The tiny ripples of the lake were warm and clear, they lifted their boat on to the bank, and looked round with joy.
They were quite alone in a forsaken little stream-mouth, and on the knoll just behind was the clump of trees.
'We will bathe just for a moment,' said Ursula, 'and then we'll have tea.'
They looked round.
Nobody could notice them, or could come up in time to see them.
In less than a minute Ursula had thrown off her clothes and had slipped naked into the water, and was swimming out.
Quickly, Gudrun joined her.
They swam silently and blissfully for a few minutes, circling round their little stream-mouth.
Then they slipped ashore and ran into the grove again, like nymphs.
'How lovely it is to be free,' said Ursula, running swiftly here and there between the tree trunks, quite naked, her hair blowing loose.
The grove was of beech-trees, big and splendid, a steel-grey scaffolding of trunks and boughs, with level sprays of strong green here and there, whilst through the northern side the distance glimmered open as through a window.
When they had run and danced themselves dry, the girls quickly dressed and sat down to the fragrant tea.
They sat on the northern side of the grove, in the yellow sunshine facing the slope of the grassy hill, alone in a little wild world of their own.
The tea was hot and aromatic, there were delicious little sandwiches of cucumber and of caviare, and winy cakes.
'Are you happy, Prune?' cried Ursula in delight, looking at her sister.
'Ursula, I'm perfectly happy,' replied Gudrun gravely, looking at the westering sun.
'So am I.'
When they were together, doing the things they enjoyed, the two sisters were quite complete in a perfect world of their own.
And this was one of the perfect moments of freedom and delight, such as children alone know, when all seems a perfect and blissful adventure.
When they had finished tea, the two girls sat on, silent and serene.
Then Ursula, who had a beautiful strong voice, began to sing to herself, softly:
'Annchen von Tharau.'
Gudrun listened, as she sat beneath the trees, and the yearning came into her heart.
Ursula seemed so peaceful and sufficient unto herself, sitting there unconsciously crooning her song, strong and unquestioned at the centre of her own universe. And Gudrun felt herself outside.
Always this desolating, agonised feeling, that she was outside of life, an onlooker, whilst Ursula was a partaker, caused Gudrun to suffer from a sense of her own negation, and made her, that she must always demand the other to be aware of her, to be in connection with her.
'Do you mind if I do Dalcroze to that tune, Hurtler?' she asked in a curious muted tone, scarce moving her lips.
'What did you say?' asked Ursula, looking up in peaceful surprise.
'Will you sing while I do Dalcroze?' said Gudrun, suffering at having to repeat herself.
Ursula thought a moment, gathering her straying wits together.
'While you do—?' she asked vaguely.
'Dalcroze movements,' said Gudrun, suffering tortures of self-consciousness, even because of her sister.
'Oh Dalcroze!
I couldn't catch the name. DO—I should love to see you,' cried Ursula, with childish surprised brightness. 'What shall I sing?'
'Sing anything you like, and I'll take the rhythm from it.'
But Ursula could not for her life think of anything to sing.
However, she suddenly began, in a laughing, teasing voice:
'My love—is a high-born lady—'
Gudrun, looking as if some invisible chain weighed on her hands and feet, began slowly to dance in the eurythmic manner, pulsing and fluttering rhythmically with her feet, making slower, regular gestures with her hands and arms, now spreading her arms wide, now raising them above her head, now flinging them softly apart, and lifting her face, her feet all the time beating and running to the measure of the song, as if it were some strange incantation, her white, rapt form drifting here and there in a strange impulsive rhapsody, seeming to be lifted on a breeze of incantation, shuddering with strange little runs.
Ursula sat on the grass, her mouth open in her singing, her eyes laughing as if she thought it was a great joke, but a yellow light flashing up in them, as she caught some of the unconscious ritualistic suggestion of the complex shuddering and waving and drifting of her sister's white form, that was clutched in pure, mindless, tossing rhythm, and a will set powerful in a kind of hypnotic influence.
'My love is a high-born lady—She is-s-s—rather dark than shady—' rang out Ursula's laughing, satiric song, and quicker, fiercer went Gudrun in the dance, stamping as if she were trying to throw off some bond, flinging her hands suddenly and stamping again, then rushing with face uplifted and throat full and beautiful, and eyes half closed, sightless.
The sun was low and yellow, sinking down, and in the sky floated a thin, ineffectual moon.
Ursula was quite absorbed in her song, when suddenly Gudrun stopped and said mildly, ironically:
'Ursula!'
'Yes?' said Ursula, opening her eyes out of the trance.
Gudrun was standing still and pointing, a mocking smile on her face, towards the side.
'Ugh!' cried Ursula in sudden panic, starting to her feet.
'They're quite all right,' rang out Gudrun's sardonic voice.
On the left stood a little cluster of Highland cattle, vividly coloured and fleecy in the evening light, their horns branching into the sky, pushing forward their muzzles inquisitively, to know what it was all about.
Their eyes glittered through their tangle of hair, their naked nostrils were full of shadow.
'Won't they do anything?' cried Ursula in fear.