Of Human Bondage
were clad in European, shabby clothes, their thin great-coats were
threadbare, but each wore a tarbouch. Their faces were gray with cold.
One was of middle age, with a black beard, but the other was a youth of
eighteen, with a face deeply scarred by smallpox and with one eye only.
They passed by Cronshaw and Philip.
“Allah is great, and Mahomet is his prophet,” said Cronshaw
impressively.
The elder advanced with a cringing smile, like a mongrel used to blows.
With a sidelong glance at the door and a quick surreptitious movement
he showed a pornographic picture.
“Are you Masr-ed-Deen, the merchant of Alexandria, or is it from far
Bagdad that you bring your goods, O, my uncle; and yonder one-eyed
youth, do I see in him one of the three kings of whom Scheherazade told
stories to her lord?”
The pedlar’s smile grew more ingratiating, though he understood no word
of what Cronshaw said, and like a conjurer he produced a sandalwood
box.
“Nay, show us the priceless web of Eastern looms,” quoth Cronshaw. “For
I would point a moral and adorn a tale.”
The Levantine unfolded a table-cloth, red and yellow, vulgar, hideous,
and grotesque.
“Thirty-five francs,” he said.
“O, my uncle, this cloth knew not the weavers of Samarkand, and those
colours were never made in the vats of Bokhara.”
“Twenty-five francs,” smiled the pedlar obsequiously.
“Ultima Thule was the place of its manufacture, even Birmingham the
place of my birth.”
“Fifteen francs,” cringed the bearded man.
“Get thee gone, fellow,” said Cronshaw. “May wild asses defile the
grave of thy maternal grandmother.”
Imperturbably, but smiling no more, the Levantine passed with his wares
to another table. Cronshaw turned to Philip.
“Have you ever been to the Cluny, the museum? There you will see
Persian carpets of the most exquisite hue and of a pattern the
beautiful intricacy of which delights and amazes the eye. In them you
will see the mystery and the sensual beauty of the East, the roses of
Hafiz and the wine-cup of Omar; but presently you will see more. You
were asking just now what was the meaning of life. Go and look at those
Persian carpets, and one of these days the answer will come to you.”
“You are cryptic,” said Philip.
“I am drunk,” answered Cronshaw.
XLVI
Philip did not find living in Paris as cheap as he had been led to
believe and by February had spent most of the money with which he
started. He was too proud to appeal to his guardian, nor did he wish
Aunt Louisa to know that his circumstances were straitened, since he
was certain she would make an effort to send him something from her own
pocket, and he knew how little she could afford to. In three months he
would attain his majority and come into possession of his small
fortune. He tided over the interval by selling the few trinkets which
he had inherited from his father.
At about this time Lawson suggested that they should take a small
studio which was vacant in one of the streets that led out of the
Boulevard Raspail. It was very cheap. It had a room attached, which
they could use as a bed-room; and since Philip was at the school every
morning Lawson could have the undisturbed use of the studio then;
Lawson, after wandering from school to school, had come to the
conclusion that he could work best alone, and proposed to get a model
in three or four days a week. At first Philip hesitated on account of
the expense, but they reckoned it out; and it seemed (they were so
anxious to have a studio of their own that they calculated
pragmatically) that the cost would not be much greater than that of
living in a hotel. Though the rent and the cleaning by the concierge
would come to a little more, they would save on the petit dejeuner,
which they could make themselves. A year or two earlier Philip would
have refused to share a room with anyone, since he was so sensitive
about his deformed foot, but his morbid way of looking at it was
growing less marked: in Paris it did not seem to matter so much, and,
though he never by any chance forgot it himself, he ceased to feel that
other people were constantly noticing it.
They moved in, bought a couple of beds, a washing-stand, a few chairs,
and felt for the first time the thrill of possession. They were so
excited that the first night they went to bed in what they could call a
home they lay awake talking till three in the morning; and next day
found lighting the fire and making their own coffee, which they had in
pyjamas, such a jolly business that Philip did not get to Amitrano’s
till nearly eleven. He was in excellent spirits. He nodded to Fanny
Price.
“How are you getting on?” he asked cheerily.
“What does that matter to you?” she asked in reply.
Philip could not help laughing.
“Don’t jump down my throat. I was only trying to make myself polite.”
“I don’t want your politeness.”
“D’you think it’s worth while quarrelling with me too?” asked Philip
mildly. “There are so few people you’re on speaking terms with, as it
is.”
“That’s my business, isn’t it?”
“Quite.”
He began to work, vaguely wondering why Fanny Price made herself so
disagreeable. He had come to the conclusion that he thoroughly disliked
her. Everyone did. People were only civil to her at all from fear of
the malice of her tongue; for to their faces and behind their backs she
said abominable things. But Philip was feeling so happy that he did not
want even Miss Price to bear ill-feeling towards him. He used the
artifice which had often before succeeded in banishing her ill-humour.
“I say, I wish you’d come and look at my drawing. I’ve got in an awful
mess.”
“Thank you very much, but I’ve got something better to do with my
time.”
Philip stared at her in surprise, for the one thing she could be
counted upon to do with alacrity was to give advice. She went on
quickly in a low voice, savage with fury.
“Now that Lawson’s gone you think you’ll put up with me. Thank you very
much. Go and find somebody else to help you. I don’t want anybody
else’s leavings.”
Lawson had the pedagogic instinct; whenever he found anything out he
was eager to impart it; and because he taught with delight he talked
with profit. Philip, without thinking anything about it, had got into
the habit of sitting by his side; it never occurred to him that Fanny
Price was consumed with jealousy, and watched his acceptance of someone
else’s tuition with ever-increasing anger.
“You were very glad to put up with me when you knew nobody here,” she
said bitterly, “and as soon as you made friends with other people you
threw me aside, like an old glove”—she repeated the stale metaphor with
satisfaction—“like an old glove. All right, I don’t care, but I’m not
going to be made a fool of another time.”
There was a suspicion of truth in what she said, and it made Philip
angry enough to answer what first came into his head.
“Hang it all, I only asked your advice because I saw it pleased you.”
She gave a gasp and threw him a sudden look of anguish. Then two tears
rolled down her cheeks. She looked frowsy and grotesque. Philip, not
knowing what on earth this new attitude implied, went back to his work.
He was uneasy and conscience-stricken; but he would not go to her and
say he was sorry if he had caused her pain, because he was afraid she
would take the opportunity to snub him. For two or three weeks she did
not speak to him, and, after Philip had got over the discomfort of
being cut by her, he was somewhat relieved to be free from so difficult
a friendship. He had been a little disconcerted by the air of
proprietorship she assumed over him. She was an extraordinary woman.
She came every day to the studio at eight o’clock, and was ready to
start working when the model was in position; she worked steadily,
talking to no one, struggling hour after hour with difficulties she
could not overcome, and remained till the clock struck twelve. Her work
was hopeless. There was not in it the smallest approach even to the
mediocre achievement at which most of the young persons were able after
some months to arrive. She wore every day the same ugly brown dress,
with the mud of the last wet day still caked on the hem and with the
raggedness, which Philip had noticed the first time he saw her, still
unmended.
But one day she came up to him, and with a scarlet face asked whether
she might speak to him afterwards.
“Of course, as much as you like,” smiled Philip. “I’ll wait behind at
twelve.”
He went to her when the day’s work was over.
“Will you walk a little bit with me?” she said, looking away from him
with embarrassment.
“Certainly.”
They walked for two or three minutes in silence.
“D’you remember what you said to me the other day?” she asked then on a
sudden.
“Oh, I say, don’t let’s quarrel,” said Philip. “It really isn’t worth
while.”
She gave a quick, painful inspiration.
“I don’t want to quarrel with you. You’re the only friend I had in
Paris. I thought you rather liked me. I felt there was something
between us. I was drawn towards you—you know what I mean, your
club-foot.”
Philip reddened and instinctively tried to walk without a limp. He did
not like anyone to mention the deformity. He knew what Fanny Price
meant. She was ugly and uncouth, and because he was deformed there was
between them a certain sympathy. He was very angry with her, but he
forced himself not to speak.
“You said you only asked my advice to please me. Don’t you think my
work’s any good?”
“I’ve only seen your drawing at Amitrano’s. It’s awfully hard to judge
from that.”
“I was wondering if you’d come and look at my other work. I’ve never
asked anyone else to look at it. I should like to show it to you.”
“It’s awfully kind of you. I’d like to see it very much.”
“I live quite near here,” she said apologetically. “It’ll only take you
ten minutes.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” he said.
They were walking along the boulevard, and she turned down a side
street, then led him into another, poorer still, with cheap shops on
the ground floor, and at last stopped. They climbed flight after flight
of stairs. She unlocked a door, and they went into a tiny attic with a
sloping roof and a small window. This was closed and the room had a
musty smell. Though it was very cold there was no fire and no sign that
there had been one. The bed was unmade. A chair, a chest of drawers
which served also as a wash-stand, and a cheap easel, were all the
furniture. The place would have been squalid enough in any case, but
the litter, the untidiness, made the impression revolting. On the
chimney-piece, scattered over with paints and brushes, were a cup, a
dirty plate, and a tea-pot.
“If you’ll stand over there I’ll put them on the chair so that you can
see them better.”
She showed him twenty small canvases, about eighteen by twelve. She
placed them on the chair, one after the other, watching his face; he
nodded as he looked at each one.
“You do like them, don’t you?” she said anxiously, after a bit.
“I just want to look at them all first,” he answered. “I’ll talk
afterwards.”
He was collecting himself. He was panic-stricken. He did not know what
to say. It was not only that they were ill-drawn, or that the colour
was put on amateurishly by someone who had no eye for it; but there was
no attempt at getting the values, and the perspective was grotesque. It
looked like the work of a child of five, but a child would have had
some naivete and might at least have made an attempt to put down what
he saw; but here was the work of a vulgar mind chock full of
recollections of vulgar pictures. Philip remembered that she had talked
enthusiastically about Monet and the Impressionists, but here were only
the worst traditions of the Royal Academy.