Dorothea did at last appear on this quaint background,
walking up the short aisle in her white beaver bonnet
and gray cloak—the same she had worn in
the Vatican. Her face being, from her entrance,
towards the chancel, even her shortsighted eyes soon
discerned Will, but there was no outward show of her
feeling except a slight paleness and a grave bow as
she passed him. To his own surprise Will felt
suddenly uncomfortable, and dared not look at her after
they had bowed to each other. Two minutes later,
when Mr. Casaubon came out of the vestry, and, entering
the pew, seated himself in face of Dorothea, Will
felt his paralysis more complete. He could look
nowhere except at the choir in the little gallery
over the vestry-door: Dorothea was perhaps pained,
and he had made a wretched blunder. It was no
longer amusing to vex Mr. Casaubon, who had the advantage
probably of watching him and seeing that he dared
not turn his head. Why had he not imagined this
beforehand?— but he could not expect that
he should sit in that square pew alone, unrelieved
by any Tuckers, who had apparently departed from Lowick
altogether, for a new clergyman was in the desk.
Still he called himself stupid now for not foreseeing
that it would be impossible for him to look towards
Dorothea—nay, that she might feel his coming
an impertinence. There was no delivering himself
from his cage, however; and Will found his places and
looked at his book as if he had been a school-mistress,
feeling that the morning service had never been so
immeasurably long before, that he was utterly ridiculous,
out of temper, and miserable. This was what a
man got by worshipping the sight of a woman!
The clerk observed with surprise that Mr. Ladislaw
did not join in the tune of Hanover, and reflected
that he might have a cold.
Mr. Casaubon did not preach that morning, and there
was no change in Will’s situation until the
blessing had been pronounced and every one rose.
It was the fashion at Lowick for “the betters”
to go out first. With a sudden determination
to break the spell that was upon him, Will looked
straight at Mr. Casaubon. But that gentleman’s
eyes were on the button of the pew-door, which he opened,
allowing Dorothea to pass, and following her immediately
without raising his eyelids. Will’s glance
had caught Dorothea’s as she turned out of the
pew, and again she bowed, but this time with a look
of agitation, as if she were repressing tears.
Will walked out after them, but they went on towards
the little gate leading out of the churchyard into
the shrubbery, never looking round.
It was impossible for him to follow them, and he could
only walk back sadly at mid-day along the same road
which he had trodden hopefully in the morning.
The lights were all changed for him both without
and within.
CHAPTER XLVIII
Surely the golden hours are
turning gray
And dance no more, and vainly
strive to run:
I see their white locks streaming
in the wind—
Each face is haggard as it
looks at me,
Slow turning in the constant
clasping round
Storm-driven.
