Sons and Lovers | Page 7

answer.
"I can have your bank-book, can't I?"
"Tha can ha'e it, for what good it'll be to thee."
"I thought--" she began. He had told her he had a good bit of money
left over. But she realised it was no use asking questions. She sat rigid
with bitterness and indignation.

The next day she went down to see his mother.
"Didn't you buy the furniture for Walter?" she asked.
"Yes, I did," tartly retorted the elder woman.
"And how much did he give you to pay for it?"
The elder woman was stung with fine indignation.
"Eighty pound, if you're so keen on knowin'," she replied.
"Eighty pounds! But there are forty-two pounds still owing!"
"I can't help that."
"But where has it all gone?"
"You'll find all the papers, I think, if you look--beside ten pound as he
owed me, an' six pound as the wedding cost down here."
"Six pounds!" echoed Gertrude Morel. It seemed to her monstrous that,
after her own father had paid so heavily for her wedding, six pounds
more should have been squandered in eating and drinking at Walter's
parents' house, at his expense.
"And how much has he sunk in his houses?" she asked.
"His houses--which houses?"
Gertrude Morel went white to the lips. He had told her the house he
lived in, and the next one, was his own.
"I thought the house we live in--" she began.
"They're my houses, those two," said the mother-in-law. "And not clear
either. It's as much as I can do to keep the mortgage interest paid."
Gertrude sat white and silent. She was her father now.

"Then we ought to be paying you rent," she said coldly.
"Walter is paying me rent," replied the mother.
"And what rent?" asked Gertrude.
"Six and six a week," retorted the mother.
It was more than the house was worth. Gertrude held her head erect,
looked straight before her.
"It is lucky to be you," said the elder woman, bitingly, "to have a
husband as takes all the worry of the money, and leaves you a free
hand."
The young wife was silent.
She said very little to her husband, but her manner had changed
towards him. Something in her proud, honourable soul had crystallised
out hard as rock.
When October came in, she thought only of Christmas. Two years ago,
at Christmas, she had met him. Last Christmas she had married him.
This Christmas she would bear him a child.
"You don't dance yourself, do you, missis?" asked her nearest
neighbour, in October, when there was great talk of opening a
dancing-class over the Brick and Tile Inn at Bestwood.
"No--I never had the least inclination to," Mrs. Morel replied.
"Fancy! An' how funny as you should ha' married your Mester. You
know he's quite a famous one for dancing."
"I didn't know he was famous," laughed Mrs. Morel.
"Yea, he is though! Why, he ran that dancing-class in the Miners' Arms
club-room for over five year."

"Did he?"
"Yes, he did." The other woman was defiant. "An' it was thronged
every Tuesday, and Thursday, an' Sat'day--an' there WAS carryin's-on,
accordin' to all accounts."
This kind of thing was gall and bitterness to Mrs. Morel, and she had a
fair share of it. The women did not spare her, at first; for she was
superior, though she could not help it.
He began to be rather late in coming home.
"They're working very late now, aren't they?" she said to her
washer-woman.
"No later than they allers do, I don't think. But they stop to have their
pint at Ellen's, an' they get talkin', an' there you are! Dinner stone
cold--an' it serves 'em right."
"But Mr. Morel does not take any drink."
The woman dropped the clothes, looked at Mrs. Morel, then went on
with her work, saying nothing.
Gertrude Morel was very ill when the boy was born. Morel was good to
her, as good as gold. But she felt very lonely, miles away from her own
people. She felt lonely with him now, and his presence only made it
more intense.
The boy was small and frail at first, but he came on quickly. He was a
beautiful child, with dark gold ringlets, and dark-blue eyes which
changed gradually to a clear grey. His mother loved him passionately.
He came just when her own bitterness of disillusion was hardest to bear;
when her faith in life was shaken, and her soul felt dreary and lonely.
She made much of the child, and the father was jealous.
At last Mrs. Morel despised her husband. She turned to the child; she
turned from the father. He had begun to neglect her; the novelty of his

own home was gone. He had no grit, she said bitterly to herself. What