They had informed him at the school where she was living, and having

no immediate anxiety about her comfort his thoughts took the

direction of a burning indignation against the training school

committee. In his bewilderment Phillotson entered the adjacent

cathedral, just now in a direly dismantled state by reason of

the repairs. He sat down on a block of freestone, regardless of

the dusty imprint it made on his breeches; and his listless eyes

following the movements of the workmen he presently became aware

that the reputed culprit, Sue's lover Jude, was one amongst them.

Jude had never spoken to his former hero since the meeting by the

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model of Jerusalem. Having inadvertently witnessed Phillotson's

tentative courtship of Sue in the lane there had grown up in the

younger man's mind a curious dislike to think of the elder, to meet

him, to communicate in any way with him; and since Phillotson's

success in obtaining at least her promise had become known to Jude,

he had frankly recognized that he did not wish to see or hear of his

senior any more, learn anything of his pursuits, or even imagine

again what excellencies might appertain to his character. On this

very day of the schoolmaster's visit Jude was expecting Sue, as she

had promised; and when therefore he saw the schoolmaster in the nave

of the building, saw, moreover, that he was coming to speak to him,

he felt no little embarrassment; which Phillotson's own embarrassment

prevented his observing.

Jude joined him, and they both withdrew from the other workmen to the

spot where Phillotson had been sitting. Jude offered him a piece of

sackcloth for a cushion, and told him it was dangerous to sit on the

bare block.

"Yes; yes," said Phillotson abstractedly, as he reseated himself, his

eyes resting on the ground as if he were trying to remember where he

was. "I won't keep you long. It was merely that I have heard that

you have seen my little friend Sue recently. It occurred to me to

speak to you on that account. I merely want to ask--about her."

"I think I know what!" Jude hurriedly said. "About her escaping

from the training school, and her coming to me?"

"Yes."

"Well"--Jude for a moment felt an unprincipled and fiendish wish to

annihilate his rival at all cost. By the exercise of that treachery

which love for the same woman renders possible to men the most

honourable in every other relation of life, he could send off

Phillotson in agony and defeat by saying that the scandal was true,

and that Sue had irretrievably committed herself with him. But his

action did not respond for a moment to his animal instinct; and what

he said was, "I am glad of your kindness in coming to talk plainly to

me about it. You know what they say?--that I ought to marry her."




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