'No,' she murmured. 'He is far away.'
'Far away? From YOU? What sort of husband can he be?'
'O, do not speak against him! It was through you! He found out--'
'Ah, is it so! ... That's sad, Tess!'
'Yes.'
'But to stay away from you--to leave you to work like this!'
'He does not leave me to work!' she cried, springing to the defence
of the absent one with all her fervour. 'He don't know it! It is by
my own arrangement.'
'Then, does he write?'
'I--I cannot tell you. There are things which are private to
ourselves.'
'Of course that means that he does not. You are a deserted wife, my
fair Tess--'
In an impulse he turned suddenly to take her hand; the buff-glove was
on it, and he seized only the rough leather fingers which did not
express the life or shape of those within.
'You must not--you must not!' she cried fearfully, slipping her hand
from the glove as from a pocket, and leaving it in his grasp. 'O,
will you go away--for the sake of me and my husband--go, in the name
of your own Christianity!'
'Yes, yes; I will,' he said abruptly, and thrusting the glove back to
her he turned to leave. Facing round, however, he said, 'Tess, as
God is my judge, I meant no humbug in taking your hand!'
A pattering of hoofs on the soil of the field, which they had not
noticed in their preoccupation, ceased close behind them; and a voice
reached her ear:
'What the devil are you doing away from your work at this time o'
day?'
Farmer Groby had espied the two figures from the distance, and had
inquisitively ridden across, to learn what was their business in his
field.
'Don't speak like that to her!' said d'Urberville, his face
blackening with something that was not Christianity.
'Indeed, Mister! And what mid Methodist pa'sons have to do with
she?'
'Who is the fellow?' asked d'Urberville, turning to Tess.
She went close up to him.
'Go--I do beg you!' she said.
'What! And leave you to that tyrant? I can see in his face what a
churl he is.'
'He won't hurt me. HE'S not in love with me. I can leave at
Lady-Day.'
'Well, I have no right but to obey, I suppose. But--well, goodbye!'
Her defender, whom she dreaded more than her assailant, having
reluctantly disappeared, the farmer continued his reprimand, which
Tess took with the greatest coolness, that sort of attack being
independent of sex. To have as a master this man of stone, who would
have cuffed her if he had dared, was almost a relief after her former
experiences. She silently walked back towards the summit of the
