Sons and Lovers - Daimon Club

She was very proud of her son. He went to the night school,
and learned shorthand, so that by the time he was sixteen he was
the best shorthand clerk and book-keeper on the place, except one.
Then he taught in the night schools. But he was so fiery that only
his good-nature and his size protected him.
All the things that men do--the decent things--William did.
He could run like the wind. When he was twelve he won a first
prize in a race; an inkstand of glass, shaped like an anvil.
It stood proudly on the dresser, and gave Mrs. Morel a keen pleasure.
The boy only ran for her. He flew home with his anvil, breathless,
with a "Look, mother!" That was the first real tribute to herself.
She took it like a queen.
"How pretty!" she exclaimed.
Then he began to get ambitious. He gave all his money to
his mother. When he earned fourteen shillings a week, she gave him
back two for himself, and, as he never drank, he felt himself rich.
He went about with the bourgeois of Bestwood. The townlet contained
nothing higher than the clergyman. Then came the bank manager,
then the doctors, then the tradespeople, and after that the hosts
of colliers. Willam began to consort with the sons of the chemist,
the schoolmaster, and the tradesmen. He played billiards in
the Mechanics' Hall. Also he danced--this in spite of his mother.
All the life that Bestwood offered he enjoyed, from the sixpenny-hops
down Church Street, to sports and billiards.
Paul was treated to dazzling descriptions of all kinds of
flower-like ladies, most of whom lived like cut blooms in William's
heart for a brief fortnight.
Occasionally some flame would come in pursuit of her errant
swain. Mrs. Morel would find a strange girl at the door,
and immediately she sniffed the air.
"Is Mr. Morel in?" the damsel would ask appealingly.
"My husband is at home," Mrs. Morel replied.
"I--I mean YOUNG Mr. Morel," repeated the maiden painfully.
"Which one? There are several."
Whereupon much blushing and stammering from the fair one.
"I--I met Mr. Morel--at Ripley," she explained.