The Forsyte Saga John Galsworthy (hot novels to read TXT) đ
- Author: John Galsworthy
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âThat old storyâ âwas it so very dreadful?â
âYes.â In his voice, too, there was a note of defiance.
She dragged her hands away. âI didnât think in these days boys were tied to their mothersâ apron-strings.â
Jonâs chin went up as if he had been struck.
âOh! I didnât mean it, Jon. What a horrible thing to say!â Swiftly she came close to him. âJon, dear; I didnât mean it.â
âAll right.â
She had put her two hands on his shoulder, and her forehead down on them; the brim of her hat touched his neck, and he felt it quivering. But, in a sort of paralysis, he made no response. She let go of his shoulder and drew away.
âWell, Iâll go, if you donât want me. But I never thought youâd have given me up.â
âI havenât,â cried Jon, coming suddenly to life. âI canât. Iâll try again.â
Her eyes gleamed, she swayed toward him. âJonâ âI love you! Donât give me up! If you do, I donât know whatâ âI feel so desperate. What does it matterâ âall that past-compared with this?â
She clung to him. He kissed her eyes, her cheeks, her lips. But while he kissed her he saw, the sheets of that letter fallen down on the floor of his bedroomâ âhis fatherâs white dead faceâ âhis mother kneeling before it. Fleurâs whispered, âMake her! Promise! Oh! Jon, try!â seemed childish in his ear. He felt curiously old.
âI promise!â he muttered. âOnly, you donât understand.â
âShe wants to spoil our lives, just becauseâ ââ
âYes, of what?â
Again that challenge in his voice, and she did not answer. Her arms tightened round him, and he returned her kisses; but even while he yielded, the poison worked in him, the poison of the letter. Fleur did not know, she did not understandâ âshe misjudged his mother; she came from the enemyâs camp! So lovely, and he loved her soâ âyet, even in her embrace, he could not help the memory of Hollyâs words: âI think she has a âhavingâ nature,â and his motherâs âMy darling boy, donât think of meâ âthink of yourself!â
When she was gone like a passionate dream, leaving her image on his eyes, her kisses on his lips, such an ache in his heart, Jon leaned in the window, listening to the car bearing her away. Still the scent as of warm strawberries, still the little summer sounds that should make his song; still all the promise of youth and happiness in sighing, floating, fluttering Julyâ âand his heart torn; yearning strong in him; hope high in him yet with its eyes cast down, as if ashamed. The miserable task before him! If Fleur was desperate, so was heâ âwatching the poplars swaying, the white clouds passing, the sunlight on the grass.
He waited till evening, till after their almost silent dinner, till his mother had played to him and still he waited, feeling that she knew what he was waiting to say. She kissed him and went upstairs, and still he lingered, watching the moonlight and the moths, and that unreality of colouring which steals along and stains a summer night. And he would have given anything to be back again in the pastâ âbarely three months back; or away forward, years, in the future. The present with this dark cruelty of a decision, one way or the other, seemed impossible. He realised now so much more keenly what his mother felt than he had at first; as if the story in that letter had been a poisonous germ producing a kind of fever of partisanship, so that he really felt there were two camps, his motherâs and hisâ âFleurâs and her fatherâs. It might be a dead thing, that old tragic ownership and enmity, but dead things were poisonous till time had cleaned them away. Even his love felt tainted, less illusioned, more of the earth, and with a treacherous lurking doubt lest Fleur, like her father, might want to own; not articulate, just a stealing haunt, horribly unworthy, which crept in and about the ardour of his memories, touched with its tarnishing breath the vividness and grace of that charmed face and figureâ âa doubt, not real enough to convince him of its presence, just real enough to deflower a perfect faith. And perfect faith, to Jon, not yet twenty, was essential. He still had Youthâs eagerness to give with both hands, to take with neitherâ âto give lovingly to one who had his own impulsive generosity. Surely she had! He got up from the window-seat and roamed in the big grey ghostly room, whose walls were hung with silvered canvas. This house his father said in that deathbed letterâ âhad been built for his mother to live inâ âwith Fleurâs father! He put out his hand in the half-dark, as if to grasp the shadowy hand of the dead. He clenched, trying to feel the thin vanished fingers of his father; to squeeze them, and reassure him that heâ âhe was on his fatherâs side. Tears, prisoned within him, made his eyes feel dry and hot. He went back to the window. It was warmer, not so eerie, more comforting outside, where the moon hung golden, three days off full; the freedom of the night was comforting. If only Fleur and he had met on some desert island without a pastâ âand Nature for their house! Jon had still his high regard for desert islands, where breadfruit grew, and the water was blue above the coral. The night was deep, was freeâ âthere was enticement in it; a lure, a promise, a refuge from entanglement, and love! Milksop tied to his motherâsâ â! His cheeks burned. He shut the window, drew curtains over it, switched off the lighted sconce, and went upstairs.
The door of his room was open, the light turned up; his mother, still in her evening gown, was standing at the window. She turned and said:
âSit down, Jon; letâs talk.â She sat down on the window-seat, Jon on
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