The Journey in Despair
- Hetty's nervous, Hetty's lonely, Hetty's running out of cash. And now she's sick—"too ill even to think with any distinctness of the evils that were to come" (37.1). As she lies in bed, she imagines the scandal that would ensue if she went back to Hayslope.
- She would be a charity case, without money, without anyone's compassion. No matter how much she yearns "to be back in her safe home again," her "dread of shame" is too strong (37.3).
- The only decent option Hetty hits on is going to her "friend in trouble," Dinah (37.5). It's that or commit suicide, and Hetty doesn't think she's up to the latter. So she composes herself, goes downstairs, has some breakfast. And starts figuring out how to find Dinah on a shoestring budget.
- Fortunately, Hetty still has some jewelry to pawn. And the landlord and landlady are only too willing to advance her three guineas, if she leaves her trinkets with them. What could three guineas buy in 1800? We don't know, and Hetty doesn't care. She just wants to get her money and seek Dinah out.
- Hetty gets back on the road. Yet by this time, she wants nothing more than to "wander out of sight, and drown herself where her body would never be found" (37.24). And yet (thank heavens) she soldiers on.
- By now, Hetty is a changed woman. Yes, "woman": you don't experience this much misery and still get called a mere "girl." Her Arthur delusions are totally gone, and she actually sets her teeth "when she [thinks] of Arthur. She cursed him, without knowing what her cursing would do" (37.30).
- The Hetty of yesterday was all fantasies and trinkets; the Hetty of today would be happy to sleep in a shed.
- Which is exactly what she does. As she wanders on foot toward Dinah, or wherever, Hetty takes refuge in a hovel near some sheep. But she is roused by "an elderly man in a smock-frock," who wants to know what she's up to (37.32). He means no harm, really he doesn't. In fact, the out-of-place Hetty seems to unnerve him.
- Hetty gets back on the road, aware that she'll look like "a beggar or a wild woman" if this goes on much longer (37.42). But go on it will. By the end of the chapter, she's still counting her coins and trying to find Dinah.
- As Eliot's narrator says: "My heart bleeds for her as I see her toiling along on her weary feet" (37.45). You're not alone, Eliot Narrator Person. You're not alone.