The Woodlanders

by Thomas Hardy

  CHAPTER V.

  Winterborne sped on his way to Sherton Abbas without elation andwithout discomposure. Had he regarded his inner self spectacularly, aslovers are now daily more wont to do, he might have felt pride in thediscernment of a somewhat rare power in him--that of keeping not onlyjudgment but emotion suspended in difficult cases. But he noted itnot. Neither did he observe what was also the fact, that though hecherished a true and warm feeling towards Grace Melbury, he was notaltogether her fool just now. It must be remembered that he had notseen her for a year.

  Arrived at the entrance to a long flat lane, which had taken the spiritout of many a pedestrian in times when, with the majority, to travelmeant to walk, he saw before him the trim figure of a young woman inpattens, journeying with that steadfast concentration which meanspurpose and not pleasure. He was soon near enough to see that she wasMarty South. Click, click, click went the pattens; and she did notturn her head.

  She had, however, become aware before this that the driver of theapproaching gig was Giles. She had shrunk from being overtaken by himthus; but as it was inevitable, she had braced herself up for hisinspection by closing her lips so as to make her mouth quiteunemotional, and by throwing an additional firmness into her tread.

  "Why do you wear pattens, Marty? The turnpike is clean enough, althoughthe lanes are muddy."

  "They save my boots."

  "But twelve miles in pattens--'twill twist your feet off. Come, get upand ride with me."

  She hesitated, removed her pattens, knocked the gravel out of themagainst the wheel, and mounted in front of the nodding specimenapple-tree. She had so arranged her bonnet with a full border andtrimmings that her lack of long hair did not much injure herappearance; though Giles, of course, saw that it was gone, and may haveguessed her motive in parting with it, such sales, though infrequent,being not unheard of in that locality.

  But nature's adornment was still hard by--in fact, within two feet ofhim, though he did not know it. In Marty's basket was a brown paperpacket, and in the packet the chestnut locks, which, by reason of thebarber's request for secrecy, she had not ventured to intrust to otherhands.

  Giles asked, with some hesitation, how her father was getting on.

  He was better, she said; he would be able to work in a day or two; hewould be quite well but for his craze about the tree falling on him.

  "You know why I don't ask for him so often as I might, I suppose?" saidWinterborne. "Or don't you know?"

  "I think I do."

  "Because of the houses?"

  She nodded.

  "Yes. I am afraid it may seem that my anxiety is about those houses,which I should lose by his death, more than about him. Marty, I do feelanxious about the houses, since half my income depends upon them; but Ido likewise care for him; and it almost seems wrong that houses shouldbe leased for lives, so as to lead to such mixed feelings."

  "After father's death they will be Mrs. Charmond's?"

  "They'll be hers."

  "They are going to keep company with my hair," she thought.

  Thus talking, they reached the town. By no pressure would she ride upthe street with him. "That's the right of another woman," she said,with playful malice, as she put on her pattens. "I wonder what you arethinking of! Thank you for the lift in that handsome gig. Good-by."

  He blushed a little, shook his head at her, and drove on ahead into thestreets--the churches, the abbey, and other buildings on this clearbright morning having the liny distinctness of architectural drawings,as if the original dream and vision of the conceiving master-mason,some mediaeval Vilars or other unknown to fame, were for a few minutesflashed down through the centuries to an unappreciative age. Giles sawtheir eloquent look on this day of transparency, but could not construeit. He turned into the inn-yard.

  Marty, following the same track, marched promptly to thehair-dresser's, Mr. Percombe's. Percombe was the chief of his trade inSherton Abbas. He had the patronage of such county offshoots as hadbeen obliged to seek the shelter of small houses in that ancient town,of the local clergy, and so on, for some of whom he had made wigs,while others among them had compensated for neglecting him in theirlifetime by patronizing him when they were dead, and letting him shavetheir corpses. On the strength of all this he had taken down his pole,and called himself "Perruquier to the aristocracy."

  Nevertheless, this sort of support did not quite fill his children'smouths, and they had to be filled. So, behind his house there was alittle yard, reached by a passage from the back street, and in thatyard was a pole, and under the pole a shop of quite another descriptionthan the ornamental one in the front street. Here on Saturday nightsfrom seven till ten he took an almost innumerable succession oftwopences from the farm laborers who flocked thither in crowds from thecountry. And thus he lived.

  Marty, of course, went to the front shop, and handed her packet to himsilently. "Thank you," said the barber, quite joyfully. "I hardlyexpected it after what you said last night."

  She turned aside, while a tear welled up and stood in each eye at thisreminder.

  "Nothing of what I told you," he whispered, there being others in theshop. "But I can trust you, I see."

  She had now reached the end of this distressing business, and wentlistlessly along the street to attend to other errands. These occupiedher till four o'clock, at which time she recrossed the market-place.It was impossible to avoid rediscovering Winterborne every time shepassed that way, for standing, as he always did at this season of theyear, with his specimen apple-tree in the midst, the boughs rose abovethe heads of the crowd, and brought a delightful suggestion of orchardsamong the crowded buildings there. When her eye fell upon him for thelast time he was standing somewhat apart, holding the tree like anensign, and looking on the ground instead of pushing his produce as heought to have been doing. He was, in fact, not a very successfulseller either of his trees or of his cider, his habit of speaking hismind, when he spoke at all, militating against this branch of hisbusiness.

  While she regarded him he suddenly lifted his eyes in a direction awayfrom Marty, his face simultaneously kindling with recognition andsurprise. She followed his gaze, and saw walking across to him aflexible young creature in whom she perceived the features of her shehad known as Miss Grace Melbury, but now looking glorified and refinedabove her former level. Winterborne, being fixed to the spot by hisapple-tree, could not advance to meet her; he held out his spare handwith his hat in it, and with some embarrassment beheld her coming ontiptoe through the mud to the middle of the square where he stood.

  Miss Melbury's arrival so early was, as Marty could see, unexpected byGiles, which accounted for his not being ready to receive her. Indeed,her father had named five o'clock as her probable time, for whichreason that hour had been looming out all the day in his forwardperspective, like an important edifice on a plain. Now here she wascome, he knew not how, and his arranged welcome stultified.

  His face became gloomy at her necessity for stepping into the road, andmore still at the little look of embarrassment which appeared on hersat having to perform the meeting with him under an apple-tree ten feethigh in the middle of the market-place. Having had occasion to take offthe new gloves she had bought to come home in, she held out to him ahand graduating from pink at the tips of the fingers to white at thepalm; and the reception formed a scene, with the tree over their heads,which was not by any means an ordinary one in Sherton Abbas streets.

  Nevertheless, the greeting on her looks and lips was of a restrainedtype, which perhaps was not unnatural. For true it was that GilesWinterborne, well-attired and well-mannered as he was for a yeoman,looked rough beside her. It had sometimes dimly occurred to him, inhis ruminating silence at Little Hintock, that external phenomena--suchas the lowness or height or color of a hat, the fold of a coat, themake of a boot, or the chance attitude or occupation of a limb at theinstant of view--may have a great influence upon feminine opinion of aman's worth--so frequently founded on non-essentials;
but a certaincausticity of mental tone towards himself and the world in general hadprevented to-day, as always, any enthusiastic action on the strength ofthat reflection and her momentary instinct of reserve at first sightof him was the penalty he paid for his laxness.

  He gave away the tree to a by-stander, as soon as he could find one whowould accept the cumbersome gift, and the twain moved on towards theinn at which he had put up. Marty made as if to step forward for thepleasure of being recognized by Miss Melbury; but abruptly checkingherself, she glided behind a carrier's van, saying, dryly, "No; I baintwanted there," and critically regarded Winterborne's companion.

  It would have been very difficult to describe Grace Melbury withprecision, either now or at any time. Nay, from the highest point ofview, to precisely describe a human being, the focus of a universe--howimpossible! But, apart from transcendentalism, there never probablylived a person who was in herself more completely a reductio adabsurdum of attempts to appraise a woman, even externally, by items offace and figure. Speaking generally, it may be said that she wassometimes beautiful, at other times not beautiful, according to thestate of her health and spirits.

  In simple corporeal presentment she was of a fair and clear complexion,rather pale than pink, slim in build and elastic in movement. Her lookexpressed a tendency to wait for others' thoughts before uttering herown; possibly also to wait for others' deeds before her own doing. Inher small, delicate mouth, which had perhaps hardly settled down to itsmatured curves, there was a gentleness that might hinder sufficientself-assertion for her own good. She had well-formed eyebrows which,had her portrait been painted, would probably have been done in Prout'sor Vandyke brown.

  There was nothing remarkable in her dress just now, beyond a naturalfitness and a style that was recent for the streets of Sherton. But,indeed, had it been the reverse, and quite striking, it would havemeant just as little. For there can be hardly anything less connectedwith a woman's personality than drapery which she has neither designed,manufactured, cut, sewed, or even seen, except by a glance of approvalwhen told that such and such a shape and color must be had because ithas been decided by others as imperative at that particular time.

  What people, therefore, saw of her in a cursory view was very little;in truth, mainly something that was not she. The woman herself was ashadowy, conjectural creature who had little to do with the outlinespresented to Sherton eyes; a shape in the gloom, whose true descriptioncould only be approximated by putting together a movement now and aglance then, in that patient and long-continued attentiveness whichnothing but watchful loving-kindness ever troubles to give.

  There was a little delay in their setting out from the town, and MartySouth took advantage of it to hasten forward, with the view of escapingthem on the way, lest they should feel compelled to spoil theirtete-a-tete by asking her to ride. She walked fast, and one-third ofthe journey was done, and the evening rapidly darkening, before sheperceived any sign of them behind her. Then, while ascending a hill,she dimly saw their vehicle drawing near the lowest part of theincline, their heads slightly bent towards each other; drawn together,no doubt, by their souls, as the heads of a pair of horses well in handare drawn in by the rein. She walked still faster.

  But between these and herself there was a carriage, apparently abrougham, coming in the same direction, with lighted lamps. When itovertook her--which was not soon, on account of her pace--the scene wasmuch darker, and the lights glared in her eyes sufficiently to hide thedetails of the equipage.

  It occurred to Marty that she might take hold behind this carriage andso keep along with it, to save herself the mortification of beingovertaken and picked up for pity's sake by the coming pair.Accordingly, as the carriage drew abreast of her in climbing the longascent, she walked close to the wheels, the rays of the nearest lamppenetrating her very pores. She had only just dropped behind when thecarriage stopped, and to her surprise the coachman asked her, over hisshoulder, if she would ride. What made the question more surprisingwas that it came in obedience to an order from the interior of thevehicle.

  Marty gladly assented, for she was weary, very weary, after working allnight and keeping afoot all day. She mounted beside the coachman,wondering why this good-fortune had happened to her. He was rather agreat man in aspect, and she did not like to inquire of him for sometime.

  At last she said, "Who has been so kind as to ask me to ride?"

  "Mrs. Charmond," replied her statuesque companion.

  Marty was stirred at the name, so closely connected with her lastnight's experiences. "Is this her carriage?" she whispered.

  "Yes; she's inside."

  Marty reflected, and perceived that Mrs. Charmond must have recognizedher plodding up the hill under the blaze of the lamp; recognized,probably, her stubbly poll (since she had kept away her face), andthought that those stubbles were the result of her own desire.

  Marty South was not so very far wrong. Inside the carriage a pair ofbright eyes looked from a ripely handsome face, and though behind thosebright eyes was a mind of unfathomed mysteries, beneath them there beata heart capable of quick extempore warmth--a heart which could, indeed,be passionately and imprudently warm on certain occasions. At present,after recognizing the girl, she had acted on a mere impulse, possiblyfeeling gratified at the denuded appearance which signified the successof her agent in obtaining what she had required.

  "'Tis wonderful that she should ask ye," observed the magisterialcoachman, presently. "I have never known her do it before, for as arule she takes no interest in the village folk at all."

  Marty said no more, but occasionally turned her head to see if shecould get a glimpse of the Olympian creature who as the coachman hadtruly observed, hardly ever descended from her clouds into the Tempe ofthe parishioners. But she could discern nothing of the lady. She alsolooked for Miss Melbury and Winterborne. The nose of their horsesometimes came quite near the back of Mrs. Charmond's carriage. Butthey never attempted to pass it till the latter conveyance turnedtowards the park gate, when they sped by. Here the carriage drew upthat the gate might be opened, and in the momentary silence Marty hearda gentle oral sound, soft as a breeze.

  "What's that?" she whispered.

  "Mis'ess yawning."

  "Why should she yawn?"

  "Oh, because she's been used to such wonderfully good life, and findsit dull here. She'll soon be off again on account of it."

  "So rich and so powerful, and yet to yawn!" the girl murmured. "Thenthings don't fay with she any more than with we!"

  Marty now alighted; the lamp again shone upon her, and as the carriagerolled on, a soft voice said to her from the interior, "Good-night."

  "Good-night, ma'am," said Marty. But she had not been able to see thewoman who began so greatly to interest her--the second person of herown sex who had operated strongly on her mind that day.