He was touching unconsciously the dead husks of flowers as he passed
by, and talking disconnectedly to himself.
'You can't go away,' he was saying. 'There IS no away. You only
withdraw upon yourself.' He threw a dead flower-husk on to the water.
'An antiphony--they lie, and you sing back to them. There wouldn't have
to be any truth, if there weren't any lies. Then one needn't assert
anything--' He stood still, looking at the water, and throwing upon it the husks of
the flowers.
'Cybele--curse her! The accursed Syria Dea! Does one begrudge it her?
What else is there--?' Ursula wanted to laugh loudly and hysterically, hearing his isolated
voice speaking out. It was so ridiculous.
He stood staring at the water. Then he stooped and picked up a stone,
which he threw sharply at the pond. Ursula was aware of the bright moon
leaping and swaying, all distorted, in her eyes. It seemed to shoot out
arms of fire like a cuttle-fish, like a luminous polyp, palpitating
strongly before her.
And his shadow on the border of the pond, was watching for a few
moments, then he stooped and groped on the ground. Then again there was
a burst of sound, and a burst of brilliant light, the moon had exploded
on the water, and was flying asunder in flakes of white and dangerous
fire. Rapidly, like white birds, the fires all broken rose across the
pond, fleeing in clamorous confusion, battling with the flock of dark
waves that were forcing their way in. The furthest waves of light,
fleeing out, seemed to be clamouring against the shore for escape, the
waves of darkness came in heavily, running under towards the centre.
But at the centre, the heart of all, was still a vivid, incandescent
quivering of a white moon not quite destroyed, a white body of fire
writhing and striving and not even now broken open, not yet violated.
It seemed to be drawing itself together with strange, violent pangs, in
blind effort. It was getting stronger, it was re-asserting itself, the
inviolable moon. And the rays were hastening in in thin lines of light,
to return to the strengthened moon, that shook upon the water in
triumphant reassumption.
Birkin stood and watched, motionless, till the pond was almost calm,
the moon was almost serene. Then, satisfied of so much, he looked for
more stones. She felt his invisible tenacity. And in a moment again,
the broken lights scattered in explosion over her face, dazzling her;
and then, almost immediately, came the second shot. The moon leapt up
white and burst through the air. Darts of bright light shot asunder,
darkness swept over the centre. There was no moon, only a battlefield
of broken lights and shadows, running close together. Shadows, dark and
heavy, struck again and again across the place where the heart of the
moon had been, obliterating it altogether. The white fragments pulsed
up and down, and could not find where to go, apart and brilliant on the
water like the petals of a rose that a wind has blown far and wide.