The Rainbow, D. H. Lawrence [books for new readers .txt] 📗

horror in humanity, that would destroy her, and with which she was at war. Yet it had to be so.

In the morning again she must go to school. She got up and went without murmuring even to herself. She was in the hands of some bigger, stronger, coarser will.

School was fairly quiet. But she could feel the class watching her, ready to spring on her. Her instinct was aware of the class instinct to catch her if she were weak. But she kept cold and was guarded.

Williams was absent from school. In the middle of the morning there was a knock at the door: someone wanted the headmaster. Mr. Harby went out, heavily, angrily, nervously. He was afraid of irate parents. After a moment in the passage, he came again into school.

“Sturgess,” he called to one of his larger boys. “Stand in front of the class and write down the name of anyone who speaks. Will you come this way, Miss Brangwen.”

He seemed vindictively to seize upon her.

Ursula followed him, and found in the lobby a thin woman with a whitish skin, not ill-dressed in a grey costume and a purple hat.

“I called about Vernon,” said the woman, speaking in a refined accent. There was about the woman altogether an appearance of refinement and of cleanliness, curiously contradicted by her half beggar’s deportment, and a sense of her being unpleasant to touch, like something going bad inside. She was neither a lady nor an ordinary working man’s wife, but a creature separate from society. By her dress she was not poor.

Ursula knew at once that she was Williams’ mother, and that he was Vernon. She remembered that he was always clean, and well-dressed, in a sailor suit. And he had this same peculiar, half transparent unwholesomeness, rather like a corpse.

“I wasn’t able to send him to school today,” continued the woman, with a false grace of manner. “He came home last night so ill⁠—he was violently sick⁠—I thought I should have to send for the doctor.⁠—You know he has a weak heart.”

The woman looked at Ursula with her pale, dead eyes.

“No,” replied the girl, “I did not know.”

She stood still with repulsion and uncertainty. Mr. Harby, large and male, with his overhanging moustache, stood by with a slight, ugly smile at the corner of his eyes. The woman went on insidiously, not quite human:

“Oh, yes, he has had heart disease ever since he was a child. That is why he isn’t very regular at school. And it is very bad to beat him. He was awfully ill this morning⁠—I shall call on the doctor as I go back.”

“Who is staying with him now, then?” put in the deep voice of the schoolmaster, cunningly.

“Oh, I left him with a woman who comes in to help me⁠—and who understands him. But I shall call in the doctor on my way home.”

Ursula stood still. She felt vague threats in all this. But the woman was so utterly strange to her, that she did not understand.

“He told me he had been beaten,” continued the woman, “and when I undressed him to put him to bed, his body was covered with marks⁠—I could show them to any doctor.”

Mr. Harby looked at Ursula to answer. She began to understand. The woman was threatening to take out a charge of assault on her son against her. Perhaps she wanted money.

“I caned him,” she said. “He was so much trouble.”

“I’m sorry if he was troublesome,” said the woman, “but he must have been shamefully beaten. I could show the marks to any doctor. I’m sure it isn’t allowed, if it was known.”

“I caned him while he kept kicking me,” said Ursula, getting angry because she was half excusing herself, Mr. Harby standing there with the twinkle at the side of his eyes, enjoying the dilemma of the two women.

“I’m sure I’m sorry if he behaved badly,” said the woman. “But I can’t think he deserved beating as he has been. I can’t send him to school, and really can’t afford to pay the doctor.⁠—Is it allowed for the teachers to beat the children like that, Mr. Harby?”

The headmaster refused to answer. Ursula loathed herself, and loathed Mr. Harby with his twinkling cunning and malice on the occasion. The other miserable woman watched her chance.

“It is an expense to me, and I have a great struggle to keep my boy decent.”

Ursula still would not answer. She looked out at the asphalt yard, where a dirty rag of paper was blowing.

“And it isn’t allowed to beat a child like that, I am sure, especially when he is delicate.”

Ursula stared with a set face on the yard, as if she did not hear. She loathed all this, and had ceased to feel or to exist.

“Though I know he is troublesome sometimes⁠—but I think it was too much. His body is covered with marks.”

Mr. Harby stood sturdy and unmoved, waiting now to have done, with the twinkling, tiny wrinkles of an ironical smile at the corners of his eyes. He felt himself master of the situation.

“And he was violently sick. I couldn’t possibly send him to school today. He couldn’t keep his head up.”

Yet she had no answer.

“You will understand, sir, why he is absent,” she said, turning to Mr. Harby.

“Oh, yes,” he said, rough and offhand. Ursula detested him for his male triumph. And she loathed the woman. She loathed everything.

“You will try to have it remembered, sir, that he has a weak heart. He is so sick after these things.”

“Yes,” said the headmaster, “I’ll see about it.”

“I know he is troublesome,” the woman only addressed herself to the male now⁠—“but if you could have him punished without beating⁠—he is really delicate.”

Ursula was beginning to feel upset. Harby stood in rather superb mastery, the woman cringing to him to tickle him as one tickles trout.

“I had come to explain why he was away this morning, sir. You will understand.”

She held out her hand. Harby took it and let it go, surprised and angry.

“Good morning,” she said, and she gave