throwing herself to risk。 It roused a sort of madness in him。
Like a flower shaking and wide…opened in the sun; she tempted
him and challenged him; and he accepted the challenge; something
went fixed in him。 And under all her laughing; poignant
recklessness was the quiver of tears。 That almost sent him mad;
mad with desire; with pain; whose only issue was through
possession of her body。
So; shaken; afraid; they went back to her parents in the
kitchen; and dissimulated。 But something was roused in both of
them that they could not now allay。 It intensified and
heightened their senses; they were more vivid; and powerful in
their being。 But under it all was a poignant sense of
transience。 It was a magnificent self…assertion on the part of
both of them; he asserted himself before her; he felt himself
infinitely male and infinitely irresistible; she asserted
herself before him; she knew herself infinitely desirable; and
hence infinitely strong。 And after all; what could either of
them get from such a passion but a sense of his or of her own
maximum self; in contradistinction to all the rest of life?
Wherein was something finite and sad; for the human soul at its
maximum wants a sense of the infinite。
Nevertheless; it was begun now; this passion; and must go on;
the passion of Ursula to know her own maximum self; limited and
so defined against him。 She could limit and define herself
against him; the male; she could be her maximum self; female; oh
female; triumphant for one moment in exquisite assertion against
the male; in supreme contradistinction to the male。
The next afternoon; when he came; prowling; she went with him
across to the church。 Her father was gradually gathering in
anger against him; her mother was hardening in anger against
her。 But the parents were naturally tolerant in action。
They went together across the churchyard; Ursula and
Skrebensky; and ran to hiding in the church。 It was dimmer in
there than the sunny afternoon outside; but the mellow glow