Of Human Bondage (104 page)

  "Oh, hold your jaw," she cried roughly. "How d'you
suppose I'm going to live?"

  He took hold of her arm and without thinking what he
was doing tried to drag her away.

  "For God's sake come along. Let me take you home.
You don't know what you're doing. It's criminal."

  "What do I care? Let them take their chance. Men
haven't been so good to me that I need bother my head about
them."

  She pushed him away and walking up to the box-office
put down her money. Philip had threepence in his pocket. He could
not follow. He turned away and walked slowly down Oxford
Street.

  "I can't do anything more," he said to himself.

  That was the end. He did not see her again.

  Christmas that year falling on Thursday, the shop
was to close for four days: Philip wrote to his uncle asking
whether it would be convenient for him to spend the holidays at the
vicarage. He received an answer from Mrs. Foster, saying that Mr.
Carey was not well enough to write himself, but wished to see his
nephew and would be glad if he came down. She met Philip at the
door, and when she shook hands with him, said:

  "You'll find him changed since you was here last,
sir; but you'll pretend you don't notice anything, won't you, sir?
He's that nervous about himself."

  Philip nodded, and she led him into the
dining-room.

  "Here's Mr. Philip, sir."

  The Vicar of Blackstable was a dying man. There was
no mistaking that when you looked at the hollow cheeks and the
shrunken body. He sat huddled in the arm-chair, with his head
strangely thrown back, and a shawl over his shoulders. He could not
walk now without the help of sticks, and his hands trembled so that
he could only feed himself with difficulty.

  "He can't last long now," thought Philip, as he
looked at him.

  "How d'you think I'm looking?" asked the Vicar.
"D'you think I've changed since you were here last?"

  "I think you look stronger than you did last
summer."

  "It was the heat. That always upsets me."

  Mr. Carey's history of the last few months consisted
in the number of weeks he had spent in his bed-room and the number
of weeks he had spent downstairs. He had a hand-bell by his side
and while he talked he rang it for Mrs. Foster, who sat in the next
room ready to attend to his wants, to ask on what day of the month
he had first left his room.

  "On the seventh of November, sir."

  Mr. Carey looked at Philip to see how he took the
information.

  "But I eat well still, don't I, Mrs. Foster?"

  "Yes, sir, you've got a wonderful appetite."

  "I don't seem to put on flesh though."

  Nothing interested him now but his health. He was
set upon one thing indomitably and that was living, just living,
notwithstanding the monotony of his life and the constant pain
which allowed him to sleep only when he was under the influence of
morphia.

  "It's terrible, the amount of money I have to spend
on doctor's bills." He tinkled his bell again. "Mrs. Foster, show
Master Philip the chemist's bill."

  Patiently she took it off the chimney-piece and
handed it to Philip.

  "That's only one month. I was wondering if as you're
doctoring yourself you couldn't get me the drugs cheaper. I thought
of getting them down from the stores, but then there's the
postage."

  Though apparently taking so little interest in him
that he did not trouble to inquire what Phil was doing, he seemed
glad to have him there. He asked how long he could stay, and when
Philip told him he must leave on Tuesday morning, expressed a wish
that the visit might have been longer. He told him minutely all his
symptoms and repeated what the doctor had said of him. He broke off
to ring his bell, and when Mrs. Foster came in, said:

  "Oh, I wasn't sure if you were there. I only rang to
see if you were."

  When she had gone he explained to Philip that it
made him uneasy if he was not certain that Mrs. Foster was within
earshot; she knew exactly what to do with him if anything happened.
Philip, seeing that she was tired and that her eyes were heavy from
want of sleep, suggested that he was working her too hard.

  "Oh, nonsense," said the Vicar, "she's as strong as
a horse." And when next she came in to give him his medicine he
said to her:

  "Master Philip says you've got too much to do, Mrs.
Foster. You like looking after me, don't you?"

  "Oh, I don't mind, sir. I want to do everything I
can."

  Presently the medicine took effect and Mr. Carey
fell asleep. Philip went into the kitchen and asked Mrs. Foster
whether she could stand the work. He saw that for some months she
had had little peace.

  "Well, sir, what can I do?" she answered. "The poor
old gentleman's so dependent on me, and, although he is troublesome
sometimes, you can't help liking him, can you? I've been here so
many years now, I don't know what I shall do when he comes to
go."

  Philip saw that she was really fond of the old man.
She washed and dressed him, gave him his food, and was up half a
dozen times in the night; for she slept in the next room to his and
whenever he awoke he tinkled his little bell till she came in. He
might die at any moment, but he might live for months. It was
wonderful that she should look after a stranger with such patient
tenderness, and it was tragic and pitiful that she should be alone
in the world to care for him.

  It seemed to Philip that the religion which his
uncle had preached all his life was now of no more than formal
importance to him: every Sunday the curate came and administered to
him Holy Communion, and he often read his Bible; but it was clear
that he looked upon death with horror. He believed that it was the
gateway to life everlasting, but he did not want to enter upon that
life. In constant pain, chained to his chair and having given up
the hope of ever getting out into the open again, like a child in
the hands of a woman to whom he paid wages, he clung to the world
he knew.

  In Philip's head was a question he could not ask,
because he was aware that his uncle would never give any but a
conventional answer: he wondered whether at the very end, now that
the machine was painfully wearing itself out, the clergyman still
believed in immortality; perhaps at the bottom of his soul, not
allowed to shape itself into words in case it became urgent, was
the conviction that there was no God and after this life
nothing.

  On the evening of Boxing Day Philip sat in the
dining-room with his uncle. He had to start very early next morning
in order to get to the shop by nine, and he was to say good-night
to Mr. Carey then. The Vicar of Blackstable was dozing and Philip,
lying on the sofa by the window, let his book fall on his knees and
looked idly round the room. He asked himself how much the furniture
would fetch. He had walked round the house and looked at the things
he had known from his childhood; there were a few pieces of china
which might go for a decent price and Philip wondered if it would
be worth while to take them up to London; but the furniture was of
the Victorian order, of mahogany, solid and ugly; it would go for
nothing at an auction. There were three or four thousand books, but
everyone knew how badly they sold, and it was not probable that
they would fetch more than a hundred pounds. Philip did not know
how much his uncle would leave, and he reckoned out for the
hundredth time what was the least sum upon which he could finish
the curriculum at the hospital, take his degree, and live during
the time he wished to spend on hospital appointments. He looked at
the old man, sleeping restlessly: there was no humanity left in
that shrivelled face; it was the face of some queer animal. Philip
thought how easy it would be to finish that useless life. He had
thought it each evening when Mrs. Foster prepared for his uncle the
medicine which was to give him an easy night. There were two
bottles: one contained a drug which he took regularly, and the
other an opiate if the pain grew unendurable. This was poured out
for him and left by his bed-side. He generally took it at three or
four in the morning. It would be a simple thing to double the dose;
he would die in the night, and no one would suspect anything; for
that was how Doctor Wigram expected him to die. The end would be
painless. Philip clenched his hands as he thought of the money he
wanted so badly. A few more months of that wretched life could
matter nothing to the old man, but the few more months meant
everything to him: he was getting to the end of his endurance, and
when he thought of going back to work in the morning he shuddered
with horror. His heart beat quickly at the thought which obsessed
him, and though he made an effort to put it out of his mind he
could not. It would be so easy, so desperately easy. He had no
feeling for the old man, he had never liked him; he had been
selfish all his life, selfish to his wife who adored him,
indifferent to the boy who had been put in his charge; he was not a
cruel man, but a stupid, hard man, eaten up with a small
sensuality. It would be easy, desperately easy. Philip did not
dare. He was afraid of remorse; it would be no good having the
money if he regretted all his life what he had done. Though he had
told himself so often that regret was futile, there were certain
things that came back to him occasionally and worried him. He
wished they were not on his conscience.

  His uncle opened his eyes; Philip was glad, for he
looked a little more human then. He was frankly horrified at the
idea that had come to him, it was murder that he was meditating;
and he wondered if other people had such thoughts or whether he was
abnormal and depraved. He supposed he could not have done it when
it came to the point, but there the thought was, constantly
recurring: if he held his hand it was from fear. His uncle
spoke.

  "You're not looking forward to my death, Philip?"
Philip felt his heart beat against his chest.

  "Good heavens, no."

  "That's a good boy. I shouldn't like you to do that.
You'll get a little bit of money when I pass away, but you mustn't
look forward to it. It wouldn't profit you if you did."

  He spoke in a low voice, and there was a curious
anxiety in his tone. It sent a pang into Philip's heart. He
wondered what strange insight might have led the old man to surmise
what strange desires were in Philip's mind.

  "I hope you'll live for another twenty years," he
said.

  "Oh, well, I can't expect to do that, but if I take
care of myself I don't see why I shouldn't last another three or
four."

  He was silent for a while, and Philip found nothing
to say. Then, as if he had been thinking it all over, the old man
spoke again.

  "Everyone has the right to live as long as he
can."

  Philip wanted to distract his mind.

  "By the way, I suppose you never hear from Miss
Wilkinson now?"

  "Yes, I had a letter some time this year. She's
married, you know."

  "Really?"

  "Yes, she married a widower. I believe they're quite
comfortable."