7--The Night of the Sixth of November
Having resolved on flight Eustacia at times seemed anxious thatsomething should happen to thwart her own intention. The only event thatcould really change her position was the appearance of Clym. The glorywhich had encircled him as her lover was departed now; yet some goodsimple quality of his would occasionally return to her memory and stir amomentary throb of hope that he would again present himself before her.But calmly considered it was not likely that such a severance as nowexisted would ever close up--she would have to live on as a painfulobject, isolated, and out of place. She had used to think of the heathalone as an uncongenial spot to be in; she felt it now of the wholeworld.
Towards evening on the sixth her determination to go away again revived.About four o'clock she packed up anew the few small articles she hadbrought in her flight from Alderworth, and also some belonging to herwhich had been left here; the whole formed a bundle not too large to becarried in her hand for a distance of a mile or two. The scene withoutgrew darker; mud-coloured clouds bellied downwards from the sky likevast hammocks slung across it, and with the increase of night a stormywind arose; but as yet there was no rain.
Eustacia could not rest indoors, having nothing more to do, and shewandered to and fro on the hill, not far from the house she was soonto leave. In these desultory ramblings she passed the cottage of SusanNunsuch, a little lower down than her grandfather's. The door wasajar, and a riband of bright firelight fell over the ground without. AsEustacia crossed the firebeams she appeared for an instant as distinctas a figure in a phantasmagoria--a creature of light surrounded byan area of darkness; the moment passed, and she was absorbed in nightagain.
A woman who was sitting inside the cottage had seen and recognizedher in that momentary irradiation. This was Susan herself, occupiedin preparing a posset for her little boy, who, often ailing, wasnow seriously unwell. Susan dropped the spoon, shook her fist at thevanished figure, and then proceeded with her work in a musing, absentway.
At eight o'clock, the hour at which Eustacia had promised to signalWildeve if ever she signalled at all, she looked around the premises tolearn if the coast was clear, went to the furze-rick, and pulled thencea long-stemmed bough of that fuel. This she carried to the corner of thebank, and, glancing behind to see if the shutters were all closed, shestruck a light, and kindled the furze. When it was thoroughly ablazeEustacia took it by the stem and waved it in the air above her head tillit had burned itself out.
She was gratified, if gratification were possible to such a mood, byseeing a similar light in the vicinity of Wildeve's residence a minuteor two later. Having agreed to keep watch at this hour every night, incase she should require assistance, this promptness proved how strictlyhe had held to his word. Four hours after the present time, that is, atmidnight, he was to be ready to drive her to Budmouth, as prearranged.
Eustacia returned to the house. Supper having been got over she retiredearly, and sat in her bedroom waiting for the time to go by. The nightbeing dark and threatening, Captain Vye had not strolled out to gossipin any cottage or to call at the inn, as was sometimes his custom onthese long autumn nights; and he sat sipping grog alone downstairs.About ten o'clock there was a knock at the door. When the servant openedit the rays of the candle fell upon the form of Fairway.
I was a-forced to go to Lower Mistover tonight, he said, and Mr.Yeobright asked me to leave this here on my way; but, faith, I put it inthe lining of my hat, and thought no more about it till I got back andwas hasping my gate before going to bed. So I have run back with it atonce.
He handed in a letter and went his way. The girl brought it to thecaptain, who found that it was directed to Eustacia. He turned it overand over, and fancied that the writing was her husband's, though hecould not be sure. However, he decided to let her have it at once ifpossible, and took it upstairs for that purpose; but on reaching thedoor of her room and looking in at the keyhole he found there was nolight within, the fact being that Eustacia, without undressing, hadflung herself upon the bed, to rest and gather a little strength for hercoming journey. Her grandfather concluded from what he saw that he oughtnot to disturb her; and descending again to the parlour he placed theletter on the mantelpiece to give it to her in the morning.
At eleven o'clock he went to bed himself, smoked for some time in hisbedroom, put out his light at half-past eleven, and then, as was hisinvariable custom, pulled up the blind before getting into bed, that hemight see which way the wind blew on opening his eyes in the morning,his bedroom window commanding a view of the flagstaff and vane. Just ashe had lain down he was surprised to observe the white pole of the staffflash into existence like a streak of phosphorus drawn downwards acrossthe shade of night without. Only one explanation met this--a light hadbeen suddenly thrown upon the pole from the direction of the house. Aseverybody had retired to rest the old man felt it necessary to getout of bed, open the window softly, and look to the right and left.Eustacia's bedroom was lighted up, and it was the shine from her windowwhich had lighted the pole. Wondering what had aroused her, he remainedundecided at the window, and was thinking of fetching the letter to slipit under her door, when he heard a slight brushing of garments on thepartition dividing his room from the passage.
The captain concluded that Eustacia, feeling wakeful, had gone for abook, and would have dismissed the matter as unimportant if he had notalso heard her distinctly weeping as she passed.
She is thinking of that husband of hers, he said to himself. Ah, thesilly goose! she had no business to marry him. I wonder if that letteris really his?
He arose, threw his boat-cloak round him, opened the door, and said,Eustacia! There was no answer. Eustacia! he repeated louder, thereis a letter on the mantelpiece for you.
But no response was made to this statement save an imaginary one fromthe wind, which seemed to gnaw at the corners of the house, and thestroke of a few drops of rain upon the windows.
He went on to the landing, and stood waiting nearly five minutes. Stillshe did not return. He went back for a light, and prepared to followher; but first he looked into her bedroom. There, on the outside of thequilt, was the impression of her form, showing that the bed had notbeen opened; and, what was more significant, she had not taken hercandlestick downstairs. He was now thoroughly alarmed; and hastilyputting on his clothes he descended to the front door, which he himselfhad bolted and locked. It was now unfastened. There was no longerany doubt that Eustacia had left the house at this midnight hour; andwhither could she have gone? To follow her was almost impossible. Hadthe dwelling stood in an ordinary road, two persons setting out, onein each direction, might have made sure of overtaking her; but it wasa hopeless task to seek for anybody on a heath in the dark, thepracticable directions for flight across it from any point being asnumerous as the meridians radiating from the pole. Perplexed what to do,he looked into the parlour, and was vexed to find that the letter stilllay there untouched.
At half-past eleven, finding that the house was silent, Eustacia hadlighted her candle, put on some warm outer wrappings, taken her bag inher hand, and, extinguishing the light again, descended the staircase.When she got into the outer air she found that it had begun to rain, andas she stood pausing at the door it increased, threatening to come onheavily. But having committed herself to this line of action there wasno retreating for bad weather. Even the receipt of Clym's letter wouldnot have stopped her now. The gloom of the night was funereal; allnature seemed clothed in crape. The spiky points of the fir trees behindthe house rose into the sky like the turrets and pinnacles of an abbey.Nothing below the horizon was visible save a light which was stillburning in the cottage of Susan Nunsuch.
Eustacia opened her umbrella and went out from the enclosure by thesteps over the bank, after which she was beyond all danger of beingperceived. Skirting the pool, she followed the path towards Rainbarrow,occasionally stumbling over twisted furze roots, tufts of rushes, oroozing lumps of fleshy fungi, which at this season lay scattered aboutthe heath like the rotten liver and lungs of some colossal animal.The moon and stars were closed up by cloud and rain to the degreeof extinction. It was a night which led the traveller's thoughtsinstinctively to dwell on nocturnal scenes of disaster in thechronicles of the world, on all that is terrible and dark in history andlegend--the last plague of Egypt, the destruction of Sennacherib's host,the agony in Gethsemane.
Eustacia at length reached Rainbarrow, and stood still there to think.Never was harmony more perfect than that between the chaos of her mindand the chaos of the world without. A sudden recollection had flashedon her this moment--she had not money enough for undertaking a longjourney. Amid the fluctuating sentiments of the day her unpractical mindhad not dwelt on the necessity of being well-provided, and now that shethoroughly realized the conditions she sighed bitterly and ceased tostand erect, gradually crouching down under the umbrella as if she weredrawn into the Barrow by a hand from beneath. Could it be that she wasto remain a captive still? Money--she had never felt its value before.Even to efface herself from the country means were required. To askWildeve for pecuniary aid without allowing him to accompany her wasimpossible to a woman with a shadow of pride left in her; to fly ashis mistress--and she knew that he loved her--was of the nature ofhumiliation.
Anyone who had stood by now would have pitied her, not so much onaccount of her exposure to weather, and isolation from all of humanityexcept the mouldered remains inside the tumulus; but for that other formof misery which was denoted by the slightly rocking movement that herfeelings imparted to her person. Extreme unhappiness weighed visiblyupon her. Between the drippings of the rain from her umbrella to hermantle, from her mantle to the heather, from the heather to the earth,very similar sounds could be heard coming from her lips; and thetearfulness of the outer scene was repeated upon her face. The wings ofher soul were broken by the cruel obstructiveness of all about her; andeven had she seen herself in a promising way of getting to Budmouth,entering a steamer, and sailing to some opposite port, she would havebeen but little more buoyant, so fearfully malignant were other things.She uttered words aloud. When a woman in such a situation, neither old,deaf, crazed, nor whimsical, takes upon herself to sob and soliloquizealoud there is something grievous the matter.
Can I go, can I go? she moaned. He's not GREAT enough for me to givemyself to--he does not suffice for my desire!... If he had been a Saul ora Bonaparte--ah! But to break my marriage vow for him--it is too poor aluxury!... And I have no money to go alone! And if I could, what comfortto me? I must drag on next year, as I have dragged on this year, and theyear after that as before. How I have tried and tried to be a splendidwoman, and how destiny has been against me!... I do not deserve my lot!she cried in a frenzy of bitter revolt. O, the cruelty of putting meinto this ill-conceived world! I was capable of much; but I have beeninjured and blighted and crushed by things beyond my control! O, howhard it is of Heaven to devise such tortures for me, who have done noharm to Heaven at all!
The distant light which Eustacia had cursorily observed in leavingthe house came, as she had divined, from the cottage window of SusanNunsuch. What Eustacia did not divine was the occupation of the womanwithin at that moment. Susan's sight of her passing figure earlier inthe evening, not five minutes after the sick boy's exclamation, Mother,I do feel so bad! persuaded the matron that an evil influence wascertainly exercised by Eustacia's propinquity.
On this account Susan did not go to bed as soon as the evening's workwas over, as she would have done at ordinary times. To counteract themalign spell which she imagined poor Eustacia to be working, theboy's mother busied herself with a ghastly invention of superstition,calculated to bring powerlessness, atrophy, and annihilation on anyhuman being against whom it was directed. It was a practice well knownon Egdon at that date, and one that is not quite extinct at the presentday.
She passed with her candle into an inner room, where, among otherutensils, were two large brown pans, containing together perhaps ahundredweight of liquid honey, the produce of the bees during theforegoing summer. On a shelf over the pans was a smooth and solid yellowmass of a hemispherical form, consisting of beeswax from the same takeof honey. Susan took down the lump, and cutting off several thinslices, heaped them in an iron ladle, with which she returned to theliving-room, and placed the vessel in the hot ashes of the fireplace. Assoon as the wax had softened to the plasticity of dough she kneaded thepieces together. And now her face became more intent. She began mouldingthe wax; and it was evident from her manner of manipulation that she wasendeavouring to give it some preconceived form. The form was human.
By warming and kneading, cutting and twisting, dismembering andre-joining the incipient image she had in about a quarter of an hourproduced a shape which tolerably well resembled a woman, and wasabout six inches high. She laid it on the table to get cold and hard.Meanwhile she took the candle and went upstairs to where the little boywas lying.
Did you notice, my dear, what Mrs. Eustacia wore this afternoon besidesthe dark dress?
A red ribbon round her neck.
Anything else?
No--except sandal-shoes.
A red ribbon and sandal-shoes, she said to herself.
Mrs. Nunsuch went and searched till she found a fragment of thenarrowest red ribbon, which she took downstairs and tied round the neckof the image. Then fetching ink and a quilt from the rickety bureau bythe window, she blackened the feet of the image to the extent presumablycovered by shoes; and on the instep of each foot marked cross-lines inthe shape taken by the sandalstrings of those days. Finally she tieda bit of black thread round the upper part of the head, in faintresemblance to a snood worn for confining the hair.
Susan held the object at arm's length and contemplated it with asatisfaction in which there was no smile. To anybody acquainted withthe inhabitants of Egdon Heath the image would have suggested EustaciaYeobright.
From her workbasket in the window-seat the woman took a paper of pins,of the old long and yellow sort, whose heads were disposed to come offat their first usage. These she began to thrust into the image in alldirections, with apparently excruciating energy. Probably as many asfifty were thus inserted, some into the head of the wax model, some intothe shoulders, some into the trunk, some upwards through the soles ofthe feet, till the figure was completely permeated with pins.
She turned to the fire. It had been of turf; and though the high heapof ashes which turf fires produce was somewhat dark and dead on theoutside, upon raking it abroad with the shovel the inside of the massshowed a glow of red heat. She took a few pieces of fresh turf from thechimney-corner and built them together over the glow, upon which thefire brightened. Seizing with the tongs the image that she had made ofEustacia, she held it in the heat, and watched it as it began to wasteslowly away. And while she stood thus engaged there came from betweenher lips a murmur of words.
It was a strange jargon--the Lord's Prayer repeated backwards--theincantation usual in proceedings for obtaining unhallowed assistanceagainst an enemy. Susan uttered the lugubrious discourse three timesslowly, and when it was completed the image had considerably diminished.As the wax dropped into the fire a long flame arose from the spot,and curling its tongue round the figure ate still further into itssubstance. A pin occasionally dropped with the wax, and the embersheated it red as it lay.