Arnold Bennett

“ Long before schooldays are over he learns to take a doleful pleasure in watching the exit of the London train from the railway station. He stands by the hot engine and envies the very stoker. Gazing curiously into the carriages, he wonders that men and women who in a few hours will be treading streets called Piccadilly and the Strand can contemplate the immediate future with so much apparent calmness; some of them even have the audacity to look bored. He finds it difficult to keep from throwing himself in the guard's van as it glides past him ”

“ Richard forgot that he was himself a clerk, looking not out of place in that scene.
Presently he espied a woman who seemed to belong to another sphere. She was leaning over the parapet of the jetty, and though a black and white sunshade entirely hid her head and shoulders, the simple, perfectly hung black skirt, the neatly shod foot, the small, smoothly gloved hand with thin gold circlet at wrist, sufficed to convince him that here, by some strange chance, was one of those exquisite creatures who on Saturday afternoons drove past the end of Raphael Street on their way to Hurlingham or Barnes. ”

“ He could afford to wait,—to wait till he had made a reputation, and half a score of women, elegant and refined, were only too willing to envelop him in an atmosphere of adoration.
It was part of his plan for economy to dine always at the Crabtree, where one shilling was the price of an elaborate repast, and he went there on New Year's Day. As he walked up Charing Cross Road, his thoughts turned naturally to Miss Roberts. Would she be as cordial as when he had met her on the omnibus, or would she wear the polite mask of the cashier, treating him merely as a frequenter of the establishment? ”

“ The rustic cannot share the townsman's enthusiasm for rural scenery; he sees no matter for ecstasy in the view from his cottage door; and in the same way the average man and the average woman dine together, talk together, walk together, and know not how richly they are therein blessed. But with solitaries like Richard it is different. Debarred from fellowship with the opposite sex by circumstances and an innate diffidence which makes the control of circumstance impossible, their starved sensibilities acquire certain morbid tenderness. ”

“ When the door opened in answer to his second ring, a faint, sour odour escaped from the house, and he remembered the friendly feminine warnings which he had received at Bursley on the subject of London lodgings. The aspect of the landlady, however, reassured him; she was a diminutive old woman in ridiculously short skirts, with a yellow, crinkled face, grey eyes, and a warm, benevolent smile that conquered. As she greeted Richard she blushed like a girl, and made a little old-fashioned curtsey. Richard offered his hand, and, after wiping hers on a clean apron, she took it timidly. ”

“ No one had ever called upon him before.
"I don't know, sir; it's a young gentleman."
The young gentleman was ushered in. He wore a new black frock coat, and light grey trousers which fell in rich folds over new patent-leather boots. The shortcomings of his linen, which was dull and bluish in tint, were more than atoned for by the magnificence of a new white silk necktie with heliotrope spots. He carried a silk hat and a pair of unworn kid gloves in one hand, and in the other a half-smoked cigar and a stick, with whose physiognomy Richard was quite familiar.
"Hello, Jenkins!" ”

“ Save for the porter leisurely lighting the station lamps, he was alone,—alone, as it seemed to him, in an upper world, above London, and especially above Fulham and the house where lived the girl who read "East Lynne." How commonplace must she be! Richard wondered that Mr. Aked could exist surrounded by all the banalities of Carteret Street. Even his own lodging was more attractive, for at least Raphael Street was within sound of the central hum and beat of the city. ”

“ At Piccadilly Circus he loitered, and then crossed over and went along Coventry Street to Leicester Square. The immense façade of the Ottoman [Pg 9] Theatre of Varieties, with its rows of illuminated windows and crescent moons set against the sky, rose before him, and the glory of it was intoxicating. It is not too much to say that the Ottoman held a stronger fascination for Richard than any other place in London. The British Museum, Fleet Street, and the Lyceum were magic names, but more magical than either was the name of the Ottoman. ”

“ As far back as Richard's memory went, he and Mary had lived together and alone in the small Red House which lay half a mile out of Bursley, towards Turnhill, on the Manchester road. At one time it had been rurally situated, creeping plants had clothed its red walls, and the bare patch behind it had been a garden; but the gradual development of a coal-producing district had covered the fields with smooth, mountainous heaps of grey refuse, and stunted or killed every tree in the neighbourhood. ”

“ Her manner of saying "my friend"—half mockery, half deference—gave Richard intense satisfaction.
They walked to the end of the jetty and sat down on a stone seat.
"Isn't it beautiful?" she exclaimed enthusiastically.
"What—the town, or the people, or the sea?"
"Everything. I've scarcely been to the seaside before in all my life, and I think it's lovely."
"The sea would be splendid if one could see it, but it blinds one even to glance at it in this heat." ”

“ He beckoned with a quaint movement of his forefinger which brought a smile to the man's face—a smile which Richard answered jovially.
"Sir?"
"A shilling cigar, please, and a coffee and cognac."
At about nine o'clock he went out again into the chill air, and the cigar burnt brightly between his lips. He had unceremoniously dismissed the too importunate image of Adeline, and he was conscious of a certain devil-may-care elation.
Women were everywhere on the pavements. They lifted their silk skirts out of the mud, revealing ankles and lace petticoats. They smiled on him. ”

“ From the engine a thin column of steam rose lazily to the angular roof, where a few sparrows fluttered with sudden swoops and short flights. The engine-driver leaned against the side of the cab, stroking his beard; the stoker was trimming coal on the tender. Those two knew the spectacle by heart: the scattered piles of steamer trunks amidst which passengers hurried hither and thither with no apparent object; the continual purposeless opening and shutting of carriage doors; the deferential gestures of the glittering guard as he bent an ear to ladies whose footmen stood respectfully behind them ”

“ As his glance fell on the stairs leading up to the room where lay the body of Mr. Aked, separated from the unconscious Adeline only by a gimcrack wall of lath and plaster, an uncomfortable feeling of awe took hold of him. Death was very incurable, and he had been assisting at a tragedy. How unreal and distorted seemed the events of a few hours before! He had a curious sense of partnership in [Pg 152] shame, as if he and the nurse and the doctor had last night done Adeline an injury and were conspiring to hide their sin. What would she say when she knew that her uncle was dead? ”

“ Curpet and Smythe, who did business cheek by jowl with an attorney-general and probably employed him, came an elevation of spirit as he darkly guessed what none can realise completely, that a man's future lies on his own knees, and on the knees of no gods whatsoever. ”

“ After what seemed an interminable delay the curtain was drawn back at one side and a tall man in evening dress, his face a dead white, stepped before the footlights and bowed several times; the noise rose to a thunderous roar, in which howls and hissing were distinguishable. Richard shook from head to foot, and tears unaccountably came to his eyes. ”

“ Lottie began to whimper. Richard said he would call again later to make inquiries, and presently discovered himself in Fulham Road, walking slowly towards Putney.
Mr. Aked's case was hopeless; of that Richard felt sure. The man must be getting on in years, and his frame, not constitutionally vigorous, had doubtless been fatally weakened by long-continued carelessness. What a strange creature of whims and enthusiasms he was! Although there could be no question as to his age, Richard never regarded him as more than a few years older than himself. ”

“ In the upturned eyes of a shop-girl who went by on the arm of her lover he divined a passion as pure as that of Eugénie Grandet; on the wrinkled countenance of an older woman he beheld only the nobility of suffering; a youth who walked alone, smoking a cigarette, was a pathetic figure perhaps condemned to years of solitude in London. When there was no one else to see, he saw Adeline,—Adeline with her finger on her lips, Adeline angry with her uncle, [Pg 107] Adeline pouring out tea, Adeline reaching down his hat from the peg, Adeline laughing at the gate. ”

“ Sunday was stiflingly hot. At Sloane Street the roof of every Putney omnibus was already laden with passengers, and Richard on his way to Carteret Street to make the acquaintance of Laura's married sister, Milly Powell, her husband and young child, was forced at last to be content with a seat inside. The public houses were just closing for the afternoon, and the footpaths full of holiday-makers, with here and there a girl or a middle-aged man carrying a Bible. No vehicles were abroad except the omnibuses and an occasional hired carriage which passed by with a nonchalant, lazy air. ”

“ She was a plain girl, possessing few attractions, except the supreme one of being a woman. She was below him in station; but had she not her refinements? Though she could not enter into his mental or emotional life, did she not exhale for him a certain gracious influence? His heart went forth to her. Her flirtations with Mr. Aked, her alleged dalliance with Jenkins? Trifles, nothings! She had told him that she lived with her mother and father and a younger brother, and on more than one occasion she had mentioned the Wesleyan chapel; he had gathered that the whole family was religious. ”

“ She was never moved by the events on the stage, and whether it happened to be tragedy or burlesque at which they were assisting, she turned to Richard at the end of every act with the same happy, contented smile, and usually began to make remarks upon the men and women around her. It was the play-house and not the play of which she was really fond.
After the fall of the curtain, they lingered till most of the audience had gone. Sometimes they supped at a restaurant. "It is my turn," she would say now and then, when the obsequious waiter presented the bill, and would give Richard her purse. ”

“ They had a piano in a donkey-cart, and the woman sang to the man's accompaniment. Just as Richard and Adeline came up, "The River of Years" was announced for performance.
"Let us listen to this," said Adeline.
They stood at the rim of the crowd. The woman had a rich contralto voice and sang with feeling, and her listeners were generous of both applause and coppers.
"I wonder who she is," Adeline murmured, with a touch of melancholy,—"I wonder who she is. I love that song." ”

“ A man, he reflected, cannot by taking thought fall in love (and yet this was exactly what he had attempted to do!) , and that in any case Adeline would not have suited him. Still, at moments when he recalled her face and gestures, her exquisite feminality, and especially her fine candour at their parting, he grew melancholy and luxuriously pitied himself. ”

“ Strange to say, the incident did not trouble Richard in the least.
He walked down to Victoria with Jenkins towards midnight, and on returning to his lodging, thought for the hundredth time how futile was his present mode of existence, how bare of all that makes life worth living. Of what avail to occupy pretty rooms, if one occupied them alone, coming into them at night to find them empty, leaving them in the morning without a word of farewell? In the waste of London, Laura Roberts made the one green spot. He had lost interest in his novel. ”

“ People have got into a way of sneering at the suburbs. Why, the suburbs are London! It is alone the—the concussion of meeting suburbs in the centre of London that makes the city and West End interesting. We could show how the special characteristics of the different suburbs exert a subtle influence on the great central spots. Take Fulham; no one thinks anything of Fulham, but suppose it were swept off the face of the earth the effect would be to alter, for the seeing eye, the character of Piccadilly and the Strand and Cheapside. ”

“ Larch," the nurse called pleasantly.
The patient, supported by pillows, was sitting upright in bed, and as Richard entered he looked towards the door with the expression of an unarmed man on the watch for an assassin. His face was drawn and duskily pale, but on each cheek burned a red flush; at every cruel inspiration the nostrils dilated widely, and the shoulders were raised in a frenzied effort to fill the embarrassed lungs.
"Well, Mr. Aked," Richard greeted him, "here I am, you see." ”

“ London is the place where newspapers are issued, books written, and plays performed. And this youth, who now sits in an office, reads all the newspapers. He knows exactly when a new work by a famous author should appear, and awaits the reviews with impatience. ”