Page 529 - sons-and-lovers

an. At this period, unknowingly, he resisted his mother’s
influence. He did not tell her things; there was a distance
between them.
Clara was happy, almost sure of him. She felt she had at
last got him for herself; and then again came the uncertain-
ty. He told her jestingly of the affair with her husband. Her
colour came up, her grey eyes flashed.
‘That’s him to a ‘T’,’ she cried—‘like a navvy! He’s not fit
for mixing with decent folk.’
‘Yet you married him,’ he said.
It made her furious that he reminded her.
‘I did!’ she cried. ‘But how was I to know?’
‘I think he might have been rather nice,’ he said.
‘You think I made him what he is!’ she exclaimed.
‘Oh no! he made himself. But there’s something about
him—-‘
Clara looked at her lover closely. There was something in
him she hated, a sort of detached criticism of herself, a cold-
ness which made her woman’s soul harden against him.
‘And what are you going to do?’ she asked.
‘How?’
‘About Baxter.’
‘There’s nothing to do, is there?’ he replied.
‘You can fight him if you have to, I suppose?’ she said.
‘No; I haven’t the least sense of the ‘fist’. It’s funny. With
most men there’s the instinct to clench the fist and hit. It’s
not so with me. I should want a knife or a pistol or some-
thing to fight with.’
‘Then you’d better carry something,’ she said.

Sons and Lovers