Of Human Bondage
and Leon. He did not know quite what those unknown contacts would give
him, but he felt that he would gather from them a strength and a
purpose which would make him more capable of affronting and
comprehending the manifold wonders of places more distant and more
strange.
For this was only a beginning. He had got into communication with the
various companies which took surgeons out on their ships, and knew
exactly what were their routes, and from men who had been on them what
were the advantages and disadvantages of each line. He put aside the
Orient and the P. & O. It was difficult to get a berth with them; and
besides their passenger traffic allowed the medical officer little
freedom; but there were other services which sent large tramps on
leisurely expeditions to the East, stopping at all sorts of ports for
various periods, from a day or two to a fortnight, so that you had
plenty of time, and it was often possible to make a trip inland. The
pay was poor and the food no more than adequate, so that there was not
much demand for the posts, and a man with a London degree was pretty
sure to get one if he applied. Since there were no passengers other
than a casual man or so, shipping on business from some out-of-the-way
port to another, the life on board was friendly and pleasant. Philip
knew by heart the list of places at which they touched; and each one
called up in him visions of tropical sunshine, and magic colour, and of
a teeming, mysterious, intense life. Life! That was what he wanted. At
last he would come to close quarters with Life. And perhaps, from Tokyo
or Shanghai it would be possible to tranship into some other line and
drip down to the islands of the South Pacific. A doctor was useful
anywhere. There might be an opportunity to go up country in Burmah, and
what rich jungles in Sumatra or Borneo might he not visit? He was young
still and time was no object to him. He had no ties in England, no
friends; he could go up and down the world for years, learning the
beauty and the wonder and the variedness of life.
Now this thing had come. He put aside the possibility that Sally was
mistaken; he felt strangely certain that she was right; after all, it
was so likely; anyone could see that Nature had built her to be the
mother of children. He knew what he ought to do. He ought not to let
the incident divert him a hair’s breadth from his path. He thought of
Griffiths; he could easily imagine with what indifference that young
man would have received such a piece of news; he would have thought it
an awful nuisance and would at once have taken to his heels, like a
wise fellow; he would have left the girl to deal with her troubles as
best she could. Philip told himself that if this had happened it was
because it was inevitable. He was no more to blame than Sally; she was
a girl who knew the world and the facts of life, and she had taken the
risk with her eyes open. It would be madness to allow such an accident
to disturb the whole pattern of his life. He was one of the few people
who was acutely conscious of the transitoriness of life, and how
necessary it was to make the most of it. He would do what he could for
Sally; he could afford to give her a sufficient sum of money. A strong
man would never allow himself to be turned from his purpose.
Philip said all this to himself, but he knew he could not do it. He
simply could not. He knew himself.
“I’m so damned weak,” he muttered despairingly.
She had trusted him and been kind to him. He simply could not do a
thing which, notwithstanding all his reason, he felt was horrible. He
knew he would have no peace on his travels if he had the thought
constantly with him that she was wretched. Besides, there were her
father and mother: they had always treated him well; it was not
possible to repay them with ingratitude. The only thing was to marry
Sally as quickly as possible. He would write to Doctor South, tell him
he was going to be married at once, and say that if his offer still
held he was willing to accept it. That sort of practice, among poor
people, was the only one possible for him; there his deformity did not
matter, and they would not sneer at the simple manners of his wife. It
was curious to think of her as his wife, it gave him a queer, soft
feeling; and a wave of emotion spread over him as he thought of the
child which was his. He had little doubt that Doctor South would be
glad to have him, and he pictured to himself the life he would lead
with Sally in the fishing village. They would have a little house
within sight of the sea, and he would watch the mighty ships passing to
the lands he would never know. Perhaps that was the wisest thing.
Cronshaw had told him that the facts of life mattered nothing to him
who by the power of fancy held in fee the twin realms of space and
time. It was true. Forever wilt thou love and she be fair!
His wedding present to his wife would be all his high hopes.
Self-sacrifice! Philip was uplifted by its beauty, and all through the
evening he thought of it. He was so excited that he could not read. He
seemed to be driven out of his rooms into the streets, and he walked up
and down Birdcage Walk, his heart throbbing with joy. He could hardly
bear his impatience. He wanted to see Sally’s happiness when he made
her his offer, and if it had not been so late he would have gone to her
there and then. He pictured to himself the long evenings he would spend
with Sally in the cosy sitting-room, the blinds undrawn so that they
could watch the sea; he with his books, while she bent over her work,
and the shaded lamp made her sweet face more fair. They would talk over
the growing child, and when she turned her eyes to his there was in
them the light of love. And the fishermen and their wives who were his
patients would come to feel a great affection for them, and they in
their turn would enter into the pleasures and pains of those simple
lives. But his thoughts returned to the son who would be his and hers.
Already he felt in himself a passionate devotion to it. He thought of
passing his hands over his little perfect limbs, he knew he would be
beautiful; and he would make over to him all his dreams of a rich and
varied life. And thinking over the long pilgrimage of his past he
accepted it joyfully. He accepted the deformity which had made life so
hard for him; he knew that it had warped his character, but now he saw
also that by reason of it he had acquired that power of introspection
which had given him so much delight. Without it he would never have had
his keen appreciation of beauty, his passion for art and literature,
and his interest in the varied spectacle of life. The ridicule and the
contempt which had so often been heaped upon him had turned his mind
inward and called forth those flowers which he felt would never lose
their fragrance. Then he saw that the normal was the rarest thing in
the world. Everyone had some defect, of body or of mind: he thought of
all the people he had known (the whole world was like a sick-house, and
there was no rhyme or reason in it), he saw a long procession, deformed
in body and warped in mind, some with illness of the flesh, weak hearts
or weak lungs, and some with illness of the spirit, languor of will, or
a craving for liquor. At this moment he could feel a holy compassion
for them all. They were the helpless instruments of blind chance. He
could pardon Griffiths for his treachery and Mildred for the pain she
had caused him. They could not help themselves. The only reasonable
thing was to accept the good of men and be patient with their faults.
The words of the dying God crossed his memory:
Forgive them, for they know not what they do.
CXXII
He had arranged to meet Sally on Saturday in the National Gallery. She
was to come there as soon as she was released from the shop and had
agreed to lunch with him. Two days had passed since he had seen her,
and his exultation had not left him for a moment. It was because he
rejoiced in the feeling that he had not attempted to see her. He had
repeated to himself exactly what he would say to her and how he should
say it. Now his impatience was unbearable. He had written to Doctor
South and had in his pocket a telegram from him received that morning:
“Sacking the mumpish fool. When will you come?” Philip walked along
Parliament Street. It was a fine day, and there was a bright, frosty
sun which made the light dance in the street. It was crowded. There was
a tenuous mist in the distance, and it softened exquisitely the noble
lines of the buildings. He crossed Trafalgar Square. Suddenly his heart
gave a sort of twist in his body; he saw a woman in front of him who he
thought was Mildred. She had the same figure, and she walked with that
slight dragging of the feet which was so characteristic of her. Without
thinking, but with a beating heart, he hurried till he came alongside,
and then, when the woman turned, he saw it was someone unknown to him.
It was the face of a much older person, with a lined, yellow skin. He
slackened his pace. He was infinitely relieved, but it was not only
relief that he felt; it was disappointment too; he was seized with
horror of himself. Would he never be free from that passion? At the
bottom of his heart, notwithstanding everything, he felt that a
strange, desperate thirst for that vile woman would always linger. That
love had caused him so much suffering that he knew he would never,
never quite be free of it. Only death could finally assuage his desire.
But he wrenched the pang from his heart. He thought of Sally, with her
kind blue eyes; and his lips unconsciously formed themselves into a
smile. He walked up the steps of the National Gallery and sat down in
the first room, so that he should see her the moment she came in. It
always comforted him to get among pictures. He looked at none in
particular, but allowed the magnificence of their colour, the beauty of
their lines, to work upon his soul. His imagination was busy with
Sally. It would be pleasant to take her away from that London in which
she seemed an unusual figure, like a cornflower in a shop among orchids
and azaleas; he had learned in the Kentish hop-field that she did not
belong to the town; and he was sure that she would blossom under the
soft skies of Dorset to a rarer beauty. She came in, and he got up to
meet her. She was in black, with white cuffs at her wrists and a lawn
collar round her neck. They shook hands.
“Have you been waiting long?”
“No. Ten minutes. Are you hungry?”
“Not very.”
“Let’s sit here for a bit, shall we?”
“If you like.”
They sat quietly, side by side, without speaking. Philip enjoyed having
her near him. He was warmed by her radiant health. A glow of life
seemed like an aureole to shine about her.
“Well, how have you been?” he said at last, with a little smile.
“Oh, it’s all right. It was a false alarm.”
“Was it?”
“Aren’t you glad?”
An extraordinary sensation filled him. He had felt certain that Sally’s
suspicion was well-founded; it had never occurred to him for an instant
that there was a possibility of error. All his plans were suddenly
overthrown, and the existence, so elaborately pictured, was no more
than a dream which would never be realised. He was free once more.
Free! He need give up none of his projects, and life still was in his
hands for him to do what he liked with. He felt no exhilaration, but
only dismay. His heart sank. The future stretched out before him in
desolate emptiness. It was as though he had sailed for many years over
a great waste of waters, with peril and privation, and at last had come
upon a fair haven, but as he was about to enter, some contrary wind had
arisen and drove him out again into the open sea; and because he had