Thomas Hardy: The Woodlanders

44. CHAPTER XLIV. (continued)

Fitzpiers's mental sufferings and suspense led him at last to take a melancholy journey to the neighborhood of Little Hintock; and here he hovered for hours around the scene of the purest emotional experiences that he had ever known in his life. He walked about the woods that surrounded Melbury's house, keeping out of sight like a criminal. It was a fine evening, and on his way homeward he passed near Marty South's cottage. As usual she had lighted her candle without closing her shutters; he saw her within as he had seen her many times before.

She was polishing tools, and though he had not wished to show himself, he could not resist speaking in to her through the half-open door. "What are you doing that for, Marty?"

"Because I want to clean them. They are not mine." He could see, indeed, that they were not hers, for one was a spade, large and heavy, and another was a bill-hook which she could only have used with both hands. The spade, though not a new one, had been so completely burnished that it was bright as silver.

Fitzpiers somehow divined that they were Giles Winterborne's, and he put the question to her.

She replied in the affirmative. "I am going to keep 'em," she said, "but I can't get his apple-mill and press. I wish could; it is going to be sold, they say."

"Then I will buy it for you," said Fitzpiers. "That will be making you a return for a kindness you did me." His glance fell upon the girl's rare-colored hair, which had grown again. "Oh, Marty, those locks of yours--and that letter! But it was a kindness to send it, nevertheless," he added, musingly.

After this there was confidence between them--such confidence as there had never been before. Marty was shy, indeed, of speaking about the letter, and her motives in writing it; but she thanked him warmly for his promise of the cider-press. She would travel with it in the autumn season, as he had done, she said. She would be quite strong enough, with old Creedle as an assistant.