The Return of the Native

by Thomas Hardy

  IV

  The Ministrations of a Half-forgotten One

  Eustacia's journey was at first as vague in direction as that ofthistledown on the wind. She did not know what to do. She wished ithad been night instead of morning, that she might at least have borneher misery without the possibility of being seen. Tracing mile aftermile along between the dying ferns and the wet white spiders' webs,she at length turned her steps towards her grandfather's house. Shefound the front door closed and locked. Mechanically she went roundto the end where the stable was, and on looking in at the stable-doorshe saw Charley standing within.

  "Captain Vye is not at home?" she said.

  "No, ma'am," said the lad in a flutter of feeling; "he's gone toWeatherbury, and won't be home till night. And the servant is gonehome for a holiday. So the house is locked up."

  Eustacia's face was not visible to Charley as she stood at thedoorway, her back being to the sky, and the stable but indifferentlylighted; but the wildness of her manner arrested his attention. Sheturned and walked away across the enclosure to the gate, and washidden by the bank.

  When she had disappeared Charley, with misgiving in his eyes, slowlycame from the stable door, and going to another point in the bank helooked over. Eustacia was leaning against it on the outside, her facecovered with her hands, and her head pressing the dewy heather whichbearded the bank's outer side. She appeared to be utterly indifferentto the circumstance that her bonnet, hair, and garments were becomingwet and disarranged by the moisture of her cold, harsh pillow.Clearly something was wrong.

  Charley had always regarded Eustacia as Eustacia had regarded Clymwhen she first beheld him--as a romantic and sweet vision, scarcelyincarnate. He had been so shut off from her by the dignity of herlook and the pride of her speech, except at that one blissful intervalwhen he was allowed to hold her hand, that he had hardly deemed hera woman, wingless and earthly, subject to household conditions anddomestic jars. The inner details of her life he had only conjectured.She had been a lovely wonder, predestined to an orbit in which thewhole of his own was but a point; and this sight of her leaning like ahelpless, despairing creature against a wild wet bank filled him withan amazed horror. He could no longer remain where he was. Leapingover, he came up, touched her with his finger, and said tenderly, "Youare poorly, ma'am. What can I do?"

  Eustacia started up, and said, "Ah, Charley--you have followed me.You did not think when I left home in the summer that I should comeback like this!"

  "I did not, dear ma'am. Can I help you now?"

  "I am afraid not. I wish I could get into the house. I feelgiddy--that's all."

  "Lean on my arm, ma'am, till we get to the porch, and I will try toopen the door."

  He supported her to the porch, and there depositing her on a seathastened to the back, climbed to a window by the help of a ladder,and descending inside opened the door. Next he assisted her into theroom, where there was an old-fashioned horsehair settee as large as adonkey-waggon. She lay down here, and Charley covered her with a cloakhe found in the hall.

  "Shall I get you something to eat and drink?" he said.

  "If you please, Charley. But I suppose there is no fire?"

  "I can light it, ma'am."

  He vanished, and she heard a splitting of wood and a blowing ofbellows; and presently he returned, saying, "I have lighted a fire inthe kitchen, and now I'll light one here."

  He lit the fire, Eustacia dreamily observing him from her couch. Whenit was blazing up he said, "Shall I wheel you round in front of it,ma'am, as the morning is chilly?"

  "Yes, if you like."

  "Shall I go and bring the victuals now?"

  "Yes, do," she murmured languidly.

  When he had gone, and the dull sounds occasionally reached her earsof his movements in the kitchen, she forgot where she was, and hadfor a moment to consider by an effort what the sounds meant. After aninterval which seemed short to her whose thoughts were elsewhere, hecame in with a tray on which steamed tea and toast, though it wasnearly lunch-time.

  "Place it on the table," she said. "I shall be ready soon."

  He did so, and retired to the door; when, however, he perceived thatshe did not move he came back a few steps.

  "Let me hold it to you, if you don't wish to get up," said Charley.He brought the tray to the front of the couch, where he knelt down,adding, "I will hold it for you."

  Eustacia sat up and poured out a cup of tea. "You are very kind tome, Charley," she murmured as she sipped.

  "Well, I ought to be," said he diffidently, taking great troublenot to rest his eyes upon her, though this was their only naturalposition, Eustacia being immediately before him. "You have been kindto me."

  "How have I?" said Eustacia.

  "You let me hold your hand when you were a maiden at home."

  "Ah, so I did. Why did I do that? My mind is lost--it had to do withthe mumming, had it not?"

  "Yes, you wanted to go in my place."

  "I remember. I do indeed remember--too well!"

  She again became utterly downcast; and Charley, seeing that she wasnot going to eat or drink any more, took away the tray.

  Afterwards he occasionally came in to see if the fire was burning, toask her if she wanted anything, to tell her that the wind had shiftedfrom south to west, to ask her if she would like him to gather hersome blackberries; to all which inquiries she replied in the negativeor with indifference.

  She remained on the settee some time longer, when she aroused herselfand went upstairs. The room in which she had formerly slept stillremained much as she had left it, and the recollection that thisforced upon her of her own greatly changed and infinitely worsenedsituation again set on her face the undetermined and formlessmisery which it had worn on her first arrival. She peeped into hergrandfather's room, through which the fresh autumn air was blowingfrom the open window. Her eye was arrested by what was a familiarsight enough, though it broke upon her now with a new significance.

  It was a brace of pistols, hanging near the head of her grandfather'sbed, which he always kept there loaded, as a precaution againstpossible burglars, the house being very lonely. Eustacia regardedthem long, as if they were the page of a book in which she read anew and a strange matter. Quickly, like one afraid of herself, shereturned downstairs and stood in deep thought.

  "If I could only do it!" she said. "It would be doing much good tomyself and all connected with me, and no harm to a single one."

  The idea seemed to gather force within her, and she remained ina fixed attitude nearly ten minutes, when a certain finality wasexpressed in her gaze, and no longer the blankness of indecision.

  She turned and went up the second time--softly and stealthily now--andentered her grandfather's room, her eyes at once seeking the head ofthe bed. The pistols were gone.

  The instant quashing of her purpose by their absence affected herbrain as a sudden vacuum affects the body: she nearly fainted. Whohad done this? There was only one person on the premises besidesherself. Eustacia involuntarily turned to the open window whichoverlooked the garden as far as the bank that bounded it. On thesummit of the latter stood Charley, sufficiently elevated by itsheight to see into the room. His gaze was directed eagerly andsolicitously upon her.

  She went downstairs to the door and beckoned to him.

  "You have taken them away?"

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "Why did you do it?"

  "I saw you looking at them too long."

  "What has that to do with it?"

  "You have been heart-broken all the morning, as if you did not wantto live."

  "Well?"

  "And I could not bear to leave them in your way. There was meaningin your look at them."

  "Where are they now?"

  "Locked up."

  "Where?"

  "In the stable."

  "Give them to me."

  "No, ma'am."

  "You refuse?"

  "I do. I care too much for you to give 'em up."

  She tu
rned aside, her face for the first time softening from the stonyimmobility of the earlier day, and the corners of her mouth resumingsomething of that delicacy of cut which was always lost in her momentsof despair. At last she confronted him again.

  "Why should I not die if I wish?" she said tremulously. "I have madea bad bargain with life, and I am weary of it--weary. And now you havehindered my escape. O, why did you, Charley! What makes death painfulexcept the thought of others' grief?--and that is absent in my case,for not a sigh would follow me!"

  "Ah, it is trouble that has done this! I wish in my very soul that hewho brought it about might die and rot, even if 'tis transportation tosay it!"

  "Charley, no more of that. What do you mean to do about this you haveseen?"

  "Keep it close as night, if you promise not to think of it again."

  "You need not fear. The moment has passed. I promise." She then wentaway, entered the house, and lay down.

  Later in the afternoon her grandfather returned. He was about toquestion her categorically; but on looking at her he withheld hiswords.

  "Yes, it is too bad to talk of," she slowly returned in answer to hisglance. "Can my old room be got ready for me tonight, grandfather? Ishall want to occupy it again."

  He did not ask what it all meant, or why she had left her husband, butordered the room to be prepared.