When the hops were picked, Philip with the news in his pocket that he
had got the appointment as assistant house-physician at St. Luke’s,
accompanied the Athelnys back to London. He took modest rooms in
Westminster and at the beginning of October entered upon his duties.
The work was interesting and varied; every day he learned something
new; he felt himself of some consequence; and he saw a good deal of
Sally. He found life uncommonly pleasant. He was free about six, except
on the days on which he had out-patients, and then he went to the shop
at which Sally worked to meet her when she came out. There were several
young men, who hung about opposite the ‘trade entrance’ or a little
further along, at the first corner; and the girls, coming out two and
two or in little groups, nudged one another and giggled as they
recognised them. Sally in her plain black dress looked very different
from the country lass who had picked hops side by side with him. She
walked away from the shop quickly, but she slackened her pace when they
met, and greeted him with her quiet smile. They walked together through
the busy street. He talked to her of his work at the hospital, and she
told him what she had been doing in the shop that day. He came to know
the names of the girls she worked with. He found that Sally had a
restrained, but keen, sense of the ridiculous, and she made remarks
about the girls or the men who were set over them which amused him by
their unexpected drollery. She had a way of saying a thing which was
very characteristic, quite gravely, as though there were nothing funny
in it at all, and yet it was so sharp-sighted that Philip broke into
delighted laughter. Then she would give him a little glance in which
the smiling eyes showed she was not unaware of her own humour. They met
with a handshake and parted as formally. Once Philip asked her to come
and have tea with him in his rooms, but she refused.
“No, I won’t do that. It would look funny.”
Never a word of love passed between them. She seemed not to desire
anything more than the companionship of those walks. Yet Philip was
positive that she was glad to be with him. She puzzled him as much as
she had done at the beginning. He did not begin to understand her
conduct; but the more he knew her the fonder he grew of her; she was
competent and self controlled, and there was a charming honesty in her:
you felt that you could rely upon her in every circumstance.
“You are an awfully good sort,” he said to her once a propos of nothing
at all.
“I expect I’m just the same as everyone else,” she answered.
He knew that he did not love her. It was a great affection that he felt
for her, and he liked her company; it was curiously soothing; and he
had a feeling for her which seemed to him ridiculous to entertain
towards a shop-girl of nineteen: he respected her. And he admired her
magnificent healthiness. She was a splendid animal, without defect; and
physical perfection filled him always with admiring awe. She made him
feel unworthy.
Then, one day, about three weeks after they had come back to London as
they walked together, he noticed that she was unusually silent. The
serenity of her expression was altered by a slight line between the
eyebrows: it was the beginning of a frown.
“What’s the matter, Sally?” he asked.
She did not look at him, but straight in front of her, and her colour
darkened.
“I don’t know.”
He understood at once what she meant. His heart gave a sudden, quick
beat, and he felt the colour leave his cheeks.
“What d’you mean? Are you afraid that… ?”
He stopped. He could not go on. The possibility that anything of the
sort could happen had never crossed his mind. Then he saw that her lips
were trembling, and she was trying not to cry.
“I’m not certain yet. Perhaps it’ll be all right.”
They walked on in silence till they came to the corner of Chancery
Lane, where he always left her. She held out her hand and smiled.
“Don’t worry about it yet. Let’s hope for the best.”
He walked away with a tumult of thoughts in his head. What a fool he
had been! That was the first thing that struck him, an abject,
miserable fool, and he repeated it to himself a dozen times in a rush
of angry feeling. He despised himself. How could he have got into such
a mess? But at the same time, for his thoughts chased one another
through his brain and yet seemed to stand together, in a hopeless
confusion, like the pieces of a jig-saw puzzle seen in a nightmare, he
asked himself what he was going to do. Everything was so clear before
him, all he had aimed at so long within reach at last, and now his
inconceivable stupidity had erected this new obstacle. Philip had never
been able to surmount what he acknowledged was a defect in his resolute
desire for a well ordered life, and that was his passion for living in
the future; and no sooner was he settled in his work at the hospital
than he had busied himself with arrangements for his travels. In the
past he had often tried not to think too circumstantially of his plans
for the future, it was only discouraging; but now that his goal was so
near he saw no harm in giving away to a longing that was so difficult
to resist. First of all he meant to go to Spain. That was the land of
his heart; and by now he was imbued with its spirit, its romance and
colour and history and grandeur; he felt that it had a message for him
in particular which no other country could give. He knew the fine old
cities already as though he had trodden their tortuous streets from
childhood. Cordova, Seville, Toledo, Leon, Tarragona, Burgos. The great
painters of Spain were the painters of his soul, and his pulse beat
quickly as he pictured his ecstasy on standing face to face with those
works which were more significant than any others to his own tortured,
restless heart. He had read the great poets, more characteristic of
their race than the poets of other lands; for they seemed to have drawn
their inspiration not at all from the general currents of the world’s
literature but directly from the torrid, scented plains and the bleak
mountains of their country. A few short months now, and he would hear
with his own ears all around him the language which seemed most apt for
grandeur of soul and passion. His fine taste had given him an inkling
that Andalusia was too soft and sensuous, a little vulgar even, to
satisfy his ardour; and his imagination dwelt more willingly among the
wind-swept distances of Castile and the rugged magnificence of Aragon
and Leon. He did not know quite what those unknown contacts would give
him, but he felt that he would gather from them a strength and a
purpose which would make him more capable of affronting and
comprehending the manifold wonders of places more distant and more
strange.
For this was only a beginning. He had got into communication with the
various companies which took surgeons out on their ships, and knew
exactly what were their routes, and from men who had been on them what
were the advantages and disadvantages of each line. He put aside the
Orient and the P. & O. It was difficult to get a berth with them; and
besides their passenger traffic allowed the medical officer little
freedom; but there were other services which sent large tramps on
leisurely expeditions to the East, stopping at all sorts of ports for
various periods, from a day or two to a fortnight, so that you had
plenty of time, and it was often possible to make a trip inland. The
pay was poor and the food no more than adequate, so that there was not
much demand for the posts, and a man with a London degree was pretty
sure to get one if he applied. Since there were no passengers other
than a casual man or so, shipping on business from some out-of-the-way
port to another, the life on board was friendly and pleasant. Philip
knew by heart the list of places at which they touched; and each one
called up in him visions of tropical sunshine, and magic colour, and of
a teeming, mysterious, intense life. Life! That was what he wanted. At
last he would come to close quarters with Life. And perhaps, from Tokyo
or Shanghai it would be possible to tranship into some other line and
drip down to the islands of the South Pacific. A doctor was useful
anywhere. There might be an opportunity to go up country in Burmah, and
what rich jungles in Sumatra or Borneo might he not visit? He was young
still and time was no object to him. He had no ties in England, no
friends; he could go up and down the world for years, learning the
beauty and the wonder and the variedness of life.
Now this thing had come. He put aside the possibility that Sally was
mistaken; he felt strangely certain that she was right; after all, it
was so likely; anyone could see that Nature had built her to be the
mother of children. He knew what he ought to do. He ought not to let
the incident divert him a hair’s breadth from his path. He thought of
Griffiths; he could easily imagine with what indifference that young
man would have received such a piece of news; he would have thought it
an awful nuisance and would at once have taken to his heels, like a
wise fellow; he would have left the girl to deal with her troubles as
best she could. Philip told himself that if this had happened it was
because it was inevitable. He was no more to blame than Sally; she was
a girl who knew the world and the facts of life, and she had taken the
risk with her eyes open. It would be madness to allow such an accident
to disturb the whole pattern of his life. He was one of the few people
who was acutely conscious of the transitoriness of life, and how
necessary it was to make the most of it. He would do what he could for
Sally; he could afford to give her a sufficient sum of money. A strong
man would never allow himself to be turned from his purpose.
Philip said all this to himself, but he knew he could not do it. He
simply could not. He knew himself.
“I’m so damned weak,” he muttered despairingly.
She had trusted him and been kind to him. He simply could not do a
thing which, notwithstanding all his reason, he felt was horrible. He
knew he would have no peace on his travels if he had the thought
constantly with him that she was wretched. Besides, there were her
father and mother: they had always treated him well; it was not
possible to repay them with ingratitude. The only thing was to marry
Sally as quickly as possible. He would write to Doctor South, tell him
he was going to be married at once, and say that if his offer still
held he was willing to accept it. That sort of practice, among poor
people, was the only one possible for him; there his deformity did not
matter, and they would not sneer at the simple manners of his wife. It
was curious to think of her as his wife, it gave him a queer, soft
feeling; and a wave of emotion spread over him as he thought of the
child which was his. He had little doubt that Doctor South would be
glad to have him, and he pictured to himself the life he would lead
with Sally in the fishing village. They would have a little house
within sight of the sea, and he would watch the mighty ships passing to
the lands he would never know. Perhaps that was the wisest thing.
Cronshaw had told him that the facts of life mattered nothing to him
who by the power of fancy held in fee the twin realms of space and
time. It was true. Forever wilt thou love and she be fair!
His wedding present to his wife would be all his high hopes.
Self-sacrifice! Philip was uplifted by its beauty, and all through the
evening he thought of it. He was so excited that he could not read. He
seemed to be driven out of his rooms into the streets, and he walked up
and down Birdcage Walk, his heart throbbing with joy. He could hardly
bear his impatience. He wanted to see Sally’s happiness when he made
her his offer, and if it had not been so late he would have gone to her
there and then. He pictured to himself the long evenings he would spend
with Sally in the cosy sitting-room, the blinds undrawn so that they
could watch the sea; he with his books, while she bent over her work,
and the shaded lamp made her sweet face more fair. They would talk over
the growing child, and when she turned her eyes to his there was in
them the light of love. And the fishermen and their wives who were his
patients would come to feel a great affection for them, and they in
their turn would enter into the pleasures and pains of those simple
lives. But his thoughts returned to the son who would be his and hers.
Already he felt in himself a passionate devotion to it. He thought of
passing his hands over his little perfect limbs, he knew he would be
beautiful; and he would make over to him all his dreams of a rich and
varied life. And thinking over the long pilgrimage of his past he
accepted it joyfully. He accepted the deformity which had made life so
hard for him; he knew that it had warped his character, but now he saw
also that by reason of it he had acquired that power of introspection
which had given him so much delight. Without it he would never have had
his keen appreciation of beauty, his passion for art and literature,
and his interest in the varied spectacle of life. The ridicule and the
contempt which had so often been heaped upon him had turned his mind
inward and called forth those flowers which he felt would never lose
their fragrance. Then he saw that the normal was the rarest thing in
the world. Everyone had some defect, of body or of mind: he thought of
all the people he had known (the whole world was like a sick-house, and
there was no rhyme or reason in it), he saw a long procession, deformed
in body and warped in mind, some with illness of the flesh, weak hearts
or weak lungs, and some with illness of the spirit, languor of will, or
a craving for liquor. At this moment he could feel a holy compassion
for them all. They were the helpless instruments of blind chance. He
could pardon Griffiths for his treachery and Mildred for the pain she
had caused him. They could not help themselves. The only reasonable
thing was to accept the good of men and be patient with their faults.
The words of the dying God crossed his memory:
Forgive them, for they know not what they do.