The Rainbow

He returned gradually, but newly created, as after a

gestation, a new birth, in the womb of darkness. Aerial and

light everything was, new as a morning, fresh and newly-begun.

Like a dawn the newness and the bliss filled in. And she sat

utterly still with him, as if in the same.

Then she looked up at him, the wide, young eyes blazing with

light. And he bent down and kissed her on the lips. And the dawn

blazed in them, their new life came to pass, it was beyond all

conceiving good, it was so good, that it was almost like a

passing-away, a trespass. He drew her suddenly closer to

him.

For soon the light began to fade in her, gradually, and as

she was in his arms, her head sank, she leaned it against him,

and lay still, with sunk head, a little tired, effaced because

she was tired. And in her tiredness was a certain negation of

him.

"There is the child," she said, out of the long silence.

He did not understand. It was a long time since he had heard

a voice. Now also he heard the wind roaring, as if it had just

begun again.

"Yes," he said, not understanding. There was a slight

contraction of pain at his heart, a slight tension on his brows.

Something he wanted to grasp and could not.

"You will love her?" she said.

The quick contraction, like pain, went over him again.

"I love her now," he said.

She lay still against him, taking his physical warmth without

heed. It was great confirmation for him to feel her there,

absorbing the warmth from him, giving him back her weight and

her strange confidence. But where was she, that she seemed so

absent? His mind was open with wonder. He did not know her.

"But I am much older than you," she said.

"How old?" he asked.

"I am thirty-four," she said.

"I am twenty-eight," he said.

"Six years."

She was oddly concerned, even as if it pleased her a little.

He sat and listened and wondered. It was rather splendid, to be

so ignored by her, whilst she lay against him, and he lifted her

with his breathing, and felt her weight upon his living, so he

had a completeness and an inviolable power. He did not interfere

with her. He did not even know her. It was so strange that she

lay there with her weight abandoned upon him. He was silent with

delight. He felt strong, physically, carrying her on his

breathing. The strange, inviolable completeness of the two of

them made him feel as sure and as stable as God. Amused, he

wondered what the vicar would say if he knew.