Of Human Bondage
bother of packing and the tedium of a journey, had at last been driven
off just before Christmas by the preparations for that festival. He
could not support the thought of a Teutonic merry-making. It gave him
goose-flesh to think of the season’s aggressive cheerfulness, and in
his desire to avoid the obvious he determined to travel on Christmas
Eve.
Philip was not sorry to see him off, for he was a downright person and
it irritated him that anybody should not know his own mind. Though much
under Hayward’s influence, he would not grant that indecision pointed
to a charming sensitiveness; and he resented the shadow of a sneer with
which Hayward looked upon his straight ways. They corresponded. Hayward
was an admirable letter-writer, and knowing his talent took pains with
his letters. His temperament was receptive to the beautiful influences
with which he came in contact, and he was able in his letters from Rome
to put a subtle fragrance of Italy. He thought the city of the ancient
Romans a little vulgar, finding distinction only in the decadence of
the Empire; but the Rome of the Popes appealed to his sympathy, and in
his chosen words, quite exquisitely, there appeared a rococo beauty. He
wrote of old church music and the Alban Hills, and of the languor of
incense and the charm of the streets by night, in the rain, when the
pavements shone and the light of the street lamps was mysterious.
Perhaps he repeated these admirable letters to various friends. He did
not know what a troubling effect they had upon Philip; they seemed to
make his life very humdrum. With the spring Hayward grew dithyrambic.
He proposed that Philip should come down to Italy. He was wasting his
time at Heidelberg. The Germans were gross and life there was common;
how could the soul come to her own in that prim landscape? In Tuscany
the spring was scattering flowers through the land, and Philip was
nineteen; let him come and they could wander through the mountain towns
of Umbria. Their names sang in Philip’s heart. And Cacilie too, with
her lover, had gone to Italy. When he thought of them Philip was seized
with a restlessness he could not account for. He cursed his fate
because he had no money to travel, and he knew his uncle would not send
him more than the fifteen pounds a month which had been agreed upon. He
had not managed his allowance very well. His pension and the price of
his lessons left him very little over, and he had found going about
with Hayward expensive. Hayward had often suggested excursions, a visit
to the play, or a bottle of wine, when Philip had come to the end of
his month’s money; and with the folly of his age he had been unwilling
to confess he could not afford an extravagance.
Luckily Hayward’s letters came seldom, and in the intervals Philip
settled down again to his industrious life. He had matriculated at the
university and attended one or two courses of lectures. Kuno Fischer
was then at the height of his fame and during the winter had been
lecturing brilliantly on Schopenhauer. It was Philip’s introduction to
philosophy. He had a practical mind and moved uneasily amid the
abstract; but he found an unexpected fascination in listening to
metaphysical disquisitions; they made him breathless; it was a little
like watching a tight-rope dancer doing perilous feats over an abyss;
but it was very exciting. The pessimism of the subject attracted his
youth; and he believed that the world he was about to enter was a place
of pitiless woe and of darkness. That made him none the less eager to
enter it; and when, in due course, Mrs. Carey, acting as the
correspondent for his guardian’s views, suggested that it was time for
him to come back to England, he agreed with enthusiasm. He must make up
his mind now what he meant to do. If he left Heidelberg at the end of
July they could talk things over during August, and it would be a good
time to make arrangements.
The date of his departure was settled, and Mrs. Carey wrote to him
again. She reminded him of Miss Wilkinson, through whose kindness he
had gone to Frau Erlin’s house at Heidelberg, and told him that she had
arranged to spend a few weeks with them at Blackstable. She would be
crossing from Flushing on such and such a day, and if he travelled at
the same time he could look after her and come on to Blackstable in her
company. Philip’s shyness immediately made him write to say that he
could not leave till a day or two afterwards. He pictured himself
looking out for Miss Wilkinson, the embarrassment of going up to her
and asking if it were she (and he might so easily address the wrong
person and be snubbed), and then the difficulty of knowing whether in
the train he ought to talk to her or whether he could ignore her and
read his book.
At last he left Heidelberg. For three months he had been thinking of
nothing but the future; and he went without regret. He never knew that
he had been happy there. Fraulein Anna gave him a copy of Der Trompeter
von Sackingen and in return he presented her with a volume of William
Morris. Very wisely neither of them ever read the other’s present.
XXXII
Philip was surprised when he saw his uncle and aunt. He had never
noticed before that they were quite old people. The Vicar received him
with his usual, not unamiable indifference. He was a little stouter, a
little balder, a little grayer. Philip saw how insignificant he was.
His face was weak and self-indulgent. Aunt Louisa took him in her arms
and kissed him; and tears of happiness flowed down her cheeks. Philip
was touched and embarrassed; he had not known with what a hungry love
she cared for him.
“Oh, the time has seemed long since you’ve been away, Philip,” she
cried.
She stroked his hands and looked into his face with glad eyes.
“You’ve grown. You’re quite a man now.”
There was a very small moustache on his upper lip. He had bought a
razor and now and then with infinite care shaved the down off his
smooth chin.
“We’ve been so lonely without you.” And then shyly, with a little break
in her voice, she asked: “You are glad to come back to your home,
aren’t you?”
“Yes, rather.”
She was so thin that she seemed almost transparent, the arms she put
round his neck were frail bones that reminded you of chicken bones, and
her faded face was oh! so wrinkled. The gray curls which she still wore
in the fashion of her youth gave her a queer, pathetic look; and her
little withered body was like an autumn leaf, you felt it might be
blown away by the first sharp wind. Philip realised that they had done
with life, these two quiet little people: they belonged to a past
generation, and they were waiting there patiently, rather stupidly, for
death; and he, in his vigour and his youth, thirsting for excitement
and adventure, was appalled at the waste. They had done nothing, and
when they went it would be just as if they had never been. He felt a
great pity for Aunt Louisa, and he loved her suddenly because she loved
him.
Then Miss Wilkinson, who had kept discreetly out of the way till the
Careys had had a chance of welcoming their nephew, came into the room.
“This is Miss Wilkinson, Philip,” said Mrs. Carey.
“The prodigal has returned,” she said, holding out her hand. “I have
brought a rose for the prodigal’s buttonhole.”
With a gay smile she pinned to Philip’s coat the flower she had just
picked in the garden. He blushed and felt foolish. He knew that Miss
Wilkinson was the daughter of his Uncle William’s last rector, and he
had a wide acquaintance with the daughters of clergymen. They wore
ill-cut clothes and stout boots. They were generally dressed in black,
for in Philip’s early years at Blackstable homespuns had not reached
East Anglia, and the ladies of the clergy did not favour colours. Their
hair was done very untidily, and they smelt aggressively of starched
linen. They considered the feminine graces unbecoming and looked the
same whether they were old or young. They bore their religion
arrogantly. The closeness of their connection with the church made them
adopt a slightly dictatorial attitude to the rest of mankind.
Miss Wilkinson was very different. She wore a white muslin gown stamped
with gay little bunches of flowers, and pointed, high-heeled shoes,
with open-work stockings. To Philip’s inexperience it seemed that she
was wonderfully dressed; he did not see that her frock was cheap and
showy. Her hair was elaborately dressed, with a neat curl in the middle
of the forehead: it was very black, shiny and hard, and it looked as
though it could never be in the least disarranged. She had large black
eyes and her nose was slightly aquiline; in profile she had somewhat
the look of a bird of prey, but full face she was prepossessing. She
smiled a great deal, but her mouth was large and when she smiled she
tried to hide her teeth, which were big and rather yellow. But what
embarrassed Philip most was that she was heavily powdered: he had very
strict views on feminine behaviour and did not think a lady ever
powdered; but of course Miss Wilkinson was a lady because she was a
clergyman’s daughter, and a clergyman was a gentleman.
Philip made up his mind to dislike her thoroughly. She spoke with a
slight French accent; and he did not know why she should, since she had
been born and bred in the heart of England. He thought her smile
affected, and the coy sprightliness of her manner irritated him. For
two or three days he remained silent and hostile, but Miss Wilkinson
apparently did not notice it. She was very affable. She addressed her
conversation almost exclusively to him, and there was something
flattering in the way she appealed constantly to his sane judgment. She
made him laugh too, and Philip could never resist people who amused
him: he had a gift now and then of saying neat things; and it was
pleasant to have an appreciative listener. Neither the Vicar nor Mrs.
Carey had a sense of humour, and they never laughed at anything he
said. As he grew used to Miss Wilkinson, and his shyness left him, he
began to like her better; he found the French accent picturesque; and
at a garden party which the doctor gave she was very much better
dressed than anyone else. She wore a blue foulard with large white
spots, and Philip was tickled at the sensation it caused.
“I’m certain they think you’re no better than you should be,” he told
her, laughing.
“It’s the dream of my life to be taken for an abandoned hussy,” she
answered.
One day when Miss Wilkinson was in her room he asked Aunt Louisa how
old she was.
“Oh, my dear, you should never ask a lady’s age; but she’s certainly
too old for you to marry.”
The Vicar gave his slow, obese smile.
“She’s no chicken, Louisa,” he said. “She was nearly grown up when we
were in Lincolnshire, and that was twenty years ago. She wore a pigtail
hanging down her back.”
“She may not have been more than ten,” said Philip.
“She was older than that,” said Aunt Louisa.
“I think she was near twenty,” said the Vicar.
“Oh no, William. Sixteen or seventeen at the outside.”
“That would make her well over thirty,” said Philip.
At that moment Miss Wilkinson tripped downstairs, singing a song by
Benjamin Goddard. She had put her hat on, for she and Philip were going
for a walk, and she held out her hand for him to button her glove. He
did it awkwardly. He felt embarrassed but gallant. Conversation went
easily between them now, and as they strolled along they talked of all
manner of things. She told Philip about Berlin, and he told her of his
year in Heidelberg. As he spoke, things which had appeared of no
importance gained a new interest: he described the people at Frau
Erlin’s house; and to the conversations between Hayward and Weeks,
which at the time seemed so significant, he gave a little twist, so