“Lord, you be too strict! What do ye use such words for, and condemn to hell your dear little innocent children that’s lost to ’ee! Upon my life I don’t call that religion!”
Sue flung her face upon the bed, sobbing. “O, don’t, don’t! That kills me!” She remained shaken with her grief, and slipped down upon her knees.
“I’ll tell ’ee what—you ought not to marry this man again!” said Mrs. Edlin indignantly. “You are in love wi’ t’ other still!”
“Yes I must—I am his already!”
“Pshoo! You be t’ other man’s. If you didn’t like to commit yourselves to the binding vow again, just at first, ’twas all the more credit to your consciences, considering your reasons, and you med ha’ lived on, and made it all right at last. After all, it concerned nobody but your own two selves.”
“Richard says he’ll have me back, and I’m bound to go! If he had refused, it might not have been so much my duty to—give up Jude. But—” She remained with her face in the bedclothes, and Mrs. Edlin left the room.
Phillotson in the interval had gone back to his friend Gillingham, who still sat over the supper-table. They soon rose, and walked out on the green to smoke awhile. A light was burning in Sue’s room, a shadow moving now and then across the blind.
Gillingham had evidently been impressed with the indefinable charm of Sue, and after a silence he said, “Well: you’ve all but got her again at last. She can’t very well go a second time. The pear has dropped into your hand.”
“Yes! … I suppose I am right in taking her at her word. I confess there seems a touch of selfishness in it. Apart from her being what she is, of course, a luxury for a fogey like me, it will set me right in the eyes of the clergy and orthodox laity, who have never forgiven me for letting her go. So I may get back in some degree into my old track.”
“Well—if you’ve got any sound reason for marrying her again, do it now in God’s name! I was always against your opening the cage-door and letting the bird go in such an obviously suicidal way. You might have been a school inspector by this time, or a reverend, if you hadn’t been so weak about her.”
“I did myself irreparable damage—I know it.”
“Once you’ve got her housed again, stick to her.”
Phillotson was more evasive tonight. He did not care to admit clearly that his taking Sue to him again had at bottom nothing to do with repentance of letting her go, but was, primarily, a human instinct flying in the face of custom and profession. He said, “Yes—I shall do that. I know woman better now. Whatever justice there was in releasing her, there was little logic, for one holding my views on other subjects.”
Gillingham looked at him, and wondered whether it would ever happen that the reactionary spirit induced by the world’s sneers and his own physical wishes would make Phillotson more orthodoxly cruel to her than he had erstwhile been informally and perversely kind.
“I perceive it won’t do to give way to impulse,” Phillotson resumed, feeling more and more every minute the necessity of acting up to his position. “I flew in the face of the Church’s teaching; but I did it without malice prepense. Women are so strange in their influence, that they tempt you to misplaced kindness. However, I know myself better now. A little judicious severity, perhaps. …”
“Yes; but you must tighten the reins by degrees only. Don’t be too strenuous at first. She’ll come to any terms in time.”
The caution was unnecessary, though Phillotson did not say so. “I remember what my vicar at Shaston said, when I left after the row that was made about my agreeing to her elopement. ‘The only thing you can do to retrieve your position and hers is to admit your error in not restraining her with a wise and strong hand, and to get her back again if she’ll come, and be firm in the future.’ But I was so headstrong at that time that I paid no heed. And that after the divorce she should have thought of doing so I did not dream.”
The gate of Mrs. Edlin’s cottage clicked, and somebody began crossing in the direction of the school. Phillotson said “Good night.”
“O, is that Mr. Phillotson,” said Mrs. Edlin. “I was going over to see ’ee. I’ve been upstairs with her, helping her to unpack her things; and upon my word, sir, I don’t think this ought to be!”
“What—the wedding?”
“Yes. She’s forcing herself to it, poor dear little thing; and you’ve no notion what she’s suffering. I was never much for religion nor against it, but it can’t be right to let her do this, and you ought to persuade her out of it. Of course everybody will say it was very good and forgiving of ’ee to take her to ’ee again. But for my part I don’t.”
“It’s her wish, and I am willing,” said Phillotson with grave reserve, opposition making him illogically tenacious now. “A great piece of laxity will be rectified.”
“I don’t believe it. She’s his wife if anybody’s. She’s had three children by him, and he loves her dearly; and it’s a wicked shame to egg her on to this, poor little quivering thing! She’s got nobody on her side. The one man who’d be her friend the obstinate creature won’t allow to come near her. What first put her into this mood o’ mind, I wonder!”
“I can’t tell. Not I certainly. It is all voluntary on her part. Now that’s all I have to say.” Phillotson spoke stiffly. “You’ve turned round, Mrs. Edlin. It is unseemly of you!”
“Well. I knowed you’d be affronted at what I had to say; but I don’t mind that. The truth’s the truth.”
“I’m not affronted, Mrs. Edlin. You’ve been too kind a neighbour for that. But I must be allowed to know
