“Ah! Oak, I thought you were here,” he said. “I met the mail-cart ten minutes ago, and a letter was put into my hand, which I opened without reading the address. I believe it is yours. You must excuse the accident please.”
“O yes—not a bit of difference, Mr. Boldwood—not a bit,” said Gabriel, readily. He had not a correspondent on earth, nor was there a possible letter coming to him whose contents the whole parish would not have been welcome to peruse.
Oak stepped aside, and read the following in an unknown hand:—
“DEAR FRIEND,—I do not know your name, but I think these few lines will reach you, which I write to thank you for your kindness to me the night I left Weatherbury in a reckless way. I also return the money I owe you, which you will excuse my not keeping as a gift. All has ended well, and I am happy to say I am going to be married to the young man who has courted me for some time—Sergeant Troy, of the 11th Dragoon Guards, now quartered in Melchester. He would, I know, object to my having received anything except as a loan, being a man of great respectability and high honour—indeed, a nobleman by blood.
“I should be much obliged to you if you would keep the contents of this letter a secret for the present, dear friend. We mean to surprise Weatherbury by coming there soon as husband and wife, though I blush to state it to one nearly a stranger. The sergeant grew up in Weatherbury. Thanking you again for your kindness,
“I am, your sincere well-wisher, “FANNY ROBIN.”
“Have you read it, Mr. Boldwood?” said Gabriel; “if not, you had better do so. I know you are interested in Fanny Robin.”
Boldwood read the letter and looked grieved.
“Fanny—poor Fanny! the end she is so confident of has not yet come, she should remember—and may never come.”
“What sort of a man is this Sergeant Troy?” said Gabriel.
“H’m—I’m afraid not one to build much hope upon in such a case as this,” the farmer murmured, “though he’s a clever fellow, and up to everything. A slight romance attaches to him, too. His mother was a French governess, and it seems that a secret attachment existed between her and the late Lord Severn. Soon after she was married to a poor medical man, and while money was forthcoming all went on well. Unfortunately for her boy, his best friends died; and he got then a situation as second clerk at a lawyer’s in Casterbridge. He stayed there for some time, and might have worked himself into a dignified position of some sort had he not indulged in the wild freak of enlisting. I have much doubt if ever little Fanny will surprise us in the way she mentions—very much doubt A silly girl!—silly girl!”