Rosalind opened the door to him. She started slightly, as a young girl will, and said:

‘Oh, I’ll tell father.’

With which she disappeared, leaving Birkin in the hall, looking at some reproductions from Picasso, lately introduced by Gudrun. He was admiring the almost wizard, sensuous apprehension of the earth, when Will Brangwen appeared, rolling down his shirt sleeves.

‘Well,’ said Brangwen, ‘I’ll get a coat.’ And he too disappeared for a moment. Then he returned, and opened the door of the drawing–room, saying:

‘You must excuse me, I was just doing a bit of work in the shed. Come inside, will you.’

Birkin entered and sat down. He looked at the bright, reddish face of the other man, at the narrow brow and the very bright eyes, and at the rather sensual lips that unrolled wide and expansive under the black cropped moustache. How curious it was that this was a human being! What Brangwen thought himself to be, how meaningless it was, confronted with the reality of him. Birkin could see only a strange, inexplicable, almost patternless collection of passions and desires and suppressions and traditions and mechanical ideas, all cast cast unfused and disunited into this slender, bright–faced man of nearly fifty, who was as unresolved now as he was at twenty, and as uncreated. How could he be the parent of Ursula, when he was not created himself. He was not a parent. A slip of living flesh had been transmitted through him, but the spirit had not come from him. The spirit had not come from any ancestor, it had come out of the unknown. A child is the child of the mystery, or it is uncreated.

‘The weather’s not so bad as it has been,’ said Brangwen, after waiting a moment. There was no connection between the two men.

‘No,’ said Birkin. ‘It was full moon two days ago.’

‘Oh! You believe in the moon then, affecting the weather?’

‘No, I don’t think I do. I don’t really know enough about it.’

‘You know what they say? The moon and the weather may change together, but the change of the moon won’t change the weather.’

‘Is that it?’ said Birkin. ‘I hadn’t heard it.’

There was a pause. Then Birkin said:

‘Am I hindering you? I called to see Ursula, really. Is she at home?’

‘I don’t believe she is. I believe she’s gone to the library. I’ll just see.’

Birkin could hear him enquiring in the dining–room.

‘No,’ he said, coming back. ‘But she won’t be long. You wanted to speak to her?’

Birkin looked across at the other man with curious calm, clear eyes.

‘As a matter of fact,’ he said, ‘I wanted to ask her to marry me.’

A point of light came on the golden–brown eyes of the elder man.

‘O–oh?’ he said, looking at Birkin, then dropping his eyes before the calm, steadily watching look of the other: ‘Was she expecting you then?’

“Oh, yes.”

“Well, we reckoned we’d strike another river soon, d‘ye see. But there was somethin’ wrong; compasses, or map, or somethin’, and it didn’t turn up. Water ran out. Just except a little drop for the likes of you, and — and —”

“And you couldn’t wash yourself,” interrupted his companion gravely, staring up at his grimy visage.

“No, nor drink. And Mr. Bender, he was the fust to go, and then Indian Pete, and then Mrs. McGregor, and then Johnny Hones, and then, dearie, your mother.”

“Then mother’s a deader too,” cried the little girl, dropping her face in her pinafore and sobbing bitterly.

“Yes, they all went except you and me. Then I thought there was some chance of water in this direction, so I heaved you over my shoulder and we tramped it together. It don’t seem as though we‘ve improved matters. There’s an almighty small chance for us now!”

“Do you mean that we are going to die to?” asked the child, checking her sobs, and raising her tear-stained face.

“I guess that’s about the size of it.”

“Why didn’t you say so before?” she said, laughing gleefully. “You gave me such a fright. Why, of course, now as long as we die we’ll be with mother again.”

“Yes, you will, dearie.”

“And you too. I’ll tell her how awful good you‘ve been. I’ll bet she meets us at the door of heaven with a big pitcher of water, and a lot of buckwheat cakes, hot and toasted on both sides, like Bob and me was fond of. How long will it be first?”

“I don’t know — not very long.” The man‘s eyes were fixed upon the northern horizon. In the blue vault of the heaven there had appeared three little specks which increased in size every moment, so rapidly did they approach. They speedily resolved themselves into three large brown birds, which circled over the heads of the two wanderers, and then settled upon some rocks which overlooked them. They were buzzards, the vultures of the West, whose coming is the forerunner of death.

“Cocks and hens,” cried the little girl gleefully, pointing at their ill-omened forms, and clapping her hands to make them rise. “Say, did God make this country?”

“Of course He did,” said her companion, rather startled by this unexpected question.

“He made the country down in Illinois, and He made the Missouri,” the little girl continued. “I guess somebody else made the country in these parts. It’s not nearly so well done. They forgot the water and the trees.”

“What would ye think of offering up prayer?” the man asked diffidently.

“It ain’t night yet,” she answered.

“It don’t matter. It ain‘t quite regular, but He won’t mind that, you bet. You say over them ones that you used to say every night in the wagon when we was on the plains.”