Alexander played some Hungarian music, and they all danced, seized by the spirit.Gerald was marvellously exhilarated at finding himself in motion, moving towards Gudrun, dancing with feet that could not yet escape from the waltz and the two-step, but feeling his force stir along his limbs and his body, out of captivity.He did not know yet how to dance their convulsive, rag-time sort of dancing, but he knew how to begin.Birkin, when he could get free from the weight of the people present, whom he disliked, danced rapidly and with a real gaiety.And how Hermione hated him for this irresponsible gaiety.
`Now I see,' cried the Contessa excitedly, watching his purely gay motion, which he had all to himself.`Mr Birkin, he is a changer.'
Hermione looked at her slowly, and shuddered, knowing that only a foreigner could have seen and have said this.
`Cosa vuol'dire, Palestra?' she asked, sing-song.
`Look,' said the Contessa, in Italian.`He is not a man, he is a chameleon, a creature of change.'
`He is not a man, he is treacherous, not one of us,' said itself over in Hermione's consciousness.And her soul writhed in the black subjugation to him, because of his power to escape, to exist, other than she did, because he was not consistent, not a man, less than a man.She hated him in a despair that shattered her and broke her down, so that she suffered sheer dissolution like a corpse, and was unconscious of everything save the horrible sickness of dissolution that was taking place within her, body and soul.
The house being full, Gerald was given the smaller room, really the dressing-room, communicating with Birkin's bedroom.When they all took their candles and mounted the stairs, where the lamps were burning subduedly, Hermione captured Ursula and brought her into her own bedroom, to talk to her.A sort of constraint came over Ursula in the big, strange bedroom.
Hermione seemed to be bearing down on her, awful and inchoate, making some appeal.They were looking at some Indian silk shirts, gorgeous and sensual in themselves, their shape, their almost corrupt gorgeousness.And Hermione came near, and her bosom writhed, and Ursula was for a moment blank with panic.And for a moment Hermione's haggard eyes saw the fear on the face of the other, there was again a sort of crash, a crashing down.And Ursula picked up a shirt of rich red and blue silk, made for a young princess of fourteen, and was crying mechanically:
`Isn't it wonderful -- who would dare to put those two strong colours together --'
Then Hermione's maid entered silently and Ursula, overcome with dread, escaped, carried away by powerful impulse.
Birkin went straight to bed.He was feeling happy, and sleepy.Since he had danced he was happy.But Gerald would talk to him.Gerald, in evening dress, sat on Birkin's bed when the other lay down, and must talk.
`Who are those two Brangwens?' Gerald asked.
`They live in Beldover.'
`In Beldover! Who are they then?'
`Teachers in the Grammar School.'
There was a pause.
`They are!' exclaimed Gerald at length.`I thought I had seen them before.'
`It disappoints you?' said Birkin.
`Disappoints me! No -- but how is it Hermione has them here?'
`She knew Gudrun in London -- that's the younger one, the one with the darker hair -- she's an artist -- does sculpture and modelling.'
`She's not a teacher in the Grammar School, then -- only the other?'
`Both -- Gudrun art mistress, Ursula a class mistress.'
`And what's the father?'
`Handicraft instructor in the schools.'
`Really!'
`Class-barriers are breaking down!'
Gerald was always uneasy under the slightly jeering tone of the other.
`That their father is handicraft instructor in a school! What does it matter to me?'
Birkin laughed.Gerald looked at his face, as it lay there laughing and bitter and indifferent on the pillow, and he could not go away.
`I don't suppose you will see very much more of Gudrun, at least.She is a restless bird, she'll be gone in a week or two,' said Birkin.
`Where will she go?'
`London, Paris, Rome -- heaven knows.I always expect her to sheer off to Damascus or San Francisco; she's a bird of paradise.God knows what she's got to do with Beldover.It goes by contraries, like dreams.'
Gerald pondered for a few moments.
`How do you know her so well?' he asked.
`I knew her in London,' he replied, `in the Algernon Strange set.She'll know about Pussum and Libidnikov and the rest -- even if she doesn't know them personally.She was never quite that set -- more conventional, in a way.I've known her for two years, I suppose.'
`And she makes money, apart from her teaching?' asked Gerald.
`Some -- irregularly.She can sell her models.She has a certain reclame.'
`How much for?'
`A guinea, ten guineas.'
`And are they good? What are they?'
`I think sometimes they are marvellously good.That is hers, those two wagtails in Hermione's boudoir -- you've seen them -- they are carved in wood and painted.'
`I thought it was savage carving again.'
`No, hers.That's what they are -- animals and birds, sometimes odd small people in everyday dress, really rather wonderful when they come off.They have a sort of funniness that is quite unconscious and subtle.'
`She might be a well-known artist one day?' mused Gerald.
`She might.But I think she won't.She drops her art if anything else catches her.Her contrariness prevents her taking it seriously -- she must never be too serious, she feels she might give herself away.And she won't give herself away -- she's always on the defensive.That's what I can't stand about her type.By the way, how did things go off with Pussum after I left you? I haven't heard anything.'
`Oh, rather disgusting.Halliday turned objectionable, and I only just saved myself from jumping in his stomach, in a real old-fashioned row.'
Birkin was silent.
