Thomas Hardy

Her Death and After

  The summons was urgent: and forth I went –
  By the way of the Western Wall, so drear 
  On that winter night, and sought a gate, 
         Where one, by Fate, 
     Lay dying that I held dear. 
  
  And there, as I paused by her tenement, 
  And the trees shed on me their rime and hoar, 
  I thought of the man who had left her lone – 
         Him who made her his own 
  	When I loved her, long before. 
  
  The rooms within had the piteous shine 
  That home-things wear when there’s aught amiss; 
  From the stairway floated the rise and fall 
  		Of an infant’s call, 
  	Whose birth had brought her to this. 
  
  Her life was the price she would pay for that whine – 
  For a child by the man she did not love. 
  ‘But let that rest for ever,’ I said, 
  		And bent my tread 
  	To the bedchamber above. 
  
  She took my hand in her thin white own, 
  And smiled her thanks – though nigh too weak –
  And made them a sign to leave us there,
  		Then faltered, ere 
  	She could bring herself to speak. 
  
  ‘Just to see you – before I go – he’ll condone 
  Such a natural thing now my time’s not much – 
  When Death is so near it hustles hence 
  		All passioned sense 
  	Between woman and man as such! 
  
  ‘My husband is absent. As heretofore 
  The City detains him. But, in truth, 
  He has not been kind. . . . I will speak no blame, 
  		But – the child is lame; 
  	O, I pray she may reach his ruth! 
  
  ‘Forgive past days – I can say no more –
  Maybe had we wed you would now repine! . . . 
  But I treated you ill. I was punished. Farewell! 
  		– Truth shall I tell? 
  	Would the child were yours and mine! 
  
  ‘As a wife I was true. But, such my unease 
  That, could I insert a deed back in Time, 
  I’d make her yours, to secure your care; 
  		And the scandal bear, 
  	And the penalty for the crime!’ 
  
  – When I had left, and the swinging trees 
  Rang above me, as lauding her candid say, 
  Another was I. Her words were enough: 
  		Came smooth, came rough, 
  	I felt I could live my day. 
  
  Next night she died; and her obsequies 
  In the Field of Tombs where the earthworks frowned 
  Had her husband’s heed. His tendance spent, 
  		I often went 
  	And pondered by her mound. 
  
  All that year and the next year whiled, 
  And I still went thitherward in the gloam; 
  But the Town forgot her and her nook, 
  		And her husband took 
  	Another Love to his home. 
  
  And the rumour flew that the lame lone child 
  Whom she wished for its safety child of mine, 
  Was treated ill when offspring came 
  		Of the new-made dame, 
  	And marked a more vigorous line. 
  
  A smarter grief within me wrought 
  Than even at loss of her so dear –
  That the being whose soul my soul suffused
  		Had a child ill-used, 
  	While I dared not interfere! 
  
  One eve as I stood at my spot of thought 
  In the white-stoned Garth, brooding thus her wrong, 
  Her husband neared; and to shun his nod 
  		By her hallowed sod 
  	I went from the tombs among 
  
  To the Cirque of the Gladiators which faced – 
  That haggard mark of Imperial Rome, 
  Whose Pagan echoes mock the chime 
  		Of our Christian time
  	From its hollows of chalk and loam. 
  
  The sun’s gold touch was scarce displaced 
  From the vast Arena where men once bled, 
  When her husband followed; bowed; half-passed 
  		With lip upcast; 
  	Then halting sullenly said: 
  
  ‘It is noised that you visit my first wife’s tomb. 
  Now, I gave her an honoured name to bear 
  While living, when dead. So I’ve claim to ask 
  		By what right you task 
  	My patience by vigiling there? 
  
  ‘There’s decency even in death, I assume; 
  Preserve it, sir, and keep away; 
  For the mother of my first-born you 
  		Show mind undue! 
  	– Sir, I’ve nothing more to say.’ 
  
  A desperate stroke discerned I then – 
  God pardon – or pardon not – the lie; 
  She had sighed that she wished (lest the child should pine 
  		Of slights) ’twere mine, 
  	So I said: ‘But the father I. 
  
  ‘That you thought it yours is the way of men; 
  But I won her troth long ere your day: 
  You learnt how, in dying, she summoned me? 
  		’Twas in fealty. 
  	– Sir, I’ve nothing more to say, 
  
  ‘Save that, if you’ll hand me my little maid, 
  I’ll take her, and rear her, and spare you toil. 
  Think it more than a friendly act none can; 
  		I’m a lonely man, 
  	While you’ve a large pot to boil. 
  
  ‘If not, and you’ll put it to ball or blade – 
  To-night, to-morrow night, anywhen – 
  I’ll meet you here. . . . But think of it, 
  		And in season fit 
  	Let me hear from you again.’ 
  
  – Well, I went away, hoping; but nought I heard 
  Of my stroke for the child, till there greeted me 
  A little voice that one day came 
  		To my window-frame 
  	And babbled innocently: 
  
  ‘My father who’s not my own, sends word 
  I’m to stay here, sir, where I belong!’ 
  Next a writing came: ‘Since the child was the fruit 
  		Of your lawless suit, 
  	Pray take her, to right a wrong.’ 
  
  And I did. And I gave the child my love, 
  And the child loved me, and estranged us none. 
  But compunctions loomed; for I’d harmed the dead 
  		By what I said 
  	For the good of the living one. 
  
  – Yet though, God wot, I am sinner enough, 
  And unworthy the woman who drew me so, 
  Perhaps this wrong for her darling’s good 
  		She forgives, or would, 
  	If only she could know!