Page:Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891 Volume 2).pdf/155

 ‘He’s going to marry her!’ murmured Retty, never taking eyes off Tess. ‘How her face shows it!’

‘You be going to marry him?’ asked Marian.

‘Yes,’ said Tess.

‘When?’

‘Some day.’

They thought that this was evasiveness only.

‘Yes—going to marry him—a gentleman!’ repeated Izz Huett.

And by a sort of fascination the three girls, one after another, crept out of their beds, and came and stood barefooted round Tess. Retty put her hands upon Tess’s shoulders, as if to realize her friend’s corporeality after such a miracle, and the other two laid their arms round her waist, all looking into her face.

‘How it do seem! Almost more than I can think of!’ said Izz Huett.

Marian kissed Tess. ‘Yes,’ she murmured as she withdrew her lips.

‘Was that because of love for her, or because other lips have touched there by now?’ continued Izz drily to Marian.

‘I wasn’t thinking o’ that,’ said Marian simply