Page 342 - women-in-love

was breaking, giving way now, at this crisis.
And it was a strain. He knew there was no equilibrium.
He would have to go in some direction, shortly, to find re-
lief. Only Birkin kept the fear definitely off him, saved
him his quick sufficiency in life, by the odd mobility and
changeableness which seemed to contain the quintessence
of faith. But then Gerald must always come away from Bir-
kin, as from a Church service, back to the outside real world
of work and life. There it was, it did not alter, and words
were futilities. He had to keep himself in reckoning with the
world of work and material life. And it became more and
more difficult, such a strange pressure was upon him, as if
the very middle of him were a vacuum, and outside were an
awful tension.
He had found his most satisfactory relief in women. Af-
ter a debauch with some desperate woman, he went on quite
easy and forgetful. The devil of it was, it was so hard to keep
up his interest in women nowadays. He didn’t care about
them any more. A Pussum was all right in her way, but she
was an exceptional case, and even she mattered extreme-
ly little. No, women, in that sense, were useless to him any
more. He felt that his MIND needed acute stimulation, be-
fore he could be physically roused.

342 Women in Love