CHAPTER SEVEN

Boy and Girl Love

Paul had been many times to the Leivers' farm. He was becoming friends with the three Leivers boys, but Miriam, the girl he had seen on his first visit, remained distant.

She was a strange girl. The only person she ever really talked to was her mother. She read poetry and always had dreams of a more romantic life. But life on the farm would not let her dream for long. Her brothers treated her as a servant and she hated them. She was nearly sixteen and very beautiful.

It was a long time before she would allow herself to speak freely to Paul. The only boys she had ever known were her brothers, and they never took her seriously. Then one day she asked him,

"Have you seen the swing?"

"No," said Paul, "let's go and see it."

In one of the farm buildings was a rope tied to the roof. At the end, it had been tied in a loop so someone could sit in it.

"You go first," he said to the girl.

"No, I won't go first. You go," she said.

For the first time in her young life she enjoyed giving way to a man. Paul stepped into the swing. He pushed off with great energy. Soon he was flying through the air, back and forth, higher and higher. She watched him in amazement.

"I've-had a long enough turn, it's your go," he said after a while.

He helped her to get started. Miriam felt his hands upon her body. He pushed her off. She flew into the air, when she returned he was there to catch her and send her off again. Her heart melted in hot pain when the moment came for him to push her forward again.

Paul was becoming part of the Leivers' family. They accepted him, and he felt at home when he was there. Miriam began to feel differently towards him. He was not like her brothers, even though he spent a lot of time with them, he was always a little different.

Paul started giving Miriam lessons in mathematics. But things came slowly to her. He got angry at her if she didn't understand what he was trying to teach.

"You don't give me enough time to learn it," she said.

"If you say so," he would reply, throwing the book on the table.

Often, when he would go into the kitchen, Mrs Leivers would look at him and say:

"Don't be so hard on Miriam. She may not be quick, but I'm sure she tries."

"I can't help it. I just get angry with her," he said, feeling sorry about getting angry.

"You're not angry with me?" he asked Miriam later.

"No," she replied, in her beautiful deep voice, "I'm not angry."

Then he would often leave Miriam and go off with her brothers. It was painful for Miriam to see this. But she waited for him to come back to her.

Paul was now painting more than ever. When he had finished a work, he liked nothing more than to show it to Miriam. From what she said about his paintings, he learned something about himself. She helped him to see what had been there all along.

That there was any love growing between them both would have denied. He thought himself too intelligent for such a thing, and she thought she was above it and did not need men. Miriam was very sensitive. Her work on the farm had shown her all the facts of life. But because of this daily contact with the laws of nature, she had become sickened by the thought of sex. Paul followed her in this matter.

When he was nineteen, he was still earning little money, but he was happy. His painting was going well and life was fine.

That Easter, Paul organized for them to take a walk in the mountains. The day was full of light and color. Everyone was in a holiday mood. They had lunch in a field and spent the afternoon exploring the country.

Miriam went off by herself for a while. She could not spend too much time in the company of others. She never felt that she was like other people. Because of this, her best friend and lover was nature. She was most at peace when alone in the forest.

It was getting late, so she tried to find the others. She came out of the forest onto a road. In the distance she could see Paul. The sun was setting in front of him. He looked thin and strong, and it seemed as if the sun was giving him to her. A deep pain took hold of her, and she knew she must love him. She had discovered him.

The next Sunday, Miriam was upstairs dressing when Paul came. She liked to come running down to meet him. She stood at the foot of the stairs putting on a necklace he had given her. It got caught in her hair, but she finally got it on. She looked beautiful. Miriam went to stand by the window. Suddenly, she heard the gate open and saw Paul push his bicycle into the yard. She saw him look at the house, and she moved out of view. He walked in a relaxed way and his bicycle went with him as if it were a living animal.

"Paul is here!" she screamed.

She stood waiting for him. As she did, she searched inside herself to see if she really wanted this Paul Morel. She felt there would be some shame in it. Yet, she was afraid to find she did not want him. Then came a new pain, if she did want him, did he already know? But she stopped herself. How could it be wrong to love him?

Paul entered and sat down. He didn't seem to notice Miriam. He was talking to some of the family about a painting he had brought to show them. She went into the other room to be alone. It was lunch-time before she was able to speak to Paul, and then she was so distant that he thought he must have done something that angered her.

He did not want to become Miriam's lover. Their relationship had always been for him an intellectual one. He told anyone who asked that they were just friends. If Miriam was there, she remained silent and nodded her head in agreement. He was a fool who did not know his own heart. Yet both chose to ignore the talk of others.

"We aren't lovers; we are friends," he said to her. "We know it. Let them talk. What does it matter what they say?"

Sometimes when they were walking together, she would put her arm around his. But this always angered him. With Miriam, he was always trying to explore his own mind. When she did something like that it destroyed his thoughts.

One summer evening Miriam came to the house. Paul was alone in the kitchen.

"Come and have a look at the flowers," he said.

He picked her some flowers. He pinned them onto her dress, stepping back to see how they looked. Miriam laughed.

No other man would take pinning flowers onto a dress so seriously. He had nearly finished getting the flowers exactly how he wanted them, when he heard his mother coming.

"Don't tell mother," he said.

Miriam stood looking at the sunset. She would visit him no more, she thought.

"Good evening, Mrs Morel," she said, sounding as if she were a stranger.

"Oh, it's you Miriam," replied Mrs Morel coldly.

But Paul wanted everyone to accept his friendship with this girl for what he thought it was. Mrs Morel knew better.

It was not until he was twenty years old that the family could pay to go away for a holiday. Now at last Paul had saved enough money, and they were all going. There was to be a big group, some of Annie's friends, one of Paul's, and Miriam.

It was a great excitement looking for places to go. They decided on a town by the sea called Mablethorpe. They were to leave early on the Saturday morning, so Miriam came to stay the night at the house. Paul had found a poem about the town they were to visit, so he read it to the family. Miriam sat staring at him. He was her whole world. Mrs Morel sat jealously on her own chair.

After dinner Miriam went to help clean up.

"Let me help clean up," she said.

"Certainly not," said Annie, "You sit down again."

So Miriam did what she was told and sat down. All the women, whether they knew it or not, were fighting for Paul's attention. And they each did this in the way they thought best.

When they arrived at the house they had rented, they were all very happy. It was away from any other house and it had a view of the sea. Miriam did not get to have Paul to herself much during the holiday. It was only when at night the others went to town and Paul stayed to paint that he was all hers. He talked to her endlessly about ideas and painting.

One night they went for a walk along the beach. It was a warm and beautiful night. There was no one else in sight, and the only noise was the noise of the sea. Paul loved listening to the sea. It was late when they turned around and started for home. Paul and Miriam walked in silence. Suddenly he stopped. A large orange moon was staring at them. His heart beat very fast and his blood ran hot.

She was there with him, under this beautiful sky. He felt confused and sad. He did not understand the feelings in his heart—that was the problem. He was afraid of her. The fact that he might want her, as a man wants a woman, scared him. And she was too sensitive to stand the shock of physical love, even a strong kiss. The kiss he was too scared to give.

He hated her, for she seemed to make him hate himself. They walked home in silence. He thought of his mother and the other happy people back at the house. Their lives didn't seem so troubled. They loved and laughed without a care, he thought. Would he always be so unhappy, and what was it about this girl that could make him feel so bad about himself?

(end of section)