Chapter 3 Chapter 2 Shortlands

The Bronwens had gone back to the Bedovers, and the wedding party had gathered at the Criches in Shortlands.The mansion was situated on the other side of the narrow Willie Lake, a long line of houses along the top of a hillside, the houses were low and old, like a manor.There were a few lonely trees on the gently sloping lawn below the Shortlands, which might have been a park, with a narrow lake in front of it.On the other side of the lawn and the lake, facing Shortlands, was a wooded hill that hid the coal mine valley beyond, but did not stop the rising black smoke from the coal mines.But in any case, the scene is rather idyllic, beautiful and peaceful, and the house is uniquely built here.

Now Shortlands is packed with Krich's family and wedding guests.The father was not in good health, so he withdrew first to rest, so that Gerald became the master.He stood in the modest drawing room to greet the gentlemen with a friendly and elegant manner.He was almost socially happy, smiling and friendly. The maids kept the three married daughters of the Creech family busy and confused the scene.You can always hear one or another of the Creech daughters' characteristic orders: "Helen, come here." "Mazelie, I want you to come here." "Hey, I Said Mrs. Whitman--" There was a "chacha" of skirts in the hall, accompanied by beautiful women passing by, a child dancing in the hall, and a footman hurriedly coming and going busy.

The male guests gathered together silently in groups of three or five, chatting while smoking, pretending to be dismissive of the lively scene in the women's world.But they weren't really talking, they were still watching the excited women, listening to their chilling laughter and their rapid-fire chatter.They waited, restless and irritated.But Gerald still looked so amiable, so happy, that it was not known whether he was waiting for someone or not, except that he was the center of the occasion. Suddenly, noiselessly, Mrs. Creech entered the room, looking around with a strong, sharp face.She was still wearing the hat, and the blue silk dress with the tulle over it.

"What's the matter, Mom?" Gerald asked. "Nothing, nothing!" she replied vaguely.Then she went straight to Birkin, who was talking to one of the Creeches' sons-in-law. "How do you do, Mr. Birkin," she said in a low voice, as if she didn't think much of her guest.And she held out her hand to him. "Oh, Mrs. Creech," Birkin accosted her improvisingly, "I couldn't get close to you just now." "I don't know half the people here," she said in a low voice.Her son-in-law took advantage of the moment to hide away nervously.

"Don't you like strangers?" laughed Birkin. "I've never understood why a man should value those whom he meets by chance. Why should I know them?" "Yes! Yes!" Mrs. Creech lowered her voice and said somewhat urgently. "It doesn't count when they come. I don't know these people in the hall. The children introduced me, "Mother, this is Mr. So-and-so. 'I don't know anything else.What is the relationship between Mr. So-and-so and his title?What have I to do with him and his title? " As she spoke she raised her eyes to Birkin, which startled Birkin.He was flattered that she could come and talk to him, because she didn't take anyone seriously.He looked down at her tense, chiseled face, but he dared not gaze into her hard blue eyes, so he looked away to her hair.Above her pretty ears, her hair was coiled so-so and loose, not very cool.Her neck was not so refreshing either.Still, Birkin felt drawn to her more than anyone else.But he thought to himself that he should always wash himself carefully, at least his neck and ears should always be clean.

Thinking of these things, he smiled slightly.But he was still nervous, feeling that he and this strange old woman were talking in someone else's camp like traitors and enemies.He was like a deer, with one ear pulled back and the other stretched forward in search of something. "It doesn't really matter to others." He didn't want to talk, so he chatted up. The mother looked up at him suddenly with deep questioning, as if doubting his sincerity. "How do you explain 'so-called'?" she asked sharply. "So many people are not all important," he replied, forced to dig deeper.

"They're joking and laughing, and it's best to let them all go. Fundamentally, they don't exist, they're not there." She stared at him as he spoke. "We don't imagine them!" she said bitterly. "It's nothing to imagine, they don't exist." "Hmm," she said, "I don't think so yet. They're there, and whether they exist or not doesn't depend on me. All I know is that they don't want me to take them seriously." .Don’t think I have to know them just because they’re here. In my eyes, they’re like nothing.”

"Exactly," he replied. "Really?" she asked again. "It's like it never came," he repeated.At this point they all stopped talking. "It doesn't count if they come, it's a nuisance," she said. "My sons-in-law are here." She said a little to herself, "Now Laura is married and has a son-in-law, but I really can't tell which is John and which is John. They come and call me mom. I know what they're going to say - 'Hello, mom.' I really want to say, 'I can't count It's your mother.' But what's the use? Here they come. I have my own children, and I can still tell which is mine and which is another woman's."

"It should be," said Birkin. She looked at him in surprise, maybe she had forgotten who she was talking to.Her thread of speech was interrupted. She glanced casually around the room.Birkin could not guess what she was looking for, or what she was thinking.It was obvious that she was paying attention to her sons. "Are all my children there?" she asked him out of the blue. He smiled, taken aback, maybe scared. "I don't know anyone very well except Gerald," he said. "Gerald!" she cried. "He's the most useless of the boys. You don't think that, do you?"

"No way," said Birkin. The mother stared at her eldest son from a distance for a long time. "Hi," she said in a strange, mocking voice.The sound frightened Birkin, who seemed afraid to face reality.Mrs. Creech walked away, forgetting about him, but came back a moment later. "I wish he had a friend," she said, "he never had any." Birkin looked down into her blue gaze, which he could not understand. "Am I my brother's caretaker?" he whispered to himself. He remembered that it was Cain's cry, and he was slightly shocked.And Gerald is the reincarnated Cain.Of course he wasn't Cain, but he did kill his brother.It was purely accidental, and he was not responsible for the consequences of killing his brother.It was Gerald who killed his younger brother in an accident when he was a child.Isn't it just such a thing?Why brand sin and curse the life that caused the accident?A man lives by chance and dies by chance, doesn't he?Does a person's life depend on chance factors?Does his life relate only to race, kind, and species in general?If not, is there no such thing as pure chance?Did anything that happened have general significance?Yeah?Birkin stood thinking, forgetting Mrs Creech, just as she had forgotten him.

-------- ① Adam's eldest son in the Bible killed his younger brother Abel. He did not believe in chance.In the deepest sense, these are all intertwined. Just as he was reaching this conclusion, one of the Creeches' daughters stepped up and said, "Come on, mother dear, take your hat off, eh? We're going to sit down to dinner, it's a formal occasion, Don't you, dear?" And she put her hand in her mother's arm, and walked away with her on her arm.Birkin immediately went over to chat with the nearest gentleman. The gong sounded for dinner, and people looked up, but no one moved towards the dining room.The women of the family felt that the sound of the gong had nothing to do with them.Five minutes passed before Crother, the old footman, appeared anxiously in the doorway, looking at Gerald beggingly.Gerald snatched a large bent conch shell from the shelf and blew a deafening bang without greeting anyone.This peculiar conch sound is heart-shattering.This move was so effective that people started to move one after another, moving towards the dining room together as if commanded by the same signal. Gerald waited for a while until his sister came to be mistress.He knew his mother would not do her duty with all her heart.But as soon as my sister came, she hurried to her seat.So it was up to the lad to direct the guests to the table, and he seemed a little too bossy in doing it. As the tapas began, the dining room fell silent.At this moment, a girl of thirteen or fourteen years old with long shawl hair said calmly: "Gerald, you make such a terrible noise to greet the guests, but you forgot to say hello to Papa." "Really?" he said to the group. "My father is lying down to rest. He's not feeling well." "What the hell is he like?" asked a married daughter, but her eyes were fixed on the huge wedding cake piled up in the middle of the table, with fake flowers falling from it. "He's not sick, just tired," replied Winifred, with shawl-haired hair. The glasses were filled with wine, and everyone was chatting happily.At a far table sat my mother, her hair still coiled loosely.Birkin sat beside her.Sometimes she would cast a savage glance at the rows of faces, hold her head out for a moment to stare unceremoniously, and then ask Birkin in a low voice. "Who is that young man?" "I don't know," replied Birkin cautiously. "Have I met him before?" she asked. "No way. I haven't seen it anyway," he replied.So she was satisfied.She closed her eyes wearily, showing a serene expression, looking very much like a queen in repose.Then she opened her eyes again, with a polite smile on her face, and for a moment she looked like a cheerful hostess.She bowed gracefully, and everyone seemed welcome and happy.Then suddenly the shadow came back on her face, a sullen, eagle-like expression, and she had the look of a fighting beast, with a fierce glint under her brow, as if she hated everyone. "Mom," Deanna called, "may I drink?" Deanna was older than Winifred and beautiful. "Okay, you can drink it," replied the mother blankly, not interested in the question at all. So Deanna motioned for someone to pour wine for her. "Shouldn't Gerald limit my drinking," she said quietly to the crowd. "There, Dee," said my brother kindly.Deanna cast a defiant glance at her brother as she drank. It was strange how free and somewhat anarchic the family seemed to be.This is not so much a laissez-faire as a resistance to authority.Gerrard was a bit dominant in the family, not because he was in any special position, but because he had an overwhelming personality.His voice was kind but commanding, a quality that struck his sisters. Hermione was discussing ethnic issues with the bridegroom. "No," she said, "I think it's a mistake to promote patriotism, and that nations compete with each other as firms compete with each other." "Oh, you can't say that, how can you say that?" cried Gerald.He loves to argue. "You can't equate a race with a business concern. And nation presumably means race, and nation means race." For a while, everyone stopped talking.Gerald and Hermione had always been so strangely polite and hostile to each other, they were almost evenly matched. "Do you think race equals nation?" she asked thoughtfully, her face expressionless and her tone vacillating. Knowing that Hermione was expecting him to join the discussion, Birkin said deferentially, "I think Gerald is right that race is the fundamental factor of nationality, at least in Europe." Hermione paused again, as if to cool down the assertion. Then she made a strange authoritative statement: "Yes, if so, isn't the advocacy of patriotism advocating the racial instinct? Isn't it also advocating the commercial instinct? It's an instinct to possess wealth. Is this what we mean by a nation?" "Perhaps," said Birkin, feeling in his heart that the time and place for discussing the subject were inappropriate. But Gerald, now that he had found the thread of the argument, continued to argue. "A race can have a commercial side," he said. "In fact, it must. It's the same as a family. One has to be fed. You have to fight other families to get fed. Fighting against other ethnic groups. Otherwise, it would be inconceivable.” Hermione didn't speak again, but showed a domineering and indifferent demeanor.Then she said: "Yes, it can be different, I don't think it's right to stir up a spirit of hostility, it creates hatred and it grows day by day." "But can you take down the competitive spirit?" Gerald asked. "Competition is a necessary stimulus to production and improvement." "That's right," Hermione replied casually, "but I think it's fine without competition." Birkin said: "I declare that I hate competition." Hermione was eating a piece of bread, and hearing Birkin say this, she pulled the bread out of her teeth with ridiculous slowness.She turned to Birkin affectionately, and said with satisfaction: "You do hate the spirit, all right." "Hate it," he repeated. "Yeah," she whispered confidently and contentedly. "But," insisted Gerald, "if you don't allow a man to take the life of his neighbor, why do you allow one nation to take the life of another?" Hermione muttered under her breath for a long time before she said in a sarcastic, nonchalant tone: "It's all about wealth, isn't it? But it's not all about wealth, is it?" Gerald was annoyed by the vulgar materialism in her words. "Of course it is, more or less," he shot back. "If I take his hat off a man's head, that hat becomes a symbol of freedom. When he rises up to get his hat back, he is fighting to get his freedom back." Hermione felt overwhelmed. "Wrong is right," she said angrily, "but imagining a case to argue with is not sincere? Nobody's going to come and take my hat off my head, will they?" "That's because the criminal law prevented him from doing it," Gerrard said. "No," said Birkin, "ninety-nine per cent of the people don't want my hat." "That's just a matter of opinion," Gerrard said. "Maybe it's about the hat." The groom said with a smile. "If he wants my hat, as you say," said Birkin, "it is safe to say that I can decide that the loss of my hat is the greater loss of my freedom. I am a free and unencumbered man, and if I were Forced to fight, what I lose is my freedom. It's a question of which is worth more to me, my freedom of action or the loss of my hat?" "Yes," said Hermione, looking at Birkin strangely, "yes." "So, will you allow someone to come and take the hat off your head?" the bride asked Hermione. The tall, erect woman turned gradually, seemingly insensitive to the interlocutor's question. "No," she replied, in a slow, impersonal voice, with a hint of snickering clearly hidden in that tone. "No, I won't let anyone take my hat off my head." "But how do you prevent him from doing that?" asked Gerald. "I don't know, maybe I'll kill him," said Hermione slowly. There was a strange titter in her voice, and a menacing, confident humor in her demeanor. "Of course," said Gerrard, "I can understand Rupert. The question for him is whether his hat is more important than his peace of mind." "Peace of mind and body," said Birkin. "Well, say what you will," said Gerald, "but how can you solve a nation's problem by that?" "God bless me," laughed Birkin. "And you're going to actually solve the problem?" Gerald insisted. "If the nation's crown were an old hat, a thief could take it off." "But can the crown of a nation or race be an old hat?" insisted Gerald. "Certainly, I believe," said Birkin. "I'm not sure yet," Gerrard said. "I disagree with that, Rupert," said Hermione. "All right," said Birkin. "I'm all for the idea that the national crown is an old hat," laughed Gerrard. "You look like a fool in it," Deanna said.Deanna is his teenage little sister, who speaks with impertinence. "We really can't understand these broken hats." Laura.Criage cried, "Come on, Gerald, we're going to toast, let's toast. Full, full, yes, cheers! Toast! Toast!" Birkin watched as his glass was filled with champagne, and race and annihilation were on his mind.The foam overflowed the glass, and the pourer leaned back hastily.Seeing the fresh champagne, Birkin suddenly felt thirsty and drank it down.The atmosphere in the room disturbed him, and he felt oppressed. "Did I do it by accident or for some reason?" he asked himself.He concluded, to use a vulgar word, that he did so from "accidental purpose."He glanced at the footman who was approaching, and found that he walked quietly, with an indifferent attitude, and harbored the dissatisfaction of a servant.Birkin found himself loathing toasts, valets, assemblies, and even humans.When he got up to toast, he felt a little sick for some reason. Finally it's over, the meal.Several gentlemen came out for a walk in the garden.There is a lawn here, with several flower beds, and an iron fence on the edge of the small garden.The scenery here is quite pleasant, from here you can see a tree-lined road winding along the lake below the mountain.The spring is bright and the water is rippling.The woods across the lake were brown and full of life.A group of beautiful Jersey cows came to the iron fence, breathing heavily from their smooth mouths and noses, probably expecting people to eat rusks. Birkin leaned against the fence while a cow steamed his hand. "Beautiful, what a beautiful cow," said Marshall, a son-in-law of the Creech family. "This cow has the best milk." "Yes," said Birkin. "Oh, my little beauty, oh, little beauty!" Marshall falsettoed, and Birkin couldn't breathe with laughter at such a strange tone. "Who won your race, Lupton?" Birkin asked the bridegroom, trying to hide his own laughter. The groom pulls a cigar from his mouth. "Racing?" A smile floated on his face as he said that, he didn't want to mention the matter of running to the door of the church where 33 women in love were taught just now. "We arrived at the same time. At least, she touched the door with her hand first, and my hand touched her shoulder." "Say what?" Gerald asked. Birkin told him about the race between the bride and groom just now. "Huh!" Gerald said dissatisfiedly, "Why are you late?" "Lupton talked about immortality for a while," said Birkin, "and then we couldn't find the button hook." "My God!" cried Marshall, "talk about immortality on your wedding day! Don't you have anything else to think about?" "What's wrong with that?" asked the well-groomed naval officer, blushing sensitively. "It sounds like you didn't come here to get married, but rather to be executed. Talk about immortality!" the brother-in-law said emphatically. His words are so boring. "And what conclusions have you come to?" Gerald asked, ears pricked up for a metaphysical discussion. "You don't need a soul today, boy?" said Marshall. "It'll get in your way." "Okay! Marshall, go talk to someone else." Gerald suddenly called out impatiently. "I mean it, I promise," said Marshall a little crossly. "Souls that talk too much—" He hung back indignantly, and Gerald glared at him angrily.Gerald's gaze grew softer and kinder as his fat body disappeared into the distance. "One thing to tell you, Lupton," said Gerald, turning suddenly to the bridegroom, "Laura couldn't have brought such a fool into our family as Rorty." "Don't worry about it," Birkin said with a smile. "I didn't pay attention to them." The groom smiled. "Well, what about that race? Who started it?" Gerald asked. "We were late. Laura was standing on the steps of the churchyard when the carriage came up. It was she who ran forward. Why are you angry? Does it offend the dignity of your family?" "Yes, sort of," said Gerald, "you have to do everything properly, and if you can't do it properly, don't do anything." "Excellent motto," said Birkin. "You disagree with me?" asked Gerald. "Very agree," said Birkin, "only that it makes me uncomfortable when you speak in an aphoristic tone." "Damn Rupert, you want to monopolize all the maxims for yourself." Gerald said. "No, I'd get rid of all maxims, but you keep letting them get in the way." Gerald laughed at the humor, then raised his eyebrows in disdain. "Don't you believe there is a code of conduct?" he challenged Birkin harshly. "Rules, no. I hate all rules. But there should be some rules for the mob. Every man has his own ego, and he can do what he wants." "What do you mean by the self?" Gerald asked. "A maxim or a cliché?" "I mean doing things on my own. I think Laura breaking free from Lupton and running to the church door is a perfect example of doing things on her own. It's wonderful. The most precious thing about a person is to do things according to his natural impulse, which is the most gentlemanly." Manners. You're the most gentlemanly man you can be." "You don't expect me to take your words seriously, do you think I do?" Gerald asked. "Yes, Gerrard, I only expect very few people to take me this seriously, and you are one of them." "I'm afraid I can't live up to your expectations here, not at all. You think everyone is free to do what they want." "I've always looked at it that way. I want people to like what's purely individual about themselves so they can be themselves. But people just love group action." "But I," said Gerald darkly, "don't like being in a world like you say, where people go on their own, following their natural impulses. I want people to kill each other in five minutes." "That means you want to kill," Birkin said. "What does that mean?" Gerald asked angrily. Birkin said: "He who doesn't want to kill doesn't kill, and no one else can kill him if he doesn't want to. It's a perfect truth. There are two people who kill: the murderer and the murdered." A person who is killed is a person who is suitable to be killed, and there is a huge desire to be killed in him." "Sometimes your talk is sheer nonsense," said Gerald to Birkin. "None of us would like to be killed, but there are quite a few who would do it for us, maybe when." "That's a disgusting point of view, Gerald," said Birkin. "No wonder you're afraid of yourself, and your own happiness." "Why should I be afraid of myself?" said Gerald. "Besides I don't think I'm happy." "There seems to be a lurking desire in you to have your guts ripped open, so you imagine someone has a knife up their sleeve," Birkin said. "How do you know?" Gerald asked. "I observed it from you." The two confronted each other.The hatred between them is so strange, it is almost like love.It was always like this between them, the conversation always led to a kind of closeness, a strange, terrible closeness, or hate, or love, or both.They always break up nonchalantly, as if separation is an inconspicuous little thing, and they really treat it as a little thing.But their burning hearts reflected each other and burned together, which they would not admit.They want to maintain a casual, relaxed, unrestrained friendship, and they don't want to make the relationship between the two parties artificial, unmanly, so heart-to-heart and warm-hearted.They do not at all believe that men can be too close, so their great friendship is suppressed and never developed.