"Then, never mind it. You will get through it. Scotchmen are always lucky.""No - not always!" he said, shaking his head gloomily as he contemplated a crumb on the table. "I know many who have not been so! There was Sandy Macfarlane, who started to America to try his fortune, and he was drowned;and Archibald Leith, he was murdered! And poor Willie Dunbleeze and Maitland Macfreeze - they fell into bad courses, and went the way of all such!""Why - you old goosey - I was only speaking in a general sense, of course!
You are always so literal. Now when we have finished tea, sing me that funny song about high-heeled shoon and siller tags, and the one-and-forty wooers.""No, no. I couldna sing tonight! It's Henchard - he hates me; so that I may not be his friend if I would. I would understand why there should be a wee bit envy; but I cannet see a reason for the whole intensity of what he feels. Now, can you, Lucetta? It is more like old-fashioned rivalry in love than just a bit of rivalry in trade."Lucetta had grown somewhat wan. "No," she replied.
"I give him employment - I cannet refuse it. But neither can I blind myself to the fact that with a man of passions such as his, there is no safeguard for conduct!""What have you heard - O Donald, dearest?" said Lucetta in alarm. The words on her lips were "anything about me?" - but she did not utter them.
She could not, however, suppress her agitation, and her eyes filled with tears.
"No, no - it is not so serious as ye fancy," declared Farfrae soothingly;though he did not know its seriousness so well as she.
"I wish you would do what we have talked of," mournfully remarked Lucetta.
"Give up business, and go away from here. We have plenty of money, and why should we stay?"Farfrae seemed seriously disposed to discuss this move, and they talked thereon till a visitor was announced. Their neighbour Alderman Vatt came in.
"You've heard, I suppose, of poor Doctor Chalkfield's death? Yes - died this afternoon at five," said Mr Vatt. Chalkfield was the Councilman who had succeeded to the Mayoralty in the preceding November.
Farfrae was sorry at the intelligence, and Mr Vatt continued: "Well, we know he's been going some days, and as his family is well provided for we must take it all as it is. Now I have called to ask 'ee this - quite privately. If I should nominate 'ee to succeed him, and there should be no particular opposition, will 'ee accept the chair?""But there are folk whose turn is before mine; and I'm over young, and may be thought pushing!" said Farfrae after a pause.
"Not at all. I don't speak for myself only, several have named it. You won't refuse?""We thought of going away," interposed Lucetta, looking at Farfrae anxiously.
"It was only a fancy," Farfrae murmured. "I wouldna refuse if it is the wish of a respectable majority in the Council.""Very well, then, look upon yourself as elected. We have had older men long enough."When he was gone Farfrae said musingly, "See now how it's ourselves that are ruled by the Powers above us! We plan this, but we do that. If they want to make me Mayor I will stay, and Henchard must rave as he will."From this evening onward Lucetta was very uneasy. If she had not been imprudence incarnate she would not have acted as she did when she met Henchard by accident a day or two later. It was in the bustle of the market, when no one could readily notice their discourse.
"Michael," said she, "I must again ask you what I asked you months ago - to return me any letters or papers of mine that you may have - unless you have destroyed them? You must see how desirable it is that the times at Jersey should be blotted out, for the good of all parties.""Why, bless the woman! - I packed up every scrap of your handwriting to give you in the coach - but you never appeared."She explained how the death of her aunt had prevented her taking the journey on that day. "And what became of the parcel then?" she asked.
He could not say - he would consider. When she was gone he recollected that he had left a heap of useless papers in his former dining-room safe - built up in the wall of his old house - now occupied by Farfrae. The letters might have been amongst them.
A grotesque grin shaped itself on Henchard's face. Had that safe been opened?
On the very evening which followed this there was a great ringing of bells in Casterbridge, and the combined brass, wood, catgut, and leather bands played round the town with more prodigality of percussion-notes than ever. Farfrae was Mayor - the two-hundredth odd of a series forming an elective dynasty dating back to the days of Charles I - and the fair Lucetta was the courted of the town... But, ah! that worm i' the bud - Henchard;what he could tell!
He, in the meantime, festering with indignation at some erroneous intelligence of Farfrae's opposition to the scheme for installing him in the little seed-shop, was greeted with the news of the municipal election (Which, by reason of Farfrae's comparative youth and his Scottish nativity - a thing unprecedented in the case - had an interest far beyond the ordinary).
The bell-ringing and the band-playing, loud as Tamerlane's trumpet, goaded the downfallen Henchard indescribably: the ousting now seemed to him to be complete.