Now when Sir John was gone, and his remains carried to his family
burying-place in another part of England, the lady began in due time
to wonder whither Sir William had betaken himself. But she had been
cured of precipitancy (if ever woman were), and was prepared to wait
her whole lifetime a widow if the said Sir William should not
reappear. Her life was now passed mostly within the walls, or in
promenading between the pleasaunce and the bowling-green; and she
very seldom went even so far as the high road which then skirted the
grounds on the north, though it has now, and for many years, been
diverted to the south side. Her patience was rewarded (if love be
in any case a reward); for one day, many months after her second
husband's death, a messenger arrived at her gate with the
intelligence that Sir William Hervy was again in Casterbridge, and
would be glad to know if it were her pleasure that he should wait
upon her.
It need hardly be said that permission was joyfully granted, and
within two hours her lover stood before her, a more thoughtful man
than formerly, but in all essential respects the same man, generous,
modest to diffidence, and sincere. The reserve which womanly
decorum threw over her manner was but too obviously artificial, and
when he said 'the ways of Providence are strange,' and added after a
moment, 'and merciful likewise,' she could not conceal her
agitation, and burst into tears upon his neck.
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