The Mayor of Casterbridge | Page 5

Bed and board is dear at some
figures 'pon my 'vation 'tis!"
"Set it higher, auctioneer," said the trusser.
"Two guineas!" said the auctioneer; and no one replied.
"If they don't take her for that, in ten seconds they'll have to give
more," said the husband. "Very well. Now auctioneer, add another."

"Three guineas--going for three guineas!" said the rheumy man.
"No bid?" said the husband. "Good Lord, why she's cost me fifty times
the money, if a penny. Go on."
"Four guineas!" cried the auctioneer.
"I'll tell ye what--I won't sell her for less than five," said the husband,
bringing down his fist so that the basins danced. "I'll sell her for five
guineas to any man that will pay me the money, and treat her well; and
he shall have her for ever, and never hear aught o' me. But she shan't go
for less. Now then--five guineas--and she's yours. Susan, you agree?"
She bowed her head with absolute indifference.
"Five guineas," said the auctioneer, "or she'll be withdrawn. Do
anybody give it? The last time. Yes or no?"
"Yes," said a loud voice from the doorway.
All eyes were turned. Standing in the triangular opening which formed
the door of the tent was a sailor, who, unobserved by the rest, had
arrived there within the last two or three minutes. A dead silence
followed his affirmation.
"You say you do?" asked the husband, staring at him.
"I say so," replied the sailor.
"Saying is one thing, and paying is another. Where's the money?"
The sailor hesitated a moment, looked anew at the woman, came in,
unfolded five crisp pieces of paper, and threw them down upon the
tablecloth. They were Bank-of-England notes for five pounds. Upon the
face of this he clinked down the shillings severally--one, two, three,
four, five.
The sight of real money in full amount, in answer to a challenge for the
same till then deemed slightly hypothetical had a great effect upon the

spectators. Their eyes became riveted upon the faces of the chief actors,
and then upon the notes as they lay, weighted by the shillings, on the
table.
Up to this moment it could not positively have been asserted that the
man, in spite of his tantalizing declaration, was really in earnest. The
spectators had indeed taken the proceedings throughout as a piece of
mirthful irony carried to extremes; and had assumed that, being out of
work, he was, as a consequence, out of temper with the world, and
society, and his nearest kin. But with the demand and response of real
cash the jovial frivolity of the scene departed. A lurid colour seemed to
fill the tent, and change the aspect of all therein. The mirth-wrinkles
left the listeners' faces, and they waited with parting lips.
"Now," said the woman, breaking the silence, so that her low dry voice
sounded quite loud, "before you go further, Michael, listen to me. If
you touch that money, I and this girl go with the man. Mind, it is a joke
no longer."
"A joke? Of course it is not a joke!" shouted her husband, his
resentment rising at her suggestion. "I take the money; the sailor takes
you. That's plain enough. It has been done elsewhere--and why not
here?"
"'Tis quite on the understanding that the young woman is willing," said
the sailor blandly. "I wouldn't hurt her feelings for the world."
"Faith, nor I," said her husband. "But she is willing, provided she can
have the child. She said so only the other day when I talked o't!"
"That you swear?" said the sailor to her.
"I do," said she, after glancing at her husband's face and seeing no
repentance there.
"Very well, she shall have the child, and the bargain's complete," said
the trusser. He took the sailor's notes and deliberately folded them, and
put them with the shillings in a high remote pocket, with an air of

finality.
The sailor looked at the woman and smiled. "Come along!" he said
kindly. "The little one too--the more the merrier!" She paused for an
instant, with a close glance at him. Then dropping her eyes again, and
saying nothing, she took up the child and followed him as he made
towards the door. On reaching it, she turned, and pulling off her
wedding-ring, flung it across the booth in the hay-trusser's face.
"Mike," she said, "I've lived with thee a couple of years, and had
nothing but temper! Now I'm no more to 'ee; I'll try my luck elsewhere.
'Twill be better for me and Elizabeth-Jane, both. So good-bye!"
Seizing the sailor's arm with her right hand, and mounting the little girl
on her left, she went out of the tent sobbing bitterly.
A stolid look of concern filled the husband's face, as if,