Tess of the d'Urbervilles

LVIII

The night was strangely solemn and still. In the small hours she
whispered to him the whole story of how he had walked in his sleep with
her in his arms across the Froom stream, at the imminent risk of both
their lives, and laid her down in the stone coffin at the ruined abbey.
He had never known of that till now.

“Why didn’t you tell me next day?” he said. “It might have prevented
much misunderstanding and woe.”

“Don’t think of what’s past!” said she. “I am not going to think
outside of now. Why should we! Who knows what to-morrow has in store?”

But it apparently had no sorrow. The morning was wet and foggy, and
Clare, rightly informed that the caretaker only opened the windows on
fine days, ventured to creep out of their chamber and explore the
house, leaving Tess asleep. There was no food on the premises, but
there was water, and he took advantage of the fog to emerge from the
mansion and fetch tea, bread, and butter from a shop in a little place
two miles beyond, as also a small tin kettle and spirit-lamp, that they
might get fire without smoke. His re-entry awoke her; and they
breakfasted on what he had brought.

They were indisposed to stir abroad, and the day passed, and the night
following, and the next, and next; till, almost without their being
aware, five days had slipped by in absolute seclusion, not a sight or
sound of a human being disturbing their peacefulness, such as it was.
The changes of the weather were their only events, the birds of the New
Forest their only company. By tacit consent they hardly once spoke of
any incident of the past subsequent to their wedding-day. The gloomy
intervening time seemed to sink into chaos, over which the present and
prior times closed as if it never had been. Whenever he suggested that
they should leave their shelter, and go forwards towards Southampton or
London, she showed a strange unwillingness to move.

“Why should we put an end to all that’s sweet and lovely!” she
deprecated. “What must come will come.” And, looking through the
shutter-chink: “All is trouble outside there; inside here content.”

He peeped out also. It was quite true; within was affection, union,
error forgiven: outside was the inexorable.

“And—and,” she said, pressing her cheek against his, “I fear that what
you think of me now may not last. I do not wish to outlive your present
feeling for me. I would rather not. I would rather be dead and buried
when the time comes for you to despise me, so that it may never be
known to me that you despised me.”

“I cannot ever despise you.”

“I also hope that. But considering what my life has been, I cannot see
why any man should, sooner or later, be able to help despising me....
How wickedly mad I was! Yet formerly I never could bear to hurt a fly
or a worm, and the sight of a bird in a cage used often to make me
cry.”

They remained yet another day. In the night the dull sky cleared, and
the result was that the old caretaker at the cottage awoke early. The
brilliant sunrise made her unusually brisk; she decided to open the
contiguous mansion immediately, and to air it thoroughly on such a day.
Thus it occurred that, having arrived and opened the lower rooms before
six o’clock, she ascended to the bedchambers, and was about to turn the
handle of the one wherein they lay. At that moment she fancied she
could hear the breathing of persons within. Her slippers and her
antiquity had rendered her progress a noiseless one so far, and she
made for instant retreat; then, deeming that her hearing might have
deceived her, she turned anew to the door and softly tried the handle.
The lock was out of order, but a piece of furniture had been moved
forward on the inside, which prevented her opening the door more than
an inch or two. A stream of morning light through the shutter-chink
fell upon the faces of the pair, wrapped in profound slumber, Tess’s
lips being parted like a half-opened flower near his cheek. The
caretaker was so struck with their innocent appearance, and with the
elegance of Tess’s gown hanging across a chair, her silk stockings
beside it, the pretty parasol, and the other habits in which she had
arrived because she had none else, that her first indignation at the
effrontery of tramps and vagabonds gave way to a momentary
sentimentality over this genteel elopement, as it seemed. She closed
the door, and withdrew as softly as she had come, to go and consult
with her neighbours on the odd discovery.

Not more than a minute had elapsed after her withdrawal when Tess woke,
and then Clare. Both had a sense that something had disturbed them,
though they could not say what; and the uneasy feeling which it
engendered grew stronger. As soon as he was dressed he narrowly scanned
the lawn through the two or three inches of shutter-chink.

“I think we will leave at once,” said he. “It is a fine day. And I
cannot help fancying somebody is about the house. At any rate, the
woman will be sure to come to-day.”

She passively assented, and putting the room in order, they took up the
few articles that belonged to them, and departed noiselessly. When they
had got into the Forest she turned to take a last look at the house.

“Ah, happy house—goodbye!” she said. “My life can only be a question of
a few weeks. Why should we not have stayed there?”

“Don’t say it, Tess! We shall soon get out of this district altogether.
We’ll continue our course as we’ve begun it, and keep straight north.
Nobody will think of looking for us there. We shall be looked for at
the Wessex ports if we are sought at all. When we are in the north we
will get to a port and away.”

Having thus persuaded her, the plan was pursued, and they kept a
bee-line northward. Their long repose at the manor-house lent them
walking power now; and towards mid-day they found that they were
approaching the steepled city of Melchester, which lay directly in
their way. He decided to rest her in a clump of trees during the
afternoon, and push onward under cover of darkness. At dusk Clare
purchased food as usual, and their night march began, the boundary
between Upper and Mid-Wessex being crossed about eight o’clock.

To walk across country without much regard to roads was not new to
Tess, and she showed her old agility in the performance. The
intercepting city, ancient Melchester, they were obliged to pass
through in order to take advantage of the town bridge for crossing a
large river that obstructed them. It was about midnight when they went
along the deserted streets, lighted fitfully by the few lamps, keeping
off the pavement that it might not echo their footsteps. The graceful
pile of cathedral architecture rose dimly on their left hand, but it
was lost upon them now. Once out of the town they followed the
turnpike-road, which after a few miles plunged across an open plain.

Though the sky was dense with cloud, a diffused light from some
fragment of a moon had hitherto helped them a little. But the moon had
now sunk, the clouds seemed to settle almost on their heads, and the
night grew as dark as a cave. However, they found their way along,
keeping as much on the turf as possible that their tread might not
resound, which it was easy to do, there being no hedge or fence of any
kind. All around was open loneliness and black solitude, over which a
stiff breeze blew.

They had proceeded thus gropingly two or three miles further when on a
sudden Clare became conscious of some vast erection close in his front,
rising sheer from the grass. They had almost struck themselves against
it.

“What monstrous place is this?” said Angel.

“It hums,” said she. “Hearken!”

He listened. The wind, playing upon the edifice, produced a booming
tune, like the note of some gigantic one-stringed harp. No other sound
came from it, and lifting his hand and advancing a step or two, Clare
felt the vertical surface of the structure. It seemed to be of solid
stone, without joint or moulding. Carrying his fingers onward he found
that what he had come in contact with was a colossal rectangular
pillar; by stretching out his left hand he could feel a similar one
adjoining. At an indefinite height overhead something made the black
sky blacker, which had the semblance of a vast architrave uniting the
pillars horizontally. They carefully entered beneath and between; the
surfaces echoed their soft rustle; but they seemed to be still out of
doors. The place was roofless. Tess drew her breath fearfully, and
Angel, perplexed, said—

“What can it be?”

Feeling sideways they encountered another tower-like pillar, square and
uncompromising as the first; beyond it another and another. The place
was all doors and pillars, some connected above by continuous
architraves.

“A very Temple of the Winds,” he said.

The next pillar was isolated; others composed a trilithon; others were
prostrate, their flanks forming a causeway wide enough for a carriage;
and it was soon obvious that they made up a forest of monoliths grouped
upon the grassy expanse of the plain. The couple advanced further into
this pavilion of the night till they stood in its midst.

“It is Stonehenge!” said Clare.

“The heathen temple, you mean?”

“Yes. Older than the centuries; older than the d’Urbervilles! Well,
what shall we do, darling? We may find shelter further on.”

But Tess, really tired by this time, flung herself upon an oblong slab
that lay close at hand, and was sheltered from the wind by a pillar.
Owing to the action of the sun during the preceding day, the stone was
warm and dry, in comforting contrast to the rough and chill grass
around, which had damped her skirts and shoes.

“I don’t want to go any further, Angel,” she said, stretching out her
hand for his. “Can’t we bide here?”

“I fear not. This spot is visible for miles by day, although it does
not seem so now.”

“One of my mother’s people was a shepherd hereabouts, now I think of
it. And you used to say at Talbothays that I was a heathen. So now I am
at home.”

He knelt down beside her outstretched form, and put his lips upon hers.

“Sleepy are you, dear? I think you are lying on an altar.”

“I like very much to be here,” she murmured. “It is so solemn and
lonely—after my great happiness—with nothing but the sky above my face.
It seems as if there were no folk in the world but we two; and I wish
there were not—except ’Liza-Lu.”

Clare thought she might as well rest here till it should get a little
lighter, and he flung his overcoat upon her, and sat down by her side.

“Angel, if anything happens to me, will you watch over ’Liza-Lu for my
sake?” she asked, when they had listened a long time to the wind among
the pillars.

“I will.”

“She is so good and simple and pure. O, Angel—I wish you would marry
her if you lose me, as you will do shortly. O, if you would!”

“If I lose you I lose all! And she is my sister-in-law.”

“That’s nothing, dearest. People marry sister-laws continually about
Marlott; and ’Liza-Lu is so gentle and sweet, and she is growing so
beautiful. O, I could share you with her willingly when we are spirits!
If you would train her and teach her, Angel, and bring her up for your
own self!... She had all the best of me without the bad of me; and if
she were to become yours it would almost seem as if death had not
divided us... Well, I have said it. I won’t mention it again.”

She ceased, and he fell into thought. In the far north-east sky he
could see between the pillars a level streak of light. The uniform
concavity of black cloud was lifting bodily like the lid of a pot,
letting in at the earth’s edge the coming day, against which the
towering monoliths and trilithons began to be blackly defined.

“Did they sacrifice to God here?” asked she.

“No,” said he.

“Who to?”

“I believe to the sun. That lofty stone set away by itself is in the
direction of the sun, which will presently rise behind it.”

“This reminds me, dear,” she said. “You remember you never would
interfere with any belief of mine before we were married? But I knew
your mind all the same, and I thought as you thought—not from any
reasons of my own, but because you thought so. Tell me now, Angel, do
you think we shall meet again after we are dead? I want to know.”

He kissed her to avoid a reply at such a time.

“O, Angel—I fear that means no!” said she, with a suppressed sob. “And
I wanted so to see you again—so much, so much! What—not even you and I,
Angel, who love each other so well?”

Like a greater than himself, to the critical question at the critical
time he did not answer; and they were again silent. In a minute or two
her breathing became more regular, her clasp of his hand relaxed, and
she fell asleep. The band of silver paleness along the east horizon
made even the distant parts of the Great Plain appear dark and near;
and the whole enormous landscape bore that impress of reserve,
taciturnity, and hesitation which is usual just before day. The
eastward pillars and their architraves stood up blackly against the
light, and the great flame-shaped Sun-stone beyond them; and the Stone
of Sacrifice midway. Presently the night wind died out, and the
quivering little pools in the cup-like hollows of the stones lay still.
At the same time something seemed to move on the verge of the dip
eastward—a mere dot. It was the head of a man approaching them from the
hollow beyond the Sun-stone. Clare wished they had gone onward, but in
the circumstances decided to remain quiet. The figure came straight
towards the circle of pillars in which they were.

He heard something behind him, the brush of feet. Turning, he saw over
the prostrate columns another figure; then before he was aware, another
was at hand on the right, under a trilithon, and another on the left.
The dawn shone full on the front of the man westward, and Clare could
discern from this that he was tall, and walked as if trained. They all
closed in with evident purpose. Her story then was true! Springing to
his feet, he looked around for a weapon, loose stone, means of escape,
anything. By this time the nearest man was upon him.

“It is no use, sir,” he said. “There are sixteen of us on the Plain,
and the whole country is reared.”

“Let her finish her sleep!” he implored in a whisper of the men as they
gathered round.

When they saw where she lay, which they had not done till then, they
showed no objection, and stood watching her, as still as the pillars
around. He went to the stone and bent over her, holding one poor little
hand; her breathing now was quick and small, like that of a lesser
creature than a woman. All waited in the growing light, their faces and
hands as if they were silvered, the remainder of their figures dark,
the stones glistening green-gray, the Plain still a mass of shade. Soon
the light was strong, and a ray shone upon her unconscious form,
peering under her eyelids and waking her.

“What is it, Angel?” she said, starting up. “Have they come for me?”

“Yes, dearest,” he said. “They have come.”

“It is as it should be,” she murmured. “Angel, I am almost glad—yes,
glad! This happiness could not have lasted. It was too much. I have had
enough; and now I shall not live for you to despise me!”

She stood up, shook herself, and went forward, neither of the men
having moved.

“I am ready,” she said quietly.