She had to make up her mind what to do. She would leave Venice on the Saturday that he was leaving Wragby: in six days' time. This would bring her to London on the Monday following, and she would then see him. She wrote to him to the London address, asking him to send her a letter to Hartland's hotel, and to call for her on the Monday evening at seven.
Inside herself she was curiously and complicatedly angry, and all her responses were numb. She refused to confide even in Hilda, and Hilda, offended by her steady silence, had become rather intimate with a Dutch woman. Connie hated these rather stifling intimacies between women, intimacy into which Hilda always entered ponderously.

Sir Malcolm decided to travel with Connie, and Duncan could come on with Hilda. The old artist always did himself well: he took berths on the Orient Express, in spite of Connie's dislike of trains de luxe, the atmosphere of vulgar depravity there is aboard them nowadays. However, it would make the journey to Paris shorter.

Sir Malcolm was always uneasy going back to his wife. It was habit carried over from the first wife. But there would be a house-party for the grouse, and he wanted to be well ahead. Connie, sunburnt and handsome, sat in silence, forgetting all about the landscape.

`A little dull for you, going back to Wragby,' said her father, noticing her glumness.

`I'm not sure I shall go back to Wragby,' she said, with startling abruptness, looking into his eyes with her big blue eyes. His big blue eyes took on the frightened look of a man whose social conscience is not quite clear.

`You mean you'll stay on in Paris a while?'

`No! I mean never go back to Wragby.'

He was bothered by his own little problems, and sincerely hoped he was getting none of hers to shoulder.

`How's that, all at once?' he asked.

`I'm going to have a child.'

It was the first time she had uttered the words to any living soul, and it seemed to mark a cleavage in her life.

`How do you know?' said her father.

She smiled.

`How should I know?'

`But not Clifford's child, of course?'

`No! Another man's.'

She rather enjoyed tormenting him.

`Do I know the man?' asked Sir Malcolm.

`No! You've never seen him.'

There was a long pause.

`And what are your plans?'

`I don't know. That's the point.'

`No patching it up with Clifford?'

`I suppose Clifford would take it,' said Connie. `He told me, after last time you talked to him, he wouldn't mind if I had a child, so long as I went about it discreetly.'

`Only sensible thing he could say, under the circumstances. Then I suppose it'll be all right.'

`In what way?' said Connie, looking into her father's eyes. They were big blue eyes rather like her own, but with a certain uneasiness in them, a look sometimes of an uneasy little boy, sometimes a look of sullen selfishness, usually good-humoured and wary.

`You can present Clifford with an heir to all the Chatterleys, and put another baronet in Wragby.'

Sir Malcolm's face smiled with a half-sensual smile.

`But I don't think I want to,' she said.

`Why not? Feeling entangled with the other man? Well! If you want the truth from me, my child, it's this. The world goes on. Wragby stands and will go on standing. The world is more or less a fixed thing and, externally, we have to adapt ourselves to it. Privately, in my private opinion, we can please ourselves. Emotions change. You may like one man this year and another next. But Wragby still stands. Stick by Wragby as far as Wragby sticks by you. Then please yourself. But you'll get very little out of making a break. You can make a break if you wish. You have an independent income, the only thing that never lets you down. But you won't get much out of it. Put a little baronet in Wragby. It's an amusing thing to do.'

And Sir Malcolm sat back and smiled again. Connie did not answer.

`I hope you had a real man at last,' he said to her after a while, sensually alert.

`I did. That's the trouble. There aren't many of them about,' she said.

`No, by God!' he mused. `There aren't! Well, my dear, to look at you, he was a lucky man. Surely he wouldn't make trouble for you?'

`Oh no! He leaves me my own mistress entirely.'

`Quite! Quite! A genuine man would.'

Sir Malcolm was pleased. Connie was his favourite daughter, he had always liked the female in her. Not so much of her mother in her as in Hilda. And he had always disliked Clifford. So he was pleased, and very tender with his daughter, as if the unborn child were his child.

He drove with her to Hartland's hotel, and saw her installed: then went round to his club. She had refused his company for the evening.

She found a letter from Mellors.

I won't come round to your hotel, but I'll wait for you outside the Golden Cock in Adam Street at seven.
There he stood, tall and slender, and so different, in a formal suit of thin dark cloth. He had a natural distinction, but he had not the cut-to-pattern look of her class. Yet, she saw at once, he could go anywhere. He had a native breeding which was really much nicer than the cut-to-pattern class thing.
`Ah, there you are! How well you look!'

`Yes! But not you.'

She looked in his face anxiously. It was thin, and the cheekbones showed. But his eyes smiled at her, and she felt at home with him. There it was: suddenly, the tension of keeping up her appearances fell from her. Something flowed out of him physically, that made her feel inwardly at ease and happy, at home. With a woman's now alert instinct for happiness, she registered it at once. `I'm happy when he's there!' Not all the sunshine of Venice had given her this inward expansion and warmth.

`Was it horrid for you?' she asked as she sat opposite him at table. He was too thin; she saw it now. His hand lay as she knew it, with the curious loose forgottenness of a sleeping animal. She wanted so much to take it and kiss it. But she did not quite dare.

`People are always horrid,' he said.

`And did you mind very much?'

`I minded, as I always shall mind. And I knew I was a fool to mind.'

`Did you feel like a dog with a tin can tied to its tail? Clifford said you felt like that.'

He looked at her. It was cruel of her at that moment: for his pride had suffered bitterly.

`I suppose I did,' he said.

She never knew the fierce bitterness with which he resented insult.

There was a long pause.

`And did you miss me?' she asked.

`I was glad you were out of it.'

Again there was a pause.

`But did people believe about you and me?' she asked.

`No! I don't think so for a moment.'

`Did Clifford?'

`I should say not. He put it off without thinking about it. But naturally it made him want to see the last of me.'

`I'm going to have a child.'

The expression died utterly out of his face, out of his whole body. He looked at her with darkened eyes, whose look she could not understand at all: like some dark-flamed spirit looking at her.

`Say you're glad!' she pleaded, groping for his hand. And she saw a certain exultance spring up in him. But it was netted down by things she could not understand.

`It's the future,' he said.

`But aren't you glad?' she persisted.

`I have such a terrible mistrust of the future.'

`But you needn't be troubled by any responsibility. Clifford would have it as his own, he'd be glad.'

She saw him go pale, and recoil under this. He did not answer.

`Shall I go back to Clifford and put a little baronet into Wragby?' she asked.

He looked at her, pale and very remote. The ugly little grin flickered on his face.

`You wouldn't have to tell him who the father was?'

`Oh!' she said; `he'd take it even then, if I wanted him to.'

He thought for a time.

`Ay!' he said at last, to himself. `I suppose he would.'

There was silence. A big gulf was between them.

`But you don't want me to go back to Clifford, do you?' she asked him.

`What do you want yourself?' he replied.

`I want to live with you,' she said simply.

In spite of himself, little flames ran over his belly as he heard her say it, and he dropped his head. Then he looked up at her again, with those haunted eyes.

`If it's worth it to you,' he said. `I've got nothing.'

`You've got more than most men. Come, you know it,' she said.

`In one way, I know it.' He was silent for a time, thinking. Then he resumed: `They used to say I had too much of the woman in me. But it's not that. I'm not a woman not because I don't want to shoot birds, neither because I don't want to make money, or get on. I could have got on in the army, easily, but I didn't like the army. Though I could manage the men all right: they liked me and they had a bit of a holy fear of me when I got mad. No, it was stupid, dead-handed higher authority that made the army dead: absolutely fool-dead. I like men, and men like me. But I can't stand the twaddling bossy impudence of the people who run this world. That's why I can't get on. I hate the impudence of money, and I hate the impudence of class. So in the world as it is, what have I to offer a woman?'

`But why offer anything? It's not a bargain. It's just that we love one another,' she said.

`Nay, nay! It's more than that. Living is moving and moving on. My life won't go down the proper gutters, it just won't. So I'm a bit of a waste ticket by myself. And I've no business to take a woman into my life, unless my life does something and gets somewhere, inwardly at least, to keep us both fresh. A man must offer a woman some meaning in his life, if it's going to be an isolated life, and if she's a genuine woman. I can't be just your male concubine.'

`Why not?' she said.

`Why, because I can't. And you would soon hate it.'

`As if you couldn't trust me,' she said.

The grin flickered on his face.

`The money is yours, the position is yours, the decisions will lie with you. I'm not just my Lady's fucker, after all.'

`What else are you?'

`You may well ask. It no doubt is invisible. Yet I'm something to myself at least. I can see the point of my own existence, though I can quite understand nobody else's seeing it.'

`And will your existence have less point, if you live with me?'

He paused a long time before replying:

`It might.'

She too stayed to think about it.

`And what is the point of your existence?'

`I tell you, it's invisible. I don't believe in the world, not in money, nor in advancement, nor in the future of our civilization. If there's got to be a future for humanity, there'll have to be a very big change from what now is.'

`And what will the real future have to be like?'

`God knows! I can feel something inside me, all mixed up with a lot of rage. But what it really amounts to, I don't know.'

`Shall I tell you?' she said, looking into his face. `Shall I tell you what you have that other men don't have, and that will make the future? Shall I tell you?'

`Tell me then,' he replied.

`It's the courage of your own tenderness, that's what it is: like when you put your hand on my tail and say I've got a pretty tail.'

The grin came flickering on his face.

`That!' he said.

Then he sat thinking.

`Ay!' he said. `You're right. It's that really. It's that all the way through. I knew it with the men. I had to be in touch with them, physically, and not go back on it. I had to be bodily aware of them and a bit tender to them, even if I put em through hell. It's a question of awareness, as Buddha said. But even he fought shy of the bodily awareness, and that natural physical tenderness, which is the best, even between men; in a proper manly way. Makes 'em really manly, not so monkeyish. Ay! it's tenderness, really; it's cunt-awareness. Sex is really only touch, the closest of all touch. And it's touch we're afraid of. We're only half-conscious, and half alive. We've got to come alive and aware. Especially the English have got to get into touch with one another, a bit delicate and a bit tender. It's our crying need.'

She looked at him.

`Then why are you afraid of me?' she said.

He looked at her a long time before he answered.

`It's the money, really, and the position. It's the world in you.'

`But isn't there tenderness in me?' she said wistfully.

He looked down at her, with darkened, abstract eyes.

`Ay! It comes an' goes, like in me.'

`But can't you trust it between you and me?' she asked, gazing anxiously at him.

She saw his face all softening down, losing its armour. `Maybe!' he said. They were both silent.

`I want you to hold me in your arms,' she said. `I want you to tell me you are glad we are having a child.'

She looked so lovely and warm and wistful, his bowels stirred towards her.

`I suppose we can go to my room,' he said. `Though it's scandalous again.'

But she saw the forgetfulness of the world coming over him again, his face taking the soft, pure look of tender passion.

They walked by the remoter streets to Coburg Square, where he had a room at the top of the house, an attic room where he cooked for himself on a gas ring. It was small, but decent and tidy.

She took off her things, and made him do the same. She was lovely in the soft first flush of her pregnancy.

`I ought to leave you alone,' he said.

`No!' she said. `Love me! Love me, and say you'll keep me. Say you'll keep me! Say you'll never let me go, to the world nor to anybody.'

She crept close against him, clinging fast to his thin, strong naked body, the only home she had ever known.

`Then I'll keep thee,' he said. `If tha wants it, then I'll keep thee.'

He held her round and fast.

`And say you're glad about the child,' she repeated.

`Kiss it! Kiss my womb and say you're glad it's there.'

But that was more difficult for him.

`I've a dread of puttin' children i' th' world,' he said. `I've such a dread o' th' future for 'em.'

`But you've put it into me. Be tender to it, and that will be its future already. Kiss it!'

He quivered, because it was true. `Be tender to it, and that will be its future.'---At that moment he felt a sheer love for the woman. He kissed her belly and her mound of Venus, to kiss close to the womb and the foetus within the womb.

`Oh, you love me! You love me!' she said, in a little cry like one of her blind, inarticulate love cries. And he went in to her softly, feeling the stream of tenderness flowing in release from his bowels to hers, the bowels of compassion kindled between them.

And he realized as he went into her that this was the thing he had to do, to e into tender touch, without losing his pride or his dignity or his integrity as a man. After all, if she had money and means, and he had none, he should be too proud and honourable to hold back his tenderness from her on that account. `I stand for the touch of bodily awareness between human beings,' he said to himself, `and the touch of tenderness. And she is my mate. And it is a battle against the money, and the machine, and the insentient ideal monkeyishness of the world. And she will stand behind me there. Thank God I've got a woman! Thank God I've got a woman who is with me, and tender and aware of me. Thank God she's not a bully, nor a fool. Thank God she's a tender, aware woman.' And as his seed sprang in her, his soul sprang towards her too, in the creative act that is far more than procreative.

She was quite determined now that there should be no parting between him and her. But the ways and means were still to settle.

`Did you hate Bertha Coutts?' she asked him.

`Don't talk to me about her.'

`Yes! You must let me. Because once you liked her. And once you were as intimate with her as you are with me. So you have to tell me. Isn't it rather terrible, when you've been intimate with her, to hate her so? Why is it?'

`I don't know. She sort of kept her will ready against me, always, always: her ghastly female will: her freedom! A woman's ghastly freedom that ends in the most beastly bullying! Oh, she always kept her freedom against me, like vitriol in my face.'

`But she's not free of you even now. Does she still love you?'

`No, no! If she's not free of me, it's because she's got that mad rage, she must try to bully me.'

`But she must have loved you.'

`No! Well, in specks she did. She was drawn to me. And I think even that she hated. She loved me in moments. But she always took it back, and started bullying. Her deepest desire was to bully me, and there was no altering her. Her will was wrong, from the first.'

`But perhaps she felt you didn't really love her, and she wanted to make you.'

`My God, it was bloody making.'

`But you didn't really love her, did you? You did her that wrong.'

`How could I? I began to. I began to love her. But somehow, she always ripped me up. No, don't let's talk of it. It was a doom, that was. And she was a doomed woman. This last time, I'd have shot her like I shoot a stoat, if I'd but been allowed: a raving, doomed thing in the shape of a woman! If only I could have shot her, and ended the whole misery! It ought to be allowed. When a woman gets absolutely possessed by her own will, her own will set against everything, then it's fearful, and she should be shot at last.'

`And shouldn't men be shot at last, if they get possessed by their own will?'

`Ay!---the same! But I must get free of her, or she'll be at me again. I wanted to tell you. I must get a divorce if I possibly can. So we must be careful. We mustn't really be seen together, you and I. I never, never could stand it if she came down on me and you.'

Connie pondered this.

`Then we can't be together?' she said.

`Not for six months or so. But I think my divorce will go through in September; then till March.'

`But the baby will probably be born at the end of February,' she said.

He was silent.

`I could wish the Cliffords and Berthas all dead,' he said.

`It's not being very tender to them,' she said.

`Tender to them? Yea, even then the tenderest thing you could do for them, perhaps, would be to give them death. They can't live! They only frustrate life. Their souls are awful inside them. Death ought to be sweet to them. And I ought to be allowed to shoot them.'

`But you wouldn't do it,' she said.

`I would though! and with less qualms than I shoot a weasel. It anyhow has a prettiness and a loneliness. But they are legion. Oh, I'd shoot them.'

`Then perhaps it is just as well you daren't.'

`Well.'

Connie had now plenty to think of. It was evident he wanted absolutely to be free of Bertha Coutts. And she felt he was right. The last attack had been too grim.---This meant her living alone, till spring. Perhaps she could get divorced from Clifford. But how? If Mellors were named, then there was an end to his divorce. How loathsome! Couldn't one go right away, to the far ends of the earth, and be free from it all?

One could not. The far ends of the world are not five minutes from Charing Cross, nowadays. While the wireless is active, there are no far ends of the earth. Kings of Dahomey and Lamas of Tibet listen in to London and New York.

Patience! Patience! The world is a vast and ghastly intricacy of mechanism, and one has to be very wary, not to get mangled by it.

Connie confided in her father.

`You see, Father, he was Clifford's game-keeper: but he was an officer in the army in India. Only he is like Colonel C. E. Florence, who preferred to become a private soldier again.'

Sir Malcolm, however, had no sympathy with the unsatisfactory mysticism of the famous C. E. Florence. He saw too much advertisement behind all the humility. It looked just like the sort of conceit the knight most loathed, the conceit of self-abasement.

`Where did your game-keeper spring from?' asked Sir Malcolm irritably.

`He was a collier's son in Tevershall. But he's absolutely presentable.'

The knighted artist became more angry.

`Looks to me like a gold-digger,' he said. `And you're a pretty easy gold-mine, apparently.'

`No, Father, it's not like that. You'd know if you saw him. He's a man. Clifford always detested him for not being humble.'

`Apparently he had a good instinct, for once.'

What Sir Malcolm could not bear was the scandal of his daughter's having an intrigue with a game-keeper. He did not mind the intrigue: he minded the scandal.

`I care nothing about the fellow. He's evidently been able to get round you all right. But, by God, think of all the talk. Think of your step-mother how she'll take it!'

`I know,' said Connie. `Talk is beastly: especially if you live in society. And he wants so much to get his own divorce. I thought we might perhaps say it was another man's child, and not mention Mellors' name at all.'

`Another man's! What other man's?'

`Perhaps Duncan Forbes. He has been our friend all his life.'

`And he's a fairly well-known artist. And he's fond of me.'

`Well I'm damned! Poor Duncan! And what's he going to get out of it?'

`I don't know. But he might rather like it, even.'

`He might, might he? Well, he's a funny man if he does. Why, you've never even had an affair with him, have you?'

`No! But he doesn't really want it. He only loves me to be near him, but not to touch him.'

`My God, what a generation!'

`He would like me most of all to be a model for him to paint from. Only I never wanted to.'

`God help him! But he looks down-trodden enough for anything.'

`Still, you wouldn't mind so much the talk about him?'

`My God, Connie, all the bloody contriving!'

`I know! It's sickening! But what can I do?'

`Contriving, conniving; conniving, contriving! Makes a man think he's lived too long.'

`Come, Father, if you haven't done a good deal of contriving and conniving in your time, you may talk.'

`But it was different, I assure you.'

`It's always different.'

Hilda arrived, also furious when she heard of the new developments. And she also simply could not stand the thought of a public scandal about her sister and a game-keeper. Too, too humiliating!

`Why should we not just disappear, separately, to British Columbia, and have no scandal?' said Connie.

But that was no good. The scandal would come out just the same. And if Connie was going with the man, she'd better be able to marry him. This was Hilda's opinion. Sir Malcolm wasn't sure. The affair might still blow over.

`But will you see him, Father?'

Poor Sir Malcolm! he was by no means keen on it. And poor Mellors, he was still less keen. Yet the meeting took place: a lunch in a private room at the club, the two men alone, looking one another up and down.

Sir Malcolm drank a fair amount of whisky, Mellors also drank. And they talked all the while about India, on which the young man was well informed.

This lasted during the meal. Only when coffee was served, and the waiter had gone, Sir Malcolm lit a cigar and said, heartily:

`Well, young man, and what about my daughter?'

The grin flickered on Mellors' face.

`Well, Sir, and what about her?'

`You've got a baby in her all right.'

`I have that honour!' grinned Mellors.

`Honour, by God!' Sir Malcolm gave a little squirting laugh, and became Scotch and lewd. `Honour! How was the going, eh? Good, my boy, what?'

`Good!'

`I'll bet it was! Ha-ha! My daughter, chip of the old block, what! I never went back on a good bit of fucking, myself. Though her mother, oh, holy saints!' He rolled his eyes to heaven. `But you warmed her up, oh, you warmed her up, I can see that. Ha-ha! My blood in her! You set fire to her haystack all right. Ha-ha-ha! I was jolly glad of it, I can tell you. She needed it. Oh, she's a nice girl, she's a nice girl, and I knew she'd be good going, if only some damned man would set her stack on fire! Ha-ha-ha! A game-keeper, eh, my boy! Bloody good poacher, if you ask me. Ha-ha! But now, look here, speaking seriously, what are we going to do about it? Speaking seriously, you know!'

Speaking seriously, they didn't get very far. Mellors, though a little tipsy, was much the soberer of the two. He kept the conversation as intelligent as possible: which isn't saying much.

`So you're a game-keeper! Oh, you're quite right! That sort of game is worth a man's while, eh, what? The test of a woman is when you pinch her bottom. You can tell just by the feel of her bottom if she's going to come up all right. Ha-ha! I envy you, my boy. How old are you?'

`Thirty-nine.'

The knight lifted his eyebrows.

`As much as that! Well, you've another good twenty years, by the look of you. Oh, game-keeper or not, you're a good cock. I can see that with one eye shut. Not like that blasted Clifford! A lily-livered hound with never a fuck in him, never had. I like you, my boy, I'll bet you've a good cod on you; oh, you're a bantam, I can see that. You're a fighter. Game-keeper! Ha-ha, by crikey, I wouldn't trust my game to you! But look here, seriously, what are we going to do about it? The world's full of blasted old women.'

Seriously, they didn't do anything about it, except establish the old free-masonry of male sensuality between them.

`And look here, my boy, if ever I can do anything for you, you can rely on me. Game-keeper! Christ, but it's rich! I like it! Oh, I like it! Shows the girl's got spunk. What? After all, you know, she has her own income, moderate, moderate, but above starvation. And I'll leave her what I've got. By God, I will. She deserves it for showing spunk, in a world of old women. I've been struggling to get myself clear of the skirts of old women for seventy years, and haven't managed it yet. But you're the man, I can see that.'

`I'm glad you think so. They usually tell me, in a sideways fashion, that I'm the monkey.'

`Oh, they would! My dear fellow, what could you be but a monkey, to all the old women?'

They parted most genially, and Mellors laughed inwardly all the time for the rest of the day.

The following day he had lunch with Connie and Hilda, at some discreet place.

`It's a very great pity it's such an ugly situation all round,' said Hilda.

`I had a lot o' fun out of it,' said he.

`I think you might have avoided putting children into the world until you were both free to marry and have children.'

`The Lord blew a bit too soon on the spark,' said he.

`I think the Lord had nothing to do with it. Of course, Connie has enough money to keep you both, but the situation is unbearable.'

`But then you don't have to bear more than a small corner of it, do you?' said he.

`If you'd been in her own class.'

`Or if I'd been in a cage at the Zoo.'

There was silence.

`I think,' said Hilda, `it will be best if she names quite another man as co-respondent and you stay out of it altogether.'

`But I thought I'd put my foot right in.'

`I mean in the divorce proceedings.'

He gazed at her in wonder. Connie had not dared mention the Duncan scheme to him.

`I don't follow,' he said.

`We have a friend who would probably agree to be named as co-respondent, so that your name need not appear,' said Hilda.

`You mean a man?'

`Of course!'

`But she's got no other?'

He looked in wonder at Connie.

`No, no!' she said hastily. `Only that old friendship, quite simple, no love.'

`Then why should the fellow take the blame? If he's had nothing out of you?'

`Some men are chivalrous and don't only count what they get out of a woman,' said Hilda.

`One for me, eh? But who's the johnny?'

`A friend whom we've known since we were children in Scotland, an artist.'

`Duncan Forbes!' he said at once, for Connie had talked to him. `And how would you shift the blame on to him?'

`They could stay together in some hotel, or she could even stay in his apartment.'

`Seems to me like a lot of fuss for nothing,' he said.

`What else do you suggest?' said Hilda. `If your name appears, you will get no divorce from your wife, who is apparently quite an impossible person to be mixed up with.'

`All that!' he said grimly.

There was a long silence.

`We could go right away,' he said.

`There is no right away for Connie,' said Hilda. `Clifford is too well known.'

Again the silence of pure frustration.

`The world is what it is. If you want to live together without being persecuted, you will have to marry. To marry, you both have to be divorced. So how are you both going about it?'

He was silent for a long time.

`How are you going about it for us?' he said.

`We will see if Duncan will consent to figure as co-respondent: then we must get Clifford to divorce Connie: and you must go on with your divorce, and you must both keep apart till you are free.'

`Sounds like a lunatic asylum.'

`Possibly! And the world would look on you as lunatics: or worse.;

`What is worse?'

`Criminals, I suppose.'

`Hope I can plunge in the dagger a few more times yet,' he said, grinning. Then he was silent, and angry.

`Well!' he said at last. `I agree to anything. The world is a raving idiot, and no man can kill it: though I'll do my best. But you re right. We must rescue ourselves as best we can.'

He looked in humiliation, anger, weariness and misery at Connie.

`Ma lass!' he said. `The world's goin' to put salt on thy tail.'

`Not if we don't let it,' she said.

She minded this conniving against the world less than he did.

Duncan, when approached, also insisted on seeing the delinquent game-keeper, so there was a dinner, this time in his flat: the four of them. Duncan was a rather short, broad, dark-skinned, taciturn Hamlet of a fellow with straight black hair and a weird Celtic conceit of himself. His art was all tubes and valves and spirals and strange colours, ultra-modern, yet with a certain power, even a certain purity of form and tone: only Mellors thought it cruel and repellent. He did not venture to say so, for Duncan was almost insane on the point of his art: it was a personal cult, a personal religion with him.

They were looking at the pictures in the studio, and Duncan kept his smallish brown eyes on the other man. He wanted to hear what the game-keeper would say. He knew already Connie's and Hilda's opinions.

`It is like a pure bit of murder,' said Mellors at last; a speech Duncan by no means expected from a game-keeper.

`And who is murdered?' asked Hilda, rather coldly and sneeringly.

`Me! It murders all the bowels of compassion in a man.'

A wave of pure hate came out of the artist. He heard the note of dislike in the other man's voice, and the note of contempt. And he himself loathed the mention of bowels of compassion. Sickly sentiment!

Mellors stood rather tall and thin, worn-looking, gazing with flickering detachment that was something like the dancing of a moth on the wing, at the pictures.

`Perhaps stupidity is murdered; sentimental stupidity,' sneered the artist.

`Do you think so? I think all these tubes and corrugated vibrations are stupid enough for anything, and pretty sentimental. They show a lot of self-pity and an awful lot of nervous self-opinion, seems to me.'

In another wave of hate the artist's face looked yellow. But with a sort of silent hauteur he turned the pictures to the wall.

`I think we may go to the dining-room,' he said. And they trailed off, dismally.

After coffee, Duncan said:

`I don't at all mind posing as the father of Connie's child. But only on the condition that she'll come and pose as a model for me. I've wanted her for years, and she's always refused.' He uttered it with the dark finality of an inquisitor announcing an auto da fe.

`Ah!' said Mellors. `You only do it on condition, then?'

`Quite! I only do it on that condition.' The artist tried to put the utmost contempt of the other person into his speech. He put a little too much.

`Better have me as a model at the same time,' said Mellors. `Better do us in a group, Vulcan and Venus under the net of art. I used to be a blacksmith, before I was a game-keeper.'

`Thank you,' said the artist. `I don't think Vulcan has a figure that interests me.'

`Not even if it was tubified and titivated up?'

There was no answer. The artist was too haughty for further words.

It was a dismal party, in which the artist henceforth steadily ignored the presence of the other man, and talked only briefly, as if the words were wrung out of the depths of his gloomy portentousness, to the women.

`You didn't like him, but he's better than that, really. He's really kind,' Connie explained as they left.

`He's a little black pup with a corrugated distemper,' said Mellors.

`No, he wasn't nice today.'

`And will you go and be a model to him?'

`Oh, I don't really mind any more. He won't touch me. And I don't mind anything, if it paves the way to a life together for you and me.'

`But he'll only shit on you on canvas.'

`I don't care. He'll only be painting his own feelings for me, and I don't mind if he does that. I wouldn't have him touch me, not for anything. But if he thinks he can do anything with his owlish arty staring, let him stare. He can make as many empty tubes and corrugations out of me as he likes. It's his funeral. He hated you for what you said: that his tubified art is sentimental and self-important. But of course it's true.'

她再也不都犹豫了。她决定星期六(他离开勒格贝的那天也是星期六)离开威尼斯。她将于下星期一到伦敦，地她便可以会见他了，她给他写了一封信，寄到他的伦敦的地址去，要他回信到哈兰饭店，并且星期一晚上七点到那儿去会她。

她心里感到一种奇异的复杂的愤怒，她所有的感应都好象麻木了。她甚至对希尔达也不愿告以心事，希尔达呢，对她的这种固执的大不高光，很亲切地跟一个荷兰女人交好起来，康妮觉得女人与女人之间这种有点闷抑的亲切是可憎的；反之，希尔达却趋之难不恐不及。

麦尔肯爵士决意和康妮一路回去，旦肯将陪希尔达回来。这老艺术家是养尊处优贯了的人，他买了两张“东方快画”的卧铺票，虽然康妮并不喜欢奢侈的卧车和那种车里的庸俗腐败的氛围。然而坐这种车到巴黎快一些。

麦尔肯爵士回家去见太太时，总是心中局促不安的。这是他的一第一位太太在世的时候传下来的习惯了。但是家里将举行一个松鸡的游猎会，他要及时赶到。阳光晒赤了的美丽的康妮，默默地坐着，把沿作宾景色全都忘了。

“回勒格贝去，你觉得有点烦闷的。”她的父亲看到她的郁郁不快的情形时说。

“我还说不定是要回勒格贝去呢。”她骤然地说，两只蓝色的大眼睛望着她父亲，他的蓝色的大眼睛，显着一个良心有疚的人的惊愕神情。

“你的意思是说要在巴黎待一下么？”

“不！我是说永不回勒格贝去。”

他老人家自己的小烦恼已经够受了，他衷心希望不要再担负她的烦恼。

“这是怎么说的，这么突然？”他问道。

“我要有个孩子了。”

这句话是她第一次对人说的，她的生命好象也随着这句话而裂成两片了。

“你怎么知道呢？”她的父亲问道。

她微笑着。

“我怎么知道！”

“当然不是克利福的孩子呢？”

“对！是另一个人的。

她觉得有点快意地使他捉摸不住地焦急起来。

“我认识那个人么？”麦尔肯爵士问道。

“不！你从来没有见过他。”

静默了很久以后，他说：

“你打算怎样呢？”

“我不知道，问题也就在这儿。”

“没法子跟克利福商量解决么？”

“我想克利福定发受孩子的。”康妮说；“前回你跟他谈话后，他对我说过，假如我有个孩子的话，他决不会介意的，只要我审慎行事。”

“在这种情况下，这是他唯一的有理智的话，以我想事情是没有什么问题了。”

“怎么见得？”康妮直望着她父亲的眼睛说，她父亲的眼睛，有点象她自己的，又蓝又大，但是笼罩着某种不安的神情，有时象个不安的幼童的眼睛，有时带着那乖僻自私的样子，通常是欢乐的，小心翼翼的。

“你可以给克利福一个查太莱姓的传宗接代的人，而且在勒格贝安置另一个小男爵。”

麦尔肯爵士的脸孔上显着半肉感的微笑。

“但我想我是不愿意的。”她说。

“为什么不？难道你觉得牵挂着那另一个人么？喂！我的孩子，让我告诉你一点真话吧。世界是赓续下去的。勒格贝存在着，它将继续存在，世界多少是固定的，我们表面上不得不去适应客观存在。在么认上说，我个人的意见是：我们喜怎样便可怎样。情感是变动的，你今年可以喜欢这人，明年喜欢另一个。但是勒格贝却继续存在着，只要勒格贝忠于你，你便要忠于勒格贝，此外，你什么都可以随意，但是如果你把事情破坏了，你不会得到多大好处的，人要是喜欢破坏的话，你尽可破坏，你有你个人的收入，这是一个人唯一可以依赖的东西，但是破坏了于你是没有多大好处的，给勒格贝一个小男爵：这是件好玩的事情。”

麦尔肯爵士重新微笑起来，康妮一声不响。

“我希望你终于得到一个真正的男人了。”过了一会他对她说道，肉感地生气勃然。

“是的，我实在得到了。不过烦恼也就在这儿。世上真正的男人是罕有的。”她说。

“啊，天！这是真的。他沉思着说：“的确罕有！那么，我亲爱的，瞧你这这个样子，他是个幸福的人，他决不会给你什么烦恼吧？”

“啊！不！他完全让我自主。”

“自然啦！自然啦！一个真男子应该是这样的。”

麦尔肯爵士心里觉得高兴。康妮是他的宠女，他一向就喜欢她的女性，她肖母亲的地方不象希尔达那么多，而他是一向讨厌克利福的，所以他高兴，他对他的女儿表示着慈蔼的温情，仿佛那未出世的孩子是他的。

他陪她乘车到哈兰饭店去，看她一切安顿了后，才到他的惧乐部去，她说晚上用不着他来陪她。

她得到了梅乐干的一封信。

我不愿到你的饭店里，但是我七点钟在亚当街的金鸡咖啡店的门前候你。

他在那儿等着她，瘦长的身躯，穿着一套薄薄的黑礼服，使他显得非常异要。他有一种自然的卓越的神气，但是没有她那个阶级的人的依式定做的样儿，虽然，她马上瞧出了他是可以到处出头的人。他有一种天生的仪态，那确是楷依式定做的阶级的东西好得多。

“呀！你来了！你的气色真好啊！”

“是的！可是你的便不见得好。”

她不安地望着他的脸，他瘦了，他的颧骨显露出来，但是他的眼睛向她微笑着，她觉得与他是毫无隔阂的。突然。她的维持外表的力量松懈了。一种肉体上的什么东西，从他泛溢出来，那使她的内心觉得安泰、快乐而无羁。她的追求幸福的锐敏的女子本这，立即告诉她：他在时，我是快乐的！威尼斯的所有阳光，并没有给过她这种内在的焕发与温暖。

“那件事使你觉得太可怖了吧？”当他们在一张桌子边相对着坐下后，她问道。

“人们总是可怖的。”他说，他太瘦了，她现在看出来了，她看见了他的手，和从前一般，象个人睡了的兽类似的，带着士种奇异的忘乎所以的态度放在桌上。她真想拿来亲吻。但是她不太有这胆量。

“你难过得很吧？”她说。

“是的，我觉得难过，而难过的日子还有呢。我知道我的觉得难过是愚蠢的。”

“你是不是觉得象一只尾巴上缚了个锡罐的狗？克利福说你有那样的神气呢。”

他望着她。此刻对他说这种话，是太残忍了：因为他的自尊心曾受过很大的苦楚。

“我想是的。”他说。

她决不知道侮辱对他所引起的狂暴的苦叶泊愤恨呢。

他们沉默了好一会。

“你怀念我不？”她问道。

“我高兴你远远离那一切。”

他们重新沉默着。

“但是，人们相信不相信你和我的事情？”她问道。

“不！我决不以为他们会相信的。”

“克利福呢？”

“我想他也不，他把事情搁在一边不去想它，但是，当然，那使他永不愿再见我的面了。”

“我就要有个孩子了。”

他脸上的、全身的表情全死了，他两只阴郁的眼睛望着她，这种注视是使她莫明其妙的：这象是一种火焰的灵魂在望着她。

“告诉我你高兴吧！”她握着他的手恳求道。她看见某种得胜的狂喜，从他的心里流溢出来，但是这种狂喜是给一种她所不明白的东西网结着的。

“那是个将来。”他说。

“难道你不高兴么？”她坚持着说。

“我是很不信任将来的。”

“但是你不必烦恼要负什么责任的，克利福将接受这个孩子如同已出一般，他一定要高兴的。”

她看见他听了这个话苍白在而退缩起来，他不答一词。

“你要我回到克利福那里去，而给勒格贝生个小男婴么？”她问道。

他望着她，又苍白又疏远，那狞恶的微微的苦笑挂在他的脸上。

“你不必告诉他谁是父亲吧！”

“啊！”她说，甚至我告诉他，他也要接受这个孩子的。”

他思索了一会。

“是的！”他最后自言自语地说，他也要的。”

他们静默着，他们中间好象有个阔大的深渊似的。

“但是你不愿我回克利福那儿去吧，是不是？”她问他说。

“你自己愿意怎样呢？”

“我愿和你同居。”她简单地说。

他听了这话，情不自禁地觉得一些小火焰在他的小腹上奔驰而过，他把头垂下了，然后用他那阴郁的眼睛再望着她。

“要是你觉得值得的话。”他说，“我是毫无所有的人。”

“你有的东西比大多数的男子更多，算了，你自己是知道的。”她说。

“是的，在某种程度上我是知道的。”他静思了一会，然后继续说：“人家一向说我的女性太浓了，但是这话是不真实的，我不女性并不因为我不喜欢射杀鸟儿，也不是因为我不喜欢弄钱或不喜欢往上爬。我在军队里要往上爬本来是很容易的，但是我却不喜欢军队，虽然我很可以驾驭男子们，他们也喜欢我，而当我发起脾气来的时候，他们便要怕神怕鬼似的怕我。咳，军队之所以是个死东西，绝对地呆笨的死东西，就是那愚昧的、机械的、上峰的权威所造成的。我喜欢男子们，而男子们也喜欢我，但是我就忍受不了那班经营这世界的人们的呓语和摆嗅架子的无耻。这便是我不能上进的缘故，我恨金钱的无耻行为，我恨阶级的无耻行为，在这种世界里，我还有什么可以献给一个女子的东西？”

“但是为什么要献给什么东西呢？那又不是一个交易，我们不过是互相钟爱罢了。”她说。

“不！不！事情不是这么简单的，生活便是前进，我的生命不愿就适当的轨道，简直不愿。所以我是有点象废物似的，我没有权利使一个女子进入我的生活，除非我的生活有所作为有所成就一至少是内在地，能使我们俩常觉新鲜奋发。男子应该把他生活中的下结有意及的东西献给女子，假如这个生活将是孤立的，假如这个女子是个真庄女子！我不能只做你的男性拼妇。”

“为什么不呢？”她说。

“咳，因为我不能，而且你转眼便要厌恨这种生活的。”

“你这话说得好象你不能信赖我似的。”她说。

他苦笑丰。

“钱是你的，社会地位是你的，一切将由你主决，。总之，我只是太太的内满足者罢了。”

“此外你还是什么呢？”

“我不怪你疑问。无疑地那是看不见的。可是，我对于自己，并不妄自轻贱。我明白我自己的生存的意义，虽然我也很了解旁人是不明白的。

“难道和我同居后，你的生存的意义便要减少了么？”

他停了很久才答道：

“也许；”

她也迟地思索着。

“什么是你的生存的意义呢？”

“我告诉你，那是看不见的。我不相信世界，我不相信金钱，我不相信进步，我不相信我们的文明的将来，假如人类是有个将来的话，那便得有个大大的变换。”

“那么真正的将来是怎样的呢？”

“上帝才知道！我觉得我的心里有一种什么东西和无限的愤怒混合着。但是那确切是什么，我却不知道。”

“我要我告诉你么？”她望着他的脸说，你要我告诉你有的是什么东西么？那是他人所没有的，而且是创造将来的东西，你要我告诉你么？”

“告诉我吧，”他答道。

“那是你自己的温情的勇气；当你的手放在我的臀互，说我有个美丽的臀部的时候，便是那个东西。”

他的脸上显着苦笑。

“对了！”他说。

然后他静默地想着。

“是的！”他说，“你说得对。就是那个。全是那个！在我和男子们的关系中，我感觉到这个东西，我不得不肉体地和他们接触，而且不能退缩。我得内地对他们醒悟，而且对他们表示一点温情，甚至当我使他们痛苦折磨的时候对于肉体的醒悟和自然的肉体的温情也羞怯退缩，而这醒悟和温情却是最善的——甚至在男子与男中间。男子之所以刚强勇敢，而不是一些猿猴，也就因为那种东西。是的！那是温情的，的确；那是性的醒悟。性爱实在只是一种接触，一切接触中最密切的接触。而我们所惧怕的使是接触。我们只醒悟了一半，生活着一半，我们得完全地生活和醒悟。尤其是我们英国人得用点温情与辛勤；互相接触起来，这是我们的迫切的需要。”

她望着他。

“那么你为什么惧怕我呢？”她说。

他望着她很久才答道：

“那是因为你的金钱和你的地位，那是因为你所有的世界”“但是我难道没有温情么？康妮热劲地问道：

他阴郁地，心不在焉地望着她。

“是的！有的！时来时去，和我自己一样。”

“但是你难道不能信任这温情在人和我之间存在么？”她焦虑地凝视着他问道。

她看见他的脸色温和了下来，那抵抗的神气渐渐地失掉下”

“也让”他说。

两个人都静默着。

“我要你把我抱在你的怀里，”她说，“我要你对我说，你高兴我们将有个孩子了。”

她是这样的美丽，这样的温暖，这样的热切，他的脏腑为她骚动起来了。

“我想我们可以到我房子里去吧，”他说，“虽然这又是件令人谤的事情。”

她看见又把世界忘怀了，他的脸孔现着温柔的、热情的、柔媚面纯洁的光彩。。

他们沿着偏僻的街道走到高堡广场。他的房子在最高的一层，是个屋顶楼房，整洁而大方，他有个煤气炉自己烧煮着食物。

她把自己的衣裳脱了，叫他也把他的脱了，初期怀孕中的温软鲜丽的她，是动人的。

“我不应该烦扰你。”他说。

“别说这话！”她说，“疼爱我吧！疼爱我，说你不会丢弃我吧！说你不会丢弃我吧！说你永会让我回到世上去，或回到任何人那里去！”

她倔近他，紧贴着他纤瘦而强壮的裸体一这是她所知道的唯一的栖身处。

“那么我将留着您，”他说，“要是您愿意，我将留着你！”

他紧紧地环抱着她。

“告诉我你高兴有这孩子吧！”她重复地说，“吻吻他吧！吻吻这孩子所在的地方，说人高兴他在那儿吧。”

但是他犹豫着。

“我很惧怕孩子们生在这种世上；我很替他们的将来担心。”

“但是你已经把他放在我的里面了，对、他温柔吧，这便是他的将来了。吻吻他吧！”

他战战栗着，因为那是对的。“对他温柔吧，这便是他的将来了。”一这时，他对她的爱情是绝大的。他吻着她的小腹和好怕美神之丘，他假近着她的子宫和子宫里面的胎儿吻着。

“啊，你是爱我的！你是爱我的！”她细声地呼喊起来，这种呼喊是象她的性讥进时的呼喊一样，盲目的，模糊不清的。她温柔地插进她的里面，觉得温情的波涛，汹涌地从他自已的心肠里流到她的心肠里，两个相怜相爱的心肠在他们间燃烧着。

当他进她的里面去时，他明白了这是他应该做的事情：和她作温情的接触，而保存着他的骄傲、尊严和一个男子的完整。总之，虽则她有钱而他则两袖清风但是让他的骄傲心与正义心，却不容他因此而撤回他对她的温情的。他心里想到：“我拥护人与人间的肉体的醒悟的接触和温情的接触。她是我的伴侣。她授助我和金钱、机械以及世人的兽性的呆钝的理想作战。多谢上帝，我得了个女人了！我得了个又温柔又了解我的女人，和我相聚！多谢上帝，她并不是凶暴的矗妇。多谢上帝，她最个温柔的醒悟的女人。”当他的精液在她里面插射的时候，在这种创造的行为中一那是远地生殖行为的一他的灵魂也向她插射着。

现在，她是完全决定了：他和她是不可分离的了。不过，怎样呢，什么方法呢，那是仍待解决的。

“你恨不恨自黛·古蒂斯？”她问道。

“别对我说起她吧。”

“啊！你得让我说说，因为你曾经喜欢过她；而且你曾经和她亲密过。正如你现在和我一样，所以人得告诉我。在你们间有过这种亲密以后，而恨她到这步田地，可不是有点可怕的么？这是什么缘故？”

“我不知道。她的意志好象无时无刻不在准备着反抗我！咳！她那狞恶的女性的意志，她那自由狂！这种自由狂的结局是最残暴的暴虐！啊，她是拿着她的自由来反对我，好象她把硫酸抛在我脸上一样。”

“但是她甚至现在还没有脱离你呢。她还爱不爱你？”

“不，不！她所以没有放弃我，那是因为她有一种狂恨，她定要伤害我罢了。”

”但是她一定爱过你的。”

“不！唔，有时也许的。她是受我吸引的，我想就这一点也是好汽僧恨的。她有时爱我，但是转间，她便要开始苛刻我。她的最大的欲望便是苛刻我，那是没有法子使她改变的。在一开始的时候；她的意增就是反抗我的。”

“也许那是因为她觉得你并不真正爱她，而她想使你爱她的缘故呢。”

“老天！那是什么念头！”

“但是你不曾真正有过她吧，是不是？这就是你给她的苦头。”

“我有什么法子？我开始想去爱她；但是她总给我钉子碰，不，不要谈论空虚了吧，那是之动运，而她是常识，最近这些日子里，假如人家准我的话，我定把她这具有妇人形式的狂暴的东西象一头野兽似的宰了。假如，可以把她宰了的话，这一切不幸便没有了！人们真应该准许这种去恶除暴的行为。当一个女子地地给好怕固扫诉意志占着的时候，当她的固执的意志在反抗着一切的时候，那就可怖了，那就非把她杀掉不可了。”

“而男子们呢，当他们给固扫诉意志占据着的时候，不也应该把他们杀掉么？”

“是的！一样！……但是我得把她摆脱了，否则将向我重新追迫的。我早就想告诉你，只要可能，我必要离婚。所以我们得小心，你和我，得别让人看见在一起，假如她撞到了你我头上来的时候，我是绝对、绝对忍受不了的。”

康妮沉思着。

“那么我们不能在一起了？”她说。

“大约在六个月脑是不能的。但是我相信我的离婚在九月间便可完成，那么得等到明年三月。”

“但是孩子大概要在二月尾出薛尼。”她说。

他静默了。

“我愿所有克利福和白黛一流人都死尽！”他说。

“你对待他们并没有多大的温情呢。”她说。

“温情对待他们？但是对他们最温情的事也许就是绘他们一个死！他们是不能生活的！他们只知破坏生命。他们体内的灵魂是令人生怖的。死亡于他们应该是甘甜的了。人们应该准我去反他们杀尽才是！”

“但是你决不会这样做的。”她说。

“我一定会！我杀他们比杀一只鼬鼠还要觉得泰然。鼬鼠还有它的孤寂的美。但是他们太多了。啊，假如我可以的话，我定要把他们杀尽。”

“或许你还是不敢那么做的。”“唔。”

康妮现在要想的事情多着了，无疑地他是绝对地想把白黛·古蒂斯摆脱，她觉得他是对的。最后的斗争是太可怕了。那便是说，她将孤独地生活到春天。也许她可以和克利福离婚。但是怎样？假如梅乐士的名字一提起了，那么他那方面的离婚便离不成了。多么讨厌！一个人难道不能一直走到地球的尽头，摆脱这一切么？”

这是不可能的。现在世界的尽头，从伦敦到查宁十字街不过五分钟的距离罢了，只要有无线电，地球是没有远近的。非洲达荷美的王和西藏的喇嘛，都能听着伦敦和纽约呢。

忍耐吧！忍耐吧世界是个广大而可怖的机器网，若要不陷身其中，一个人得好好地小心从事。

康妮把心事告诉她的父亲。

“你知道，爸爸，他是克利福的守猎人，但是他从前是驻印度的军官。不过他是象佛罗佛斯上校似的，他愿意回到从前的阶级里去。”

但是麦尔肯爵士对于这著名的佛罗伦斯的轻薄的神秘主义是没有好感的。他觉得在那许多的谦逊后面宣传的作用太浓厚了。这种自傲的行为一故意自抑的自傲行为，是这老爵士所最讨厌的。

“你的守猎人是打那里跳出来的？”麦尔肯爵士愤愤地问道。

“他是个达娃斯哈的矿工的儿子，但是他是个绝对不会购笑大方的人。”

这位有爵衔的艺术家更加愤怒起来了。

“在我看来，这象是个打金矿的我。”他说，“而你显然是个很容易开采的金矿。”

“不，爸爸你错了，要是你邮过他，你便知道了。他是个真男子。克利福常常厌恶他，就是因为他是毫不屈辱的人。”

“这样看来，克利福倒有个一次不氏蝗本能了。”

麦尔肯爵士所不能堪的，便电报人知道了他的女儿跟一个守猎人私通。这种私通他是不反对的c他只是怕外间的非议罢了。

“那个人怎样，我倒不管。他显然是知道怎样迷惑你的。但是天哟！想想有空的闲话吧！想想你的继母听见了时的样子吧！”

“我知道。”康妮说，“闲话是可怕的，尤其是在上流社会里。而他呢，他是渴望着他的离婚能够成功的。我想我们也许可以说孩子是另一个人的，把梅乐士的名字完全不提。”

“另一个人的？谁呢？”

“或者旦肯·霍布斯”他从小就是我们的朋友，他又是个出名的艺术家，而而他喜欢我。”

“啊，这样么！可怜的旦肯！他将得到什么好处呢？”

“我不知道，但是那也许可以给他某种的偿吧。”

“真的，真的么？咳，如果这样，他真是个怪物！怎么，你和他甚至从来没有发生过关系么？”

“没有！但是他实在也不想。他只爱亲近我，但是不受接触。”

“我的上帝，多么古怪的一代人！”

“我最喜欢我的地方，就是做他的模特儿。不过我从来没有允许过他。”

“可怜的家伙！但是这种没有骨气的人看来是什么都做得出的。”

“不地穸宁愿他的名字和我的凑在一起吧？”

“老天呀！康妮，这一切诡计！”

“我知道！这是令人作呕的。但是我有什么办法呢？”

“一个诡计过了又是一个诡计！我想我活利弊太久了。”

“算了，爸爸你年轻的时候不也作过不少的诡计？”

“但是我确实告诉你，那是不同的。”

“老是说不同的。”

希尔达到了，听到了这种新事态，她也狂怒着，她也一样想起人人都要知道她的妹妹和一个守猎人发生关系，她简直忍不住，那是太，太屈辱了！

“为什么我们不可以干脆地陷遁了，个别地跑到英属哥化比亚去，那便没有非议了？”康妮说。

但是那是没有用的。非议还是一样要爆发的，康妮如果要跟哪个人去，那么最好是她能嫁他。这是希尔达的意见。麦尔肯爵士犹豫着。他想也许事情还可补救吧。

“你将会一会他吧，爸爸？”

可怜的麦尔肯爵士！他是毫不愿意的。可怜的梅乐士！他尤其不愿想，虽然，会见终于成了事实，那是在俱乐部的一间厢房里的午餐，只有他两个人在那儿，两只眼睛互相打量着。

麦尔肯爵士喝了不少的威士忌，梅乐士也喝着，他们滔滔地谈着印度，这是那年轻人所熟悉的问题。

这种谈话占去了全餐的时间，直至咖来了，侍仆走了，麦尔肯爵士才燃了一支雪茄诚恳地说道：

“喂，年轻人，我女儿的事怎么样？”

梅乐士的脸上显着苦笑。

“唔，先生，她的事怎么样？”

“是你给了她一个孩子呢。”

“这是我的光荣！，！梅乐士苦笑着说。

“光荣，老天爷！”麦尔肯爵士响亮地笑着说，这是苏格兰人的猥亵的笑，“光荣！哎，事情怎样？好吧，是不是？”

“好！”

“那是我敢打赌的！哈，哈！我的女儿的确是麦某人的女儿！我自己也一样我是从不懊悔佳妙的性交的，虽然她的母亲……啊，‘老天爷！’”他的眼睛向天炯着，“但是你使她温情起来了，啊，我看得见的，你使她温热起来了。哈，哈！我的血在她血脉里流着呢；你很知道怎样放火烧她啊！哈，哈，哈！我真高兴，我可以告诉你，她需要那个。啊，她是个好女子，她是个好女子，我早就知道只要有个知道怎样放火烧她的男子汉，她就合适了，哈，哈，一个守猎人，哎，我的孩子！你是个拿手的偷猎人！我告诉你！哈，但是，现在，说正经话吧，我们要怎样安排这事呢？说正经话吧，你知道！

说正经话吧，他们都摸不着什么头脑，梅乐士虽然有点醉了，但是两人中他是最清醒的一个，他尽力使谈话不至太糊涂起来，那是没有多大可说的。

“好，你是个守猎者！啊，你是很对的！这种猎是值得费心的！可不是么？一个女子的试金石，便是当你在她的屁股上捏一把的时候，只要摸摸她的臀儿，便知道她合适不合适。哈，哈：我羡慕你，我的孩子，你多大年纪了！”

“三十九。”

麦尔肯爵士扬着眉头。

“有这么多了？好，看你这神气，你还有好好的二十年在你面前，啊：是守猎人也罢，不是也罢，你是个好雄鸡。这个我只用一只眼睛便看得出来，不象那讨厌的克利福：一个从来没有点儿兴头的可怜虫。