Dairyman Crick withdrew, and Tess dropped behind. Mr Clare also
stepped out of line, and began privateering about for the weed. When
she found him near her, her very tension at what she had heard the
night before made her the first to speak. "Don't they look pretty?" she said. "Who?"
"Izzy Huett and Retty."
Tess had moodily decided that either of these maidens would make a
good farmer's wife, and that she ought to recommend them, and obscure
her own wretched charms.
"Pretty? Well, yes--they are pretty girls--fresh looking. I have
often thought so."
"Though, poor dears, prettiness won't last long!"
"O no, unfortunately."
"They are excellent dairywomen."
"Yes: though not better than you."
"They skim better than I."
"Do they?"
Clare remained observing them--not without their observing him.
"She is colouring up," continued Tess heroically. "Who?"
"Retty Priddle."
"Oh! Why it that?"
"Because you are looking at her."
Self-sacrificing as her mood might be, Tess could not well go further
and cry, "Marry one of them, if you really do want a dairywoman and
not a lady; and don't think of marrying me!" She followed Dairyman
Crick, and had the mournful satisfaction of seeing that Clare
remained behind.
From this day she forced herself to take pains to avoid him--never
allowing herself, as formerly, to remain long in his company, even if
their juxtaposition were purely accidental. She gave the other three
every chance. Tess was woman enough to realize from their avowals to herself that
Angel Clare had the honour of all the dairymaids in his keeping, and
her perception of his care to avoid compromising the happiness of
either in the least degree bred a tender respect in Tess for what she
deemed, rightly or wrongly, the self-controlling sense of duty shown
by him, a quality which she had never expected to find in one of the
opposite sex, and in the absence of which more than one of the simple
hearts who were his house-mates might have gone weeping on her
pilgrimage. XXIII The hot weather of July had crept upon them unawares, and the
atmosphere of the flat vale hung heavy as an opiate over the
dairy-folk, the cows, and the trees. Hot steaming rains fell
frequently, making the grass where the cows fed yet more rank, and
hindering the late hay-making in the other meads.
It was Sunday morning; the milking was done; the outdoor milkers
had gone home. Tess and the other three were dressing themselves
rapidly, the whole bevy having agreed to go together to Mellstock
Church, which lay some three or four miles distant from the
dairy-house. She had now been two months at Talbothays, and this
was her first excursion.