"Well, since you say no, I won't. I have no wish opposed to yours."

He knew this to be true enough. Since the desperation of the night

her activities had dropped to zero, and there was no further rashness

to be feared. Tess tried to busy herself again over the breakfast-table with more

or less success, and they sat down both on the same side, so that

their glances did not meet. There was at first something awkward

in hearing each other eat and drink, but this could not be escaped;

moreover, the amount of eating done was small on both sides.

Breakfast over, he rose, and telling her the hour at which he might

be expected to dinner, went off to the miller's in a mechanical

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pursuance of the plan of studying that business, which had been his

only practical reason for coming here.

When he was gone Tess stood at the window, and presently saw his form

crossing the great stone bridge which conducted to the mill premises.

He sank behind it, crossed the railway beyond, and disappeared.

Then, without a sigh, she turned her attention to the room, and began

clearing the table and setting it in order. The charwoman soon came.

Her presence was at first a strain upon

Tess, but afterwards an alleviation. At half-past twelve she

left her assistant alone in the kitchen, and, returning to the

sitting-room, waited for the reappearance of Angel's form behind the

bridge. About one he showed himself. Her face flushed, although he was a

quarter of a mile off. She ran to the kitchen to get the dinner

served by the time he should enter. He went first to the room where

they had washed their hands together the day before, and as he

entered the sitting-room the dish-covers rose from the dishes as if

by his own motion. "How punctual!" he said.

"Yes. I saw you coming over the bridge," said she.

The meal was passed in commonplace talk of what he had been doing

during the morning at the Abbey Mill, of the methods of bolting and

the old-fashioned machinery, which he feared would not enlighten him

greatly on modern improved methods, some of it seeming to have been

in use ever since the days it ground for the monks in the adjoining

conventual buildings--now a heap of ruins. He left the house again

in the course of an hour, coming home at dusk, and occupying himself

through the evening with his papers. She feared she was in the way

and, when the old woman was gone, retired to the kitchen, where she

made herself busy as well as she could for more than an hour.




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