And he remained wrathful and distinct from her, unchanged
outwardly to her, but underneath a solid power of antagonism to
her. Of which she became gradually aware. And it irritated her
to be made aware of him as a separate power. She lapsed into a
sort of sombre exclusion, a curious communion with mysterious
powers, a sort of mystic, dark state which drove him and the
child nearly mad. He walked about for days stiffened with
resistance to her, stiff with a will to destroy her as she was.
Then suddenly, out of nowhere, there was connection between them
again. It came on him as he was working in the fields. The
tension, the bond, burst, and the passionate flood broke forward
into a tremendous, magnificent rush, so that he felt he could
snap off the trees as he passed, and create the world
afresh.
And when he arrived home, there was no sign between them. He
waited and waited till she came. And as he waited, his limbs
seemed strong and splendid to him, his hands seemed like
passionate servants to him, goodly, he felt a stupendous power
in himself, of life, and of urgent, strong blood.
She was sure to come at last, and touch him. Then he burst
into flame for her, and lost himself. They looked at each other,
a deep laugh at the bottom of their eyes, and he went to take of
her again, wholesale, mad to revel in the inexhaustible wealth
of her, to bury himself in the depths of her in an inexhaustible
exploration, she all the while revelling in that he revelled in
her, tossed all her secrets aside and plunged to that which was
secret to her as well, whilst she quivered with fear and the
last anguish of delight.
What did it matter who they were, whether they knew each
other or not?
The hour passed away again, there was severance between them,
and rage and misery and bereavement for her, and deposition and
toiling at the mill with slaves for him. But no matter. They had
had their hour, and should it chime again, they were ready for
it, ready to renew the game at the point where it was left off,
on the edge of the outer darkness, when the secrets within the
woman are game for the man, hunted doggedly, when the secrets of
the woman are the man's adventure, and they both give themselves
to the adventure.
She was with child, and there was again the silence and
distance between them. She did not want him nor his secrets nor
his game, he was deposed, he was cast out. He seethed with fury
at the small, ugly-mouthed woman who had nothing to do with him.
Sometimes his anger broke on her, but she did not cry. She
turned on him like a tiger, and there was battle.