第69章

`Of course,' continued the unwitting Clare, `I should have been glad to know you to be descended exclusively from the long-suffering, dumb, unrecorded rank and file of the English nation, and not from the self-seeking few who made themselves powerful at the expense of the rest.But I am corrupted away from that by my affection for you, Tess [he laughed as he spoke], and made selfish likewise.For your own sake I rejoice in your descent.

Society is hopelessly snobbish, and this fact of your extraction may make an appreciable difference to its acceptance of you as my wife, after Ihave made you the well-read woman that I mean to make you.My mother too, poor soul, will think so much better of you on account of it.Tess, you must spell your name correctly - d'Urberville - from this very day.'

`I like the other way rather best.'

`But you must , dearest! Good heavens, why dozens of mushroom millionaires would jump at such a possession! By the bye, there's one of that kidney who has taken the name - where have I heard of him? - Up in the neighbourhood of The Chase, I think.Why, he is the very man who had that rumpus with my father I told you of.What an odd coincidence!'

`Angel, I think I would rather not take the name! It is unlucky, perhaps!'

She was agitated.

`Now then, Mistress Teresa d'Urberville, I have you.Take my name, and so you will escape yours! The secret is out, so why should you any longer refuse me?'

`If it is sure to make you happy to have me as your wife, and you feel that you do wish to marry me, very, very much------'

`I do, dearest, of course!'

`I mean, that it is only your wanting me very much, and being hardly able to keep alive without me, whatever my offences, that would make me feel I ought to say I will.'

`You will - you do say it, I know! You will be mine for ever and ever.'

He clasped her close and kissed her.

`Yes!'

She had no sooner said it than she burst into a dry hard sobbing, so violent that it seemed to rend her.Tess was not a hysterical girl by any means, and he was surprised.

`Why do you cry, dearest?'

`I can't tell - quite! - I am so glad to think - of being yours, and making you happy!'

`But this does not seem very much like gladness, my Tessy!'

`I mean - I cry because I have broken down in my vow! I said I would die unmarried!'

`But, if you love me you would like me to be your husband?'

`Yes, yes, yes! But O, I sometimes wish I had never been born!'

`Now, my dear Tess, if I did not know that you are very much excited, and very inexperienced, I should say that remark was not very complimentary.

How came you to wish that if you care for me? Do you care for me? I wish you would prove it in some way.'

`How can I prove it more than I have done?' she cried, in a distraction of tenderness.`Will this prove it more?'

She clasped his neck, and for the first time Clare learnt what an impassioned woman's kisses were like upon the lips of one whom she loved with all her heart and soul, as Tess loved him.

`There - now do you believe?' she asked, flushed, and wiping her eyes.

`Yes.I never really doubted - never, never!'

So they drove on through the gloom, forming one bundle inside the sail-cloth, the horse going as he would, and the rain driving against them.She had consented.She might as well have agreed at first.The `appetite for joy'

which pervades all creation, that tremendous force which sways humanity to its purpose, as the tide sways the helpless weed, was not to be controlled by vague lucubrations over the social rubric.

`I must write to my mother,' she said.`You don't mind my doing that?'

`Of course not, dear child.You are a child to me, Tess, not to know how very proper it is to write to your mother at such a time, and how wrong it would be in me to object.Where does she live?'

`At the same place - Marlott.On the further side of Blackmoor Vale.'

`Ah, then I have seen you before this summer--'

`Yes; at that dance on the green; but you would not dance with me.O, I hope that is of no ill-omen for us now!'

Chapter 31 Tess wrote a most touching and urgent letter to her mother the very next day, and by the end of the week a response to her communication arrived in Joan Durbeyfield's wandering last-century hand.DEAR TESS, - I write these few lines Hoping they will find you well, as they leave me at Present, thank God for it.Dear Tess, we are all glad to Hear that you are going really to be married soon.But with respect to your question, Tess, I say between ourselves, quite private but very strong, that on no account do you say a word of your Bygone Trouble to him.I did not tell everything to your Father, he being so Proud on account of his Respectability, which, perhaps, your Intended is the same.

Many a woman - some of the Highest in the Land - have had a Trouble in their time; and why should you Trumpet yours when others don't Trumpet theirs? No girl would be such a Fool, specially as it is so long ago, and not your Fault at all.I shall answer the same if you ask me fifty times.

Besides, you must bear in mind that, knowing it to be your Childish Nature to tell all that's in your heart - so simple! - I made you promise me never to let it out by Word or Deed, having your Welfare in my Mind; and you most solemnly did promise it going from this Door.I have not named either that Question or your coming marriage to your Father, as he would blab it everywhere, poor Simple Man.

Dear Tess, keep up your Spirits, and we mean to send you a Hogshead of Cyder for your Wedding, knowing there is not much in your parts, and thin Sour Stuff what there is.So no more at present, and with kind love to your Young Man.- From your affectte.Mother, J.DURBEYFIELD.`O mother, mother!' murmured Tess.

She was recognizing how light was the touch of events the most oppressive upon Mrs Durbeyfield's elastic spirit.Her mother did not see life as Tess saw it.That haunting episode of bygone days was to her mother but a passing accident.But perhaps her mother was right as to the course to be followed, whatever she might be in her reasons.Silence seemed, on the face of it, best for her adored one's happiness: silence it should be.