Page 256 - sons-and-lovers

self, as she thought, would she feel alive again. And now he
asked her to look at this garden, wanting the contact with
her again. Impatient of the set in the field, she turned to the
quiet lawn, surrounded by sheaves of shut-up crocuses. A
feeling of stillness, almost of ecstasy, came over her. It felt
almost as if she were alone with him in this garden.
Then he left her again and joined the others. Soon they
started home. Miriam loitered behind, alone. She did not
fit in with the others; she could very rarely get into human
relations with anyone: so her friend, her companion, her
lover, was Nature. She saw the sun declining wanly. In the
dusky, cold hedgerows were some red leaves. She lingered to
gather them, tenderly, passionately. The love in her finger-
tips caressed the leaves; the passion in her heart came to a
glow upon the leaves.
Suddenly she realised she was alone in a strange road,
and she hurried forward. Turning a corner in the lane, she
came upon Paul, who stood bent over something, his mind
fixed on it, working away steadily, patiently, a little hope-
lessly. She hesitated in her approach, to watch.
He remained concentrated in the middle of the road. Be-
yond, one rift of rich gold in that colourless grey evening
seemed to make him stand out in dark relief. She saw him,
slender and firm, as if the setting sun had given him to her.
A deep pain took hold of her, and she knew she must love
him. And she had discovered him, discovered in him a rare
potentiality, discovered his loneliness. Quivering as at some
‘annunciation’, she went slowly forward.
At last he looked up.