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SONS AND LOVERS
“I wish I could understand you, “ she said.
“There’s simply nothing to understand, “ he laughed. She
bowed her head, brooding.
He did not see Dawes for several days; then one morning
as he ran upstairs from the Spiral room he almost collided
with the burly metal – worker.
“What the – !” cried the smith. “Sorry! “ said Paul, and
passed on. “SORRY! “ sneered Dawes.
Paul whistled lightly, “Put Me among the Girls”.
‘Til stop your whistle, my jockey! “ he said. The other took no
notice.
“You’re gain’ to answer for that job of the other night.”
Paul went to his desk in his corner, and turned over the
leaves of the ledger.
“Go and tell Fanny I want order 097, quick! “he said to his
boy. Dawes stood in the doorway, tall and threatening, looking at the top of the young man’s head.
“Six and five’s eleven and seven’s one – and – six,” Paul
added aloud. “An’ you hear, do you!” said Dawes.
“FIVE AND NINEPENCE! “ He wrote a figure. “What’s
that? “ he said.
“I’m going to show you what it is,” said the smith. The
other went on adding the figures aloud.
“Yer crawlin’ little – , yer daresn’t face me proper!”
Paul quickly snatched the heavy ruler. Dawes started.
The young man ruled some lines in his ledger. The elder man
was infuriated.
“But wait till I light on you, no matter where it is, I’ll settle
your hash for a bit, yer little swine! “
“All right, “ said Paul.
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DAVID HERBERT LAWRENCE
At that the smith started heavily from the doorway.
Just then a whistle piped shrilly. Paul went to the speaking – tube.
“Yes! “ he said, and he listened. “Er – yes! “ He listened,
then he laughed. “I’ll come down directly. I’ve got a visitor just
now.”
Dawes knew from his tone that he had been speaking
to Clara. He stepped forward.
“Yer little devil! “ he said. ‘Tll visitor you, inside of two
minutes! Think I’m gain’ to have YOU whipperty – snappin’
round?”
The other clerks in the warehouse looked up. Paul’s
office – boy appeared, holding some white article.
“Fanny says you could have had it last night if you’d let her
know, “ he said.
“All right, “ answered Paul, looking at the stocking. “Get
it off. “ Dawes stood frustrated, helpless with rage. Morel turned
round.
“Excuse me a minute, “ he said to Dawes, and he would
have run downstairs.
“By God, I’ll stop your gallop! “ shouted the smith, seizing him by the arm. He turned quickly.
“Hey! Hey! “ cried the office – boy, alarmed.
Thomas Jordan started out of his little glass office, and
came running down the room.
“What’s a – matter, what’s a – matter? “ he said, in his old
man’s sharp voice.
‘’I’m just gam ter settle this little – , that’s all, “ said
Dawes desperately.
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SONS AND LOVERS
“What do you mean?” snapped Thomas Jordan. “What I say,
“ said Dawes, but he hung fire.
Morel was leaning against the counter, ashamed, half –
grinning. “What’s it all about? “ snapped Thomas Jordan.
“Couldn’t say, “ said Paul, shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders.
“Couldn’t yer, couldn’t yer! “ cried Dawes, thrusting
forward his handsome, furious face, and squaring his fist.
“Have you finished? “ cried the old man, strutting. “Get
off about your business, and don’t come here tipsy in the morning.”
Dawes turned his big frame slowly upon him.
“Tipsy!” he said. “Who’s tipsy? I’m no more tipsy than YOU
are!” “We’ve heard that song before, “ snapped the old man.
“Now you get off, and don’t be long about it. Comin’
HERE with your rowdying.”
The smith looked down contemptuously on his employer. His hands, large, and grimy, and yet well shaped for his
labour, worked restlessly. Paul remembered they were the
hands of Clara’s husband, and a flash of hate went through
him.
“Get out before you’re turned out!” snapped Thomas Jordan. “Why, who’ll turn me out?” said Dawes, beginning to
sneer.
Mr. Jordan started, marched up to the smith, waving him
off, thrusting his stout little figure at the man, saying:
“Get off my premises – get off!”
He seized and twitched Dawes’s arm.
“Come off! “ said the smith, and with a jerk of the elbow
he sent the little manufacturer staggering backwards.
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DAVID HERBERT LAWRENCE
Before anyone could help him, Thomas Jordan had collided with the flimsy spring – door. It had given way, and let
him crash down the half – dozen steps into Fanny’s room.
There was a second of amazement; then men and girls were
running. Dawes stood a moment looking bitterly on the scene,
then he took his departure.
Thomas Jordan was shaken and braised, not otherwise
hurt. He was, however, beside himself with rage. He dismissed Dawes from his employment, and summoned him
for assault.
At the trial Paul Morel had to give evidence. Asked how
the trouble began, he said:
“Dawes took occasion to insult Mrs. Dawes and me because I accompanied her to the theatre one evening; then I
threw some beer at him, and he wanted his revenge. “
“Cherchez Ia femme!” smiled the magistrate.
The case was dismissed after the magistrate had told
Dawes he thought him a skunk.
“You gave the case away,” snapped Mr. Jordan to Paul.
“I don’t think I did, “ replied the latter. “Besides, you didn’t
really want a conviction, did you? “
“What do you think I took the case up for? “
“Well, “ said Paul, ‘Tm sorry if I said the wrong thing. “
Clara was also very angry.
“Why need MY name have been dragged in?” she said.
“Better speak it openly than leave it to be whispered. “ “There
was no need for anything at all, “ she declared. “We are none
the poorer,” he said indifferently.
“YOU may not be, “ she said. “And you?” he asked.
“I need never have been mentioned. “
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SONS AND LOVERS
“I’m sorry,” he said; but he did not sound sorry.
He told himself easily: “She will come round. “ And she did.
He told his mother about the fall of Mr. Jordan and
the trial of Dawes. Mrs. Morel watched him closely.
“And what do you think of it all? “ she asked him. “I think
he’s a fool, “ he said.
But he was very uncomfortable, nevertheless.
“Have you ever considered where it will end?” his mother
said. “No,” he answered; “things work out of themselves.”
“They do, in a way one doesn’t like, as a rule,” said his
mother.
And then one has to put up with them, he said.
“You’ll find you’re not as good at ‘putting up’ as you imagine,” she said.
He went on working rapidly at his design.
“Do you ever ask HER opinion? “ she said at length. “What
of?”
“Of you, and the whole thing. “
“I don’t care what her opinion of me is. She’s fearfully in
love with me, but it’s not very deep. “
“But quite as deep as your feeling for her. “ He looked up
at his mother curiously.
“Yes,” he said. “You know, mother, I think there must
be something the matter with me, that I CAN’T love. When
she’s there, as a rule, I DO love her. Sometimes, when I see her
just as THE WOMAN, I love her, mother; but then, when she
talks and criticises, I often don’t listen to her.”
“Yet she’s as much sense as Miriam.”
“Perhaps; and I love her better than Miriam. But WHY
don’t they hold me?”
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DAVID HERBERT LAWRENCE
The last question was almost a lamentation. His mother
turned away her face, sat looking across the room, very
quiet, grave, with something of renunciation.
“But you wouldn’t want to marry Clara?” she said.
“No; at first perhaps I would. But why – why don’t I want
to marry her or anybody? I feel sometimes as if I wronged
my women, mother.”
“How wronged them, my son?” “I don’t know.”
He went on painting rather despairingly; he had touched
the quick of the trouble.
“And as for wanting to marry, “ said his mother, “there’s
plenty of time yet.”
“But no, mother. I even love Clara, and I did Miriam; but
to GIVE myself to them in marriage I couldn’t. I couldn’t
belong to them. They seem to want ME, and I can’t ever give it
them.”
“You haven’t met the right woman.”
“And I never shall meet the right woman while you live, “
he said. She was very quiet. Now she began to feel again tired,
as if she were done.
“We’ll see, my son,” she answered.
The feeling that things were going in a circle made him
mad.
Clara was, indeed, passionately in love with him, and he
with her, as far as passion went. In the daytime he forgot
her a good deal. She was working in the same building, but
he was not aware of it. He was busy, and her existence was of
no matter to him. But all the time she was in her Spiral room
she had a sense that he was upstairs, a physical sense of his
person in the same building. Every second she expected him
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SONS AND LOVERS
to come through the door, and when he came it was a shock
to her. But he was often short and offhand with her. He gave
her his directions in an official manner, keeping her at bay.
With what wits she had left she listened to him. She dared
not misunderstand or fail to remember, but it was a cruelty
to her. She wanted to touch his chest. She knew exactly how
his breast was shapen under the waistcoat, and she wanted
to touch it. It maddened her to hear his mechanical voice giving orders about the work. She wanted to break through the
sham of it, smash the trivial coating of business which covered
him with hardness, get at the man again; but she was afraid, and
before she could feel one touch of his warmth he was gone, and
she ached again.
He knew that she was dreary every evening she did not
see him, so he gave her a good deal of his time. The days
were often a misery to her, but the evenings and the nights
were usually a bliss to them both. Then they were silent.
For hours they sat together, or walked together in the dark,
and talked only a few, almost meaningless words. But he had
her hand in his, and her bosom left its warmth in his chest,
making him feel whole.
One evening they were walking down by the canal,
and something was troubling him. She knew she had not
got him. All the time he whistled softly and persistently
to himself. She listened, feeling she could learn more from
his whistling than from his speech. It was a sad dissatisfied
tune – a tune that made her feel he would not stay with
her. She walked on in silence. When they came to the swing
bridge he sat down on the great pole, looking at the stars in
the water. He was a long way from her. She had been thinking.
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DAVID HERBERT LAWRENCE
“Will you always stay at Jordan’s? “ she asked.
“No, “ he answered without reflecting. “No; I s’llleave Nottingham and go abroad – soon. “
“Go abroad! What for? “ “I dunno! I feel restless. “ “But what
shall you do? “
“I shall have to get some steady designing work, and
some sort of sale for my pictures first,” he said. “I am gradually making my way. I know I am.”
“And when do you think you’ll go?”
“I don’t know. I shall hardly go for long, while there’s my
mother.” “You couldn’t leave her?”
“Not for long. “
She looked at the stars in the black water. They lay very
white and staring. It was an agony to know he would leave
her, but it was almost an agony to have him near her.
“And if you made a nice lot of money, what would you
do? “ she asked.
“Go somewhere in a pretty house near London with my
mother. “ “I see. “
There was a long pause.
“I could still come and see you, “he said. “I don’t know. Don’t
ask me what Ishould do; Idon’t know.”
There was a silence. The stars shuddered and broke upon
the water. There came a breath of wind. He went suddenly to
her, and put his hand on her shoulder.
“Don’t ask me anything about the future, “ he said miserably. “I don’t know anything. Be with me now, will you, no
matter what it is?”
And she took him in her arms. After all, she was a married woman, and she had no right even to what he gave her.
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SONS AND LOVERS
He needed her badly. She had him in her arms, and he was
miserable. With her warmth she folded him over, consoled
him, loved him. She would let the moment stand for itself.
After a moment he lifted his head as if he wanted to speak.
“Clara,” he said, struggling.
She caught him passionately to her, pressed his head
down on her breast with her hand. She could not bear the
suffering in his voice. She was afraid in her soul. He might
have anything of her anything; but she did not want to KNOW.
She felt she could not bear it. She wanted him to be soothed
upon her – soothed. She stood clasping him and caressing
him, and he was something unknown to her – something almost uncanny. She wanted to soothe him into forgetfulness.
And soon the struggle went down in his soul, and he
forgot. But then Clara was not there for him, only a woman,
warm, something he loved and almost worshipped, there in
the dark. But it was not Clara, and she submitted to him. The
naked hunger and inevitability of his loving her, something
strong and blind and ruthless in its primitiveness, made the
hour almost terrible to her. She knew how stark and alone
he was, and she felt it was great that he came to her; and she
took him simply because his need was bigger either than her
or him, and her soul was still within her. She did this for
him in his need, even if he left her, for she loved him.
All the while the peewits were screaming in the field.
When he came to, he wondered what was near his eyes, curving and strong with life in the dark, and what voice it was
speaking. Then he realised it was the grass, and the peewit
was calling. The warmth was Clara’s breathing heaving. He
lifted his head, and looked into her eyes. They were dark and
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DAVID HERBERT LAWRENCE
shining and strange, life wild at the source staring into
his life, stranger to him, yet meeting him; and he put his
face down on her throat, afraid. What was she? A strong,
strange, wild life, that breathed with his in the darkness
through this hour. It was all so much bigger than themselves
that he was hushed. They had met, and included in their
meeting the thrust of the manifold grass stems, the cry of the
peewit, the wheel of the stars.
When they stood up they saw other lovers stealing
down the opposite hedge. It seemed natural they were there;
the night contained them.
And after such an evening they both were very still, having known the immensity of passion. They felt small, half –
afraid, childish and wondering, like Adam and Eve when
they lost their innocence and realised the magnificence of
the power which drove them out of Paradise and across the
great night and the great day of humanity. It was for each
of them an initiation and a satisfaction. To know their own
nothingness, to know the tremendous living flood which
carried them always, gave them rest within themselves. If so
great a magnificent power could overwhelm them, identify
them altogether with itself, so that they knew they were
only grains in the tremendous heave that lifted every grass
blade its little height, and every tree, and living thing, then
why fret about themselves? They could let themselves be
carried by life, and they felt a sort of peace each in the other.
There was a verification which they had had together. Nothing could nullify it, nothing could take it away; it was almost
their belief in life.
But Clara was not satisfied. Something great was there,
she knew; something great enveloped her. But it did not keep
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