Diggory withdrew with an emphatic step, Wildeve's eye passing over his
form in withering derision, as if he were no more than a heath-cropper.
When the reddleman's figure could no longer be seen, Wildeve himself
descended and plunged into the rayless hollow of the vale.

To lose the two women--he who had been the well-beloved of both--was too
ironical an issue to be endured. He could only decently save himself
by Thomasin; and once he became her husband, Eustacia's repentance, he
thought, would set in for a long and bitter term. It was no wonder that
Wildeve, ignorant of the new man at the back of the scene, should have
supposed Eustacia to be playing a part. To believe that the letter was
not the result of some momentary pique, to infer that she really gave
him up to Thomasin, would have required previous knowledge of her
transfiguration by that man's influence. Who was to know that she had
grown generous in the greediness of a new passion, that in coveting one
cousin she was dealing liberally with another, that in her eagerness to
appropriate she gave way?

Full of this resolve to marry in haste, and wring the heart of the proud
girl, Wildeve went his way.

Meanwhile Diggory Venn had returned to his van, where he stood looking
thoughtfully into the stove. A new vista was opened up to him. But,
however promising Mrs. Yeobright's views of him might be as a candidate
for her niece's hand, one condition was indispensable to the favour of
Thomasin herself, and that was a renunciation of his present wild mode
of life. In this he saw little difficulty.

He could not afford to wait till the next day before seeing Thomasin and
detailing his plan. He speedily plunged himself into toilet operations,
pulled a suit of cloth clothes from a box, and in about twenty minutes
stood before the van-lantern as a reddleman in nothing but his face, the
vermilion shades of which were not to be removed in a day. Closing the
door and fastening it with a padlock, Venn set off towards Blooms-End.

He had reached the white palings and laid his hand upon the gate when
the door of the house opened, and quickly closed again. A female form
had glided in. At the same time a man, who had seemingly been standing
with the woman in the porch, came forward from the house till he was
face to face with Venn. It was Wildeve again.

"Man alive, you've been quick at it," said Diggory sarcastically.

"And you slow, as you will find," said Wildeve. "And," l