fork darted down on the prey. Martin Poyser’s large person
shook with his silent unctuous laugh. He turned towards Mrs. Poyser to
see if she too had been observant of Tom, and the eyes of husband and
wife met in a glance of good-natured amusement.

“Tom Saft” was a great favourite on the farm, where he played the part
of the old jester, and made up for his practical deficiencies by his
success in repartee. His hits, I imagine, were those of the flail, which
falls quite at random, but nevertheless smashes an insect now and then.
They were much quoted at sheep-shearing and haymaking times, but I
refrain from recording them here, lest Tom’s wit should prove to be
like that of many other bygone jesters eminent in their day--rather of a
temporary nature, not dealing with the deeper and more lasting relations
of things.

Tom excepted, Martin Poyser had some pride in his servants and
labourers, thinking with satisfaction that they were the best worth
their pay of any set on the estate. There was Kester Bale, for example
(Beale, probably, if the truth were known, but he was called Bale, and
was not conscious of any claim to a fifth letter), the old man with the
close leather cap and the network of wrinkles on his sun-browned face.
Was there any man in Loamshire who knew better the “natur” of all
farming work? He was one of those invaluable labourers who can not only
turn their hand to everything, but excel in everything they turn their
hand to. It is true Kester’s knees were much bent outward by this time,
and he walked with a perpetual curtsy, as if he were among the most
reverent of men. And so he was; but I am obliged to admit that the
object of his reverence was his own skill, towards which he performed
some rather affecting acts of worship. He always thatched the ricks--for
if anything were his forte more than another, it was thatching--and when
the last touch had been put to the last beehive rick, Kester, whose home
lay at some distance from the farm, would take a walk to the rick-yard
in his best clothes on a Sunday morning and stand in the lane, at a due
distance, to contemplate his own thatching, walking about to get each
rick from the proper point of view. As he curtsied along, with his eyes
upturned to the straw knobs imitative of golden globes at the summits
of the beehive ricks, which indeed were gold of the best sort, you might
have imagined him to be engaged in some pagan act of adoration.
Kester was an old bachelor and reputed to have stockings full of coin,
concerning which his master cracked a joke with him every pay-night:
not a new unseasoned joke, but a good old one, that had been tried
many times before and had worn well. “Th’ young measter’s a merry mon,”
 Kester frequently remarked; for having begun his career by frightening
away the crows under the last Martin Poyser but one, he could never
cease to account the reigning Martin a young master. I am not ashamed
of commemorating old Kester. You and I are indebted to the hard hands of
such men--hands that have long ago mingled with the soil they tilled so
faithfully, thriftily making the best they could of the earth’s fruits,
and receiving the smallest share as their own wages.

Then, at the end of the table, opposite his master, there was Alick, the
shepherd and head-man, with the ruddy face and broad shoulders, not on
the best terms with old Kester; indeed, their intercourse was confined
to an occasional snarl, for though they probably differed little
concerning hedging and ditching and the treatment of ewes, there was a
profound difference of opinion between them as to their own respective
merits. When Tityrus and Meliboeus happen to be on the same farm, they
are not sentimentally polite to each other. Alick, indeed, was not by
any means a honeyed man. His speech had usually something of a snarl
in it, and his broad-shouldered aspect something of the bull-dog
expression--“Don’t you meddle with me, and I won’t meddle with you.” But
he was honest even to the splitting of an oat-grain rather than he
would take beyond his acknowledged share, and as “close-fisted” with
his master’s property as if it had been his own--throwing very small
handfuls of damaged barley to the chickens, because a large handful
affected his imagination painfully with a sense of profusion.
Good-tempered Tim, the waggoner, who loved his horses, had his grudge
against Alick in the matter of corn. They rarely spoke to each other,
and never looked at each other, even over their dish of cold potatoes;
but then, as this was their usual mode of behaviour towards all mankind,
it would be an unsafe conclusion that they had more than transient fits
of unfriendliness. The bucolic character at Hayslope, you perceive,
was not of that entirely genial, merry, broad-grinning sort, apparently
observed in most districts visited by artists. The mild radiance of a
smile was a rare sight on a field-labourer’s face, and there was seldom
any gradation between bovine gravity and a laugh. Nor was every labourer
so honest as our friend Alick. At this very table, among Mr. Poyser’s
men, there is that big Ben Tholoway, a very powerful thresher, but
detected more than once in carrying away his master’s corn in his
pockets--an action which, as Ben was not a philosopher, could hardly be
ascribed to absence of mind. However, his master had forgiven him, and
continued to employ him, for the Tholoways had lived on the Common time
out of mind, and had always worked for the Poysers. And on the whole, I
daresay, society was not much the worse because Ben had not six months
of it at the treadmill, for his views of depredation were narrow, and
the House of Correction might have enlarged them. As it was, Ben ate his
roast beef to-night with a serene sense of having stolen nothing more
than a few peas and beans as seed for his garden since the last harvest
supper, and felt warranted in thinking that Alick’s suspicious eye, for
ever upon him, was an injury to his innocence.

But NOW the roast beef was finished and the cloth was drawn, leaving
a fair large deal table for the bright drinking-cans, and the foaming
brown jugs, and the bright brass candlesticks, pleasant to behold. NOW,
the great ceremony of the evening was to begin--the harvest-song,
in which every man must join. He might be in tune, if he liked to be
singular, but he must not sit with closed lips. The movement was obliged
to be in triple time; the rest was ad libitum.

As to the origin of this song--whether it came in its actual state from
the brain of a single rhapsodist, or was gradually perfected by a school
or succession of rhapsodists, I am ignorant. There is a stamp of
unity, of individual genius upon it, which inclines me to the former
hypothesis, though I am not blind to the consideration that this unity
may rather have arisen from that consensus of many minds which was a
condition of primitive thought, foreign to our modern consciousness.
Some will perhaps think that they detect in the first quatrain
an indication of a lost line, which later rhapsodists, failing in
imaginative vigour, have supplied by the feeble device of iteration.
Others, however, may rather maintain that this very iteration is an
original felicity, to which none but the most prosaic minds can be
insensible.

The ceremony connected with the song was a drinking ceremony. (That
is perhaps a painful fact, but then, you know, we cannot reform our
forefathers.) During the first and second quatrain, sung decidedly
forte, no can was filled.

     Here’s a health unto our master,
     The founder of the feast;
     Here’s a health unto our master
     And to our mistress!

     And may his doings prosper,
     Whate’er he takes in hand,
     For we are all his servants,
     And are at his command.

But now, immediately before the third quatrain or chorus, sung
fortissimo, with emphatic raps of the table, which gave the effect of
cymbals and drum together, Alick’s can was filled, and he was bound to
empty it before the chorus ceased.

     Then drink, boys, drink!
     And see ye do not spill,
     For if ye do, ye shall drink two,
     For ‘tis our master’s will.

When Alick had gone successfully through this test of steady-handed
manliness, it was the turn of old Kester, at his right hand--and so on,
till every man had drunk his initiatory pint under the stimulus of the
chorus. Tom Saft--the rogue--took care to spill a little by accident;
but Mrs. Poyser (too officiously, Tom thought) interfered to prevent the
exaction of the penalty.

To any listener outside the door it would have been the reverse of
obvious why the “Drink, boys, drink!” should have such an immediate and
often-repeated encore; but once entered, he would have seen that all
faces were at present sober, and most of them serious--it was the
regular and respectable thing for those excellent farm-labourers to do,
as much as for elegant ladies and gentlemen to smirk and bow over their
wine-glasses. Bartle Massey, whose ears were rather sensitive, had
gone out to see what sort of evening it was at an early stage in the
ceremony, and had not finished his contemplation until a silence of
five minutes declared that “Drink, boys, drink!” was not likely to
begin again for the next twelvemonth. Much to the regret of the boys
and Totty: on them the stillness fell rather flat, after that glorious
thumping of the table, towards which Totty, seated on her father’s knee,
contributed with her small might and small fist.

When Bartle re-entered, however, there appeared to be a general desire
for solo music after the choral. Nancy declared that Tim the waggoner
knew a song and was “allays singing like a lark i’ the stable,”
 whereupon Mr. Poyser said encouragingly, “Come, Tim, lad, let’s hear
it.” Tim looked sheepish, tucked down his head, and said he couldn’t
sing, but this encouraging invitation of the master’s was echoed all
round the table. It was a conversational opportunity: everybody could
say, “Come, Tim,” except Alick, who never relaxed into the frivolity of
unnecessary speech. At last, Tim’s next neighbour, Ben Tholoway, began
to give emphasis to his speech by nudges, at which Tim, growing rather
savage, said, “Let me alooan, will ye? Else I’ll ma’ ye sing a toon ye
wonna like.” A good-tempered waggoner’s patience has limits, and Tim was
not to be urged further.

“Well, then, David, ye’re the lad to sing,” said Ben, willing to show
that he was not discomfited by this check. “Sing ‘My loove’s a roos
wi’out a thorn.’”

The amatory David was a young man of an unconscious abstracted
expression, which was due probably to a squint of superior intensity
rather than to any mental characteristic; for he was not indifferent to
Ben’s invitation, but blushed and laughed and rubbed his sleeve over his
mouth in a way that was regarded as a symptom of yielding. And for some
time the company appeared to be much in earnest about the desire to hear
David’s song. But in vain. The lyricism of the evening was in the cellar
at present, and was not to be drawn from that retreat just yet.

Meanwhile the conversation at the head of the table had taken a
political turn. Mr. Craig was not above talking politics occasionally,
though he piqued himself rather on a wise insight than on specific
information. He saw so far beyond the mere facts of a case that really
it was superfluous to know them.

“I’m no reader o’ the paper myself,” he observed to-night, as he filled
his pipe, “though I might read it fast enough if I liked, for there’s
Miss Lyddy has ‘em and ‘s done with ‘em i’ no time. But there’s Mills,
now, sits i’ the chimney-corner and reads the paper pretty nigh
from morning to night, and when he’s got to th’ end on’t he’s more
addle-headed than he was at the beginning. He’s full o’ this peace now,
as they talk on; he’s been reading and reading, and thinks he’s got to
the bottom on’t. ‘Why, Lor’ bless you, Mills,’ says I, ‘you see no more
into this thing nor you can see into the middle of a potato. I’ll tell
you what it is: you think it’ll be a fine thing for the country. And I’m
not again’ it--mark my words--I’m not again’ it. But it’s my opinion as
there’s them at the head o’ this country as are worse enemies to us
nor Bony and all the mounseers he’s got at ‘s back; for as for the
mounseers, you may skewer half-a-dozen of ‘em at once as if they war
frogs.’”

“Aye, aye,” said Martin Poyser, listening with an air of much
intelligence and edification, “they ne’er ate a bit o’ beef i’ their
lives. Mostly sallet, I reckon.”

“And says I to Mills,” continued Mr. Craig, “‘Will you try to make me
believe as furriners like them can do us half th’ harm them ministers
do with their bad government? If King George ‘ud turn ‘em all away and
govern by himself, he’d see everything righted. He might take on Billy
Pitt again if he liked; but I don’t see myself what we want wi’ anybody
besides King and Parliament. It’s that nest o’ ministers does the
mischief, I tell you.’”

“Ah, it’s fine talking,” observed Mrs. Poyser, who was now seated near
her husband, with Totty on her lap--“it’s fine talking. It’s hard work
to tell which is Old Harry when everybody’s got boots on.”

“As for this peace,” said Mr. Poyser, turning his head on one side in
a dubitative manner and giving a precautionary puff to his pipe between
each sentence, “I don’t know. Th’ war’s a fine thing for the country,
an’ how’ll you keep up prices wi’out it? An’ them French are a wicked
sort o’ folks, by what I can make out. What can you do better nor fight
‘em?”

“Ye’re partly right there, Poyser,” said Mr. Craig, “but I’m not again’
the peace--to make a holiday for a bit. We can break it when we like,
an’ I’m in no fear o’ Bony, for all they talk so much o’ his cliverness.
That’s what I says to Mills this morning. Lor’ bless you, he sees no
more through Bony!...why, I put him up to more in three minutes than he
gets from’s paper all the year round. Says I, ‘Am I a gardener as knows
his business, or arn’t I, Mills? Answer me that.’ ‘To be sure y’ are,
Craig,’ says he--he’s not a bad fellow, Mills isn’t, for a butler, but
weak i’ the head. ‘Well,’ says I, ‘you talk o’ Bony’s cliverness; would
it be any use my being a first-rate gardener if I’d got nought but a
quagmire to work on?’ ‘No,’ says he. ‘Well,’ I says, ‘that’s just
what it is wi’ Bony. I’ll not deny but he may be a bit cliver--he’s
no Frenchman born, as I understand--but what’s he got at’s back but
mounseers?’”

Mr. Craig paused a moment with an emphatic stare after this triumphant
specimen of Socratic argument, and then added, thumping the table rather
fiercely, “Why, it’s a sure thing--and there’s them ‘ull bear witness
to’t--as i’ one regiment where there was one man a-missing, they put
the regimentals on a big monkey, and they fit him as the shell fits the
walnut, and you couldn’t tell the monkey from the mounseers!”

“Ah! Think o’ that, now!” said Mr. Poyser, impressed at once with the
political bearings of the fact and with its striking interest as an
anecdote in natural history.

“Come, Craig,” said Adam, “that’s a little too strong. You don’t believe
that. It’s all nonsense about the French being such poor sticks. Mr.
Irwine’s seen ‘em in their own country, and he says they’ve plenty o’
fine fellows among ‘em. And as for knowledge, and contrivances, and
manufactures, there’s a many things as we’re a fine sight behind ‘em in.
It’s poor foolishness to run down your enemies. Why, Nelson and the
rest of ‘em ‘ud have no merit i’ beating ‘em, if they were such offal as
folks pretend.”

Mr. Poyser looked doubtfully at Mr. Craig, puzzled by this opposition of
authorities. Mr. Irwine’s testimony was not to be disputed; but, on the
other hand, Craig was a knowing fellow, and his view was less startling.
Martin had never “heard tell” of the French being good for much. Mr.
Craig had found no answer but such as was implied in taking a long
draught of ale and then looking down fixedly at the proportions of his
own leg, which he turned a little outward for that purpose, when Bartle
Massey returned from the fireplace, where he had been smoking his
first pipe in quiet, and broke the silence by saying, as he thrust his
forefinger into the canister, “Why, Adam, how happened you not to be at
church on Sunday? Answer me that, you rascal. The anthem went limping
without you. Are you going to disgrace your schoolmaster in his old
age?”

“No, Mr. Massey,” said Adam. “Mr. and Mrs. Poyser can tell you where I
was. I was in no bad company.”

“She’s gone, Adam--gone to Snowfield,” said Mr. Poyser, reminded of
Dinah for the first time this evening. “I thought you’d ha’ persuaded
her better. Nought ‘ud hold her, but she must go yesterday forenoon. The
missis has hardly got over it. I thought she’d ha’ no sperrit for th’
harvest supper.”

Mrs. Poyser had thought of Dinah several times since Adam had come in,
but she had had “no heart” to mention the bad news.

“What!” said Bartle, with an air of disgust. “Was there a woman
concerned? Then I give you up, Adam.”

“But it’s a woman you’n spoke well on, Bartle,” said Mr. Poyser. “Come
now, you canna draw back; you said once as women wouldna ha’ been a bad
invention if they’d all been like Dinah.”

“I meant her voice, man--I meant her voice, that was all,” said Bartle.
“I can bear to hear her speak without wanting to put wool in my ears. As
for other things, I daresay she’s like the rest o’ the women--thinks
two and two ‘ll come to make five, if she cries and bothers enough about
it.”

“Aye, aye!” said Mrs. Poyser; “one ‘ud think, an’ hear some folks talk,
as the men war ‘cute enough to count the corns in a bag o’ wheat wi’
only smelling at it. They can see through a barn-door, they can. Perhaps
that’s the reason THEY can see so little o’ this side on’t.”

Martin Poyser shook with delighted laughter and winked at Adam, as much
as to say the schoolmaster was in for it now.

“Ah!” said Bartle sneeringly, “the women are quick enough--they’re quick
enough. They know the rights of a story before they hear it, and can
tell a man what his thoughts are before he knows ‘em himself.”

“Like enough,” said Mrs. Poyser, “for the men are mostly so slow, their
thoughts overrun ‘em, an’ they can only catch ‘em by the tail. I can
count a stocking-top while a man’s getting’s tongue ready an’ when he
outs wi’ his speech at last, there’s little broth to be made on’t. It’s
your dead chicks take the longest hatchin’. Howiver, I’m not denyin’ the
women are foolish: God Almighty made ‘em to match the men.”

“Match!” said Bartle. “Aye, as vinegar matches one’s teeth. If a man
says a word, his wife ‘ll match it with a contradiction; if he’s a
mind for hot meat, his wife ‘ll match it with cold bacon; if he laughs,
she’ll match him with whimpering. She’s such a match as the horse-fly
is to th’ horse: she’s got the right venom to sting him with--the right
venom to sting him with.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Poyser, “I know what the men like--a poor soft, as ‘ud
simper at ‘em like the picture o’ the sun, whether they did right or
wrong, an’ say thank you for a kick, an’ pretend she didna know which
end she stood uppermost, till her husband told her. That’s what a man
wants in a wife, mostly; he wants to make sure o’ one fool as ‘ull tell
him he’s wise. But there’s some men can do wi’out that--they think so
much o’ themselves a’ready. An’ that’s how it is there’s old bachelors.”

“Come, Craig,” said Mr. Poyser jocosely, “you mun get married pretty
quick, else you’ll be set down for an old bachelor; an’ you see what the
women ‘ull think on you.”

“Well,” said Mr. Craig, willing to conciliate Mrs. Poyser and setting a
high value on his own compliments, “I like a cleverish woman--a woman o’
sperrit--a managing woman.”

“You’re out there, Craig,” said Bartle, dryly; “you’re out there. You
judge o’ your garden-stuff on a better plan than that. You pick the
things for what they can excel in--for what they can excel in. You don’t
value your peas for their roots, or your carrots for their flowers. Now,
that’s the way you should choose women. Their cleverness ‘ll never come
to much--never come to much--but they make excellent simpletons, ripe
and strong-flavoured.”

“What dost say to that?” said Mr. Poyser, throwing himself back and
looking merrily at his wife.

“Say!” answered Mrs. Poyser, with dangerous fire kindling in her
eye. “Why, I say as some folks’ tongues are like the clocks as run
on strikin’, not to tell you the time o’ the day, but because there’s
summat wrong i’ their own inside...”

Mrs. Poyser would probably have brought her rejoinder to a further
climax, if every one’s attention had not at this moment been called to
the other end of the table, where the lyricism, which had at first only
manifested itself by David’s sotto voce performance of “My love’s a rose
without a thorn,” had gradually assumed a rather deafening and complex
character. Tim, thinking slightly of David’s vocalization, was impelled
to supersede that feeble buzz by a spirited commencement of “Three Merry
Mowers,” but David was not to be put down so easily, and showed himself
capable of a copious crescendo, which was rendering it doubtful whether
the rose would not predominate over the mowers, when old Kester, with
an entirely unmoved and immovable aspect, suddenly set up a quavering
treble--as if he had been an alarum, and the time was come for him to go
off.

The company at Alick’s end of the table took this form of vocal
entertainment very much as a matter of course, being free from musical
prejudices; but Bartle Massey laid down his pipe and put his fingers in
his ears; and Adam, who had been longing to go ever since he had heard
Dinah was not in the house, rose and said he must bid good-night.

“I’ll go with you, lad,” said Bartle; “I’ll go with you before my ears
are split.”

“I’ll go round by the Common and see you home, if you like, Mr. Massey,”
 said Adam.

“Aye, aye!” said Bartle; “then we can have a bit o’ talk together. I
never get hold of you now.”

“Eh! It’s a pity but you’d sit it out,” said Martin Poyser. “They’ll all
go soon, for th’ missis niver lets ‘em stay past ten.”

But Adam was resolute, so the good-nights were said, and the two friends
turned out on their starlight walk together.

“There’s that poor fool, Vixen, whimpering for me at home,” said Bartle.
“I can never bring her here with me for fear she should be struck with
Mrs. Poyser’s eye, and the poor bitch might go limping for ever after.”

“I’ve never any need to drive Gyp back,” said Adam, laughing. “He always
turns back of his own head when he finds out I’m coming here.”

“Aye, aye,” said Bartle. “A terrible woman!--made of needles, made of
needles. But I stick to Martin--I shall always stick to Martin. And
he likes the needles, God help him! He’s a cushion made on purpose for
‘em.”

“But she’s a downright good-natur’d woman, for all that,” said Adam,
“and as true as the daylight. She’s a bit cross wi’ the dogs when they
offer to come in th’ house, but if they depended on her, she’d take care
and have ‘em well fed. If her tongue’s keen, her heart’s tender: I’ve
seen that in times o’ trouble. She’s one o’ those women as are better
than their word.”

“Well, well,” said Bartle, “I don’t say th’ apple isn’t sound at the
core; but it sets my teeth on edge--it sets my teeth on edge.”



Chapter LIV

The Meeting on the Hill


ADAM understood Dinah’s haste to go away, and drew hope rather than
discouragement from it. She was fearful lest the strength of her feeling
towards him should hinder her from waiting and listening faithfully for
the ultimate guiding voice from within.

“I wish I’d asked her to write to me, though,” he thought. “And yet even
that might disturb her a bit, perhaps. She wants to be quite quiet
in her old way for a while. And I’ve no right to be impatient and
interrupting her with my wishes. She’s told me what her mind is,
and she’s not a woman to say one thing and mean another. I’ll wait
patiently.”

That was Adam’s wise resolution, and it throve excellently for the first
two or three weeks on the nourishment it got from the remembrance of
Dinah’s confession that Sunday afternoon. There is a wonderful amount
of sustenance in the first few words of love. But towards the middle
of October the resolution began to dwindle perceptibly, and showed
dangerous symptoms of exhaustion. The weeks were unusually long: Dinah
must surely have had more than enough time to make up her mind. Let a
woman say what she will after she has once told a man that she loves
him, he is a little too flushed and exalted with that first draught she
offers him to care much about the taste of the second. He treads the
earth with a very elastic step as he walks away from her, and makes
light of all difficulties. But that sort of glow dies out: memory gets
sadly diluted with time, and is not strong enough to revive us. Adam
was no longer so confident as he had been. He began to fear that perhaps
Dinah’s old life would have too strong a grasp upon her for any new
feeling to triumph. If she had not felt this, she would surely have
written to him to give him some comfort; but it appeared that she held
it right to discourage him. As Adam’s confidence waned, his patience
waned with it, and he thought he must write himself. He must ask Dinah
not to leave him in painful doubt longer than was needful. He sat up
late one night to write her a letter, but the next morning he burnt it,
afraid of its effect. It would be worse to have a discouraging answer
by letter than from her own lips, for her presence reconciled him to her
will.

You perceive how it was: Adam was hungering for the sight of Dinah, and
when that sort of hunger reaches a certain stage, a lover is likely to
still it though he may have to put his future in pawn.

But what harm could he do by going to Snowfield? Dinah could not be
displeased with him for it. She had not forbidden him to go. She must
surely expect that he would go before long. By the second Sunday in
October this view of the case had become so clear to Adam that he was
already on his way to Snowfield, on horseback this time, for his hours
were precious now, and he had borrowed Jonathan Burge’s good nag for the
journey.

What keen memories went along the road with him! He had often been to
Oakbourne and back since that first journey to Snowfield, but beyond
Oakbourne the greystone walls, the broken country, the meagre trees,
seemed to be telling him afresh the story of that painful past which he
knew so well by heart. But no story is the same to us after a lapse of
time--or rather, we who read it are no longer the same interpreters--and
Adam this morning brought with him new thoughts through that grey
country, thoughts which gave an altered significance to its story of the
past.

That is a base and selfish, even a blasphemous, spirit which rejoices
and is thankful over the past evil that has blighted or crushed another,
because it has been made a source of unforeseen good to ourselves. Adam
could never cease to mourn over that mystery of human sorrow which had
been brought so close to him; he could never thank God for another’s
misery. And if I were capable of that narrow-sighted joy in Adam’s
behalf, I should still know he was not the man to feel it for himself.
He would have shaken his head at such a sentiment and said, “Evil’s
evil, and sorrow’s sorrow, and you can’t alter it’s natur by wrapping
it up in other words. Other folks were not created for my sake, that I
should think all square when things turn out well for me.”

But it is not ignoble to feel that the fuller life which a sad
experience has brought us is worth our own personal share of pain.
Surely it is not possible to feel otherwise, any more than it would be
possible for a man with cataract to regret the painful process by which
his dim blurred sight of men as trees walking had been exchanged for
clear outline and effulgent day. The growth of higher feeling within
us is like the growth of faculty, bringing with it a sense of added
strength. We can no more wish to return to a narrower sympathy than
a painter or a musician can wish to return to his cruder manner, or a
philosopher to his less complete formula.

Something like this sense of enlarged being was in Adam’s mind this
Sunday morning, as he rode along in vivid recollection of the past. His
feeling towards Dinah, the hope of passing his life with her, had been
the distant unseen point towards which that hard journey from Snowfield
eighteen months ago had been leading him. Tender and deep as his love
for Hetty had been--so deep that the roots of it would never be torn
away--his love for Dinah was better and more precious to him, for it
was the outgrowth of that fuller life which had come to him from his
acquaintance with deep sorrow. “It’s like as if it was a new strength to
me,” he said to himself, “to love her and know as she loves me. I shall
look t’ her to help me to see things right. For she’s better than I
am--there’s less o’ self in her, and pride. And it’s a feeling as gives
you a sort o’ liberty, as if you could walk more fearless, when you’ve
more trust in another than y’ have in yourself. I’ve always been
thinking I knew better than them as belonged to me, and that’s a poor
sort o’ life, when you can’t look to them nearest to you t’ help you
with a bit better thought than what you’ve got inside you a’ready.”

It was more than two o’clock in the afternoon when Adam came in sight of
the grey town on the hill-side and looked searchingly towards the green
valley below, for the first glimpse of the old thatched roof near the
ugly red mill. The scene looked less harsh in the soft October sunshine
than it had in the eager time of early spring, and the one grand charm
it possessed in common with all wide-stretching woodless regions--that
it filled you with a new consciousness of the overarching sky--had a
milder, more soothing influence than usual, on this almost cloudless
day. Adam’s doubts and fears melted under this influence as the delicate
weblike clouds had gradually melted away into the clear blue above him.
He seemed to see Dinah’s gentle face assuring him, with its looks alone,
of all he longed to know.

He did not expect Dinah to be at home at this hour, but he got down from
his horse and tied it at the little gate, that he might ask where she
was gone to-day. He had set his mind on following her and bringing her
home. She was gone to Sloman’s End, a hamlet about three miles off, over
the hill, the old woman told him--had set off directly after morning
chapel, to preach in a cottage there, as her habit was. Anybody at the
town would tell him the way to Sloman’s End. So Adam got on his horse
again and rode to the town, putting up at the old inn and taking a
hasty dinner there in the company of the too chatty landlord, from whose
friendly questions and reminiscences he was glad to escape as soon as
possible and set out towards Sloman’s End. With all his haste it was
nearly four o’clock before he could set off, and he thought that as
Dinah had gone so early, she would perhaps already be near returning.
The little, grey, desolate-looking hamlet, unscreened by sheltering
trees, lay in sight long before he reached it, and as he came near he
could hear the sound of voices singing a hymn. “Perhaps that’s the last
hymn before they come away,” Adam thought. “I’ll walk back a bit and
turn again to meet her, farther off the village.” He walked back till he
got nearly to the top of the hill again, and seated himself on a loose
stone, against the low wall, to watch till he should see the little
black figure leaving the hamlet and winding up the hill. He chose
this spot, almost at the top of the hill, because it was away from all
eyes--no house, no cattle, not even a nibbling sheep near--no presence
but the still lights and shadows and the great embracing sky.

She was much longer coming than he expected. He waited an hour at
least watching for her and thinking of her, while the afternoon shadows
lengthened and the light grew softer. At last he saw the little black
figure coming from between the grey houses and gradually approaching the
foot of the hill. Slowly, Adam thought, but Dinah was really walking at
her usual pace, with a light quiet step. Now she was beginning to wind
along the path up the hill, but Adam would not move yet; he would not
meet her too soon; he had set his heart on meeting her in this assured
loneliness. And now he began to fear lest he should startle her too
much. “Yet,” he thought, “she’s not one to be overstartled; she’s always
so calm and quiet, as if she was prepared for anything.”

What was she thinking of as she wound up the hill? Perhaps she had found
complete repose without him, and had ceased to feel any need of his
love. On the verge of a decision we all tremble: hope pauses with
fluttering wings.

But now at last she was very near, and Adam rose from the stone wall.
It happened that just as he walked forward, Dinah had paused and turned
round to look back at the village--who does not pause and look back in
mounting a hill? Adam was glad, for, with the fine instinct of a lover,
he felt that it would be best for her to hear his voice before she
saw him. He came within three paces of her and then said, “Dinah!” She
started without looking round, as if she connected the sound with no
place. “Dinah!” Adam said again. He knew quite well what was in her
mind. She was so accustomed to think of impressions as purely spiritual
monitions that she looked for no material visible accompaniment of the
voice.

But this second time she looked round. What a look of yearning love it
was that the mild grey eyes turned on the strong dark-eyed man! She did
not start again at the sight of him; she said nothing, but moved towards
him so that his arm could clasp her round.

And they walked on so in silence, while the warm tears fell. Adam was
content, and said nothing. It was Dinah who spoke first.

“Adam,” she said, “it is the Divine Will. My soul is so knit to yours
that it is but a divided life I live without you. And this moment, now
you are with me, and I feel that our hearts are filled with the same
love. I have a fulness of strength to bear and do our heavenly Father’s
Will that I had lost before.”

Adam paused and looked into her sincere eyes.

“Then we’ll never part any more, Dinah, till death parts us.”

And they kissed each other with a deep joy.

What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they
are joined for life--to strengthen each other in all labour, to rest on
each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all pain, to be
one with each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of the
last parting?



Chapter LV

Marriage Bells


IN little more than a month after that meeting on the hill--on a rimy
morning in departing November--Adam and Dinah were married.

It was an event much thought of in the village. All Mr. Burge’s men had
a holiday, and all Mr. Poyser’s, and most of those who had a holiday
appeared in their best clothes at the wedding. I think there was hardly
an inhabitant of Hayslope specially mentioned in this history and still
resident in the parish on this November morning who was not either in
church to see Adam and Dinah married, or near the church door to greet
them as they came forth. Mrs. Irwine and her daughters were waiting at
the churchyard gates in their carriage (for they had a carriage now) to
shake hands with the bride and bridegroom and wish them well; and in the
absence of Miss Lydia Donnithorne at Bath, Mrs. Best, Mr. Mills, and
Mr. Craig had felt it incumbent on them to represent “the family” at the
Chase on the occasion. The churchyard walk was quite lined with familiar
faces, many of them faces that had first looked at Dinah when she
preached on the Green. And no wonder they showed this eager interest on
her marriage morning, for nothing like Dinah and the history which had
brought her and Adam Bede together had been known at Hayslope within the
memory of man.

Bessy Cranage, in her neatest cap and frock, was crying, though she did
not exactly know why; for, as her cousin Wiry Ben, who stood near her,
judiciously suggested, Dinah was not going away, and if Bessy was in low
spirits, the best thing for her to do was to follow Dinah’s example and
marry an honest fellow who was ready to have her. Next to Bessy, just
within the church door, there were the Poyser children, peeping round
the corner of the pews to get a sight of the mysterious ceremony;
Totty’s face wearing an unusual air of anxiety at the idea of seeing
cousin Dinah come back looking rather old, for in Totty’s experience no
married people were young.

I envy them all the sight they had when the marriage was fairly ended
and Adam led Dinah out of church. She was not in black this morning,
for her Aunt Poyser would by no means allow such a risk of incurring bad
luck, and had herself made a present of the wedding dress, made all of
grey, though in the usual Quaker form, for on this point Dinah could not
give way. So the lily face looked out with sweet gravity from under
a grey Quaker bonnet, neither smiling nor blushing, but with lips
trembling a little under the weight of solemn feelings. Adam, as he
pressed her arm to his side, walked with his old erectness and his head
thrown rather backward as if to face all the world better. But it was
not because he was particularly proud this morning, as is the wont of
bridegrooms, for his happiness was of a kind that had little reference
to men’s opinion of it. There was a tinge of sadness in his deep joy;
Dinah knew it, and did not feel aggrieved.

There were three other couples, following the bride and bridegroom:
first, Martin Poyser, looking as cheery as a bright fire on this rimy
morning, led quiet Mary Burge, the bridesmaid; then came Seth serenely
happy, with Mrs. Poyser on his arm; and last of all Bartle Massey, with
Lisbeth--Lisbeth in a new gown and bonnet, too busy with her pride in
her son and her delight in possessing the one daughter she had desired
to devise a single pretext for complaint.

Bartle Massey had consented to attend the wedding at Adam’s earnest
request, under protest against marriage in general and the marriage of a
sensible man in particular. Nevertheless, Mr. Poyser had a joke against
him after the wedding dinner, to the effect that in the vestry he had
given the bride one more kiss than was necessary.

Behind this last couple came Mr. Irwine, glad at heart over this good
morning’s work of joining Adam and Dinah. For he had seen Adam in the
worst moments of his sorrow; and what better harvest from that painful
seed-time could there be than this? The love that had brought hope and
comfort in the hour of despair, the love that had found its way to the
dark prison cell and to poor Hetty’s darker soul--this strong gentle
love was to be Adam’s companion and helper till death.

There was much shaking of hands mingled with “God bless you’s” and other
good wishes to the four couples, at the churchyard gate, Mr. Poyser
answering for the rest with unwonted vivacity of tongue, for he had
all the appropriate wedding-day jokes at his command. And the women, he
observed, could never do anything but put finger in eye at a wedding.
Even Mrs. Poyser could not trust herself to speak as the neighbours
shook hands with her, and Lisbeth began to cry in the face of the very
first person who told her she was getting young again.

Mr. Joshua Rann, having a slight touch of rheumatism, did not join
in the ringing of the bells this morning, and, looking on with some
contempt at these informal greetings which required no official
co-operation from the clerk, began to hum in his musical bass, “Oh what
a joyful thing it is,” by way of preluding a little to the effect he
intended to produce in the wedding psalm next Sunday.

“That’s a bit of good news to cheer Arthur,” said Mr. Irwine to his
mother, as they drove off. “I shall write to him the first thing when we
get home.”




Epilogue


IT is near the end of June, in 1807. The workshops have been shut
up half an hour or more in Adam Bede’s timber-yard, which used to
be Jonathan Burge’s, and the mellow evening light is falling on the
pleasant house with the buff walls and the soft grey thatch, very much
as it did when we saw Adam bringing in the keys on that June evening
nine years ago.

There is a figure we know well, just come out of the house, and shading
her eyes with her hands as she looks for something in the distance, for
the rays that fall on her white borderless cap and her pale auburn hair
are very dazzling. But now she turns away from the sunlight and looks
towards the door.

We can see the sweet pale face quite well now: it is scarcely at all
altered--only a little fuller, to correspond to her more matronly
figure, which still seems light and active enough in the plain black
dress.

“I see him, Seth,” Dinah said, as she looked into the house. “Let us go
and meet him. Come, Lisbeth, come with Mother.”

The last call was answered immediately by a small fair creature with
pale auburn hair and grey eyes, little more than four years old, who ran
out silently and put her hand into her mother’s.

“Come, Uncle Seth,” said Dinah.

“Aye, aye, we’re coming,” Seth answered from within, and presently
appeared stooping under the doorway, being taller than usual by the
black head of a sturdy two-year-old nephew, who had caused some delay by
demanding to be carried on uncle’s shoulder.

“Better take him on thy arm, Seth,” said Dinah, looking fondly at the
stout black-eyed fellow. “He’s troublesome to thee so.”

“Nay, nay: Addy likes a ride on my shoulder. I can carry him so for a
bit.” A kindness which young Addy acknowledged by drumming his heels
with promising force against Uncle Seth’s chest. But to walk by Dinah’s
side, and be tyrannized over by Dinah’s and Adam’s children, was Uncle
Seth’s earthly happiness.

“Where didst see him?” asked Seth, as they walked on into the adjoining
field. “I can’t catch sight of him anywhere.”

“Between the hedges by the roadside,” said Dinah. “I saw his hat and his
shoulder. There he is again.”

“Trust thee for catching sight of him if he’s anywhere to be seen,” said
Seth, smiling. “Thee’t like poor mother used to be. She was always on
the look out for Adam, and could see him sooner than other folks, for
all her eyes got dim.”

“He’s been longer than he expected,” said Dinah, taking Arthur’s watch
from a small side pocket and looking at it; “it’s nigh upon seven now.”

“Aye, they’d have a deal to say to one another,” said Seth, “and the
meeting ‘ud touch ‘em both pretty closish. Why, it’s getting on towards
eight years since they parted.”

“Yes,” said Dinah, “Adam was greatly moved this morning at the thought
of the change he should see in the poor young man, from the sickness he
has undergone, as well as the years which have changed us all. And the
death of the poor wanderer, when she was coming back to us, has been
sorrow upon sorrow.”

“See, Addy,” said Seth, lowering the young one to his arm now and
pointing, “there’s Father coming--at the far stile.”

Dinah hastened her steps, and little Lisbeth ran on at her utmost speed
till she clasped her father’s leg. Adam patted her head and lifted her
up to kiss her, but Dinah could see the marks of agitation on his face
as she approached him, and he put her arm within his in silence.

“Well, youngster, must I take you?” he said, trying to smile, when Addy
stretched out his arms--ready, with the usual baseness of infancy, to
give up his Uncle Seth at once, now there was some rarer patronage at
hand.

“It’s cut me a good deal, Dinah,” Adam said at last, when they were
walking on.

“Didst find him greatly altered?” said Dinah.

“Why, he’s altered and yet not altered. I should ha’ known him anywhere.
But his colour’s changed, and he looks sadly. However, the doctors say
he’ll soon be set right in his own country air. He’s all sound in th’
inside; it’s only the fever shattered him so. But he speaks just the
same, and smiles at me just as he did when he was a lad. It’s wonderful
how he’s always had just the same sort o’ look when he smiles.”

“I’ve never seen him smile, poor young man,” said Dinah.

“But thee wilt see him smile, to-morrow,” said Adam. “He asked after
thee the first thing when he began to come round, and we could talk to
one another. ‘I hope she isn’t altered,’ he said, ‘I remember her face
so well.’ I told him ‘no,’” Adam continued, looking fondly at the eyes
that were turned towards his, “only a bit plumper, as thee’dst a right
to be after seven year. ‘I may come and see her to-morrow, mayn’t I?’ he
said; ‘I long to tell her how I’ve thought of her all these years.’”

“Didst tell him I’d always used the watch?” said Dinah.

“Aye; and we talked a deal about thee, for he says he never saw a woman
a bit like thee. ‘I shall turn Methodist some day,’ he said, ‘when she
preaches out of doors, and go to hear her.’ And I said, ‘Nay, sir, you
can’t do that, for Conference has forbid the women preaching, and she’s
given it up, all but talking to the people a bit in their houses.’”

“Ah,” said Seth, who could not repress a comment on this point, “and a
sore pity it was o’ Conference; and if Dinah had seen as I did, we’d ha’
left the Wesleyans and joined a body that ‘ud put no bonds on Christian
liberty.”

“Nay, lad, nay,” said Adam, “she was right and thee wast wrong. There’s
no rules so wise but what it’s a pity for somebody or other. Most o’
the women do more harm nor good with their preaching--they’ve not got
Dinah’s gift nor her sperrit--and she’s seen that, and she thought it
right to set th’ example o’ submitting, for she’s not held from other
sorts o’ teaching. And I agree with her, and approve o’ what she did.”

Seth was silent. This was a standing subject of difference rarely
alluded to, and Dinah, wishing to quit it at once, said, “Didst
remember, Adam, to speak to Colonel Donnithorne the words my uncle and
aunt entrusted to thee?”

“Yes, and he’s going to the Hall Farm with Mr. Irwine the day after
to-morrow. Mr. Irwine came in while we were talking about it, and he
would have it as the Colonel must see nobody but thee to-morrow. He
said--and he’s in the right of it--as it’ll be bad for him t’ have his
feelings stirred with seeing many people one after another. ‘We must
get you strong and hearty,’ he said, ‘that’s the first thing to be done
Arthur, and then you shall have your own way. But I shall keep you
under your old tutor’s thumb till then.’ Mr. Irwine’s fine and joyful at
having him home again.”

Adam was silent a little while, and then said, “It was very cutting when
we first saw one another. He’d never heard about poor Hetty till Mr.
Irwine met him in London, for the letters missed him on his journey.
The first thing he said to me, when we’d got hold o’ one another’s hands
was, ‘I could never do anything for her, Adam--she lived long enough
for all the suffering--and I’d thought so of the time when I might do
something for her. But you told me the truth when you said to me once,
“There’s a sort of wrong that can never be made up for.”’”

“Why, there’s Mr. and Mrs. Poyser coming in at the yard gate,” said
Seth.

“So there is,” said Dinah. “Run, Lisbeth, run to meet Aunt Poyser. Come
in, Adam, and rest; it has been a hard day for thee.”





SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Other Works by George Eliot


Scenes of Clerical Life            1857   Stories
Adam Bede                          1859   Novel
The Mill on the Floss              1860   Novel
Silas Marner                       1861   Novel
Romola                             1863   Novel
Felix Holt the Radical             1866   Novel
How Lisa Loved the King            1867   Poems
The Spanish Gypsy                  1868   Poem
Middlemarch                        1872   Novel
The Legend of Jubal                1874   Poem
Daniel Deronda                     1876   Novel
Impressions of Theophrastus Such   1879   Essays
Adam Bede - Part 2
