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CHAPTER XLVIII - DOUBTS ARISE -- DOUBTS LINGER
BATHSHEBA underwent the enlargement of her husband's absence
from hours to days with a slight feeling of surprise, and a
slight feeling of relief; yet neither sensation rose at any
time far above the level commonly designated as
indifference. She belonged to him: the certainties of that
position were so well defined, and the reasonable
probabilities of its issue so bounded that she could not
speculate on contingencies. Taking no further interest in
herself as a splendid woman, she acquired the indifferent
feelings of an outsider in contemplating her probable fate
as a singular wretch; for Bathsheba drew herself and her
future in colours that no reality could exceed for darkness.
Her original vigorous pride of youth had sickened, and with
it had declined all her anxieties about coming years, since
anxiety recognizes a better and a worse alternative, and
Bathsheba had made up her mind that alternatives on any
noteworthy scale had ceased for her. Soon, or later -- and
that not very late -- her husband would be home again. And
then the days of their tenancy of the Upper Farm would be
numbered. There had originally been shown by the agent to
the estate some distrust of Bathsheba's tenure as James
Everdene's successor, on the score of her sex, and her
youth, and her beauty; but the peculiar nature of her
uncle's will, his own frequent testimony before his death to
her cleverness in such a pursuit, and her vigorous
marshalling of the numerous flocks and herds which came
suddenly into her hands before negotiations were concluded,
had won confidence in her powers, and no further objections
had been raised. She had latterly been in great doubt as to
what the legal effects of her marriage would be upon her
position; but no notice had been taken as yet of her change
of name, and only one point was clear -- that in the event
of her own or her husband's inability to meet the agent at
the forthcoming January rent-day, very little consideration
would be shown, and, for that matter, very little would be
deserved. Once out of the farm, the approach of poverty
would be sure.
Hence Bathsheba lived in a perception that her purposes were
broken off. She was not a woman who could hope on without
good materials for the process, differing thus from the less
far-sighted and energetic, though more petted ones of the
sex, with whom hope goes on as a sort of clockwork which the
merest food and shelter are sufficient to wind up; and
perceiving clearly that her mistake had been a fatal one,
she accepted her position, and waited coldly for the end.
The first Saturday after Troy's departure she went to
Casterbridge alone, a journey she had not before taken since
her marriage. On this Saturday Bathsheba was passing slowly
on foot through the crowd of rural business-men gathered as
usual in front of the market-house, who were as usual gazed
upon by the burghers with feelings that those healthy lives
were dearly paid for by exclusion from possible
aldermanship, when a man, who had apparently been following
her, said some words to another on her left hand.
Bathsheba's ears were keen as those of any wild animal, and
she distinctly heard what the speaker said, though her back
was towards him.
"I am looking for Mrs. Troy. Is that she there?"
"Yes; that's the young lady, I believe," said the the person
addressed.
"I have some awkward news to break to her. Her husband is
drowned."
As if endowed with the spirit of prophecy, Bathsheba gasped
out, "No, it is not true; it cannot be true!" Then she said
and heard no more. The ice of self-command which had
latterly gathered over her was broken, and the currents
burst forth again, and over whelmed her. A darkness came
into her eyes, and she fell.
But not to the ground. A gloomy man, who had been observing
her from under the portico of the old corn-exchange when she
passed through the group without, stepped quickly to her
side at the moment of her exclamation, and caught her in his
arms as she sank down.
"What is it?" said Boldwood, looking up at the bringer of
the big news, as he supported her.
"Her husband was drowned this week while bathing in Lulwind
Cove. A coastguardsman found his clothes, and brought them
into Budmouth yesterday."
Thereupon a strange fire lighted up Boldwood's eye, and his
face flushed with the suppressed excitement of an
unutterable thought. Everybody's glance was now centred
upon him and the unconscious Bathsheba. He lifted her
bodily off the ground, and smoothed down the folds of her
dress as a child might have taken a storm-beaten bird and
arranged its ruffled plumes, and bore her along the pavement
to the King's Arms Inn. Here he passed with her under the
archway into a private room; and by the time he had
deposited -- so lothly -- the precious burden upon a sofa,
Bathsheba had opened her eyes. Remembering all that had
occurred, she murmured, "I want to go home!"
Boldwood left the room. He stood for a moment in the
passage to recover his senses. The experience had been too
much for his consciousness to keep up with, and now that he
had grasped it it had gone again. For those few heavenly,
golden moments she had been in his arms. What did it matter
about her not knowing it? She had been close to his breast;
he had been close to hers.
He started onward again, and sending a woman to her, went
out to ascertain all the facts of the case. These appeared
to be limited to what he had already heard. He then ordered
her horse to be put into the gig, and when all was ready
returned to inform her. He found that, though still pale
and unwell, she had in the meantime sent for the Budmouth
man who brought the tidings, and learnt from him all there
was to know.
Being hardly in a condition to drive home as she had driven
to town, Boldwood, with every delicacy of manner and
feeling, offered to get her a driver, or to give her a seat
in his phaeton, which was more comfortable than her own
conveyance. These proposals Bathsheba gently declined, and
the farmer at once departed.
About half-an-hour later she invigorated herself by an
effort, and took her seat and the reins as usual -- in
external appearance much as if nothing had happened. She
went out of the town by a tortuous back street, and drove
slowly along, unconscious of the road and the scene. The
first shades of evening were showing themselves when
Bathsheba reached home, where, silently alighting and
leaving the horse in the hands of the boy, she proceeded at
once upstairs. Liddy met her on the landing. The news had
preceded Bathsheba to Weatherbury by half-an-hour, and Liddy
looked inquiringly into her mistress's face. Bathsheba had
nothing to say.
She entered her bedroom and sat by the window, and thought
and thought till night enveloped her, and the extreme lines
only of her shape were visible. Somebody came to the door,
knocked, and opened it.
"Well, what is it, Liddy?" she said.
"I was thinking there must be something got for you to
wear," said Liddy, with hesitation.
"What do you mean?"
"Mourning."
"No, no, no," said Bathsheba, hurriedly.
"But I suppose there must be something done for poor ----"
"Not at present, I think. It is not necessary."
"Why not, ma'am?"
"Because he's still alive."
"How do you know that?" said Liddy, amazed.
"I don't know it. But wouldn't it have been different, or
shouldn't I have heard more, or wouldn't they have found
him, Liddy? -- or -- I don't know how it is, but death would
have been different from how this is. I am perfectly
convinced that he is still alive!"
Bathsheba remained firm in this opinion till Monday, when
two circumstances conjoined to shake it. The first was a
short paragraph in the local newspaper, which, beyond making
by a methodizing pen formidable presumptive evidence of
Troy's death by drowning, contained the important testimony
of a young Mr. Barker, M.D., of Budmouth, who spoke to being
an eyewitness of the accident, in a letter to the editor.
In this he stated that he was passing over the cliff on the
remoter side of the cove just as the sun was setting. At
that time he saw a bather carried along in the current
outside the mouth of the cove, and guessed in an instant
that there was but a poor chance for him unless he should be
possessed of unusual muscular powers. He drifted behind a
projection of the coast, and Mr. Barker followed along the
shore in the same direction. But by the time that he could
reach an elevation sufficiently great to command a view of
the sea beyond, dusk had set in, and nothing further was to
be seen.
The other circumstance was the arrival of his clothes, when
it became necessary for her to examine and identify them --
though this had virtually been done long before by those who
inspected the letters in his pockets. It was so evident to
her in the midst of her agitation that Troy had undressed in
the full conviction of dressing again almost immediately,
that the notion that anything but death could have prevented
him was a perverse one to entertain.
Then Bathsheba said to herself that others were assured in
their opinion; strange that she should not be. A strange
reflection occurred to her, causing her face to flush.
Suppose that Troy had followed Fanny into another world.
Had he done this intentionally, yet contrived to make his
death appear like an accident? Nevertheless, this thought
of how the apparent might differ from the real -- made vivid
by her bygone jealousy of Fanny, and the remorse he had
shown that night -- did not blind her to the perception of a
likelier difference, less tragic, but to herself far more
disastrous.
When alone late that evening beside a small fire, and much
calmed down, Bathsheba took Troy's watch into her hand,
which had been restored to her with the rest of the articles
belonging to him. She opened the case as he had opened it
before her a week ago. There was the little coil of pale
hair which had been as the fuze to this great explosion.
"He was hers and she was his; they should be gone together,"
she said. "I am nothing to either of them, and why should I
keep her hair?" She took it in her hand, and held it over
the fire." No -- I'll not burn it -- I'll keep it in memory
of her, poor thing!" she added, snatching back her hand.
Content of CHAPTER XLVIII - DOUBTS ARISE -- DOUBTS LINGER [Thomas Hardy's novel: Far From The Madding Crowd]
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Read next: CHAPTER XLIX - OAK'S ADVANCEMENT -- A GREAT HOPE
Read previous: CHAPTER XLVII - ADVENTURES BY THE SHORE
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