Jude the Obscure (Oxford World's Classics)

At Christminster Again
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He suggested that she should come to him there at Marygreen.
On second thoughts he took out the last paragraph but one, and
having re-written the letter he despatched it immediately; and in
some excitement awaited the issue.
A few days after a 
figure moved through the white fog which
enveloped the Beersheba suburb of Christminster, towards the quar-
ter in which Jude Fawley had taken up his lodging since his division
from Sue. A timid knock sounded upon the door of his abode.
It was evening––so he was at home; and by a species of divination
he jumped up and rushed to the door himself.
‘Will you come out with me? I would rather not come in. I want
to––to talk with you––and to go with you to the Cemetery.’
It had been in the trembling accents of Sue that these words came.
Jude put on his hat. ‘It is dreary for you to be out,’ he said. ‘But if
you prefer not to come in, I don’t mind.’
‘Yes––I do. I shall not keep you long.’
Jude was too much a
ffected to go on talking at first; she, too, was
now such a mere cluster of nerves that all initiatory power seemed to
have left her, and they proceeded through the fog like Acherontic
shades* for a long while, without sound or gesture.
‘I want to tell you,’ she presently said, her voice now quick now
slow; ‘so that you may not hear of it by chance. I am going back to
Richard. He has––so magnanimously––agreed to forgive all.’
‘Going back? How can you go——’
‘He is going to marry me again. That is for form’s sake, and to
satisfy the world, which does not see things as they are. But of course
I am his wife already. Nothing has changed that.’
He turned upon her with an anguish that was well-nigh 
fierce.
‘But you are my wife! Yes, you are. You know it. I have always
regretted that feint of ours in going away and pretending to come
back legally married, to save appearances. I loved you, and you loved
me; and we closed with each other; and that made the marriage. We
still love––you as well as I––I know it, Sue. Therefore our marriage is
not cancelled.’
‘Yes; I know how you see it,’ she answered with despairing self-
suppression. ‘But I am going to marry him again, as it would be
called by you. Strictly speaking you, too,––don’t mind my saying it,
Jude!––you should take back––Arabella.’
Jude the Obscure
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‘I should? Good God––what next! But how if you and I had
married legally, as we were on the point of doing?’
‘I should have felt just the same––that ours was not a marriage;
and I would go back to Richard without repeating the sacrament, if
he asked me. But “the world and its ways have a certain worth”* (I
suppose): therefore I concede a repetition of the ceremony. . . . Don’t
crush all the life out of me by satire and argument, I implore you. I
was strongest once, I know, and perhaps I treated you cruelly. But
Jude, return good for evil! I am the weaker now. Don’t retaliate upon
me, but be kind. O be kind to me––a poor wicked woman who is
trying to mend!’
He shook his head hopelessly, his eyes wet. The blow of her
bereavement seemed to have destroyed her reasoning faculty. The
once keen vision was dimmed. ‘All wrong, all wrong!’ he said husk-
ily. ‘Error––perversity! It drives me out of my senses. Do you care
for him? Do you love him? You know you don’t! It will be a fanatic
prostitution––God forgive me, yes––that’s what it will be!’
‘I don’t love him––I must, must own it, in deepest remorse. But I
shall try to learn to love him by obeying him.’
Jude argued, urged, implored; but her conviction was proof
against all. It seemed to be the one thing on earth on which she was
firm, and that her firmness in this had left her tottering in every
other impulse and wish she possessed.
‘I have been considerate enough to let you know the whole truth,
and to tell it you myself,’ she said in hurt tones; ‘that you might not
consider yourself slighted by hearing of it at second-hand. I have
even owned the extreme fact that I do not love him. I did not think
you would be so rough with me for doing so. I was going to ask
you . . .’
‘To give you away?’
‘No. To send––my boxes to me––if you would. But I suppose you
won’t.’
‘Why, of course I will. What––isn’t he coming to fetch you––to
marry you from here? He won’t condescend to do that?’
‘No––I won’t let him. I go to him voluntarily, just as I went away
from him. We are to be married at his little church at Marygreen.’
She was so sadly sweet in what he called her wrongheadedness
that Jude could not help being moved to tears more than once for
pity of her. ‘I never knew such a woman for doing impulsive
At Christminster Again
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penances as you, Sue. No sooner does one expect you to go straight
on, as the one rational proceeding, than you double round the
corner!’
‘Ah, well; let that go. . . . Jude, I must say good-bye. But I wanted
you to go to the cemetery with me. Let our farewell be there––beside
the graves of those who died to bring home to me the error of my
views.’
They turned in the direction of the place, and the gate was opened
to them on application. Sue had been there often, and she knew the
way to the spot in the dark. They reached it, and stood still.
‘It is here––I should like to part,’ said she.
‘So be it.’
‘Don’t think me hard because I have acted on conviction. Your
generous devotion to me is unparalleled, Jude! Your worldly failure,
if you have failed, is to your credit rather than to your blame.
Remember that the best and greatest among mankind are those who
do themselves no worldly good. Every successful man is more or less
a sel
fish man. The devoted fail. “Charity seeketh not her own.”’*
‘In that chapter we are at one, ever beloved darling, and on it we’ll