The two sisters held themselves tense, and went straight
towards the gate. The women made way for them, but
barely sufficient, as if grudging to yield ground. The sisters
passed in silence through the stone gateway and up the steps,
on the red carpet, a policeman estimating their progress.
"What price the stockings?" said a voice at the back of Gudrun. A sudden fierce anger swept over the girl, violent, and murderous. She would have liked them all annihilated, cleared away, so that the world was left clear for her. How she hated walking up the churchyard path, along the red carpet, continuing in motion, in their sight.
"I won't go into the church," she said suddenly, with such final decision that Ursula immediately halted, turned round, and branched off up a small side path which led to the little private gate of the Grammar School, whose grounds adjoined those of the church.
Just inside the gate of the school shrubbery, outside the churchyard, Ursula sat down for a moment on the low stone wall under the laurel bushes, to rest. Behind her, the large red building of the school rose up peacefully, the windows all open for the holiday. Over the shrubs, before her, were the pale roofs and tower of the old church. The sisters were hidden by the foliage.
Gudrun sat down in silence. Her mouth was shut close, her face averted. She was regretting bitterly that she had ever come back. Ursula looked at her, and thought how amazingly beautiful she was, flushed with discomfiture. But she caused a constraint over Ursula's nature, a certain weariness. Ursula wished to be alone, freed from the tightness, the enclosure of Gudrun's presence.
"Are we going to stay here?" asked Gudrun.
"I was only resting a minute," said Ursula, getting up as if rebuked. "We will stand in the corner by the fives-court, we shall see everything from there."
For the moment, the sunshine fell brightly into the church-yard, there was a vague scent of sap and of spring, perhaps of violets from off the graves. Some white daisies were out, bright as angels. In the air, the unfolding leaves of a copper-beech were blood-red.
