CHAPTER IX--A RENCOUNTER
It was one o'clock on Saturday. Gertrude Lodge, having been
admitted to the jail as above described, was sitting in a waiting-
room within the second gate, which stood under a classic archway of
ashlar, then comparatively modern, and bearing the inscription,
'COVNTY JAIL: 1793.' This had been the facade she saw from the
heath the day before. Near at hand was a passage to the roof on
which the gallows stood.
The town was thronged, and the market suspended; but Gertrude had
seen scarcely a soul. Having kept her room till the hour of the
appointment, she had proceeded to the spot by a way which avoided
the open space below the cliff where the spectators had gathered;
but she could, even now, hear the multitudinous babble of their
voices, out of which rose at intervals the hoarse croak of a single
voice uttering the words, 'Last dying speech and confession!' There
had been no reprieve, and the execution was over; but the crowd
still waited to see the body taken down.
Soon the persistent girl heard a trampling overhead, then a hand
beckoned to her, and, following directions, she went out and crossed
the inner paved court beyond the gatehouse, her knees trembling so
that she could scarcely walk. One of her arms was out of its
sleeve, and only covered by her shawl.
On the spot at which she had now arrived were two trestles, and
before she could think of their purpose she heard heavy feet
descending stairs somewhere at her back. Turn her head she would
not, or could not, and, rigid in this position, she was conscious of
a rough coffin passing her shoulder, borne by four men. It was
open, and in it lay the body of a young man, wearing the smockfrock
of a rustic, and fustian breeches. The corpse had been thrown into
the coffin so hastily that the skirt of the smockfrock was hanging
over. The burden was temporarily deposited on the trestles.
By this time the young woman's state was such that a gray mist
seemed to float before her eyes, on account of which, and the veil
she wore, she could scarcely discern anything: it was as though she
had nearly died, but was held up by a sort of galvanism.
'Now!' said a voice close at hand, and she was just conscious that
the word had been addressed to her.
By a last strenuous effort she advanced, at the same time hearing
persons approaching behind her. She bared her poor curst arm; and
Davies, uncovering the face of the corpse, took Gertrude's hand, and
held it so that her arm lay across the dead man's neck, upon a line
the colour of an unripe blackberry, which surrounded it.
Gertrude shrieked: 'the turn o' the blood,' predicted by the
conjuror, had taken place. But at that moment a second shriek rent
the air of the enclosure: it was not Gertrude's, and its effect
upon her was to make her start round.
Immediately behind her stood Rhoda Brook, her face drawn, and her
eyes red with weeping. Behind Rhoda stood Gertrude's own husband;
his countenance lined, his eyes dim, but without a tear.
'D-n you! what are you doing here?' he said hoarsely.
'Hussy--to come between us and our child now!' cried Rhoda. 'This
is the meaning of what Satan showed me in the vision! You are like
her at last!' And clutching the bare arm of the younger woman, she
pulled her unresistingly back against the wall. Immediately Brook
had loosened her hold the fragile young Gertrude slid down against
the feet of her husband. When he lifted her up she was unconscious.
The mere sight of the twain had been enough to suggest to her that
the dead young man was Rhoda's son. At that time the relatives of
an executed convict had the privilege of claiming the body for
burial, if they chose to do so; and it was for this purpose that
Lodge was awaiting the inquest with Rhoda. He had been summoned by
her as soon as the young man was taken in the crime, and at
different times since; and he had attended in court during the
trial. This was the 'holiday' he had been indulging in of late.
The two wretched parents had wished to avoid exposure; and hence had
come themselves for the body, a waggon and sheet for its conveyance
and covering being in waiting outside.
Gertrude's case was so serious that it was deemed advisable to call
to her the surgeon who was at hand. She was taken out of the jail
into the town; but she never reached home alive. Her delicate
vitality, sapped perhaps by the paralyzed arm, collapsed under the
double shock that followed the severe strain, physical and mental,
to which she had subjected herself during the previous twenty-four
hours. Her blood had been 'turned' indeed--too far. Her death took
place in the town three days after.
Her husband was never seen in Casterbridge again; once only in the
old market-place at Anglebury, which he had so much frequented, and
very seldom in public anywhere. Burdened at first with moodiness
and remorse, he eventually changed for the better, and appeared as a
chastened and thoughtful man. Soon after attending the funeral of
his poor young wife he took steps towards giving up the farms in
Holmstoke and the adjoining parish, and, having sold every head of
his stock, he went away to Port-Bredy, at the other end of the
county, living there in solitary lodgings till his death two years
later of a painless decline. It was then found that he had
bequeathed the whole of his not inconsiderable property to a
reformatory for boys, subject to the payment of a small annuity to
Rhoda Brook, if she could be found to claim it.
For some time she could not be found; but eventually she reappeared
in her old parish,--absolutely refusing, however, to have anything
to do with the provision made for her. Her monotonous milking at
the dairy was resumed, and followed for many long years, till her
form became bent, and her once abundant dark hair white and worn
away at the forehead--perhaps by long pressure against the cows.
Here, sometimes, those who knew her experiences would stand and
observe her, and wonder what sombre thoughts were beating inside
that impassive, wrinkled brow, to the rhythm of the alternating
milk-streams.
('Blackwood's Magazine,' January 1888.)
