such as Mercy Chant could not show. But it was done with a sorry shake of the head. 'It is nothing—it is nothing!' she said. 'Nobody loves it; nobody sees it. Who cares about the looks of a castaway like me!'
Her journey back was rather a meander than a march. It had no sprightliness, no purpose; only a tendency. Along the tedious length of Benvill Lane she began to grow tired, and she leant upon gates and paused by milestones.
She did not enter any house till, at the seventh or eighth mile, she descended the steep long hill below which lay the village or townlet of Evershead, where in the morning she had breakfasted with such contrasting expectations. The cottage by the church, in which she again sat down, was almost the first at that end of the village, and while the woman fetched her some milk from the pantry, Tess, looking down the street, perceived that the place seemed quite deserted.
'The people are gone to afternoon service, I suppose?' she said.
'No, my dear,' said the old woman. ''Tis too soon for that; the bells haint strook out yet. They be all gone to hear the preaching
