etail of the outing was
a facet reflecting a sparkle to Jude, and he did not venture to
meditate on the life of inconsistency he was leading. His Sue's
conduct was one lovely conundrum to him; he could say no more.

There duly came the charm of calling at the college door for her; her
emergence in a nunlike simplicity of costume that was rather enforced
than desired; the traipsing along to the station, the porters'
"B'your leave!," the screaming of the trains--everything formed the
basis of a beautiful crystallization. Nobody stared at Sue, because
she was so plainly dressed, which comforted Jude in the thought that
only himself knew the charms those habiliments subdued. A matter
of ten pounds spent in a drapery-shop, which had no connection
with her real life or her real self, would have set all Melchester
staring. The guard of the train thought they were lovers, and put
them into a compartment all by themselves.

"That's a good intention wasted!" said she.

Jude did not respond. He thought the remark unnecessarily cruel,
and partly untrue.

They reached the park and castle and wandered through the
picture-galleries, Jude stopping by preference in front of the
devotional pictures by Del Sarto, Guido Reni, Spagnoletto,
Sassoferrato, Carlo Dolci, and others. Sue paused patiently beside
him, and stole critical looks into his face as, regarding the
Virgins, Holy Families, and Saints, it grew reverent and abstracted.
When she had thoroughly estimated him at this, she would move on and
wait for him before a Lely or Reynolds. It was evident that her
cousin deeply interested her, as one might be interested in a man
puzzling out his way along a labyrinth from which one had one's self
escaped.

When they came out a long time still remained to them and Jude
proposed that as soon as they had had something to eat they should
walk across the high country to the north of their present position,
and intercept the train of another railway leading back to
Melchester, at a station about seven miles off. Sue, who was
inclined for any adventure that would intensify the sense of her
day's freedom, readily agreed; and away they went, leaving the
adjoining station behind them.

It was indeed open country, wide and high. They talked and bounded
on, Jude cutting from a little covert a long walking-stick for Sue
as tall as herself, with a great crook, which made her look like a
shepherdess. About half-way on their journey they