He stood motionless, watching her sullen, rather ugly walk.
She was sullenly picking and pulling at the twigs of the hedge as she passed.
She grew smaller, she seemed to pass out of his sight.
A darkness came over his mind.
Only a small, mechanical speck of consciousness hovered near him.
He felt tired and weak. Yet also he was relieved. He gave up his old position.
He went and sat on the bank.
No doubt Ursula was right.
It was true, really, what she said.
He knew that his spirituality was concomitant of a process of depravity, a sort of pleasure in self-destruction.
There really WAS a certain stimulant in self-destruction, for him—especially when it was translated spiritually.
But then he knew it—he knew it, and had done.
And was not Ursula's way of emotional intimacy, emotional and physical, was it not just as dangerous as Hermione's abstract spiritual intimacy?
Fusion, fusion, this horrible fusion of two beings, which every woman and most men insisted on, was it not nauseous and horrible anyhow, whether it was a fusion of the spirit or of the emotional body?
Hermione saw herself as the perfect Idea, to which all men must come: And Ursula was the perfect Womb, the bath of birth, to which all men must come!
And both were horrible.
Why could they not remain individuals, limited by their own limits?
Why this dreadful all-comprehensiveness, this hateful tyranny?
Why not leave the other being, free, why try to absorb, or melt, or merge?
One might abandon oneself utterly to the MOMENTS, but not to any other being.
He could not bear to see the rings lying in the pale mud of the road.
He picked them up, and wiped them unconsciously on his hands.
They were the little tokens of the reality of beauty, the reality of happiness in warm creation. But he had made his hands all dirty and gritty.
There was a darkness over his mind.
The terrible knot of consciousness that had persisted there like an obsession was broken, gone, his life was dissolved in darkness over his limbs and his body.
But there was a point of anxiety in his heart now.
He wanted her to come back.
He breathed lightly and regularly like an infant, that breathes innocently, beyond the touch of responsibility.
She was coming back.
He saw her drifting desultorily under the high hedge, advancing towards him slowly.
He did not move, he did not look again.
He was as if asleep, at peace, slumbering and utterly relaxed.
She came up and stood before him, hanging her head.
'See what a flower I found you,' she said, wistfully holding a piece of purple-red bell-heather under his face.
He saw the clump of coloured bells, and the tree-like, tiny branch: also her hands, with their over-fine, over-sensitive skin.
'Pretty!' he said, looking up at her with a smile, taking the flower.
Everything had become simple again, quite simple, the complexity gone into nowhere.
But he badly wanted to cry: except that he was weary and bored by emotion.
Then a hot passion of tenderness for her filled his heart.
He stood up and looked into her face.
It was new and oh, so delicate in its luminous wonder and fear.
He put his arms round her, and she hid her face on his shoulder.
It was peace, just simple peace, as he stood folding her quietly there on the open lane.
It was peace at last.
The old, detestable world of tension had passed away at last, his soul was strong and at ease.
She looked up at him.
The wonderful yellow light in her eyes now was soft and yielded, they were at peace with each other.
He kissed her, softly, many, many times.
A laugh came into her eyes.
'Did I abuse you?' she asked.