Tess of the dUrbervilles

"Hark at that child!" cried Mrs Durbeyfield, with parenthetic

admiration. "Perhaps to show his diamond ring," murmured Sir John, dreamily, from

his chair. "I'll think it over," said Tess, leaving the room.

"Well, she's made a conquest o' the younger branch of us, straight

off," continued the matron to her husband, "and she's a fool if she

don't follow it up." "I don't quite like my children going away from home," said the

haggler. "As the head of the family, the rest ought to come to me."

"But do let her go, Jacky," coaxed his poor witless wife. "He's

struck wi' her--you can see that. He called her Coz! He'll marry

her, most likely, and make a lady of her; and then she'll be what

her forefathers was." John Durbeyfield had more conceit than energy or health, and this

supposition was pleasant to him.

"Well, perhaps that's what young Mr d'Urberville means," he admitted;

"and sure enough he mid have serious thoughts about improving his

blood by linking on to the old line. Tess, the little rogue! And

have she really paid 'em a visit to such an end as this?" Meanwhile Tess was walking thoughtfully among the gooseberry-bushes

in the garden, and over Prince's grave. When she came in her mother

pursued her advantage. "Well, what be you going to do?" she asked. "I wish I had seen Mrs d'Urberville," said Tess. "I think you mid as well settle it. Then you'll see her soon

enough." Her father coughed in his chair. "I don't know what to say!" answered the girl restlessly. "It is for

you to decide. I killed the old horse, and I suppose I ought to do

something to get ye a new one. But--but--I don't quite like Mr

d'Urberville being there!"

The children, who had made use of this idea of Tess being taken up by

their wealthy kinsfolk (which they imagined the other family to be)

as a species of dolorifuge after the death of the horse, began to cry

at Tess's reluctance, and teased and reproached her for hesitating.

"Tess won't go-o-o and be made a la-a-dy of!--no, she says she

wo-o-on't!" they wailed, with square mouths. "And we shan't have a

nice new horse, and lots o' golden money to buy fairlings! And Tess

won't look pretty in her best cloze no mo-o-ore!"

Her mother chimed in to the same tune: a certain way she had of

making her labours in the house seem heavier than they were by

prolonging them indefinitely, also weighed in the argument. Her

father alone preserved an attitude of neutrality.