The Mayor of Casterbridge

Chapter 23

A conjecture that her visitor might be some other person

had, indeed, flashed through Lucetta's mind when she was on

the point of bursting out; but it was just too late to

recede.

He was years younger than the Mayor of Casterbridge; fair,

fresh, and slenderly handsome. He wore genteel cloth

leggings with white buttons, polished boots with infinite

lace holes, light cord breeches under a black velveteen coat

and waistcoat; and he had a silver-topped switch in his

hand. Lucetta blushed, and said with a curious mixture of

pout and laugh on her face--"O, I've made a mistake!"

The visitor, on the contrary, did not laugh half a wrinkle.

"But I'm very sorry!" he said, in deprecating tones. "I

came and I inquired for Miss Henchard, and they showed me up

here, and in no case would I have caught ye so unmannerly if

I had known!"

"I was the unmannerly one," she said.

"But is it that I have come to the wrong house, madam?" said

Mr. Farfrae, blinking a little in his bewilderment and

nervously tapping his legging with his switch.

"O no, sir,--sit down. You must come and sit down now you

are here," replied Lucetta kindly, to relieve his

embarrassment. "Miss Henchard will be here directly."

Now this was not strictly true; but that something about the

young man--that hyperborean crispness, stringency, and

charm, as of a well-braced musical instrument, which had

awakened the interest of Henchard, and of Elizabeth-Jane and

of the Three Mariners' jovial crew, at sight, made his

unexpected presence here attractive to Lucetta. He

hesitated, looked at the chair, thought there was no danger

in it (though there was), and sat down.

Farfrae's sudden entry was simply the result of Henchard's

permission to him to see Elizabeth if he were minded to woo

her. At first he had taken no notice of Henchard's brusque

letter; but an exceptionally fortunate business transaction

put him on good terms with everybody, and revealed to him

that he could undeniably marry if he chose. Then who so

pleasing, thrifty, and satisfactory in every way as

Elizabeth-Jane? Apart from her personal recommendations a

reconciliation with his former friend Henchard would, in the

natural course of things, flow from such a union. He

therefore forgave the Mayor his curtness; and this morning

on his way to the fair he had called at her house, where he

learnt that she was staying at Miss Templeman's. A little

stimulated at not finding her ready and waiting--so fanciful

are men!--he hastened on to High-Place Hall to encounter no

Elizabeth but its mistress herself.

"The fair to-day seems a large one," she said when, by

natural deviation, their eyes sought the busy scene without.

"Your numerous fairs and markets keep me interested. How

many things I think of while I watch from here!"

He seemed in doubt how to answer, and the babble without

reached them as they sat--voices as of wavelets on a looping

sea, one ever and anon rising above the rest. "Do you look

out often?" he asked.

"Yes--very often."

"Do you look for any one you know?"

Why should she have answered as she did?

"I look as at a picture merely. But," she went on, turning

pleasantly to him, "I may do so now--I may look for you.

You are always there, are you not? Ah--I don't mean it

seriously! But it is amusing to look for somebody one knows

in a crowd, even if one does not want him. It takes off the

terrible oppressiveness of being surrounded by a throng, and

having no point of junction with it through a single

individual."

"Ay! Maybe you'll be very lonely, ma'am?"

"Nobody knows how lonely."

"But you are rich, they say?"

"If so, I don't know how to enjoy my riches. I came to

Casterbridge thinking I should like to live here. But I

wonder if I shall."

"Where did ye come from, ma'am?"

"The neighbourhood of Bath."

"And I from near Edinboro'," he murmured. "It's better to

stay at home, and that's true; but a man must live where his

money is made. It is a great pity, but it's always so! Yet

I've done very well this year. O yes," he went on with

ingenuous enthusiasm. "You see that man with the drab

kerseymere coat? I bought largely of him in the autumn when

wheat was down, and then afterwards when it rose a little I

sold off all I had! It brought only a small profit to me;

while the farmers kept theirs, expecting higher figures--

yes, though the rats were gnawing the ricks hollow. Just

when I sold the markets went lower, and I bought up the corn

of those who had been holding back at less price than my

first purchases. And then," cried Farfrae impetuously, his

face alight, "I sold it a few weeks after, when it happened

to go up again! And so, by contenting mysel' with small

profits frequently repeated, I soon made five hundred

pounds--yes!"--(bringing down his hand upon the table, and

quite forgetting where he was)--"while the others by keeping

theirs in hand made nothing at all!"

Lucetta regarded him with a critical interest. He was quite

a new type of person to her. At last his eye fell upon the

lady's and their glances met.

"Ay, now, I'm wearying you!" he exclaimed.

She said, "No, indeed," colouring a shade.

"What then?"

"Quite otherwise. You are most interesting."

It was now Farfrae who showed the modest pink.

"I mean all you Scotchmen," she added in hasty correction.

"So free from Southern extremes. We common people are all

one way or the other--warm or cold, passionate or frigid.

You have both temperatures going on in you at the same

time."

"But how do you mean that? Ye were best to explain clearly,

ma'am."

"You are animated--then you are thinking of getting on. You

are sad the next moment--then you are thinking of Scotland

and friends."

"Yes. I think of home sometimes!" he said simply.

"So do I--as far as I can. But it was an old house where I

was born, and they pulled it down for improvements, so I

seem hardly to have any home to think of now."

Lucetta did not add, as she might have done, that the house

was in St. Helier, and not in Bath.

"But the mountains, and the mists and the rocks, they are

there! And don't they seem like home?"

She shook her head.

"They do to me--they do to me," he murmured. And his mind

could be seen flying away northwards. Whether its origin

were national or personal, it was quite true what Lucetta

had said, that the curious double strands in Farfrae's

thread of life--the commercial and the romantic--were very

distinct at times. Like the colours in a variegated cord

those contrasts could be seen intertwisted, yet not

mingling.

"You are wishing you were back again," she said.

"Ah, no, ma'am," said Farfrae, suddenly recalling himself.

The fair without the windows was now raging thick and loud.

It was the chief hiring fair of the year, and differed quite

from the market of a few days earlier. In substance it was

a whitey-brown crowd flecked with white--this being the body

of labourers waiting for places. The long bonnets of the

women, like waggon-tilts, their cotton gowns and checked

shawls, mixed with the carters' smockfrocks; for they, too,

entered into the hiring. Among the rest, at the corner of

the pavement, stood an old shepherd, who attracted the eyes

of Lucetta and Farfrae by his stillness. He was evidently a

chastened man. The battle of life had been a sharp one with

him, for, to begin with, he was a man of small frame. He

was now so bowed by hard work and years that, approaching

from behind, a person could hardly see his head. He had

planted the stem of his crook in the gutter and was resting

upon the bow, which was polished to silver brightness by the

long friction of his hands. He had quite forgotten where he

was, and what he had come for, his eyes being bent on the

ground. A little way off negotiations were proceeding which

had reference to him; but he did not hear them, and there

seemed to be passing through his mind pleasant visions of

the hiring successes of his prime, when his skill laid open

to him any farm for the asking.

The negotiations were between a farmer from a distant county

and the old man's son. In these there was a difficulty.

The farmer would not take the crust without the crumb of the

bargain, in other words, the old man without the younger;

and the son had a sweetheart on his present farm, who stood

by, waiting the issue with pale lips.

"I'm sorry to leave ye, Nelly," said the young man with

emotion. "But, you see, I can't starve father, and he's out

o' work at Lady-day. 'Tis only thirty-five mile."

The girl's lips quivered. "Thirty-five mile!" she murmured.

"Ah! 'tis enough! I shall never see 'ee again!" It was,

indeed, a hopeless length of traction for Dan Cupid's

magnet; for young men were young men at Casterbridge as

elsewhere.

"O! no, no--I never shall," she insisted, when he pressed

her hand; and she turned her face to Lucetta's wall to hide

her weeping. The farmer said he would give the young man

half-an-hour for his answer, and went away, leaving the

group sorrowing.

Lucetta's eyes, full of tears, met Farfrae's. His, too, to

her surprise, were moist at the scene.

"It is very hard," she said with strong feelings. "Lovers

ought not to be parted like that! O, if I had my wish, I'd

let people live and love at their pleasure!"

"Maybe I can manage that they'll not be parted," said

Farfrae. "I want a young carter; and perhaps I'll take the

old man too--yes; he'll not be very expensive, and doubtless

he will answer my pairrpose somehow."

"O, you are so good!" she cried, delighted. "Go and tell

them, and let me know if you have succeeded!"

Farfrae went out, and she saw him speak to the group. The

eyes of all brightened; the bargain was soon struck.

Farfrae returned to her immediately it was concluded.

"It is kind-hearted of you, indeed," said Lucetta. "For my

part, I have resolved that all my servants shall have lovers

if they want them! Do make the same resolve!"

Farfrae looked more serious, waving his head a half turn.

"I must be a little stricter than that," he said.

"Why?"

"You are a--a thriving woman; and I am a struggling hay-and-

corn merchant."

"I am a very ambitious woman."

"Ah, well, I cannet explain. I don't know how to talk to

ladies, ambitious or no; and that's true," said Donald with

grave regret. "I try to be civil to a' folk--no more!"

"I see you are as you say," replied she, sensibly getting

the upper hand in these exchanges of sentiment. Under this

revelation of insight Farfrae again looked out of the window

into the thick of the fair.

Two farmers met and shook hands, and being quite near the

window their remarks could be heard as others' had been.

"Have you seen young Mr. Farfrae this morning?" asked one.

"He promised to meet me here at the stroke of twelve; but

I've gone athwart and about the fair half-a-dozen times, and

never a sign of him: though he's mostly a man to his word."

"I quite forgot the engagement," murmured Farfrae.

"Now you must go," said she; "must you not?"

"Yes," he replied. But he still remained.

"You had better go," she urged. "You will lose a customer.

"Now, Miss Templeman, you will make me angry," exclaimed

Farfrae.

"Then suppose you don't go; but stay a little longer?"

He looked anxiously at the farmer who was seeking him and

who just then ominously walked across to where Henchard was

standing, and he looked into the room and at her. "I like

staying; but I fear I must go!" he said. "Business ought

not to be neglected, ought it?

"Not for a single minute."

"It's true. I'll come another time--if I may, ma'am?"

"Certainly," she said. "What has happened to us to-day is

very curious."

"Something to think over when we are alone, it's like to

be?"

"Oh, I don't know that. It is commonplace after all."

"No, I'll not say that. O no!"

"Well, whatever it has been, it is now over; and the market

calls you to be gone."

"Yes, yes. Market--business! I wish there were no business

in the warrld."

Lucetta almost laughed--she would quite have laughed--but

that there was a little emotion going in her at the time.

"How you change!" she said. "You should not change like

this.

"I have never wished such things before," said the

Scotchman, with a simple, shamed, apologetic look for his

weakness. "It is only since coming here and seeing you!"

"If that's the case, you had better not look at me any

longer. Dear me, I feel I have quite demoralized you!"

"But look or look not, I will see you in my thoughts. Well,

I'll go--thank you for the pleasure of this visit."

"Thank you for staying."

"Maybe I'll get into my market-mind when I've been out a few

minutes," he murmured. "But I don't know--I don't know!"

As he went she said eagerly, "You may hear them speak of me

in Casterbridge as time goes on. If they tell you I'm a

coquette, which some may, because of the incidents of my

life, don't believe it, for I am not."

"I swear I will not!" he said fervidly.

Thus the two. She had enkindled the young man's enthusiasm

till he was quite brimming with sentiment; while he from

merely affording her a new form of idleness, had gone on to

wake her serious solicitude. Why was this? They could not

have told.

Lucetta as a young girl would hardly have looked at a

tradesman. But her ups and downs, capped by her

indiscretions with Henchard had made her uncritical as to

station. In her poverty she had met with repulse from the

society to which she had belonged, and she had no great zest

for renewing an attempt upon it now. Her heart longed for

some ark into which it could fly and be at rest. Rough or

smooth she did not care so long as it was warm.

Farfrae was shown out, it having entirely escaped him that

he had called to see Elizabeth. Lucetta at the window

watched him threading the maze of farmers and farmers' men.

She could see by his gait that he was conscious of her eyes,

and her heart went out to him for his modesty--pleaded with

her sense of his unfitness that he might be allowed to come

again. He entered the market-house, and she could see him

no more.

Three minutes later, when she had left the window, knocks,

not of multitude but of strength, sounded through the house,

and the waiting-maid tripped up.

"The Mayor," she said.

Lucetta had reclined herself, and she was looking dreamily

through her fingers. She did not answer at once, and the

maid repeated the information with the addition, "And he's

afraid he hasn't much time to spare, he says."

"Oh! Then tell him that as I have a headache I won't detain

him to-day."

The message was taken down, and she heard the door close.

Lucetta had come to Casterbridge to quicken Henchard's

feelings with regard to her. She had quickened them, and

now she was indifferent to the achievement.

Her morning view of Elizabeth-Jane as a disturbing element

changed, and she no longer felt strongly the necessity of

getting rid of the girl for her stepfather's sake. When the

young woman came in, sweetly unconscious of the turn in the

tide, Lucetta went up to her, and said quite sincerely--

"I'm so glad you've come. You'll live with me a long time,

won't you?"

Elizabeth as a watch-dog to keep her father off--what a new

idea. Yet it was not unpleasing. Henchard had neglected

her all these days, after compromising her indescribably in

the past. The least he could have done when he found

himself free, and herself affluent, would have been to

respond heartily and promptly to her invitation.

Her emotions rose, fell, undulated, filled her with wild

surmise at their suddenness; and so passed Lucetta's

experiences of that day.