Jude the Obscure (Oxford World's Classics)

Jude the Obscure


---

‘Yes . . . yes. And I almost wish you had not come! It is a little too
soon––that’s all I mean. Still, let us make the best of it. You haven’t
heard about the school, I suppose?’
‘No––what about it?’
‘Only that I am going away from here to another place. The
managers and I don’t agree, and we are going to part––that’s all.’
Sue did not for a moment, either now or later, suspect what
troubles had resulted to him from letting her go; it never once
seemed to cross her mind, and she had received no news whatever
from Shaston. They talked on slight and ephemeral subjects, and
when his tea was brought up he told the amazed little servant that a
cup was to be set for Sue. That young person was much more inter-
ested in their history than they supposed, and as she descended the
stairs she lifted her eyes and hands in grotesque amazement. While
they sipped Sue went to the window and thoughtfully said, ‘It is
such a beautiful sunset, Richard.’
‘They are mostly beautiful from here, owing to the rays crossing
the mist of the Vale. But I lose them all, as they don’t shine into this
gloomy corner where I lie.’
‘Wouldn’t you like to see this particular one? It is like Heaven
opened.’
‘Ah yes! But I can’t.’
‘I’ll help you to.’
‘No––the bedstead can’t be shifted.’
‘But see how I mean.’
She went to where a swing-glass stood, and taking it in her hands
carried it to a spot by the window where it could catch the sunshine,
moving the glass till the beams were re
flected into Phillotson’s face.
‘There––you can see the great red sun now!’ she said. ‘And I am
sure it will cheer you––I do so hope it will!’ She spoke with a child-
like, repentant kindness, as if she could not do too much for him.
Phillotson smiled sadly. ‘You are an odd creature!’ he murmured
as the sun glowed in his eyes. ‘The idea of your coming to see me,
after what has passed!’
‘Don’t let us go back upon that!’ she said quickly. ‘I have to catch
the omnibus for the train, as Jude doesn’t know I have come; he was
out when I started; so I must return home almost directly. Richard, I
am so very glad you are better. You don’t hate me, do you? You have
been such a kind friend to me.’
At Shaston


---

‘I am glad to know you think so,’ said Phillotson huskily. ‘No. I
don’t hate you!’
It grew dusk quickly in the gloomy room during their intermittent
chat, and when candles were brought and it was time to leave she put
her hand in his––or rather allowed it to 
flit through his; for she was
signi
ficantly light in touch. She had nearly closed the door when he
said, ‘Sue!’ He had noticed that, in turning away from him, tears
were on her face and a quiver in her lip.
It was bad policy to recall her––he knew it while he pursued it.
But he could not help it. She came back.
‘Sue,’ he murmured, ‘do you wish to make it up, and stay? I’ll
forgive you, and condone everything!’
‘O you can’t, you can’t!’ she said hastily. ‘You can’t condone it
now.’
‘He is your husband now, in e
ffect, you mean, of course.’
‘You may assume it. He is obtaining a divorce from his wife
Arabella.’
‘His wife! It is altogether news to me that he has a wife.’
‘It was a bad marriage.’
‘Like yours.’
‘Like mine. He is not doing it so much on his own account as on
hers. She wrote and told him it would be a kindness to her since then
she could marry and live respectably. And Jude has agreed.’
‘A wife. . . . A kindness to her. Ah, yes; a kindness to her to release
her altogether. . . . But I don’t like the sound of it. I can forgive,
Sue.’
‘No, no. You can’t have me back now I have been so wicked––as to
do what I have done.’
There had arisen in Sue’s face that incipient fright which showed
itself whenever he changed from friend to husband, and which made
her adopt any line of defence against marital feeling in him. ‘I must
go now. I’ll come again––may I?’
‘I don’t ask you to go, even now. I ask you to stay.’
‘I thank you, Richard; but I must. As you are not so ill as I thought,
I cannot stay!’
‘She’s his––his from lips to heel!’ said Phillotson; but so faintly
that in closing the door she did not hear it. The dread of a reaction-
ary change in the schoolmaster’s sentiments, coupled, perhaps, with
a faint shamefacedness at letting even him know what a slipshod lack
Jude the Obscure


---

of thoroughness, from a man’s point of view, characterized her trans-
ferred allegiance, prevented her telling him of her, thus far,
incomplete relations with Jude; and Phillotson lay writhing like a
man in hell as he pictured the prettily dressed, maddening com-
pound of sympathy and averseness who bore his name, returning
impatiently to the home of her lover.
Gillingham was so interested in Phillotson’s a
ffairs, and so ser-
iously concerned about him, that he walked up the hillside to
Shaston two or three times a week, although, there and back, it was a
journey of nine miles, which had to be performed between tea and
supper, after a hard day’s work in school. When he called on the next
occasion after Sue’s visit his friend was downstairs, and Gillingham
noticed that his restless mood had been supplanted by a more 
fixed
and composed one.
‘She’s been here since you called last,’ said Phillotson.
‘Not Mrs. Phillotson?’
‘Yes.’
‘Ah! You have made it up?’
‘No. She just came, patted my pillow with her little white hand,
played the thoughtful nurse for half-an-hour, and went away.’
‘Well––I’m hanged! A little hussy!’
‘What do you say?’
‘O––nothing!’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, what a tantalizing, capricious little woman. If she were
not your wife——’
‘She is not; she’s another man’s except in name and law. And I
have been thinking––it was suggested to me by a conversation I had
with her––that, in kindness to her I ought to dissolve the legal tie
altogether; which, singularly enough, I think I can do, now she has
been back, and refused my request to stay after I said I had forgiven
her. I believe that fact would a
fford me opportunity of doing it,
though I did not see it at the moment. What’s the use of keeping her
chained on to me if she doesn’t belong to me? I know––I feel abso-
lutely certain––that she would welcome my taking such a step as the
greatest charity to her. For though as a fellow-creature she sympa-
thizes with, and pities me, and even weeps for me, as a husband she
cannot endure me. She loathes me––there’s no use in mincing
words––she loathes me, and my only manly, and digni
fied, and
At Shaston


---

merciful course is to complete what I have begun. . . . And for
worldly reasons, too, it will be better for her to be independent. I
have hopelessly ruined my prospects because of my decision as to
what was best for us, though she does not know it; I see only dire
poverty ahead from my feet to the grave; for I can be accepted as
teacher no more. I shall probably have enough to do to make both
ends meet during the remainder of my life, now my occupation’s
gone; and I shall be better able to bear it alone. I may as well tell you
that what has suggested my letting her go is some news she brought
me; the news that Fawley is doing the same.’
‘O––he had a spouse, too. A queer couple––these lovers!’
‘Well––I don’t want your opinion on that. What I was going to say
is that my liberating her can do her no possible harm, and will open
up a chance of happiness for her which she has never dreamt of
hitherto. For then they’ll be able to marry, as they ought to have done
at 
first.’
Gillingham did not hurry to reply. ‘I may disagree with your
motive,’ he said gently, for he respected views he could not share.
‘But I think you are right in your determination––if you can carry it
out. I doubt, however, if you can.’
Jude the Obscure


---