![]() ![]() There’s an immense difference! Where is that. The truth is, that though one might suspect her of strong maternal feelings, my wife doesn’t seem to me the type of woman who bears children in her own body. Each time when I come into the hall and see the perambulator, I catch myself thinking: “H’m, someone has brought a baby!” Or, when his crying wakes me at night, I feel inclined to blame my wife for having brought the baby in from outside. A queer thing is I can’t connect him with my wife and myself I’ve never accepted him as ours. I wonder if that little soft rolling bundle sees anything, feels anything? Now she turns him over on her knee, and in this light, his soft arms and legs waving, he is extraordinarily like a young crab. She turns away, pulls the other red sock off the baby, sits him up, and begins to unbutton him behind. Will she never grow accustomed to these simple-one might say-everyday little lies? Will she never learn not to expose herself-or to build up defences? Then I really meet her gaze, meet it fully, and I fancy her face quivers. “Nothing,” I answer softly.Īt that she stirs, and still trying not to make it sound important, she says, “Oh, but you must have been thinking of something!” I smile and draw two fingers across my forehead in the way I have. She knows-how long has she known?-that I am not “working.” It is strange that with her full, open gaze, she should smile so timidly-and that she should say in such a hesitating voice, “What are you thinking?” What a voice! What power! What velvety softness! Marvellous! And as I think that, a mournful glorious voice begins to sing in my bosom. and what then? Aren’t those just the signs, the traces of my feeling? The bright green streaks made by someone who walks over the dewy grass? Not the feeling itself. And now I am walking along a deserted road-it is impossible to miss the puddles, and the trees are stirring-stirring.īut one could go on with such a catalogue for ever-on and on-until one lifted the single arum lily leaf and discovered the tiny snails clinging, until one counted. How strong the sea smells! How loudly the tied-up boats knock against one another! I am crossing the wet stackyard, hooded in an old sack, carrying a lantern, while the house-dog, like a soaking doormat, springs, shakes himself over me. I am brushing through deserted gardens and falling into moist smelling summer-houses (you know how soft and almost crumbling the wood of a summer-house is in the rain), I am standing on the dark quayside, giving my ticket into the wet red hand of the old sailor in an oilskin. I am conscious of tall houses, their doors and shutters sealed against the night, of dripping balconies and sodden flower-pots. And all at one and the same moment I am arriving in a strange city, slipping under the hood of the cab while the driver whips the cover off the breathing horse, running from shelter to shelter, dodging someone, swerving by someone else. While I am here, I am there, lifting my face to the dim sky, and it seems to me it must be raining all over the world-that the whole earth is drenched, is sounding with a soft quick patter or hard steady drumming, or gurgling and something that is like sobbing and laughing mingled together, and that light playful splashing that is of water falling into still lakes and flowing rivers. I like to think of that cold drenched window behind the blind, and beyond, the dark bushes in the garden, their broad leaves bright with rain, and beyond the fence, the gleaming road with the two hoarse little gutters singing against each other, and the wavering reflections of the lamps, like fishes’ tails. She sits, bent forward, clasping the little bare foot, staring into the glow, and as the fire quickens, falls, flares again, her shadow-an immense Mother and Child-is here and gone again upon the wall. One of his red woollen boots is off, one is on. But the warmth, the quiet, and the sleepy baby, have made her dreamy. She is about to put him to bed before she clears away the dishes and piles them up in the kitchen for the servant girl to-morrow morning. My wife, with her little boy on her lap, is in a low chair before the fire. all the paraphernalia, in fact, of an extremely occupied man. The lamp with the green shade is alight I have before me two large books of reference, both open, a pile of papers. I am sitting at my writing table which is placed across a corner so that I am behind it, as it were, and facing the room. ![]() We have left the small, cold dining-room, we have come back to the sitting-room where there is a fire. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |