He could not afford to wait till the next day before
seeing Thomasin and detailing his plan. He speedily
plunged himself into toilet operations, pulled a suit
of cloth clothes from a box, and in about twenty minutes
stood before the van-lantern as a reddleman in nothing
but his face, the vermilion shades of which were not
to be removed in a day. Closing the door and
fastening it with a padlock, Venn set off towards
Blooms-End.
He had reached the white palings and laid his hand
upon the gate when the door of the house opened, and
quickly closed again. A female form had glided
in. At the same time a man, who had seemingly
been standing with the woman in the porch, came forward
from the house till he was face to face with Venn.
It was Wildeve again.
“Man alive, you’ve been quick at it,”
said Diggory sarcastically.
“And you slow, as you will find,” said
Wildeve. “And,” lowering his voice,
“you may as well go back again now. I’ve
claimed her, and got her. Good night, reddleman!”
Thereupon Wildeve walked away.
Venn’s heart sank within him, though it had
not risen unduly high. He stood leaning over
the palings in an indecisive mood for nearly a quarter
of an hour. Then he went up the garden path, knocked,
and asked for Mrs. Yeobright.
Instead of requesting him to enter she came to the
porch. A discourse was carried on between them
in low measured tones for the space of ten minutes
or more. At the end of the time Mrs. Yeobright
went in, and Venn sadly retraced his steps into the
heath. When he had again regained his van he
lit the lantern, and with an apathetic face at once
began to pull off his best clothes, till in the course
of a few minutes he reappeared as the confirmed and
irretrievable reddleman that he had seemed before.
Firmness Is Discovered in a Gentle Heart
On that evening the interior of Blooms-End, though
cosy and comfortable, had been rather silent.
Clym Yeobright was not at home. Since the Christmas
party he had gone on a few days’ visit to a friend
about ten miles off.
The shadowy form seen by Venn to part from Wildeve
in the porch, and quickly withdraw into the house,
was Thomasin’s. On entering she threw down
a cloak which had been carelessly wrapped round her,
and came forward to the light, where Mrs. Yeobright
sat at her work-table, drawn up within the settle,
so that part of it projected into the chimney-corner.
“I don’t like your going out after dark
alone, Tamsin,” said her aunt quietly, without
looking up from her work.
“I have only been just outside the door.”
“Well?” inquired Mrs. Yeobright, struck
by a change in the tone of Thomasin’s voice,
and observing her. Thomasin’s cheek was
flushed to a pitch far beyond that which it had reached
before her troubles, and her eyes glittered.
“It was he who knocked,” she said.
