"

"Yes," she said, sobbing.

"And now I am a poor fellow in brown leather."

"Don't taunt me. But enough of this. I will not be depressed any more.
I am going from home this afternoon, unless you greatly object. There is
to be a village picnic--a gipsying, they call it--at East Egdon, and I
shall go."

"To dance?"

"Why not? You can sing."

"Well, well, as you will. Must I come to fetch you?"

"If you return soon enough from your work. But do not inconvenience
yourself about it. I know the way home, and the heath has no terror for
me."

"And can you cling to gaiety so eagerly as to walk all the way to a
village festival in search of it?"

"Now, you don't like my going alone! Clym, you are not jealous?"

"No. But I would come with you if it could give you any pleasure;
though, as things stand, perhaps you have too much of me already. Still,
I somehow wish that you did not want to go. Yes, perhaps I am jealous;
and who could be jealous with more reason than I, a half-blind man, over
such a woman as you?"

"Don't think like it. Let me go, and don't take all my spirits away!"

"I would rather lose all my own, my sweet wife. Go and do whatever you
like. Who can forbid your indulgence in any whim? You have all my heart
yet, I believe; and because you bear with me, who am in truth a drag
upon you, I owe you thanks. Yes, go alone and shine. As for me, I will
stick to my doom. At that kind of meeting people would shun me. My hook
and gloves are like the St. Lazarus rattle of the leper, warning the
world to get out of the way of a sight that would sadden them." He
kissed her, put on his leggings, and went out.

When he was gone she rested her head upon her hands and said to herself,
"Two wasted lives--his and mine. And I am come to this! Will it drive me
out of my mind?"

She cast about for any possible course which offered the least
improvement on the existing state of things, and could find none. She
imagined how all those Budmouth ones who should learn what had become
of her would say, "Look at the girl for whom nobody was good enough!"
To Eustacia the situation seemed such a mockery of her hopes that death
appeared the only door of relief if the satire of Heaven should go much
further.

Suddenly she aroused herself and exclaimed, "But I'll shake it off. Yes,
I WILL shake it off! No one shall know my suffering. I'll be bitterly
merry, and ironically gay, and I'll laugh in derision. And I'll begin by
going