Page 405 - lady-chatterlys-lover

’Only sensible thing he could say, under the circumstanc-
es. Then I suppose it’ll be all right.’
’In what way?’ said Connie, looking into her father’s eyes.
They were big blue eyes rather like her own, but with a cer-
tain uneasiness in them, a look sometimes of an uneasy
little boy, sometimes a look of sullen selfishness, usually
good-humoured and wary.
’You can present Clifford with an heir to all the Chatter-
leys, and put another baronet in Wragby.’
Sir Malcolm’s face smiled with a half-sensual smile.
’But I don’t think I want to,’ she said.
’Why not? Feeling entangled with the other man? Well!
If you want the truth from me, my child, it’s this. The world
goes on. Wragby stands and will go on standing. The world
is more or less a fixed thing and, externally, we have to
adapt ourselves to it. Privately, in my private opinion, we
can please ourselves. Emotions change. You may like one
man this year and another next. But Wragby still stands.
Stick by Wragby as far as Wragby sticks by you. Then please
yourself. But you’ll get very little out of making a break.
You can make a break if you wish. You have an independent
income, the only thing that never lets you down. But you
won’t get much out of it. Put a little baronet in Wragby. It’s
an amusing thing to do.’
And Sir Malcolm sat back and smiled again. Connie did
not answer.
’I hope you had a real man at last,’ he said to her after a
while, sensually alert.
’I did. That’s the trouble. There aren’t many of them

0 Lady Chatterly’s Lover