He wandered about awhile, obtained something to eat; and then, having another half-hour on his hands, his feet involuntarily took him through the venerable graveyard of Trinity Church, with its avenues of limes, in the direction of the schools again.
They were entirely in darkness.
She had said she lived over the way at Old-Grove Place, a house which he soon discovered from her description of its antiquity.
A glimmering candlelight shone from a front window, the shutters being yet unclosed.
He could see the interior clearly—the floor sinking a couple of steps below the road without, which had become raised during the centuries since the house was built.
Sue, evidently just come in, was standing with her hat on in this front parlour or sitting-room, whose walls were lined with wainscoting of panelled oak reaching from floor to ceiling, the latter being crossed by huge moulded beams only a little way above her head.
The mantelpiece was of the same heavy description, carved with Jacobean pilasters and scroll-work.
The centuries did, indeed, ponderously overhang a young wife who passed her time here.
She had opened a rosewood work-box, and was looking at a photograph.
Having contemplated it a little while she pressed it against her bosom, and put it again in its place.
Then becoming aware that she had not obscured the windows she came forward to do so, candle in hand.
It was too dark for her to see Jude without, but he could see her face distinctly, and there was an unmistakable tearfulness about the dark, long-lashed eyes.
She closed the shutters, and Jude turned away to pursue his solitary journey home.
"Whose photograph was she looking at?" he said.
He had once given her his; but she had others, he knew.
Yet it was his, surely?
He knew he should go to see her again, according to her invitation.
Those earnest men he read of, the saints, whom Sue, with gentle irreverence, called his demi-gods, would have shunned such encounters if they doubted their own strength.
But he could not.
He might fast and pray during the whole interval, but the human was more powerful in him than the Divine.
II
However, if God disposed not, woman did.
The next morning but one brought him this note from her:
Don't come next week.
On your own account don't!
We were too free, under the influence of that morbid hymn and the twilight.
Think no more than you can help of
Susanna Florence Mary.
The disappointment was keen.
He knew her mood, the look of her face, when she subscribed herself at length thus.
But whatever her mood he could not say she was wrong in her view.
He replied:
I acquiesce.
You are right.
It is a lesson in renunciation which I suppose I ought to learn at this season.
Jude.
He despatched the note on Easter Eve, and there seemed a finality in their decisions.
But other forces and laws than theirs were in operation.
On Easter Monday morning he received a message from the Widow Edlin, whom he had directed to telegraph if anything serious happened:
Your aunt is sinking.
Come at once.
He threw down his tools and went.
Three and a half hours later he was crossing the downs about Marygreen, and presently plunged into the concave field across which the short cut was made to the village.
As he ascended on the other side a labouring man, who had been watching his approach from a gate across the path, moved uneasily, and prepared to speak.
"I can see in his face that she is dead," said Jude.
"Poor Aunt Drusilla!"
It was as he had supposed, and Mrs. Edlin had sent out the man to break the news to him.
"She wouldn't have knowed 'ee.
She lay like a doll wi' glass eyes; so it didn't matter that you wasn't here," said he.
Jude went on to the house, and in the afternoon, when everything was done, and the layers-out had finished their beer, and gone, he sat down alone in the silent place.