Forty Four: Far From The Madding Crowd: Thomas Hardy: Under A Tree

Bathsheba went along the dark road, neither knowing nor caring about the direction.  She reached a gate leading into a thicket overhung by large oak and beech trees.  It occurred to her that she had seen it by daylight on some previous occasion, and that it was brake of fern, now withering fast.  She could think of nothing better to do with her palpitating self, than to hide here. She found a reclining trunk, where she sank down upon a tangled couch of fronds and stems. 

The night passed.  Bathsheba was not sure whether she slept. But after a long interval she became conscious of her surroundings. She was in a secluded place. A course throated chatter of a sparrow, followed by "Chee- weeze-weeze-weeze!" from another retreat. 

It was a finch. 

Third: "Tink-tink-tink-a-chink!" from the hedge. 

It was a robin. 

"Chuk-chuk-chuk!" overhead. 

A squirrel.

Then, from the road, "With my ra-ta-ta

and my rum-tum-tum!" 

It was a ploughboy. Presently he came opposite, and she believed from his voice that he was one of the boys from her own farm.  He was followed by a shambling tramp of heavy feet, and looking through the ferns Bathsheba could just discern in the wan light of daybreak a team of her own horses.  They stopped to drink at a pond of other side of the way.  She watched them flouncing into the pool, tossing up their heads, drinking again, the water dribbling from their lips in silver threads.  There was another flounce, and they came out of the pond, and turned back again towards the farm. 

She looked farther around.  The morning twilight was just beginning. She perceived that in her lap and clinging to her hair, were red and yellow leaves which had come down from the trees and settled silently upon her during her partial sleep. Bathsheba shook her dress to get rid of them, when multitudes of the same family lying around about her rose and fully fluttered away in the breeze thus created, "like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing." There was an opening towards the east. The light from the morning star attracted her eyes to that direction.  From her feet, and the ferns the ground sloped towards to a hollow, in which was a species of swamp dotted with fungi.  A morning mist hung over it now.  The hedge behind it was not visible clearly.  The general aspect of swamp was harmful.  The immediate neighbourhood of Bathsheba was a nursery of pestilence, small and great. Bathsheba arose with a tremor of having passed the night on the brink of such a place. 

Bathsheba could hear the footsteps along the road.  She crouched down out of sight.  The pedestrian came into view was a school boy, with a bag slung over his shoulder.  He paused, and without looking up, murmured, "O Lord, O Lord, O Lord, that I know out of book. Give us, Give us, Give us ---- that I know. Grace that, Grace that, Grace that" Other words followed to the same effect.  The boy was of dunce class apparently; the book was a psalter; and this was the way of his learning.  Bathsheba was slightly amused by this, and the boy passed on.

By this time stupor has given place to anxiety, and anxiety began to make room for hunger and thirst.  A form now appeared on other side of the swamp, half hidden by mist, and came towards Bathsheba.  She found that it was Liddy, her maid.  Her heart bounded with gratitude, that she was not altogether deserted, and she jumped up.

"Oh, Liddy!" she said, but the words were only been framed by her lips; and there came no sound.  She had lost her voice by exposure to the clogged atmosphere all these hours of night.

"Oh, ma'am, I am so glad I have found you," said Liddy as soon she saw Bathsheba.

"You can't come across," Bathsheba said in a whisper, which she vainly endeavoured to make loud enough to reach Liddy.  Liddy, not hearing this, stepped down upon the swamp, saying, "It will bear me up, I think."  Bathsheba saw Liddy crossing the swamp in the morning light.  Bubbles of rainbow colours rose up from sweating sod behind Bathsheba's feet as she trod, hissing as they burst and joined watery atmosphere.  Liddy did not sink as Bathsheba had feared.  She landed safely on the other side, and looked up at the pale and weary face of her mistress.

"Poor thing!" said Liddy with tears in her eyes.  " Do hearten yourself up a little, ma'am. However" ---

"I can't speak above a whisper --- my voice is gone for the present," said Bathsheba hurriedly.  "I suppose the damp air from that hollow has taken it away.  "Liddy, don't question me, mind.  Who sent you --- anybody?"

"Nobody.  I thought when I found you were not at home, something cruel had happened.  I fancy I heard his voice last night; and so, knowing something was wrong" ---

"Is he at home?"

"No. He left just before I came out."

"Is Fanny taken away?"

"Not yet.  She will soon be --- at nine o'clock."

"We won't go home at present, then. Suppose we walk about in this wood." 

Liddy, without understanding everything, or anything, assented, and they walked together farther among the trees.

"But you had better come in ma'am, and have something to eat.  You will die of a chill!"

"I shall not come indoors yet ---perhaps never."

"Shall I get you something to eat, and something else to put over your head, besides that little shwal?"

"If you will, Liddy."

Liddy vanished, and at the end of twenty minutes, returned with a cloak, hat, some slices of bread and butter, a teacup, and some tea in a little china jug.

"Is Fanny gone?"

"No," said her companion, pouring out tea.

Bathsheba wrapped herself up, and ate and drank sparingly.  Her voice was then a little clearer, and a trifling colour returned to her face.

"Now, we will walk about again," she said.

They wandered about the wood for nearly two hours, Bathsheba replying in monosyllables to Liddy's prattle, for her mind ran on one subject, and one only.  She interrupted with ---

"I wonder if Fanny is gone by this time?" 

"I will go and see." 

She came back with the information that men were just taking away the corpse; that Bathsheba had been inquired for; that she had replied to the effect that her mistress was unwell, and could not be seen.

"Then they think that I am in my bed room." 

"Yes," said Liddy, and she ventured to add, "you said when I first found you that you might never go home again. You didn't mean it, ma'am?" 

"No; I have altered my mind. It is only women with no pride in them who run away from their husbands.  There's one position worse than that of being found dead in your husband's house, and that is to be found alive through having gone away to the house of somebody else. I have thought of it all this morning, and I have chosen my course.  A runaway wife is an encumbrance to everybody, a burden to herself, and a byword --- all of which make up a heap of misery greater than staying at home, though this may include trifling, insult, beating and starvation. Liddy, if ever you marry, you will find yourself in a fearful situation, but mind this, don't you flinch.  Stand your ground, and be cut to pieces.  That's what I am going to do."

"Oh, mistress, don't talk so!" said Liddy taking her hand; "but I knew you had too much sense to bide away.  May I ask what dreadful thing it is that has happened between you and him?"

"You may ask; but I may not tell."

They returned to the house by another route, somewhat roundabout, entering at the rear side of the house.  Bathsheba glided up the backstairs to a disused attic, followed by Liddy.

"Liddy," she said with a lighter heart, "you are to be my confidante for the present.  I shall take up my abode here.  Will you get a fire lighted, put down a piece of carpet, and help me to make the place comfortable? Afterwards I want you and Maryann to bring up that little iron bedstead in the small room, and the bed  belonging to it, and a table, and some other things . . . What shall I do to pass the heavy time away!" 

"Hemming handkerchief is a very good thing," said Liddy.

"Oh, no, no! I hate needle work." 

"Knitting?"

"And that, too." 

"You might finish your sampler [1]  Only the carnations [2] and peacockds want filling in; and then it could be framed and glazed, and hung beside your aunt, ma'am"

"Samplers are out of date.  Bring up some books --- not new ones."

"Some of your uncle's old ones, ma'am?"

"Yes.  Some of those we stowed away in boxes. Bring Beaumont and Fletcher's [3] 'Maid's Tragedy', and the 'Mourning Bride' and let me see 'Night Thoughts' and the 'Vanity of Human Wishes'"

"And the story of the black man who murdered his wife Desdemona?  It is a nice dismal one that would suit you now."

"Now Liddy, you have been looking into my books without telling me; and I said you were not to!  How do you know it would suit me?  It wouldn't suit me at all."

"But, if others do"---

"No, they don't; and I won't read dismal books.  Why should I read dismal books, indeed?  Bring me  'Love in a village' and 'Maid of the Mill' and 'Doctor Syntax' and some volumes of 'Spectator'.

All that day Bathsheba and Liddy lived in the attic.  Troy was nowhere in the neighborhood, or troubled them at all.  Bathsheba sat at the window till sunset, sometimes attempting to read, at other times watching every moment outside without much purpose, and listening to every sound without much interest.

At the west front of the church tower young men of the village gathered, as was their custom, for a game of fives. She could see the ball flying upwards almost to the belfry window, and the brown and black heads of the lads darting about right and left, their white shirt sleeves gleaming in the sun.  Occasional shout and peal of laughter came through the stillness of the evening air.  The game concluded abruptly, and the players leapt over the wall and vanished.

"Why did the players finished their game so suddenly?" Bathsheba inquired the next time Liddy entered.

"I think two men came just from Casterbridge, and began puttig up a grand carved tombstone," said Liddy.

"The lads went to see whose it was."

"Do you know?" Bathsheba asked.

"I don't," said Liddy.

      END OF THE CHAPTER 

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Notes:-

1. Sampler: A piece of decorative embroidery stitched by young women to practice or demonstrate needle work.

2. Carnations: Decoration with flowers.

3. Beaumont and Fletcher's: Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher were highly successful English playwrights who developed and popularized tragicomedy plays during the first quarter of 17th century.