 CHAPTER 46 THE GURG-OIL AND IT'S DOINGS The Tower of Weatherbury Church was a square erection of fourteenth-century date, having two stone gurgoyles on each of the four faces of its parapet. Of these eight carved protuberances only two at this time continued to serve the purpose of their erection, that of spouting the water from the lead-roof within. One mouth in each front had been closed by bygone churchwardens as superfluous, and two others were broken away and choked, a matter not of much consequence to the well-being of the Tower, for the two mouths which still remained open and active were gaping enough to do all the work. It has been sometimes argued that there is no truer criterion of the vitality of any given art period than the power of the master spirits of that time in grotesque, and certainly in the instance of Gothic art there is no disputing the proposition. Weatherbury Tower was a somewhat early instance of the use of an ornamental parapet in parish as distinct from cathedral churches, and the gurgoyles which are the necessary correlatives of a parapet were exceptionally prominent of the boldest cut that the hand could shape and of the most original design that a human brain could conceive. There was, so to speak, that symmetry in their distortion which is less the characteristic of British than of continental grotesques of the period. All the eight were different from each other, a beholder was convinced that nothing on earth could be more hideous than those he saw on the north side until he went round to the south. Of the two on this latter face only that at the southeastern corner concerns the story. It was too human to be called like a dragon, too impish to be like a man, too animal to be like a fiend, and not enough like a bird to be called a griffin. This horrible stone entity was fashioned as if covered with a wrinkled hide. It had short erect ears, eyes starting from their sockets, and its fingers and hands were seizing the corners of its mouth, which they thus seemed to pull open to give free passage to the water it vomited. The lower row of teeth was quite washed away, though the upper still remained. Here and thus jutting a couple feet from the wall against which its feet rested as a support, the creature had for four hundred years laughed at the surrounding landscape, voicelessly in dry weather, and in wet with a gurgling and snorting sound. Troy slept on in the porch, and the rain increased outside. Presently the gurgle spat. In due time a small stream began to trickle through the seventy feet of aerial space between its mouth and the ground, which the water drops smote like duck shot in their accelerated velocity. The stream thickened in substance and increased in power, gradually spouting further and yet further from the side of the tower. When the rain fell in a steady and ceaseless torrent, the stream dashed down in volumes. We follow its course to the ground at this point of time. The end of the liquid parabola has come forward from the wall, has advanced over the plinth moldings, over a heap of stones, over the marble border, and into the midst of Fanny Robin's grave. The force of the stream had, until very lately, been received upon some loose stones spread there about, which had acted as a shield to the soil under the onset. These during the summer had been cleared from the ground, and there was now nothing to resist the downfall but the bare earth. For several years the stream had not spouted so far from the tower as it was doing on this night, and such a contingency had been overlooked. Sometimes this obscure corner received no inhabitant for the space of two or three years, and then it was usually but a pauper, a poacher, or other sinner of undignified sins. The persistent torrent from the gurgoyles jaws directed all its vengeance into the grave. The rich tawny mound was stirred into motion and boiled like chocolate. The water accumulated and washed deeper down and the roar of the pool thus formed, spread into the night as the head and chief among other noises of the kind created by the deluging rain. The flowers so carefully planted by Fanny's repentant lover began to move and writhe in their bed. The winter violets turned slowly upside down and became a mere mat of mud. Soon the snow drop and other bulbs danced in the boiling mass like ingredients in a cauldron. Plants of the tufted species were loosened, rose to the surface and floated off. Troy did not awake from his comfortless sleep till it was broad day. Not having been in bed for two nights his shoulders felt stiff, his feet tender and his head heavy. He remembered his position, arose, shivered, took the spade, and again went out. The rain had quite ceased and the sun was shining through the green, brown, and yellow leaves, now sparkling and varnished by the raindrops to the brightness of similar effects in the landscapes of Roysdale and Habima, and full of all those infinite beauties that arise from the union of water and color with highlights. The air was rendered so transparent by the heavy full of rain that the autumn hues of the middle distance were as rich as those near at hand, and the remote fields intercepted by the angle of the tower appeared in the same plain as the tower itself. He entered the gravel path which would take him behind the tower. The path, instead of being stony as it had been the night before, was browned over with a thin coating of mud. At one place in the path he saw a tuft of stringy roots washed white and clean as a bundle of tendons. He picked it up. Surely it could not be one of the prim roses he had planted. He saw a bulb, another, and another as he advanced. Beyond doubt they were the crocuses. With the face of perplexed dismay Troy turned the corner, and then beheld the wreck the stream had made. The pool upon the grave had soaked away into the ground and in its place was a hollow. The disturbed earth was washed over the grass and pathway in the guise of the brown mud he had already seen, and it spotted the marble tombstone with the same stains. Nearly all the flowers were washed clean out of the ground and they lay roots upwards on the spots whether they had been splashed by the stream. Troy's brow became heavily contracted. He set his teeth closely and his compressed lips moved as those of one in great pain. This singular accident, by a strange confluence of emotions in him, was felt as the sharpest sting of all. Troy's face was very expressive, and any observer who had seen him now would hardly have believed him to be a man who had laughed and sung and poured love-trifles into a woman's ear. To curse his miserable lot was at first his impulse, but even that lowest stage of rebellion needed an activity whose absence was necessarily antecedent to the existence of the morbid misery which wrung him. The sight, coming as it did, superimposed upon the other dark scenery of the previous days, formed a sort of climax to the whole panorama, and it was more than he could endure. Sanguine by nature, Troy had a power of alluding grief by simply adjourning it. He could put off the consideration of any particular specter till the matter had become old and softened by time. The planting of flowers on Fanny's grave had been perhaps but a species of illusion from the primary grief, and now it was as if his intention had been known and circumvented. Almost for the first time in his life, Troy, as he stood by this dismantled grave, wished himself another man. It is seldom that a person with much animal spirit does not feel that the fact of his life being his own is the one qualification which singles it out as a more hopeful life than that of others who may actually resemble him in every particular. Troy had felt in his transient way hundreds of times that he could not envy other people their condition because the possession of that condition would have necessitated a different personality when he desired no other than his own. He had not minded the peculiarities of his birth, the vicissitudes of his life, the meteor-like uncertainty of all that related to him, because these appertained to the hero of his story, without whom there would have been no story at all for him, and it seemed to be only in the nature of things that matters would write themselves at some proper date and wind up well. This very morning the illusion completed its disappearance, and as it were, all of a sudden Troy hated himself. The suddenness was probably more apparent than real. A coral reef which just come short of the ocean surface is no more to the horizon than if it had never been begun, and the mere finishing stroke is what often appears to create an event which has long been potentially an accomplished thing. He stood and meditated a miserable man. Wither should he go. He that is accursed let him be accursed still, was the pitiless anathema written in the spoliated effort of his newborn solicitousness. A man who has spent his primal strength in journeying in one direction has not much spirit left for reversing his course. Troy had, since yesterday, faintly reversed his, but the nearest opposition had disheartened him. To turn about would have been hard enough under the greatest providential encouragement, but to find that providence, far from helping him into a new course, or showing any ways that he might adopt one, actually jeered his first trembling and critical attempt in that kind, was more than nature could bear. He slowly withdrew from the grave. He did not attempt to fill up the hole, replace the flowers, or do anything at all. He simply threw up his cards and foresore his game for that time and always. Going out of the church yard silently and unobserved, none of the villagers having yet risen, he passed down some fields at the back and emerged just as secretly upon the high road. Shortly afterwards he had gone from the village. Meanwhile, Bathsheba remained a voluntary prisoner in the attic. The door was kept locked, except during the entries and exits of Liddy, for whom a bed had been arranged in a small adjoining room. The light of Troy's lantern in the church yard was noticed about ten o'clock by the maid-servant, who casually glanced from the window in that direction whilst taking her supper. And she called Bathsheba's attention to it. They looked curiously at the phenomenon for a time until Liddy was sent to bed. Bathsheba did not sleep very heavily that night, when her attendant was unconscious and softly breathing in the next room. The mistress of the house was still looking out of the window, at the faint gleam spreading from among the trees, not in a steady shine but blinking like a revolving coast light, though this appearance failed to suggest to her that a person was passing and repassing in front of it. Bathsheba sat there till it began to rain, and the light vanished, when she withdrew to lie restlessly in her bed and re-enact in a worn mind the lured scene of yesterday night. Almost before the first faint sign of dawn appeared, she arose again and opened the window to obtain a full breathing of the new morning air, the pains being now wet with the trembling tears left by the night rain, each one rounded with a pale luster caught from primrose-shoed slashes through a cloud low down in the awakening sky. From the trees came the sound of steady dripping upon the drifted leaves under them, and from the direction of the church she could hear another noise, peculiar and not intermittent like the rest, the pearl of water falling into a pool. Liddy knocked at eight o'clock, and Bathsheba unlocked the door. What a heavy rain we've had in the night, ma'am, said Liddy, when her inquiries about breakfast had been made. Yes, very heavy. Did you hear that strange noise from the churchyard? I heard one strange noise. I have been thinking it must have been the water from the tower-spouts. Well, that's what the shepherd was saying, ma'am. He's now gone on to see. Oh, Gabriel has been here this morning? Only just looked in and passing, quite in his old way, which I thought he had left off lately. But the tower-spouts used to spatter on the stones and we are puzzled, for this was like the boiling of a pot. Not being able to read, think, or work, Bathsheba asked Liddy to stay and breakfast with her. The tongue of the more childish woman still ran on about recent events. Are you going across to the church, ma'am? she asked. Not that I know of, said Bathsheba. I thought you might like to go and see where they have put Fanny. The trees hide the place from your window. Bathsheba had all sorts of dreads about meeting her husband. Has Mr. Troy been in to-night? she said. No, ma'am. I think he's gone to Budmouth. Budmouth! The sound of the word carried with it a much diminished perspective of him and his deeds. There were thirteen miles interval betwixt them now. She hated questioning Liddy about her husband's movements, and indeed had hitherto seduously avoided doing so. But now all the house knew that there had been some dreadful disagreement between them, and it was futile to attempt disguise. Bathsheba had reached the stage at which people ceased to have any appreciative regard for public opinion. What makes you think he has gone there? she said. Labin Tall saw him on the Budmouth Road this morning before breakfast. Bathsheba was momentarily relieved of that wayward heaviness of the past twenty-four hours which had quenched the vitality of youth in her without substituting the philosophy of mature years, and she resolved to go out and walk a little way. So when breakfast was over she put on her bonnet and took a direction towards the church. It was nine o'clock, and the men having returned to work again from their first meal, she was not likely to meet many of them in the road. Knowing that Fanny had been laid in the reprobates' quarter of the graveyard called in the parish behind church, which was invisible from the road, it was impossible to resist the impulse to enter and look upon a spot which, from nameless feelings, she at the same time dreaded to see. She had been unable to overcome an impression that some connection existed between her rival and the light through the trees. Bathsheba skirted the buttress and beheld the hole and the tomb, its delicately vain surface splashed and stained just as Troy had seen it, and left it two hours earlier. On the other side of the scene stood Gabriel, his eyes too were fixed on the tomb, and her arrival having been noiseless she had not as yet attracted his attention. Bathsheba did not at once perceive that the grand tomb and the disturbed grave were Fanny's, and she looked at both sides and around for some humbler mound, earthed up and clotted in the usual way. Then her eye followed Oaks, and she read the words with which the inscription opened. Erected by Francis Troy in beloved memory of Fanny Robin, Oaks saw her and his first act was to gaze inquiringly and learn how she received this knowledge of the authorship of the work, which to himself had caused considerable astonishment. But such discoveries did not much affect her now, emotional convulsions seemed to have become the common places of her history, and she bade him good morning and asked him to fill in the hole with the spade which was standing by. Lost Oak was doing as she desired, Bathsheba collected the flowers and began planting them with that sympathetic manipulation of roots and leaves which is so conspicuous in a woman's gardening, and which flowers seem to understand and thrive upon. She requested Oak to get the church wardens to turn the leadwork at the mouth of the girgoyle that hung gaping down upon them, that by this means the stream might be directed sideways and a repetition of the accident prevented. Finally, with the superfluous magnanimity of a woman whose narrower instincts have brought down bitterness upon her instead of love, she wiped the mud spots from the tomb as if she rather liked its words than otherwise and went home again. CHAPTER XLXVII ADVENTURES BY THE SHORE Troy wandered along towards the south, a composite feeling made up of disgust with the, to him, humdrum tediousness of a farmer's life, gloomy images of her who lay in the churchyard, remorse, and a general averseness to his wife's society, impelled him to seek a home in any place on earth save Weatherbury. The sad accessories of Fanny's End confronted him as vivid pictures which threatened to be indelible and made life in Bathsheba's house intolerable. At three in the afternoon he found himself at the foot of a slope more than a mile in length, which ran to the ridge of a range of hills lying parallel with the shore and forming a monotonous barrier between the basin of cultivated country inland and the wilder scenery of the coast. Up the hills stretched a road nearly straight and perfectly white, the two sides approaching each other in a gradual taper till they met the sky at the top about two miles off. Throughout the length of this narrow and irksome inclined plain, not a sign of life was visible on this garish afternoon. Troy toiled up the road with a languor and depression greater than any he had experienced for many a day and year before. The air was warm and muggy and the top seemed to recede as he approached. At last he reached the summit and a wide and novel prospect burst upon him with an effect almost like that of the Pacific upon Balboa's gaze. The broad steely sea marked only by faint lines which had the semblance of being etched there on to a degree not deep enough to disturb its general evenness stretched the whole width of his front and round to the right where near the town and port of Budmouth the sun bristled down upon it and banished all color to substitute in its place a clear oily polish. Nothing moved in sky, land, or sea except a frill of milk-white foam along the nearer angles of the shore, shreds of which licked the contiguous stones like tongues. He descended and came to a small basin of sea enclosed by the cliffs. Troy's nature freshened within him. He thought he would rest and bathe here before going farther. He undressed and plunged in. Inside the cove the water was uninteresting to a swimmer, being smooth as a pond, and to get a little of the ocean swell Troy presently swam between the two projecting spurs of rock which formed the pillars of Hercules to this miniature Mediterranean. Unfortunately for Troy, a current unknown to him existed outside, which unimportant to craft of any burden was awkward for a swimmer who might be taken in it unawares. Troy found himself carried to the left and then round in a swoop out to sea. He now recollected the place in its sinister character. Many bathers had there prayed for a dry death from time to time, and like Gonzalo also had been unanswered, and Troy began to deem it possible that he might be added to their number. Not a boat of any kind was at present within sight. But far in the distance, Budmouth lay upon the sea as it were quietly regarding his efforts. And beside the town the harbor showed its position by a dim meshwork of ropes and spars. After well-nigh exhausting himself and attempts to get back to the mouth of the cove, in his weakness swimming several inches deeper than it was his want, keeping up his breath entirely by his nostrils, turning upon his back a dozen times over, swimming in papillon, and so on, Troy resolved at last resort to tread water at a slight incline, and so endeavored to reach the shore at any point, merely giving himself a gentle impetus inwards while carried on in the general direction of the tide. This necessarily a slow process he found to be not altogether so difficult. And though there was no choice of the landing place, the objects on shore passing by him in a sad and slow procession, he perceptively approached the extremity of a spit of land yet further to the right, now well-defined against the sunny portion of the horizon. While the swimmer's eyes were fixed upon the spit, as his only means of salvation on this side of the unknown, a moving object broke the outline of the extremity, and immediately a ship's boat appeared manned with several sailor lads, her bows toward the sea. All Troy's vigor spasmodically revived to prolong the struggle yet a little further. Swimming with his right arm, he held up his left to hail them, splashing upon the waves and shouting with all his might. From the position of the setting sun, his white form was distinctly visible upon the now deep-hewed bosom of the sea to the east of the boat, and the men saw him at once, backing their oars and putting the boat about. They pulled towards him with a will, and in five or six minutes from the time of his first hallow, two of the sailors hauled him in over the stern. They formed part of a brig's crew and had come ashore for land, lending him what little clothing they could spare among them as a slight protection against the rapid cooling air. They agreed to land him in the morning, and without further delay, for it was growing late, they made again towards the roadstead where their vessel lay. And now night drooped slowly upon the wide watery levels in front, and at no great distance from them, where the shoreline curved round and formed a long riband of shade upon the horizon, a series of points of yellow light began to start into existence, denoting the spot to be the sight of Budmouth, where the lamps were being lighted along the parade. The cluck of their oars was the only sound of any distinctness upon the sea, and as they labored amid the thickening shades, the lamp-lights grew larger, each appearing to send a flaming sword deep down into the waves before it, until there arose, among other dim shapes of the kind, the form of the vessel for which they were bound. Recording by Simon Evers Far from the madding crowd, by Thomas Hardy, Chapter 48 Doubts arise, Doubts linger. Bathsheba underwent the enlargement of her husband's absence from ours to-days, with a slight feeling of surprise, and a slight feeling of relief. Yet neither sensation rose at any time far above the level commonly designated as indifference. She belonged to him. The certainties of that position were so well-defined, and the reasonable probabilities of its issues so bounded, that she could not speculate on contingencies. Taking no further interest in herself as a splendid woman, she acquired the indifferent feelings of an outsider in contemplating her probable fate as a singular wretch. For Bathsheba drew herself and her future in colors that no reality could exceed for darkness. Her original vigorous pride of youth had sickened, and with it had declined all her anxieties about coming years, since anxiety recognizes a better and a worse alternative, and Bathsheba had made up her mind that alternatives on any noteworthy scale had ceased for her. Soon, all later, and that's not very late, her husband would be home again, and then the days of their tenancy of the upper farm would be numbered. There had originally been shown by the agent to the estate some distrust of Bathsheba's tenure as James Everdeen's successor on the score of her sex and her youth and her beauty. But the peculiar nature of her uncle's will, his own frequent testimony before his death to her cleverness in such a pursuit, and her vigorous marshalling of the numerous flocks and hurt which came suddenly into her hands before negotiations were concluded, had won confidence in her powers, and no further objections had been raised. She had latterly been in great doubt as to what the legal effects of her marriage would be upon her position. But no notice had been taken as yet of her change of name, and only one point was clear. That, in the event of her own or her husband's inability to meet the agent at the forthcoming January rent day, very little consideration would be shown, and for that matter very little would be deserved. Once out of the farm, the approach of poverty would be sure. Hence Bathsheba lived in a perception that her purposes were broken off. She was not a woman who could hope on without good materials for the process, differing thus from the less farsighted and energetic, though more petted ones of the sex, with whom hope goes on as a sort of clockwork which the merest food and shelter are sufficient to wind up, and perceiving clearly that her mistake had been a fatal one. She accepted her position, and waited coldly for the end. The first Saturday after Troy's departure she went to Casterbridge alone. A journey she had not before taken since her marriage. On this Saturday Bathsheba was passing slowly on foot through the crowd of rural businessmen gathered as usual in front of the market-house, who were as usual gazed upon by the burgers with feelings that those healthy lives were dearly paid for by exclusion from possible aldermanship. When a man, who had apparently been following her, said some words to another on her left hand. Bathsheba's ears were keen as those of any wild animal, and she distinctly heard what the speaker said, though her back was towards him. I am looking for Mrs. Troy. Is that she there? Yes, that's the young lady, I believe, said the person addressed. I have some awkward news to break to her. A husband is drowned. As if in doubt with the spirit of prophecy Bathsheba gasped out, no, it is not true, it cannot be true. Then she said unheard no more. The ice of self-command which had latterly gathered over her was broken, and the currents burst forth again and overwhelmed her. A darkness came into her eyes, and she fell. But not to the ground. A gloomy man, who had been observing her from under the portico of the old scorn exchange when she passed through the group without, stepped quickly to her side at the moment of her exclamation and caught her in his arms as she sank down. What is it? said Bouldwood, looking up at the bringer of the big news, as he supported her. Her husband was drowned this week while bathing in Lalwin Cove. Her coast guardsmen found his clothes and brought them into Bobmouth yesterday. Thereupon a strange fire lighted up Bouldwood's eye, and his face flushed with the suppressed excitement of an unutterable thought. Everybody's glance was now centred upon him and the unconscious Bathsheba. He lifted her bodily off the ground and smoothed down the folds of her dress as a child might have taken a storm-beaten bird and arranged its ruffled prumes, and bore her along the pavement to the king's arms in. Here he passed with her under the archway into a private room, and by the time he had deposited so loathily the precious burden upon a sofa Bathsheba had opened her eyes. Remembering all that had occurred, she murmured, "'I want to go home,' Bouldwood left the room. He stood for a moment in the passage to recover his senses. The experience had been too much for his consciousness to keep up with, and now that he had grasped it, it had gone again. For those few heavenly golden moments she had been in his arms. What did it matter about her not knowing it? She had been close to his breast. He had been close to hers." He started onward again, and sending a woman to her went out to ascertain all the facts of the case. These appeared to be limited to what he had already heard. He then ordered her horse to be put into the gig, and when all was ready returned to inform her. He found that, though still pale and unwell, she had in the meantime sent for the Budmouth man who brought the tidings, and learned from him all there was to know. Being hardly in a condition to drive home as she had driven to town, Bouldwood, with every delicacy of manner and feeling, offered to get her a driver or to give her a seat in his frightened, which was more comfortable than her own conveyance. These proposals Bathsheba gently declined, and the farmer at once departed. About half an hour later she invigorated herself by an effort and took her seat and the reins, as usual, in external appearance much as if nothing had happened. She went out of the town by a tortuous back-street, and drove slowly along unconscious of the road and the scene. The first shades of evening were showing themselves when Bathsheba reached home, where, silently alighting and leaving the horse in the hands of the boy, she proceeded at once upstairs. Liddy met her on the landing. The news had preceded Bathsheba to weather babe a half an hour, and Liddy looked inquirily into her mistress's face. Bathsheba had nothing to say. She entered her bedroom and sat by the window, and thought and thought, till night enveloped her, and the extreme lines only of her shape were visible. Somebody came to the door, knocked, and opened it. "'Well, what is it, Liddy?' she said. "'I was thinking there must be something God for you to wear,' said Liddy, with hesitation. "'What do you mean?' "'Morning. No, no, no,' said Bathsheba hurriedly. "'But I suppose there must be something done for poor— not a present, I think. It is not necessary.' "'Why not, ma'am? Because he's still alive.' "'How do you know that?' said Liddy, amazed. "'I don't know it. But wouldn't it have been different, or shouldn't I have heard more? Wouldn't they have found him, Liddy? Or—I don't know how it is, but death would have been different from how this is. I am perfectly convinced that he is still alive.' Bathsheba remained firm in this opinion till Monday, when two circumstances conjoined to shake it. The first was a short paragraph in the local newspaper, which, beyond making by a methodising pen formidable presumptive evidence of Troy's death by drowning, contained the important testimony of a young Mr. Barker, M.D., of Budmouth, who spoke to being an eyewitness of the accident in a letter to the editor. In this he stated that he was passing over the cliff on the remote side of the cove just as the sun was setting. At that time he saw a bather carried along in the current outside the mouth of the cove, and guessed in an instant that there was but a poor chance of him unless he should be possessed of unusual muscular powers. He drifted behind a projection of the coast, and Mr. Barker followed along the shore in the same direction. But, by the time that he could reach an elevation sufficiently great to command of the view of the sea beyond, dusk had set in, and nothing further was to be seen. The other circumstance was the arrival of his clothes when it became necessary for her to examine and identify them, though this had been virtually done long before by those who inspected the letters in his pockets. It was so evident to her in the midst of her agitation that Troy had undressed in the full conviction of dressing again almost immediately that the notion that anything but death could have prevented him was a perverse one to entertain. Then Bathsheba said to herself that others were assured in their opinion. Strange that she should not be. A strange reflection occurred to her causing her face to flush. Suppose that Troy had followed Fanny into another world. Had he done this intentionally he had contrived to make his death appear like an accident. Nevertheless, this thought of how the apparent might differ from the real, made vivid by her bygone jealousy of Fanny and the remorse he had shown that night, did not blind her to the perception of a likelier difference, less tragic, but to herself far more disastrous. When alone, late that evening beside a small fire, a much calmed down, Bathsheba took Troy's watch into her hand, which had been restored to her with the rest of the articles belonging to him. She opened the case as he had opened it before her a week ago. There was the little coil of pale hair which had been as the fuse to this great explosion. He was hers, and she was his. They should be gone together, she said. I am nothing to either of them, and why should I keep her hair? She took it in her hand and held it over the fire. No, I'll not burn it. I'll keep it in memory of her poor thing, she added, snatching back her hand. End of Chapter 48 Recording by Simon Evers Chapter 49 of Far From the Madding Crowd This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Simon Evers Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy Chapter 49 Oaks Advancement A Great Hope The later autumn and the winter drew on a pace, and the leaves lay thick upon the turf of the glades and the mosses of the woods. Bathsheba, having previously been living in a state of suspended feeling which was not suspense, now lived in a mood of quietitude which was not precisely priestfulness. While she had known him to be alive, she could have thought of his death with equanimity. But now that it might be she had lost him, she regretted that he was not hers still. She kept the farm going, raked in her profits without caring keenly about them, and expended money on ventures because she had done so him by gone days, which, though not long gone by, seemed infinitely removed from her present. She looked back upon that past over a great gulf, as if she were now a dead person, having the faculty of meditation still left in her, by means of which, like the mouldering gentlefolk of the poet's story, she could sit and ponder what a gift life used to be. However, one excellent result of her general apathy was the long-delayed installation of Oak as Baeliff. But he, having virtually exercised that function for a long time already, the change beyond the substantial increase of wages it brought was a little more than a nominal one addressed to the outside world. Boldwood lived secluded and inactive. Much of his wheat and all his barley of that season had been spoiled by the rain. It sprouted, grew into intricate mats, and was ultimately thrown to the pigs in armfuls. The strange neglect which had produced this ruin and waste became the subject of whispered talk among all the people round. And it was elicited from one of Boldwood's men that forgetfulness had nothing to do with it, for he had been reminded of the danger to his corn as many times and as persistently as in fairies dared to do. The sight of the pigs turning in disgust from the rotten ears seemed to arouse Boldwood, and he one evening sent for Oak. Whether it was suggested by Bathsheba's recent act for promotion or not, the farmer proposed at the interview that Gabriel should undertake the superintendents of the lower farm as well as of Bathsheba's, because of the necessity Boldwood felt for such aid and the impossibility of discovering a more trustworthy man. Gabriel's malignant star was assuredly setting fast. Bathsheba, when she learned of this proposal, for Oak was obliged to consult her, and she languidly objected. She considered that the two farms together were too extensive for the observation of one man. Boldwood, who was apparently determined by personal rather than commercial reasons, suggested that Oak should be furnished with a horse for his sole use, when the plan would present no difficulty the two farms lying side by side. Boldwood did not directly communicate with her during these negotiations, but Oak, who was the go-between throughout. All was harmoniously arranged at last, and we now see Oak mounted on a strong cob and daily trotting the length and breadth of about two thousand acres in a cheerful spirit of surveillance, as if the crops all belonged to him, the actual mistress of the one half and the master of the other, sitting in their respective homes in gloomy and sad seclusion. Out of this there arose, during the spring succeeding, a torque in the parish that Gable Oak was feathering his nest fast. Whatever you do think, said Susan Tall, Gable Oak is coming here quite the dand. He now wears shiny boots with hardly a hob in them two or three times a week and a tall hat of sundies and a hardy nose the name of Smockfrock. When I see people strut enough to be cut up into Bantam cocks I stand dormant with wonder and says no more. It was eventually known that Gable though paid a fixed wage by Bathsheba independent of the fluctuations of agricultural profits, had made an engagement with Bulbwood by which Oak was to receive a share of the receipts, a small share certainly, yet it was money of a higher quality than mere wages and capable of expansion in a way that wages were not. Gable Oak was a near man. Although his condition had thus far improved, he lived in no better style than before, occupying the same cottage, paring his own potatoes, mending his stockings and sometimes even making his bed with his own hands. But as Oak was not only provokingly indifferent to public opinion, but a man who clung persistently to old habits and usages simply because they were old, there was room for doubt as to his motives. A great hope had latterly germinated in Bulbwood, whose unreasoning devotion to Bathsheba could only be characterized as a fond madness which neither time nor circumstance evil nor good report could weaken or destroy. This fevered hope had grown up again like a grain of mustard seed during the quiet which followed the hasty conjecture as the way was drowned. He nourished it fearfully and almost shunned the contemplation of it in earnest lest facts should reveal the wildness of the dream. Bathsheba, having at last been persuaded to wear mourning, her appearance as she entered the church in that guise was in itself a weekly addition to his faith that a time was coming, very far off perhaps, yet surely nearing reward. How long he might have to wait he had not yet clesely considered. What he would try to recognize was that the severe schooling she had been subjected to had made Bathsheba much more considerate than she had formally been of the feelings of others. And he trusted that should she be willing at any time in the future to marry any man at all that man would be himself. It was the stratum of good feeling in her. Her self-reproach for the injury she had thoughtlessly done him might be depended upon now to a much greater extent than before her infatuation and disappointment. It would be possible to approach her by the channel of her good nature and to suggest a friendly business-like compact between them for fulfilment at some future day keeping the passionate side of her desire entirely out of her sight. To the eyes of the middle-aged Bathsheba was perhaps additionally charming just now. Her exuberance of spirit was pruned down. The original phantom of delight had shown herself to be not too bright for human nature's daily food and she had been able to enter this second poetical phase without losing much of the first in the process. Bathsheba's return from a two-month visit to her old aunt at Norcom afforded the impassioned and yearning farmer a pretext for inquiring directly after her, now possibly in the ninth month of her widowhood, and endeavouring to get a notion of her state of mind regarding him. This occurred in the middle of the hay-making and Bulbwood contrived to be near Liddy, who was assisting in the fields. I am glad to see you out of doors, Liddy, he said pleasantly. She simpered and wondered in her heart why he should speak so frankly to her. I hope Mrs. Troy is quite well after her long absence," he continued, in a manner expressing that the coldest hearted neighbour could scarcely say less about her. She's quite well, sir. And cheerful, I suppose. Yes, cheerful. Fearful, did you say? Oh, no, I merely said she was cheerful. Tells you all her affairs? No, sir. Some of them? Yes, sir. Mrs. Troy puts much confidence in you, Liddy, and very wisely, perhaps. She do, sir. I've been with her all through her troubles and was with her at the time of Mr. Troy's going and all, and if she were to marry again I expect I should bind with her. She promises that you will. Quite natural, said the strategic lover throbbing throughout him at the presumption which Liddy's words appeared to warrant that his darling had thought of remarriage. No, she doesn't promise it exactly. I merely judge it on my own account. Yes, yes, I understand. When she alludes to the possibility of marrying again, you conclude, she never do allude to it, sir, said Liddy, thinking how very stupid Mr. Bulbulb was getting. Oh, of course not. He returned hastily, his hope falling again. You needn't take quite such long wishes with your rake, Liddy. Short and quick ones are best. Well, perhaps, as she is absolute mistress again now, it is wise of her to resolve never to give up her freedom. My mistress did certainly once say, though not seriously, that she suppose she might marry again at the end of seven years from last year, if she cared to risk Mr. Troy's coming back and claiming her. Ah, six years from the present time. Said that she might. She might marry at once in every reasonable person's opinion whatever the lawyers may say to the contrary. Have you been to ask them? Said Liddy innocently. Not I, said Bulbulb, with a growing red. Liddy, you needn't stay here a minute later than you wish, so Mr. Oake says. I am now going on a little farther. Good afternoon. He went away vexed with himself. He said, he went away vexed with himself and ashamed of having for this one time in his life done anything which could be called underhand. Poor Bulbulb had no more skill in finesse than a battering ram. And he was uneasy with the sense of having made himself to appear stupid and what was worse, mean. But he had, after all, lighted upon one fact by way of repayment. It was a singularly fresh and fascinating fact, but not without its sadness it was pertinent and real. In little more than six years from this time Bathsheba might certainly marry him. There was something definite in that hope. For admitting that there might have been no deeper thought in her words to Liddy about marriage they showed at least her creed on the matter. This pleasant notion was now continually in his mind. Six years were a long time, but how much shorter than never the idea he had for so long been obliged to endure. Jacob had served twice seven years for Rachel. What was six for such a woman as this? He tried to like the notion of waiting for her better than that of winning her at once. Bulbulb felt his love to be so deep and strong and eternal that it was possible she had never yet known its full volume. And this patience in delay would have fought him an opponent of giving sweet proof on the point. He would annihilate the six years of his life as if they were minutes. So little did he value his time on earth beside her love. He would let her see all those six years of intangible ethereal courtship how little care he had for anything but as it bore upon the consummation. Meanwhile, the early and the late summer brought round the week in which Green Hill Fair was held. This fair was frequently attended by the folk of Weatherbury. End of Chapter 49 Recording by Simon Evers Chapter 50 of Far From the Madding Crowd This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Simon Evers Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy Chapter 50 The Sheep Fair Troy touches his wife's hand. Green Hill was the Ninjdie Novgorod of South Wessex and the busiest, merriest, noisiest day of the whole statute number was the day of the Sheep Fair. This yearly gathering was upon the summit of a hill which retained the remains of an ancient earthwork consisting of a huge rampart and entrenchment of an oval form encircling the top of the hill though somewhat broken down here and there. To each of the two chief openings on opposite sides a winding road ascended and the Devil Green space of ten or fifteen acres enclosed by the bank was the site of the fair. A few permanent erections dotted the spot, but the majority of visitors patronized canvas alone for resting and feeding under during the time of their sojourn here. Shepherds who had tetted with their flocks from long distances started from home two or three days or even a week before the fair, driving their charges a few miles each day, not more than ten or twelve, and resting them at night in hard fields by the wayside at previously chosen points, where they fed having fasted since morning. The shepherd of each flock marched behind a bundle containing his kit for the week strapped upon his shoulders, and in his hand his crook, which he used as the staff of his pilgrimage. Several of the sheep would get worn and lame, and occasionally a lambing occurred on the road. To meet these contingencies they were frequently provided to accompany the flocks from the remote appoints, a pony and wagon into which the weekly ones were taken on a journey. The weatherbury farms, however, were no such long distance from the hill, and those arrangements were not necessary in their case. But the large united flocks of Bathsheba and Farmer Bouldwood formed a valuable and imposing multitude which demanded much attention, and on this account Gabriel, in addition to Bouldwood's shepherd and cane ball accompanied them all along the way through the decayed old time of Kingsbeer and upward to the plateau, old George the Dog, of course, behind them. When the autumn sun slanted over Greenhill this morning, and lighted the dewy flat upon its crest, nebulous clouds of dust were to be seen floating between the pairs of hedges which streaked the wide prospect around in all directions. These gradually converged upon the base of the hill, and the flocks became individually visible, climbing the serpentine time ways which led to the top. Thus, in a slow procession, they entered the opening to which the robes tended, multitude after multitude, horned and hornless, blue flocks and red flocks, buff flocks and brown flocks, even green and salmon-tinted flocks, according to the fancy of the colorists and custom of the farm. Men were shouting, dogs were parking with greatest ammunition, but the thronging travellers in so long had grown nearly indifferent to such terrors that they still bleated piteously at the unwantedness of their experiences, a tall shepherd rising here and there in the midst of them, like a gigantic idol amid a crowd of prostrate devotees. The great mass of sheep in the fair consisted of south-downs and the old Wessex-horned breeds. To the latter class Martha Sheba's and Farmer Bulbwood's mainly belonged. She's filed in about nine o'clock. They've amicculated horns lopping gracefully on each side of their cheeks in geometrically perfect spirals, a small pink and white ear nestling under each horn. Before and behind came other varieties, perfect leopards as to the full-rich substance of their coats and only lacking the spots. There were also a few of the Oxfordshire breed whose wool was beginning to curl like a child's flaxen hair, though surpassed in this respect by the effeminate Lester's which were in turn less curly than the Cotswell's. But the most picturesque by far was a small flock of ex-mores which chanced to be there this year. Their pied faces and legs, dark and heavy horns, tresses of wool hanging round their swarthy foreheads quite relieved the monotony of the flocks in that quarter. All these bleeding, panting and weary thousands had entered and were penned before the morning had far advanced. The dog belonging to each flock being tied to the core of the pen containing it. Allies for pedestrians intersected the pens which soon became crowded with buyers and sellers from far and near. In another part of the hill an altogether different scene began to force itself upon the eye towards mid-day. The tent, of exceptional newness and a size, was in course of erection here. As the day drew on the flocks began to change hands, lightening the shepherd's responsibilities, and they turned their attention to this tent an inquire of a man at work there whose soul seemed concentrated on tying a bothering knot in no time. What was going on? The royal hippodrome performance of Turpin's ride to York and the death of Blackbess replied the man promptly without turning his eyes or leaving off tying. As soon as the tent was completed the bands struck up highly stimulating harmonies and the announcement was publicly made Blackbess standing in a conspicuous position on the outside as a living proof if proof were wanted of the truth of the irracula utterances from the stage over which the people were to enter. These were so convinced genuine appeals to heart and understanding both that they soon began to crowd in abundantly among the foremost being visible Jan Cogan and Joseph Porgras who were on holiday keeping here today. That's a great rough and pushing me! screamed a woman in front of Jan over her shoulder at him when the rush was at its fiercest. How can I help pushing you when the folk behind push me? said Cogan in a deprecating turn turning his head towards your foresaid and focused as far as he could without turning his body which was jammed as in a vice. There was a silence. Then the drums and trumpets again sent forth their echoing notes. The crowd was again ecstasied and gave another lurch in which Cogan and Porgras were again thrust by those behind upon the woman in front. All that helped as females should be at the mercy of such roughens! exclaimed one of those ladies again by the wind. Now, said Cogan, appealing in an earnest voice to the public at large as he stood clustered about his shoulder blades, did he ever hear such an unreasonable woman as that? Upon my carcass neighbours, if I could only get out of this cheese-ring the damn woman might eat the show for me! Don't you lose your temper, Jan? implored Joseph Porgras in a whisper. They might get their men to murder us for I think by the shine of their eyes or the form of woman kind. Jan held his tongue, as if he had no objection to be pacified to please offend, and they gradually reached to the foot of the ladder. Porgras, being flattened like a jumping-jack, and the six-months, for admission which he had got ready half an hour earlier, have him become so reeking hot in the tight squeeze of his excited hand that the woman in spangles brazen rings set with glass darmens and with chalked face and shoulders he hastily dropped it again from a fear that some trick had been played to burn her fingers. So they all entered, and the cloth of the tent to the eyes of an observer on the outside became bulged into innumerable pimples such as you observe on the sack of potatoes caused by the various human heads, backs, and elbows at high pressure within. At the rear of the large tent there were two small dressing tents. One of these allotted to the mail for performers was partitioned into halves by a cloth. And in one of the divisions there was, sitting on the grass pulling on a pair of jack-boots a young man whom he instantly recognised as Sergeant Troy. Troy's appearance in this position may be briefly accounted for. The brig, a bore which he was taken in Budmouth Roads, was about to start on a voyage, though somewhat short of hands. Troy read the articles and joined. But before they sailed a boat was dispatched across the bay to Lullwind Cove. As he had half expected his clothes were gone. He ultimately worked his passage to the United States where he made a precarious living in various towns as professor of gymnastics, sword exercise, fencing, and pugilism. A few months were sufficient to give him a distaste for this kind of life. There was a certain animal form of refinement in his nature. And however pleasant a strange condition might be whilst privations were easily warded off, it was disadvantageously coarse when money was short. There was ever present, too, the idea that he could claim a home and its comforts did he but choose to return to England and Weatherbury Farm. Weathermouth Sheba fought him dead was a frequent subject of curious conjecture. To England he did return at last. But the fact of drawing nearer to Weatherbury abstracted its fascinations and his intention to enter his old groove at that place became modified. It was with gloom he considered on landing at Liverpool that if he were to go home his reception would be of a kind very unpleasant to contemplate. For what Troy had in the way of emotion was an occasional fitful sentiment which sometimes caused him as much convenience as a motion of a strong and healthy kind. Bathsheba was not a woman to be made a fool of or a woman to suffer in silence. And how could he endure existence with a spirited wife to whom at first entering he would be beholden for food and lodging. Moreover, it was not at all unlikely that his wife would fail at her farming if she had not already done so. And he would then become liable for her maintenance. And what a life such a future of poverty with her would be the spectre of fanny constantly between them harrowing his temper and embittering her words. Thus for reasons touching on distaste, regret and shame commingled he put off his return from day to day and would have decided to put it all together if he could have found anywhere else the ready-made which existed for him there. At this time, the July preceding the September in which we find him at Greenhill Fair he fell in with a travelling circus which was performing in the outskirts of a northern town. Troy introduced himself to the manager by taming a restive horse of the troop, hitting a suspended apple with a pistol bullet far from the animal's back when in full gallop and other feats. For his merits in these or more or less based upon his experiences as a groom and guardsman Troy was taken into the company and the play of terpim was prepared with a view to his personation of the chief character. Troy was not greatly elated by the appreciative spirit in which he was undoubtedly treated but he thought the engagement might afford him a few weeks for consideration. It was thus carelessly and without having formed any definite plan for the future that Troy found himself at Greenhill Fair with the rest of the company on this day. And now the mild autumn sun got lower and in front of the pavilion the following instant had taken place. Bathsheba who was driven to the fair that day by her odd man poor grass had, like everyone else read or heard the announcement that Mr. Francis, the great cosmopolitan equestrian and rough-rider would enact the part of terpim. And she was not yet too old and care-worn to be without a little curiosity to see him. This particular show was by far the largest and grandest in the fair a horde of little shows grouping themselves under its shade, like chickens around a hen. The crowd had passed in and Bouldwood, who had been watching all the day for an opportunity of speaking to her, seeing her comparatively isolated, came up to her side. I hoped the sheep had done well today, Mrs. Troy. He said nervously. Oh, yes, thank you," said Bathsheba, colour springing up into the centre of her cheeks. I was fortunate enough to sell them all just as we got upon the hill, so we hadn't to pen at all. And now you are entirely at leisure. Yes, except that I have to see one more dealer in two hours' time, otherwise I should be going home. I was looking at this large tent and the announcement. Have you ever seen the play of Turpin rides to York? Turpin was a real man, was he not? Oh, yes, perfectly true, all of it. Indeed, I think I've heard Jan Coggins say that the relation of his new Tom King, Turpin's friend, quite well. Coggins is rather given to strange stories connected with his relations, we must remember. I hope they can all be believed. Yes, yes, we know, Coggins, but Turpin is true enough. You have never seen it played, I suppose. Never. I was not allowed to go into these places when I was young. Hark! What's that prancing? How they shout? Black Bess just started off, I suppose. Am I so right in supposing you would like to see the performance, Mrs. Troy? Please accuse my mistake if it is one. But if you would like to, I'll get a seat for you with pleasure. Perceiving that she hesitated to be added, I myself shall not stay to see it. I've seen it before. Now, Bathsheba did care a little to see the show, and had only withheld her feet from the ladder because she feared to go in alone. She had been hoping that Oak might appear, whose assistance in such cases was always accepted as an inalienable right. But Oak was nowhere to be seen, and hence it was that she said, then if you would just look in first to see if there's room, I think I will go in for a minute or two. And so, a short time after this, Bathsheba appeared in the tent with Bulwud at her elbow, who, taking her to a reserved seat, again withdrew. This feature consisted of one raised bench in a very conspicuous part of the circle, covered with red cloth, and flawed with a piece of carpet. And Bathsheba immediately found to her confusion that she was the single reserved individual in the tent, the rest of the crowded spectators, one and all, standing on their legs on the borders of the arena, where they got twice as good a view of the performance for half the money. Hence, as many eyes were turned upon her enthroned alone in this place of honour against a scarlet background, as upon the ponies and clowns who were engaged in preliminary exploits in the centre, she said. Once there, Bathsheba was forced to make the best of it, and remain. She sat down, spreading her skirts with some dignity over the unoccupied space on each side of her, and giving a new and feminine aspect to the pavilion. In a few minutes she noticed the fat red nape of Coggan's neck amongst those standing just below her, and Joseph Porgras's saintly profile a little further on. The interior was shadowy with a peculiar shade. The strange luminous semi-opacities of fine autumn afternoons and eaves intensified into Rembrandt effects, the few yellow sunbeams which came through holes and divisions in the canvas, and spurted like jets of gold dust across the dusky blue atmosphere of haze pervading the tent, until they alighted on inner surfaces of cloth opposite, and shone like little lamps scattered there. Troy, on peeping from his dressing-tent through a slip for a reconnoiter before entering, saw his unconscious wife on high before him as described sitting as queen of the tournament. He started back in utter confusion, for although his disguise effectively concealed his personality, he instantly felt that she would be sure to recognize his voice. He had several times during the day thought of the possibility of some weatherbury person or other appearing and recognizing him, but he had taken the risk carelessly. If they see me, let them," he had said. But here was Bathsheba in her own person, and the reality of the scene was so much intenser than any of his prefigurings that he felt he had not half enough considered the point. She looked so charming and fair that his cool mood about weatherbury people was changed. He had not expected her to exercise his power over him in the twinkling of an eye. Should he go on and care nothing? He could not bring himself to do that. Beyond a politic wish to remain unknown, there suddenly arose in him now a sense of shame at the possibility that his attractive young wife who already despised him should despise him more by discovering him in so mean a position after so long a time. He actually blushed at the thought, and was vexed beyond measure that his sentiments of dislike towards weatherbury should have led him to dally about the country in this way. But Troy was never more clever than when absolutely at his wit's end. He hastily thrust aside the curtain dividing his own little dressing-space from that of the manager and proprietor who now appeared as the individual called Tom King as far down as the aforesaid respectable manager thence to his toes. Here's the devil to pay," said Troy. How's that? Why, there's a black-guard creditor in the tent. I don't want to see who'll discover me and nab me as sure as Satan if I open my mouth. What's to be done? He must appear now, I think. I can't. But the play must proceed. Do you give out that Turpin has got a bad cold and can't speak his part, but that he'll perform it just the same as the proprietor shook his head? Anyhow, play on, no play. I won't open my mouth," said Troy, firmly. Oh, very well. Then let me see. I tell you how I'll manage," said the other, who perhaps felt it would be extremely awkward to offend his leading man just at this time. I won't tell him anything about your keeping silence. Go on with the peace and say nothing. Do what you can, by a judicious wink, now and then, and a few indomitable nods in the heroic places, you know. They'll never find out that the speeches are omitted. This seemed feasible enough for Turpin's speeches were not many or long, the fascination of the peace lying entirely in the action. And accordingly the play began, and at the appointed time Black Bess leapt into the grassy circle amid the plaudits of the spectators. At the turnpike scene where Bess and Turpin are hotly pursued at midnight by the officers and the half-awake gatekeeper in his tassled nightcap denies that any horseman has passed. Coggan uttered a broad-chested, Well done! which could be heard all over the fair above the bleeding. And Porgrass smiled delightedly with a nice sense of dramatic contrast between our hero, who coolly leaps the gate, and halting justice in the form of his enemies, who must need to pull up cumbulously and wait to be let through. At the death of Tom King he could not refrain from seizing Coggan by the hand and whispering with tears in his eyes. Of course he's not really shot, Jan, only seemingly. And when the last sad scene came on, and the body of the gallant and faithful Bess had to be carried out on a shutter by twelve volunteers from among the spectators, nothing could restrain Porgrass from lending a hand, exclaiming as he asked Jan to join him. It will be something to tell of at warrants in future years, Jan, and hand down to our children. For many a year in weatherbury, Joseph told, with the air of a man who had had experiences in his time, that he touched with his own hand the hoof of Bess as she lay upon the board upon his shoulder. If, as some thinkers hold, immortality consists of being enshrined in others' memories, then did Black Bess become immortal that day if she had never done so before. Meanwhile, Troy had added a few touches to ordinary makeup for the character, the more affectionately to disguise himself. And though he had felt faint qualms on first entering, the metamorphosis affected by judiciously lining his face with a wire rendered him safe from the eyes of Bathsheba and her men. Nevertheless, he was relieved when it was got through. There was a second performance in the evening, and the tent was lighted up. Troy had taken his part very quietly this time venturing to introduce a few speeches on occasion, and was just concluding it when, while standing at the edge of the circle contiguous to the first row of spectators, he observed within a yard of him the eye of a man darted keenly into his side features. Troy hastily shifted his position after having recognized in the scrutineer the navish bailiff Pennyways, his wife's sworn enemy, who still hung about the outskirts of Weatherbury. At first Troy resolved to take no notice and abide by circumstances, that he had been recognized by this man was highly probable, yet there was room for doubt. Then the great objection he had felt to allowing news of his proximity to proceed into Weatherbury in the event based on a feeling that knowledge of his present occupation would discredit him still further in his wife's eyes returned in full force. Moreover should he resolve not to return at all a tale of his being alive a being in the neighborhood would be awkward and he was anxious to acquire a knowledge of his wife's temporal affairs before deciding which to do. In this dilemma Troy at once went out to recognize her. It occurred to him that to find Pennyways and make a friend of him if possible, would be a very wise act. He put on a thick beard borrowed from the establishment and in this he wandered about the fair field. It was now almost dark and respectable people were getting their carts and gigs ready to go home. The largest refreshment booth in the fair was provided by an innkeeper from a neighboring town. This was considered an exceptional place for pertaining the necessary food and rest. Host Trencher as he was jointly called by the local newspaper being a substantial man of high repute for catering through all the country round. The tent was divided to first and second class compartments and at the end of the first class division was he had further enclosure for the most exclusive fenced off from the body of the tent by a luncheon bar behind which the host himself stood bustling about him white apron and shirt sleeves and looking as if he had never lived anywhere but under canvas all his life. In these penetralia were chairs and a table which on candles being lighted made quite a cosy and luxurious show with an urn plated tea and coffee pots china tea cups and plum cakes. Troy stood at the entrance to the booth where a gypsy woman was frying pancakes over a little fire of sticks and selling them at a penny apiece and looked over the heads of the people within. He could see nothing of penny ways but he soon discerned Bathsheba through an opening into the reserved space of the further end. Troy thereupon retreated went round the tent into the darkness and listened. He could hear Bathsheba's voice immediately inside the canvas. She was conversing with a man. A warmth overspread his face. Surely she was not so unprincipled as to flirt in a fair. He wondered if then she reckoned upon his death as an absolute certainty. To get at the root of the matter Troy took a pen knife from his pocket and softly made two little cuts crosswise in the cloth which by folding back the corners left a hole the size of a wafer. Close to this he placed his face, withdrawing it again in a movement of surprise for his eye had been within 12 inches of the top of Bathsheba's head. It was too near to be convenient. He made another hole a little to one side and lower down in a shady place beside her chair from which she was easy and safe to survey her by looking horizontally. Troy took in the scene completely now. She was leaning back sipping a cup of tea that she held in her hand and the owner of the male voice was Bouldwood who had apparently just bought the cup to her. Bathsheba, being in an negligent mood lent so idly against the canvas that it was pressed to the shape of her shoulder and she was in fact as good as in Troy's arms and he was obliged to keep his breast carefully backward that she might not feel it warmth as he gazed in. Troy found unexpected cords of feeling to be stirred again within him as there had been stirred earlier in the day. She was handsome as ever and she was his. It was some minutes before he could counteract his sudden wish to go in and claim her and then he thought how the proud girl who had always looked down upon him even whilst it was to love him would hate him on discovering a trolling player. Were he to make himself known that chapter of his life must at all risks be kept forever from her and from the Weatherbury people or his name would be a byword throughout the parish. He would be nicknamed Turpin as long as he lived. Surely before he could claim her these few past months of his existence must be entirely blotted out. Up before you start, ma'am," said Farmer Bouldwood. Thank you, said Bathsheba, but I must be going at once. It was great neglect in that man to keep me waiting here till so late. I should have gone two hours ago if it had not been for him. I had no idea of coming in here. But there's nothing so refreshing as a cup of tea though I should never have got one if you hadn't helped me. Troy scrutinised her cheek as lit by the candles varying shade thereon and the white shell-like sinuosities of her little ear. She took out her purse and was insisting to Bouldwood on paying for her tea for herself. When at this moment Pennyways entered the tent Troy trembled. Here was his scheme for respectability endangered at once. He was about to leave his whole of a smile, attempt to follow Pennyways out if the ex-Baliff had recognised him. When he was arrested by the conversation and found he was too late. Excuse me, ma'am," said Pennyways, I've some private information for your ear alone. I cannot hear it now, she said coldly. That Bathsheba could not endure this man was evident. In fact, he was continually coming to her with some tale or other by which he might creep into favour at the expense of persons maligned. I'll write it down," said Pennyways confidently. He stooped over the table, pulled a leaf from a warped pocket-book and wrote upon the paper in a round hand, Your husband is here. I've seen him. Who's the fool now? This he folded small and handed towards her. Bathsheba would not read it. She would not even put out her hand to take it. Pennyways then with a laugh of derision tossed it into her lap and, turning away, left her. From the words and actions of Pennyways, Troy, though he had not been able to see what the ex-Baliff wrote, had not a moment's doubt that the note referred to him. Nothing that he could think of could be done to check the exposure. That's my luck," he whispered, and added implications which rustled in the gloom like a pestle and wind. Meanwhile, Bouldwood said, taking up the note from her lap, Don't you wish to read it, Mrs. Troy? If not, I'll destroy it. Oh, well," said Bathsheba carelessly. Perhaps it is unjust not to read it, but I can guess what it's about. He wants me to recommend him, or it is to tell me of some little relationship with my work-people. He's always doing that. Bathsheba held the note in her right hand. Bouldwood handed towards her a plate of cut bread and butter, when, in order to take a slice, she put the note into her left hand, where she was still holding the purse, and then allowed her hand to drop beside her close to the canvas. The moment had come for saving his game, and Troy impossibly felt that for yet another time he looked at the fair hand and saw the pink fingertips and the blue veins of the wrist encircled by a bracelet of coral chippings which she wore. How familiar it all was to him. Then, with the lightning action in which he was such an adept, he noiselessly slipped his hand under the bottom of the tent-cloth, which was far from being pinned tightly down, lifted it a little way, keeping his eye to the hull, his fingers dropped to the canvas and ran away in the gloom towards the bank and ditch, smiling at the scream of astonishment which burst from her. Troy then slid down on the outside of the rampart, hastened round to the bottom of the entrenchment, to a distance of a hundred yards, ascended again, and crossed boldly in a slow walk towards the front entrance of the tent. His object was now to get to Pennyways and prevent a repetition of the announcement of time as he should choose. Troy reached the tent door and, standing among the groups there gathered, looked anxiously for Pennyways, evidently not wishing to make himself prominent by inquiring for him. One or two men were speaking of a daring attempt that had just been made to rob a young lady by lifting the canvas of the tent beside her. It was supposed that the rogue had imagined a slip of paper which she held in her hand to be a banknote, for he had seized it and made off with it, thus behind. His chagra and disappointment of discovering its worthlessness would be a good joke, it was said. However, the occurrence seemed to become known to few, for it had not interrupted a fiddler who had lately begun playing by the door of the tent, nor the four bowed old men with grim countenances and walking sticks in hand who were dancing major maddies real to the tune. Behind these stood Pennyways. Troy glided up to him, beckoned, and whispered a few words. And with a mistual glance of concurrence the two men went into the night together. End of Chapter 50 Recording by Simon Evers Please visit LibriVox.org The arrangement for getting back again to Weatherbury had been that oak should take the place of poor grass in Bathsheba's conveyance and drive her home, it being discovered late in the afternoon that Joseph was suffering from his old complaint, a multiplying eye, and was therefore hardly trustworthy as coachman and protector to a woman. But oak had found himself so occupied and was so full of many cares relative to those portions of Bouldwood's flocks that were not disposed of that Bathsheba, without telling oak or anybody, resolved to drive home herself as she had many times done from Casterbridge Market and trust to her good angel for performing the journey unmolested. But, having fallen in with Farmer Bouldwood accidentally, on her part at least, at the refreshment tent, she found it impossible to refuse his offer to ride on horseback beside her as escort. It had grown twilight before she was aware, but Bouldwood assured her that there was no cause for uneasiness as the moon would be up in half an hour. Only after the incident in the tent she had risen to go, now absolutely alarmed and really grateful for her old lover's protection, though regretting Gabriel's absence, whose company she would have much preferred as being more proper as well as more pleasant, since he was her own managing-man and servant. This, however, could not be helped. She would not, on any consideration, treat Bouldwood harshly, but once already ill-used him and the moon having risen and the gig being ready, she drove across the hilltop in the wending ways which led downward to oblivious obscurity as it seemed, for the moon and the hill it flooded with light were an appearance on a level, the rest of the world lying as a vast shady conclave between them. Bouldwood mounted his horse and followed in close speed. Thus they descended into the lowlands and the sounds of those left on the hill came like voices from the sky and the lights were as those of a camp in heaven. They soon passed the merry stragglers and the immediate vicinity of the hill, traversed Kingsbear and got upon the high road. The keen instincts of Belchiba had perceived that the farmer's staunch devotion to herself was still undiminished and re-sympathized deeply. The sight had quite depressed her this evening, had reminded her of her folly. She wished anew as she had wished many months ago for some means of making reparation for her fault. Hence her pity for the man who so persistently loved onto his own injury and permanent gloom had betrayed Belchiba into an injudicious considerateness of manner which appeared almost like tenderness and gave new vigor to the exquisite dream of a Jacob's seven years service in poor Boldwood's mind. He soon found an excuse for advancing from his position in the rear and rode close by her side. They had gone two or three miles in the moonlight, speaking desultorily across the wheel of her gig concerning the fare, farming, oak's usefulness to them both and other indifferent subjects. Belchiba said suddenly and simply, Mrs. Troy, you will marry again some day? This point-blank query unmistakably confused her and it was not till a minute or more had elapsed that she said, I have not seriously thought of any such subject. I quite understand that yet. Your late husband has been dead nearly one year and you forget that his death was never absolutely proved and may not have taken place so that I may not be really a widow, she said, catching at the straw of escape that the fact afforded. Not absolutely proved, perhaps, but it was proved circumstantially. A man saw him drowning to no reasonable person has any doubt of his death. Nor have you, ma'am, I should imagine. I have not now or I should have acted differently, she said gently. Certainly, at first, had a strange unaccountable feeling that he could not have perished but I have been able to explain that in several ways since but though I am fully persuaded that I shall see him no more, I am far from thinking of marriage with another. I should be very contemptible to indulge in such a thought. They were silent now a while and having struck into an unfrequented track across a common, sort of boldwood saddle and her gig springs were all the sounds to be heard. Boldwood ended the pause. Do you remember when I carried you fainting in my arms into the king's arms in Castor Bridge? Every dog has his day. That was mine. I know, I know it all, she said hurriedly. I, for one, shall never cease regretting that events so fell out as to deny you to me. I am very sorry, she said, and then checked herself. I mean, you know, I am sorry you thought I I have always this dreary pleasure in thinking over those past times with you that I was something to you before he was anything and that you belonged almost to me. But of course, that's nothing. You never liked me. I did and respected you too. Do you now? Yes. Which. How do you mean which? Do you like me or do you respect me? I don't know. At least I cannot tell you. It is difficult for a woman to define her feelings in language which is chiefly made by men to express theirs. My treatment of you was thoughtless, inexcusable, wicked. I shall eternally regret it. If there had been anything to make amends, I would most gladly have done it. There was nothing on earth I so longed to do as to repair the error. But that was not possible. Don't blame yourself. You are not so far in the wrong as you suppose, Bathsheba. Suppose you had real complete proof that you are what in fact you are a widow. Would you repair the old wrong to me by marrying me? I would say I shouldn't yet at any rate. But you might at some future time in your life? Oh yes, I might at some time. Well then, do you know that without further proof of any kind you may marry again in about six years from the present subject to nobody's objection or blame? Oh yes, she said quickly. I know all that, but don't talk of it. In six years where may we all be by that time? They will soon glide by and it will seem an astonishingly short time to look back upon when they are passed much less than to look forward to now. Yes, yes, I have found that in my own experience. Now listen once more, boldward pleaded. If I wait that time will you marry me? You own that you owe me a man's. Let that be your way of making them. But Mr. Boldward, six years, do you want to be the wife of any other man? No, indeed. I mean that I don't like to talk about this matter now. Perhaps it is not proper and I ought not to allow it. Let us drop it. My husband may be living as I said. Of course, I'll drop the subject if you wish, but society has nothing to do with reasons. I am a middle-aged man willing to protect you for the remainder of our lives. On your side, at least, there is no passion or blamable haste. On mine, perhaps there is, but I can't help seeing that if you choose from a feeling of pity and, as you say, a wish to make a man's to make a bargain with me for a far ahead time, an agreement which will set me happy later it may be. There is no fault to be found with you as a woman. Hadn't I the first place beside you? Haven't you been almost mine once already? Surely you can say to me as much as this. You will have me back again should circumstances permit? Now, pray, speak, oh, Bathsheba, promise, it's only a little promise that if you marry again marry me. His tone was so excited that she almost feared him at this moment, even whilst she sympathized. It was a simple physical fear the weak of the strong. There was no emotional aversion or inner repugnance. She said, with some distress in her voice, for she remembered vividly his outburst on the Yelbury Road and shrank from a repetition of his anger, she never married another man whilst you wished me to be your wife whatever comes, but to say more you have taken me so by surprise. But let it stand in these simple words that in six years time you will be my wife. Unexpected accidents will not mention because those, of course, must be given way to. Now, this time I know you will keep your word. That's why I hesitate to give it. Oh, but do give it. Remember the past and be kind. She breathed and then said mournfully, oh, what shall I do? I don't love you and I much fear that I never shall love you as much as a woman ought to love a husband. If you, sir, know that and I can yet give you happiness by a mere promise to marry at the end of six years if my husband should not come back it is a great honour to me and if you value such an act of friendship from a woman who doesn't esteem herself as she did and has little love left why I will promise consider if I cannot promise soon but soon is perhaps never Oh, no, it is not I mean soon Christmas will say Christmas He said nothing further till he added well, I'll say no more to you about it till that time Bathsheba was in a very peculiar state of mind which showed how entirely the soul is the slave of the body the ethereal spirit dependent for its quality upon the tangible flesh and blood it is hardly too much to say that she felt coerced by a force stronger than her own will not only into the act of promising upon this singularly remote and vague matter but into the emotion of fancying that she ought to promise when the weeks intervening between the night of this conversation and Christmas day began perceptibly to diminish her anxiety and perplexity increased today she was led by an accident into an oddly confidential dialogue with Gabriel about her difficulty it afforded her a little relief of a dull and cheerless kind they were auditing accounts and as something occurred in the course of their labours which led Oak to say speaking of boldwood he'll never forget you, ma'am never then out came her trouble before she was aware and she told him how she had again got into the toils what boldwood had asked her and how he was expecting her assent the most mournful reason of all for my agreeing to it she said sadly and the true reason why I think to do so for good or for evil is this it is a thing I have not breathed to a living soul as yet I believe that if I don't give my word he'll go out of his mind really, do ye said Gabriel gravely I believe this she continued with reckless frankness and heaven knows I say it in a spirit the very reverse of vain for I am grieved and troubled to my soul about it I believe I hold that man's future in my hand his career depends entirely upon my treatment of him, oh Gabriel I tremble at my responsibility for it is terrible well, I think this much ma'am as I told you years ago said oak that his life is a total blank whenever he isn't hoping for it but I can't suppose I hope that nothing so dreadful hangs on to it as you fancy his natural manner has always been dark and strange, you know but since the case is so sad and odd like why don't ye give the conditional promise I think I would what is it right some rash acts of my past life have taught me that a watched woman must have very much circumspection to retain only a very little credit and I do want and long to be discreet in this and six years why we may all be in our graves by that time even if Mr. Troy does not come back again which he may not impossibly do such thoughts give a sort of absurdity to the scheme now isn't it preposterous Gabriel however he came to dream of it I cannot think but is it wrong you know you are older than I eighty years older ma'am yes, eighty years and is it wrong perhaps it would be an uncommon agreement for a man and woman to make don't see really anything wrong about it said oak slowly in fact the very thing that makes it doubtful if you ought to marry and under any condition that is you're not caring about him for I may suppose yes you may suppose that love is wanting she said shortly love is an utterly bygone sorry worn out miserable thing with me for him anyone else well your want of love seems to me the one thing that takes away harm from such an agreement with him if wild heat had to do with it making you long to overcome the awkwardness about your husband's vanishing it may be wrong but a cold hearted agreement to oblige a man seems different somehow the real sin ma'am in my mind lies in thinking of ever a wedding with a man you don't love honest and true that I am willing to pay the penalty of said Bathsheba firmly you know Gabriel this is what I cannot get off my conscience that I once seriously injured him in sheer idleness if I had never played a trick upon him he would never have wanted to marry me oh if I could only pay some heavy damages in money to him for for the harm I did and so get the sin off my soul that way well there's the debt which can only be discharged in one way and I believe I am bound to do it if it honestly lies in my power without any consideration of my own future at all when a rake gambles away his expectations the fact that it is an inconvenient debt does not make him the less liable I've been a rake and the single point I ask you is your own scruples and the fact that in the eye of the law my husband is only missing will keep any man from marrying me until seven years have passed am I free to entertain such an idea even though it is a sort of penance for it will be that I hate the act of marriage under such circumstances and the class of women I should seem to belong to by doing it it seems to me that already depends upon where you think everybody else do that your husband is dead yes I've long ceased to doubt that I well know what would have brought him back long before this time if he had lived well then in a religious sense you will be as free to think a marrying again as any real widow of one year standing but why don't you ask Mr. Thirdly's advice on how to treat Mr. Bouldwood no when I want a broad minded opinion for general enlightenment distinct from special advice I never go to a man who deals in the subject professionally so I like the Parsons opinion on law the lawyers on doctoring the doctors on business and my business man's that is yours on morals and all in love my own she spoke with a grave smile she did not reply at once and then saying good evening Mr. Oh went away she had spoken frankly and neither asked nor expected any reply from Gabriel more satisfactory than that she had obtained yet in the center most parts of her complicated heart there existed at this minute a little pang of disappointment for a reason she would not allow herself to recognize ok had not once wished her free that he might marry her himself had not once said I could wait for you as well as he that was the insect sting not that she would have listened to any such hypothesis oh no for wasn't she saying all the time that such thoughts of the future were improper and wasn't Gabriel far too poor a man to speak sentiment to her yet he might have just hinted about that old love of his and asked in a playful offhand way if he might speak of it it would have seemed pretty and sweet if no more and then she would have shown how kind and inoffensive a woman's know can sometimes be but to give such cool advice the very advice she had asked for it ruffled our heroine all the afternoon end of chapter 51 recording by John leader Bloomington Illinois