Why he did so he could not say, but
something seemed to impel him to the act. The tape-like surface of
the road diminished in his rear as far as he could see, and as he
gazed a moving spot intruded on the white vacuity of its perspective.
It was a human figure running. Clare waited, with a dim sense that
somebody was trying to overtake him.
The form descending the incline was a woman's, yet so entirely was
his mind blinded to the idea of his wife's following him that even
when she came nearer he did not recognize her under the totally
changed attire in which he now beheld her. It was not till she was
quite close that he could believe her to be Tess.
"I saw you--turn away from the station--just before I got there--and
I have been following you all this way!"
She was so pale, so breathless, so quivering in every muscle, that he
did not ask her a single question, but seizing her hand, and pulling
it within his arm, he led her along. To avoid meeting any possible
wayfarers he left the high road and took a footpath under some
fir-trees. When they were deep among the moaning boughs he stopped
and looked at her inquiringly.
"Angel," she said, as if waiting for this, "do you know what I have
been running after you for? To tell you that I have killed him!"
A pitiful white smile lit her face as she spoke.
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