I have thought it all over carefully,
and I can never, never forgive you! You know that I
did not intend to wrong you--why have you so wronged
me? You are cruel, cruel indeed! I will try to forget
you. It is all injustice I have received at your
hands!
T.
"It is quite true!" said Angel, throwing down the letter. "Perhaps
she will never be reconciled to me!"
"Don't, Angel, be so anxious about a mere child of the soil!" said
his mother.
"Child of the soil! Well, we all are children of the soil. I wish
she were so in the sense you mean; but let me now explain to you what
I have never explained before, that her father is a descendant in the
male line of one of the oldest Norman houses, like a good many others
who lead obscure agricultural lives in our villages, and are dubbed
'sons of the soil.'"
He soon retired to bed; and the next morning, feeling exceedingly
unwell, he remained in his room pondering. The circumstances amid
which he had left Tess were such that though, while on the south of
the Equator and just in receipt of her loving epistle, it had seemed
the easiest thing in the world to rush back into her arms the moment
he chose to forgive her, now that he had arrived it was not so easy
as it had seemed.
Pages:
589
590
591
592
593
594
595
596
597
598
599
600
601
602
603
604
605
606
607
608
609
610
611
612
613