Part 44 (1/2)

”I could wors.h.i.+p ye, Buzz, for saying that,” remarked Nance Mockridge.

”I do like to see the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g pulled off such Christmas candles. I am quite unequal to the part of villain myself, or I'd gi'e all my small silver to see that lady toppered....And perhaps I shall soon,” she added significantly.

”That's not a n.o.ble pa.s.siont for a 'oman to keep up,” said Longways.

Nance did not reply, but every one knew what she meant. The ideas diffused by the reading of Lucetta's letters at Peter's Finger had condensed into a scandal, which was spreading like a miasmatic fog through Mixen Lane, and thence up the back streets of Casterbridge.

The mixed a.s.semblage of idlers known to each other presently fell apart into two bands by a process of natural selection, the frequenters of Peter's Finger going off Mixen Lanewards, where most of them lived, while Coney, Buzzford, Longways, and that connection remained in the street.

”You know what's brewing down there, I suppose?” said Buzzford mysteriously to the others.

Coney looked at him. ”Not the skimmity-ride?”

Buzzford nodded.

”I have my doubts if it will be carried out,” said Longways. ”If they are getting it up they are keeping it mighty close.

”I heard they were thinking of it a fortnight ago, at all events.”

”If I were sure o't I'd lay information,” said Longways emphatically.

”'Tis too rough a joke, and apt to wake riots in towns. We know that the Scotchman is a right enough man, and that his lady has been a right enough 'oman since she came here, and if there was anything wrong about her afore, that's their business, not ours.”

Coney reflected. Farfrae was still liked in the community; but it must be owned that, as the Mayor and man of money, engrossed with affairs and ambitions, he had lost in the eyes of the poorer inhabitants something of that wondrous charm which he had had for them as a light-hearted penniless young man, who sang ditties as readily as the birds in the trees. Hence the anxiety to keep him from annoyance showed not quite the ardour that would have animated it in former days.

”Suppose we make inquiration into it, Christopher,” continued Longways; ”and if we find there's really anything in it, drop a letter to them most concerned, and advise 'em to keep out of the way?”

This course was decided on, and the group separated, Buzzford saying to Coney, ”Come, my ancient friend; let's move on. There's nothing more to see here.”

These well-intentioned ones would have been surprised had they known how ripe the great jocular plot really was. ”Yes, to-night,” Jopp had said to the Peter's party at the corner of Mixen Lane. ”As a wind-up to the Royal visit the hit will be all the more pat by reason of their great elevation to-day.”

To him, at least, it was not a joke, but a retaliation.

38.

The proceedings had been brief--too brief--to Lucetta whom an intoxicating Weltl.u.s.t had fairly mastered; but they had brought her a great triumph nevertheless. The shake of the Royal hand still lingered in her fingers; and the chit-chat she had overheard, that her husband might possibly receive the honour of knighthood, though idle to a degree, seemed not the wildest vision; stranger things had occurred to men so good and captivating as her Scotchman was.

After the collision with the Mayor, Henchard had withdrawn behind the ladies' stand; and there he stood, regarding with a stare of abstraction the spot on the lapel of his coat where Farfrae's hand had seized it.

He put his own hand there, as if he could hardly realize such an outrage from one whom it had once been his wont to treat with ardent generosity.

While pausing in this half-stupefied state the conversation of Lucetta with the other ladies reached his ears; and he distinctly heard her deny him--deny that he had a.s.sisted Donald, that he was anything more than a common journeyman.

He moved on homeward, and met Jopp in the archway to the Bull Stake. ”So you've had a snub,” said Jopp.

”And what if I have?” answered Henchard sternly.

”Why, I've had one too, so we are both under the same cold shade.” He briefly related his attempt to win Lucetta's intercession.

Henchard merely heard his story, without taking it deeply in. His own relation to Farfrae and Lucetta overshadowed all kindred ones. He went on saying brokenly to himself, ”She has supplicated to me in her time; and now her tongue won't own me nor her eyes see me!... And he--how angry he looked. He drove me back as if I were a bull breaking fence.... I took it like a lamb, for I saw it could not be settled there. He can rub brine on a green wound!... But he shall pay for it, and she shall be sorry. It must come to a tussle--face to face; and then we'll see how a c.o.xcomb can front a man!”