The Greatest Works of D. H. Lawrence. D. H. Lawrence

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      Mrs. Morel's emotion turned into sudden hate of the drunkard who had come in thus upon her.

      “At any rate, it is sober,” she said.

      “H'm—h'm! h'm—h'm!” he sneered. He went into the passage, hung up his hat and coat. Then they heard him go down three steps to the pantry. He returned with a piece of pork-pie in his fist. It was what Mrs. Morel had bought for her son.

      “Nor was that bought for you. If you can give me no more than twenty-five shillings, I'm sure I'm not going to buy you pork-pie to stuff, after you've swilled a bellyful of beer.”

      “Wha-at—wha-at!” snarled Morel, toppling in his balance. “Wha-at—not for me?” He looked at the piece of meat and crust, and suddenly, in a vicious spurt of temper, flung it into the fire.

      Paul started to his feet.

      “Waste your own stuff!” he cried.

      “What—what!” suddenly shouted Morel, jumping up and clenching his fist. “I'll show yer, yer young jockey!”

      “All right!” said Paul viciously, putting his head on one side. “Show me!”

      He would at that moment dearly have loved to have a smack at something. Morel was half crouching, fists up, ready to spring. The young man stood, smiling with his lips.

      “Ussha!” hissed the father, swiping round with a great stroke just past his son's face. He dared not, even though so close, really touch the young man, but swerved an inch away.

      “Right!” said Paul, his eyes upon the side of his father's mouth, where in another instant his fist would have hit. He ached for that stroke. But he heard a faint moan from behind. His mother was deadly pale and dark at the mouth. Morel was dancing up to deliver another blow.

      “Father!” said Paul, so that the word rang.

      Morel started, and stood at attention.

      “Mother!” moaned the boy. “Mother!”

      She began to struggle with herself. Her open eyes watched him, although she could not move. Gradually she was coming to herself. He laid her down on the sofa, and ran upstairs for a little whisky, which at last she could sip. The tears were hopping down his face. As he kneeled in front of her he did not cry, but the tears ran down his face quickly. Morel, on the opposite side of the room, sat with his elbows on his knees glaring across.

      “What's a-matter with 'er?” he asked.

      “Faint!” replied Paul.

      “H'm!”

      The elderly man began to unlace his boots. He stumbled off to bed. His last fight was fought in that home.

      Paul kneeled there, stroking his mother's hand.

      “Don't be poorly, mother—don't be poorly!” he said time after time.

      “It's nothing, my boy,” she murmured.

      At last he rose, fetched in a large piece of coal, and raked the fire. Then he cleared the room, put everything straight, laid the things for breakfast, and brought his mother's candle.

      “Can you go to bed, mother?”

      “Yes, I'll come.”

      “Sleep with Annie, mother, not with him.”

      “No. I'll sleep in my own bed.”

      “Don't sleep with him, mother.”

      “I'll sleep in my own bed.”

      She rose, and he turned out the gas, then followed her closely upstairs, carrying her candle. On the landing he kissed her close.

      “Good-night, mother.”

      “Good-night!” she said.

      He pressed his face upon the pillow in a fury of misery. And yet, somewhere in his soul, he was at peace because he still loved his mother best. It was the bitter peace of resignation.

      The efforts of his father to conciliate him next day were a great humiliation to him.

      Everybody tried to forget the scene.

      Chapter IX

       Defeat of Miriam

       Table of Contents

      Paul was dissatisfied with himself and with everything. The deepest of his love belonged to his mother. When he felt he had hurt her, or wounded his love for her, he could not bear it. Now it was spring, and there was battle between him and Miriam. This year he had a good deal against her. She was vaguely aware of it. The old feeling that she was to be a sacrifice to this love, which she had had when she prayed, was mingled in all her emotions. She did not at the bottom believe she ever would have him. She did not believe in herself primarily: doubted whether she could ever be what he would demand of her. Certainly she never saw herself living happily through a lifetime with him. She saw tragedy, sorrow, and sacrifice ahead. And in sacrifice she was proud, in renunciation she was strong, for she did not trust herself to support everyday life. She was prepared for the big things and the deep things, like tragedy. It was the sufficiency of the small day-life she could not trust.

      The Easter holidays began happily. Paul was his own frank self. Yet she felt it would go wrong. On the Sunday afternoon she stood at her bedroom window, looking across at the oak-trees of the wood, in whose branches a twilight was tangled, below the bright sky of the afternoon. Grey-green rosettes of honeysuckle leaves hung before the window, some already, she fancied, showing bud. It was spring, which she loved and dreaded.

      Hearing the clack of the gate she stood in suspense. It was a bright grey day. Paul came into the yard with his bicycle, which glittered as he walked. Usually he rang his bell and laughed towards the house. To-day he walked with shut lips and cold, cruel bearing, that had something of a slouch and a sneer in it. She knew him well by now, and could tell from that keen-looking, aloof young body of his what was happening inside him. There was a cold correctness in the way he put his bicycle in its place, that made her heart sink.

      She came downstairs nervously. She was wearing a new net blouse that she thought became her. It had a high collar with a tiny ruff, reminding her of Mary, Queen of Scots, and making her, she thought, look wonderfully a woman, and dignified. At twenty she was full-breasted and luxuriously formed. Her face was still like a soft rich mask, unchangeable. But her eyes, once lifted, were wonderful. She was afraid of him. He would notice her new blouse.

      He, being in a hard, ironical mood, was entertaining the family to a description of a service given in the Primitive Methodist Chapel, conducted by one of the well-known preachers of the sect. He sat at the head of the table, his mobile face, with the eyes that could be so beautiful, shining with tenderness or dancing with laughter, now taking on one expression and then another, in imitation of various people he was mocking. His mockery always hurt her; it was too near the reality. He was too clever and cruel. She felt that when his eyes were like this, hard with mocking hate, he would spare neither himself nor anybody else. But Mrs. Leivers СКАЧАТЬ