Life the Hound

Equivocal

She was my best friend. We cared about each other so much, that I didn't believe for a second the rumors they spread about her. How she was… involved with a man, outside of wedlock. How she had a child, and lost it before it could be baptized, resulting in its eternal suffering. How she had baptized it herself. Such dirty, horrible, crude rumors. How on earth could I believe that of her?

Comes at a bound

Either to rend me

Or to befriend me.

I had left because of my family. We couldn't afford to remain in the vale anymore. So I vowed to my poor Tess that I would return to her side someday. And when I made good on that promise, she wasn't there. I heard the worst things about her: She ran off with a man separate from the one who gave her the child; she married said man and fed from his inheritance (which I heard was quite bountiful); she betrayed her betrothed and hastened to the side of her rapist. I was worried, disturbed by these escalating accusations towards my darling friend, but of course none of them could be true. My Tess despised men. How could she have become such a tramp as was described to me, in such a short period of time that I was absent?

I cannot tell

The hound's intent

Till he has sprung

At my bare hand

With teeth or tongue.

I saw her face when she finally returned to her family. She looked gaunt, ghostly, and worn. Aged beyond her years. I decided not to ask her help in finding the level of truth within the whispers. And she left just as quickly as she came, just as mysteriously. I found that her family joined her, and discovered too late that her dear father was dead and the entire Durbeyfield family was booted from their own home, because they couldn't pay. I felt so useless. How could I call myself her dearest friend, when I merely worried about her reputation instead of earnestly trying to help her? Of course, none of the rumors were true! How could they be? And yet, she left me, after forcing her rapist to exit the stage before her. Well, maybe that rumor had some element of truth in it. And she ran away with her dear husband, who finally accepted her after conceding that the birth of her child out of wedlock was not her fault, but her assailant's. So, the thoughts that she was once a mother were correct, as well.

But of course, she had to pay for her crime against the world; my poor Tess murdered the man who had tortured her the entire duration of my absence. And she was executed.

I heard of her death through hearsay, as well. I didn't believe it at first. But now I had to believe everything about her, I suppose. The things they say made her seem like such a monster. I don't doubt that anymore.

Meanwhile I stand

And wait the event.

-The Hound (Robert Francis)