Part 11 (1/2)
”I don't mean that,” he said hastily. ”I mean before that time. I know it was not your fault; but those women friends of yours gave you bad advice. If they hadn't, or you hadn't taken it, we should at this moment have been free from a bond which, not to mince matters, galls both of us devilishly. It may be very sad, but it is true.”
”Who's been telling you about my friends? What advice? I insist upon you telling me.”
”Pooh-I'd rather not.”
”But you shall-you ought to. It is mean of 'ee not to!”
”Very well.” And he hinted gently what had been revealed to him. ”But I don't wish to dwell upon it. Let us say no more about it.”
Her defensive manner collapsed. ”That was nothing,” she said, laughing coldly. ”Every woman has a right to do such as that. The risk is hers.”
”I quite deny it, Bella. She might if no lifelong penalty attached to it for the man, or, in his default, for herself; if the weakness of the moment could end with the moment, or even with the year. But when effects stretch so far she should not go and do that which entraps a man if he is honest, or herself if he is otherwise.”
”What ought I to have done?”
”Given me time... Why do you fuss yourself about melting down that pig's fat to-night? Please put it away!”
”Then I must do it to-morrow morning. It won't keep.”
”Very well-do.”
XI
Next morning, which was Sunday, she resumed operations about ten o'clock; and the renewed work recalled the conversation which had accompanied it the night before, and put her back into the same intractable temper.
”That's the story about me in Marygreen, is it-that I entrapped 'ee? Much of a catch you were, Lord send!” As she warmed she saw some of Jude's dear ancient cla.s.sics on a table where they ought not to have been laid. ”I won't have them books here in the way!” she cried petulantly; and seizing them one by one she began throwing them upon the floor.
”Leave my books alone!” he said. ”You might have thrown them aside if you had liked, but as to soiling them like that, it is disgusting!” In the operation of making lard Arabella's hands had become smeared with the hot grease, and her fingers consequently left very perceptible imprints on the book-covers. She continued deliberately to toss the books severally upon the floor, till Jude, incensed beyond bearing, caught her by the arms to make her leave off. Somehow, in going so, he loosened the fastening of her hair, and it rolled about her ears.
”Let me go!” she said.
”Promise to leave the books alone.”
She hesitated. ”Let me go!” she repeated.
”Promise!”
After a pause: ”I do.”
Jude relinquished his hold, and she crossed the room to the door, out of which she went with a set face, and into the highway. Here she began to saunter up and down, perversely pulling her hair into a worse disorder than he had caused, and unfastening several b.u.t.tons of her gown. It was a fine Sunday morning, dry, clear and frosty, and the bells of Alfredston Church could be heard on the breeze from the north. People were going along the road, dressed in their holiday clothes; they were mainly lovers-such pairs as Jude and Arabella had been when they sported along the same track some months earlier. These pedestrians turned to stare at the extraordinary spectacle she now presented, bonnetless, her dishevelled hair blowing in the wind, her bodice apart, her sleeves rolled above her elbows for her work, and her hands reeking with melted fat. One of the pa.s.sers said in mock terror: ”Good Lord deliver us!”
”See how he's served me!” she cried. ”Making me work Sunday mornings when I ought to be going to my church, and tearing my hair off my head, and my gown off my back!”
Jude was exasperated, and went out to drag her in by main force. Then he suddenly lost his heat. Illuminated with the sense that all was over between them, and that it mattered not what she did, or he, her husband stood still, regarding her. Their lives were ruined, he thought; ruined by the fundamental error of their matrimonial union: that of having based a permanent contract on a temporary feeling which had no necessary connection with affinities that alone render a lifelong comrades.h.i.+p tolerable.
”Going to ill-use me on principle, as your father ill-used your mother, and your father's sister ill-used her husband?” she asked. ”All you be a queer lot as husbands and wives!”
Jude fixed an arrested, surprised look on her. But she said no more, and continued her saunter till she was tired. He left the spot, and, after wandering vaguely a little while, walked in the direction of Marygreen. Here he called upon his great-aunt, whose infirmities daily increased.