DOI article:
Crackanthorpe, Hubert: The Haseltons
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21806#0157
By Hubert Crackanthorpe 153
One hand hung over the arm of the chair, limp and white and
fragile ; her head, bent over her breast, was coyly resting in the
curve of her elbow; her hair was a little dishevelled ; her breathing
was soft and regulär, like a child’s.
He sat down noiselessly, awed by this vision of her. The cat,
which had lain stretched on the hearth-rug, sprang into his lap,
purring and caressing. He thought it stränge that animals had
no sense of human sinfulness, and recalled the devotion of the dog
of a prostitute, whom he had known years and years ago. . . .
He watched her, and her unconsciousness loosed within him
the sickening pangs of remorse. . . . He mused vaguely on
suicide as the only fitting termination. . . . And he descended
to cheap anathemas upon life. . . .
* * * * *
By-and-by she awoke, opening her eyes slowly, wonderingly.
He was kneeling before her, kissing her hand with reverential
precaution.
She saw tears in his eyes : she was still scarcely awake : she
made no efFort to comprehend ; only was impulsively grateful, and
slipping her arms behind his head, drew him towards her and kissed
him on the eyes. He submitted, and a tear moistened her lips.
Then they went up-stairs.
And she, passionately clutching at every memory of their love,
feverishly cheated herseif into bitter self-upbraiding, into attri-
buting to him a nobility of nature that set him above all other
men. And he, at each renewed outburst of her wild straining
towards her ideal, suffered, as if she had cut his bare flesh with a
whip.
It was his insistent attitude of resentful humility that finally
wearied her of the fit of false exaltation. When she sank to
sleep, the old ache was at her heart.
The Yellow Book—Vol. V. k. Swann
One hand hung over the arm of the chair, limp and white and
fragile ; her head, bent over her breast, was coyly resting in the
curve of her elbow; her hair was a little dishevelled ; her breathing
was soft and regulär, like a child’s.
He sat down noiselessly, awed by this vision of her. The cat,
which had lain stretched on the hearth-rug, sprang into his lap,
purring and caressing. He thought it stränge that animals had
no sense of human sinfulness, and recalled the devotion of the dog
of a prostitute, whom he had known years and years ago. . . .
He watched her, and her unconsciousness loosed within him
the sickening pangs of remorse. . . . He mused vaguely on
suicide as the only fitting termination. . . . And he descended
to cheap anathemas upon life. . . .
* * * * *
By-and-by she awoke, opening her eyes slowly, wonderingly.
He was kneeling before her, kissing her hand with reverential
precaution.
She saw tears in his eyes : she was still scarcely awake : she
made no efFort to comprehend ; only was impulsively grateful, and
slipping her arms behind his head, drew him towards her and kissed
him on the eyes. He submitted, and a tear moistened her lips.
Then they went up-stairs.
And she, passionately clutching at every memory of their love,
feverishly cheated herseif into bitter self-upbraiding, into attri-
buting to him a nobility of nature that set him above all other
men. And he, at each renewed outburst of her wild straining
towards her ideal, suffered, as if she had cut his bare flesh with a
whip.
It was his insistent attitude of resentful humility that finally
wearied her of the fit of false exaltation. When she sank to
sleep, the old ache was at her heart.
The Yellow Book—Vol. V. k. Swann