I was now sixteen and a half, and my mother had kept me at school much
longer than her means had warranted. I think that at one time she had
some idea that I might gain a scholarship and go to Oxford or
Cambridge, but my progress, though respectable, never suggested that I
might achieve honours. I think, as a matter of fact, that I could have
done so had I cared to, but I had no ambition to spend the best years
of early manhood in a torture chamber, and it is obvious that to a
youth of imagination, who has no means of joining in the recreations
of his fellows, and is expected to justify himself by brilliant
scholastic success, a career at the ’Varsity can be little else.
The question of my future was a very serious one. It was not possible
for my mother to pay anything towards giving me a profession, and
without influence the outlook was not hopeful.
Unknown to her I conceived the idea of writing to Gascoyne Gascoyne, a
distant cousin who was at the head of a large stockbroking firm. I
pointed out our relationship and asked if he could possibly find room
for me in his office. He replied in a type-written letter saying that
he had no knowledge of the relationship. He did not deny it, it might
be so, but at any rate he had no vacancies nor was he likely to have
any. It would therefore be of no use for Mr. Rank to trouble him
again.
I kept his letter, but I did not run the risk of a second rebuff from
any other member of the family.
Mr. Johnson came to the rescue. He had, it appeared, a great friend in
the City who employed two or three clerks and who had a vacancy. I was
interviewed, approved of, and engaged at the salary of fifteen
shillings a week. From circumstances which afterwards came to my
knowledge I believe that Mr. Johnson paid something in the way of a
premium. My mother was delighted. It was a start in life, and in her
eyes a good start was everything. Personally, I thought it a
deplorable beginning, and only took it because nothing better offered.
I was determined, however, not to stay longer than I could help.
With the best intentions in the world Mr. Johnson was quite incapable
of grasping my character. He talked to me of a youth of application, a
middle age of strenuous endeavour for a living wage, and an old age of
decent competence. The prospect appalled me. It sounded inexpressibly
gray. I gravitated towards wealth and luxury as the needle to a
magnet. I remember his saying:
“By the time you are thirty, Israel, you should be able to keep your
mother in this house and have it to yourselves.”
I had much ado to restrain a scornful laugh. By the time I was thirty
I was determined to have established my mother in a house fully ten
times the size.
I soon realised that the office I was in did not even afford a
starting point for a career, and could not be a recommendation to
anything better. I had no friends in the City of my own age. I
instinctively avoided those youths whom in the natural course of
events a person in my position would have associated with. The school
my mother had sent me to had put me out of sympathy with them,
and—what was more to the point—they could not be of any possible use
to me. I was bitterly envious of those boys who entered their
relations’ houses of business on advantageous terms, with sufficient
allowances and smart clothes. My poverty appeared to me extreme. I was
not in the first few months ever sufficiently in pocket to be able to
go to theatres and places of amusement as other young men did, and yet
I found myself with tastes equally expensive and with an abnormal love
of pleasure. Of my fifteen shillings a week I gave my mother eight,
and out of the remainder I was obliged to find my lunches and fares to
town and back, a condition of things that reduced me to chronic
discontent. I saw that the great point was to have rich friends and
make use of them. I also grasped the cardinal maxim that for success
in life it is essential to avoid the unlucky and the necessitous, and
above all not to be led away by the fact that in themselves the latter
are probably the most entertaining sections of society. If a man
wishes to be rich he must live among the rich, and how to do this on
fifteen shillings a week was the problem.
A Semitic appearance, however superior, is not the best recommendation
to society. In the Western it rouses instinctive antagonism. At the
same time, and because the laws of compensation are inevitable, it is
this antagonism that makes the Jew what he is. His powers of
resistance are automatically developed by it, and it encourages his
virility. The greater the odds a man has to fight the greater his
ultimate skill of fence. That man is fortunate who has the world
against him.
At sixteen and a half, however, my philosophy was not equal to the
annoyances of the situation. I wasted a great deal of valuable energy
in useless complaining. Sibella seemed lost to me for ever. Even had
she promised herself to me I should have placed no faith in her
staying power. I was quite sure that my humble start in life must have
brought home to her the difference in our positions as nothing in our
boy and girl relations had ever done. To Sibella, luxurious,
pleasure-loving and flippant, the junior clerk in a third-rate
business house was an altogether inferior and impossible person. The
shabbier I seemed, the smarter Lionel Holland must have appeared. He
was blossoming into a complete dandy, and had all the means at hand to
gratify his taste for fine clothes. I had spent a year under these
depressing conditions when I made a friend.
Godfrey Twyneham was the son of a rich man with whom our firm did a
certain amount of business. He was about eighteen months older than
myself, and there was nothing very remarkable about his personal
appearance except a pervading air of gentlemanliness. He had been
coming in and out of our office for twelve months before I realised
that he was inclined to take special notice of me. One morning as I
was on the way to my contemptible lunch he joined me. We walked a few
yards together, I painfully sure that he must be very anxious to be
rid of so shabby a companion. To my surprise, however, he asked me to
lunch with him. I was on the point of refusing, but he linked his arm
in mine in an altogether friendly and unpatronising manner, and I
yielded.
He had evidently taken a great fancy to me and insisted on my lunching
with him first about once a week, then twice a week, and finally every
day. He also insisted on my going to theatres with him, and grew quite
offended if we did not spend our Saturday evenings together. In vain I
protested—not very vehemently perhaps—that I could in no way make any
return. He laughed the idea to scorn. Why should I? We liked each
other. He was well off, I was not. That was a mere accident, and we
should be small-minded indeed if we allowed it to interfere with our
intimacy. He insisted on lending me money, declaring that I was sure
to make a fortune, and when that day came I could pay him back. He was
certainly the most generous person I have ever met, and, though I have
not paid him back, he has never mentioned the matter to me. I don’t
think he allowed the question of money to come between himself and his
friends. At the present moment he is in South America, and just before
the trial I received quite a heartbroken letter from him, declaring
his belief in my innocence, and in case I should need it, placing a
large sum of money at my disposal. Poor Godfrey! I suppose he forgot
that Earl Gascoyne is a rich man.
Before I met him I had all the inclination for pleasure and
indulgence, and his generosity had the effect of making me feel that I
could never again endure life unaccompanied by a certain amount of
excitement.
I was hopelessly unfitted by temperament for the dreary, sordid life
of shabby suburbanism that lay before me. I dwell upon these facts
because I think they may serve to show that I was impelled by all the
forces of my nature to make some attempt to rescue myself by decisive
action from the mire in which it seemed only too probable I was
destined to wade all my life. Godfrey Twyneham, with the best
intentions in the world, and from motives of purest friendship,
succeeded in making our house at Clapham appear ten degrees more
shabby and my position in the City infinitely more humiliating. He
introduced me to his tailor, bootmaker, and hosier, and lo! I found
myself well dressed. I dined at his father’s house in a decent dress
suit, and was introduced to a circle of his friends who gave me a very
good time indeed. The Twynehams lived at Highgate, and I constantly
spent Saturday to Monday with them. I think my mother missed me, but
she never complained and seemed only too glad that I was enjoying
myself. I was compelled to invent some plausible excuse for being able
to afford clothes so very superior to anything I had been accustomed
to. I explained that Godfrey Twyneham had been able to put me in the
way of some private business and that he had introduced me to his
tailor, it being necessary that I should be well dressed in order to
follow up my opportunity. Godfrey was one of those good-natured souls
with no such strict principles as prevented his telling a small fib to
oblige a friend. My mother and he took to each other at once, and it
flattered my vanity not a little that he seemed to like coming to us
and sharing my humble tenement bedroom apparently as much as I liked
visiting their luxurious house at Highgate.
I think the only occasion on which I was tactless enough to cause him
to disapprove of me was when I began to apologise for the poorness of
our household. I think I detected the faintest suspicion of a scornful
surprise in his face as he said:
“I don’t think those things matter, do you, except to snobs?”
The rebuke was severe, but it did me good and I avoided such mistakes
afterwards.
Even now I recall with pleasure the look of astonishment on Sibella’s
face the Sunday afternoon I called at the Hallwards’ in my new finery.
I felt that I had reason to be satisfied with myself. I knew that I
could do justice to my clothes and that I need not fear comparison
even with Lionel Holland. In fact, his smartness invariably had
something of the dressed up shop boy about it, while I had reason to
believe that in spite of my half Semitic origin I conveyed an
impression of distinction. At least, Godfrey told me so, and I knew he
was to be relied on in such matters. The drawing-room was full of
people when I entered, and Sibella said in a confidential tone of
approval:
“You do look smart, Israel. You will make Lionel quite jealous.”
Lionel Holland was also taken by surprise when he came in a few
minutes afterwards. Sibella, true to her character, and feeling that
Lionel had perhaps received enough encouragement of late,
ostentatiously permitted me to be her favoured cavalier for the
afternoon. She was unable to control her desire to set men at each
other’s throats. Had it been anyone else I should have managed her
properly and not permitted myself to be played fast and loose with.
Sibella, however, was the exception in my life, and she was always
drawing the unexpected from my character.
I heard her say to Lionel in a voice intended for me to hear:
“Doesn’t Israel look nice, Lionel?”
“He’s been robbing the till, I suppose.”
Sibella laughed a high, silvery laugh. The reply was sufficiently
spiteful and showed that she had succeeded in deepening an animosity
already bitter enough.
The sneer had truth, in that it suggested the disparity between my
apparel and my income, and consequently I hated Lionel Holland the
more.
Mr. Johnson might have proved a most awkward inquirer as to the
sources of my apparent prosperity, but just about this time he died.
He was found one morning sitting in his armchair, in front of a fire
which had burnt out hours before, dead, and clasped in his stiffening
fingers was a portrait of my mother in a little leather case. He had
evidently had it secretly copied, for she had not given it to him. He
had no relations, and the only person who appeared on the scene to
take charge of things was a local solicitor, who informed my mother
that she had inherited through her late lodger the sum of one thousand
pounds and all his personal effects. I think she was glad for my sake
as much as for her own.
“You see, Israel, with the house, which is our own, and a thousand
pounds properly invested in addition to what I have got, we can never
come absolutely to want, and if I can only get another lodger who will
pay well we should be quite comfortably off.”
The prospect failed to dazzle me. My ideas of what constituted comfort
grew daily. We discussed the manner of investing the thousand pounds
endlessly. My mother would not hear of anything but gilt-edged
securities, and would have been quite content with a miserable three
and a half per cent., whereas I declared it was a matter of no
difficulty to obtain a safe five or even six per cent. Before the
matter was decided my mother died and I found myself alone in the
world.
The event plunged me into the deepest dejection, for I had loved her
dearly. I took stock of my position and decided that whatever happened
I would resign my clerkship. My resignation was promptly followed by
the offer of a rise in salary, so potent a lever is independence to
progress in life. They were unable, however, to make me any such
proposal as tempted me to remain.
At first I made all sorts of good resolutions, which I might have kept
had not Godfrey Twyneham, whose advice was always practical, been
called away at this moment to South America. His father had a branch
of his business at Buenos Ayres and Godfrey was destined to manage it,
the control of the London house being reserved for the eldest son. He
was anxious for me to accompany him and even went to considerable
trouble in finding a post for me. I could not, however, bring myself
to give up Sibella and at the last moment declined to go. Poor
Godfrey! I don’t think he ever quite forgave me, and since then we
have not seen much of each other.
My fifteen hundred pounds soon began to dwindle. From day to day I
salved my conscience by assuring myself that, though I was spending my
capital, I was making friends who could not fail to be useful to me.
Inwardly I knew perfectly well that the class of young men I was
mixing with could never help me to a livelihood. I shut up the house
at Clapham and took rooms near Piccadilly, and eighteen months of my
life were wasted in unprofitable lounging. I seldom rose till late,
and when I was dressed strolled round to a luxurious bar near Bond
Street to meet several boon companions and spend the afternoon in
tippling. In the evening I frequented those theatres at which the more
frivolous pieces were played, and afterwards hung about the stage
doors. I soon found myself led into extravagances in the way of little
suppers and small presents of jewellery, which made my capital
disappear at an alarming rate. Like countless other young men before
me, and no doubt since, I was unable to pull up, although I could feel
my financial bark throbbing with impending disaster and could hear the
roar of the rapids growing nearer and nearer. I shut my eyes and went
ahead, hoping for a miracle. Somehow I obtained a reputation for
riches for which there were no reasonable grounds. I managed to hold
on for a year at high pressure, then for another six months with
difficulty, living on the credit that twelve months’ ostentatious
solvency had secured me. Then ensued a few months of decline, and on
the morning of my twenty-third birthday I found myself heavily in debt
and penniless. A few borrowed fivers kept me afloat for a short time
and then Lionel Holland put a spoke in my wheel and sent me headlong.
I had been asked to a supper given by a friend of mine who had just
come of age. He had partaken frequently of my hospitality in my
prosperous days, and, having some sense of gratitude, had not omitted
me on this important occasion.
To my annoyance, I found that Lionel Holland, with whom I did not know
my friend was acquainted, was of the party. We welcomed each other
with outward civility, but I saw danger in his eye.
The supper passed off pleasantly enough, and afterwards we took
hansoms and drove to my friend’s rooms. I escorted a chorus-girl from
the Frivolity, a particular friend of mine, with whom I was making
desperate attempts to keep on terms of intimacy. Our hansom broke
down, and my little friend, nervous and hysterical, fainted. I carried
her into the vestibule of a well-known club, where, with the aid of
brandy, she was brought round, and after ten minutes or so declared
that she had no intention of going home, but asked me to take her on
to join the others. We found them wondering what had happened to us,
and in the excitement of detailing the scene I did not notice that the
manner of the others had perceptibly changed towards me. As soon as I
detected a certain coolness I realised that Lionel Holland had been
saying something to my detriment. The women were especially distant,
and I know no class who can make a man feel so unpleasantly that he is
not wanted as the sort of female whom my host was entertaining. They
have a genius for being cruel to anyone who is going under, and after
all, it is not to be wondered at. They themselves have risked too much
to care about increasing the odds. In such a mood, however, they are
dangerous, for no considerations of breeding restrain them. My own
particular friend was taken out of the room by one of the other women,
and on her return I could see at once that she had had repeated to her
whatever Lionel Holland had said. Her manner became suddenly insolent
and aggressive, as if she felt that it was she who had been wronged.
Inwardly I quaked, for I knew what she was capable of.
She had taken more wine than was good for her, and was by no means
mistress of herself.
As usual, I was in charge of the piano, playing accompaniments for
anyone who would contribute a song and filling in myself with snatches
of music hall ditties, or florid pianoforte arrangements of the most
popular tunes of the day.
I had even successfully accompanied Lionel Holland, who had rather a
nice voice, and had managed with great skill and tact to put him in
high good humour with his performance. I was nervously conscious that
it was necessary for my own dignity to make the evening pass off
smoothly.
My little friend was then pressed to sing, and I hastened to join in
the request. Though she had an exceedingly pretty voice she was one of
those people who become vocally helpless if in any way under the
influence of alcohol. Her voice sounded weak and tremulous; she was
unable to keep to the right key, and, feeling that she was making an
exhibition of herself, lost her temper more and more at every bar. In
an absolute panic I did everything I could in order that her song
should pass off successfully, but to no purpose. She forgot her words,
and I ventured to prompt her, which seemed to irritate her the more.
To make matters worse the others laughed.
Suddenly she stopped and laughed too, an unpleasant laugh with little
mirth in it.
“He’s a nice pianist, isn’t he? He’d be more at home blacking the
lodger’s boots, instead of pretending to be a gentleman on his
mother’s hard earned savings.”
She herself was a plumber’s daughter, but in her case that was not to
the point.
With commendable presence of mind I pretended not to hear, and
commenced to play something loudly on the piano.
She was, however, transported with rage at her own failure and
determined to make somebody pay.
She shut the lid of the piano down violently, and I only just managed
to save my hands from being crushed. To such a female, in such a
condition, it is not a long way to hysterics.
“Get back to the lodgers!” she screamed. “What do you mean by coming
here and pretending to be a gentleman? You ought to be horsewhipped.
You——” Here followed a string of epithets intensely humiliating to
have to listen to under the circumstances. The other ladies present
proceeded to take her part and to treat her as a highly injured
female. They crowded round her as she lay sobbing and gurgling and
swearing on the sofa, and deluged her with sympathy.
“I really don’t wonder at her being upset,” said one.
“Such a thing to find out. Enough to make her feel small,” protested
another.
“It is indeed,” said a third, and turning to me added with a comic
attempt at hauteur, “You cad!”
I felt terribly uncomfortable. I quite saw the sort of character
Lionel Holland had been kind enough to give me. I felt like breaking a
champagne bottle over his head, only it would have done no good, and
vengeance should always bide its time if it is to be effective.
He too looked uncomfortable, as if he had not expected the mean part
he had played to be brought home to him so obviously and so soon.
As my presence seemed to make the lady grow worse every moment I
suggested that I should go. My host, a youth with every instinct of
good breeding, would not hear of it, but several of the other men were
growing a little tired of the scene. They had only met me in such
society as we were now in and it did not matter to them what my origin
was. They would not be called upon to recognise me in a legitimate
social way.
“Good-night, your lordship,” said one of the women mockingly, as I
left the room.
It was no haphazard gibe. Obviously Holland, in order to heap further
discredit upon me, had revived the boast of my schoolboy days. I went
up to him before I left the house and said quite quietly, so that no
one else could hear:
“You will be very sorry for this, and I want to assure you of the
fact.”
I cannot describe the intense conviction I managed to throw into the
words. I felt they would come true. He tried to laugh scornfully but
the failure died upon his lips. He was frightened in spite of himself.