One of the pair was Angel Clare, the other a tall budding
creature--half girl, half woman--a spiritualized image of Tess,
slighter than she, but with the same beautiful eyes--Clare's
sister-in-law, 'Liza-Lu. Their pale faces seemed to have shrunk
to half their natural size. They moved on hand in hand, and never
spoke a word, the drooping of their heads being that of Giotto's
"Two Apostles". When they had nearly reached the top of the great West Hill the
clocks in the town struck eight. Each gave a start at the notes,
and, walking onward yet a few steps, they reached the first
milestone, standing whitely on the green margin of the grass, and
backed by the down, which here was open to the road. They entered
upon the turf, and, impelled by a force that seemed to overrule their
will, suddenly stood still, turned, and waited in paralyzed suspense
beside the stone.
The prospect from this summit was almost unlimited. In the valley
beneath lay the city they had just left, its more prominent buildings
showing as in an isometric drawing--among them the broad cathedral
tower, with its Norman windows and immense length of aisle and nave,
the spires of St Thomas's, the pinnacled tower of the College, and,
more to the right, the tower and gables of the ancient hospice,
where to this day the pilgrim may receive his dole of bread and ale.
Behind the city swept the rotund upland of St Catherine's Hill;
further off, landscape beyond landscape, till the horizon was lost
in the radiance of the sun hanging above it.
Against these far stretches of country rose, in front of the other
city edifices, a large red-brick building, with level gray roofs,
and rows of short barred windows bespeaking captivity, the whole
contrasting greatly by its formalism with the quaint irregularities
of the Gothic erections. It was somewhat disguised from the road in
passing it by yews and evergreen oaks, but it was visible enough up
here. The wicket from which the pair had lately emerged was in the
wall of this structure. From the middle of the building an ugly
flat-topped octagonal tower ascended against the east horizon, and
viewed from this spot, on its shady side and against the light, it
seemed the one blot on the city's beauty. Yet it was with this blot,
and not with the beauty, that the two gazers were concerned.
Upon the cornice of the tower a tall staff was fixed. Their eyes
were riveted on it. A few minutes after the hour had struck
something moved slowly up the staff, and extended itself upon the
breeze.