TESS OF THE D’URBERVILLES
would be well content to do that if so be you had forgiven me! . . . If you will send me one little line and say, I am coming soon, I will bide on, Angel, O so cheerfully! . . . Think how it do hurt my heart not to see you ever, ever! Ah, if I could only make your dear heart ache one little minute of each day as mine does every day and all day long, it might lead you to show pity to your poor lonely one. . . . I would be content, ay, glad, to live with you as your servant, if I may not as your wife; so that I could only be near you, and get glimpses of you, and think of you as mine. . . . I long for only one thing in heaven, or earth, or under the earth, to meet you, my own dear! Come to me, come to me, and save me from what threatens me.’
Clare's eyes were blinded with tears as, springing wildly up to go and find her immediately, he asked his father if she had applied for any money during his absence. His father returned a negative, and then for the first time it occurred to Angel that her pride had stood in her way. From his remarks his parents now for the first time gathered the real reason of the separation; and their Christianity was such that, reprobates being their especial care, the tenderness towards Tess which
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