strongly in the boreal light of a remoter view. Moreover, when two
people are once parted--have abandoned a common domicile and a common
environment--new growths insensibly bud upward to fill each vacated
place; unforeseen accidents hinder intentions, and old plans are
forgotten.
XXXVII
Midnight came and passed silently, for there was nothing to announce
it in the Valley of the Froom.
Not long after one o'clock there was a slight creak in the darkened
farmhouse once the mansion of the d'Urbervilles. Tess, who used the
upper chamber, heard it and awoke. It had come from the corner step
of the staircase, which, as usual, was loosely nailed. She saw the
door of her bedroom open, and the figure of her husband crossed the
stream of moonlight with a curiously careful tread. He was in his
shirt and trousers only, and her first flush of joy died when she
perceived that his eyes were fixed in an unnatural stare on vacancy.
When he reached the middle of the room he stood still and murmured in
tones of indescribable sadness--
'Dead! dead! dead!'
Under the influence of any strongly-disturbing force, Clare would
occasionally walk in his sleep, and even perform strange feats, such
as he had done on the night of their return from market just before
their marriage, when he re-enacted in his bedroom his combat with the
man who had insulted her. Tess saw that continued mental distress
had wrought him into that somnambulistic state now.
Her loyal confidence in him lay so deep down in her heart, that,
awake or asleep, he inspired her with no sort of personal fear. If
he had entered with a pistol in his hand he would scarcely have
disturbed her trust in his protectiveness.
Clare came close, and bent over her. 'Dead, dead, dead!' he murmured.
After fixedly regarding her for some moments with the same gaze of
unmeasurable woe, he bent lower, enclosed her in his arms, and rolled
her in the sheet as in a shroud. Then lifting her from the bed with
as much respect as one would show to a dead body, he carried her
across the room, murmuring--
'My poor, poor Tess--my dearest, darling Tess! So sweet, so good, so
true!'
The words of endearment, withheld so severely in his waking hours,
were inexpressibly sweet to her forlorn and hungry heart. If it had
been to save her weary life she would not, by moving or struggling,
have put an end to the position she found herself in. Thus she lay
in absolute stillness, scarcely venturing to breathe, and, wondering
what he was going to do with her, suffered herself to be borne out
upon the landing.
'My wife--dead, dead!' he said.
He paused in his labours for a moment to lean with her against the
banister. Was he going to throw her down? Self-solicitude was near
extinction in her, and in the knowledge that he had planned to depart
on the morrow, possibly for always, she lay in his arms in this
