介绍:
When Gudrun heard that Mr Crich was dead, she felt rebuked. She had stayed away lest Gerald should think her too easy of winning. And now, he was in the midst of trouble, whilst she was cold.
The following day she went up as usual to Winifred, who was glad to see her, glad to get away into the studio. The girl had wept, and then, too frightened, had turned aside to avoid any more tragic eventuality. She and Gudrun resumed work as usual, in the isolation of the studio, and this seemed an immeasurable happiness, a pure world of freedom, after the aimlessness and misery of the house. Gudrun stayed on till evening. She and Winifred had dinner brought up to the studio, where they ate in freedom, away from all the people in the house.
After dinner Gerald came up. The great high studio was full of shadow and a fragrance of coffee. Gudrun and Winifred had a little table near the fire at the far end, with a white lamp whose light did not travel far. They were a tiny world to themselves, the two girls surrounded by lovely shadows, the beams and rafters shadowy over-head, the benches and implements shadowy down the studio.
“You are cosy enough here,” said Gerald, going up to them.
There was a low brick fireplace, full of fire, an old blue Turkish rug, the little oak table with the lamp and the white-and-blue cloth and the dessert, and Gudrun making coffee in an odd brass coffee-maker, and Winifred scalding a little milk in a tiny saucepan.
“Have you had coffee?” said Gudrun.
“I have, but I’ll have some more with you,” he replied.
“Then you must have it in a glass—there are only two cups,” said Winifred.
“It is the same to me,” he said, taking a chair and coming into the charmed circle of the girls. How happy they were, how cosy and glamorous it was with them, in a world of lofty shadows! The outside world, in which he had been transacting funeral business all the day was completely wiped out. In an instant he snuffed glamour and magic.
They had all their things very dainty, two odd and lovely little cups, scarlet and solid gilt, and a little black jug with scarlet discs, and the curious coffee-machine, whose spirit-flame flowed steadily, almost invisibly. There was the effect of rather sinister richness, in which Gerald at once escaped himself.
They all sat down, and Gudrun carefully poured out the coffee.
“Will you have milk?” she asked calmly, yet nervously poising the little black jug with its big red dots. She was always so completely controlled, yet so bitterly nervous.
“No, I won’t,” he replied.
So, with a curious humility, she placed him the little cup of coffee, and herself took the awkward tumbler. She seemed to want to serve him.
“Why don’t you give me the glass—it is so clumsy for you,” he said. He would much rather have had it, and seen her daintily served. But she was silent, pleased with the disparity, with her self-abasement.
“You are quite en ménage,” he said.
“Yes. We aren’t really at home to visitors,” said Winifred.
“You’re not? Then I’m an intruder?”
For once he felt his conventional dress was out of place, he was an outsider.
Gudrun was very quiet. She did not feel drawn to talk to him. At this stage, silence was best—or mere light words. It was best to leave serious things aside. So they talked gaily and lightly, till they heard the man below lead out the horse, and call it to “back-back!” into the dog-cart that was to take Gudrun home. So she put on her things, and shook hands with Gerald, without once meeting his eyes. And she was gone.
The funeral was detestable. Afterwards, at the tea-table, the daughters kept saying—“He was a good father to us—the best father in the world”—or else—“We shan’t easily find another man as good as father was.”
Gerald acquiesced in all this. It was the right conventional attitude, and, as far as the world went, he believed in the conventions. He took it as a matter of course. But Winifred hated everything, and hid in the studio, and cried her heart out, and wished Gudrun would come.
Luckily everybody was going away. The Criches never stayed long at home. By dinner-time, Gerald was left quite alone. Even Winifred was carried off to London, for a few days with her sister Laura.
But when Gerald was really left alone, he could not bear it. One day passed by, and another. And all the time he was like a man hung in chains over the edge of an abyss. Struggle as he might, he could not turn himself to the solid earth, he could not get footing. He was suspended on the edge of a void, writhing. Whatever he thought of, was the abyss—whether it were friends or strangers, or work or play, it all showed him only the same bottomless void, in which his heart swung perishing. There was no escape, there was nothing to grasp hold of. He must writhe on the edge of the chasm, suspended in chains of invisible physical life.
At first he was quiet, he kept still, expecting the extremity to pass away, expecting to find himself released into the world of the living, after this extremity of penance. But it did not pass, and a crisis gained upon him.
As the evening of the third day came on, his heart rang with fear. He could not bear another night. Another night was coming on, for another night he was to be suspended in chain of physical life, over the bottomless pit of nothingness. And he could not bear it. He could not bear it. He was frightened deeply, and coldly, frightened in his soul. He did not believe in his own strength any more. He could not fall into this infinite void, and rise again. If he fell, he would be gone for ever. He must withdraw, he must seek reinforcements. He did not believe in his own single self, any further than this.
After dinner, faced with the ultimate experience of his own nothingness, he turned aside. He pulled on his boots, put on his coat, and set out to walk in the night.
It was dark and misty. He went through the wood, stumbling and feeling his way to the Mill. Birkin was away. Good—he was half glad. He turned up the hill, and stumbled blindly over the wild slopes, having lost the path in the complete darkness. It was boring. Where was he going? No matter. He stumbled on till he came to a path again. Then he went on through another wood. His mind became dark, he went on automatically. Without thought or sensation, he stumbled unevenly on, out into the open again, fumbling for stiles, losing the path, and going along the hedges of the fields till he came to the outlet.
And at last he came to the high road. It had distracted him to struggle blindly through the maze of darkness. But now, he must take a direction. And he did not even know where he was. But he must take a direction now. Nothing would be resolved by merely walking, walking away. He had to take a direction.
He stood still on the road, that was high in the utterly dark night, and he did not know where he was. It was a strange sensation, his heart beating, and ringed round with the utterly unknown darkness. So he stood for some time.
Then he heard footsteps, and saw a small, swinging light. He immediately went towards this. It was a miner.
“Can you tell me,” he said, “where this road goes?”
“Road? Ay, it goes ter Whatmore.”
“Whatmore! Oh thank you, that’s right. I thought I was wrong. Good-night.”
“Good-night,” replied the broad voice of the miner.
Gerald guessed where he was. At least, when he came to Whatmore, he would know. He was glad to be on a high road. He walked forward as in a sleep of decision.
That was Whatmore Village—? Yes, the King’s Head—and there the hall gates. He descended the steep hill almost running. Winding through the hollow, he passed the Grammar School, and came to Willey Green Church. The churchyard! He halted.
Then in another moment he had clambered up the wall and was going among the graves. Even in this darkness he could see the heaped pallor of old white flowers at his feet. This then was the grave. He stooped down. The flowers were cold and clammy. There was a raw scent of chrysanthemums and tube-roses, deadened. He felt the clay beneath, and shrank, it was so horribly cold and sticky. He stood away in revulsion.
Here was one centre then, here in the complete darkness beside the unseen, raw grave. But there was nothing for him here. No, he had nothing to stay here for. He felt as if some of the clay were sticking cold and unclean, on his heart. No, enough of this.
Where then?—home? Never! It was no use going there. That was less than no use. It could not be done. There was somewhere else to go. Where?
A dangerous resolve formed in his heart, like a fixed idea. There was Gudrun—she would be safe in her home. But he could get at her—he would get at her. He would not go back tonight till he had come to her, if it cost him his life. He staked his all on this throw.
He set off walking straight across the fields towards Beldover. It was so dark, nobody could ever see him. His feet were wet and cold, heavy with clay. But he went on persistently, like a wind, straight forward, as if to his fate. There were great gaps in his consciousness. He was conscious that he was at Winthorpe hamlet, but quite unconscious how he had got there. And then, as in a dream, he was in the long street of Beldover, with its street-lamps.
There was a noise of voices, and of a door shutting loudly, and being barred, and of men talking in the night. The “Lord Nelson” had just closed, and the drinkers were going home. He had better ask one of these where she lived—for he did not know the side streets at all.
“Can you tell me where Somerset Drive is?” he asked of one of the uneven men.
“Where what?” replied the tipsy miner’s voice.
“Somerset Drive.”
“Somerset Drive!—I’ve heard o’ such a place, but I couldn’t for my life say where it is. Who might you be wanting?”
“Mr Brangwen—William Brangwen.”
“William Brangwen—?—?”
“Who teaches at the Grammar School, at Willey Green—his daughter teaches there too.”
“O-o-o-oh, Brangwen! Now I’ve got you. Of course, William Brangwen! Yes, yes, he’s got two lasses as teachers, aside hisself. Ay, that’s him—that’s him! Why certainly I know where he lives, back your life I do! Yi—what place do they ca’ it?”
“Somerset Drive,” repeated Gerald patiently. He knew his own colliers fairly well.
“Somerset Drive, for certain!” said the collier, swinging his arm as if catching something up. “Somerset Drive—yi! I couldn’t for my life lay hold o’ the lercality o’ the place. Yis, I know the place, to be sure I do—”
He turned unsteadily on his feet, and pointed up the dark, nigh-deserted road.
“You go up theer—an’ you ta’e th’ first—yi, th’ first turnin’ on your left—o’ that side—past Withamses tuffy shop—”
“I know,” said Gerald.
“Ay! You go down a bit, past wheer th’ water-man lives—and then Somerset Drive, as they ca’ it, branches off on ’t right hand side—an’ there’s nowt but three houses in it, no more than three, I believe,—an’ I’m a’most certain as theirs is th’ last—th’ last o’ th’ three—you see—”
“Thank you very much,” said Gerald. “Good-night.”
And he started off, leaving the tipsy man there standing rooted.
Gerald went past the dark shops and houses, most of them sleeping now, and twisted round to the little blind road that ended on a field of darkness. He slowed down, as he neared his goal, not knowing how he should proceed. What if the house were closed in darkness?
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