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CHAPTER XI - OUTSIDE THE BARRACKS -- SNOW -- A MEETING
FOR dreariness nothing could surpass a prospect in the
outskirts of a certain town and military station, many miles
north of Weatherbury, at a later hour on this same snowy
evening -- if that may be called a prospect of which the
chief constituent was darkness.
It was a night when sorrow may come to the brightest without
causing any great sense of incongruity: when, with
impressible persons, love becomes solicitousness, hope sinks
to misgiving, and faith to hope: when the exercise of
memory does not stir feelings of regret at opportunities for
ambition that have been passed by, and anticipation does not
prompt to enterprise.
The scene was a public path, bordered on the left hand by a
river, behind which rose a high wall. On the right was a
tract of land, partly meadow and partly moor, reaching, at
its remote verge, to a wide undulating upland.
The changes of the seasons are less obtrusive on spots of
this kind than amid woodland scenery. Still, to a close
observer, they are just as perceptible; the difference is
that their media of manifestation are less trite and
familiar than such well-known ones as the bursting of the
buds or the fall of the leaf. Many are not so stealthy and
gradual as we may be apt to imagine in considering the
general torpidity of a moor or waste. Winter, in coming to
the country hereabout, advanced in well-marked stages,
wherein might have been successively observed the retreat of
the snakes, the transformation of the ferns, the filling of
the pools, a rising of fogs, the embrowning by frost, the
collapse of the fungi, and an obliteration by snow.
This climax of the series had been reached to-night on the
aforesaid moor, and for the first time in the season its
irregularities were forms without features; suggestive of
anything, proclaiming nothing, and without more character
than that of being the limit of something else -- the lowest
layer of a firmament of snow. From this chaotic skyful of
crowding flakes the mead and moor momentarily received
additional clothing, only to appear momentarily more naked
thereby. The vast arch of cloud above was strangely low,
and formed as it were the roof of a large dark cavern,
gradually sinking in upon its floor; for the instinctive
thought was that the snow lining the heavens and that
encrusting the earth would soon unite into one mass without
any intervening stratum of air at all.
We turn our attention to the left-hand characteristics;
which were flatness in respect of the river, verticality in
respect of the wall behind it, and darkness as to both.
These features made up the mass. If anything could be
darker than the sky, it was the wall, and if any thing could
be gloomier than the wall it was the river beneath. The
indistinct summit of the facade was notched and pronged by
chimneys here and there, and upon its face were faintly
signified the oblong shapes of windows, though only in the
upper part. Below, down to the water's edge, the flat was
unbroken by hole or projection.
An indescribable succession of dull blows, perplexing in
their regularity, sent their sound with difficulty through
the fluffy atmosphere. It was a neighbouring clock striking
ten. The bell was in the open air, and being overlaid with
several inches of muffling snow, had lost its voice for the
time.
About this hour the snow abated: ten flakes fell where
twenty had fallen, then one had the room of ten. Not long
after a form moved by the brink of the river.
By its outline upon the colourless background, a close
observer might have seen that it was small. This was all
that was positively discoverable, though it seemed human.
The shape went slowly along, but without much exertion, for
the snow, though sudden, was not as yet more than two inches
deep. At this time some words were spoken aloud: --
"One. Two. Three. Four. Five."
Between each utterance the little shape advanced about half
a dozen yards. It was evident now that the windows high in
the wall were being counted. The word "Five" represented
the fifth window from the end of the wall.
Here the spot stopped, and dwindled smaller. The figure was
stooping. Then a morsel of snow flew across the river
towards the fifth window. It smacked against the wall at a
point several yards from its mark. The throw was the idea
of a man conjoined with the execution of a woman. No man
who had ever seen bird, rabbit, or squirrel in his
childhood, could possibly have thrown with such utter
imbecility as was shown here.
Another attempt, and another; till by degrees the wall must
have become pimpled with the adhering lumps of snow. At last
one fragment struck the fifth window.
The river would have been seen by day to be of that deep
smooth sort which races middle and sides with the same
gliding precision, any irregularities of speed being
immediately corrected by a small whirlpool. Nothing was
heard in reply to the signal but the gurgle and cluck of one
of these invisible wheels -- together with a few small
sounds which a sad man would have called moans, and a happy
man laughter -- caused by the flapping of the waters against
trifling objects in other parts of the stream.
The window was struck again in the same manner.
Then a noise was heard, apparently produced by the opening
of the window. This was followed by a voice from the same
quarter.
"Who's there?"
The tones were masculine, and not those of surprise. The
high wall being that of a barrack, and marriage being looked
upon with disfavour in the army, assignations and
communications had probably been made across the river
before tonight.
"Is it Sergeant Troy?" said the blurred spot in the snow,
tremulously.
This person was so much like a mere shade upon the earth,
and the other speaker so much a part of the building, that
one would have said the wall was holding a conversation with
the snow.
"Yes," came suspiciously from the shadow. "What girl are
you?"
"Oh, Frank -- don't you know me?" said the spot. "Your
wife, Fanny Robin."
"Fanny!" said the wall, in utter astonishment.
"Yes," said the girl, with a half-suppressed gasp of
emotion.
There was something in the woman's tone which is not that of
the wife, and there was a manner in the man which is rarely
a husband's. The dialogue went on:
"How did you come here?"
"I asked which was your window. Forgive me!"
"I did not expect you to-night. Indeed, I did not think you
would come at all. It was a wonder you found me here. I am
orderly to-morrow."
"You said I was to come."
"Well -- I said that you might."
"Yes, I mean that I might. You are glad to see me, Frank?"
"Oh yes -- of course."
"Can you -- come to me!"
My dear Fan, no! The bugle has sounded, the barrack gates
are closed, and I have no leave. We are all of us as good
as in the county gaol till to-morrow morning."
"Then I shan't see you till then!" The words were in a
faltering tone of disappointment.
"How did you get here from Weatherbury?"
"I walked -- some part of the way -- the rest by the
carriers."
"I am surprised."
"Yes -- so am I. And Frank, when will it be?"
"What?"
"That you promised."
"I don't quite recollect."
"O you do! Don't speak like that. It weighs me to the
earth. It makes me say what ought to be said first by you."
"Never mind -- say it."
"O, must I? -- it is, when shall we be married, Frank?"
"Oh, I see. Well -- you have to get proper clothes."
"I have money. Will it be by banns or license?"
"Banns, I should think."
"And we live in two parishes."
"Do we? What then?"
"My lodgings are in St. Mary's, and this is not. So they
will have to be published in both."
"Is that the law?"
"Yes. O Frank -- you think me forward, I am afraid! Don't,
dear Frank -- will you -- for I love you so. And you said
lots of times you would marry me, and and -- I -- I -- I ---
-"
"Don't cry, now! It is foolish. If I said so, of course I
will."
"And shall I put up the banns in my parish, and will you in
yours?"
"Yes"
"To-morrow?"
"Not tomorrow. We'll settle in a few days."
"You have the permission of the officers?"
"No, not yet."
"O -- how is it? You said you almost had before you left
Casterbridge."
"The fact is, I forgot to ask. Your coming like this is so
sudden and unexpected."
"Yes -- yes -- it is. It was wrong of me to worry you.
I'll go away now. Will you come and see me to-morrow, at
Mrs. Twills's, in North Street? I don't like to come to the
Barracks. There are bad women about, and they think me
one."
"Quite, so. I'll come to you, my dear. Good-night."
"Good-night, Frank -- good-night!"
And the noise was again heard of a window closing. The
little spot moved away. When she passed the corner a
subdued exclamation was heard inside the wall.
"Ho -- ho -- Sergeant -- ho -- ho!" An expostulation
followed, but it was indistinct; and it became lost amid a
low peal of laughter, which was hardly distinguishable from
the gurgle of the tiny whirlpools outside.
Content of CHAPTER XI - OUTSIDE THE BARRACKS -- SNOW -- A MEETING [Thomas Hardy's novel: Far From The Madding Crowd]
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Read next: CHAPTER XII - FARMERS -- A RULE -- IN EXCEPTION
Read previous: CHAPTER X - MISTRESS AND MEN
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