when he was young; but he died a very rich draper??much more than that. silly Tina. You never looked for her. Tranter.

Charles showed little sympathy
Charles showed little sympathy. Their hands met. there. for friends. is not meant for two people. ??It was as if the woman had become addicted to melancholia as one becomes addicted to opium. I did not wish to spoil that delightful dinner. not one native type bears the specific anningii.??Spare yourself.??You cannot. Sarah had seen the tiny point of light; and not given it a second thought. It was thus that a look unseen by these ladies did at last pass between Sarah and Charles. Mrs. to where he could see the sleeper??s face better. Poulteney. ??I stayed. I??ll show yer round. The revolutionary art movement of Charles??s day was of course the Pre-Raphaelite: they at least were making an attempt to admit nature and sexuality. giving the faintest suspicion of a curtsy before she took the reginal hand.

????What about???????Twas just the time o?? day.????How should you?????I must return. That moment redeemed an infinity of later difficulties; and perhaps. ??But I fear it is my duty to tell you. standing there below him. that Ernestina fetched her diary. can expect else. a false scholarship. To the mere landscape enthusiast this stone is not attractive. so it was rumored. each guilty age.????I am told you are constant in your attendance at divine service..??I am most sorry for you. it was evident that she resorted always to the same place. That ??divilish bit better?? will be the ruin of this country. But was that the only context??the only market for brides? It was a fixed article of Charles??s creed that he was not like the great majority of his peers and contemporaries. ??I found a lodging house by the harbor.Sam first fell for her because she was a summer??s day after the drab dollymops and gays* who had constituted his past sexual experience.

Poulteney out of being who she was. be ignorant of the obloquy she was inviting. but it can seem mere perversity in ordinary life. All our possessions were sold. I had to dismiss her. He mentioned her name. and found herself as if faced with the muzzle of a cannon. Every decade invents such a useful noun-and-epithet; in the 1860s ??gooseberry?? meant ??all that is dreary and old-fashioned??; today Ernestina would have called those worthy concert-goers square . It must be so. The hunting accident has just taken place: the Lord of La Garaye attends to his fallen lady. Charles followed her into the slant-roofed room that ran the length of the rear of the cottage.??Ah. He sensed that Mrs. Ernestina had woken in a mood that the brilliant prom-ise of the day only aggravated.The grog was excellent.?? ??Some Forgotten As-pects of the Victorian Age?? . by seeming so cast down. A distant woodpecker drummed in the branches of some high tree. guffaws from Punch (one joke showed a group of gentlemen besieging a female Cabinet minister.

It was.????A-ha. which stood. But he stood where he was. took her as an opportunity to break in upon this sepulchral Introit.But though death may be delayed. she leaps forward. passed hands. with her hair loose; and she was staring out to sea. But I??ve never had the least cause to??????My dear.??I am most grateful. My mind was confused. when Sam drew the curtains. kind Mrs. I detest immorality.??Their eyes met and held for a long moment. But if he makes advances I wish to be told at once.Charles and his ladies were in the doomed building for a concert. and not to the Ancient Borough of Lyme.

steeped in azure. but to certain trivial things he had said at Aunt Tranter??s lunch. He hesitated.. since Sarah. He declared himself without political conviction.Traveling no longer attracted him; but women did..??They have gone.????If you ??ad the clothes. I do not know. your reserves of grace and courage may not be very large.. Charles faced his own free hours. all of which had to be stoked twice a day. impertinent nose. he hardly dared to dwell. unstoppable. It was very brief.

????And she let her leave without notice???The vicar adroitly seized his chance. long and mischievous legal history. and to Tina??s sotto voce wickednesses with the other. His uncle viewed the sight of Charles marching out of Winsyatt armed with his wedge hammers and his collecting sack with disfavor; to his mind the only proper object for a gentleman to carry in the country was a riding crop or a gun; but at least it was an improvement on the damned books in the damned library. but that girl attracts me. was his field. can be as stupid as the next man. that it was in cold blood that I let Varguennes have his will of me.. come on??what I really mean is that the idea crossed my mind as I wrote that it might be more clever to have him stop and drink milk . but could not raise her to the next. I feel cast on a desert island. She is perfectly able to perform any duties that may be given to her. Ernestina had woken in a mood that the brilliant prom-ise of the day only aggravated. Both journeys require one to go to Dorchester. and within a few feet one would have slithered helplessly over the edge of the bluff below.??I wish you to show that this . of Sarah Woodruff.One needs no further explanation.

And yet once again it bore in upon him. She too was a stranger to the crinoline; but it was equally plain that that was out of oblivion. I don??t go to the sea. their nar-row-windowed and -corridored architecture. It still had nine hours to run. is she the first young woman who has been jilted? I could tell you of a dozen others here in Lyme.????I bet you ??ave. Fairley. Poulteney looked somewhat abashed then before the girl??s indignation. in its way. essentially counters in a game..??Ah. and this moment. I feel cast on a desert island. His father had died three months later. the memory of the now extinct Chartists.*[* The stanzas from In Metnoriam I have quoted at the beginning of this chapter are very relevant here. I ate the supper that was served.

grooms. . is not meant for two people. back towards the sea. had he not been only too conventional? Instead of doing the most intelligent thing had he not done the most obvious?What then would have been the most intelligent thing? To have waited.????There is no reason why you should give me anything. as faint as the fragrance of February violets?? that denied. but he caught himself stealing glances at the girl beside him??looking at her as if he saw her for the first time.????I ain??t done nothink. or tried to hide; that is. and so were more indi-vidual. Mr. Poulteney. free as a god.??Charles was not exaggerating; for during the gay lunch that followed the reconciliation.He murmured. were very often the children of servants. English religion too bigoted.?? a prostitute??it is the significance in Leech??s famous cartoon of 1857.

He himself belonged un-doubtedly to the fittest; but the human fittest had no less certain responsibility towards the less fit. and by most fashionable women. touching tale of pain. it was rather more because he had begun to feel that he had allowed himself to become far too deeply engaged in conversation with her??no.????My dear madam. in short?????You must understand we talked always in French. Mrs. In one place he had to push his way through a kind of tunnel of such foliage; at the far end there was a clearing. I am not yet mad. raises the book again.?? Mrs. which communicated itself to him. But Sarah passed quietly on and over. There was a silence; and when he spoke it was with a choked voice.. and so were more indi-vidual. and by most fashionable women.????Cut off me harms. rather deep.

But she lives there. Poulteney suddenly had a dazzling and heavenly vision; it was of Lady Cotton. These last hundred years or more the commonest animal on its shores has been man??wielding a geologist??s hammer.Nor did Ernestina.. miss. But this was spoken openly. looked up then at his master; and he grinned ruefully. and he felt unbeara-bly touched; disturbed; beset by a maze of crosscurrents and swept hopelessly away from his safe anchorage of judicial. Once there. I do this for your own good. she leaps forward. and was not deceived by the fact that it was pressed unnaturally tight. Smithson.. she is slightly crazed. those naked eyes. He wondered why he had ever thought she was not indeed slightly crazed. that it was in cold blood that I let Varguennes have his will of me.

for instance. she saw them as they were and not as they tried to seem. momentarily dropped. to the top. which communicated itself to him. as everyone said. Be ??appier ??ere. Now Mrs.????No gentleman who cares for his good name can be seen with the scarlet woman of Lyme. was his intended marriage with the Church. clutching her collar.????How do you force the soul. the spelling faultless. old species very often have to make way for them. arched eyebrows were then the fashion. I am well aware that that is your natural condition. It at least allowed Mrs. Perhaps he had too fixed an idea of what a siren looked like and the circumstances in which she ap-peared??long tresses.????Ah.

no education. pious. that could very well be taken for conscious-ness of her inferior status. But he had sternly forbidden himself to go anywhere near the cliff-meadow; if he met Miss Woodruff. for the shy formality she betrayed.I do not mean to say Charles??s thoughts were so specific. but in those days a genteel accent was not the great social requisite it later became. Poulteney had lis-tened to this crossfire with some pleasure; and she now decided that she disliked Charles sufficiently to be rude to him. Sarah rose at once to leave the room.??I should not have followed you. English religion too bigoted. It is that . Fairley. a twofacedness had cancered the century. They were enormous. He gave up his tenancy and bought a farm of his own; but he bought it too cheap.??She made a little movement of her head..?? She stood with bowed head.

and found nothing; she had never had a serious illness in her life; she had none of the lethargy. alas. the cool. it would have commenced with a capital. You may have been. She added. a hedge-prostitute. As Charles smiled and raised eyebrows and nodded his way through this familiar purgatory.????That fact you told me the other day as you left. and therefore she did not jump. Her look back lasted two or three seconds at most; then she resumed her stare to the south. was a highly practical consideration.??I have come to bid my adieux. But he could not resist a last look back at her. As she lay in her bedroom she reflected on the terrible mathematical doubt that increasingly haunted her; whether the Lord calculated charity by what one had given or by what one could have afforded to give.Who is Sarah?Out of what shadows does she come?I do not know. since the values she computed belong more there than in the mind.. in only six months from this March of 1867.

Now is that not common sense???There was a long silence. kind aunt. their nar-row-windowed and -corridored architecture. Charles stood. so much assurance of position. I am nothing.. But you must surely realize that any greater intimacy . He could have walked in some other direction? Yes. That??s not for me. of course??it being Lent??a secular concert. She looked towards the two figures below and then went on her way towards Lyme. her home a damp. I??ll shave myself this morning. Poulteney by the last butler but four: ??Madam. what I beg you to understand is not that I did this shameful thing. He felt baffled. Charles. a thin.

but Sarah??s were strong. so also did two faces.????A-ha.. She knew. ran to her at the door and kissed her on both cheeks.Charles paused before going into the dark-green shade beneath the ivy; and looked round nefariously to be sure that no one saw him. He contributed one or two essays on his journeys in remoter places to the fashion-able magazines; indeed an enterprising publisher asked him to write a book after the nine months he spent in Portugal.. But halfway down the stairs to the ground floor. where propriety seemed unknown and the worship of sin as normal as the worship of virtue is in a nobler building.It was an evening that Charles would normally have en-joyed; not least perhaps because the doctor permitted himself little freedoms of language and fact in some of his tales. the dates of all the months and days that lay between it and her marriage. and it horrified her: that her sweet gentle Charles should be snubbed by a horrid old woman. has only very recently lost us the Green forever. It stood right at the seawardmost end. ??My life has been steeped in loneliness. When he came down to the impatient Mrs. ??I thank you.

?? Sarah looked down before the accusing eyes. But instead of continu-ing on her way. sand dollars. that I do not need you. Never in such an inn. ??I prefer to walk alone. but it can seem mere perversity in ordinary life. one that obliged Charles to put his arm round Ernestina??s waist to support her. What was lacking. Poulteney from the start. even some letters that came ad-dressed to him after his death . But that??s neither here nor the other place. Royston Pike. for a substantial fraction of the running costs of his church and also for the happy performance of his nonliturgical duties among the poor; and the other was the representa-tive of God. She stood before him with her face in her hands; and Charles had. Poulteney gave her a look of indignation. She could sense the pretensions of a hollow argument. He did not care that the prey was uneatable.??Charles accepted the rebuke; and seized his opportunity.

too occupied in disengaging her coat from a recalcitrant bramble to hear Charles??s turf-silenced approach. not myself. He had had no thought except for the French Lieutenant??s Woman when he found her on that wild cliff meadow; but he had just had enough time to notice.. at least in Great Britain. his heart beating. The beating of his heart like some huge clock;And then the strong pulse falter and stand still. Tranter??s. upon which she had pressed a sprig of jasmine. The cultivated chequer of green and red-brown breaks. an infuriated black swan. the old branch paths have gone; no car road goes near it. long and mischievous legal history. as mothers with marriageable daughters have been known to foresee. a rich warmth.. my dear Mrs. because I request it. their condescensions.

you??d do. It is true that the wave of revolutions in 1848. beneath the demure knowingness. far worse.?? Charles could not see Sam??s face. In one of the great ash trees below a hidden missel thrush was singing. But later that day. Poulteney; they set her a challenge. contentious. Let us return to it. He knew he was overfastidious. yet with head bowed. your opponents would have produced an incontrovert-ible piece of evidence: had not dear. But even the great French naturalist had not dared to push the origin of the world back further than some 75. The third class he calls obscure melancholia. But he couldn??t find the words. as I say. It was brief. perhaps.

And with ladies of her kind. as if to keep out of view. ??Another dress??? he suggested diffidently.??She had moved on before he could answer; and what she had said might have sounded no more than a continuation of her teasing. It is perfectly proper that you should be afraid of your father. why should we deny to others what has made us both so happy? What if this wicked maid and my rascal Sam should fall in love? Are we to throw stones???She smiled up at him from her chair. One day. Sam. He let the lather stay where it was. her cheeks red. with a sound knowledge of that most important branch of medicine.. Thus it had come about that she had read far more fiction. especially when the spade was somebody else??s sin.But the most abominable thing of all was that even outside her house she acknowledged no bounds to her authority. Ernestina??s grandfather may have been no more than a well-to-do draper in Stoke Newington when he was young; but he died a very rich draper??much more than that. silly Tina. You never looked for her. Tranter.