1“By the way,” said Dr. Ansell one evening when Morel was in Sheffield, “we’ve got a man in the fever hospital here who comes from Nottingham—Dawes. He doesn’t seem to have many belongings in this world.”

2“Baxter Dawes!” Paul exclaimed.

3“That’s the man—has been a fine fellow, physically, I should think. Been in a bit of a mess lately. You know him?”

4“He used to work at the place where I am.”

5“Did he? Do you know anything about him? He’s just sulking, or he’d be a lot better than he is by now.”

6“I don’t know anything of his home circumstances, except that he’s separated from his wife and has been a bit down, I believe. But tell him about me, will you? Tell him I’ll come and see him.”

7The next time Morel saw the doctor he said:

8“And what about Dawes?”

9“I said to him,” answered the other, “‘Do you know a man from Nottingham named Morel?’ and he looked at me as if he’d jump at my throat. So I said: ‘I see you know the name; it’s Paul Morel.’ Then I told him about your saying you would go and see him. ‘What does he want?’ he said, as if you were a policeman.”

10“And did he say he would see me?” asked Paul.

11“He wouldn’t say anything—good, bad or indifferent,” replied the doctor.

12“Why not?”

13“That’s what I want to know. There he lies and sulks, day in, day out. Can’t get a word of information out of him.”

14“Do you think I might go?” asked Paul.

15“You might.”

16There was a feeling of connection between the rival men, more than ever since they had fought. In a way Morel felt guilty towards the other, and more or less responsible. And being in such a state of soul himself, he felt an almost painful nearness to Dawes, who was suffering and despairing, too. Besides, they had met in a naked extremity of hate, and it was a bond. At any rate, the elemental man in each had met.

17He went down to the isolation hospital, with Dr. Ansell’s card. This sister, a healthy young Irishwoman, led him down the ward.

18“A visitor to see you, Jim Crow,” she said.

19Dawes turned over suddenly with a startled grunt.

20“Eh?”

21“Caw!” she mocked. “He can only say ‘Caw!’ I have brought you a gentleman to see you. Now say ‘Thank you,’ and show some manners.”

22Dawes looked swiftly with his dark, startled eyes beyond the sister at Paul. His look was full of fear, mistrust, hate, and misery. Morel met the swift, dark eyes, and hesitated. The two men were afraid of the naked selves they had been.

23“Dr. Ansell told me you were here,” said Morel, holding out his hand.

24Dawes mechanically shook hands.

25“So I thought I’d come in,” continued Paul.

26There was no answer. Dawes lay staring at the opposite wall.

27“Say ‘Caw!’” mocked the nurse. “Say ‘Caw!’ Jim Crow.”

28“He is getting on all right?” said Paul to her.

29“Oh yes! He lies and imagines he’s going to die,” said the nurse, “and it frightens every word out of his mouth.”

30“And you must have somebody to talk to,” laughed Morel.

31“That’s it!” laughed the nurse. “Only two old men and a boy who always cries. It is hard lines! Here am I dying to hear Jim Crow’s voice, and nothing but an odd ‘Caw!’ will he give!”

32“So rough on you!” said Morel.

33“Isn’t it?” said the nurse.

34“I suppose I am a godsend,” he laughed.

35“Oh, dropped straight from heaven!” laughed the nurse.

36Presently she left the two men alone. Dawes was thinner, and handsome again, but life seemed low in him. As the doctor said, he was lying sulking, and would not move forward towards convalescence. He seemed to grudge every beat of his heart.

37“Have you had a bad time?” asked Paul.

38Suddenly again Dawes looked at him.

39“What are you doing in Sheffield?” he asked.

40“My mother was taken ill at my sister’s in Thurston Street. What are you doing here?”

41There was no answer.

42“How long have you been in?” Morel asked.

43“I couldn’t say for sure,” Dawes answered grudgingly.

44He lay staring across at the wall opposite, as if trying to believe Morel was not there. Paul felt his heart go hard and angry.

45“Dr. Ansell told me you were here,” he said coldly.

46The other man did not answer.

47“Typhoid’s pretty bad, I know,” Morel persisted.

48Suddenly Dawes said:

49“What did you come for?”

50“Because Dr. Ansell said you didn’t know anybody here. Do you?”

51“I know nobody nowhere,” said Dawes.

52“Well,” said Paul, “it’s because you don’t choose to, then.”

53There was another silence.

54“We s’ll be taking my mother home as soon as we can,” said Paul.

55“What’s a-matter with her?” asked Dawes, with a sick man’s interest in illness.

56“She’s got a cancer.”

57There was another silence.

58“But we want to get her home,” said Paul. “We s’ll have to get a motor-car.”

59Dawes lay thinking.

60“Why don’t you ask Thomas Jordan to lend you his?” said Dawes.

61“It’s not big enough,” Morel answered.

62Dawes blinked his dark eyes as he lay thinking.

63“Then ask Jack Pilkington; he’d lend it you. You know him.”

64“I think I s’ll hire one,” said Paul.

65“You’re a fool if you do,” said Dawes.

66The sick man was gaunt and handsome again. Paul was sorry for him because his eyes looked so tired.

67“Did you get a job here?” he asked.

68“I was only here a day or two before I was taken bad,” Dawes replied.

69“You want to get in a convalescent home,” said Paul.

70The other’s face clouded again.

71“I’m goin’ in no convalescent home,” he said.

72“My father’s been in the one at Seathorpe, an’ he liked it. Dr. Ansell would get you a recommend.”

73Dawes lay thinking. It was evident he dared not face the world again.

74“The seaside would be all right just now,” Morel said. “Sun on those sandhills, and the waves not far out.”

75The other did not answer.

76“By Gad!” Paul concluded, too miserable to bother much; “it’s all right when you know you’re going to walk again, and swim!”

77Dawes glanced at him quickly. The man’s dark eyes were afraid to meet any other eyes in the world. But the real misery and helplessness in Paul’s tone gave him a feeling of relief.

78“Is she far gone?” he asked.

79“She’s going like wax,” Paul answered; “but cheerful—lively!”

80He bit his lip. After a minute he rose.

81“Well, I’ll be going,” he said. “I’ll leave you this half-crown.”

82“I don’t want it,” Dawes muttered.

83Morel did not answer, but left the coin on the table.

84“Well,” he said, “I’ll try and run in when I’m back in Sheffield. Happen you might like to see my brother-in-law? He works in Pyecrofts.”

85“I don’t know him,” said Dawes.

86“He’s all right. Should I tell him to come? He might bring you some papers to look at.”

87The other man did not answer. Paul went. The strong emotion that Dawes aroused in him, repressed, made him shiver.

88He did not tell his mother, but next day he spoke to Clara about this interview. It was in the dinner-hour. The two did not often go out together now, but this day he asked her to go with him to the Castle grounds. There they sat while the scarlet geraniums and the yellow calceolarias blazed in the sunlight. She was now always rather protective, and rather resentful towards him.

89“Did you know Baxter was in Sheffield Hospital with typhoid?” he asked.

90She looked at him with startled grey eyes, and her face went pale.

91“No,” she said, frightened.

92“He’s getting better. I went to see him yesterday—the doctor told me.”

93Clara seemed stricken by the news.

94“Is he very bad?” she asked guiltily.

95“He has been. He’s mending now.”

96“What did he say to you?”

97“Oh, nothing! He seems to be sulking.”

98There was a distance between the two of them. He gave her more information.

99She went about shut up and silent. The next time they took a walk together, she disengaged herself from his arm, and walked at a distance from him. He was wanting her comfort badly.

100“Won’t you be nice with me?” he asked.

101She did not answer.

102“What’s the matter?” he said, putting his arm across her shoulder.

103“Don’t!” she said, disengaging herself.

104He left her alone, and returned to his own brooding.

105“Is it Baxter that upsets you?” he asked at length.

106“I have been vile to him!” she said.

107“I’ve said many a time you haven’t treated him well,” he replied.

108And there was a hostility between them. Each pursued his own train of thought.

109“I’ve treated him—no, I’ve treated him badly,” she said. “And now you treat me badly. It serves me right.”

110“How do I treat you badly?” he said.

111“It serves me right,” she repeated. “I never considered him worth having, and now you don’t consider me. But it serves me right. He loved me a thousand times better than you ever did.”

112“He didn’t!” protested Paul.

113“He did! At any rate, he did respect me, and that’s what you don’t do.”

114“It looked as if he respected you!” he said.

115“He did! And I made him horrid—I know I did! You’ve taught me that. And he loved me a thousand times better than ever you do.”

116“All right,” said Paul.

117He only wanted to be left alone now. He had his own trouble, which was almost too much to bear. Clara only tormented him and made him tired. He was not sorry when he left her.

118She went on the first opportunity to Sheffield to see her husband. The meeting was not a success. But she left him roses and fruit and money. She wanted to make restitution. It was not that she loved him. As she looked at him lying there her heart did not warm with love. Only she wanted to humble herself to him, to kneel before him. She wanted now to be self-sacrificial. After all, she had failed to make Morel really love her. She was morally frightened. She wanted to do penance. So she kneeled to Dawes, and it gave him a subtle pleasure. But the distance between them was still very great—too great. It frightened the man. It almost pleased the woman. She liked to feel she was serving him across an insuperable distance. She was proud now.

119Morel went to see Dawes once or twice. There was a sort of friendship between the two men, who were all the while deadly rivals. But they never mentioned the woman who was between them.

120Mrs. Morel got gradually worse. At first they used to carry her downstairs, sometimes even into the garden. She sat propped in her chair, smiling, and so pretty. The gold wedding-ring shone on her white hand; her hair was carefully brushed. And she watched the tangled sunflowers dying, the chrysanthemums coming out, and the dahlias.

121Paul and she were afraid of each other. He knew, and she knew, that she was dying. But they kept up a pretence of cheerfulness. Every morning, when he got up, he went into her room in his pyjamas.

122“Did you sleep, my dear?” he asked.

123“Yes,” she answered.

124“Not very well?”

125“Well, yes!”

126Then he knew she had lain awake. He saw her hand under the bedclothes, pressing the place on her side where the pain was.

127“Has it been bad?” he asked.

128“No. It hurt a bit, but nothing to mention.”

129And she sniffed in her old scornful way. As she lay she looked like a girl. And all the while her blue eyes watched him. But there were the dark pain-circles beneath that made him ache again.

130“It’s a sunny day,” he said.

131“It’s a beautiful day.”

132“Do you think you’ll be carried down?”

133“I shall see.”

134Then he went away to get her breakfast. All day long he was conscious of nothing but her. It was a long ache that made him feverish. Then, when he got home in the early evening, he glanced through the kitchen window. She was not there; she had not got up.

135He ran straight upstairs and kissed her. He was almost afraid to ask:

136“Didn’t you get up, pigeon?”

137“No,” she said, “it was that morphia; it made me tired.”

138“I think he gives you too much,” he said.

139“I think he does,” she answered.

140He sat down by the bed, miserably. She had a way of curling and lying on her side, like a child. The grey and brown hair was loose over her ear.

141“Doesn’t it tickle you?” he said, gently putting it back.

142“It does,” she replied.

143His face was near hers. Her blue eyes smiled straight into his, like a girl’s—warm, laughing with tender love. It made him pant with terror, agony, and love.

144“You want your hair doing in a plait,” he said. “Lie still.”

145And going behind her, he carefully loosened her hair, brushed it out. It was like fine long silk of brown and grey. Her head was snuggled between her shoulders. As he lightly brushed and plaited her hair, he bit his lip and felt dazed. It all seemed unreal, he could not understand it.

146At night he often worked in her room, looking up from time to time. And so often he found her blue eyes fixed on him. And when their eyes met, she smiled. He worked away again mechanically, producing good stuff without knowing what he was doing.

147Sometimes he came in, very pale and still, with watchful, sudden eyes, like a man who is drunk almost to death. They were both afraid of the veils that were ripping between them.

148Then she pretended to be better, chattered to him gaily, made a great fuss over some scraps of news. For they had both come to the condition when they had to make much of the trifles, lest they should give in to the big thing, and their human independence would go smash. They were afraid, so they made light of things and were gay.

149Sometimes as she lay he knew she was thinking of the past. Her mouth gradually shut hard in a line. She was holding herself rigid, so that she might die without ever uttering the great cry that was tearing from her. He never forgot that hard, utterly lonely and stubborn clenching of her mouth, which persisted for weeks. Sometimes, when it was lighter, she talked about her husband. Now she hated him. She did not forgive him. She could not bear him to be in the room. And a few things, the things that had been most bitter to her, came up again so strongly that they broke from her, and she told her son.

150He felt as if his life were being destroyed, piece by piece, within him. Often the tears came suddenly. He ran to the station, the tear-drops falling on the pavement. Often he could not go on with his work. The pen stopped writing. He sat staring, quite unconscious. And when he came round again he felt sick, and trembled in his limbs. He never questioned what it was. His mind did not try to analyse or understand. He merely submitted, and kept his eyes shut; let the thing go over him.

151His mother did the same. She thought of the pain, of the morphia, of the next day; hardly ever of the death. That was coming, she knew. She had to submit to it. But she would never entreat it or make friends with it. Blind, with her face shut hard and blind, she was pushed towards the door. The days passed, the weeks, the months.

152Sometimes, in the sunny afternoons, she seemed almost happy.

153“I try to think of the nice times—when we went to Mablethorpe, and Robin Hood’s Bay, and Shanklin,” she said. “After all, not everybody has seen those beautiful places. And wasn’t it beautiful! I try to think of that, not of the other things.”

154Then, again, for a whole evening she spoke not a word; neither did he. They were together, rigid, stubborn, silent. He went into his room at last to go to bed, and leaned against the doorway as if paralysed, unable to go any farther. His consciousness went. A furious storm, he knew not what, seemed to ravage inside him. He stood leaning there, submitting, never questioning.

155In the morning they were both normal again, though her face was grey with the morphia, and her body felt like ash. But they were bright again, nevertheless. Often, especially if Annie or Arthur were at home, he neglected her. He did not see much of Clara. Usually he was with men. He was quick and active and lively; but when his friends saw him go white to the gills, his eyes dark and glittering, they had a certain mistrust of him. Sometimes he went to Clara, but she was almost cold to him.

156“Take me!” he said simply.

157Occasionally she would. But she was afraid. When he had her then, there was something in it that made her shrink away from him—something unnatural. She grew to dread him. He was so quiet, yet so strange. She was afraid of the man who was not there with her, whom she could feel behind this make-belief lover; somebody sinister, that filled her with horror. She began to have a kind of horror of him. It was almost as if he were a criminal. He wanted her—he had her—and it made her feel as if death itself had her in its grip. She lay in horror. There was no man there loving her. She almost hated him. Then came little bouts of tenderness. But she dared not pity him.

158Dawes had come to Colonel Seely’s Home near Nottingham. There Paul visited him sometimes, Clara very occasionally. Between the two men the friendship developed peculiarly. Dawes, who mended very slowly and seemed very feeble, seemed to leave himself in the hands of Morel.

159In the beginning of November Clara reminded Paul that it was her birthday.

160“I’d nearly forgotten,” he said.

161“I’d thought quite,” she replied.

162“No. Shall we go to the seaside for the week-end?”

163They went. It was cold and rather dismal. She waited for him to be warm and tender with her, instead of which he seemed hardly aware of her. He sat in the railway-carriage, looking out, and was startled when she spoke to him. He was not definitely thinking. Things seemed as if they did not exist. She went across to him.

164“What is it dear?” she asked.

165“Nothing!” he said. “Don’t those windmill sails look monotonous?”

166He sat holding her hand. He could not talk nor think. It was a comfort, however, to sit holding her hand. She was dissatisfied and miserable. He was not with her; she was nothing.

167And in the evening they sat among the sandhills, looking at the black, heavy sea.

168“She will never give in,” he said quietly.

169Clara’s heart sank.

170“No,” she replied.

171“There are different ways of dying. My father’s people are frightened, and have to be hauled out of life into death like cattle into a slaughter-house, pulled by the neck; but my mother’s people are pushed from behind, inch by inch. They are stubborn people, and won’t die.”

172“Yes,” said Clara.

173“And she won’t die. She can’t. Mr. Renshaw, the parson, was in the other day. ‘Think!’ he said to her; ‘you will have your mother and father, and your sisters, and your son, in the Other Land.’ And she said: ‘I have done without them for a long time, and can do without them now. It is the living I want, not the dead.’ She wants to live even now.”

174“Oh, how horrible!” said Clara, too frightened to speak.

175“And she looks at me, and she wants to stay with me,” he went on monotonously. “She’s got such a will, it seems as if she would never go—never!”

176“Don’t think of it!” cried Clara.

177“And she was religious—she is religious now—but it is no good. She simply won’t give in. And do you know, I said to her on Thursday: ‘Mother, if I had to die, I’d die. I’d will to die.’ And she said to me, sharp: ‘Do you think I haven’t? Do you think you can die when you like?’”

178His voice ceased. He did not cry, only went on speaking monotonously. Clara wanted to run. She looked round. There was the black, re-echoing shore, the dark sky down on her. She got up terrified. She wanted to be where there was light, where there were other people. She wanted to be away from him. He sat with his head dropped, not moving a muscle.

179“And I don’t want her to eat,” he said, “and she knows it. When I ask her: ‘Shall you have anything’ she’s almost afraid to say ‘Yes.’ ‘I’ll have a cup of Benger’s,’ she says. ‘It’ll only keep your strength up,’ I said to her. ‘Yes’—and she almost cried—‘but there’s such a gnawing when I eat nothing, I can’t bear it.’ So I went and made her the food. It’s the cancer that gnaws like that at her. I wish she’d die!”

180“Come!” said Clara roughly. “I’m going.”

181He followed her down the darkness of the sands. He did not come to her. He seemed scarcely aware of her existence. And she was afraid of him, and disliked him.

182In the same acute daze they went back to Nottingham. He was always busy, always doing something, always going from one to the other of his friends.

183On the Monday he went to see Baxter Dawes. Listless and pale, the man rose to greet the other, clinging to his chair as he held out his hand.

184“You shouldn’t get up,” said Paul.

185Dawes sat down heavily, eyeing Morel with a sort of suspicion.

186“Don’t you waste your time on me,” he said, “if you’ve owt better to do.”

187“I wanted to come,” said Paul. “Here! I brought you some sweets.”

188The invalid put them aside.

189“It’s not been much of a week-end,” said Morel.

190“How’s your mother?” asked the other.

191“Hardly any different.”

192“I thought she was perhaps worse, being as you didn’t come on Sunday.”

193“I was at Skegness,” said Paul. “I wanted a change.”

194The other looked at him with dark eyes. He seemed to be waiting, not quite daring to ask, trusting to be told.

195“I went with Clara,” said Paul.

196“I knew as much,” said Dawes quietly.

197“It was an old promise,” said Paul.

198“You have it your own way,” said Dawes.

199This was the first time Clara had been definitely mentioned between them.

200“Nay,” said Morel slowly; “she’s tired of me.”

201Again Dawes looked at him.

202“Since August she’s been getting tired of me,” Morel repeated.

203The two men were very quiet together. Paul suggested a game of draughts. They played in silence.

204“I s’ll go abroad when my mother’s dead,” said Paul.

205“Abroad!” repeated Dawes.

206“Yes; I don’t care what I do.”

207They continued the game. Dawes was winning.

208“I s’ll have to begin a new start of some sort,” said Paul; “and you as well, I suppose.”

209He took one of Dawes’s pieces.

210“I dunno where,” said the other.

211“Things have to happen,” Morel said. “It’s no good doing anything—at least—no, I don’t know. Give me some toffee.”

212The two men ate sweets, and began another game of draughts.

213“What made that scar on your mouth?” asked Dawes.

214Paul put his hand hastily to his lips, and looked over the garden.

215“I had a bicycle accident,” he said.

216Dawes’s hand trembled as he moved the piece.

217“You shouldn’t ha’ laughed at me,” he said, very low.

218“When?”

219“That night on Woodborough Road, when you and her passed me—you with your hand on her shoulder.”

220“I never laughed at you,” said Paul.

221Dawes kept his fingers on the draught-piece.

222“I never knew you were there till the very second when you passed,” said Morel.

223“It was that as did me,” Dawes said, very low.

224Paul took another sweet.

225“I never laughed,” he said, “except as I’m always laughing.”

226They finished the game.

227That night Morel walked home from Nottingham, in order to have something to do. The furnaces flared in a red blotch over Bulwell; the black clouds were like a low ceiling. As he went along the ten miles of highroad, he felt as if he were walking out of life, between the black levels of the sky and the earth. But at the end was only the sick-room. If he walked and walked for ever, there was only that place to come to.

228He was not tired when he got near home, or he did not know it. Across the field he could see the red firelight leaping in her bedroom window.

229“When she’s dead,” he said to himself, “that fire will go out.”

230He took off his boots quietly and crept upstairs. His mother’s door was wide open, because she slept alone still. The red firelight dashed its glow on the landing. Soft as a shadow, he peeped in her doorway.

231“Paul!” she murmured.

232His heart seemed to break again. He went in and sat by the bed.

233“How late you are!” she murmured.

234“Not very,” he said.

235“Why, what time is it?” The murmur came plaintive and helpless.

236“It’s only just gone eleven.”

237That was not true; it was nearly one o’clock.

238“Oh!” she said; “I thought it was later.”

239And he knew the unutterable misery of her nights that would not go.

240“Can’t you sleep, my pigeon?” he said.

241“No, I can’t,” she wailed.

242“Never mind, Little!” He said crooning. “Never mind, my love. I’ll stop with you half an hour, my pigeon; then perhaps it will be better.”

243And he sat by the bedside, slowly, rhythmically stroking her brows with his finger-tips, stroking her eyes shut, soothing her, holding her fingers in his free hand. They could hear the sleepers’ breathing in the other rooms.

244“Now go to bed,” she murmured, lying quite still under his fingers and his love.

245“Will you sleep?” he asked.

246“Yes, I think so.”

247“You feel better, my Little, don’t you?”

248“Yes,” she said, like a fretful, half-soothed child.

249Still the days and the weeks went by. He hardly ever went to see Clara now. But he wandered restlessly from one person to another for some help, and there was none anywhere. Miriam had written to him tenderly. He went to see her. Her heart was very sore when she saw him, white, gaunt, with his eyes dark and bewildered. Her pity came up, hurting her till she could not bear it.

250“How is she?” she asked.

251“The same—the same!” he said. “The doctor says she can’t last, but I know she will. She’ll be here at Christmas.”

252Miriam shuddered. She drew him to her; she pressed him to her bosom; she kissed him and kissed him. He submitted, but it was torture. She could not kiss his agony. That remained alone and apart. She kissed his face, and roused his blood, while his soul was apart writhing with the agony of death. And she kissed him and fingered his body, till at last, feeling he would go mad, he got away from her. It was not what he wanted just then—not that. And she thought she had soothed him and done him good.

253December came, and some snow. He stayed at home all the while now. They could not afford a nurse. Annie came to look after her mother; the parish nurse, whom they loved, came in morning and evening. Paul shared the nursing with Annie. Often, in the evenings, when friends were in the kitchen with them, they all laughed together and shook with laughter. It was reaction. Paul was so comical, Annie was so quaint. The whole party laughed till they cried, trying to subdue the sound. And Mrs. Morel, lying alone in the darkness heard them, and among her bitterness was a feeling of relief.

254Then Paul would go upstairs gingerly, guiltily, to see if she had heard.

255“Shall I give you some milk?” he asked.

256“A little,” she replied plaintively.

257And he would put some water with it, so that it should not nourish her. Yet he loved her more than his own life.

258She had morphia every night, and her heart got fitful. Annie slept beside her. Paul would go in in the early morning, when his sister got up. His mother was wasted and almost ashen in the morning with the morphia. Darker and darker grew her eyes, all pupil, with the torture. In the mornings the weariness and ache were too much to bear. Yet she could not—would not—weep, or even complain much.

259“You slept a bit later this morning, little one,” he would say to her.

260“Did I?” she answered, with fretful weariness.

261“Yes; it’s nearly eight o’clock.”

262He stood looking out of the window. The whole country was bleak and pallid under the snow. Then he felt her pulse. There was a strong stroke and a weak one, like a sound and its echo. That was supposed to betoken the end. She let him feel her wrist, knowing what he wanted.

263Sometimes they looked in each other’s eyes. Then they almost seemed to make an agreement. It was almost as if he were agreeing to die also. But she did not consent to die; she would not. Her body was wasted to a fragment of ash. Her eyes were dark and full of torture.

264“Can’t you give her something to put an end to it?” he asked the doctor at last.

265But the doctor shook his head.

266“She can’t last many days now, Mr. Morel,” he said.

267Paul went indoors.

268“I can’t bear it much longer; we shall all go mad,” said Annie.

269The two sat down to breakfast.

270“Go and sit with her while we have breakfast, Minnie,” said Annie. But the girl was frightened.

271Paul went through the country, through the woods, over the snow. He saw the marks of rabbits and birds in the white snow. He wandered miles and miles. A smoky red sunset came on slowly, painfully, lingering. He thought she would die that day. There was a donkey that came up to him over the snow by the wood’s edge, and put its head against him, and walked with him alongside. He put his arms round the donkey’s neck, and stroked his cheeks against his ears.

272His mother, silent, was still alive, with her hard mouth gripped grimly, her eyes of dark torture only living.

273It was nearing Christmas; there was more snow. Annie and he felt as if they could go on no more. Still her dark eyes were alive. Morel, silent and frightened, obliterated himself. Sometimes he would go into the sick-room and look at her. Then he backed out, bewildered.

274She kept her hold on life still. The miners had been out on strike, and returned a fortnight or so before Christmas. Minnie went upstairs with the feeding-cup. It was two days after the men had been in.

275“Have the men been saying their hands are sore, Minnie?” she asked, in the faint, querulous voice that would not give in. Minnie stood surprised.

276“Not as I know of, Mrs. Morel,” she answered.

277“But I’ll bet they are sore,” said the dying woman, as she moved her head with a sigh of weariness. “But, at any rate, there’ll be something to buy in with this week.”

278Not a thing did she let slip.

279“Your father’s pit things will want well airing, Annie,” she said, when the men were going back to work.

280“Don’t you bother about that, my dear,” said Annie.

281One night Annie and Paul were alone. Nurse was upstairs.

282“She’ll live over Christmas,” said Annie. They were both full of horror. “She won’t,” he replied grimly. “I s’ll give her morphia.”

283“Which?” said Annie.

284“All that came from Sheffield,” said Paul.

285“Ay—do!” said Annie.

286The next day he was painting in the bedroom. She seemed to be asleep. He stepped softly backwards and forwards at his painting. Suddenly her small voice wailed:

287“Don’t walk about, Paul.”

288He looked round. Her eyes, like dark bubbles in her face, were looking at him.

289“No, my dear,” he said gently. Another fibre seemed to snap in his heart.

290That evening he got all the morphia pills there were, and took them downstairs. Carefully he crushed them to powder.

291“What are you doing?” said Annie.

292“I s’ll put ’em in her night milk.”

293Then they both laughed together like two conspiring children. On top of all their horror flicked this little sanity.

294Nurse did not come that night to settle Mrs. Morel down. Paul went up with the hot milk in a feeding-cup. It was nine o’clock.

295She was reared up in bed, and he put the feeding-cup between her lips that he would have died to save from any hurt. She took a sip, then put the spout of the cup away and looked at him with her dark, wondering eyes. He looked at her.

296“Oh, it is bitter, Paul!” she said, making a little grimace.

297“It’s a new sleeping draught the doctor gave me for you,” he said. “He thought it would leave you in such a state in the morning.”

298“And I hope it won’t,” she said, like a child.

299She drank some more of the milk.

300“But it is horrid!” she said.

301He saw her frail fingers over the cup, her lips making a little move.

302“I know—I tasted it,” he said. “But I’ll give you some clean milk afterwards.”

303“I think so,” she said, and she went on with the draught. She was obedient to him like a child. He wondered if she knew. He saw her poor wasted throat moving as she drank with difficulty. Then he ran downstairs for more milk. There were no grains in the bottom of the cup.

304“Has she had it?” whispered Annie.

305“Yes—and she said it was bitter.”

306“Oh!” laughed Annie, putting her under lip between her teeth.

307“And I told her it was a new draught. Where’s that milk?”

308They both went upstairs.

309“I wonder why nurse didn’t come to settle me down?” complained the mother, like a child, wistfully.

310“She said she was going to a concert, my love,” replied Annie.

311“Did she?”

312They were silent a minute. Mrs. Morel gulped the little clean milk.

313“Annie, that draught was horrid!” she said plaintively.

314“Was it, my love? Well, never mind.”

315The mother sighed again with weariness. Her pulse was very irregular.

316“Let us settle you down,” said Annie. “Perhaps nurse will be so late.”

317“Ay,” said the mother—“try.”

318They turned the clothes back. Paul saw his mother like a girl curled up in her flannel nightdress. Quickly they made one half of the bed, moved her, made the other, straightened her nightgown over her small feet, and covered her up.

319“There,” said Paul, stroking her softly. “There!—now you’ll sleep.”

320“Yes,” she said. “I didn’t think you could do the bed so nicely,” she added, almost gaily. Then she curled up, with her cheek on her hand, her head snugged between her shoulders. Paul put the long thin plait of grey hair over her shoulder and kissed her.

321“You’ll sleep, my love,” he said.

322“Yes,” she answered trustfully. “Good-night.”

323They put out the light, and it was still.

324Morel was in bed. Nurse did not come. Annie and Paul came to look at her at about eleven. She seemed to be sleeping as usual after her draught. Her mouth had come a bit open.

325“Shall we sit up?” said Paul.

326“I s’ll lie with her as I always do,” said Annie. “She might wake up.”

327“All right. And call me if you see any difference.”

328“Yes.”

329They lingered before the bedroom fire, feeling the night big and black and snowy outside, their two selves alone in the world. At last he went into the next room and went to bed.

330He slept almost immediately, but kept waking every now and again. Then he went sound asleep. He started awake at Annie’s whispered, “Paul, Paul!” He saw his sister in her white nightdress, with her long plait of hair down her back, standing in the darkness.

331“Yes?” he whispered, sitting up.

332“Come and look at her.”

333He slipped out of bed. A bud of gas was burning in the sick chamber. His mother lay with her cheek on her hand, curled up as she had gone to sleep. But her mouth had fallen open, and she breathed with great, hoarse breaths, like snoring, and there were long intervals between.

334“She’s going!” he whispered.

335“Yes,” said Annie.

336“How long has she been like it?”

337“I only just woke up.”

338Annie huddled into the dressing-gown, Paul wrapped himself in a brown blanket. It was three o’clock. He mended the fire. Then the two sat waiting. The great, snoring breath was taken—held awhile—then given back. There was a space—a long space. Then they started. The great, snoring breath was taken again. He bent close down and looked at her.