He heard the distant hooters of Stacks Gate, for seven-o’clock. It was Monday morning. He shivered a little, and with his face between her breasts pressed her soft breasts up over his ears, to deafen him.
She had not even heard the hooters. She lay perfectly still, her soul washed transparent.
“You must get up, mustn’t you?” he muttered.
“What time?” came her colourless voice.
“Seven-o’clock blowers a bit sin’.”
“I suppose I must.”
She was resenting, as she always did, the compulsion from outside.
He sat up and looked blankly out of the window.
“You do love me, don’t you?” she asked calmly.
He looked down at her.
“Tha knows what tha knows. What dost ax for!” he said, a little fretfully.
“I want you to keep me, not to let me go,” she said.
His eyes seemed full of a warm, soft darkness that could not think.
“When? Now?”
“Now in your heart. Then I want to come and live with you always, soon.”
He sat naked on the bed, with his head dropped, unable to think.
“Don’t you want it,” she asked.