Of Human Bondage (46 page)

  "It's awful cheek my sending anything," said
Flanagan, "but I don't care, I'm going to send. D'you think they're
rotten?"

  "Not so rotten as I should have expected," said
Philip.

  They showed in fact an astounding cleverness. The
difficulties had been avoided with skill, and there was a dash
about the way in which the paint was put on which was surprising
and even attractive. Flanagan, without knowledge or technique,
painted with the loose brush of a man who has spent a lifetime in
the practice of the art.

  "If one were forbidden to look at any picture for
more than thirty seconds you'd be a great master, Flanagan," smiled
Philip.

  These young people were not in the habit of spoiling
one another with excessive flattery.

  "We haven't got time in America to spend more than
thirty seconds in looking at any picture," laughed the other.

  Flanagan, though he was the most scatter-brained
person in the world, had a tenderness of heart which was unexpected
and charming. Whenever anyone was ill he installed himself as
sick-nurse. His gaiety was better than any medicine. Like many of
his countrymen he had not the English dread of sentimentality which
keeps so tight a hold on emotion; and, finding nothing absurd in
the show of feeling, could offer an exuberant sympathy which was
often grateful to his friends in distress. He saw that Philip was
depressed by what he had gone through and with unaffected
kindliness set himself boisterously to cheer him up. He exaggerated
the Americanisms which he knew always made the Englishmen laugh and
poured out a breathless stream of conversation, whimsical,
high-spirited, and jolly. In due course they went out to dinner and
afterwards to the Gaite Montparnasse, which was Flanagan's
favourite place of amusement. By the end of the evening he was in
his most extravagant humour. He had drunk a good deal, but any
inebriety from which he suffered was due much more to his own
vivacity than to alcohol. He proposed that they should go to the
Bal Bullier, and Philip, feeling too tired to go to bed, willingly
enough consented. They sat down at a table on the platform at the
side, raised a little from the level of the floor so that they
could watch the dancing, and drank a bock. Presently Flanagan saw a
friend and with a wild shout leaped over the barrier on to the
space where they were dancing. Philip watched the people. Bullier
was not the resort of fashion. It was Thursday night and the place
was crowded. There were a number of students of the various
faculties, but most of the men were clerks or assistants in shops;
they wore their everyday clothes, ready-made tweeds or queer
tail-coats, and their hats, for they had brought them in with them,
and when they danced there was no place to put them but their
heads. Some of the women looked like servant-girls, and some were
painted hussies, but for the most part they were shop-girls. They
were poorly-dressed in cheap imitation of the fashions on the other
side of the river. The hussies were got up to resemble the
music-hall artiste or the dancer who enjoyed notoriety at the
moment; their eyes were heavy with black and their cheeks
impudently scarlet. The hall was lit by great white lights, low
down, which emphasised the shadows on the faces; all the lines
seemed to harden under it, and the colours were most crude. It was
a sordid scene. Philip leaned over the rail, staring down, and he
ceased to hear the music. They danced furiously. They danced round
the room, slowly, talking very little, with all their attention
given to the dance. The room was hot, and their faces shone with
sweat. it seemed to Philip that they had thrown off the guard which
people wear on their expression, the homage to convention, and he
saw them now as they really were. In that moment of abandon they
were strangely animal: some were foxy and some were wolf-like; and
others had the long, foolish face of sheep. Their skins were sallow
from the unhealthy life they led and the poor food they ate. Their
features were blunted by mean interests, and their little eyes were
shifty and cunning. There was nothing of nobility in their bearing,
and you felt that for all of them life was a long succession of
petty concerns and sordid thoughts. The air was heavy with the
musty smell of humanity. But they danced furiously as though
impelled by some strange power within them, and it seemed to Philip
that they were driven forward by a rage for enjoyment. They were
seeking desperately to escape from a world of horror. The desire
for pleasure which Cronshaw said was the only motive of human
action urged them blindly on, and the very vehemence of the desire
seemed to rob it of all pleasure. They were hurried on by a great
wind, helplessly, they knew not why and they knew not whither. Fate
seemed to tower above them, and they danced as though everlasting
darkness were beneath their feet. Their silence was vaguely
alarming. It was as if life terrified them and robbed them of power
of speech so that the shriek which was in their hearts died at
their throats. Their eyes were haggard and grim; and
notwithstanding the beastly lust that disfigured them, and the
meanness of their faces, and the cruelty, notwithstanding the
stupidness which was worst of all, the anguish of those fixed eyes
made all that crowd terrible and pathetic. Philip loathed them, and
yet his heart ached with the infinite pity which filled him.

  He took his coat from the cloak-room and went out
into the bitter coldness of the night.

  Philip could not get the unhappy event out of his
head. What troubled him most was the uselessness of Fanny's effort.
No one could have worked harder than she, nor with more sincerity;
she believed in herself with all her heart; but it was plain that
self-confidence meant very little, all his friends had it, Miguel
Ajuria among the rest; and Philip was shocked by the contrast
between the Spaniard's heroic endeavour and the triviality of the
thing he attempted. The unhappiness of Philip's life at school had
called up in him the power of self-analysis; and this vice, as
subtle as drug-taking, had taken possession of him so that he had
now a peculiar keenness in the dissection of his feelings. He could
not help seeing that art affected him differently from others. A
fine picture gave Lawson an immediate thrill. His appreciation was
instinctive. Even Flanagan felt certain things which Philip was
obliged to think out. His own appreciation was intellectual. He
could not help thinking that if he had in him the artistic
temperament (he hated the phrase, but could discover no other) he
would feel beauty in the emotional, unreasoning way in which they
did. He began to wonder whether he had anything more than a
superficial cleverness of the hand which enabled him to copy
objects with accuracy. That was nothing. He had learned to despise
technical dexterity. The important thing was to feel in terms of
paint. Lawson painted in a certain way because it was his nature
to, and through the imitativeness of a student sensitive to every
influence, there pierced individuality. Philip looked at his own
portrait of Ruth Chalice, and now that three months had passed he
realised that it was no more than a servile copy of Lawson. He felt
himself barren. He painted with the brain, and he could not help
knowing that the only painting worth anything was done with the
heart.

  He had very little money, barely sixteen hundred
pounds, and it would be necessary for him to practise the severest
economy. He could not count on earning anything for ten years. The
history of painting was full of artists who had earned nothing at
all. He must resign himself to penury; and it was worth while if he
produced work which was immortal; but he had a terrible fear that
he would never be more than second-rate. Was it worth while for
that to give up one's youth, and the gaiety of life, and the
manifold chances of being? He knew the existence of foreign
painters in Paris enough to see that the lives they led were
narrowly provincial. He knew some who had dragged along for twenty
years in the pursuit of a fame which always escaped them till they
sunk into sordidness and alcoholism. Fanny's suicide had aroused
memories, and Philip heard ghastly stories of the way in which one
person or another had escaped from despair. He remembered the
scornful advice which the master had given poor Fanny: it would
have been well for her if she had taken it and given up an attempt
which was hopeless.

  Philip finished his portrait of Miguel Ajuria and
made up his mind to send it to the Salon. Flanagan was sending two
pictures, and he thought he could paint as well as Flanagan. He had
worked so hard on the portrait that he could not help feeling it
must have merit. It was true that when he looked at it he felt that
there was something wrong, though he could not tell what; but when
he was away from it his spirits went up and he was not
dissatisfied. He sent it to the Salon and it was refused. He did
not mind much, since he had done all he could to persuade himself
that there was little chance that it would be taken, till Flanagan
a few days later rushed in to tell Lawson and Philip that one of
his pictures was accepted. With a blank face Philip offered his
congratulations, and Flanagan was so busy congratulating himself
that he did not catch the note of irony which Philip could not
prevent from coming into his voice. Lawson, quicker-witted,
observed it and looked at Philip curiously. His own picture was all
right, he knew that a day or two before, and he was vaguely
resentful of Philip's attitude. But he was surprised at the sudden
question which Philip put him as soon as the American was gone.

  "If you were in my place would you chuck the whole
thing?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "I wonder if it's worth while being a second-rate
painter. You see, in other things, if you're a doctor or if you're
in business, it doesn't matter so much if you're mediocre. You make
a living and you get along. But what is the good of turning out
second-rate pictures?"

  Lawson was fond of Philip and, as soon as he thought
he was seriously distressed by the refusal of his picture, he set
himself to console him. It was notorious that the Salon had refused
pictures which were afterwards famous; it was the first time Philip
had sent, and he must expect a rebuff; Flanagan's success was
explicable, his picture was showy and superficial: it was just the
sort of thing a languid jury would see merit in. Philip grew
impatient; it was humiliating that Lawson should think him capable
of being seriously disturbed by so trivial a calamity and would not
realise that his dejection was due to a deep-seated distrust of his
powers.

  Of late Clutton had withdrawn himself somewhat from
the group who took their meals at Gravier's, and lived very much by
himself. Flanagan said he was in love with a girl, but Clutton's
austere countenance did not suggest passion; and Philip thought it
more probable that he separated himself from his friends so that he
might grow clear with the new ideas which were in him. But that
evening, when the others had left the restaurant to go to a play
and Philip was sitting alone, Clutton came in and ordered dinner.
They began to talk, and finding Clutton more loquacious and less
sardonic than usual, Philip determined to take advantage of his
good humour.

  "I say I wish you'd come and look at my picture," he
said. "I'd like to know what you think of it."

  "No, I won't do that."

  "Why not?" asked Philip, reddening.

  The request was one which they all made of one
another, and no one ever thought of refusing. Clutton shrugged his
shoulders.

  "People ask you for criticism, but they only want
praise. Besides, what's the good of criticism? What does it matter
if your picture is good or bad?"

  "It matters to me."

  "No. The only reason that one paints is that one
can't help it. It's a function like any of the other functions of
the body, only comparatively few people have got it. One paints for
oneself: otherwise one would commit suicide. Just think of it, you
spend God knows how long trying to get something on to canvas,
putting the sweat of your soul into it, and what is the result? Ten
to one it will be refused at the Salon; if it's accepted, people
glance at it for ten seconds as they pass; if you're lucky some
ignorant fool will buy it and put it on his walls and look at it as
little as he looks at his dining-room table. Criticism has nothing
to do with the artist. It judges objectively, but the objective
doesn't concern the artist."