The car gave a great swerve, and she fell on the driver. Then she
righted herself. It gave another swerve, and she fell on
Alexander. She righted herself angrily. And now they ran straight
on: and it seemed a little quieter.
'I realized,' he said, 'that I had always made a mistake,
undertaking to love.'
'It must have been an undertaking for you,' she cried.
'Yes, I'm afraid it was. I never really wanted it. But I thought
I did. And that's where I made my mistake.'
'Whom have you ever loved?--even as an undertaking?' she asked.
'To begin with, my mother: and that was a mistake. Then my sister:
and that was a mistake. Then a girl I had known all my life: and
that was a mistake. Then my wife: and that was my most terrible
mistake. And then I began the mistake of loving you.'
'Undertaking to love me, you mean,' she said. 'But then you never
did properly undertake it. You never really UNDERTOOK to love me.'
'Not quite, did I?' said he.
And she sat feeling angry that he had never made the undertaking.
'No,' he continued. 'Not quite. That is why I came back to you.
I don't want to love you. I don't want marriage on a basis of
love.'
'On a basis of what, then?'
'I think you know without my putting it into words,' he said.
'Indeed, I assure you I don't. You are much too mysterious,' she
replied.
Talking in a swiftly-running motor-car is a nerve-racking business.
They both had a pause, to rest, and to wait for a quieter stretch
of road.
'It isn't very easy to put it into words,' he said. 'But I tried
marriage once on a basis of love, and I must say it was a ghastly
affair in the long run. And I believe it would be so, for me,
WHATEVER woman I had.'
'There must be something wrong with you, then,' said she.
'As far as love goes. And yet I want marriage. I want marriage.
I want a woman to honour and obey me.'
'If you are quite reasonable and VERY sparing with your commands,'
said Hannele. 'And very careful how you give your orders.'
'In fact, I want a sort of patient Griselda. I want to be honoured
and obeyed. I don't want love.'
'How Griselda managed to honour that fool of a husband of hers,
even if she obeyed him, is more than I can say,' said Hannele.
'I'd like to know what she REALLY thought of him. Just what any
woman thinks of a bullying fool of a husband.'
'Well,' said he, 'that's no good to me.'
They were silent now until the car stopped at the station. There
they descended and walked on under the trees by the lake.
'Sit on a seat,' he said, 'and let us finish.'
Hannele, who was really anxious to hear what he should say, and
who, woman-like, was fascinated by a man when he began to give away
his own inmost thoughts--no matter how much she might jeer
afterwards--sat down by his side. It was a grey evening, just
falling dark. Lights twinkled across the lake, the hotel over
there threaded its strings of light. Some little boats came rowing
quietly to shore. It was a grey, heavy evening, with that special
sense of dreariness with which a public holiday usually winds up.
'Honour and obedience: and the proper physical feelings,' he said.
'To me that is marriage. Nothing else.'
'But what are the proper physical feelings but love?' asked
Hannele.
'No,' he said. 'A woman wants you to adore her, and be in love
with her--and I shan't. I will not do it again, if I live a monk
for the rest of my days. I will neither adore you nor be in love
with you.'
'You won't get a chance, thank you. And what do you call the
proper physical feelings, if you are not in love? I think you want
something vile.'
'If a woman honours me--absolutely from the bottom of her nature
honours me--and obeys me because of that, I take it, my desire for
her goes very much deeper than if I was in love with her, or if I
adored her.'
'It's the same thing. If you love, then everything is there--all
the lot: your honour and obedience and everything. And if love
isn't there, nothing is there,' she said.
'That isn't true,' he replied. 'A woman may love you, she may
adore you, but she'll never honour you nor obey you. The most
loving and adoring woman today could any minute start and make a
doll of her husband--as you made of me.'
'Oh, that eternal doll. What makes it stick so in your mind?'
'I don't know. But there it is. It wasn't malicious. It was
flattering, if you like. But it just sticks in me like a thorn:
like a thorn. And there it is, in the world, in Germany somewhere.
And you can say what you like, but ANY woman, today, no matter HOW
much she loves her man--she could start any minute and make a doll
of him. And the doll would be her hero: and her hero would be no
more than her doll. My wife might have done it. She did do it, in
her mind. She had her doll of me right enough. Why, I heard her
talk about me to other women. And her doll was a great deal
sillier than the one you made. But it's all the same. If a woman
loves you, she'll make a doll out of you. She'll never be
satisfied till she's made your doll. And when she's got your doll,
that's all she wants. And that's what love means. And so, I won't
be loved. And I won't love. I won't have anybody loving me. It
is an insult. I feel I've been insulted for forty years: by love,
and the women who've loved me. I won't be loved. And I won't
love. I'll be honoured and I'll be obeyed: or nothing.'
'Then it'll most probably be nothing,' said Hannele sarcastically.
'For I assure you I've nothing but love to offer.'
'Then keep your love,' said he.
She laughed shortly.
'And you?' she cried. 'You! Even suppose you WERE honoured and
obeyed. I suppose all you've got to do is to sit there like a
sultan and sup it up.'
'Oh no. I have many things to do. And woman or no woman, I'm
going to start to do them.'
'What, pray?'
'Why, nothing very exciting. I'm going to East Africa to join a
man who's breaking his neck to get his three thousand acres of land
under control. And when I've done a few more experiments and
observations, and got all the necessary facts, I'm going to do a
book on the moon. Woman or no woman, I'm going to do that.'
'And the woman?--supposing you get the poor thing.'
'Why, she'll come along with me, and we'll set ourselves up out
there.'
'And she'll do all the honouring and obeying and housekeeping
incidentally, while you ride about in the day and stare at the moon
in the night.'
He did not answer. He was staring away across the lake.
'What will you do for the woman, poor thing, while she's racking
herself to pieces honouring you and obeying you and doing frightful
housekeeping in Africa: because I know it can be AWFUL: awful.'
'Well,' he said slowly, 'she'll be my wife, and I shall treat her
as such. If the marriage service says love and cherish--well, in
that sense I shall do so.'
'Oh!' cried Hannele. 'What, LOVE her? Actually love the poor
thing?'
'Not in that sense of the word, no. I shan't adore her or be in
love with her. But she'll be my wife, and I shall love and cherish
her as such.'
'Just because she's your wife. Not because she's herself. Ghastly
fate for any miserable woman,' said Hannele.
'I don't think so. I think it's her highest fate.'
'To be your wife?'
'To be a wife--and to be loved and shielded as a wife--not as a
flirting woman.'
'To be loved and cherished just because you're his wife! No, thank
you. All I can admire is the conceit and impudence of it.'
'Very well, then--there it is,' he said, rising.
She rose too, and they went on towards where the boat was tied.
As they were rowing in silence over the lake, he said:
'I shall leave tomorrow.'
She made no answer. She sat and watched the lights of the villa
draw near. And then she said:
'I'll come to Africa with you. But I won't promise to honour and
obey you.'
'I don't want you otherwise,' he said, very quietly.
The boat was drifting to the little landing-stage. Hannele's
friends were hallooing to her from the balcony.
'Hallo!' she cried. 'Ja. Da bin ich. Ja, 's war wundersch�n.'
Then to him she said:
'You'll come in?'
'No,' he said, 'I'll row straight back.'
From the villa they were running down the steps to meet Hannele.
'But won't you have me even if I love you?' she asked him.
'You must promise the other,' he said. 'It comes in the marriage
service.'
'Hat 's geregnet? Wiewar das Wetter? Warst du auf dem Gletscher?'
cried the voices from the garden.
'Nein--kein Regen. Wundersch�n! Ja, er war ganz auf dem
Gletscher,' cried Hannele in reply. And to him, sotto voce:
'Don't be a solemn ass. Do come in.'
'No,' he said, 'I don't want to come in.'
'Do you want to go away tomorrow? Go if you DO. But, anyway, I
won't say it BEFORE the marriage service. I needn't, need I?'
She stepped from the boat on to the plank.
'Oh,' she said, turning round, 'give me that picture, please, will
you? I want to burn it.'
He handed it to her.
'And come tomorrow, will you?' she said.
'Yes, in the morning.'
He pulled back quickly into the darkness.
End of this Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook
The Captain's Doll (1923) by D. H. Lawrence
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