The Trumpet-Major by Thomas Hardy

In four-and-twenty hours Bob had recovered. But though physically / himself again, he was not at all sure of his position as a patriot. He / had that practical knowledge of seamanship of which the country stood / much in need, and it was humiliating to find that impressment seemed to / be necessary to teach him to use it for her advantage. Many neighbouring / young men, less fortunate than himself, had been pressed and taken; and / their absence seemed a reproach to him. He went away by himself into the / mill-roof, and, surrounded by the corn-heaps, gave vent to / self-condemnation.

'Certainly, I am no man to lie here so long for the pleasure of sighting / that young girl forty times a day, and letting her sight me -- bless her / eyes! -- till I must needs want a press-gang to teach me what I've forgot. / And is it then all over with me as a British sailor? We'll see.'

When he was thrown under the influence of Anne's eyes again, which were / more tantalizingly beautiful than ever just now (so it seemed to him), / his intention of offering his services to the Government would wax / weaker, and he would put off his final decision till the next day. Anne / saw these fluctuations of his mind between love and patriotism, and being / terrified by what she had heard of sea-fights, used the utmost art of / which she was capable to seduce him from his forming purpose. She came / to him in the mill, wearing the very prettiest of her morning jackets -- the / one that only just passed the waist, and was laced so tastefully round / the collar and bosom. Then she would appear in her new hat, with a / bouquet of primroses on one side; and on the following Sunday she walked / before him in lemon-coloured boots, so that her feet looked like a pair / of yellow-hammers flitting under her dress.

But dress was the least of the means she adopted for chaining him down. / She talked more tenderly than ever; asked him to begin small undertakings / in the garden on her account; she sang about the house, that the place / might seem cheerful when he came in. This singing for a purpose required / great effort on her part, leaving her afterwards very sad. When Bob / asked her what was the matter, she would say, 'Nothing; only I am / thinking how you will grieve your father, and cross his purposes, if you / carry out your unkind notion of going to sea, and forsaking your place in / the mill.'

'Yes,' Bob would say uneasily. 'It will trouble him, I know.'

Being also quite aware how it would trouble her, he would again postpone, / and thus another week passed away.

All this time John had not come once to the mill. It appeared as if Miss / Johnson absorbed all his time and thoughts. Bob was often seen chuckling / over the circumstance. 'A sly rascal! ' he said. 'Pretending on the day / she came to be married that she was not good enough for me, when it was / only that he wanted her for himself. How he could have persuaded her to / go away is beyond me to say!'

Anne could not contest this belief of her lover's, and remained silent; / but there had more than once occurred to her mind a doubt of its / probability. Yet she had only abandoned her opinion that John had / schemed for Matilda, to embrace the opposite error; that, finding he had / wronged the young lady, he had pitied and grown to love her.

'And yet Jack, when he was a boy, was the simplest fellow alive,' resumed / Bob. 'By George, though, I should have been hot against him for such a / trick, if in losing her I hadn't found a better! But she'll never come / down to him in the world: she has high notions now. I am afraid he's / doomed to sigh in vain!'

Though Bob regretted this possibility, the feeling was not reciprocated / by Anne. It was true that she knew nothing of Matilda's temporary / treachery, and that she disbelieved the story of her lack of virtue; but / she did not like the woman. 'Perhaps it will not matter if he is doomed / to sigh in vain,' she said. 'But I owe him no ill-will. I have profited / by his doings, incomprehensible as they are. ' And she bent her fair eyes / on Bob and smiled.

Bob looked dubious. 'He thinks he has affronted me, now I have seen / through him, and that I shall be against meeting him. But, of course, I / am not so touchy. I can stand a practical joke, as can any man who has / been afloat. I'll call and see him, and tell him so.'

Before he started, Bob bethought him of something which would still / further prove to the misapprehending John that he was entirely forgiven. / He went to his room, and took from his chest a packet containing a lock / of Miss Johnson's hair, which she had given him during their brief / acquaintance, and which till now he had quite forgotten. When, at / starting, he wished Anne goodbye, it was accompanied by such a beaming / face, that she knew he was full of an idea, and asked what it might be / that pleased him so.

'Why, this,' he said, smacking his breast-pocket. 'A lock of hair that / Matilda gave me.'

Anne sank back with parted lips.

'I am going to give it to Jack -- he'll jump for joy to get it! And it / will show him how willing I am to give her up to him, fine piece as she / is.'

'Will you see her to-day, Bob? ' Anne asked with an uncertain smile.

'O no -- unless it is by accident.'

On reaching the outskirts of the town he went straight to the barracks, / and was lucky enough to find John in his room, at the left-hand corner of / the quadrangle. John was glad to see him; but to Bob's surprise he / showed no immediate contrition, and thus afforded no room for the / brotherly speech of forgiveness which Bob had been going to deliver. As / the trumpet-major did not open the subject, Bob felt it desirable to / begin himself.

'I have brought ye something that you will value, Jack,' he said, as they / sat at the window, overlooking the large square barrack-yard. 'I have / got no further use for it, and you should have had it before if it had / entered my head.'