David Herbert Lawrence
   
                 The Horce Dealer's Daughter


Файл с книжной полки Несененко Алексея
OCR: Несененко Алексей январь 2004

   
   "Well, Mabel, and what are you going to do with yourself? " asked 
Joe, with foolish flippancy. He felt quite safe himself. Without 
listening for an answer, he turned aside, worked a grain of tobacco to 
the tip of his tongue, and spat it out. He did not care about 
anything, since he felt safe himself.
   The three brothers and the sister sat round the desolate breakfast 
table, attempting some sort of desultory consultation. The morning's 
post had given the final tap to the family fortunes, and all was over. 
The dreary dining-room itself, with its heavy mahogany furniture, 
looked as if it were waiting to be done away with.
   But the consultation amounted to nothing. There was a strange air 
of ineffectuality about the three men, as they sprawled at table, 
smoking and reflecting vaguely on their own condition. The girl was 
alone, a rather short, sullen-looking young woman of twenty-seven. She 
did not share the same life as her brothers. She would have been good-
looking, save for the impassive fixity of her face, "bull-dog", as her 
brothers called it.
   There was a confused tramping of horses' feet outside. The three 
men all sprawled round in their chairs to watch. Beyond the dark 
holly-bushes that separated the strip of lawn from the highroad, they 
could see a cavalcade of shire horses swinging out of their own yard, 
being taken for exercise. This was the last time. These were the last 
horses that would go through their hands. The young men watched with 
critical, callous look. They were all frightened at the collapse of 
their lives, and the sense of disaster in which they were involved 
left them no inner freedom.
   Yet they were three fine, well-set fellows enough. Joe, the eldest, 
was a man of thirty-three, broad and handsome in a hot, flushed way. 
His face was red, he twisted his black moustache over a thick finger, 
his eyes were shallow and restless. He had a sensual way of uncovering 
his teeth when he laughed, and his bearing was stupid. Now he watched 
the horses with a glazed look of helplessness in his eyes, a certain 
stupor of downfall.
   The great draught-horses swung past. They were tied head to tail, 
four of them, and they heaved along to where a lane branched off from 
the highroad, planting their great hoofs floutingly in the fine black 
mud, swinging their great rounded haunches sumptuously, and trotting a 
few sudden steps as they were led into the lane, round the corner. 
Every movement showed a massive, slumberous strength, and a stupidity 
which held them in subjection. The groom at the head looked back, 
jerking the leading rope. And the cavalcade moved out of sight up the 
lane, the tail of the last horse, bobbed up tight and stiff, held out 
taut from the swinging great haunches as they rocked behind the hedges 
in a motionlike sleep.
   Joe watched with glazed hopeless eyes. The horses were almost like 
his own body to him. He felt he was done for now. Luckily he was 
engaged to a woman as old as himself, and therefore her father, who 
was steward of a neighbouring estate, would provide him with a job. He 
would marry and go into harness. His life was over, he would be a 
subject animal now.
   He turned uneasily aside, the retreating steps of the horses 
echoing in his ears. Then, with foolish restlessness, he reached for 
the scraps of bacon-rind from the plates, and making a faint whistling 
sound, flung them to the terrier that lay against the fender. He 
watched the dog swallow them, and waited till the creature looked into 
his eyes. Then a faint grin came on his face, and in a high, foolish 
voice he said:
   "You won't get much more bacon, shall you, you little b - ? "
   The dog faintly and dismally wagged its tail, then lowered its 
haunches, circled round, and lay down again.
   There was another helpless silence at the table. Joe sprawled 
uneasily in his seat', not willing to go till the family conclave was 
dissolved. Fred Henry, the second brother, was erect, cleanlimbed, 
alert. He had watched the passing of the horses with more sang-froid. 
If he was an animal, like Joe, he was an animal which controls, not 
one which is controlled. He was master of any horse, and he carried 
himself with a well-tempered air of mastery. But he was not master of 
the situations of life. He pushed his coarse brown moustache upwards, 
off his lip, and glanced irritably at his sister, who sat impassive 
and inscrutable.
   "You'll go and stop with Lucy for a bit, shan't you? " he asked. 
The girl did not answer.
   "I don't see what else you can do," persisted Fred Henry.
   "Go as a skivvy," Joe interpolated laconically.
   The girl did not move a muscle.
   "If I was her, I should go in for training for a nurse," said 
Malcolm, the youngest of them all. He was the baby of the family, a 
young man of twenty-two, with a fresh, jaunty museau.
   But Mabel did not take any notice of him. They had talked at her 
and round her for so many years, that she hardly heard them at all.
   The marble clock on the mantel-piece softly chimed the half-hour, 
the dog rose uneasily from the hearthrug and looked at the party at 
the breakfast table. But still they sat on in ineffectual conclave.
   "Oh, all right, "said Joe suddenly, Apropos of nothing. "I'll get a 
move on."
   He pushed back his chair, straddled his knees with a downward jerk, 
to get them free, in horsy fashion, and went to the fire. Still he did 
not go out of the room; he was curious to know what the others would 
do or say. He began to charge his pipe, looking down at the dog and 
saying, in a high, affected voice:
   "Going wi' me? Going wi' me are ter? Tha'rt goin' further than tha 
counts on just now, dost hear? "
   The dog faintly wagged its tail, the man stuck out his jaw and 
covered his pipe with his hands, and puffed intently, losing hum-self 
in the tobacco, looking down all the while at the dog with an absent 
brown eye. The dog looked up at him in mournful distrust. Joe stood 
with his knees stuck out, in real horsy fashion.
   "Have you had a letter from Lucy? " Fred Henry asked of his sister.
   "Last week," came the neutral reply.
   "And what does she say? "
   There was no answer.
   "Does she ask you to go and stop there? " persisted Fred Henry.
   "She says I can if I like."
   "Well, then, you'd better Tell her you'll come on Monday."
   This was received in silence.
   "That's what you'll do then, is it? " said Fred Henry, in some 
exasperation.
   But she made no answer. There was a silence of futility and 
irritation in the room. Malcolm grinned fatuously.
   "You'll have to make up your mind between now and next Wednesday," 
said Joe loudly, "or else find yourself lodgings on the kerbstone.
   The face of the young woman darkened, but she sat on immutable.
   "Here's Jack Fergusson!" exclaimed Malcolm, who was looking 
aimlessly out of the window.
   "Where? " exclaimed Joe, loudly.
   "Just gone past."
   "Coming in?"
   Malcolm craned his neck to see the gate.
   "Yes," he said.
   There was a silence. Mabel sat on like one condemned, at the head 
of the table. Then a whistle was heard from the kitchen. The dog got 
up and barked sharply. Joe opened the door and shouted:
   "Come on."
   After a moment a young man entered. He was muffled up in overcoat 
and a purple woollen scarf, and his tweed cap, which he did not 
remove, was pulled down on his head. He was of medium height, his face 
was rather long and pale, his eyes looked tired.
   "Hello, Jack! Well, Jack!" exclaimed Malcolm and Joe. Fred Henry 
merely said, "Jack."
   "What's doing?" asked the newcomer, evidently addressing Fred 
Henry.
   "Same. We've got to be out by Wednesday. - Got a cold?"
   "I have - got it bad, too."
   "Why don't you stop in? "
   "Me stop in? When I can't stand on my legs, perhaps I shall have a 
chance." The young man spoke huskily. He had a slight Scotch accent.
   "It's a knock-out, isn't it," said Joe, boisterously, "if a doctor 
goes round croaking with a cold. Looks bad for the patients, doesn't 
it?"
   The young doctor looked at him slowly.
   "Anything the matter with you, then? " he asked sarcastically.
   "Not as I know of. Damn your eyes, I hope not. Why?" " I thought 
you were very concerned about the patients .wondered if you might be 
one yourself."
   "Damn it, no, I've never been patient to no flaming doctor, and 
hope I never shall be," returned Joe.
   At this point Mabel rose from the table, and they all seemed to 
become aware of her existence. She began putting the dishes together. 
The young doctor looked at her, but did not address her. He had not 
greeted her. She went out of the room with the tray, her face 
impassive and unchanged.
   "When are you off then, all of you? " asked the doctor. 
   "I'm catching the eleven-forty," replied Malcolm. 
   "Are you goin' down wi' th' trap, Joe?
   "Yes, I've told you I'm going down wi' th' trap, haven't I?" 
   "We'd better be getting her in then.- So long, Jack, if I don't see 
you before I go," said Malcolm, shaking hands.
   He went out, followed by Joe, who seemed to have his tail between 
his legs.
   "Well, this is the devil's own," exclaimed the doctor, when he was 
left alone with Fred Henry. "Going before Wednesday, are you? "
   "That's the orders," replied the other,
   "Where, to Northampton?"
   "That's it."
   "The devil!" exclaimed Fergusson, with quiet chagrin.
   And there was silence between the two.
   "All settled up, are you?" asked Fergusson.
   "About."
   There was another pause.
   "Well, I shall miss yer, Freddy, boy," said the young doctor.
   "And I shall miss thee, Jack," returned the other.
   "Miss you like hell," mused the doctor.
   Fred Henry turned aside. There was nothing to say. Mabel came in 
again, to finish clearing the table.
   "What are you going to do, then, Miss Pervin?" asked Fergusson. 
"Going to your sister's, are you?"
   Mabel looked at him with her steady, dangerous eyes, that always 
made him uncomfortable, unsettling his superficial ease.
   "No," she said.
   "Well, what in the name of fortune are you going to do? Say what 
you mean to do," cried Fred Henry, with futile intensity.
   But she only averted her head, and continued her work. She folded 
the white table-cloth, and put on the chenille cloth.
   "The sulkiest bitch that ever trod!" muttered her brother.
   But she finished her task with perfectly impassive face, the young 
doctor watching her interestedly all the while. Then she went out.
   Fred Henry stared after her, clenching his lips, his blue eyes 
fixing in sharp antagonism, as he made a grimace of sour exasperation.
   "You could bray her into bits, and that's all you'd get out of 
her," he said, in a small, narrowed tone.
   The doctor smiled faintly.
   "What's she going to do, then? " he asked.
   "Strike me if/know!" returned the other.
   There was a pause. Then the doctor stirred.
   "I'll be seeing you tonight, shall I? " he said to his friend.
   "Ay - where's it to be? Are we going over to Jessdale?"
   "I don't know. I've got such a cold on me. I'll come round to the 
Moon and Stars, anyway."
   "Let Lizzie and May miss their night for once, eh?"
   "That's it - if I feel as I do now."
   "All's one - "
   The two young men went through the passage and down to the back 
door together. The house was large, but it was servantless now, and 
desolate. At the back was a small bricked house-yard, and beyond that 
a big square, gravelled fine and red, and having stables on two sides. 
Sloping, dank, winter-dark fields stretched away on the open sides.
   But the stables were empty. Joseph Pervin, the father of the 
family, had been a man of no education, who had become a fairly large 
horse dealer. The stables had been full of horses, there was a great 
turmoil and come-and-go of horses and of dealers and grooms. Then the 
kitchen was full of servants. But of late things had declined. The old 
man had married a second time, to retrieve his fortunes. Now he was 
dead and everything was gone to the dogs, there was nothing but debt 
and threatening.
   For months, Mabel had been servantless in the big house, keeping 
the home together in penury for her ineffectual brothers. She had kept 
house for ten years. But previously, it was with unstinted means. 
Then, however brutal and coarse everything was, the sense of money had 
kept her proud, confident. The men might be foul-mouthed, the women in 
the kitchen might have bad reputations, her brothers might have 
illegitimate children. But so long as there was money, the girl felt 
herself established, and brutally proud, reserved.
   No company came to the house, save dealers and coarse men. Mabel 
had no associates of her own sex, after her sister went away. But she 
did not mind. She went regularly to church, she attended to her 
father. And she lived in the memory of her mother, who had died when 
she was fourteen, and whom she had loved. She had loved her father, 
too, in a different way, depending upon him, and feeling secure in 
him, until at the age of fifty-four he married again. And then she had 
set hard against him. Now he had died and left them all hopelessly in 
debt.
   She had suffered badly during the period of poverty. Nothing, 
however, could shake the curious sullen, animal pride that dominated 
each member of the family. Now, for Mabel, the end had come. Still she 
would not cast about her. She would follow her own way just the same. 
She would always hold the keys of her own situation. Mindless and 
persistent, she endured from day to day. Why should she think? Why 
should she answer anybody? It was enough that this was the end, and 
there was no way out. She need not pass any more darkly along the main 
street of the small town, avoiding every eye. She need not demean 
herself any more, going into the shops and buying the cheapest food. 
This was at an end. She thought of nobody, not even of herself. 
Mindless and persistent, she seemed in a sort of ecstasy to be coming 
nearer to her fulfilment, her own glorification, approaching her dead 
mother, who was glorified.
   In the afternoon she took a little bag, with shears and sponge and 
a small scrubbing brush, and went out. It was a grey, wintry day, with 
saddened, dark-green fields and an atmosphere blackened by the smoke 
of foundries not far off. She went quickly, darkly along the causeway, 
needing nobody, through the town to the churchyard.
   There she always felt secure, as if no one could see her, although 
as a matter of fact she was exposed to the stare of everyone who 
passed along under the churchyard wall. Nevertheless, once under the 
shadow of the great looming church, among the graves, she felt immune 
from the world, reserved within the thick churchyard wall as in 
another country.
   Carefully she clipped the grass from the grave, and arranged the 
pinky-white, small chrysanthemums in the tin cross. When this was 
done, she took an empty jar from a neighbouring grave, Mi brought 
water, and carefully, most scrupulously sponged the marble headstone 
and the coping-stone.
   It gave her sincere satisfaction to do this. She felt in immediate 
contact with the world of her mother. She took minute pains, went 
through the park in a state bordering on pure happiness, as if in 
performing this task she came into a subtle, intimate connexion with 
her mother. For the life she followed here in the world was far less 
real than the world of death she inherited from her mother.
   The doctor's house was just by the church. Fergusson, being a mere 
hired assistant, was slave to the countryside.
   As he hurried now to attend to the outpatients in the surgery, 
glancing across the graveyard with his quick eye, he saw the girl at 
her task at the grave. She seemed so intent and remote, it was like 
looking into another world. Some mystical element was touched in him. 
He slowed down as he walked, watching her as if spell-bound.
   She lifted her eyes, feeling him looking. Their eyes met. And each 
looked again at once, each feeling, in some way, found out by the 
other. He lifted his cap and passed on down the road. There remained 
distinct in his consciousness, like a vision, the memory of her face, 
lifted from the tombstone in the churchyard, and looking at him with 
slow, large, portentous eyes. It was portentous, her face. It seemed 
to mesmerize him. There was a Heavy power in her eyes which laid hold 
of his whole being, as if he had drunk some powerful drug. He had been 
feeling weak and done before. Now the life came back into him, he felt 
delivered from his own fretted, daily self.
   He finished his duties at the surgery as quickly as might be, 
hastily filling up the bottles of the waiting people with cheap drugs. 
Then, in perpetual haste, he set off again to visit several cases in 
another part of his round, before teatime. At all times he preferred 
to walk, if he could, but particularly when he was not well. He 
fancied the motion restored him.
   The afternoon was falling. It was grey, deadened, and wintry, with 
a slow, moist, heavy coldness sinking in and deadening all the 
faculties. But why should he think or notice? He hastily climbed the 
hill and turned across the dark-green fields, following the black 
cinder-tract. In the distance, across a shallow dip in the country, 
the small town was clustered like smouldering ash, a tower, aspire, a 
heap of low, raw, extinct houses. And on the nearest fringe of the 
town, sloping into the dip, was Old-meadow, the Pervins' house. He 
could see the stables and the outbuildings distinctly, as they lay 
towards him on the slope. Well, he would not go there many more times! 
Another resource would be lost to him, another place gone: the only 
company he cared for in the alien, ugly little town he was losing. 
Nothing but work, drudgery, constant hastening from dwelling to 
dwelling among the colliers and the iron-workers. It wore him out, but 
at the same time he had a craving for it. It was a stimulant to him to 
be in the homes of the working people, moving as it were through the 
innermost body of their life. His nerves were excited and gratified. 
He could come so near, into the very lives of the rough, inarticulate, 
powerfully emotional men and women. He grumbled, he said he hated the 
hellish hole. But as a matter of fact it excited him, the contact with 
the rough, strongly-feeling people was a stimulant applied direct to 
his nerves.
   Below Oldmeadow, in the green, shallow, soddened hollow of fields, 
lay a square, deep pond. Roving across the landscape, the doctor's 
quick eye detected a figure in black passing through the gate of the 
field, down towards the pond. He looked again. It would be Mabel 
Pervin. His mind suddenly became alive and attentive.
   Why was she going down there? He pulled up on the path on the slope 
above, and stood staring. He could just make sure of the small black 
figure moving in the hollow of the failing day. He seemed to see her 
in the midst of such obscurity, that he was like a clairvoyant, seeing 
rather with the mind's eye than with ordinary sight. Yet he could see 
her positively enough, whilst he kept his eye attentive. He felt, if 
he looked away from her, in the thick, ugly falling dusk, he would 
lose her altogether.
   He followed her minutely as she moved, direct and intent, like 
something transmitted rather than stirring in voluntary activity, 
straight down the field towards the pond. There she stood on the bank 
for a moment. She never raised her head. Then she waded slowly into 
the water.
   He stood motionless as the small black figure walked slowly and 
deliberately towards the centre of the pond, very slowly, gradually 
moving deeper into the motionless water, and still moving forward as 
the water got up to her breast. Then he could see her no more in the 
dusk of the dead afternoon.
   "There!" he exclaimed. "Would you believe it?"
   And he hastened straight down, running over the wet, soddened 
fields, pushing through the hedges, down into the depression of 
callous wintry obscurity. It took him several minutes to come to the 
pond. He stood on the bank, breathing heavily. He could see nothing. 
His eyes seemed to penetrate the dead water. Yes, perhaps that was the 
dark shadow of her black clothing beneath the surface of the water.
   He slowly ventured into the pond. The bottom was deep, soft clay, 
he sank in, and the water clasped dead cold round his legs. As he 
stirred he could smell the cold, rotten clay that fouled up into the 
water. It was objectionable in his lungs. Still, repelled and yet not 
heeding, he moved deeper into the pond. The cold water rose over his 
thighs, over his loins, upon his abdomen. The lower part of his body 
was all sunk in the hideous cold element. And the bottom was so deeply 
soft and uncertain, he was afraid of pitching with his mouth 
underneath. He could not swim, and was afraid.
   He crouched a little, spreading his hands under the water and 
moving them round, trying to feel for her. The dead cold pond
   swayed upon his chest. He moved again, a little deeper, and again, 
with his hands underneath, he felt all around under the water. And he 
touched her clothing. But it evaded his fingers. He made a desperate 
effort to grasp it.
   And so doing he lost his balance and went under, horribly, 
suffocating in the foul earthy water, struggling madly for a few 
moments. At last, after what seemed an eternity, he got his footing, 
rose again into the air and looked around. He gasped, and knew he was 
in the world. Then he looked at the water. She has risen near him. He 
grasped her clothing, and drawing her nearer, turned to take his way 
to land again.
   He went very slowly, carefully, absorbed in the slow progress. He 
rose higher, climbing out of the pond. The water was now only about 
his legs; he was thankful, full of relief to be out of the clutches of 
the pond. He lifted her and staggered on to the bank, out of the 
horror of wet, grey clay.
   He laid her down on the bank. She was quite unconscious and running 
with water. He made the water come from her mouth, he worked to 
restore her. He did not have to work very long before he could feel 
the breathing begin again in her; she was breathing naturally. He 
worked a little longer. He could feel her live beneath his hands; she 
was coming back. He wiped her face, wrapped her in his overcoat, 
looked round into the dim, dark-grey world, then lifted her and 
staggered down the bank and across the fields.
   It seemed an unthinkably long way, and his burden so heavy he felt 
he would never get to the house. But at last he was in the stable-
yard, and then in the house-yard. He opened the door and went into the 
house. In the kitchen he laid her down on the hearthrug, and called. 
The house was empty. But the fire was burning in the grate.
   Then again he kneeled to attend to her. She was breathing 
regularly, her eyes were wide open and as if conscious, but there 
seemed something missing in her look. She was conscious in herself, 
but unconscious of her surroundings.
   He ran upstairs, took blankets from a bed, and put them before the 
fire to warm. Then he removed her saturated, earthy-smelling clothing, 
rubbed her dry with a towel, and wrapped her naked in the blankets. 
Then he went into the dining-room, to look for spirits. There was a 
little whisky. He drank a gulp himself, and put some into her mouth.
   The effect was instantaneous. She looked full into his face, as if 
she had been seeing him for some time, and yet had only just become 
conscious of him.
   "Dr. Fergusson?" she said.
   "What?" he answered.
   He was .digesting himself of his coat, intending to find some dry 
clothing upstairs. He could not bear the smell of the dead, clayey 
water, and he was mortally afraid for his own health.
   "What did I do? " she asked.
   "Walked into the pond," he replied. He had begun to shudder like 
one sick, and could hardly attend to her. Her eyes remained full on 
him, he seemed to be going dark in his mind, looking back at her 
helplessly. The shuddering became quieter in him, his life came back 
in him, dark and unknowing, but strong again.
   "Was I out of my mind? " she asked, while her eyes were fixed on 
him all the time.
   "Maybe, for the moment," he replied. He felt quiet, because his 
strength had come back. The strange fretful strain had left him.
   "Am I out of my mind now? " she asked.
   "Are you? " he reflected a moment. "No," he answered truthfully, "I 
don't see that you are." He turned his face aside. He was afraid now, 
because he felt dazed, and felt dimly that her power was stronger than 
his, in this issue. And she continued to look at him fixedly all the 
time. "Can you tell me where I shall find some dry things to put on? " 
he asked.
   "Did you dive into the pond for me?" she asked.
   "No," he answered. "I walked in. But I went in overhead as well."
   There was silence for a moment. He hesitated. He very much wanted 
to go upstairs to get into dry clothing. But there was another desire 
in him. And she seemed to hold him. His will seemed to have gone to 
sleep, and left him, standing there slack before her. But he felt warm 
inside himself. He did not shudder ' at all, though his clothes were 
sodden on him.
   "Why did you? " she asked.
   "Because I didn't want you to do such a foolish thing," he said.
   "It wasn't foolish," she said, still gazing at him as she lay on 
the floor, with a sofa cushion under her head. "It was the right thing 
to do. I knew best, then."
   "I'll go and shift these wet things," he said. But still he had not 
the power to move out of her presence, until she sent him. It was as 
if she had the life of his body in her hands, and he could not 
extricate himself. Or perhaps he did not want to.
   Suddenly she sat up. Then she became aware of her own immediate 
condition. She felt the blankets about her, she knew her own limbs. 
For a moment it seemed as if her reason were
   going. She looked round, with wild eye, as if seeking something. He 
stood still with fear. She saw her clothing lying scattered.
   "Who undressed me?" she asked, her eyes resting full and inevitable 
on his face.
   "I did," he replied, "to bring you round."
   For some moments she sat and gazed at him awfully, her lips parted.
   "Do you love me then? " she asked.
   He only stood and stared at her, fascinated. His soul seemed to 
melt.
   She shuffled forward on her knees, and put her arms round him, 
round his legs, as he stood there, pressing her breasts against his 
knees and thighs, clutching him with strange, convulsive certainty, 
pressing his thighs against her, drawing him to her face, her throat, 
as she looked up at him with flaring, humble eyes, of transfiguration, 
triumphant in first possession.
   "You love me," she murmured, in strange transport, yearning and 
triumphant and confident. "You love me. I know you love me, I know."
   And she was passionately kissing his knees, through the wet 
clothing, passionately and indiscriminately kissing his knees, his 
legs, as if unaware of everything.
   He looked down at the tangled wet hair, the wild, bare, animal 
shoulders. He was amazed, bewildered, and afraid. He had never thought 
of loving her. He had never wanted to love her. When he rescued her 
and restored her, he was a doctor, and she was a patient. He had had 
no single personal thought of her. Nay, this introduction of the 
personal element was very distasteful to him, a violation of his 
professional honour. It was horrible to have her there embracing his 
knees. It was horrible. He revolted from it, violently. And yet - and 
yet - he had not the power to break away.
   She looked at him again, with the same supplication of powerful 
love, and that same transcendent, frightening light of triumph. In 
view of the delicate flame which seemed to come from her face like a 
light, he was powerless. And yet he had never intended to love her. He 
had never intended. And something stubborn in him could not give way.
   "You love me," she repeated, in a murmur of deep, rhapsodic 
assurance. "You love me."
   Her hands were drawing him, drawing him down to her. He was afraid, 
even a little horrified. For he had, really, no intention of loving 
her. Yet her hands were drawing him towards her. He put out his hand 
quickly to steady himself, and grasped her bare shoulder. A flame 
seemed to burn the hand that grasped her soft shoulder. He had no 
intention of loving her: his whole will was against his yielding. It 
was horrible. And yet wonderful was the touch of her shoulders, 
beautiful the shining of her face. Was she perhaps mad? He had a 
horror of yielding to her. Yet something in him ached also.
   He had been staring away at the door, away from her. But his hand 
remained on her shoulder. She had gone suddenly very still. He looked 
down at her. Her eyes were now wide with fear, with doubt, the light 
was dying from her face, a shadow of terrible greyness was returning. 
He could not bear the touch of her eyes question upon him, and the 
look of death behind the question.
   With an inward groan he gave way, and let his heart yield towards 
her. A sudden gentle smile came on his face. And her eyes, which never 
left his face, slowly, slowly filled with tears.
   He watched the strange water rise in her eyes, like some slow 
fountain coming up. And his heart seemed to burn and melt away in his 
breast.
   He could not bear to look at her any more. He dropped on his knees 
and caught her head with his arms and pressed her face against his 
throat. She was very still. His heart, which seemed to have broken, 
was burning with a kind of agony in his breast. And he felt her slow, 
hot tears wetting his throat. But he could not move.
   He felt the hot tears wet his neck and the hollows of his neck, and 
he remained motionless, suspended through one of man's eternities. 
Only now it had become indispensable to him to have her face pressed 
close to him; he could never let her go again. He could never let her 
head go away from the close clutch of his arm. He wanted to remain 
like that for ever, with his heart hurting him in a pain that was also 
life to him. Without knowing, he was looking down on her damp, soft 
brown hair.
   Then, as it were suddenly, he smelt the horrid stagnant smell of 
that water. And at the same moment she drew away from him and looked 
at him. Her eyes were wistful and unfathomable. He was afraid of them, 
and he fell to kissing her, not knowing what he was doing. He wanted 
her eyes not to have that terrible, wistful, unfathomable look.
   When she turned her face to him again, a faint delicate flush was 
glowing, and there was again dawning that terrible shining of joy in 
her eyes, which really terrified him, and yet which he now wanted to 
see, because he feared the look of doubt still more.
   "You love me? " she said, rather faltering.
   "Yes." The word cost him a painful effort. Not because it wasn't 
true. But because it was too newly true, the saying seemed to tear 
open again his newly-torn heart. And he hardly wanted it to be true, 
even now.
   She lifted her face to him, and he bent forward and kissed her on 
the mouth, gently, with the one kiss that is an eternal pledge. And as 
he kissed her his heart strained again in his breast. He never 
intended to love her. But now it was over. He had crossed over the 
gulf to her, and all that he had left behind had shrivelled and become 
void.
   After the kiss, her eyes again slowly filled with tears. She sat 
still, away from him, with her face drooped aside, and her hands 
folded in her lap. The tears fell very slowly. There was complete 
silence. He too sat there motionless and silent on the hearthrug. The 
strange pain of his heart that was broken seemed to consume him. That 
he should love her? That this was love! That he should be ripped open 
in this way! - Him, a doctor! - How they would all jeer if they knew! 
- It was agony to him to think they might know.
   In the curious naked pain of the thought he looked again to her. 
She was sitting there drooped into a muse. He saw a tear fall, and his 
heart flared hot. He saw for the first time that one of her shoulders 
was quite uncovered, one arm bare, he could see one of her small 
breasts; dimly, because it had become almost dark in the room.
   "Why are you crying? " he asked, in an altered voice.
   She looked up at him, and behind her tears the consciousness of her 
situation for the first time brought a dark look of shame to her eyes.
   "I'm not crying, really," she said, watching him half frightened.
   He reached his hand, and softly closed it on her bare arm.
   "I love you! I love you!" he said in a soft, low vibrating voice, 
unlike himself.
   She shrank, and dropped her head. The soft, penetrating grip of his 
hand on her arm distressed her. She looked up at him.
   "I want to go," she said. "I want to go and get you some dry 
things."
   "Why?" he said. "I'm all right."
   "But I want to go," she said. "And I want you to change your 
things."
   He released her arm, and she wrapped herself in the blanket, 
looking at him rather frightened. And still she did not rise.
   "Kiss me," she said wistfully.
   He kissed her, but briefly, half in anger.
   Then, after a second, she rose nervously, all mixed up in the 
blanket. He watched her in her confusion, as she tried to extricate 
herself and wrap herself up so that she could walk. He watched her 
relentlessly, as she knew. And as she went, the blanket trailing, and 
as he saw a glimpse of her feet and her white leg, he tried to 
remember her as she was when he had wrapped her in the blanket. But 
then he didn't want to remember, because she had been nothing to him 
then, and his nature revolted from remembering her as she was when she 
was nothing to him.
   A tumbling, muffled noise from within the dark house startled him. 
Then he heard her voice: - "There are clothes." He rose and went to 
the foot of the stairs, and gathered up the garments she had thrown 
down. Then he came back to the fire, to rub himself down and dress. He 
grinned at his own appearance when he had finished.
   The fire was sinking, so he put on coal. The house was now quite 
dark, save for the light of a street -lamp that shone in faintly
   from beyond the holly trees. He lit the gas with matches he found 
on the mantel-piece. Then he emptied the pockets of his own clothes, 
and threw all his wet things in a heap into the scullery. After which 
he gathered up her sodden clothes, gently, and put them in a separate 
heap on the copper-top in the scullery.
   It was six o'clock on the clock. His own watch had stopped. He 
ought to go back to the surgery. He waited, and still she did not come 
down. So he went to the foot of the stairs and called: "I shall have 
to go."
   Almost immediately he heard her coming down. She had on her best 
dress of black voile, and her hair was tidy, but still damp. She 
looked at him - and in spite of herself, smiled. "I don't like you in 
those clothes," she said. "Do I look a sight?" he answered. They were 
shy of one another. "I'll make you some tea," she said. "No, I must 
go."
   "Must you?" And she looked at him again with the wide, strained, 
doubtful eyes. And again, from the pain of his breast, he knew how he 
loved her. He went and bent to kiss her, gently, passionately, with 
his heart's painful kiss.
   "And my hair smells so horrible," she murmured in distraction. "And 
I'm so awful, I'm so awful! Oh, no, I'm too awful." And she broke into 
bitter, heart-broken sobbing. "You can't want to love me, I'm 
horrible."
   "Don't be silly, don't be silly," he said, trying to comfort her, 
kissing her, holding her in his arms. "I want you, I want to marry 
you, we're going to be married, quickly, quickly - tomorrow if I can."
   But she only sobbed terribly, and cried:
   "I feel awful. I feel awful. I feel I'm horrible to you."
   "No, I want you, I want you," was all he answered, blindly, with 
that terrible intonation which frightened her almost more than her 
horror lest he should not want her.