第 25 页

English, French and German. He had, when he was sixteen,

discovered a Roman Catholic bookshop where he could find such

things.

He turned the leaves in absorption, absorbed in looking, not

thinking. He was like a man whose eyes were in his chest, she

said of him later.

She came to look at the things with him. Half they fascinated

her. She was puzzled, interested, and antagonistic.

It was when she came to pictures of the Pieta that she burst

out.

"I do think they're loathsome," she cried.

"What?" he said, surprised, abstracted.

"Those bodies with slits in them, posing to be

worshipped."

"You see, it means the Sacraments, the Bread," he said

slowly.

"Does it," she cried. "Then it's worse. I don't want to see

your chest slit, nor to eat your dead body, even if you offer it

to me. Can't you see it's horrible?"

"It isn't me, it's Christ."

"What if it is, it's you! And it's horrible, you wallowing in

your own dead body, and thinking of eating it in the

Sacrament."

"You've to take it for what it means."

"It means your human body put up to be slit and killed and

then worshipped--what else?"

They lapsed into silence. His soul grew angry and aloof.

"And I think that lamb in Church," she said, "is the biggest

joke in the parish----"

She burst into a "Pouf" of ridiculing laughter.

"It might be, to those that see nothing in it," he said. "You

know it's the symbol of Christ, of His innocence and

sacrifice."

"Whatever it means, it's a lamb," she said. "And I

like lambs too much to treat them as if they had to mean

something. As for the Christmas-tree

flag--no----"

And again she poufed with mockery.

"It's because you don't know anything," he said violently,

harshly. "Laugh at what you know, not at what you don't

know."

"What don't I know?"

"What things mean."

"And what does it mean?"

He was reluctant to answer her. He found it difficult.

"What does it mean?" she insisted.

"It means the triumph of the Resurrection."

She hesitated, baffled, a fear came upon her. What were these

things? Something dark and powerful seemed to extend before her.

Was it wonderful after all?

But no--she refused it.

"Whatever it may pretend to mean, what it is is a silly

absurd toy-lamb with a Christmas-tree flag ledged on its

paw--and if it wants to mean anything else, it must look

different from that."

He was in a state of violent irritation against her. Partly

he was ashamed of his love for these things; he hid his passion

for them. He was ashamed of the ecstasy into which he could

throw himself with these symbols. And for a few moments he hated

the lamb and the mystic pictures of the Eucharist, with a

violent, ashy hatred. His fire was put out, she had thrown cold

water on it. The whole thing was distasteful to him, his mouth

was full of ashes. He went out cold with corpse-like anger,

leaving her alone. He hated her. He walked through the white

snow, under a sky of lead.

And she wept again, in bitter recurrence of the previous

gloom. But her heart was easy--oh, much more easy.

She was quite willing to make it up with him when he came

home again. He was black and surly, but abated. She had broken a

little of something in him. And at length he was glad to forfeit

from his soul all his symbols, to have her making love to him.

He loved it when she put her head on his knee, and he had not

asked her to or wanted her to, he loved her when she put her

arms round him and made bold love to him, and he did not make

love to her. He felt a strong blood in his limbs again.

And she loved the intent, far look of his eyes when they

rested on her: intent, yet far, not near, not with her. And she

wanted to bring them near. She wanted his eyes to come to hers,

to know her. And they would not. They remained intent, and far,

and proud, like a hawk's naive and inhuman as a hawk's. So she

loved him and caressed him and roused him like a hawk, till he

was keen and instant, but without tenderness. He came to her

fierce and hard, like a hawk striking and taking her. He was no

mystic any more, she was his aim and object, his prey. And she

was carried off, and he was satisfied, or satiated at last.

Then immediately she began to retaliate on him. She too was a

hawk. If she imitated the pathetic plover running plaintive to

him, that was part of the game. When he, satisfied, moved with a

proud, insolent slouch of the body and a half-contemptuous drop

of the head, unaware of her, ignoring her very existence, after

taking his fill of her and getting his satisfaction of her, her

soul roused, its pinions became like steel, and she struck at

him. When he sat on his perch glancing sharply round with

solitary pride, pride eminent and fierce, she dashed at him and

threw him from his station savagely, she goaded him from his

keen dignity of a male, she harassed him from his unperturbed

pride, till he was mad with rage, his light brown eyes burned

with fury, they saw her now, like flames of anger they flared at

her and recognized her as the enemy.

Very good, she was the enemy, very good. As he prowled round

her, she watched him. As he struck at her, she struck back.

He was angry because she had carelessly pushed away his tools

so that they got rusty.

"Don't leave them littering in my way, then," she said.

"I shall leave them where I like," he cried.

"Then I shall throw them where I like."

They glowered at each other, he with rage in his hands, she

with her soul fierce with victory. They were very well matched.

They would fight it out.

She turned to her sewing. Immediately the tea-things were

cleared away, she fetched out the stuff, and his soul rose in

rage. He hated beyond measure to hear the shriek of calico as

she tore the web sharply, as if with pleasure. And the run of

the sewing-machine gathered a frenzy in him at last.

"Aren't you going to stop that row?" he shouted. "Can't you

do it in the daytime?"

She looked up sharply, hostile from her work.

"No, I can't do it in the daytime. I have other things to do.

Besides, I like sewing, and you're not going to stop me doing

it."

Whereupon she turned back to her arranging, fixing,

stitching, his nerves jumped with anger as the sewing-machine

started and stuttered and buzzed.

But she was enjoying herself, she was triumphant and happy as

the darting needle danced ecstatically down a hem, drawing the

stuff along under its vivid stabbing, irresistibly. She made the

machine hum. She stopped it imperiously, her fingers were deft

and swift and mistress.

If he sat behind her stiff with impotent rage it only made a

trembling vividness come into her energy. On she worked. At last

he went to bed in a rage, and lay stiff, away from her. And she

turned her back on him. And in the morning they did not speak,

except in mere cold civilities.

And when he came home at night, his heart relenting and

growing hot for love of her, when he was just ready to feel he

had been wrong, and when he was expecting her to feel the same,

there she sat at the sewing-machine, the whole house was covered

with clipped calico, the kettle was not even on the fire.

She started up, affecting concern.

"Is it so late?" she cried.

But his face had gone stiff with rage. He walked through to

the parlour, then he walked back and out of the house again. Her

heart sank. Very swiftly she began to make his tea.

He went black-hearted down the road to Ilkeston. When he was

in this state he never thought. A bolt shot across the doors of

his mind and shut him in, a prisoner. He went back to Ilkeston,

and drank a glass of beer. What was he going to do? He did not

want to see anybody.

He would go to Nottingham, to his own town. He went to the

station and took a train. When he got to Nottingham, still he

had nowhere to go. However, it was more agreeable to walk

familiar streets. He paced them with a mad restlessness, as if

he were running amok. Then he turned to a book-shop and found a

book on Bamberg Cathedral. Here was a discovery! here was

something for him! He went into a quiet restaurant to look at

his treasure. He lit up with thrills of bliss as he turned from

picture to picture. He had found something at last, in these

carvings. His soul had great satisfaction. Had he not come out

to seek, and had he not found! He was in a passion of

fulfilment. These were the finest carvings, statues, he had ever

seen. The book lay in his hands like a doorway. The world around

was only an enclosure, a room. But he was going away. He

lingered over the lovely statues of women. A marvellous,

finely-wrought universe crystallized out around him as he looked

again, at the crowns, the twining hair, the woman-faces. He

liked all the better the unintelligible text of the German. He

preferred things he could not understand with the mind. He loved

the undiscovered and the undiscoverable. He pored over the

pictures intensely. And these were wooden statues,

"Holz"--he believed that meant wood. Wooden statues so

shapen to his soul! He was a million times gladdened. How

undiscovered the world was, how it revealed itself to his soul!

What a fine, exciting thing his life was, at his hand! Did not

Bamberg Cathedral make the world his own? He celebrated his

triumphant strength and life and verity, and embraced the vast

riches he was inheriting.

But it was about time to go home. He had better catch a

train. All the time there was a steady bruise at the bottom of

his soul, but so steady as to be forgettable. He caught a train

for Ilkeston.

It was ten o'clock as he was mounting the hill to Cossethay,

carrying his limp book on Bamberg Cathedral. He had not yet

thought of Anna, not definitely. The dark finger pressing a

bruise controlled him thoughtlessly.

Anna had started guiltily when he left the house. She had

hastened preparing the tea, hoping he would come back. She had

made some toast, and got all ready. Then he didn't come. She

cried with vexation and disappointment. Why had he gone? Why

couldn't he come back now? Why was it such a battle between

them? She loved him--she did love him--why couldn't he

be kinder to her, nicer to her?

She waited in distress--then her mood grew harder. He

passed out of her thoughts. She had considered indignantly, what

right he had to interfere with her sewing? She had indignantly

refuted his right to interfere with her at all. She was not to

be interfered with. Was she not herself, and he the

outsider.

Yet a quiver of fear went through her. If he should leave

her? She sat conjuring fears and sufferings, till she wept with

very self-pity. She did not know what she would do if he left

her, or if he turned against her. The thought of it chilled her,

made her desolate and hard. And against him, the stranger, the

outsider, the being who wanted to arrogate authority, she

remained steadily fortified. Was she not herself? How could one

who was not of her own kind presume with authority? She knew she

was immutable, unchangeable, she was not afraid for her own

being. She was only afraid of all that was not herself. It

pressed round her, it came to her and took part in her, in form

of her man, this vast, resounding, alien world which was not

herself. And he had so many weapons, he might strike from so

many sides.

When he came in at the door, his heart was blazed with pity

and tenderness, she looked so lost and forlorn and young. She

glanced up, afraid. And she was surprised to see him,

shining-faced, clear and beautiful in his movements, as if he

were clarified. And a startled pang of fear, and shame of

herself went through her.

They waited for each other to speak.

"Do you want to eat anything?" she said.

"I'll get it myself," he answered, not wanting her to serve

him. But she brought out food. And it pleased him she did it for

him. He was again a bright lord.

"I went to Nottingham," he said mildly.

"To your mother?" she asked, in a flash of contempt.

"No--I didn't go home."

"Who did you go to see?"

"I went to see nobody."

"Then why did you go to Nottingham?"

"I went because I wanted to go."

He was getting angry that she again rebuffed him when he was

so clear and shining.

"And who did you see?"

"I saw nobody."

"Nobody?"

"No--who should I see?"

"You saw nobody you knew?"

"No, I didn't," he replied irritably.

She believed him, and her mood became cold.

"I bought a book," he said, handing her the propitiatory

volume.

She idly looked at the pictures. Beautiful, the pure women,

with their clear-dropping gowns. Her heart became colder. What

did they mean to him?

He sat and waited for her. She bent over the book.

"Aren't they nice?" he said, his voice roused and glad. Her

blood flushed, but she did not lift her head.

"Yes," she said. In spite of herself, she was compelled by

him. He was strange, attractive, exerting some power over

her.

He came over to her, and touched her delicately. Her heart

beat with wild passion, wild raging passion. But she resisted as

yet. It was always the unknown, always the unknown, and she

clung fiercely to her known self. But the rising flood carried

her away.

They loved each other to transport again, passionately and

fully.

"Isn't it more wonderful than ever?" she asked him, radiant

like a newly opened flower, with tears like dew.

He held her closer. He was strange and abstracted.