Page 349 - lady-chatterlys-lover

your hands alone for a time, do you?’
’Oh no! I can manage him quite all right. I mean, I can
do all he needs me to do. Don’t you think he’s better than
he used to be?’
’Oh much! You do wonders with him.’
’Do I though! But men are all alike: just babies, and
you have to flatter them and wheedle them and let them
think they’re having their own way. Don’t you find it so, my
Lady?’
’I’m afraid I haven’t much experience.’
Connie paused in her occupation.
’Even your husband, did you have to manage him, and
wheedle him like a baby?’ she asked, looking at the other
woman.
Mrs Bolton paused too.
’Well!’ she said. ‘I had to do a good bit of coaxing, with
him too. But he always knew what I was after, I must say
that. But he generally gave in to me.’
’He was never the lord and master thing?’
’No! At least there’d be a look in his eyes sometimes, and
then I knew I’D got to give in. But usually he gave in to me.
No, he was never lord and master. But neither was I. I knew
when I could go no further with him, and then I gave in:
though it cost me a good bit, sometimes.’
’And what if you had held out against him?’
’Oh, I don’t know, I never did. Even when he was in the
wrong, if he was fixed, I gave in. You see, I never wanted to
break what was between us. And if you really set your will
against a man, that finishes it. If you care for a man, you

Lady Chatterly’s Lover