Clare therefore thought it would be best to prepare Tess and her
family by sending a line to Marlott announcing his return, and his
hope that she was still living with them there, as he had arranged
for her to do when he left England. He despatched the inquiry that
very day, and before the week was out there came a short reply from
Mrs Durbeyfield which did not remove his embarrassment, for it bore
no address, though to his surprise it was not written from Marlott.
SIR, J write these few lines to say that my Daughter is away
from me at present, and J am not sure when she will
return, but J will let you know as Soon as she do.
J do not feel at liberty to tell you Where she is
temperly biding. J should say that me and my Family
have left Marlott for some Time.-Yours, J. DURBEYFIELD
It was such a relief to Clare to learn that Tess was at least
apparently well that her mother's stiff reticence as to her
whereabouts did not long distress him. They were all angry with him,
evidently. He would wait till Mrs Durbeyfield could inform him of
Tess's return, which her letter implied to be soon. He deserved no
more. His had been a love "which alters when it alteration finds".
He had undergone some strange experiences in his absence; he had seen
the virtual Faustina in the literal Cornelia, a spiritual Lucretia in
a corporeal Phryne; he had thought of the woman taken and set in the
midst as one deserving to be stoned, and of the wife of Uriah being
made a queen; and he had asked himself why he had not judged Tess
constructively rather than biographically, by the will rather than
by the deed? A day or two passed while he waited at his father's house for the
promised second note from Joan Durbeyfield, and indirectly to recover
a little more strength. The strength showed signs of coming back,
but there was no sign of Joan's letter. Then he hunted up the
old letter sent on to him in Brazil, which Tess had written from
Flintcomb-Ash, and re-read it. The sentences touched him now as
much as when he had first perused them. ...
I must cry to you in my trouble--I have no one
else! ... I think I must die if you do not come
soon, or tell me to come to you... please, please,
not to be just--only a little kind to me ... If
you would come, I could die in your arms! I would
be well content to do that if so be you had forgiven
me! ... if you will send me one little line, and say,
"I am coming soon," I will bide on, Angel--O, so
cheerfully! ... think how it do hurt my heart not to
see you ever--ever! Ah, if I could only make your
dear heart ache one little minute of each day as mine
does every day and all day long, it might lead you to
show pity to your poor lonely one. ... I would be
content, ay, glad, to live with you as your servant,
if I may not as your wife; so that I could only be
near you, and get glimpses of you, and think of you
as mine. ... I long for only one thing in heaven
or earth or under the earth, to meet you, my own
dear! Come to me--come to me, and save me from what
threatens me!