The two went round and ascended the crooked stair in darkness till Clym’s sitting-room on the upper floor was reached, where he lit a candle, Charley entering gently behind.  Yeobright searched his desk, and taking out a sheet of tissue-paper unfolded from it two or three undulating locks of raven hair, which fell over the paper like black streams.  From these he selected one, wrapped it up, and gave it to the lad, whose eyes had filled with tears.  He kissed the packet, put it in his pocket, and said in a voice of emotion, “O, Mr. Clym, how good you are to me!”

“I will go a little way with you,” said Clym.  And amid the noise of merriment from below they descended.  Their path to the front led them close to a little side-window, whence the rays of candles streamed across the shrubs.  The window, being screened from general observation by the bushes, had been left unblinded, so that a person in this private nook could see all that was going on within the room which contained the wedding-guests, except in so far as vision was hindered by the green antiquity of the panes.

“Charley, what are they doing?” said Clym.  “My sight is weaker again tonight, and the glass of this window is not good.”

Charley wiped his own eyes, which were rather blurred with moisture, and stepped closer to the casement.  “Mr. Venn is asking Christian Cantle to sing,” he replied, “and Christian is moving about in his chair as if he were much frightened at the question, and his father has struck up a stave instead of him.”

“Yes, I can hear the old man’s voice,” said Clym.  “So there’s to be no dancing, I suppose.  And is Thomasin in the room?  I see something moving in front of the candles that resembles her shape, I think.”

“Yes.  She do seem happy.  She is red in the face, and laughing at something Fairway has said to her.  O my!”

“What noise was that?” said Clym.

“Mr. Venn is so tall that he knocked his head against the beam in gieing a skip as he passed under.  Mrs. Venn has run up quite frightened and now she’s put her hand to his head to feel if there’s a lump.  And now they be all laughing again as if nothing had happened.”

“Do any of them seem to care about my not being there?” Clym asked.

“No, not a bit in the world.  Now they are all holding up their glasses and drinking somebody’s health.”

“I wonder if it is mine?”

“No, ’tis Mr. and Mrs. Venn’s, because he is making a hearty sort of speech.  There—­now Mrs. Venn has got up, and is going away to put on her things, I think.”

“Well, they haven’t concerned themselves about me, and it is quite right they should not.  It is all as it should be, and Thomasin at least is happy.  We will not stay any longer now, as they will soon be coming out to go home.”