Sixteen: Far From The Madding Crowd: Thomas Hardy: The Shadow of A Mistake

All Saints Church, Melchester. 

A week day. Morning.

The small congregation mainly of women and girls rose from its knees at the end of a service without sermon. They were about to disperse, but their attention was arrested by smart footsteps entering the porch and coming up the central passage. It echoed with a ring unusual in a church. It was the clink of spurs. Everybody looked. A young cavalry soldier in red uniform, with the three chevrons of a sergeant upon his sleeve, strode up the aisle. His presence embarassed the women and girls; especially by intense vigour of his steps and the seriousness upon his face. He felt his movement challenging through, with women on either side of  the aisle. Passing on through the chancel arch he never paused, and came close to the altar railing. Here, he stood for a moment. 

The deacon who had not yet took off his vestment saw the new comer and followed him to the communion rail. He whispered to the soldier and then beckoned to the clerk, who in his turn whispered to an elderly woman, apparently his wife, and they also went up the chancel steps. 

"Tis a wedding!"  murmured some of the women, brightening. "Let us wait." 

The majority again sat down.

There was the creaking of some machines behind, and some of the young ones turned their heads. From the west wall of the tower projected a little canopy with a quarterjack and a small bell beneath it, the automation being done by the same clock machinery that struck the bell in the tower. 

The jack had struck half past eleven.

"Where is the woman?" asked some of the bystanders. The young sergeant stood with rigidity of the old pillars around. He was silent as he was still looking to South-east. 

The rattle of the quarter-clock again.

"I wonder where the woman is!" a voice whispered again. 

The slight shifting of the feet and artificial coughing among the crowd. At length there was a titter. The young sergeant never moved. 

The clock ticked on. The women threw off their nervousness. Titters and gigglings were more frequent. Then came a dead silence. Everyone was waiting for the end. The striking of the quarters seemed to quicken the flight of time. The rattle of four quarters struck fitfully as before. Then followed the dull and remote resonance of the twelve heavy strokes in the tower above.

The clergy men glided into vestry, and the clerk vanished. The sergeant waited the crowd to disperse. Since it did not happen, he turned and stalked resolutely down the nave, braving them all with compressed lips.

A paved square opposite the church. Several overhanging wooden buildings of old time cast pictures of shades on it. The young man came across the square, and in the middle he met a little woman. Her anxious face sank at the sight of him. 

"Well?" he said passionately, without looking at her.

"Oh, Frank -- I made a mistake!  I thought that the church with the spire was All Saints', and I was at the door at half past eleven as you said. I waited till a quarter to twelve, and found then that I was in All Souls'.  But I wasn't much frightened, because I thought it could be tomorrow as well." 

"You fool, for so fooling me!  But say no more." 

"Shall it be tomorrow, Frank?" she asked blankly.

"Tomorrow!" and he laughed hoarsely. "I won't go through that experience again for some time, I am sure." 

"But after all," she remonstrated in a trembling voice, "the mistake was not such a terrible thing! Now dear Frank, when shall it be?"

"Ah, when? God knows!" he said with a light irony, and turning from her walked rapidly away.

End of Chapter Fifteen

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