Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence, page 26
“Ah!” she said, “you like to show me how strong you area veritable Samson!” — she mocked, although she had invited him with her eyes to take her in his arms.
We were entering the spinney of black poplar. In the hedge was an elm tree, with myriads of dark dots pointed against the bright sky, myriads of clusters of flaky green fruit.
“Look at that elm,” she said, “you’d think it was in full leaf, wouldn’t you? Do you know why it’s so prolific?”
“No,” he said, with a curious questioning drawl of the monosyllable.
“It’s casting its bread upon the winds — no, it is dying, so it puts out all its strength and loads its boughs with the last fruit It’ll be dead next year. If you’re here then, come and see. Look at the ivy, the suave smooth ivy, with its fingers in the trees’ throat. Trees know how to die, you see — we don’t.”
With her whimsical moods she tormented him. She was at the bottom a seething confusion of emotion, and she wanted to make him likewise.
“If we were trees with ivy — instead of being fine humans with free active life — we should hug our thinning lives, shouldn’t we?”
“I suppose we should.”
“You, for instance — fancy your sacrificing yourself — for the next generation — that reminds you of Schopenhauer, doesn’t it? — for the next generation, or love, or anything!”
He did not answer her; she was too swift for him. They passed on under the poplars, which were hanging strings of green beads above them. There was a little open space, with tufts of bluebells. Lettie stooped over a wood-pigeon that lay on the ground on its breast, its wings half spread. She took it up — its eyes were bursten and bloody; she felt its breast, ruffling the dimming iris on its throat.
“It’s been fighting,” he said.
“What for — a mate?” she asked, looking at him.
“I don’t know,” he answered.
“Cold — he’s quite cold, under the feathers! I think a wood-pigeon must enjoy being fought for — and being won; especially if the right one won. It would be a fine pleasure to see them fighting — don’t you think?” she said, torturing him.
“The claws are spread — it fell dead off the perch,” he replied.
“Ah, poor thing — it was wounded — and sat and waited for death — when the other had won. Don’t you think life is very cruel, George — and love the cruellest of all?”
He laughed bitterly under the pain of her soft, sad tones. “Let me bury him — and have done with the beaten lover. But we’ll make him a pretty grave.”
She scooped a hole in the dark soil, and snatching a handful of bluebells, threw them in on top of the dead bird. Then she smoothed the soil over all, and pressed her white hands on the black loam.
“There,” she said, knocking her hands one against the other to shake off the soil, “He’s done with. Come on.”
He followed her, speechless with his emotion.
The spinney opened out; the ferns were serenely uncoiling, the bluebells stood grouped with blue curls mingled. In the freer spaces forget-me-nots flowered in nebulae, and dog-violets gave an undertone of dark purple, with primroses for planets in the night. There was a slight drift of woodruff, sweet new-mown hay, scenting the air under the boughs. On a wet bank was the design of golden saxifrage, glistening unholily as if varnished by its minister, the snail. George and Lettie crushed the veined belles of wood-sorrel and broke the silken mosses. What did it matter to them what they broke or crushed?
Over the fence of the spinney was the hill-side, scattered with old thorn trees. There the little grey lichens held up ruby balls to us unnoticed. What did it matter, when all the great red apples were being shaken from the Tree to be left to rot.
“If I were a man,” said Lettie, “I would go out west and be free. I should love it.”
She took the scarf from her head and let it wave out on the wind; the colour was warm in her face with climbing, and her curls were freed by the wind, sparkling and rippling.
“Well — you’re not a man,” he said, looking at her, and speaking with timid bitterness.
“No,” she laughed, “if I were, I would shape things — oh, wouldn’t I have my own way!”
“And don’t you now?”
“Oh — I don’t want it particularly — when I’ve got it. When I’ve had my way, I do want somebody to take it back from me.”
She put her head back and looked at him sideways, laughing through the glitter of her hair.
They came to the kennels. She sat down on the edge of the great stone water-trough, and put her hands in the water, moving them gently like submerged flowers through the clear pool.
“I love to see myself in the water,” she said, “I don’t mean on the water, Narcissus — but that’s how I should like to be out west, to have a little lake of my own, and swim with my limbs quite free in the water.”
“Do you swim well?” he asked.
“Fairly.”
“I would race you — in your little lake.”
She laughed, took her hands out of the water, and watched the clear drops trickle off. Then she lifted her head suddenly, at some thought or other. She looked across the valley, and saw the red roofs of the Mill.
“Ilion, Ilion
Fatalis incestusque judex
Et mulier peregrina vertit.
In pulverem — — ”
“What’s that?” he said.
“Nothing.”
“That’s a private trough,” exclaimed a thin voice, high like a peewit’s cry. We started in surprise to see a tall, black-bearded man looking at us and away from us nervously, fidgeting uneasily some ten yards off.
“Is it?” said Lettie, looking at her wet hands, which she proceeded to dry on a fragment of a handkerchief.
“You mustn’t meddle with it,” said the man in the same reedy, oboe voice. Then he turned his head away, and his pale grey eyes roved the country-side — when he had courage, he turned his back to us, shading his eyes to continue his scrutiny. He walked hurriedly, a few steps, then craned his neck, peering into the valley, and hastened a dozen yards in another direction, again stretching and peering about. Then he went indoors.
“He is pretending to look for somebody,” said Lettie, “but it’s only because he’s afraid we shall think he came out just to look at us” — and they laughed.
Suddenly a woman appeared at the gate; she had pale eyes like the mouse-voiced man.
“You’ll get Bright’s disease sitting on that there damp stone,” she said to Lettie, who at once rose apologetically.
“I ought to know,” continued the mouse-voiced woman, “my own mother died of it.”
“Indeed,” murmured Lettie, “I’m sorry.”
“Yes,” continued the woman, “it behooves you to be careful. Do you come from Strelley Mill Farm?” she asked suddenly of George, surveying his shameful deshabille with bitter reproof.
He admitted the imputation.
“And you’re going to leave, aren’t you?”
Which also he admitted.
“Humph! — we s’ll ‘appen get some neighbours. It’s a dog’s life for loneliness. I suppose you knew the last lot that was here.”
Another brief admission.
“A dirty lot — a dirty beagle she must have been. You should just ha’ seen these grates.”
“Yes,” said Lettie. “I have seen them.”
“Faugh — the state! But come in — come in, you’ll see a difference.”
They entered, out of curiosity.
The kitchen was indeed different. It was clean and sparkling, warm with bright red chintzes on the sofa and on every chair cushion. Unfortunately the effect was spoiled by green and yellow antimaccassars, and by a profusion of paper and woollen flowers. There were three cases of woollen flowers, and on the wall, four fans stitched over with ruffled green and yellow paper, adorned with yellow paper roses, carnations, arum lilies, and poppies; there were also wall pockets full of paper flowers; while the wood outside was loaded with blossom.
“Yes,” said Lettie, “there is a difference.”
The woman swelled, and looked round. The black-bearded man peeped from behind the Christian Herald — those long blaring trumpets! — and shrank again. The woman darted at his pipe, which he had put on a piece of newspaper on the hob, and blew some imaginary ash from it. Then she caught sight of something — perhaps some dust — on the fireplace.
“There!” she cried, “I knew it; I couldn’t leave him one second! I haven’t work enough burning wood, but he must be poke — poke — ”
“I only pushed a piece in between the bars,” complained the mouse voice from behind the paper.
“Pushed a piece in!” she re-echoed, with awful scorn, seizing the poker and thrusting it over his paper. “What do you call that, sitting there telling your stories before folks — ”
They crept out and hurried away. Glancing round, Lettie saw the woman mopping the doorstep after them, and she laughed. He pulled his watch out of his breeches’ pocket; it was half-past three.
“What are you looking at the time for?” she asked. “Meg’s coming to tea,” he replied.
She said no more, and they walked slowly on.
When they came on to the shoulder of the hill, and looked down on to the mill, and the millpond, she said:
“I will not come down with you — I will go home.”
“Not come down to tea!” he exclaimed, full of reproach and amazement. “Why, what will they say?”
“No, I won’t come down — let me say farewell — jamque Vale! Do you remember how Eurydice sank back into Hell?”
“But” — he stammered, “you must come down to tea — how can I tell them? Why won’t you come?”
She answered him in Latin, with two lines from Virgil. As she watched him, she pitied his helplessness, and gave him a last cut as she said, very softly and tenderly:
“It wouldn’t be fair to Meg.”
He stood looking at her; his face was coloured only by the grey-brown tan; his eyes, the dark, self-mistrustful eyes of the family, were darker than ever, dilated with misery of helplessness; and she was infinitely pitiful. She wanted to cry in her yearning.
“Shall we go into the wood for a few minutes?” she said in a low, tremulous voice, as they turned aside.
The wood was high and warm. Along the ridings the forget-me-nots were knee deep, stretching, glimmering into the distance like the Milky Way through the night. They left the tall, flower-tangled paths to go in among the bluebells, breaking through the close-pressed flowers and ferns till they came to an oak which had fallen across the hazels, where they sat half screened. The hyacinths drooped magnificently with an overweight of purple, or they stood pale and erect, like unripe ears of purple corn. Heavy bees swung down in a blunder of extravagance among the purple flowers. They were intoxicated even with the sight of so much blue. The sound of their hearty, wanton humming came clear upon the solemn boom of the wind overhead. The sight of their clinging, clambering riot gave satisfaction to the soul. A rosy campion flower caught the sun and shone out. An elm sent down a shower of flesh-tinted sheaths upon them.
“If there were fauns and hamadryads!” she said softly, turning to him to soothe his misery. She took his cap from his head, ruffled his hair, saying:
“If you were a faun, I would put guelder roses round your hair, and make you look Bacchanalian.” She left her hand lying on his knee, and looked up at the sky. Its blue looked pale and green in comparison with the purple tide ebbing about the wood. The clouds rose up like towers, and something had touched them into beauty, and poised them up among the winds. The clouds passed on, and the pool of sky was clear.
“Look,” she said, “how we are netted down — boughs with knots of green buds. If we were free on the winds! — But I’m glad we’re not.” She turned suddenly to him, and with the same movement, she gave him her hand, and he clasped it in both his. “I’m glad we’re netted down here; if we were free in the winds — Ah!”
She laughed a peculiar little laugh, catching her breath.
“Look!” she said, “it’s a palace, with the ash-trunks smooth like a girl’s arm, and the elm-columns, ribbed and bossed and fretted, with the great steel shafts of beech, all rising up to hold an embroidered care-cloth over us; and every thread of the care-cloth vibrates with music for us, and the little broidered birds sing; and the hazel-bushes fling green spray round us, and the honeysuckle leans down to pour out scent over us. Look at the harvest of bluebells — ripened for us! Listen to the bee, sounding among all the organ-play — if he sounded exultant for us!” She looked at him, with tears coming up into her eyes, and a little, winsome, wistful smile hovering round her mouth. He was very pale, and dared not look at her. She put her hand in his, leaning softly against him. He watched, as if fascinated, a young thrush with full pale breast who hopped near to look at them — glancing with quick, shining eyes.
“The clouds are going on again,” said Lettie.
“Look at that cloud face — see — gazing right up into the sky. The lips are opening — he is telling us something — now the form is slipping away — it’s gone — come, we must go too.”
“No,” he cried, “don’t go — don’t go away.”
Her tenderness made her calm. She replied in a voice perfect in restrained sadness and resignation.
“No, my dear, no. The threads of my life were untwined; they drifted about like floating threads of gossamer; and you didn’t put out your hand to take them and twist them up into the chord with yours. Now another has caught them up, and the chord of my life is being twisted, and I cannot wrench it free and untwine it again — I can’t. I am not strong enough. Besides, you have twisted another thread far and tight into your chord; could you get free?”
“Tell me what to do — yes, if you tell me.”
“I can’t tell you — so let me go.”
“No, Lettie,” he pleaded, with terror and humility. “No, Lettie; don’t go. What should I do with my life? Nobody would love you like I do — and what should I do with my love for you? — hate it and fear it, because it’s too much for me?”
She turned and kissed him gratefully. He then took her in a long, passionate embrace, mouth to mouth. In the end it had so wearied her that she could only wait in his arms till he was too tired to hold her. He was trembling already.
“Poor Meg!” she murmured to herself dully, her sensations having become vague.
He winced, and the pressure of his arms slackened. She loosened his hands and rose half dazed from her seat by him. She left him, while he sat dejected, raising no protest.
When I went out to look for them, when tea had already been waiting on the table half an hour or more, I found him leaning against the gatepost at the bottom of the hill. There was no blood in his face, and his tan showed livid; he was haggard as if he had been ill for some weeks.
“Whatever’s the matter?” I said. “Where’s Lettie?”
“She’s gone home,” he answered, and the sound of his own voice, and the meaning of his own words made him heave. “Why?” I asked in alarm.
He looked at me as if to say, “What are you talking about? I cannot listen!”
“Why?” I insisted.
“I don’t know,” he replied.
“They are waiting tea for you,” I said.
He heard me, but took no notice.
“Come on,” I repeated, “there’s Meg and everybody waiting tea for you.”
“I don’t want any,” he said.
I waited a minute or two. He was violently sick.
“Vae meum Fervens difficile bile tumet jecur,”
I thought to myself.
When the sickness passed over, he stood up away from the post, trembling and lugubrious. His eyelids dropped heavily over his eyes, and he looked at me, and smiled a faint, sick smile.
“Come and lie down in the loft,” I said, “and I’ll tell them you’ve got a bilious bout.”
He obeyed me, not having energy to question; his strength had gone, and his splendid physique seemed shrunken; he walked weakly. I looked away from him, for in his feebleness he was already beginning to feel ludicrous.
We got into the barn unperceived, and I watched him climb the ladder to the loft. Then I went indoors to tell them.
I told them Lettie had promised to be at Highclose for tea, that George had a bilious attack, and was mooning about the barn till it was over; he had been badly sick. We ate tea without zest or enjoyment. Meg was wistful and ill at ease; the father talked to her and made much of her; the mother did not care for her much.
“I can’t understand it,” said the mother, “he so rarely has anything the matter with him — why, I’ve hardly known the day! Are you sure it’s nothing serious, Cyril? It seems such a thing — and just when Meg happened to be down — just when Meg was coming — ”
About half-past six I had again to go and look for him, to satisfy the anxiety of his mother and his sweetheart. I went whistling to let him know I was coming. He lay on a pile of hay in a corner, asleep. He had put his cap under his head to stop the tickling of the hay, and he lay half curled up, sleeping soundly. He was still very pale, and there was on his face the repose and pathos that a sorrow always leaves. As he wore no coat, I was afraid he might be chilly, so I covered him up with a couple of sacks, and I left him. I would not have him disturbed — I helped the father about the cowsheds and with the pigs.
Meg had to go at half-past seven. She was so disappointed that I said:
“Come and have a look at him — I’ll tell him you did.”
He had thrown off the sacks and spread out his limbs. As he lay on his back, flung out on the hay, he looked big again, and manly. His mouth had relaxed, and taken its old, easy lines. One felt for him now the warmth one feels for anyone who sleeps in an attitude of abandon. She leaned over him, and looked at him with a little rapture of love and tenderness; she longed to caress him. Then he stretched himself, and his eyes opened. Their sudden unclosing gave her a thrill. He smiled sleepily, and murmured, “‘Alto, Meg!” Then I saw him awake. As he remembered, he turned with a great sighing yawn, hid his face again, and lay still.
