Page 481 - women-in-love

‘I must go now and see Mama,’ said Winifred, ‘and see
Dadda before he goes to sleep.’
She bade them both good-night.
Gudrun also rose to take her leave.
‘You needn’t go yet, need you?’ said Gerald, glancing
quickly at the clock.’ It is early yet. I’ll walk down with you
when you go. Sit down, don’t hurry away.’
Gudrun sat down, as if, absent as he was, his will had
power over her. She felt almost mesmerised. He was strange
to her, something unknown. What was he thinking, what
was he feeling, as he stood there so rapt, saying nothing? He
kept her—she could feel that. He would not let her go. She
watched him in humble submissiveness.
‘Had the doctor anything new to tell you?’ she asked,
softly, at length, with that gentle, timid sympathy which
touched a keen fibre in his heart. He lifted his eyebrows with
a negligent, indifferent expression.
‘No—nothing new,’ he replied, as if the question were
quite casual, trivial. ‘He says the pulse is very weak indeed,
very intermittent—but that doesn’t necessarily mean much,
you know.’
He looked down at her. Her eyes were dark and soft and
unfolded, with a stricken look that roused him.
‘No,’ she murmured at length. ‘I don’t understand any-
thing about these things.’
‘Just as well not,’ he said. ‘I say, won’t you have a
cigarette?—do!’ He quickly fetched the box, and held her a
light. Then he stood before her on the hearth again.
‘No,’ he said, ‘we’ve never had much illness in the house,

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