Of Human Bondage
sense of the word. Was your father a professional man?”
“He was a doctor.”
“You can always tell a professional man. There’s something about them,
I don’t know what it is, but I know at once.”
They walked along from the station together.
“I say, I want you to come and see another play with me,” he said.
“I don’t mind,” she said.
“You might go so far as to say you’d like to.”
“Why?”
“It doesn’t matter. Let’s fix a day. Would Saturday night suit you?”
“Yes, that’ll do.”
They made further arrangements, and then found themselves at the corner
of the road in which she lived. She gave him her hand, and he held it.
“I say, I do so awfully want to call you Mildred.”
“You may if you like, I don’t care.”
“And you’ll call me Philip, won’t you?”
“I will if I can think of it. It seems more natural to call you Mr.
Carey.”
He drew her slightly towards him, but she leaned back.
“What are you doing?”
“Won’t you kiss me good-night?” he whispered.
“Impudence!” she said.
She snatched away her hand and hurried towards her house.
Philip bought tickets for Saturday night. It was not one of the days on
which she got off early and therefore she would have no time to go home
and change; but she meant to bring a frock up with her in the morning
and hurry into her clothes at the shop. If the manageress was in a good
temper she would let her go at seven. Philip had agreed to wait outside
from a quarter past seven onwards. He looked forward to the occasion
with painful eagerness, for in the cab on the way from the theatre to
the station he thought she would let him kiss her. The vehicle gave
every facility for a man to put his arm round a girl’s waist (an
advantage which the hansom had over the taxi of the present day), and
the delight of that was worth the cost of the evening’s entertainment.
But on Saturday afternoon when he went in to have tea, in order to
confirm the arrangements, he met the man with the fair moustache coming
out of the shop. He knew by now that he was called Miller. He was a
naturalized German, who had anglicised his name, and he had lived many
years in England. Philip had heard him speak, and, though his English
was fluent and natural, it had not quite the intonation of the native.
Philip knew that he was flirting with Mildred, and he was horribly
jealous of him; but he took comfort in the coldness of her temperament,
which otherwise distressed him; and, thinking her incapable of passion,
he looked upon his rival as no better off than himself. But his heart
sank now, for his first thought was that Miller’s sudden appearance
might interfere with the jaunt which he had so looked forward to. He
entered, sick with apprehension. The waitress came up to him, took his
order for tea, and presently brought it.
“I’m awfully sorry,” she said, with an expression on her face of real
distress. “I shan’t be able to come tonight after all.”
“Why?” said Philip.
“Don’t look so stern about it,” she laughed. “It’s not my fault. My
aunt was taken ill last night, and it’s the girl’s night out so I must
go and sit with her. She can’t be left alone, can she?”
“It doesn’t matter. I’ll see you home instead.”
“But you’ve got the tickets. It would be a pity to waste them.”
He took them out of his pocket and deliberately tore them up.
“What are you doing that for?”
“You don’t suppose I want to go and see a rotten musical comedy by
myself, do you? I only took seats there for your sake.”
“You can’t see me home if that’s what you mean?”
“You’ve made other arrangements.”
“I don’t know what you mean by that. You’re just as selfish as all the
rest of them. You only think of yourself. It’s not my fault if my
aunt’s queer.”
She quickly wrote out his bill and left him. Philip knew very little
about women, or he would have been aware that one should accept their
most transparent lies. He made up his mind that he would watch the shop
and see for certain whether Mildred went out with the German. He had an
unhappy passion for certainty. At seven he stationed himself on the
opposite pavement. He looked about for Miller, but did not see him. In
ten minutes she came out, she had on the cloak and shawl which she had
worn when he took her to the Shaftesbury Theatre. It was obvious that
she was not going home. She saw him before he had time to move away,
started a little, and then came straight up to him.
“What are you doing here?” she said.
“Taking the air,” he answered.
“You’re spying on me, you dirty little cad. I thought you was a
gentleman.”
“Did you think a gentleman would be likely to take any interest in
you?” he murmured.
There was a devil within him which forced him to make matters worse. He
wanted to hurt her as much as she was hurting him.
“I suppose I can change my mind if I like. I’m not obliged to come out
with you. I tell you I’m going home, and I won’t be followed or spied
upon.”
“Have you seen Miller today?”
“That’s no business of yours. In point of fact I haven’t, so you’re
wrong again.”
“I saw him this afternoon. He’d just come out of the shop when I went
in.”
“Well, what if he did? I can go out with him if I want to, can’t I? I
don’t know what you’ve got to say to it.”
“He’s keeping you waiting, isn’t he?”
“Well, I’d rather wait for him than have you wait for me. Put that in
your pipe and smoke it. And now p’raps you’ll go off home and mind your
own business in future.”
His mood changed suddenly from anger to despair, and his voice trembled
when he spoke.
“I say, don’t be beastly with me, Mildred. You know I’m awfully fond of
you. I think I love you with all my heart. Won’t you change your mind?
I was looking forward to this evening so awfully. You see, he hasn’t
come, and he can’t care twopence about you really. Won’t you dine with
me? I’ll get some more tickets, and we’ll go anywhere you like.”
“I tell you I won’t. It’s no good you talking. I’ve made up my mind,
and when I make up my mind I keep to it.”
He looked at her for a moment. His heart was torn with anguish. People
were hurrying past them on the pavement, and cabs and omnibuses rolled
by noisily. He saw that Mildred’s eyes were wandering. She was afraid
of missing Miller in the crowd.
“I can’t go on like this,” groaned Philip. “It’s too degrading. If I go
now I go for good. Unless you’ll come with me tonight you’ll never see
me again.”
“You seem to think that’ll be an awful thing for me. All I say is, good
riddance to bad rubbish.”
“Then good-bye.”
He nodded and limped away slowly, for he hoped with all his heart that
she would call him back. At the next lamp-post he stopped and looked
over his shoulder. He thought she might beckon to him—he was willing to
forget everything, he was ready for any humiliation—but she had turned
away, and apparently had ceased to trouble about him. He realised that
she was glad to be quit of him.
LIX
Philip passed the evening wretchedly. He had told his landlady that he
would not be in, so there was nothing for him to eat, and he had to go
to Gatti’s for dinner. Afterwards he went back to his rooms, but
Griffiths on the floor above him was having a party, and the noisy
merriment made his own misery more hard to bear. He went to a
music-hall, but it was Saturday night and there was standing-room only:
after half an hour of boredom his legs grew tired and he went home. He
tried to read, but he could not fix his attention; and yet it was
necessary that he should work hard. His examination in biology was in
little more than a fortnight, and, though it was easy, he had neglected
his lectures of late and was conscious that he knew nothing. It was
only a viva, however, and he felt sure that in a fortnight he could
find out enough about the subject to scrape through. He had confidence
in his intelligence. He threw aside his book and gave himself up to
thinking deliberately of the matter which was in his mind all the time.
He reproached himself bitterly for his behaviour that evening. Why had
he given her the alternative that she must dine with him or else never
see him again? Of course she refused. He should have allowed for her
pride. He had burnt his ships behind him. It would not be so hard to
bear if he thought that she was suffering now, but he knew her too
well: she was perfectly indifferent to him. If he hadn’t been a fool he
would have pretended to believe her story; he ought to have had the
strength to conceal his disappointment and the self-control to master
his temper. He could not tell why he loved her. He had read of the
idealisation that takes place in love, but he saw her exactly as she
was. She was not amusing or clever, her mind was common; she had a
vulgar shrewdness which revolted him, she had no gentleness nor
softness. As she would have put it herself, she was on the make. What
aroused her admiration was a clever trick played on an unsuspecting
person; to ‘do’ somebody always gave her satisfaction. Philip laughed
savagely as he thought of her gentility and the refinement with which
she ate her food; she could not bear a coarse word, so far as her
limited vocabulary reached she had a passion for euphemisms, and she
scented indecency everywhere; she never spoke of trousers but referred
to them as nether garments; she thought it slightly indelicate to blow
her nose and did it in a deprecating way. She was dreadfully anaemic
and suffered from the dyspepsia which accompanies that ailing. Philip
was repelled by her flat breast and narrow hips, and he hated the
vulgar way in which she did her hair. He loathed and despised himself
for loving her.
The fact remained that he was helpless. He felt just as he had felt
sometimes in the hands of a bigger boy at school. He had struggled
against the superior strength till his own strength was gone, and he
was rendered quite powerless—he remembered the peculiar languor he had
felt in his limbs, almost as though he were paralysed—so that he could
not help himself at all. He might have been dead. He felt just that
same weakness now. He loved the woman so that he knew he had never
loved before. He did not mind her faults of person or of character, he
thought he loved them too: at all events they meant nothing to him. It
did not seem himself that was concerned; he felt that he had been
seized by some strange force that moved him against his will, contrary
to his interests; and because he had a passion for freedom he hated the
chains which bound him. He laughed at himself when he thought how often
he had longed to experience the overwhelming passion. He cursed himself
because he had given way to it. He thought of the beginnings; nothing
of all this would have happened if he had not gone into the shop with
Dunsford. The whole thing was his own fault. Except for his ridiculous
vanity he would never have troubled himself with the ill-mannered slut.
At all events the occurrences of that evening had finished the whole
affair. Unless he was lost to all sense of shame he could not go back.
He wanted passionately to get rid of the love that obsessed him; it was
degrading and hateful. He must prevent himself from thinking of her. In
a little while the anguish he suffered must grow less. His mind went
back to the past. He wondered whether Emily Wilkinson and Fanny Price
had endured on his account anything like the torment that he suffered
now. He felt a pang of remorse.
“I didn’t know then what it was like,” he said to himself.
He slept very badly. The next day was Sunday, and he worked at his
biology. He sat with the book in front of him, forming the words with
his lips in order to fix his attention, but he could remember nothing.
He found his thoughts going back to Mildred every minute, and he
repeated to himself the exact words of the quarrel they had had. He had