“Very well, then, I will—­on one condition.  Having brought you here to this out-of-the-way place, I feel myself responsible for your safe-conduct home, whatever you may yourself feel about it.  As to your getting to Trantridge without assistance, it is quite impossible; for, to tell the truth, dear, owing to this fog, which so disguises everything, I don’t quite know where we are myself.  Now, if you will promise to wait beside the horse while I walk through the bushes till I come to some road or house, and ascertain exactly our whereabouts, I’ll deposit you here willingly.  When I come back I’ll give you full directions, and if you insist upon walking you may; or you may ride—­at your pleasure.”

She accepted these terms, and slid off on the near side, though not till he had stolen a cursory kiss.  He sprang down on the other side.

“I suppose I must hold the horse?” said she.

“Oh no; it’s not necessary,” replied Alec, patting the panting creature.  “He’s had enough of it for to-night.”

He turned the horse’s head into the bushes, hitched him on to a bough, and made a sort of couch or nest for her in the deep mass of dead leaves.

“Now, you sit there,” he said.  “The leaves have not got damp as yet.  Just give an eye to the horse—­it will be quite sufficient.”

He took a few steps away from her, but, returning, said, “By the bye, Tess, your father has a new cob to-day.  Somebody gave it to him.”

“Somebody?  You!”

D’Urberville nodded.

“O how very good of you that is!” she exclaimed, with a painful sense of the awkwardness of having to thank him just then.

“And the children have some toys.”

“I didn’t know—­you ever sent them anything!” she murmured, much moved.  “I almost wish you had not—­yes, I almost wish it!”

“Why, dear?”

“It—­hampers me so.”

“Tessy—­don’t you love me ever so little now?”

“I’m grateful,” she reluctantly admitted.  “But I fear I do not—­” The sudden vision of his passion for herself as a factor in this result so distressed her that, beginning with one slow tear, and then following with another, she wept outright.

“Don’t cry, dear, dear one!  Now sit down here, and wait till I come.”  She passively sat down amid the leaves he had heaped, and shivered slightly.  “Are you cold?” he asked.

“Not very—­a little.”

He touched her with his fingers, which sank into her as into down.  “You have only that puffy muslin dress on—­how’s that?”

“It’s my best summer one.  ’Twas very warm when I started, and I didn’t know I was going to ride, and that it would be night.”

“Nights grow chilly in September.  Let me see.”  He pulled off a light overcoat that he had worn, and put it round her tenderly.  “That’s it—­now you’ll feel warmer,” he continued.  “Now, my pretty, rest there; I shall soon be back again.”