Page 303 - lady-chatterlys-lover

’I want to go out too, for a minute.’
She went alone into the darkness. There were stars over-
head. She could smell flowers on the night air. And she
could feel her wet shoes getting wetter again. But she felt
like going away, right away from him and everybody.
It was chilly. She shuddered, and returned to the house.
He was sitting in front of the low fire.
’Ugh! Cold!’ she shuddered.
He put the sticks on the fire, and fetched more, till they
had a good crackling chimneyful of blaze. The rippling
running yellow flame made them both happy, warmed their
faces and their souls.
’Never mind!’ she said, taking his hand as he sat silent
and remote. ‘One does one’s best.’
’Ay!’ He sighed, with a twist of a smile.
She slipped over to him, and into his arms, as he sat there
before the fire.
’Forget then!’ she whispered. ‘Forget!’
He held her close, in the running warmth of the fire. The
flame itself was like a forgetting. And her soft, warm, ripe
weight! Slowly his blood turned, and began to ebb back into
strength and reckless vigour again.
’And perhaps the women REALLY wanted to be there
and love you properly, only perhaps they couldn’t. Perhaps
it wasn’t all their fault,’ she said.
’I know it. Do you think I don’t know what a broken-
backed snake that’s been trodden on I was myself!’
She clung to him suddenly. She had not wanted to start
all this again. Yet some perversity had made her.

0 Lady Chatterly’s Lover