Women in Love

In a little convulsion of too-tired yearning, she entered the church

and looked slowly along her cheeks for him, her slender body convulsed

with agitation. As best man, he would be standing beside the altar. She

looked slowly, deferring in her certainty.

And then, he was not there. A terrible storm came over her, as if she

were drowning. She was possessed by a devastating hopelessness. And she

approached mechanically to the altar. Never had she known such a pang

of utter and final hopelessness. It was beyond death, so utterly null,

desert.

The bridegroom and the groom's man had not yet come. There was a

growing consternation outside. Ursula felt almost responsible. She

could not bear it that the bride should arrive, and no groom. The

wedding must not be a fiasco, it must not.

But here was the bride's carriage, adorned with ribbons and cockades.

Gaily the grey horses curvetted to their destination at the

church-gate, a laughter in the whole movement. Here was the quick of

all laughter and pleasure. The door of the carriage was thrown open, to

let out the very blossom of the day. The people on the roadway murmured

faintly with the discontented murmuring of a crowd.

The father stepped out first into the air of the morning, like a

shadow. He was a tall, thin, careworn man, with a thin black beard that

was touched with grey. He waited at the door of the carriage patiently,

self-obliterated.

In the opening of the doorway was a shower of fine foliage and flowers,

a whiteness of satin and lace, and a sound of a gay voice saying: 'How do I get out?' A ripple of satisfaction ran through the expectant people. They pressed

near to receive her, looking with zest at the stooping blond head with

its flower buds, and at the delicate, white, tentative foot that was

reaching down to the step of the carriage. There was a sudden foaming

rush, and the bride like a sudden surf-rush, floating all white beside

her father in the morning shadow of trees, her veil flowing with

laughter.

'That's done it!' she said.

She put her hand on the arm of her care-worn, sallow father, and

frothing her light draperies, proceeded over the eternal red carpet.

Her father, mute and yellowish, his black beard making him look more

careworn, mounted the steps stiffly, as if his spirit were absent; but

the laughing mist of the bride went along with him undiminished.

And no bridegroom had arrived! It was intolerable for her. Ursula, her

heart strained with anxiety, was watching the hill beyond; the white,

descending road, that should give sight of him. There was a carriage.

It was running. It had just come into sight. Yes, it was he. Ursula

turned towards the bride and the people, and, from her place of

vantage, gave an inarticulate cry. She wanted to warn them that he was

coming. But her cry was inarticulate and inaudible, and she flushed

deeply, between her desire and her wincing confusion.