Women in Love (Barnes & Noble Classics S - D. H. Lawrence [157]
The normal consciousness, however, was returning, ebbing back. Birkin could breathe almost naturally again. Gerald’s hand slowly withdrew, Birkin slowly, dazedly rose to his feet and went towards the table. He poured out a whiskey and soda. Gerald also came for a drink.
“It was a real set-to, wasn’t it?” said Birkin, looking at Gerald with darkened eyes.
“God, yes,” said Gerald. He looked at the fine body of the other man, and added: “It wasn’t too much for you, was it?”
“No. One ought to wrestle and strive and be physically close. It makes one sane.”
“You do think so?”
“I do. Don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Gerald.
There were long spaces of silence between their words. The wrestling had some deep meaning to them—an unfinished meaning.
“We are mentally, spiritually intimate, therefore we should be more or less physically intimate too—it is more whole.”
“Certainly it is,” said Gerald. Then he laughed pleasantly, adding: “It’s rather wonderful to me.” He stretched out his arms handsomely.
“Yes,” said Birkin. “I don’t know why one should have to justify oneself.”
“No.”
The two men began to dress.
“I think also that you are beautiful,” said Birkin to Gerald, “and that is enjoyable too. One should enjoy what is given.”
“You think I am beautiful—how do you mean, physically?” asked Gerald, his eyes glistening.
“Yes. You have a northern kind of beauty, like light refracted from snow—and a beautiful, plastic form. Yes, that is there to enjoy as well. We should enjoy everything.”
Gerald laughed in his throat, and said:
“That’s certainly one way of looking at it. I can say this much, I feel better. It has certainly helped me. Is this the Bruderschaft you wanted?”
“Perhaps. Do you think this pledges anything?”
“I don’t know,” laughed Gerald.
“At any rate, one feels freer and more open now—and that is what we want.”
“Certainly,” said Gerald.
They drew to the fire, with the decanters and the glasses and the food.
“I always eat a little before I go to bed,” said Gerald. “I sleep better.”
“I should not sleep so well,” said Birkin.
“No? There you are, we are not alike. I’ll put a dressing-gown on.” Birkin remained alone, looking at the fire. His mind had reverted to Ursula. She seemed to return again into his consciousness. Gerald came down wearing a gown of broad-barred, thick black-and-green silk, brilliant and striking.
“You are very fine,” said Birkin, looking at the full robe.
“It was a caftan in Bokhara,”by said Gerald. “I like it.”
“I like it too.”
Birkin was silent, thinking how scrupulous Gerald was in his attire, how expensive too. He wore silk socks, and studs of fine workmanship, and silk underclothing, and silk braces. Curious! This was another of the differences between them. Birkin was careless and unimaginative about his own appearance.
“Of course you,” said Gerald, as if he had been thinking; “there’s something curious about you. You’re curiously strong. One doesn’t expect it, it is rather surprising.”
Birkin laughed. He was looking at the handsome figure of the other man, blond and comely in the rich robe, and he was half thinking of the difference between it and himself—so different; as far, perhaps, apart as man from woman, yet in another direction. But really it was Ursula, it was the woman who was gaining ascendance over Birkin’s being, at this moment. Gerald was becoming dim again, lapsing out of him.
“Do you know,” he said suddenly, “I went and proposed to Ursula Brangwen to-night, that she should marry me.”
He saw the blank shining wonder come over Gerald’s face.
“You did?”
“Yes. Almost formally—speaking first to her father, as it should be, in the world—though that was accident—or mischief.”
Gerald only stared in wonder, as if he did not grasp.
“You don’t mean to say that you seriously went and asked her father to let you marry her?