Eustacia was now no longer the goddess but the woman
to him, a being to fight for, support, help, be maligned
for. Now that he had reached a cooler moment
he would have preferred a less hasty marriage; but
the card was laid, and he determined to abide by the
game. Whether Eustacia was to add one other to
the list of those who love too hotly to love long
and well, the forthcoming event was certainly a ready
way of proving.
Yeobright Goes, and the Breach Is Complete
All that evening smart sounds denoting an active packing
up came from Yeobright’s room to the ears of
his mother downstairs.
Next morning he departed from the house and again
proceeded across the heath. A long day’s
march was before him, his object being to secure a
dwelling to which he might take Eustacia when she became
his wife. Such a house, small, secluded, and
with its windows boarded up, he had casually observed
a month earlier, about two miles beyond the village
of East Egdon, and six miles distant altogether; and
thither he directed his steps today.
The weather was far different from that of the evening
before. The yellow and vapoury sunset which had
wrapped up Eustacia from his parting gaze had presaged
change. It was one of those not infrequent days
of an English June which are as wet and boisterous
as November. The cold clouds hastened on in a
body, as if painted on a moving slide. Vapours
from other continents arrived upon the wind, which
curled and parted round him as he walked on.
At length Clym reached the margin of a fir and beech
plantation that had been enclosed from heath land
in the year of his birth. Here the trees, laden
heavily with their new and humid leaves, were now
suffering more damage than during the highest winds
of winter, when the boughs are especially disencumbered
to do battle with the storm. The wet young beeches
were undergoing amputations, bruises, cripplings,
and harsh lacerations, from which the wasting sap would
bleed for many a day to come, and which would leave
scars visible till the day of their burning.
Each stem was wrenched at the root, where it moved
like a bone in its socket, and at every onset of the
gale convulsive sounds came from the branches, as
if pain were felt. In a neighbouring brake a
finch was trying to sing; but the wind blew under
his feathers till they stood on end, twisted round
his little tail, and made him give up his song.
Yet a few yards to Yeobright’s left, on the
open heath, how ineffectively gnashed the storm!
Those gusts which tore the trees merely waved the
furze and heather in a light caress. Egdon was
made for such times as these.
Yeobright reached the empty house about mid-day.
It was almost as lonely as that of Eustacia’s
grandfather, but the fact that it stood near a heath
was disguised by a belt of firs which almost enclosed
the premises. He journeyed on about a mile further
to the village in which the owner lived, and, returning
with him to the house, arrangements were completed,
and the man undertook that one room at least should
be ready for occupation the next day. Clym’s
intention was to live there alone until Eustacia should
join him on their wedding day.
