. She was terribly careless of
appearances, and I was perhaps more, because o' my dreary state; and it
was through this that the scandal arose. At last I was well, and came
away. When I was gone she suffered much on my account, and didn't forget
to tell me so in letters one after another; till latterly, I felt I
owed her something, and thought that, as I had not heard of Susan for so
long, I would make this other one the only return I could make, and ask
her if she would run the risk of Susan being alive (very slight as I
believed) and marry me, such as I was. She jumped for joy, and we should
no doubt soon have been married--but, behold, Susan appears!"

Donald showed his deep concern at a complication so far beyond the
degree of his simple experiences.

"Now see what injury a man may cause around him! Even after that
wrong-doing at the fair when I was young, if I had never been so selfish
as to let this giddy girl devote herself to me over at Jersey, to the
injury of her name, all might now be well. Yet, as it stands, I must
bitterly disappoint one of these women; and it is the second. My first
duty is to Susan--there's no doubt about that."

"They are both in a very melancholy position, and that's true!" murmured
Donald.

"They are! For myself I don't care--'twill all end one way. But these
two." Henchard paused in reverie. "I feel I should like to treat the
second, no less than the first, as kindly as a man can in such a case."

"Ah, well, it cannet be helped!" said the other, with philosophic
woefulness. "You mun write to the young lady, and in your letter you
must put it plain and honest that it turns out she cannet be your wife,
the first having come back; that ye cannet see her more; and that--ye
wish her weel."

"That won't do. 'Od seize it, I must do a little more than that! I
must--though she did always brag about her rich uncle or rich aunt, and
her expectations from 'em--I must send a useful sum of money to her, I
suppose--just as a little recompense, poor girl....Now, will you help me
in this, and draw up an explanation to her of all I've told ye, breaking
it as gently as you can? I'm so bad at letters."

"And I will."

"Now, I haven't told you quite all yet. My wife Susan has my daughter
with her--the baby that was in her arms at the fair; and this girl knows
nothing of me beyond that I am some sort of relation by marriage. She
has grown up in the belief that the sailor to whom I made over her
m