Part 49 (1/2)

Henchard, however, leaving the town by the east road, proceeded to the second, or stone bridge, and thence struck into this path of solitude, following its course beside the stream till the dark shapes of the Ten Hatches cut the sheen thrown upon the river by the weak l.u.s.tre that still lingered in the west. In a second or two he stood beside the weir-hole where the water was at its deepest. He looked backwards and forwards, and no creature appeared in view. He then took off his coat and hat, and stood on the brink of the stream with his hands clasped in front of him.

While his eyes were bent on the water beneath there slowly became visible a something floating in the circular pool formed by the wash of centuries; the pool he was intending to make his death-bed. At first it was indistinct by reason of the shadow from the bank; but it emerged thence and took shape, which was that of a human body, lying stiff and stark upon the surface of the stream.

In the circular current imparted by the central flow the form was brought forward, till it pa.s.sed under his eyes; and then he perceived with a sense of horror that it was HIMSELF. Not a man somewhat resembling him, but one in all respects his counterpart, his actual double, was floating as if dead in Ten Hatches Hole.

The sense of the supernatural was strong in this unhappy man, and he turned away as one might have done in the actual presence of an appalling miracle. He covered his eyes and bowed his head. Without looking again into the stream he took his coat and hat, and went slowly away.

Presently he found himself by the door of his own dwelling. To his surprise Elizabeth-Jane was standing there. She came forward, spoke, called him ”father” just as before. Newson, then, had not even yet returned.

”I thought you seemed very sad this morning,” she said, ”so I have come again to see you. Not that I am anything but sad myself. But everybody and everything seem against you so, and I know you must be suffering.”

How this woman divined things! Yet she had not divined their whole extremity.

He said to her, ”Are miracles still worked, do ye think, Elizabeth? I am not a read man. I don't know so much as I could wish. I have tried to peruse and learn all my life; but the more I try to know the more ignorant I seem.”

”I don't quite think there are any miracles nowadays,” she said.

”No interference in the case of desperate intentions, for instance?

Well, perhaps not, in a direct way. Perhaps not. But will you come and walk with me, and I will show 'ee what I mean.”

She agreed willingly, and he took her over the highway, and by the lonely path to Ten Hatches. He walked restlessly, as if some haunting shade, unseen of her, hovered round him and troubled his glance. She would gladly have talked of Lucetta, but feared to disturb him. When they got near the weir he stood still, and asked her to go forward and look into the pool, and tell him what she saw.

She went, and soon returned to him. ”Nothing,” she said.

”Go again,” said Henchard, ”and look narrowly.”

She proceeded to the river brink a second time. On her return, after some delay, she told him that she saw something floating round and round there; but what it was she could not discern. It seemed to be a bundle of old clothes.

”Are they like mine?” asked Henchard.

”Well--they are. Dear me--I wonder if--Father, let us go away!”

”Go and look once more; and then we will get home.”

She went back, and he could see her stoop till her head was close to the margin of the pool. She started up, and hastened back to his side.

”Well,” said Henchard; ”what do you say now?”

”Let us go home.”

”But tell me--do--what is it floating there?”

”The effigy,” she answered hastily. ”They must have thrown it into the river higher up amongst the willows at Blackwater, to get rid of it in their alarm at discovery by the magistrates, and it must have floated down here.”

”Ah--to be sure--the image o' me! But where is the other? Why that one only?... That performance of theirs killed her, but kept me alive!”

Elizabeth-Jane thought and thought of these words ”kept me alive,” as they slowly retraced their way to the town, and at length guessed their meaning. ”Father!--I will not leave you alone like this!” she cried.

”May I live with you, and tend upon you as I used to do? I do not mind your being poor. I would have agreed to come this morning, but you did not ask me.”