Adam Bede
was one stout curly headed fellow about three or four year old, that I
never saw there before. He was as naughty as could be at the beginning
while I was praying, and while we was singing, but when we all sat down
and Dinah began to speak, th’ young un stood stock still all at once,
and began to look at her with’s mouth open, and presently he ran away
from’s mother and went to Dinah, and pulled at her, like a little dog,
for her to take notice of him. So Dinah lifted him up and held th’ lad
on her lap, while she went on speaking; and he was as good as could be
till he went to sleep—and the mother cried to see him.”
“It’s a pity she shouldna be a mother herself,” said Adam, “so fond as
the children are of her. Dost think she’s quite fixed against marrying,
Seth? Dost think nothing ’ud turn her?”
There was something peculiar in his brother’s tone, which made Seth
steal a glance at his face before he answered.
“It ’ud be wrong of me to say nothing ’ud turn her,” he answered. “But
if thee mean’st it about myself, I’ve given up all thoughts as she can
ever be _my_ wife. She calls me her brother, and that’s enough.”
“But dost think she might ever get fond enough of anybody else to be
willing to marry ’em?” said Adam rather shyly.
“Well,” said Seth, after some hesitation, “it’s crossed my mind
sometimes o’ late as she might; but Dinah ’ud let no fondness for the
creature draw her out o’ the path as she believed God had marked out
for her. If she thought the leading was not from Him, she’s not one to
be brought under the power of it. And she’s allays seemed clear about
that—as her work was to minister t’ others, and make no home for
herself i’ this world.”
“But suppose,” said Adam, earnestly, “suppose there was a man as ’ud
let her do just the same and not interfere with her—she might do a good
deal o’ what she does now, just as well when she was married as when
she was single. Other women of her sort have married—that’s to say, not
just like her, but women as preached and attended on the sick and
needy. There’s Mrs. Fletcher as she talks of.”
A new light had broken in on Seth. He turned round, and laying his hand
on Adam’s shoulder, said, “Why, wouldst like her to marry _thee_,
brother?”
Adam looked doubtfully at Seth’s inquiring eyes and said, “Wouldst be
hurt if she was to be fonder o’ me than o’ thee?”
“Nay,” said Seth warmly, “how canst think it? Have I felt thy trouble
so little that I shouldna feel thy joy?”
There was silence a few moments as they walked on, and then Seth said,
“I’d no notion as thee’dst ever think of her for a wife.”
“But is it o’ any use to think of her?” said Adam. “What dost say?
Mother’s made me as I hardly know where I am, with what she’s been
saying to me this forenoon. She says she’s sure Dinah feels for me more
than common, and ’ud be willing t’ have me. But I’m afraid she speaks
without book. I want to know if thee’st seen anything.”
“It’s a nice point to speak about,” said Seth, “and I’m afraid o’ being
wrong; besides, we’ve no right t’ intermeddle with people’s feelings
when they wouldn’t tell ’em themselves.”
Seth paused.
“But thee mightst ask her,” he said presently. “She took no offence at
_me_ for asking, and thee’st more right than I had, only thee’t not in
the Society. But Dinah doesn’t hold wi’ them as are for keeping the
Society so strict to themselves. She doesn’t mind about making folks
enter the Society, so as they’re fit t’ enter the kingdom o’ God. Some
o’ the brethren at Treddles’on are displeased with her for that.”
“Where will she be the rest o’ the day?” said Adam.
“She said she shouldn’t leave the farm again to-day,” said Seth,
“because it’s her last Sabbath there, and she’s going t’ read out o’
the big Bible wi’ the children.”
Adam thought—but did not say—“Then I’ll go this afternoon; for if I go
to church, my thoughts ’ull be with her all the while. They must sing
th’ anthem without me to-day.”
Chapter LII
Adam and Dinah
It was about three o’clock when Adam entered the farmyard and roused
Alick and the dogs from their Sunday dozing. Alick said everybody was
gone to church “but th’ young missis”—so he called Dinah—but this did
not disappoint Adam, although the “everybody” was so liberal as to
include Nancy the dairymaid, whose works of necessity were not
unfrequently incompatible with church-going.
There was perfect stillness about the house. The doors were all closed,
and the very stones and tubs seemed quieter than usual. Adam heard the
water gently dripping from the pump—that was the only sound—and he
knocked at the house door rather softly, as was suitable in that
stillness.
The door opened, and Dinah stood before him, colouring deeply with the
great surprise of seeing Adam at this hour, when she knew it was his
regular practice to be at church. Yesterday he would have said to her
without any difficulty, “I came to see you, Dinah: I knew the rest were
not at home.” But to-day something prevented him from saying that, and
he put out his hand to her in silence. Neither of them spoke, and yet
both wished they could speak, as Adam entered, and they sat down. Dinah
took the chair she had just left; it was at the corner of the table
near the window, and there was a book lying on the table, but it was
not open. She had been sitting perfectly still, looking at the small
bit of clear fire in the bright grate. Adam sat down opposite her, in
Mr. Poyser’s three-cornered chair.
“Your mother is not ill again, I hope, Adam?” Dinah said, recovering
herself. “Seth said she was well this morning.”
“No, she’s very hearty to-day,” said Adam, happy in the signs of
Dinah’s feeling at the sight of him, but shy.
“There’s nobody at home, you see,” Dinah said; “but you’ll wait. You’ve
been hindered from going to church to-day, doubtless.”
“Yes,” Adam said, and then paused, before he added, “I was thinking
about you: that was the reason.”
This confession was very awkward and sudden, Adam felt, for he thought
Dinah must understand all he meant. But the frankness of the words
caused her immediately to interpret them into a renewal of his
brotherly regrets that she was going away, and she answered calmly, “Do
not be careful and troubled for me, Adam. I have all things and abound
at Snowfield. And my mind is at rest, for I am not seeking my own will
in going.”
“But if things were different, Dinah,” said Adam, hesitatingly. “If you
knew things that perhaps you don’t know now....”
Dinah looked at him inquiringly, but instead of going on, he reached a
chair and brought it near the corner of the table where she was
sitting. She wondered, and was afraid—and the next moment her thoughts
flew to the past: was it something about those distant unhappy ones
that she didn’t know?
Adam looked at her. It was so sweet to look at her eyes, which had now
a self-forgetful questioning in them—for a moment he forgot that he
wanted to say anything, or that it was necessary to tell her what he
meant.
“Dinah,” he said suddenly, taking both her hands between his, “I love
you with my whole heart and soul. I love you next to God who made me.”
Dinah’s lips became pale, like her cheeks, and she trembled violently
under the shock of painful joy. Her hands were cold as death between
Adam’s. She could not draw them away, because he held them fast.
“Don’t tell me you can’t love me, Dinah. Don’t tell me we must part and
pass our lives away from one another.”
The tears were trembling in Dinah’s eyes, and they fell before she
could answer. But she spoke in a quiet low voice.
“Yes, dear Adam, we must submit to another Will. We must part.”
“Not if you love me, Dinah—not if you love me,” Adam said passionately.
“Tell me—tell me if you can love me better than a brother?”
Dinah was too entirely reliant on the Supreme guidance to attempt to
achieve any end by a deceptive concealment. She was recovering now from
the first shock of emotion, and she looked at Adam with simple sincere
eyes as she said, “Yes, Adam, my heart is drawn strongly towards you;
and of my own will, if I had no clear showing to the contrary, I could
find my happiness in being near you and ministering to you continually.
I fear I should forget to rejoice and weep with others; nay, I fear I
should forget the Divine presence, and seek no love but yours.”
Adam did not speak immediately. They sat looking at each other in
delicious silence—for the first sense of mutual love excludes other
feelings; it will have the soul all to itself.
“Then, Dinah,” Adam said at last, “how can there be anything contrary
to what’s right in our belonging to one another and spending our lives
together? Who put this great love into our hearts? Can anything be
holier than that? For we can help one another in everything as is good.
I’d never think o’ putting myself between you and God, and saying you
oughtn’t to do this and you oughtn’t to do that. You’d follow your
conscience as much as you do now.”
“Yes, Adam,” Dinah said, “I know marriage is a holy state for those who
are truly called to it, and have no other drawing; but from my
childhood upwards I have been led towards another path; all my peace
and my joy have come from having no life of my own, no wants, no wishes
for myself, and living only in God and those of his creatures whose
sorrows and joys he has given me to know. Those have been very blessed
years to me, and I feel that if I was to listen to any voice that would
draw me aside from that path, I should be turning my back on the light
that has shone upon me, and darkness and doubt would take hold of me.
We could not bless each other, Adam, if there were doubts in my soul,
and if I yearned, when it was too late, after that better part which
had once been given me and I had put away from me.”
“But if a new feeling has come into your mind, Dinah, and if you love
me so as to be willing to be nearer to me than to other people, isn’t
that a sign that it’s right for you to change your life? Doesn’t the
love make it right when nothing else would?”
“Adam, my mind is full of questionings about that; for now, since you
tell me of your strong love towards me, what was clear to me has become
dark again. I felt before that my heart was too strongly drawn towards
you, and that your heart was not as mine; and the thought of you had
taken hold of me, so that my soul had lost its freedom, and was
becoming enslaved to an earthly affection, which made me anxious and
careful about what should befall myself. For in all other affection I
had been content with any small return, or with none; but my heart was
beginning to hunger after an equal love from you. And I had no doubt
that I must wrestle against that as a great temptation, and the command
was clear that I must go away.”
“But now, dear, dear Dinah, now you know I love you better than you
love me... it’s all different now. You won’t think o’ going. You’ll
stay, and be my dear wife, and I shall thank God for giving me my life
as I never thanked him before.”
“Adam, it’s hard to me to turn a deaf ear... you know it’s hard; but a
great fear is upon me. It seems to me as if you were stretching out
your arms to me, and beckoning me to come and take my ease and live for
my own delight, and Jesus, the Man of Sorrows, was standing looking
towards me, and pointing to the sinful, and suffering, and afflicted. I
have seen that again and again when I have been sitting in stillness
and darkness, and a great terror has come upon me lest I should become
hard, and a lover of self, and no more bear willingly the Redeemer’s
cross.”
Dinah had closed her eyes, and a faint shudder went through her.
“Adam,” she went on, “you wouldn’t desire that we should seek a good
through any unfaithfulness to the light that is in us; you wouldn’t