Page 201 - sons-and-lovers

‘That he has!’ said William, smiling.
He looked at her. Her beauty seemed to hurt him. He
glanced at her flower-decked head and frowned.
‘You look nice enough, if that’s what you want to know,’
he said.
And she walked without her hat. In a little while William
recovered, and was rather tender to her. Coming to a bridge,
he carved her initials and his in a heart.
L. L. W.
W. M.
She watched his strong, nervous hand, with its glistening
hairs and freckles, as he carved, and she seemed fascinated
by it.
All the time there was a feeling of sadness and warmth,
and a certain tenderness in the house, whilst William and
Lily were at home. But often he got irritable. She had brought,
for an eight-days’ stay, five dresses and six blouses.
‘Oh, would you mind,’ she said to Annie, ‘washing me
these two blouses, and these things?’
And Annie stood washing when William and Lily went
out the next morning. Mrs. Morel was furious. And some-
times the young man, catching a glimpse of his sweetheart’s
attitude towards his sister, hated her.
On Sunday morning she looked very beautiful in a dress
of foulard, silky and sweeping, and blue as a jay-bird’s feath-
er, and in a large cream hat covered with many roses, mostly
crimson. Nobody could admire her enough. But in the eve-
ning, when she was going out, she asked again:
‘Chubby, have you got my gloves?’

00 Sons and Lovers