Of Human Bondage (73 page)

  "Show her in."

  Philip pulled himself together to receive her
without any sign of what he was feeling. He had an impulse to throw
himself on his knees and seize her hands and beg her not to go; but
he knew there was no way of moving her; she would tell Griffiths
what he had said and how he acted. He was ashamed.

  "Well, how about the little jaunt?" he said
gaily.

  "We're going. Harry's outside. I told him you didn't
want to see him, so he's kept out of your way. But he wants to know
if he can come in just for a minute to say good-bye to you."

  "No, I won't see him," said Philip.

  He could see she did not care if he saw Griffiths or
not. Now that she was there he wanted her to go quickly.

  "Look here, here's the fiver. I'd like you to go
now."

  She took it and thanked him. She turned to leave the
room.

  "When are you coming back?" he asked.

  "Oh, on Monday. Harry must go home then."

  He knew what he was going to say was humiliating,
but he was broken down with jealousy and desire.

  "Then I shall see you, shan't I?"

  He could not help the note of appeal in his
voice.

  "Of course. I'll let you know the moment I'm
back."

  He shook hands with her. Through the curtains he
watched her jump into a four-wheeler that stood at the door. It
rolled away. Then he threw himself on his bed and hid his face in
his hands. He felt tears coming to his eyes, and he was angry with
himself; he clenched his hands and screwed up his body to prevent
them; but he could not; and great painful sobs were forced from
him.

  He got up at last, exhausted and ashamed, and washed
his face. He mixed himself a strong whiskey and soda. It made him
feel a little better. Then he caught sight of the tickets to Paris,
which were on the chimney-piece, and, seizing them, with an impulse
of rage he flung them in the fire. He knew he could have got the
money back on them, but it relieved him to destroy them. Then he
went out in search of someone to be with. The club was empty. He
felt he would go mad unless he found someone to talk to; but Lawson
was abroad; he went on to Hayward's rooms: the maid who opened the
door told him that he had gone down to Brighton for the week-end.
Then Philip went to a gallery and found it was just closing. He did
not know what to do. He was distracted. And he thought of Griffiths
and Mildred going to Oxford, sitting opposite one another in the
train, happy. He went back to his rooms, but they filled him with
horror, he had been so wretched in them; he tried once more to read
Burton's book, but, as he read, he told himself again and again
what a fool he had been; it was he who had made the suggestion that
they should go away, he had offered the money, he had forced it
upon them; he might have known what would happen when he introduced
Griffiths to Mildred; his own vehement passion was enough to arouse
the other's desire. By this time they had reached Oxford. They
would put up in one of the lodging-houses in John Street; Philip
had never been to Oxford, but Griffiths had talked to him about it
so much that he knew exactly where they would go; and they would
dine at the Clarendon: Griffiths had been in the habit of dining
there when he went on the spree. Philip got himself something to
eat in a restaurant near Charing Cross; he had made up his mind to
go to a play, and afterwards he fought his way into the pit of a
theatre at which one of Oscar Wilde's pieces was being performed.
He wondered if Mildred and Griffiths would go to a play that
evening: they must kill the evening somehow; they were too stupid,
both of them to content themselves with conversation: he got a
fierce delight in reminding himself of the vulgarity of their minds
which suited them so exactly to one another. He watched the play
with an abstracted mind, trying to give himself gaiety by drinking
whiskey in each interval; he was unused to alcohol, and it affected
him quickly, but his drunkenness was savage and morose. When the
play was over he had another drink. He could not go to bed, he knew
he would not sleep, and he dreaded the pictures which his vivid
imagination would place before him. He tried not to think of them.
He knew he had drunk too much. Now he was seized with a desire to
do horrible, sordid things; he wanted to roll himself in gutters;
his whole being yearned for beastliness; he wanted to grovel.

  He walked up Piccadilly, dragging his club-foot,
sombrely drunk, with rage and misery clawing at his heart. He was
stopped by a painted harlot, who put her hand on his arm; he pushed
her violently away with brutal words. He walked on a few steps and
then stopped. She would do as well as another. He was sorry he had
spoken so roughly to her. He went up to her.

  "I say," he began.

  "Go to hell," she said.

  Philip laughed.

  "I merely wanted to ask if you'd do me the honour of
supping with me tonight."

  She looked at him with amazement, and hesitated for
a while. She saw he was drunk.

  "I don't mind."

  He was amused that she should use a phrase he had
heard so often on Mildred's lips. He took her to one of the
restaurants he had been in the habit of going to with Mildred. He
noticed as they walked along that she looked down at his limb.

  "I've got a club-foot," he said. "Have you any
objection?"

  "You are a cure," she laughed.

  When he got home his bones were aching, and in his
head there was a hammering that made him nearly scream. He took
another whiskey and soda to steady himself, and going to bed sank
into a dreamless sleep till mid-day.

  At last Monday came, and Philip thought his long
torture was over. Looking out the trains he found that the latest
by which Griffiths could reach home that night left Oxford soon
after one, and he supposed that Mildred would take one which
started a few minutes later to bring her to London. His desire was
to go and meet it, but he thought Mildred would like to be left
alone for a day; perhaps she would drop him a line in the evening
to say she was back, and if not he would call at her lodgings next
morning: his spirit was cowed. He felt a bitter hatred for
Griffiths, but for Mildred, notwithstanding all that had passed,
only a heart-rending desire. He was glad now that Hayward was not
in London on Saturday afternoon when, distraught, he went in search
of human comfort: he could not have prevented himself from telling
him everything, and Hayward would have been astonished at his
weakness. He would despise him, and perhaps be shocked or disgusted
that he could envisage the possibility of making Mildred his
mistress after she had given herself to another man. What did he
care if it was shocking or disgusting? He was ready for any
compromise, prepared for more degrading humiliations still, if he
could only gratify his desire.

  Towards the evening his steps took him against his
will to the house in which she lived, and he looked up at her
window. It was dark. He did not venture to ask if she was back. He
was confident in her promise. But there was no letter from her in
the morning, and, when about mid-day he called, the maid told him
she had not arrived. He could not understand it. He knew that
Griffiths would have been obliged to go home the day before, for he
was to be best man at a wedding, and Mildred had no money. He
turned over in his mind every possible thing that might have
happened. He went again in the afternoon and left a note, asking
her to dine with him that evening as calmly as though the events of
the last fortnight had not happened. He mentioned the place and
time at which they were to meet, and hoping against hope kept the
appointment: though he waited for an hour she did not come. On
Wednesday morning he was ashamed to ask at the house and sent a
messenger-boy with a letter and instructions to bring back a reply;
but in an hour the boy came back with Philip's letter unopened and
the answer that the lady had not returned from the country. Philip
was beside himself. The last deception was more than he could bear.
He repeated to himself over and over again that he loathed Mildred,
and, ascribing to Griffiths this new disappointment, he hated him
so much that he knew what was the delight of murder: he walked
about considering what a joy it would be to come upon him on a dark
night and stick a knife into his throat, just about the carotid
artery, and leave him to die in the street like a dog. Philip was
out of his senses with grief and rage. He did not like whiskey, but
he drank to stupefy himself. He went to bed drunk on the Tuesday
and on the Wednesday night.

  On Thursday morning he got up very late and dragged
himself, blear-eyed and sallow, into his sitting-room to see if
there were any letters. A curious feeling shot through his heart
when he recognised the handwriting of Griffiths.

  Dear old man:

  I hardly know how to write to you and yet I feel I
must write. I hope you're not awfully angry with me. I know I
oughtn't to have gone away with Milly, but I simply couldn't help
myself. She simply carried me off my feet and I would have done
anything to get her. When she told me you had offered us the money
to go I simply couldn't resist. And now it's all over I'm awfully
ashamed of myself and I wish I hadn't been such a fool. I wish
you'd write and say you're not angry with me, and I want you to let
me come and see you. I was awfully hurt at your telling Milly you
didn't want to see me. Do write me a line, there's a good chap, and
tell me you forgive me. It'll ease my conscience. I thought you
wouldn't mind or you wouldn't have offered the money. But I know I
oughtn't to have taken it. I came home on Monday and Milly wanted
to stay a couple of days at Oxford by herself. She's going back to
London on Wednesday, so by the time you receive this letter you
will have seen her and I hope everything will go off all right. Do
write and say you forgive me. Please write at once. Yours ever,

Harry.

  Philip tore up the letter furiously. He did not mean
to answer it. He despised Griffiths for his apologies, he had no
patience with his prickings of conscience: one could do a dastardly
thing if one chose, but it was contemptible to regret it
afterwards. He thought the letter cowardly and hypocritical. He was
disgusted at its sentimentality.

  "It would be very easy if you could do a beastly
thing," he muttered to himself, "and then say you were sorry, and
that put it all right again."

  He hoped with all his heart he would have the chance
one day to do Griffiths a bad turn.

  But at all events he knew that Mildred was in town.
He dressed hurriedly, not waiting to shave, drank a cup of tea, and
took a cab to her rooms. The cab seemed to crawl. He was painfully
anxious to see her, and unconsciously he uttered a prayer to the
God he did not believe in to make her receive him kindly. He only
wanted to forget. With beating heart he rang the bell. He forgot
all his suffering in the passionate desire to enfold her once more
in his arms.

  "Is Mrs. Miller in?" he asked joyously.

  "She's gone," the maid answered.

  He looked at her blankly.

  "She came about an hour ago and took away her
things."

  For a moment he did not know what to say.

  "Did you give her my letter? Did she say where she
was going?"

  Then he understood that Mildred had deceived him
again. She was not coming back to him. He made an effort to save
his face.

  "Oh, well, I daresay I shall hear from her. She may
have sent a letter to another address."

  He turned away and went back hopeless to his rooms.
He might have known that she would do this; she had never cared for
him, she had made a fool of him from the beginning; she had no
pity, she had no kindness, she had no charity. The only thing was
to accept the inevitable. The pain he was suffering was horrible,
he would sooner be dead than endure it; and the thought came to him
that it would be better to finish with the whole thing: he might
throw himself in the river or put his neck on a railway line; but
he had no sooner set the thought into words than he rebelled
against it. His reason told him that he would get over his
unhappiness in time; if he tried with all his might he could forget
her; and it would be grotesque to kill himself on account of a
vulgar slut. He had only one life, and it was madness to fling it
away. He FELT that he would never overcome his passion, but he KNEW
that after all it was only a matter of time.