Chapter 16 Man to Man

HE LAY sick and unmoved, in pure opposition to everything. He knew how near to breaking was the vessel that held his life. He knew also how strong and durable it was. And he did not care. Better a thousand times take one's chance with death, than accept a life one did not want. But best of all to persist and persist and persist for ever, till one were satisfied in life.

He knew that Ursula was referred back to him. He knew his life rested with her. But he would rather not live than accept the love she proffered. The old way of love seemed a dreadful bondage, a sort of conscription. What it was in him he did not know, but the thought of love, marriage, and children, and a life lived together, in the horrible privacy of domestic and connubial satisfaction, was repulsive. He wanted something clearer, more open, cooler, as it were. The hot narrow intimacy between man and wife was abhorrent. The way they shut their doors, these married people, and shut themselves in to their own exclusive alliance with each other, even in love, disgusted him. It was a whole community of mistrustful couples insulated in private houses or private rooms, always in couples, and no further life, no further immediate, no disinterested relationship admitted: a kaleidoscope of couples, disjoined, separatist, meaningless entities of married couples. True, he hated promiscuity even worse than marriage, and a liaison was only another kind of coupling, reactionary from the legal marriage. Reaction was a greater bore than action.

On the whole, he hated sex, it was such a limitation. It was sex that turned a man into a broken half of a couple, the woman into the other broken half. And he wanted to be single in himself, the woman single in herself. He wanted sex to revert to the level of the other appetites, to be regarded as a functional process, not as a fulfilment. He believed in sex marriage. But beyond this, he wanted a further conjunction, where man had being and woman had being, two pure beings, each constituting the freedom of the other, balancing each other like two poles of one force, like two angels, or two demons.

He wanted so much to be free, not under the compulsion of any need for unification, or tortured by unsatisfied desire. Desire and aspiration should find their object without all this torture, as now, in a world of plenty of water, simple thirst is inconsiderable, satisfied almost unconsciously. And he wanted to be with Ursula as free as with himself, single and clear and cool, yet balanced, polarised with her. The merging, the clutching, the mingling of love was become madly abhorrent to him.

But it seemed to him, woman was always so horrible and clutching, she had such a lust for possession, a greed of self-importance in love. She wanted to have, to own, to control, to be dominant. Everything must be referred back to her, to Woman, the Great Mother of everything, out of whom proceeded everything and to whom everything must finally be rendered up.

It filled him with almost insane fury, this calm assumption of the Magna Mater, that all was hers, because she had borne it. Man was hers because she had borne him. A Mater Dolorosa, she had borne him, a Magna Mater, she now claimed him again, soul and body, sex, meaning, and all. He had a horror of the Magna Mater, she was detestable.

She was on a very high horse again, was woman, the Great Mother. Did he not know it in Hermione. Hermione, the humble, the subservient, what was she all the while but the Mater Dolorosa, in her subservience, claiming with horrible, insidious arrogance and female tyranny, her own again, claiming back the man she had borne in suffering. By her very suffering and humility she bound her son with chains, she held him her everlasting prisoner.

And Ursula, Ursula was the same -- or the inverse. She too was the awful, arrogant queen of life, as if she were a queen bee on whom all the rest depended. He saw the yellow flare in her eyes, he knew the unthinkable overweening assumption of primacy in her. She was unconscious of it herself. She was only too ready to knock her head on the ground before a man. But this was only when she was so certain of her man, that she could worship him as a woman worships her own infant, with a worship of perfect possession.

It was intolerable, this possession at the hands of woman. Always a man must be considered as the broken off fragment of a woman, and the sex was the still aching scar of the laceration. Man must be added on to a woman, before he had any real place or wholeness.

And why? Why should we consider ourselves, men and women, as broken fragments of one whole? It is not true. We are not broken fragments of one whole. Rather we are the singling away into purity and clear being, of things that were mixed. Rather the sex is that which remains in us of the mixed, the unresolved. And passion is the further separating of this mixture, that which is manly being taken into the being of the man, that which is womanly passing to the woman, till the two are clear and whole as angels, the admixture of sex in the highest sense surpassed, leaving two single beings constellated together like two stars.

In the old age, before sex was, we were mixed, each one a mixture. The process of singling into individuality resulted into the great polarisation of sex. The womanly drew to one side, the manly to the other. But the separation was imperfect even them. And so our world-cycle passes. There is now to come the new day, when we are beings each of us, fulfilled in difference. The man is pure man, the woman pure woman, they are perfectly polarised. But there is no longer any of the horrible merging, mingling self-abnegation of love. There is only the pure duality of polarisation, each one free from any contamination of the other. In each, the individual is primal, sex is subordinate, but perfectly polarised. Each has a single, separate being, with its own laws. The man has his pure freedom, the woman hers. Each acknowledges the perfection of the polarised sex-circuit. Each admits the different nature in the other.

So Birkin meditated whilst he was ill. He liked sometimes to be ill enough to take to his bed. For then he got better very quickly, and things came to him clear and sure.

Whilst he was laid up, Gerald came to see him. The two men had a deep, uneasy feeling for each other. Gerald's eyes were quick and restless, his whole manner tense and impatient, he seemed strung up to some activity. According to conventionality, he wore black clothes, he looked formal, handsome and comme il faut. His hair was fair almost to whiteness, sharp like splinters of light, his face was keen and ruddy, his body seemed full of northern energy. Gerald really loved Birkin, though he never quite believed in him. Birkin was too unreal; -- clever, whimsical, wonderful, but not practical enough. Gerald felt that his own understanding was much sounder and safer. Birkin was delightful, a wonderful spirit, but after all, not to be taken seriously, not quite to be counted as a man among men.

`Why are you laid up again?' he asked kindly, taking the sick man's hand. It was always Gerald who was protective, offering the warm shelter of his physical strength.

`For my sins, I suppose,' Birkin said, smiling a little ironically.

`For your sins? Yes, probably that is so. You should sin less, and keep better in health?'

`You'd better teach me.'

He looked at Gerald with ironic eyes.

`How are things with you?' asked Birkin.

`With me?' Gerald looked at Birkin, saw he was serious, and a warm light came into his eyes.

`I don't know that they're any different. I don't see how they could be. There's nothing to change.'

`I suppose you are conducting the business as successfully as ever, and ignoring the demand of the soul.'

`That's it,' said Gerald. `At least as far as the business is concerned. I couldn't say about the soul, I'am sure.'

`No.'

`Surely you don't expect me to?' laughed Gerald.

`No. How are the rest of your affairs progressing, apart from the business?'

`The rest of my affairs? What are those? I couldn't say; I don't know what you refer to.'

`Yes, you do,' said Birkin. `Are you gloomy or cheerful? And what about Gudrun Brangwen?'

`What about her?' A confused look came over Gerald. `Well,' he added, `I don't know. I can only tell you she gave me a hit over the face last time I saw her.'

`A hit over the face! What for?'

`That I couldn't tell you, either.'

`Really! But when?'

`The night of the party -- when Diana was drowned. She was driving the cattle up the hill, and I went after her -- you remember.'

`Yes, I remember. But what made her do that? You didn't definitely ask her for it, I suppose?'

`I? No, not that I know of. I merely said to her, that it was dangerous to drive those Highland bullocks -- as it is. She turned in such a way, and said -- "I suppose you think I'm afraid of you and your cattle, don't you?" So I asked her "why," and for answer she flung me a backhander across the face.'

Birkin laughed quickly, as if it pleased him. Gerald looked at him, wondering, and began to laugh as well, saying:

`I didn't laugh at the time, I assure you. I was never so taken aback in my life.'

`And weren't you furious?'

`Furious? I should think I was. I'd have murdered her for two pins.'

`H'm!' ejaculated Birkin. `Poor Gudrun, wouldn't she suffer afterwards for having given herself away!' He was hugely delighted.

`Would she suffer?' asked Gerald, also amused now.

Both men smiled in malice and amusement.

`Badly, I should think; seeing how self-conscious she is.'

`She is self-conscious, is she? Then what made her do it? For I certainly think it was quite uncalled-for, and quite unjustified.'

`I suppose it was a sudden impulse.'

`Yes, but how do you account for her having such an impulse? I'd done her no harm.'

Birkin shook his head.

`The Amazon suddenly came up in her, I suppose,' he said.

`Well,' replied Gerald, `I'd rather it had been the Orinoco.'

They both laughed at the poor joke. Gerald was thinking how Gudrun had said she would strike the last blow too. But some reserve made him keep this back from Birkin.

`And you resent it?' Birkin asked.

`I don't resent it. I don't care a tinker's curse about it.' He was silent a moment, then he added, laughing. `No, I'll see it through, that's all. She seemed sorry afterwards.'

`Did she? You've not met since that night?'

Gerald's face clouded.

`No,' he said. `We've been -- you can imagine how it's been, since the accident.'

`Yes. Is it calming down?'

`I don't know. It's a shock, of course. But I don't believe mother minds. I really don't believe she takes any notice. And what's so funny, she used to be all for the children -- nothing mattered, nothing whatever mattered but the children. And now, she doesn't take any more notice than if it was one of the servants.'

`No? Did it upset you very much?'

`It's a shock. But I don't feel it very much, really. I don't feel any different. We've all got to die, and it doesn't seem to make any great difference, anyhow, whether you die or not. I can't feel any grief you know. It leaves me cold. I can't quite account for it.'

`You don't care if you die or not?' asked Birkin.

Gerald looked at him with eyes blue as the blue-fibred steel of a weapon. He felt awkward, but indifferent. As a matter of fact, he did care terribly, with a great fear.

`Oh,' he said, `I don't want to die, why should I? But I never trouble. The question doesn't seem to be on the carpet for me at all. It doesn't interest me, you know.'

`Timor mortis conturbat me,' quoted Birkin, adding -- `No, death doesn't really seem the point any more. It curiously doesn't concern one. It's like an ordinary tomorrow.'

Gerald looked closely at his friend. The eyes of the two men met, and an unspoken understanding was exchanged.

Gerald narrowed his eyes, his face was cool and unscrupulous as he looked at Birkin, impersonally, with a vision that ended in a point in space, strangely keen-eyed and yet blind.

`If death isn't the point,' he said, in a strangely abstract, cold, fine voice -- `what is?' He sounded as if he had been found out.

`What is?' re-echoed Birkin. And there was a mocking silence.

`There's long way to go, after the point of intrinsic death, before we disappear,' said Birkin.

`There is,' said Gerald. `But what sort of way?' He seemed to press the other man for knowledge which he himself knew far better than Birkin did.

`Right down the slopes of degeneration -- mystic, universal degeneration. There are many stages of pure degradation to go through: agelong. We live on long after our death, and progressively, in progressive devolution.'

Gerald listened with a faint, fine smile on his face, all the time, as if, somewhere, he knew so much better than Birkin, all about this: as if his own knowledge were direct and personal, whereas Birkin's was a matter of observation and inference, not quite hitting the nail on the head: -though aiming near enough at it. But he was not going to give himself away. If Birkin could get at the secrets, let him. Gerald would never help him. Gerald would be a dark horse to the end.

`Of course,' he said, with a startling change of conversation, `it is father who really feels it. It will finish him. For him the world collapses. All his care now is for Winnie -- he must save Winnie. He says she ought to be sent away to school, but she won't hear of it, and he'll never do it. Of course she is in rather a queer way. We're all of us curiously bad at living. We can do things -- but we can't get on with life at all. It's curious -- a family failing.'

`She oughtn't to be sent away to school,' said Birkin, who was considering a new proposition.

`She oughtn't. Why?'

`She's a queer child -- a special child, more special even than you. And in my opinion special children should never be sent away to school. Only moderately ordinary children should be sent to school -- so it seems to me.'

`I'm inclined to think just the opposite. I think it would probably make her more normal if she went away and mixed with other children.'

`She wouldn't mix, you see. You never really mixed, did you? And she wouldn't be willing even to pretend to. She's proud, and solitary, and naturally apart. If she has a single nature, why do you want to make her gregarious?'

`No, I don't want to make her anything. But I think school would be good for her.'

`Was it good for you?'

Gerald's eyes narrowed uglily. School had been torture to him. Yet he had not questioned whether one should go through this torture. He seemed to believe in education through subjection and torment.

`I hated it at the time, but I can see it was necessary,' he said. `It brought me into line a bit -- and you can't live unless you do come into line somewhere.'

`Well,' said Birkin, `I begin to think that you can't live unless you keep entirely out of the line. It's no good trying to toe the line, when your one impulse is to smash up the line. Winnie is a special nature, and for special natures you must give a special world.'

`Yes, but where's your special world?' said Gerald.

`Make it. Instead of chopping yourself down to fit the world, chop the world down to fit yourself. As a matter of fact, two exceptional people make another world. You and I, we make another, separate world. You don't want a world same as your brothers-in-law. It's just the special quality you value. Do you want to be normal or ordinary! It's a lie. You want to be free and extraordinary, in an extraordinary world of liberty.'

Gerald looked at Birkin with subtle eyes of knowledge. But he would never openly admit what he felt. He knew more than Birkin, in one direction -much more. And this gave him his gentle love for the other man, as if Birkin were in some way young, innocent, child-like: so amazingly clever, but incurably innocent.

`Yet you are so banal as to consider me chiefly a freak,' said Birkin pointedly.

`A freak!' exclaimed Gerald, startled. And his face opened suddenly, as if lighted with simplicity, as when a flower opens out of the cunning bud. `No -- I never consider you a freak.' And he watched the other man with strange eyes, that Birkin could not understand. `I feel,' Gerald continued, `that there is always an element of uncertainty about you -- perhaps you are uncertain about yourself. But I'm never sure of you. You can go away and change as easily as if you had no soul.'

He looked at Birkin with penetrating eyes. Birkin was amazed. He thought he had all the soul in the world. He stared in amazement. And Gerald, watching, saw the amazing attractive goodliness of his eyes, a young, spontaneous goodness that attracted the other man infinitely, yet filled him with bitter chagrin, because he mistrusted it so much. He knew Birkin could do without him -- could forget, and not suffer. This was always present in Gerald's consciousness, filling him with bitter unbelief: this consciousness of the young, animal-like spontaneity of detachment. It seemed almost like hypocrisy and lying, sometimes, oh, often, on Birkin's part, to talk so deeply and importantly.

Quite other things were going through Birkin's mind. Suddenly he saw himself confronted with another problem -- the problem of love and eternal conjunction between two men. Of course this was necessary -- it had been a necessity inside himself all his life -- to love a man purely and fully. Of course he had been loving Gerald all along, and all along denying it.

He lay in the bed and wondered, whilst his friend sat beside him, lost in brooding. Each man was gone in his own thoughts.

`You know how the old German knights used to swear a Blutbruderschaft,' he said to Gerald, with quite a new happy activity in his eyes.

`Make a little wound in their arms, and rub each other's blood into the cut?' said Gerald.

`Yes -- and swear to be true to each other, of one blood, all their lives. That is what we ought to do. No wounds, that is obsolete. But we ought to swear to love each other, you and I, implicitly, and perfectly, finally, without any possibility of going back on it.'

He looked at Gerald with clear, happy eyes of discovery. Gerald looked down at him, attracted, so deeply bondaged in fascinated attraction, that he was mistrustful, resenting the bondage, hating the attraction.

`We will swear to each other, one day, shall we?' pleaded Birkin. `We will swear to stand by each other -- be true to each other -- ultimately -infallibly -- given to each other, organically -- without possibility of taking back.'

Birkin sought hard to express himself. But Gerald hardly listened. His face shone with a certain luminous pleasure. He was pleased. But he kept his reserve. He held himself back.

`Shall we swear to each other, one day?' said Birkin, putting out his hand towards Gerald.

Gerald just touched the extended fine, living hand, as if withheld and afraid.

`We'll leave it till I understand it better,' he said, in a voice of excuse.

Birkin watched him. A little sharp disappointment, perhaps a touch of contempt came into his heart.

`Yes,' he said. `You must tell me what you think, later. You know what I mean? Not sloppy emotionalism. An impersonal union that leaves one free.'

They lapsed both into silence. Birkin was looking at Gerald all the time. He seemed now to see, not the physical, animal man, which he usually saw in Gerald, and which usually he liked so much, but the man himself, complete, and as if fated, doomed, limited. This strange sense of fatality in Gerald, as if he were limited to one form of existence, one knowledge, one activity, a sort of fatal halfness, which to himself seemed wholeness, always overcame Birkin after their moments of passionate approach, and filled him with a sort of contempt, or boredom. It was the insistence on the limitation which so bored Birkin in Gerald. Gerald could never fly away from himself, in real indifferent gaiety. He had a clog, a sort of monomania.

There was silence for a time. Then Birkin said, in a lighter tone, letting the stress of the contact pass:

`Can't you get a good governess for Winifred? -- somebody exceptional?'

`Hermione Roddice suggested we should ask Gudrun to teach her to draw and to model in clay. You know Winnie is astonishingly clever with that plasticine stuff. Hermione declares she is an artist.' Gerald spoke in the usual animated, chatty manner, as if nothing unusual had passed. But Birkin's manner was full of reminder.

`Really! I didn't know that. Oh well then, if Gudrun would teach her, it would be perfect -- couldn't be anything better -- if Winifred is an artist. Because Gudrun somewhere is one. And every true artist is the salvation of every other.'

`I thought they got on so badly, as a rule.'

`Perhaps. But only artists produce for each other the world that is fit to live in. If you can arrange that for Winifred, it is perfect.'

`But you think she wouldn't come?'

`I don't know. Gudrun is rather self-opinionated. She won't go cheap anywhere. Or if she does, she'll pretty soon take herself back. So whether she would condescend to do private teaching, particularly here, in Beldover, I don't know. But it would be just the thing. Winifred has got a special nature. And if you can put into her way the means of being selfsufficient, that is the best thing possible. She'll never get on with the ordinary life. You find it difficult enough yourself, and she is several skins thinner than you are. It is awful to think what her life will be like unless she does find a means of expression, some way of fulfilment. You can see what mere leaving it to fate brings. You can see how much marriage is to be trusted to -- look at your own mother.'

`Do you think mother is abnormal?'

`No! I think she only wanted something more, or other than the common run of life. And not getting it, she has gone wrong perhaps.'

`After producing a brood of wrong children,' said Gerald gloomily.

`No more wrong than any of the rest of us,' Birkin replied. `The most normal people have the worst subterranean selves, take them one by one.'

`Sometimes I think it is a curse to be alive,' said Gerald with sudden impotent anger.

`Well,' said Birkin, `why not! Let it be a curse sometimes to be alive -- at other times it is anything but a curse. You've got plenty of zest in it really.'

`Less than you'd think,' said Gerald, revealing a strange poverty in his look at the other man.

There was silence, each thinking his own thoughts.

`I don't see what she has to distinguish between teaching at the Grammar School, and coming to teach Win,' said Gerald.

`The difference between a public servant and a private one. The only nobleman today, king and only aristocrat, is the public, the public. You are quite willing to serve the public -- but to be a private tutor --'

`I don't want to serve either --'

`No! And Gudrun will probably feel the same.'

Gerald thought for a few minutes. Then he said:

`At all events, father won't make her feel like a private servant. He will be fussy and greatful enough.'

`So he ought. And so ought all of you. Do you think you can hire a woman like Gudrun Brangwen with money? She is your equal like anything -probably your superior.'

`Is she?' said Gerald.

`Yes, and if you haven't the guts to know it, I hope she'll leave you to your own devices.'

`Nevertheless,' said Gerald, `if she is my equal, I wish she weren't a teacher, because I don't think teachers as a rule are my equal.'

`Nor do I, damn them. But am I a teacher because I teach, or a parson because I preach?'

Gerald laughed. He was always uneasy on this score. He did not want to claim social superiority, yet he would not claim intrinsic personal superiority, because he would never base his standard of values on pure being. So he wobbled upon a tacit assumption of social standing. No, Birkin wanted him to accept the fact of intrinsic difference between human beings, which he did not intend to accept. It was against his social honour, his principle. He rose to go.

`I've been neglecting my business all this while,' he said smiling.

`I ought to have reminded you before,' Birkin replied, laughing and mocking.

`I knew you'd say something like that,' laughed Gerald, rather uneasily.

`Did you?'

`Yes, Rupert. It wouldn't do for us all to be like you are -- we should soon be in the cart. When I am above the world, I shall ignore all businesses.'

`Of course, we're not in the cart now,' said Birkin, satirically.

`Not as much as you make out. At any rate, we have enough to eat and drink --'

`And be satisfied,' added Birkin.

Gerald came near the bed and stood looking down at Birkin whose throat was exposed, whose tossed hair fell attractively on the warm brow, above the eyes that were so unchallenged and still in the satirical face. Gerald, full-limbed and turgid with energy, stood unwilling to go, he was held by the presence of the other man. He had not the power to go away.

`So,' said Birkin. `Good-bye.' And he reached out his hand from under the bed-clothes, smiling with a glimmering look.

`Good-bye,' said Gerald, taking the warm hand of his friend in a firm grasp. `I shall come again. I miss you down at the mill.'

`I'll be there in a few days,' said Birkin.

The eyes of the two men met again. Gerald's, that were keen as a hawk's, were suffused now with warm light and with unadmitted love, Birkin looked back as out of a darkness, unsounded and unknown, yet with a kind of warmth, that seemed to flow over Gerald's brain like a fertile sleep.

`Good-bye then. There's nothing I can do for you?'

`Nothing, thanks.'

Birkin watched the black-clothed form of the other man move out of the door, the bright head was gone, he turned over to sleep.

 

他卧病在床，足不出户，看什么都不顺眼。他知道这包容着他生命的空壳快破碎了。他也知道它有多么坚固，可以坚持多久。对此他并不在乎。宁可死上一千次也不过这种不愿过的生活。不过最好还是坚持、坚持、坚持直到对生活满意为止。

他知道厄秀拉又回心转意了，他知道自己的生命寄托于她了。但是，他宁愿死也不接受她奉献出的爱。旧的相爱方式似乎是一种可怕的束缚，是一种招兵买马。他弄不清自己在想什么，可是一想到按旧的方式过一种可怕的家庭生活，在夫妻关系中获得满足他就感到厌恶，什么爱、婚姻、孩子、令人厌恶。他想过一种更为清爽、开放、冷静的生活，可不行，夫妻间火热的小日子和亲昵是可怕的。他们那些结了婚的人关起门来过日子，把自己关在相互间排他的同盟中，尽管他们是相爱的，这也令他感到生厌。整个群体中互不信任的人结成夫妻又关在私人住宅中孤立起来，总是成双成对的，没有比这更进一步的生活，没有直接而又无私的关系得到承认：各式各样的双双对对，尽管结了婚，但他们仍是貌合神离，毫无意义的人。当然，他对杂居比对婚姻更仇恨，私通不过是另一种配偶罢了，是对法律婚姻的反动。反动此行动更令人讨厌。

总的来说，他厌恶性，性的局限太大了。是性把男人变成了一对配偶中的一方，把女人变成另一方。可他希望他自己是独立的自我，女人也是她独立的自我。他希望性回归到另一种欲望的水平上去，只把它看作是官能的作用，而不是一种满足。他相信两性之间的结合，可他更希望有某种超越两性结合的进一步的结合，在那种结合中，男人具有自己的存在，女人也有自己的存在，双方是两个纯粹的存在，每个人都给对方以自由，就象一种力的两极那样相互平衡，就象两个天使或两个魔鬼。

他太渴望自由了，不要受什么统一需要的强迫，不想被无法满足的欲望所折磨。这些欲望和愿意应该在不受折答的情况下得到实现，就象在一个水源充足的世界上焦渴现象是不大可能的，总是能在不自觉的情况下得到满足。他希望同厄秀拉在一起就象自己独自相处时一样自由，清楚、淡泊，同时又相互平衡、极化制约。对他来说纠缠不清、浑浑浊浊的爱是太可怕了。

可在他看来，女人总是很可怕的，她们总要控制人，那种控制欲、自大感很强。她要占有，要控制，要占主导地位，什么都得归还给女人——一切的伟大母亲，一切源于她们，最终一切都得归于她们。

女人们以圣母自居，只因为她们给予了所有人以生命，一切就该归她们所有，这种倨傲态度几乎令他发疯。男人是女人的，因为她生育了他。她是悲伤的圣母玛丽亚，伟大的母亲，她生育了他，现在她又要占有他，从肉体到性到意念上的他，她都要占有。他对伟大的母性怕极了，她太令人厌恶了。

她非常骄横，以伟大的母亲自居。这一点他在赫麦妮那儿早就领教过了。赫麦妮显得谦卑、恭顺，可她实际上也是一个悲伤的圣母玛丽娅，她以可恶、阴险的傲慢和女性的霸道要夺回她在痛苦中生下的男人。她就是以这种痛楚与谦卑将自己的儿子束缚住，令他永远成为她的囚徒。

厄秀拉，厄秀拉也是一样。她也是生活中令人恐惧的骄傲女王，似乎她是蜂王，别的蜂都得依赖她。看到她眼中闪烁的黄色火焰，他就知道她有着难以想象的极高的优越感，对此她自己并没意识到，她在男人面前太容易低头了，当然只是在她非常自信她象一个女人崇拜自己的孩子、彻底占有并崇拜这个男人时她才这样。

太可怕了，受女人的钳制。一个男人总是让人当作女人身上落下的碎片，性更是这伤口上隐隐作痛的疤。男人得先成为女人的附属才能获得真正的地位，获得自己的完整。

可是为什么，为什么我们要把我们自己——男人和女人看成是一个整体的碎片呢？不是这样的，我们不是一个整体的碎片。不如说我们是要脱离混合体，变成纯粹的人。不如说，性是我们在混合体中仍然保留着的，尚未与之混合的天性。而激情则进一步把人们从混合体中分离出来，男性的激情属于男人，女性的激情属于女人，直到这两者象天使一样清纯、完整，直到在最高的意义上超越混合的性，使两个单独的男女象群星一样形成星座。

始初前，没有性这一说，我们是混合的，每个人都是一个混合体。个体化的结果是性的极化。女人成为一极，男人成为另一极。但尽管如此，这种分离还是不彻底的。世界就是这样旋转的。如今，新的时刻到来了，每个人都在与他人的不同中求得了完善。男人是纯粹的男人，女人是纯粹的女人，他们彻底极化了。再也没有那可怕的混合与搀合着自我克制的爱了。只有这纯粹的双极化，每个人都不受另一个人的污染。对每个人来说，个性是首要的，性是次要的，但两者又是完全相互制约着的。每个人都有其独立的存在，寻着自身的规律行事。男人有自己彻底的自由，女人也一样。每个人都承认极化的性巡环路线，承认对方不同于自己的天性。

伯金生病时做了如是的思索。他有时喜欢病到卧床不起的地步，那样他反倒容易尽快康复，事情对他来说变得更清纯了、更肯定了。

伯金卧病不起时，杰拉德前来看望他，这两个男人心中都深深感到不安。杰拉德的目光是机敏的，但显得躁动不安，他显得紧张而焦躁，似乎紧张地等待做什么事一样。他按照习俗身着丧服，看上去很一本正经、漂亮潇洒又合乎时宜。他头发的颜色很淡，几乎淡到发白的程度，象一道道电光一样闪烁着。他的脸色很好，表情很机智，他浑身都洋溢着北方人的活力。

尽管杰拉德并不怎么信任伯金，可他的确很喜欢他。伯金这人太虚无缥缈了——聪明，异想天开，神奇但不够现实。杰拉德觉得自己的理解力比伯金更准确、保险。伯金是个令人愉快、一个很奇妙的人，可还不够举足轻重，还不那么算得上人上人。

“你怎么又卧床不起了？”杰拉德握住伯金的手和善地问。他们之间总是杰拉德显出保护人的样子，以自己的体魄向伯金奉献出温暖的庇护所。

“我觉得这是因为我犯了罪，在受罚。”伯金自嘲地淡然一笑道。

“犯罪受罚？对，很可能是这样。你是不是应该少犯点罪，这样就健康多了。”

“你最好开导开导我。”他调侃道。

“你过得怎么样？”伯金问。

“我吗？”杰拉德看看伯金，发现他态度很认真的样子，于是自己的目光也热情起来。

“我不知道现在跟从前有何不同，说不上为什么要有所不同，没什么好变的。”

“我想，你的企业是愈办愈有成效了，可你忽视了精神上的要求。”

“是这样的，”杰拉德说，“至少对于我的企业来说是这样。

我敢说，关于精神我谈不出个所以然来。

“没错儿。”

“你也并不希望我能谈出什么来吧？”杰拉德笑道。

“当然不。除了你的企业，别的事儿怎么样？”

“别的？别的什么？我说不上，我不知道你指的是什么。”

“不，你知道，”伯金说，“过得开心不开心？戈珍·布朗温怎么样？”

“她怎么样？”杰拉德脸上现出迷惑不解的神情。“哦，”他接着说，“我不知道。我唯一能够告诉你的是，上次见到她时她给了我一记耳光。”

“一记耳光！为什么？”

“我也说不清。”

“真的！什么时候？”

“就是水上聚会那天晚上——迪安娜淹死的那天。戈珍往山上赶牛，我追她，记起来了吗？”

“对，想起来了。可她为什么要打你耳光呢？我想不是你愿意要她打的吧？”

“我？不，我说不清。我不过说了一句追赶那些高原公牛是件危险的事儿，确实是这样的嘛。她变了脸，说：‘我觉得你以为我怕你，怕你的牛，是吗？’我只问了一句‘为什么’

她就照我脸上打了一巴掌。”

伯金笑了，似乎感到满足。杰拉德不解地看看他，然后也笑了，说：

“当时我可没笑，真的。我这辈子从未受到过这样的打击。”

“那你发火了吗？”

“发火？我是发火了。我差点杀了她。”

“哼！”伯金说，“可怜的戈珍，她这样失态会后悔不堪的！”

他十分高兴。

“后悔不堪？”杰拉德饶有兴趣地问。

两个人都诡秘地笑了。

“会的，一旦她发现自己那么自负，她会痛苦的。”

“她自负吗？可她为什么要这样呢？我肯定这不必要，也不合乎情理。”

“我以为这是一时冲动。”

“是啊，可你如何解释这种一时的冲动呢？我并没伤害她呀。”

伯金摇摇头。

“我觉得，她突然变成了一个悍妇。”

“哦，”杰拉德说，“我宁可说是奥利诺科①。”

①在英语中“悍妇”与“亚马逊河”是同一个词，亚马逊河是横贯南美的世界第一大河，奥利诺科河是南美另一大河。

两个人都为这个不高明的玩笑感到好笑。杰拉德正在想戈珍说的那句话，她说她也可以最后打他一拳。可他没有对伯金讲这事。

“你对她这样做很反感吗？”伯金问。

“不反感，我才不在乎呢。”他沉默了一会又笑道，“不，我倒要看个究竟，就这些。打那以后她似乎感到点儿负疚。”

“是吗？可你们从那晚以后没再见过面呢？”

杰拉德的脸阴沉了下来。

“是的，”他说，“我们曾——你可以想象自从出了事以后我们的境况。”

“是啊，慢慢平静下来了吧？”

“我不知道，这当然是一个打击。可我不相信母亲对此忧心忡忡，我真地不相信她会注意这事儿。可笑的是，她曾是个一心扑在孩子身上的母亲，那时什么都不算数，她心中什么都没有，只有孩子。现在可好，她对孩子们一点都不理会，似乎他们都是些仆人。”

“是吗？你为此感到很伤脑筋吧？”

“这是个打击。可我对此感受并不很深，真的。我并不觉得这有什么不同。我们反正都得死去，死跟不死之间并没有多大区别。我几乎不怎么悲哀，这你知道的。这只能让我感到寒战，我对此说不太清。”

“你认为你死不死都无所谓吗？”伯金问。

杰拉德用一双蓝色的眼睛看着伯金，那蓝蓝的眼睛真象闪着蓝光的武器。他感到很尴尬，但又觉得无所谓。其实他很怕，非常怕。

“嗨，”他说，“我才不想死呢，我为什么要死呢？不过我从不在乎。这个问题对我来说并不紧迫，压根儿吸引不了我，这你知道的。”

“我对此一点都不怕。”伯金说，“不，似乎真得谈不上什么死不死的，真奇怪，它并非与我无关，它只象一个普通的明天一样。”

杰拉德凝视着伯金，两个人的目光相遇了，双方都心照不宣。

杰拉德眯起眼睛漠然、肆无忌惮地看着伯金，然后目光停留在空中的某一点上，目光很锐利，但他什么也没看。

“如果说死亡不是人生的终点，”他声音显得很古怪、难解、冷漠，“那是什么呢？”听他的话音，他似乎暴露了自己的想法。

“是什么？”伯金重复道。接下来的沉默颇具讽刺意味。

“内在的东西死了以后，还有一段很长的路程要走，然后我们才会消失。”伯金说。

“是有一段很长的路，”杰拉德说，“可那是什么样的路呢？”他似乎要迫使另一个人说出什么来，他自以为比别人懂得多。

“就是堕落的下坡路——神秘的宇宙堕落之路。纯粹的堕落之路是很长的，路上有许多阶段。我们死后还可以活很久，不断地退化。”

杰拉德脸上挂着微笑听伯金说话，那情态表明他比伯金懂得多，似乎他的知识更直接、更是亲身体验的，而伯金的知识不过是经过观察得出的推论，尽管接近要害，但并没打中要害。但他不想暴露自己的内心世界。如果伯金能够触到他的秘密就随他去，他杰拉德是不会帮助他的。杰拉德要最终暴个冷门。

“当然了，”他突然变了一种语调说。“我父亲对此感触最深，这会让他完蛋的。对他来说世界已崩溃了。他现在唯一关心的是温妮——他说什么也要拯救她。他说非送她进学校不可，可她不听话，这样他就办不到了，当然，她太古怪了点儿。我们大家对生都有一种很不好的感觉。我们毫无办法，可我们又无法生活得和谐起来。很奇怪，这是一个家族的衰败。”

“不应该送她去学校嘛。”伯金说，此时他有了新主意。

“不应该？为什么？”

“她是个奇怪的孩子，她有她的特异之处，比你更特殊些。我认为，特殊的孩子就不应该往学校里送。往学校送的都是些稍逊色的、普通孩子，我就是这么看的。”

“我的看法恰恰相反。我认为如果她离开家跟其他孩子在一起会使她变得更正常些。”

“可她不会跟那些人打成一片，你看着吧。你从没有真正与人为伍，对吗？而她则连装样儿都不会，更不会与人为伍。她高傲、孤独，天生来不合群儿。既然她爱独往独来，你干吗要让她合群儿呢？”

“我并不想让她怎么样。我不过认为上学校对她有好处。”

“上学对你有过好处吗？”

杰拉德听到这话，眼睛眯了起来，样子很难看。学校对他来说曾是一大折磨。可他从未提出过疑问：一个人是否应该从头至尾忍受这种折磨。他似乎相信用驯服和折磨的手段可以达到教育的目的。

“我曾恨过学校，可现在我可以看得出学校的必要性，”他说，“学校教育让我同别人处得和谐了点——的确，如果你跟别人处不好你就无法生存。”

“那，”伯金说，“我可以说，如果你不跟别人彻底脱离关系你就无法生存。如果你想冲破这种关系，你就别想走进那个圈子。温妮有一种特殊的天性，对这些有特殊天性的人，你应该给其一个特殊的世界。”

“是啊，可你那个特殊世界在哪儿呢？”

“创造一个嘛。不是削足适履而是让世界适应你。事实上，两个特殊人物就构成一个世界。你和我，我们构成一个与众不同的世界。你并不想要你妹夫们那样的世界，这正是你的特殊价值所在。你想变得循规蹈矩，变得平平常常吗？这是撒谎。你其实要自由，要出人头地，在一个自由的不凡的世界里出人头地。”

杰拉德微妙地看着伯金。可他永远不会公开承认他的感受。在某一方面他比伯金懂得多，就是为了这一点，他才给予伯金以柔情的爱，似乎伯金年少，幼稚，还象个孩子，聪明得惊人但又天真得无可救药。

“可是如果你觉得我是个畸型人你可就太庸俗了。”伯金一针见血地说。

“畸型人！”杰拉德吃惊地叫道。随之他的脸色舒朗了，变得清纯，就象一朵花蕾绽开一般。“不，我从未把你当成畸型人。”他看着伯金，那目光令伯金难以理解。“我觉得，”杰拉德接着说，“你总让人捉摸不透，也许你自己就无法相信自己。反正我从来拿不准你的想法。你一转身就可以改变思想，似乎你没有头脑似的。”

他一双锋利的目光直视伯金。伯金很是惊讶。他觉得他有世人都有的头脑。他目瞪口呆了。杰拉德看出伯金的眼睛是那么迷人，这年轻、率直的目光让他着迷得很，他不禁为自己以前不信任伯金感到深深的懊悔。他知道伯金可以没有他这个朋友，他会忘记他，没有什么痛苦地忘记他，杰拉德意识到这一点，但又难以置信：这年轻人何以如此象个动物一样超然，这般自然？这几乎有点虚伪，象谎言，是的，常有这回事，伯金谈起什么来都那么深奥、那么煞有介事。

而此时伯金想的却是另一回事儿。他突然发现自己面临着另一个问题——爱和两个男人之间永恒的联系问题。这当然是个必要的问题——他一生中心里都有这个问题——纯粹、完全地爱一个男人。当然他一直是爱杰拉德的，可他又不愿承认它。

他躺在床上思忖着，杰拉德坐在旁边沉思着。两个人都各自想自己的心事。

“你知道吗，古时候德国的骑士习惯宣誓结成血谊兄弟的。”他对杰拉德说，眼里闪动着幸福的光芒，这眼神是原先所没有的。

“在胳膊上割一个小口子，伤口与伤口磨擦，相互交流血液？”杰拉德问。

“是的，还要宣誓相互忠诚，一生中都是一个血统。咱们也该这么做。不过不用割伤口，这种做法太陈旧了。我们应该宣誓相爱，你和我，明明白白地，彻底地，永远地，永不违约。”

他看着杰拉德，目光清澈，透着幸福之光。杰拉德俯视着他，深深受到他的吸引，他甚至不相信、厌恶伯金的吸引力。

“咱们哪天也宣誓吧，好吗？”伯金请求道，“咱们宣誓站在同一立场上，相互忠诚——彻底地，完全相互奉献，永不再索回。

伯金绞尽脑汁力图表达自己的思想，可杰拉德并不怎么听他的。他脸上挂着一种快意。他很得意，但他掩饰着，他退却了。

“咱们哪天宣誓好吗？”伯金向杰拉德伸出手说。

杰拉德触摸了一下伸过来的那只活生生的手，似乎害怕地缩了回去。

“等我更好地理解了再宣誓不好吗？”他寻着借口说。

伯金看着他，心中感到极大的失望，或许此时他蔑视杰拉德了。

“可以，”他说，“以后你一定要告诉我你的想法。你知道我的意思吗？这不是什么感情冲动的胡说。这是超越人性的联合，可以自由选择。”

他们都沉默了。伯金一直看着杰拉德。现在似乎看到的不是肉体的、有生命的杰拉德，那个杰拉德是司空见惯的，他很喜欢那个杰拉德，而是作为人的杰拉德，整个儿的人，似乎杰拉德的命运已经被宣判了，他受着命运的制约。杰拉德身上的这种宿命感总会在激情的接触之后压倒伯金，让伯金感到厌倦从而蔑视他、似乎杰拉德只有一种生存的形式，一种知识，一种行动，他命中注定是个只有一知半解的人，可他自己却觉得自己很完美。就是杰拉德的这种局限性让伯金厌倦，杰拉德抱残守缺，永远也不会真正快乐地飞离自我。他有点象偏执狂，自身有一种障碍物。

一时间他们沉默了好一会儿。伯金语调轻松起来，语气无所加重地说：

“你不能为温妮弗莱德找一个好的家庭教师吗？找一个不平凡的人物做她的老师。”

“赫麦妮·罗迪斯建议请戈珍来教她绘画和雕刻泥塑。温妮在泥塑方面聪明得惊人，这你知道的。赫麦妮说她是个艺术家。”杰拉德语调象往常一样快活，似乎刚才没有发生什么了不起的事。可伯金的态度却处处让人想起刚才的事。

“是吗！我还不知道呢。哦，那好，如果戈珍愿意教她，那可太好了，再没比这更好的了，温妮成为艺术家就好。戈珍就是个艺术家。每个真正的艺术家都能拯救别人。”

“一般来说，她们总是处不好。”

“或许是吧。可是，只有艺术家才能为别的艺术家创造一个适于生存的世界。如果你能为温妮弗莱德安排一个这样的世界，那就太好了。

“你觉得戈珍不会来教她吗？”

“我不知道。戈珍很有自己的见解。开价低了她是不会干的。如果她干，很快也会辞掉不干的。所以我不知道她是否会降尊来这儿执教，特别是来贝多弗当私人教师。可是还非得这样不可。温妮弗莱德禀性跟别人不同。如果你能让她变得自信，那可再好不过了。她永远也过不惯普通人的生活。让你过你也会觉得困难的，而她比你更有甚之，不知难多少倍。很难想象如果她寻找不到表达方式，寻找不到自我完善的途径她的生活将会怎样。你可以明白，命运将会把单纯的生活引向何方。你可以明白婚姻有多少可信的程度——看看你自己的母亲就知道了。”

“你认为我母亲反常吗？”

“不！我觉得她不过是需要更多的东西，或是需要与普通生活不同的东西。得不到这些，她就变得不正常了，或许是这样吧。”

“可她养了一群不肖的儿女。”杰拉德阴郁地说。

“跟我们其余的人一样，都是不肖的儿女。”伯金说，“最正常的人有着最见不得人的自我，个个儿如此。”

“有时我觉得活着就是一种诅咒。”杰拉德突然用一种苍白的愤然口吻说。

“对，”伯金说，“何尝不是这样！活着是一种诅咒，什么时候都是如此，只能是一种诅咒，常常诅咒得有滋有味儿的，真是这样。”

“并不象你想象的那么有滋味儿。”杰拉德看看伯金，那表情显得他内心很贫困。

他们沉默着，各想各的心事。

“我不明白她何以认为在小学教书与来家里教温妮有什么不同。”杰拉德说。

“它们的不同就是公与私。今日唯一上等的事是公事，人们都愿意为公共事业效力，可是要做一个私人教师嘛——”

“我不会愿意干的——”

“对呀！戈珍很可能也这么想。”

杰拉德思忖了片刻说：

“不管怎么说，我父亲是不会让她感觉自己是私人教师的。父亲会感到惊奇，并会对她感恩戴德的。”

“他应该这样。你们都应该这样。你以为你光有钱就可以雇佣戈珍·布朗温这样的女人吗？她同你们是平等的，或许比你们还优越。”

“是吗？”

“是的，如果你没有勇气承认这一点，我希望她别管你的事。”

“无论如何，”杰拉德说，“如果她跟我平等，我希望她别当教师，一般来说，教师是不会与我平等的。”

“我也是这么想，去他们的吧。可是，难道因为我教书我就是教师，我布道我就是牧师吗？”

杰拉德笑了。在这方面他总感到不自在。他并不要求社会地位的优越，他也不以内在的个性优越自居，因为他从不把自己的价值尺度建立在纯粹的存在上。为此，他总对心照不宣的社会地位表示怀疑。现在伯金要他承认人与人之间内在的不同，可他并无承认之意。这样做是与他的名誉和原则相悖的。他站起身来要走。

“我快把我的公务忘了。”他笑道。

“我早该提醒你的。”伯金笑着调侃道。

“我知道你会这样说的。”杰拉德不自在地笑道。

“是吗？”

“是的，卢伯特。我们可不能都象你那样啊，否则我们就都陷入困境了。当我超越了这个世界时，我将蔑视一切商业。”

“当然，我们现在并不是陷在困境中。”伯金嘲弄地说。

“并不象你理解的那样。至少我们有足够的吃喝——”

“并对此很满意。”伯金补了一句。

杰拉德走近床边俯视着伯金。伯金仰躺着，脖颈全暴露了出来，零乱的头发搭在眉毛上，眉毛下，挂着嘲弄表情的脸上镶着一双透着沉静目光的眼睛。杰拉德尽管四肢健壮，浑身满是活力，却被另一个人迷惑住了，他还不想走。他无力迈开步伐。

“就这样吧，”伯金说，“再见。”说着他从被子下伸出手，微笑着。

“再见，”杰拉德紧紧握着朋友火热的手说，“我会再来，我会想念你的，我就在磨房那儿。”

“过几天我就去那儿。”伯金说。

两个人的目光又相遇了。杰拉德的目光本是鹰一般锐利，可现在却变得温暖，充满了爱——他并不会承认这一点。伯金还之以茫然的目光，可是那目光中的温暖似乎令杰拉德昏然睡去。

“再见吧。我能为你做点什么吗？”

“不用了，谢谢。”

伯金目送着黑衣人走出门去，那堂皇的头颅在视线中消失了以后，他就翻身睡去了。