passage. She could see that his mouth twitched
with anger, and that bitter disappointment was written in his face
everywhere.

Elizabeth-Jane now entered, and stood before the master of the premises.
His dark pupils--which always seemed to have a red spark of light in
them, though this could hardly be a physical fact--turned indifferently
round under his dark brows until they rested on her figure. "Now then,
what is it, my young woman?" he said blandly.

"Can I speak to you--not on business, sir?" said she.

"Yes--I suppose." He looked at her more thoughtfully.

"I am sent to tell you, sir," she innocently went on, "that a distant
relative of yours by marriage, Susan Newson, a sailor's widow, is in the
town, and to ask whether you would wish to see her."

The rich rouge-et-noir of his countenance underwent a slight change.
"Oh--Susan is--still alive?" he asked with difficulty.

"Yes, sir."

"Are you her daughter?"

"Yes, sir--her only daughter."

"What--do you call yourself--your Christian name?"

"Elizabeth-Jane, sir."

"Newson?"

"Elizabeth-Jane Newson."

This at once suggested to Henchard that the transaction of his early
married life at Weydon Fair was unrecorded in the family history. It was
more than he could have expected. His wife had behaved kindly to him
in return for his unkindness, and had never proclaimed her wrong to her
child or to the world.

"I am--a good deal interested in your news," he said. "And as this is
not a matter of business, but pleasure, suppose we go indoors."

It was with a gentle delicacy of manner, surprising to Elizabeth, that
he showed her out of the office and through the outer room, where Donald
Farfrae was overhauling bins and samples with the inquiring inspection
of a beginner in charge. Henchard preceded her through the door in the
wall to the suddenly changed scene of the garden and flowers, and
onward into the house. The dining-room to which he introduced her still
exhibited the remnants of the lavish breakfast laid for Farfrae. It
was furnished to profusion with heavy mahogany furniture of the deepest
red-Spanish hues. Pembroke tables, with leaves hanging so low that they
well-nigh touched the floor, stood against the walls on legs and feet
shaped like those of an elephant, and on one lay three huge folio
volumes--a Family Bible, a "Josephus," and a "Whole Duty of Man." In the
chimney corner was a fire-grate with a fluted semicircular back, having
urns and