Outside All Laws — Jude the Obscure

Sue names a grand day and will not have ruins. Jude offers Wardour Castle for its Corinthian rooms and pictures, and every detail of the outing throws off a sparkle he refuses to examine. The guard takes them for lovers and gives them a compartment to themselves. That's a good intention wasted, she says. He thinks the remark unnecessarily cruel.

They walk the high country toward another line, and he cuts her a crook that makes her look like a shepherdess. She tires; a shepherd and his toothless mother take them in with boiled bacon and greens, and separate beds once Jude says they are not a married couple. Sue rather likes it: outside all laws except gravitation and germination. He answers that she only thinks she likes it; she is quite a product of civilisation. She names the Ishmaelite inside her. He calls her an urban miss. She looks severe and turns away.

In the morning the Close looks like a nunnery she must re-enter. I expect I shall catch it, she murmurs, then remembers a new photograph of herself and gives it to him at the gate. The porter's glance is already ominous. She passes in, looking back, and waves.