“Mother, that’s not true,” he firmly
answered.
“Can you maintain that I sit and tell untruths,
when all I wish to do is to save you from sorrow?
For shame, Clym! But it is all through that woman—a
hussy!”
Clym reddened like fire and rose. He placed his
hand upon his mother’s shoulder and said, in
a tone which hung strangely between entreaty and command,
“I won’t hear it. I may be led to
answer you in a way which we shall both regret.”
His mother parted her lips to begin some other vehement
truth, but on looking at him she saw that in his face
which led her to leave the words unsaid. Yeobright
walked once or twice across the room, and then suddenly
went out of the house. It was eleven o’clock
when he came in, though he had not been further than
the precincts of the garden. His mother was gone
to bed. A light was left burning on the table,
and supper was spread. Without stopping for any
food he secured the doors and went upstairs.
An Hour of Bliss and Many Hours of Sadness
The next day was gloomy enough at Blooms-End.
Yeobright remained in his study, sitting over the
open books; but the work of those hours was miserably
scant. Determined that there should be nothing
in his conduct towards his mother resembling sullenness,
he had occasionally spoken to her on passing matters,
and would take no notice of the brevity of her replies.
With the same resolve to keep up a show of conversation
he said, about seven o’clock in the evening,
“There’s an eclipse of the moon tonight.
I am going out to see it.” And, putting
on his overcoat, he left her.
The low moon was not as yet visible from the front
of the house, and Yeobright climbed out of the valley
until he stood in the full flood of her light.
But even now he walked on, and his steps were in the
direction of Rainbarrow.
In half an hour he stood at the top. The sky
was clear from verge to verge, and the moon flung
her rays over the whole heath, but without sensibly
lighting it, except where paths and water-courses had
laid bare the white flints and glistening quartz sand,
which made streaks upon the general shade. After
standing awhile he stooped and felt the heather.
It was dry, and he flung himself down upon the barrow,
his face towards the moon, which depicted a small
image of herself in each of his eyes.
He had often come up here without stating his purpose
to his mother; but this was the first time that he
had been ostensibly frank as to his purpose while
really concealing it. It was a moral situation
which, three months earlier, he could hardly have credited
of himself. In returning to labour in this sequestered
spot he had anticipated an escape from the chafing
of social necessities; yet behold they were here also.
More than ever he longed to be in some world where
personal ambition was not the only recognized form
of progress—such, perhaps, as might have
