Page 200 - sons-and-lovers

know! But there, she hasn’t the strength—she simply hasn’t
the strength. She ought never to have been burdened like it,
you know. I’m sorry for her, and I’m sorry for him too. My
word, if I’D had him, I shouldn’t have thought him a bad
husband! Not that she does either; and she’s very lovable.’
William came home again with his sweetheart at the
Whitsuntide. He had one week of his holidays then. It was
beautiful weather. As a rule, William and Lily and Paul
went out in the morning together for a walk. William did
not talk to his beloved much, except to tell her things from
his boyhood. Paul talked endlessly to both of them. They lay
down, all three, in a meadow by Minton Church. On one
side, by the Castle Farm, was a beautiful quivering screen
of poplars. Hawthorn was dropping from the hedges; pen-
ny daisies and ragged robin were in the field, like laughter.
William, a big fellow of twenty-three, thinner now and even
a bit gaunt, lay back in the sunshine and dreamed, while she
fingered with his hair. Paul went gathering the big daisies.
She had taken off her hat; her hair was black as a horse’s
mane. Paul came back and threaded daisies in her jet-black
hair—big spangles of white and yellow, and just a pink
touch of ragged robin.
‘Now you look like a young witch-woman,’ the boy said
to her. ‘Doesn’t she, William?’
Lily laughed. William opened his eyes and looked at her.
In his gaze was a certain baffled look of misery and fierce
appreciation.
‘Has he made a sight of me?’ she asked, laughing down
on her lover.

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