HER sake,' she replied. 'I'm sure you'd--you're the right man for
her.'

'You are?' he said. 'And do you think she would agree with you?'

'Oh yes!' she exclaimed hastily. Then, upon reconsideration, very
uneasy: 'Though Gudrun isn't so very simple, is she? One doesn't know
her in five minutes, does one? She's not like me in that.' She laughed
at him with her strange, open, dazzled face.

'You think she's not much like you?' Gerald asked.

She knitted her brows.

'Oh, in many ways she is. But I never know what she will do when
anything new comes.'

'You don't?' said Gerald. He was silent for some moments. Then he moved
tentatively. 'I was going to ask her, in any case, to go away with me
at Christmas,' he said, in a very small, cautious voice.

'Go away with you? For a time, you mean?'

'As long as she likes,' he said, with a deprecating movement.

They were both silent for some minutes.

'Of course,' said Ursula at last, 'she MIGHT just be willing to rush
into marriage. You can see.'

'Yes,' smiled Gerald. 'I can see. But in case she won't--do you think
she would go abroad with me for a few days--or for a fortnight?'

'Oh yes,' said Ursula. 'I'd ask her.'

'Do you think we might all go together?'

'All of us?' Again Ursula's face lighted up. 'It would be rather fun,
don't you think?'

'Great fun,' he said.

'And then you could see,' said Ursula.

'What?'

'How things went. I think it is best to take the honeymoon before the
wedding--don't you?'

She was pleased with this MOT. He laughed.

'In certain cases,' he said. 'I'd rather it were so in my own case.'

'Would you!' exclaimed Ursula. Then doubtingly, 'Yes, perhaps you're
right. One should please oneself.'

Birkin came in a little later, and Ursula told him what had been said.

'Gudrun!' exclaimed Birkin. 'She's a born mistress, just as Gerald is a
born lover--AMANT EN TITRE. If as somebody says all women are either
wives or mistresses, then Gudrun is a mistress.'

'And all men either lovers or husbands,' cried Ursula. 'But why not
both?'

'The one excludes the other,' he laughed.

'Then I want a lover,' cried Ursula.

'No you don't,' he said.

'But I do,' she wailed.

He kissed her, and laughed.

It was two days after this that Ursula was to go to fetch her things
from the house in Beldover. The removal had taken place, the family had
gone. Gudrun had rooms in Willey Green.

Ursula had not seen her parents since her marria