Page 143 - sons-and-lovers

could feel him losing himself. He had danced and gone to
the theatre, boated on the river, been out with friends; and
she knew he sat up afterwards in his cold bedroom grind-
ing away at Latin, because he intended to get on in his office,
and in the law as much as he could. He never sent his moth-
er any money now. It was all taken, the little he had, for his
own life. And she did not want any, except sometimes, when
she was in a tight corner, and when ten shillings would have
saved her much worry. She still dreamed of William, and
of what he would do, with herself behind him. Never for a
minute would she admit to herself how heavy and anxious
her heart was because of him.
Also he talked a good deal now of a girl he had met at a
dance, a handsome brunette, quite young, and a lady, after
whom the men were running thick and fast.
‘I wonder if you would run, my boy,’ his mother wrote to
him, ‘unless you saw all the other men chasing her too. You
feel safe enough and vain enough in a crowd. But take care,
and see how you feel when you find yourself alone, and in
triumph.’ William resented these things, and continued the
chase. He had taken the girl on the river. ‘If you saw her,
mother, you would know how I feel. Tall and elegant, with
the clearest of clear, transparent olive complexions, hair
as black as jet, and such grey eyes—bright, mocking, like
lights on water at night. It is all very well to be a bit satiri-
cal till you see her. And she dresses as well as any woman
in London. I tell you, your son doesn’t half put his head up
when she goes walking down Piccadilly with him.’
Mrs. Morel wondered, in her heart, if her son did not

1 Sons and Lovers