Chapter 34

VIIITHRIVING“Were you married in a church, Ursula?”“We were not, brother: none but gorgios, cripples, and lubbenys are ever married in a church: we took each other’s words.”MEANWHILEhis relations with Cathleen remained in abeyance. What she had accepted in the excitement of events, she needed to reconcile with her calmer thoughts. That was not so easy. She was brought to doubt of herself. She had been more hurt than she had realized, and she feared she was too weak for the suffering that filled her. For many weeks it was a pain to her to see René, for she could not but remember the destruction and misery he had brought into other lives. She had no support, for her rupture with her family had made an end of the ideas in which she had been instructed as a child, and she had no experience to draw upon, and Lotta’s theories, when it came to cold practice, vanished into the air. She could not avoid jealousy of the past; and, with that in her, she could not bring herself to take the plunge into a life so different from any she had ever imagined. René was so patient, and hadflung himself with such ardor into his new work, that she had begun to tell herself that he had no need of her, that she too was in a sense his victim, since his meeting with her had enabled him to break with the past only to thrust the weight of it upon her. The superficiality of her conceptions was betrayed and made plain to her, broken up by one fixed idea, the thought of Ann’s child. How could he have let that go? How could he thrust that back into the past? How could his feeling for herself have broken clear of that? And Ann? How could she set thousands of miles between herself and him? If she had stayed, they could have wrestled with the reality. They could have made provision in their lives for the inimical new life. But Ann, in her desperation, had left them to deal only with an idea, a shadow, a memory. René apparently could ignore it. He was full of enthusiasm and happiness. He seemed to consider Ann’s flight as a declaration of independence and to acquiesce in it. Had he felt nothing at all? Could a man come in contact with that mystery and remain unmoved? Must not such defiance of Nature be fraught with appalling consequences, to end in the worst state of all, indifference?She hugged her difficulties to herself, and dared speak of them to no one, for she was possessed by the shyness bred by a fixed idea. At last Lotta caught her out in deliberate avoidance of René and asked what had come to her. Little by little she dragged her trouble out of her, and tried to reassure her and bring her to reason.“You should ask him about it,” she said. “He must have thought it out He did not forget her. You must remember that. It was not a case of his feeling for you wiping her out of his mind. My own view is that Nature is entirely indifferent, and I don’t believe parents and children do naturally and inevitably have any feeling for each other. Indeed, Nature is so indifferent that our thoughts about it are rather impertinent. It is obvious that children do not always bind men and women, and I imagine they must often have the contrary effect; always, I should say, when they have for each other only the kind of selfish affection which resents any intrusion. Surely that is why so many women turn from their husbands to their children——”The word “intrusion” brought Cathleen to the crux of her difficulty. She saw, with some exaggeration, that this was her condition, and the quality of her affection, that she had been hungering for possession of her lover with no intrusion from the past.“O Lotta,” she said, “we are fools to set our faces against what cannot be altered. I thought I had broken away from narrow conventions, but I had only rid myself of the names of things, not of the things themselves, the silly pretense that people wake for a moment out of a sleep in which nothing can happen, love and go to sleep again. We are stupid, trying to keep all our loves separate. We can’t do anything but stumble from one love to another, can we?”“It is what all of us do, and Nature has to take her chance. It is degrading to have one’s folly andweakness, even one’s mistakes, used by Nature, but that is the way of the world, and I think a real love can always get the better of it.”“I have tried so hard.”“You should see it from his point of view. Suppose it was you who had been trapped by Nature’s indifference. You would feel hardly used if he let jealousy stand between you and him.”“But René couldn’t.”“Perhaps. Why shouldyou?It really does hurt me to see you two wasting time and youth, two absolutely free people in a world that takes its greatest pride in its waste of opportunity. You are behaving abominably. Really, if you let him be much longer he will settle down with Mr. Casey, and discover that he can do at any rate comfortably without you, and keep you as an ideal. That happened to me when I was a girl. I let things slip by until I woke up one fine day to find that I was nothing but an ideal and had no hope of ever becoming anything else, even though I had married him. So I never did. Love changes, like everything else. It grows in us and dies. Very short is the time when it can be taken and built into our lives. If that time be let slip away then love dies down. If that happens, then life can never be anything more than amusing.”“If it should be too late?” said Cathleen, alarmed.“It won’t be,” replied Lotta; “he has been to me and I said I would send you down to him.”At the week-end Cathleen went to Rickham. She found René in overalls taking down the back axle of acar. His face and hands and hair were smeared with grease.“Hullo!” he said.And Cathleen answered:“I hope I’m not in the way.”“All right. Only stand clear of the machine. There never was such ubiquitous stuff as motor grease. I shan’t be long. It’s a broken crown-wheel, I think— Oh! here’s Casey. Casey, take Miss Bentley round the garden. Have tea in the parlor, and I’ll join you when I’ve cleaned up.”It was a couple of hours before René joined them. During that time Cathleen had to listen to his praises, and to hear how the business, after a slow beginning, had begun to pick up, until now they had almost as much work as they could do with their present staff.“I’m sorry,” said René. “It’s a new customer, and he wants the car for to-morrow morning, and I couldn’t take any of the men off their jobs. It is good to see you. Have you seen the house?”No. Casey had only shown her the garden.After tea René took her over the house.“It wants you,” he said.“I knew that. I sent in my resignation yesterday.”“When will you come?”“In a month’s time.”“Forever and ever?”“It feels like that now.”“Yes. There doesn’t seem to have been anything but you and I. You’re a little slip of a woman to fillthe whole world.” And he lifted her clean off her feet. She lay back in his arms and her eyes closed, and he could feel her whole body surrender to his strength, her whole spirit come out to meet his in love.

“Were you married in a church, Ursula?”“We were not, brother: none but gorgios, cripples, and lubbenys are ever married in a church: we took each other’s words.”

“Were you married in a church, Ursula?”

“We were not, brother: none but gorgios, cripples, and lubbenys are ever married in a church: we took each other’s words.”

MEANWHILEhis relations with Cathleen remained in abeyance. What she had accepted in the excitement of events, she needed to reconcile with her calmer thoughts. That was not so easy. She was brought to doubt of herself. She had been more hurt than she had realized, and she feared she was too weak for the suffering that filled her. For many weeks it was a pain to her to see René, for she could not but remember the destruction and misery he had brought into other lives. She had no support, for her rupture with her family had made an end of the ideas in which she had been instructed as a child, and she had no experience to draw upon, and Lotta’s theories, when it came to cold practice, vanished into the air. She could not avoid jealousy of the past; and, with that in her, she could not bring herself to take the plunge into a life so different from any she had ever imagined. René was so patient, and hadflung himself with such ardor into his new work, that she had begun to tell herself that he had no need of her, that she too was in a sense his victim, since his meeting with her had enabled him to break with the past only to thrust the weight of it upon her. The superficiality of her conceptions was betrayed and made plain to her, broken up by one fixed idea, the thought of Ann’s child. How could he have let that go? How could he thrust that back into the past? How could his feeling for herself have broken clear of that? And Ann? How could she set thousands of miles between herself and him? If she had stayed, they could have wrestled with the reality. They could have made provision in their lives for the inimical new life. But Ann, in her desperation, had left them to deal only with an idea, a shadow, a memory. René apparently could ignore it. He was full of enthusiasm and happiness. He seemed to consider Ann’s flight as a declaration of independence and to acquiesce in it. Had he felt nothing at all? Could a man come in contact with that mystery and remain unmoved? Must not such defiance of Nature be fraught with appalling consequences, to end in the worst state of all, indifference?

She hugged her difficulties to herself, and dared speak of them to no one, for she was possessed by the shyness bred by a fixed idea. At last Lotta caught her out in deliberate avoidance of René and asked what had come to her. Little by little she dragged her trouble out of her, and tried to reassure her and bring her to reason.

“You should ask him about it,” she said. “He must have thought it out He did not forget her. You must remember that. It was not a case of his feeling for you wiping her out of his mind. My own view is that Nature is entirely indifferent, and I don’t believe parents and children do naturally and inevitably have any feeling for each other. Indeed, Nature is so indifferent that our thoughts about it are rather impertinent. It is obvious that children do not always bind men and women, and I imagine they must often have the contrary effect; always, I should say, when they have for each other only the kind of selfish affection which resents any intrusion. Surely that is why so many women turn from their husbands to their children——”

The word “intrusion” brought Cathleen to the crux of her difficulty. She saw, with some exaggeration, that this was her condition, and the quality of her affection, that she had been hungering for possession of her lover with no intrusion from the past.

“O Lotta,” she said, “we are fools to set our faces against what cannot be altered. I thought I had broken away from narrow conventions, but I had only rid myself of the names of things, not of the things themselves, the silly pretense that people wake for a moment out of a sleep in which nothing can happen, love and go to sleep again. We are stupid, trying to keep all our loves separate. We can’t do anything but stumble from one love to another, can we?”

“It is what all of us do, and Nature has to take her chance. It is degrading to have one’s folly andweakness, even one’s mistakes, used by Nature, but that is the way of the world, and I think a real love can always get the better of it.”

“I have tried so hard.”

“You should see it from his point of view. Suppose it was you who had been trapped by Nature’s indifference. You would feel hardly used if he let jealousy stand between you and him.”

“But René couldn’t.”

“Perhaps. Why shouldyou?It really does hurt me to see you two wasting time and youth, two absolutely free people in a world that takes its greatest pride in its waste of opportunity. You are behaving abominably. Really, if you let him be much longer he will settle down with Mr. Casey, and discover that he can do at any rate comfortably without you, and keep you as an ideal. That happened to me when I was a girl. I let things slip by until I woke up one fine day to find that I was nothing but an ideal and had no hope of ever becoming anything else, even though I had married him. So I never did. Love changes, like everything else. It grows in us and dies. Very short is the time when it can be taken and built into our lives. If that time be let slip away then love dies down. If that happens, then life can never be anything more than amusing.”

“If it should be too late?” said Cathleen, alarmed.

“It won’t be,” replied Lotta; “he has been to me and I said I would send you down to him.”

At the week-end Cathleen went to Rickham. She found René in overalls taking down the back axle of acar. His face and hands and hair were smeared with grease.

“Hullo!” he said.

And Cathleen answered:

“I hope I’m not in the way.”

“All right. Only stand clear of the machine. There never was such ubiquitous stuff as motor grease. I shan’t be long. It’s a broken crown-wheel, I think— Oh! here’s Casey. Casey, take Miss Bentley round the garden. Have tea in the parlor, and I’ll join you when I’ve cleaned up.”

It was a couple of hours before René joined them. During that time Cathleen had to listen to his praises, and to hear how the business, after a slow beginning, had begun to pick up, until now they had almost as much work as they could do with their present staff.

“I’m sorry,” said René. “It’s a new customer, and he wants the car for to-morrow morning, and I couldn’t take any of the men off their jobs. It is good to see you. Have you seen the house?”

No. Casey had only shown her the garden.

After tea René took her over the house.

“It wants you,” he said.

“I knew that. I sent in my resignation yesterday.”

“When will you come?”

“In a month’s time.”

“Forever and ever?”

“It feels like that now.”

“Yes. There doesn’t seem to have been anything but you and I. You’re a little slip of a woman to fillthe whole world.” And he lifted her clean off her feet. She lay back in his arms and her eyes closed, and he could feel her whole body surrender to his strength, her whole spirit come out to meet his in love.

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