Jude turned and retraced his steps. Drawing again towards the
station he started at hearing his name pronounced--less at the name
than at the voice. To his great surprise no other than Sue stood
like a vision before him--her look bodeful and anxious as in a dream,
her little mouth nervous, and her strained eyes speaking reproachful
inquiry.
"Oh, Jude--I am so glad--to meet you like this!" she said in quick,
uneven accents not far from a sob. Then she flushed as she observed
his thought that they had not met since her marriage.
They looked away from each other to hide their emotion, took each
other's hand without further speech, and went on together awhile,
till she glanced at him with furtive solicitude. "I arrived at
Alfredston station last night, as you asked me to, and there was
nobody to meet me! But I reached Marygreen alone, and they told me
Aunt was a trifle better. I sat up with her, and as you did not come
all night I was frightened about you--I thought that perhaps, when
you found yourself back in the old city, you were upset at--at
thinking I was--married, and not there as I used to be; and that you
had nobody to speak to; so you had tried to drown your gloom--as you
did at that former time when you were disappointed about entering as
a student, and had forgotten your promise to me that you never would
again. And this, I thought, was why you hadn't come to meet me!"
"And you came to hunt me up, and deliver me, like a good angel!"
"I thought I would come by the morning train and try to find you--in
case--in case--"
"I did think of my promise to you, dear, continually! I shall never
break out again as I did, I am sure. I may have been doing nothing
better, but I was not doing that--I loathe the thought of it."
"I am glad your staying had nothing to do with that. But," she said,
the faintest pout entering into her tone, "you didn't come back last
night and meet me, as you engaged to!"
"I didn't--I am sorry to say. I had an appointment at nine
o'clock--too late for me to catch the train that would have met
yours, or to get home at all."
Looking at his loved one as she appeared to him now, in his tender
thought the sweetest and most disinterested comrade that he had ever
had, living largely in vivid imaginings, so ethereal a creature
that her spirit could be seen trembling through her limbs, he felt
heartily ashamed of his earthliness in spending the hours he had
spent in Arabella's company. There was something rude and immoral
in thrusting these recent facts of his life upon the mind of one who,
to him, was so uncarnate as to seem at times impossible as a human
wife to any average man. And yet she was Phillotson's. How she had
become such, how she lived as such, passed his comprehension as he
regarded her to-day.