But it had shocked him, and put a mistrust into his heart,
and emphasized his fear of what was within himself. He was,
however, in a few days going about again in his own careless,
happy-go-lucky fashion, his blue eyes just as clear and honest
as ever, his face just as fresh, his appetite just as keen.
Or apparently so. He had, in fact, lost some of his buoyant
confidence, and doubt hindered his outgoing.
For some time after this, he was quieter, more conscious when
he drank, more backward from companionship. The disillusion of
his first carnal contact with woman, strengthened by his innate
desire to find in a woman the embodiment of all his
inarticulate, powerful religious impulses, put a bit in his
mouth. He had something to lose which he was afraid of losing,
which he was not sure even of possessing. This first affair did
not matter much: but the business of love was, at the bottom of
his soul, the most serious and terrifying of all to him.
He was tormented now with sex desire, his imagination
reverted always to lustful scenes. But what really prevented his
returning to a loose woman, over and above the natural
squeamishness, was the recollection of the paucity of the last
experience. It had been so nothing, so dribbling and functional,
that he was ashamed to expose himself to the risk of a
repetition of it.
He made a strong, instinctive fight to retain his native
cheerfulness unimpaired. He had naturally a plentiful stream of
life and humour, a sense of sufficiency and exuberance, giving
ease. But now it tended to cause tension. A strained light came
into his eyes, he had a slight knitting of the brows. His
boisterous humour gave place to lowering silences, and days
passed by in a sort of suspense.
He did not know there was any difference in him, exactly; for
the most part he was filled with slow anger and resentment. But
he knew he was always thinking of women, or a woman, day in, day
out, and that infuriated him. He could not get free: and he was
ashamed. He had one or two sweethearts, starting with them in
the hope of speedy development. But when he had a nice girl, he
found that he was incapable of pushing the desired development.
The very presence of the girl beside him made it impossible. He
could not think of her like that, he could not think of her
actual nakedness. She was a girl and he liked her, and dreaded
violently even the thought of uncovering her. He knew that, in
these last issues of nakedness, he did not exist to her nor she
to him. Again, if he had a loose girl, and things began to
develop, she offended him so deeply all the time, that he never
knew whether he was going to get away from her as quickly as
possible, or whether he were going to take her out of inflamed
necessity. Again he learnt his lesson: if he took her it was a
paucity which he was forced to despise. He did not despise
himself nor the girl. But he despised the net result in him of
the experience--he despised it deeply and bitterly.