For hours nothing relieved the joyless monotony of things.  Then, far beyond the ploughing-teams, a black speck was seen.  It had come from the corner of a fence, where there was a gap, and its tendency was up the incline, towards the swede-cutters.  From the proportions of a mere point it advanced to the shape of a ninepin, and was soon perceived to be a man in black, arriving from the direction of Flintcomb-Ash.  The man at the slicer, having nothing else to do with his eyes, continually observed the comer, but Tess, who was occupied, did not perceive him till her companion directed her attention to his approach.

It was not her hard taskmaster, Farmer Groby; it was one in a semi-clerical costume, who now represented what had once been the free-and-easy Alec d’Urberville.  Not being hot at his preaching there was less enthusiasm about him now, and the presence of the grinder seemed to embarrass him.  A pale distress was already on Tess’s face, and she pulled her curtained hood further over it.

D’Urberville came up and said quietly—­

“I want to speak to you, Tess.”

“You have refused my last request, not to come near me!” said she.

“Yes, but I have a good reason.”

“Well, tell it.”

“It is more serious than you may think.”

He glanced round to see if he were overheard.  They were at some distance from the man who turned the slicer, and the movement of the machine, too, sufficiently prevented Alec’s words reaching other ears.  D’Urberville placed himself so as to screen Tess from the labourer, turning his back to the latter.

“It is this,” he continued, with capricious compunction.  “In thinking of your soul and mine when we last met, I neglected to inquire as to your worldly condition.  You were well dressed, and I did not think of it.  But I see now that it is hard—­harder than it used to be when I—­knew you—­harder than you deserve.  Perhaps a good deal of it is owning to me!”

She did not answer, and he watched her inquiringly, as, with bent head, her face completely screened by the hood, she resumed her trimming of the swedes.  By going on with her work she felt better able to keep him outside her emotions.

“Tess,” he added, with a sigh of discontent,—­“yours was the very worst case I ever was concerned in!  I had no idea of what had resulted till you told me.  Scamp that I was to foul that innocent life!  The whole blame was mine—­the whole unconventional business of our time at Trantridge.  You, too, the real blood of which I am but the base imitation, what a blind young thing you were as to possibilities!  I say in all earnestness that it is a shame for parents to bring up their girls in such dangerous ignorance of the gins and nets that the wicked may set for them, whether their motive be a good one or the result of simple indifference.”

Tess still did no more than listen, throwing down one globular root and taking up another with automatic regularity, the pensive contour of the mere fieldwoman alone marking her.