Chapter 52 During the small hours of the next morning, while it was still dark, dwellers near the highways were conscious of a disturbance of their night's rest by rumbling noises, intermittently continuing till daylight - noises as certain to recur in this particular first week of the month as the voice of the cuckoo in the third week of the same.They were the preliminaries of the general removal, the passing of the empty waggons and teams to fetch the goods of the migrating families; for it was always by the vehicle of the farmer who required his services that the hired man was conveyed to his destination.That this might be accomplished within the day was the explanation of the reverberation occurring so soon after midnight, the aim of the carters being to reach the door of the outgoing households by six o'clock, when the loading of their movables at once began.
But to Tess and her mother's household no such anxious farmer sent his team.They were only women; they were not regular labourers; they were not particularly required anywhere; hence they had to hire a waggon at their own expense, and got nothing sent gratuitously.
It was a relief to Tess, when she looked out of the window that morning, to find that though the weather was windy and louring, it did not rain, and that the waggon had come.A wet Lady-Day was a spectre which removing families never forgot; damp furniture, damp bedding, damp clothing accompanied it, and left a train of ills.
Her mother, 'Liza-Lu, and Abraham were also awake, but the younger children were let sleep on.The four breakfasted by the thin light, and the `house-ridding'
was taken in hand.
It proceeded with some cheerfulness, a friendly neighbour or two assisting.
When the large articles of furniture had been packed in position a circular nest was made of the beds and bedding, in which Joan Durbeyfield and the young children were to sit through the journey.After loading there was a long delay before the horses were brought, these having been unharnessed during the ridding; but at length, about two o'clock, the whole was under way, the cooking-pot swinging from the axle of the waggon, Mrs Durbeyfield and family at the top, the matron having in her lap, to prevent injury to its works, the head of the clock, which, at any exceptional lurch of the waggon, struck one, or one-and-a-half, in hurt tones.Tess and the next eldest girl walked alongside till they were out of the village.
They had called on a few neighbours that morning and the previous evening, and some came to see them off, all wishing them well, though, in their secret hearts, hardly expecting welfare possible to such a family, harmless as the Durbeyfields were to all except themselves.Soon the equipage began to ascend to higher ground, and the wind grew keener with the change of level and soil.
The day being the sixth of April, the Durbeyfield waggon met many other waggons with families on the summit of the load, which was built on a wellnigh unvarying principle, as peculiar, probably, to the rural labourer as the hexagon to the bee.The groundwork of the arrangement was the family dresser, which, with its shining handles, and finger-marks, and domestic evidences thick upon it, stood importantly in front, over the tails of the shaft-horses, in its erect and natural position, like some Ark of the Covenant that they were bound to carry reverently.
Some of the households were lively, some mournful; some were stopping at the doors of wayside inns; where, in due time, the Durbeyfield menagerie also drew up to bait horses and refresh the travellers.
During the halt Tess's eyes fell upon a three-pint blue mug, which was ascending and descending through the air to and from the feminine section of a household, sitting on the summit of a load that had also drawn up at a little distance from the same inn.She followed one of the mug's journeys upward, and perceived it to be clasped by hands whose owner she well knew.
Tess went towards the waggon.
`Marian and Izz!' she cried to the girls, for it was they, sitting with the moving family at whose house they had lodged.`Are you house-ridding to-day, like everybody else?'
They were, they said.It had been too rough a life for them at Flintcomb-Ash, and they had come away, almost without notice, leaving Groby to prosecute them if he chose.They told Tess their destination, and Tess told them hers.
Marian leant over the load, and lowered her voice.`Do you know that the gentleman who follows 'ee - you'll guess who I mean - came to ask for 'ee at Flintcomb after you had gone? We didn't tell'n where you was, knowing you wouldn't wish to see him.'
`Ah - but I did see him!' Tess murmured.`He found me.'
`And do he know where you be going?'
`I think so.'
`Husband come back?'
`No.'
She bade her acquaintance good-bye - for the respective carters had now come out from the inn - and the two waggons resumed their journey in opposite directions; the vehicle whereon sat Marian, Izz, and the ploughman's family with whom they had thrown in their lot, being brightly painted, and drawn by three powerful horses with shining brass ornaments on their harness; while the waggon on which Mrs Durbeyfield and her family rode was a creaking erection that would scarcely bear the weight of the superincumbent load; one which had known no paint since it was made, and drawn by two horses only.The contrast well marked the difference between being fetched by a thriving farmer and conveying oneself whither no hirer waited one's coming.
The distance was great - too great for a day's journey - and it was with the utmost difficulty that the horses performed it.Though they had started so early it was quite late in the afternoon when they turned the flank of an eminence which formed part of the upland called Greenhill.
While the horses stood to stale and breathe themselves Tess looked around.
