Jude the Obsure

"Oh but you shall kiss me!" said she, starting up. "I

can't--bear--!"

He clasped her, and kissed her weeping face as he had scarcely ever

done before, and they remained in silence till she said, "Good-bye,

good-bye!" And then gently pressing him away she got free, trying to

mitigate the sadness by saying: "We'll be dear friends just the same,

Jude, won't we? And we'll see each other sometimes--yes!--and forget

all this, and try to be as we were long ago?"

Jude did not permit himself to speak, but turned and descended the

stairs.

IV

The man whom Sue, in her mental _volte-face_, was now regarding as

her inseparable husband, lived still at Marygreen.

On the day before the tragedy of the children, Phillotson had seen

both her and Jude as they stood in the rain at Christminster watching

the procession to the theatre. But he had said nothing of it at the

moment to his companion Gillingham, who, being an old friend, was

staying with him at the village aforesaid, and had, indeed, suggested

the day's trip to Christminster.

"What are you thinking of?" said Gillingham, as they went home. "The

university degree you never obtained?"

"No, no," said Phillotson gruffly. "Of somebody I saw to-day." In a

moment he added, "Susanna."

"I saw her, too."

"You said nothing."

"I didn't wish to draw your attention to her. But, as you did see

her, you should have said: 'How d'ye do, my dear-that-was?'"

"Ah, well. I might have. But what do you think of this: I have good

reason for supposing that she was innocent when I divorced her--that

I was all wrong. Yes, indeed! Awkward, isn't it?"

"She has taken care to set you right since, anyhow, apparently."

"H'm. That's a cheap sneer. I ought to have waited, unquestionably."

At the end of the week, when Gillingham had gone back to his school

near Shaston, Phillotson, as was his custom, went to Alfredston

market; ruminating again on Arabella's intelligence as he walked down

the long hill which he had known before Jude knew it, though his

history had not beaten so intensely upon its incline. Arrived in

the town he bought his usual weekly local paper; and when he had sat

down in an inn to refresh himself for the five miles' walk back, he

pulled the paper from his pocket and read awhile. The account of the

"strange suicide of a stone-mason's children" met his eye.