The Rainbow
Page 50He had to learn to contain himself again, and he hated it. He
hated her that she was not there for him. And he took himself
off, anywhere.
But an instinct of gratitude and a knowledge that she would
receive him back again, that later on she would be there for him
again, prevented his straying very far. He cautiously did not go
too far. He knew she might lapse into ignorance of him, lapse
away from him, farther, farther, farther, till she was lost to
him. He had sense enough, premonition enough in himself, to be
aware of this and to measure himself accordingly. For he did not
want to lose her: he did not want her to lapse away.
Cold, he called her, selfish, only caring about herself, a
no proper feelings at the bottom of her, and no proper niceness.
He raged, and piled up accusations that had some measure of
truth in them all. But a certain grace in him forbade him from
going too far. He knew, and he quivered with rage and hatred,
that she was all these vile things, that she was everything vile
and detestable. But he had grace at the bottom of him, which
told him that, above all things, he did not want to lose her, he
was not going to lose her.
So he kept some consideration for her, he preserved some
relationship. He went out more often, to the "Red Lion" again,
to escape the madness of sitting next to her when she did not
indifference could be. He could not stay at home. So he went to
the "Red Lion". And sometimes he got drunk. But he preserved his
measure, some things between them he never forfeited.
A tormented look came into his eyes, as if something were
always dogging him. He glanced sharp and quick, he could not
bear to sit still doing nothing. He had to go out, to find
company, to give himself away there. For he had no other outlet,
he could not work to give himself out, he had not the
knowledge.
As the months of her pregnancy went on, she left him more and
more alone, she was more and more unaware of him, his existence
beginning to go mad, ready to rave. For she was quiet and
polite, as if he did not exist, as one is quiet and polite to a
servant.
Nevertheless she was great with his child, it was his turn to
submit. She sat opposite him, sewing, her foreign face
inscrutable and indifferent. He felt he wanted to break her into
acknowledgment of him, into awareness of him. It was
insufferable that she had so obliterated him. He would smash her
into regarding him. He had a raging agony of desire to do
so.